Nin Allah Sonnta

It’s the Malinke version of Inshalla, which means God Willing. The more direct translation is ‘If God Agrees,’ and it is what I told my host family last Tuesday when the asked if I would be back that evening.

God did not agree.

My elbow had been doing this crazy infection thing for a while so I started taking antibiotics on Sunday when I realized it was not getting better after almost a week and hurt to find a position to sleep in. Then when Tuesday rolled around and it was in fact getting worse as the antibiotics should be doing their thing I decided to make the 3ish hour bike to my closest neighbor and see what he though while giving Med a good call. So I put on my dirty clothes and packed up some med supplies, 2 cliff bars, half a loaf of village bread, iPod, sunglasses, Adventure Racing Club baseball hat, and water then took off down the dirt road. It’s a good ride, fairly scenic, a few small villages to pass through keeping everything fun. I, however, am in horrible shape from not doing much of anything since we got in country; that half loaf of bread really did the trick to get me through the last third of the bike. 

Once in Bembou I stuck with my plan of going to the main road and asking someone there where the volunteer (PCV, Kellen) lives. So I biked along the main road for a while, up close to the side street that I thought he lived down, spotted the guy I thought looked most helpful and stopped next to him. I did the generic greetings then before I could ask about the volunteer the man told me that he was at his house. I looked at him for a bit so he asked if I had ever been there before… I hadn’t so he got up and walked me up the street where I saw Kellen getting out of his compound. Turns out the random man I picked up on the side of the street was his host father, so I made the right choice when I picked him out as looking helpful. 

To my luck again Kellen was on his way to second lunch at the school. He’s made this fun habit of eating with the teachers at the school, something I’ve decided to try to do. After second lunch we went to his counterpart’s house and shelled some peanuts while I tried to get a hold of Med to try finding out what is going on with me. It was kind of an ordeal getting a hold of them since I now have 2 phone numbers, but we figured it out. Med wanted me to email some pictures over when I had a chance, and this is about 3 hours closer to internet than I’ve been if a couple weeks so my chance was now. 

I hopped back on my bike and made the 45 minute ride to Saraya to meet up with the PCV there (Chris), and the volunteer I helped the baby weighings with (Emily). Chris was nice enough to let me spend the night and Emily has a pretty sweet set up, including internet so we used her computer to send out a couple pictures to Med. Later in the night we had to go to the hospital where Chris does a lot of his work so he could talk to someone about a Basketball event they were hosting the next day. While we were there Emily convinced me to let a nurse look at my elbow, she quickly said that the antibiotic I was on was not the right one at all. That, combined with Chris’s urging to head to Kedougou if things were not getting better the next day helped to make my next decision that much easier. 

I woke up the next morning fairly certain my elbow was getting worse, so instead of heading back to my village in the middle of nowhere I loaded myself and my bike onto a bus heading to the regional capitol of Kedougou. After biking to the Peace Corps regional house I rested for about 3 minutes before calling Med to update them on the status of my elbow. With the news that it was getting worse they suggested I head to Dakar so they could see it. I was able to add my computer to what I have with me at this point since that is all I had left at the regional house, and with help from people who know what their doing I was in a sept-place (a station wagon with room for 7 passengers, public transportation) on my way to Tambacounda for the night. 

Once that 3 hour ride was finished and I had made it to the Tamba regional house I soaked my elbow in hot water in an attempt to draw out some puss. I did this quickly while I was in Kedougou as well, but this attempt was far more successful and I needed to change the water several times. 

I woke up the next morning with my arm swollen up to my wrist, and made my way to the Garage to get on another sept-place to Dakar. This being a 10 hour drive, and my experience in the back seat with my elbow was less than enjoyable I opted to pay a little extra to get the front seat. VERY glad I made that decision when they loaded the sick woman into the back (you might think, rude, you should give up the good seat for the sick person. This was actually probably more desirable because she was able to be surrounded by people who knew her and would support her if needed. It was also clear very early on that she did not want help). The ride itself was fairly uneventful actually. 

A solid 10 hours later I was in Dakar negotiating taxi price to the Peace Corps office. He laughed at me, I laughed at him, and we came to an agreement. I was a little annoyed when he made me pay pat way through the ride because he needed gas, leaving me with no bargaining chip should he start driving me in circles. Luckily he didn’t, and we made it to the office easily, just in time for med to be gone for the night. 

