My Job and My Husband

Hello hello!

So I’m entering my last few weeks of The First Three Months (as in, “the first three months are the hardest”, which I’ve heard over and over) and soon I’ll be headed back to Thies for IST. As an EE volunteer, I’m required to do an Environmental Assessment of my village to present my first few days at training. I’ve got a rough draft of my resource map done (to show what exists in my village land-wise). I’ve started working on my “transect”, which is a land use evaluation exercise. I chose a line that cuts through the village and walk along, stopping at different places to take note of the land use and importance in village life. Then I’ll put it all in a pretty chart. I have to make other charts and collect information on how resources flow in and out of our village, what the key organizations and active groups are, and basically present a village profile so that I will know my village better and so that my trainers will be able to help me by knowing more about my village’s needs.

So I’m working on it step by step. A lot of it means just remembering to ask questions that will get people talking about a topic of interest. For instance, when my neighbor came into my compound yesterday, I was about to head into my hut to make some lunch, but instead, I waited a bit and showed him my map and talked about my presentation for IST. We talked about what he grows (corn) and whether it’s for sale or consumption (consumption). I found out that he’s the one who built my hut because he’s the mason and he also taught me the word for grass, which I probably learned before, but you know, you lose words sometimes.

I got back from my 4th of July excursion on Friday. As the people in my village constantly remind me, I was gone for a long time, although when I leave for the entire month of August, that will really be a long time. I would have been home earlier except that I got a little sick (the day I stayed in Kay’s village, unfortunately… a 3 hour bike ride from the Kedougou regional house… for me it’s about 4.5 hours because I bike like a grandma, which is still faster than most Senegalese I’ve biked behind). When I was in Tamba, I finally called Med with the “do I have amoebas” question and was told to do a MIF kit (collect your poo in a jar to see if you have parasites—not as traumatizing as it sounds) and get some medication from the pharmacy to combat Giardia!. After a superdose of Giardia!-fighting medicament, I was back on the road home and either Dr. Ararat nailed it, or I was on the mend anyway, because my “I think I have parasites” cramps have completely subsided. I hope that’s all I had. Oh yeah, and the waterfalls in Kedougou are beautiful in the rainy season.

Meanwhile, as a result of a miscommunication (as in I got a new phone number, but my tech trainer didn’t get the memo), my tech trainer visited me in my village, only I was in Tamba. Walking back from the market in Tamba, I saw a Peace Corps car (the cars usually live in Dakar, so I was surprised) and it pulls over, out hops Abdoulaye and he says, “Hey, I was in your village this morning!” We sat down at the Tamba house and had our “site visit”. Not optimal, but luckily I had been talking earlier that day with Tracy, another EE vol, about the kinds of things I wanted to learn at IST and was able to recite for him my list of stuff I want to know about. Plus I had some of my Assessment stuff that I had planned to work on a bit in Tamba. So it worked out.

I had a skirt made by a friend here in Velingara. My first Senegalese fabric toubab clothes and I love it. I had her copy my favorite skirt. I’ve heard (and seen) that zippers here are low-quality so I asked for buttons even though the US skirt has a zipper. What I received was a pretty new skirt with buttons, and my old skirt… with the zipper replaced by buttons. I was devastated. My favorite skirt. She saw my face (and my thoughts are basically broadcast there like on a projector screen), and said, I’m sorry, I thought that’s what you asked for. I’d fix it, but I threw it away. I thanked Mariama for the work she did. The new skirt was beautiful and the other skirt was no big deal. Then I went into the room, closed the door, and cried. There are, of course, more things in the world to cry about than an American-made zipper, but sometimes the pressure valve needs a little venting. I really liked that zipper.

A moment of silence, please.

I’m back in Velingara today so quickly after returning to village because a little bird told me that there was a package for me and I would like to make a very public THANK YOU, KATIE!!! I also got your letter, which was even more exciting than the package.

I also want to thank my Sunday school class for the birthday card. I got that one and one from my parents last time I came in. The one from the parents was one of the fancy cards that plays music when you open it. I know! High-tech, even for the US. I excitedly showed my family here and waited for the explosive reaction when they opened it. What I got was a very non-plussed “oh, it’s a radio”. Come on! We don’t even have electricity and here’s a piece of paper (that came in the mail!) that plays the Star Wars theme! I know they don’t recognize the song, but seriously. Seriously.

After a brief (and I’m sorry we got cut off… don’t know what the phone issue was) conversation with Charoma yesterday, I thought I might talk a little about being married here in Senegal. Yes, if you didn’t know, I have a husband here. Often more than one. “Do you have a husband?” Is almost always one of the first five questions you are asked, especially in places like the market and at the garage. If you don’t know the person asking, especially if it’s a guy at the garage… young, looking for an American wife, you know what I’m talkin’bout… the answer is ALWAYS “yes”. When I was in Tamba coming home this time, “Yes, I have a husband in America.” “Ah but do you have one here?” “Do I have one here?! Of course! I have three, one in Tamba, one in Kolda, one in Dakar.” I got a high five for that. “Me, I want an American wife.” “Do you speak English? No? Well, Good luck!” They loved it. In my experience here, you give them a little sass and they love you. When we loaded the car, there was a young lady next to me in the middle seat. A man was hanging in the open car door trying to get her phone number. She was clearly not interested. I have to guiltily say that this made me feel a little better inside to know that they don’t just hassle the white girl. But he did not know how to take a hint, so I took the torn-off cigarette cartridge he was offering her to write on and said “It’s finished” and threw it away. He then tried for my number, but rather than polite silence like my neighbor, I just said “No way. Goodbye.” The guys in the back seat cracked up.

Lastly, my hut. The big rains that flooded my room did more than that, it seems. As I was digging mud off of my douche, stop, let me explain what a douche is. It is a big ol’ hole in the ground. Then there’s a concrete pad covering it, mine is about the width of a double bed? There’s a hole in the middle. This serves as your toilet and drain for the shower. Shower as in bucket bath. Fill up a bucket with water from the well. Set it (covered, so you don’t contribute to malaria-carrying mosquito breeding) outside all day. Have warm water to bathe with in the evening. Learn to wash your hair without water pressure. In other words, it’s a latrine. I don’t know why I never think to call it my latrine. It’s just always my douche. So there you have it. That’s a douche. As I was scraping off the mud with my shiny new shovel, I noticed a crack in the concrete. I followed the crack all the way around the douche in a wide-arcing circle. Complete circle. I stepped away slowly and carefully from the concrete, but still managed to place a foot right next to the crack and part of it crumbled away. !!! I got my brother to show him and said, “Moussa, if I fall in, I’m going home… to America.” Crumbling door frame, fine. Leaks in the roof, fine. Backyard floods, fine. Falling into a pit of my own waste, line drawn. He assured me that it (and I) won’t fall… there’s iron rebar under there. The mud under the very thin concrete compacted with the rains, creating an air space, and when the weight of the mud (and then my foot) pressed on the concrete, it cracked. No biggie. They can pour more concrete if I want. I, however, stand by my statement. Otherwise, I think I’m making it to my next time-marker, IST. Now to get to work on my environmental report…