First order of business, shower… once I got clean clothes to change into. dI rummaged through the SeneGAD clothes and picked out the only clothes that a male could possibly wear and headed to the shower. I washed my nasty dirty clothes in the sink before the shower (so they would have as much time as possible to dry in case none of the SeneGAD clothes worked). The real shower felt AMAZING, so good that I decided to try to squeeze as much puss out of my elbow as I could. After the shower I tried on my new clothes, which were fully acceptable, grabbed some dinner, put in a movie and continued soaking my elbow. 

***Graphic details because I know some people who want to know, until the stars come back, don’t read if you don’t want to know:: The puss ranged from your standard yellowish to green, and to start off with there was what I think of as a clog. Meaning that the pus at the openings had kind of coagulated into a plug so when I started squeezing the start of that plug just popped out, needing me to actively pull it out of my arm.*** Graphicness done. 

The next (Friday) morning I went in for med to take a look, with again more swelling in my arm, and was informed that an appointment was already made for me at the clinic/hospital and that they might want to keep me for a few days so I should bring my things. Luckily I did, because of my slight fever and Popeye arm they decided to keep me there for the weekend so they could give me IV antibiotics and make sure it was all working. In reality I probably didn’t need to stay there, but whatever, luckily there was another PCV there and we got to keep each other company! 

The swelling started to go down quickly, and my Sunday afternoon I was off the IV and getting to take oral antibiotics. I am thankful that they did not have to lance it or do anything to drain out the puss beside squeeze a bunch out every morning when they changed the bandage. 

And so, Monday at 10am I was picked up from the hospital with bandages on both arms from where they had drawn blood and where my IV had stopped working right and returned to the office “Health Hut.” Now here I am, more than a week after leaving on my daylong bike trip to Bembou, back in Tamba waiting for a ride to Kedougou, then on to Khossanto.

I like being dehydrated because then I don’t sweat*

It has rained! We had one good storm a couple days ago, followed by a morning of drizzle, and a couple of small rains. From what I’ve been told “I ain’t seen nothing yet.”

Other random updates to this roller coaster of a week: My shade structre can now provide actual shade. I just scared a baby goat that didn’t realize I was sitting here, and my fence might be done. I’m hoping not because animals can still come in and eat my plants. 

That’s all beside the point, I want to talk about the last 2 days. As I’ve made a habit of doing, I showed up at my host dad’s work at about mid morning. He works at the health post every morning and likes when I come so that I can do the ticket, this requires me to write down everyones names and take their money. It’s fun to write everyone’s name because I have no idea how to spell them so everyone just winds up giggling the whole time. 

After sitting there for a little bit he informs me that the Peace Corps woman from Saraya is coming today and we are going to go with them to a nearby village. The following things were wrong with that statement: There is no Peace Corps woman in Saraya (there is one who volunteers for an NGO), and only I went along (his boss said he needed to do work). And so, without really knowing what I was getting into I hopped into the back of the ambulance and we drove off for the day. 

First stop was the village of Madina Sabodala where we proceeded to vaccinate and weigh the 23 babies under a year old. I was put in charge of the weighing! Now, if you know me, you are probably aware that I love children but my experience with infants if very limited. Well in Senegal something like 60% of the population is under 18 years old… babies be jan (no, I’m not apologizing for throwing Mandinka/Malika/Mande in there, and it might happen more, deal). 

So, weighing babies consists of putting them in a sling a la Johnny Jump Up (only far less supportive) and hanging them from a scale. This is in fact the same highly effective plan as weighing fish. Using an age/weight chart you can tell how well nourished a child is fairly effectively. 

At first I was scared that I was going to break someone’s baby, but after so many mothers grab they baby by a single are and all but throw them into the sling I stopped being scared 

Most of the babies weren’t too happy with the sling, mostly I think because they were not somehow attached to their mothers. Some of them were just really curious about this person who is not only white, but also a man who was touching them. The mom’s for the most part thought it was really funny… I tend to agree with them, the babies either stared confused at me, cried, or if we were lucky they were too tired to do anything so they just wound up being blobs hanging from a scale. 

Once all the babies were taken care of there we moved on to Mamakhono. A far less organized situation compounded by the man in charge not having much respect for women (aka the moms and the volunteer trying to make things run smoother. 

Part of this general disorganization was the decision that to weigh the babies I should stand on the world’s most finicky electronic scale, hold the babies and subtract my weight. It could be faster, but thanks to the scale it was probably slower. Perhaps the most important thing to not about this technique is that I am in full contact with all the babies. With the sling when an exceptionally dirty kid came around I could just let their mother do most of the work. On the scale all I could do is hold them away from me, being very careful not to be obvious about it. This is when I got peed on a couple times, however, far fewer babies cried throughout this process. 

Note from day 1: Babies with a mohawk are always cute. Babies with the forehead soul patch… it’s about half and half. 

Day two of baby weighing started with me getting really frustrated with my host dad. Here I was looking to have a good day in the village since I was gone the whole day before, but I was so angry with him that morning that when he suggested I go with them again I did not hesitate to jump into the ambulance again. I’m glad I did because this day was really interesting and provided me with the opportunity to hear A LOT of Malinke. 

Our first stop was Diakhling. Before we could start vaccinations an weighings we had some visitors that had work to do. It seems the Japanese government is funding a pretty major health infrastructure re-haul in the area. Phase 1: Saraya gets a new hospital; Phase 2: A few other villages get new Health Posts. Diakhling may be one of those villages, except that it is very remote so secondary costs to the project are high. It becomes a question of a lot of Health Posts in easily accessible areas, or fewer in more difficult to reach places. 

This is where the fun began, the two people representing the Japanese government could speak English, so they hired a French interpreter (I assume from Dakar). Armed with their French interpreter they set out to a village that only speaks Malinke. Of the 30 or so local men in attendance only one stepped forward as able to speak French and act as the interpreter into Malinke. This was great for me because I got to hear the whole thing translated both ways, I moved myself to a spot where I could hear everything and used it as an opportunity to try to pick up some new vocabulary. Its effectiveness is debatable. 

After they got done with their interviews we went right to work. I was happy to see Johnny Jump Up come back out for the weighings, and the man in charge brought us sodas! it was a good day. A notable difference for today is that the villages were much smaller and more rural, so to make sure that all children were taken care of there were lists for each stop of who needed work done. If a mother did not show up with her child she was sent for since the ambulance will not be able to make it out there in less than a month due to the rains. 

From our first stop we moved on to Diegoung and finally Kobokhoto, each village smaller and closer to Mali than the last. It was in Diegoung that I got the screams of terror out of the babies. It was quite obvious to be that they were certain of their impending deaths in the hands of this white man. 

The comparison that comes to mind is really just for my parents and uncle. Remember the first time I was ever in a canoe? I knew for a fact that we were going to sink and I was going to die despite the PFD around my neck. I was absolutely terrified and had no problem vocalizing this, same with these particular babies. I tried to do my work fast so I could get them back to mom before they stressed themselves out too much. The only problem is that mom barely had time to calm them down before they were getting stabbed by needles, one poor boy got one in each limb. In the long run it is better for the children, so I was able to get past the tears and obtain my sense of accomplishment.

In my rush to get away from my host dad today I neglected to bring any water, and the last villages did not offer us any of their water.  By the time I made it back to my hut I was ready to drink a liter of water, which I did and then proceeded to sweat that all out.  Luckily I decided to shower right after I drank the water, so I was nice and clean by the time I started sweating again.

Quick Pic Post 2

My hut with a small goat at the back door.

On feeling like a fool and a pig: Day 2 at site*

I woke up today without needing to be woken up! I even managed to get a little privacy from the family’s latrine by tying my sheet to my “shade structure.”

Now, Clarification on that. Yesterday I was still asleep by the time the sun had fully risen, this is not how it works apparently because my host dad decided to wake me up. Next clarification, there is a section of fence missing that closes of my back yard from the rest of the compound. This particular missing section also happens to block my view of the family latrine from my outside bedding spot. I get my own latrine in my backyard by policy, which is really nice for sanitary reasons (although I suspect someone used mine last night). Final bit of clarification, yes, I do sleep outside. The inside of my hut has been maintaining a fairly constant 100ºF (according to the thermometer hanging from the wall, so this is really a more accurate description of the wall’s temperature), as such I have spent the last 2 nights sleeping under my “shade structure.” The quotes are because it really provides more of a Shade Grid since it is only the bamboo framing that will one day hold a roof and provide me with shade and rain blocking. The fact that it doesn’t provide shade doesn’t matter at night, and I’m willing to risk getting wet to sleep where it is cooler. I still wake up sweating though. Anyway, last night, I hung up my bed sheet to act as a temporary fence so I don’t have to worry about peeking in on anyone using the latrine.

The day started slow, my host dad disappeared early; apparently running off to Mali, possibly for a funeral. So helpful neighbor boy came over and tried talking to me in French only (if you aren’t aware, my French is very limited to survival phrases). After a while he pulled me over to his family compound, I greeted his mother and the woman who was visiting, then he and I started to pull apart mango pits to get at the seeds so I could plant them. (only 485 to go). After that I decided to take a walk over to the school to check on the status of the well there and if I might be able to plant some trees there.

Still needs to be dug deeper, the pile of rocks behind throws me off every time.

On my way there I greeted everyone I passed, which led to only one attempted conversation… luckily I had prepared by reviewing the word for ‘well’ and have already mastered the verb ‘to go’ in Malinke (both slightly different than Mandinka).

Lunch was plain rice with peanut sauce - tasty, but feels like a side more than a meal. Since dad was apparently in Mali it was up to me as the oldest to do the work. I waved this duty on to my oldest brother (about 10 years old) since this was only my second lunch with the family. So he split the rice in half and poured the sauce onto the half that remained in the bowl and we started eating. We finished the first half and my youngest brother left the bowl. We’re down to me and the oldest brother… he reloads the bowl with the second half of rice, peanut sauce is poured on, and we continue eating. Well, I continue eating. He took one handful and left the bowl for me, so I at it, all of it. I’ll be honest, it was only difficult for my last two spoons full.

After lunch I decided it was time for another walk… to the hill with the supposed cell phone reception (reso). I found the hill, not the reso. Making my mother proud I decided not to double back and took a new route home. I made an effort to take a few of the conversations past greetings a few times. There were 2 main themes to these conversations 1) I am not the volunteer I replaced, he is in Kedougou; 2) I only speak a little French, but I am studying Malinke (little by little).

This endeavor made me simultaneously proud of my efforts and embarrassed of my language skills. Case in point was the teenage girl helping to make dinner with her family saying in broken English, “You do not like the English do you?” I’m sure this was her saying that I don’t speak English… well I do, I just can’t understand mumbles, sorry.

So, I returned home feeling proud and inadequate so I poured water over my head to cool off.

FUN NEW PRACTICE: Bucket Bathe into a benwar (big bucket) and use that to water the plants in my backyard! **I’m pretty sure one is a Baobob!

Then it was dinner time: millet couscous with leaf sauce. SO tasty that even now that host dad is back I decided to continue eating twice as long as everyone else. It’s good, because then I feel like a pig for eating a lot at the same time as I lose all kinds of weight because I have no protein in my diet.

The End of Homestay*

Remember how on Christmas Eve you would get so excited that you couldn't sleep and Mom and Dad would remind you that, "The sooner you fall asleep, the sooner you will wake up and it will be Christmas Day!" Well it works in the other direction too.  I am currently doing everything I can so I don't have to go to sleep and wake up tomorrow and leave my new family.

It is my opinion that Peace Corps is like a 27(ish) month lifetime.  Right now, I'm getting ready to leave for college.  Okay, I have to put another clause on this 'lifetime'; it's more at the turn of the century, when leaving for college didn't necessarily mean you were coming back.

I've been living with the Mandian family in MBour for the past 2 months.  They have fed me, taught me to talk, taught me how to get around on my own, even clothed me.  What it comes down to is I love these guys, and owe them the most for helping to be able to integrate into this new society.  I might not be able to speak the same language as everyone in the house, or even be able to carry on a conversation with the ones who speak my language.  I'm going be near tears all day tomorrow, I was having trouble today when my LCF left the city.  It made it all too real.

So not only am I leaving the family I love and the city I've grown up in to go to a village where they don't speak the exact same language I've been learning... I'm also leaving the Mandikol.  The three of us have gone through pretty much all of this together, and I think the rest of our stage would agree that we are quite possibly the closest language group here (I swear we aren't exclusive, it's just that no one knows our language).

I'm leaving my family behind, my friends are splitting up, and I'm starting something completely different.  Yup, I'm off to college.  Graduation and the "Real World" coming up after IST (In Service Training) in mid July.

But, for all of my sadness and worry about the changes about to happen, I have the world to look forward to!  I'm about to get started on what I actually came to the country for.  I can look back to my post on Village Visit to get a refresher on what I have to be excited about.  It's all about keeping a handle on the past but always looking to the future.

Happy

To Host a Wrestling Tournament*

Wrestling in Senegal is a pretty big deal. According to my LCF (Language Teacher) Aziz it has gotten more popular than Soccer in Senegal.

TANGENT: Aziz also told us a little story about why this is a good thing. About 5 years ago mugging was a big problem in the cities of Senegal. Apparently, as wrestling has gained popularity all the muggers became wrestlers. More money in a legitimate way, kind of a win win situation.

Spence’s Senegalese father, Lamine, was a wrestler back in the day, and still loves it. He seems to be grooming his son to be good too. So as a gift to his Tubabs (white people), Lamine organized a Wrestling tournament for us in front of his house. All we had to do was pay 3000cfa (pronounce cfa “say-faa”). This seemed reasonable to us, so we started calling the other trainees in our city. To most of them this price seemed unreasonable apparently, and since we didn’t want to have to pay more we extended our search the trainees of a neighboring village. They were all for the wrestling tournament so it was still on! Which was good, since in a true Senegalese fashion, we didn’t get this taken care of until the morning of. We were a little worried, but it turned out AMAZING!

It started off with the little kids wrestling, and little kids doing anything like that is just cute. As the evening wore on the age of the participants increased and the crowd got bigger, louder, and closer. As with any amateur sporting event there were more pauses than one would prefer to see, but it was none the less a great time. It started to get intense when the oldest group was going (I think age maxed out at 17ish).

Lamine’s son, Ismaela, won his bracket of the tournament, which gave him bragging rights that he tried his best to keep under control. At first it was just confusing to watch and just looked like chaos, but as the evening moved forward it became clearer what was happening and significantly more fun to watch. A little more details on the wrestling itself now.

Senegalese wrestling is best described, in my opinion, as a mix between WWE style wrestling and Sumo. Probably a little dull by American standards. The wrestlers basically bat at each other like cats for a few minutes before grabbing one another by their diapers and trying to get the other's torso/head to hit the ground before theirs. The action usually lasts a few seconds.

Back on April 4th (Senegal’s Independence Day) there was a HUGE match between and wrestler names Yekini and one named Tyson (Yes, as in Mike Tyson). The story as I know it is that Tyson was the former champion but moved to America for a few years and this was his big return match. There were some fans rooting for Tyson, but it seemed like most people were rooting for Yekini with all their Senegalese pride. It was a long build up, felt a little like watching the Super Bowl on TV, except that when Yekenni finally won you could hear the city EXPLODE with excitement. People literally flooded the streets. It was a fairly exciting match too, long, and it was close, but Tyson’s head hit the ground just before Yekini’s shoulder did.  With that the party began.

Plans and Adjustments

I'm going to try to be a responsible blogger now, I promise.  Well, semi responsible... my plan, since I don't have as ready access to the internet as bloogging responsibly requires I am going to write notes to myself on what I'm going to blog, transcribe them to the blog, and adjust the posting time to when I actually put my thoughts onto paper as opposed to when I actually put them online.  I'll even make special notation... so if you see a * at the end of a post's title it means that I wrote it on paper before it made it online.

This is all a means to make it so that I am more likely to write things up while they are fresh and therefore make this more interesting for you to read.  This is an issue for me, I'm not to most consistent when it comes to things like this.

Anyway, in order to add to the confusion, I am now going to write my first such post, which when looking at the blog will appear to be older - but I'm actually going to write it right now, it's like I'm a time traveler.

Keep in mind too, that while I wrote most of this I was sitting in a hammock quite similar to the one pictured (it is the one pictured, I took this picture then started writing).