Day 87

I am starting my last week here in Senegal. It has been good, but there is still much to be done. For instance, I will be visiting the nearby dump later this week just to see what it's like. I want to visit it for two reasons. The first is because it is known as the largest garbage dump in West Africa. They've been dumping there since the 1960s. The second reason is because it is literally a stone's throw away from the Daara. It's just right there. When we take a cab from Dakar or wherever back to the Daara, in order to convey to the taxi driver which part of Malika the Daara is in, we say it is at the dump.

Above is the satellite image of what I was writing about. I added the red and yellow lines. The yellow lines surround the Daara grounds, the red lines surround the dump. I should include a scale of some sort, but i haven't. I guess a decent enough scale could be the fact that it takes us about an hour to walk from the Daara to the nearby beach known as Malika beach.

Malika beach

Above is a picture of me playing with a kid named Amadou at the Malika beach. He is 2 years old. he came up to us because we may have been the first white people he had ever seen. This means that I was in a position to potentially decide how this kid would perceive of white people for the rest of his life. so we played some games for a bit. He's has since more than likely forgotten about me. Notice in the background that nobody is swimming in the ocean. That is because its has been ruled unsafe to swim at Malika beach due to... quicksand. They use the sand for construction purposes in Senegal, and for decades they have extracted sand from the Malika beach to use elsewhere. Apparently this isn't good for the sand, and now it is quick sand. The locals assure me that it has been well over a year since anyone has been killed by the quicksand though, so that's good.

to be continued... internet here sucks

Last week, we went to the Bandia National park. It really doesn't compare at all to the Safari experience in the Masai Mara region of Kenya, but anytime you get to see a couple of rhynos, giraffes, monkeys, and giant turtles frolicking around, it is good times.

picture of us in front of some giraffes.

We were in a 4x4 truck, this picture only makes it seem like we were taking a careless stroll through the park.

Day 72

I have reached a milestone of sorts. Today, whilst exercising, a bead of sweat was running down my nose. As a long haired man I’ve almost always had the ability to blow air from my mouth to move a strand of hair out of my face, and the same goes for sweat on the tip of my nose. But, today, I could not accomplish this previously simple task. Why? Because I am now officially a moustached man. The moustache is so thick that no air can pass upwards from my mouth. They said I would ‘just know’ when I was officially a moustached man, but I was sceptical. Now I understand, and I know.

And I approve.

We took all of the Daara kids and volunteers, packed them on a bus, and went out to a beach about an hour or so away, south of Dakar in the town of Sendou. It went really well and it was a great way to spend the first weekend of summer vacation for the kids, since they had finished school for the summer earlier that week. We didn’t realise though that a few days later all the kids would be leaving. Most of them left July 5^th, then the rest gradually left, and now about 10 kids are here. The 7 high school kids are staying for the another month or so, but otherwise its going to be pretty boring around here without the kids. But its fine, I’ll make the most of it, and one way of doing that is by seeing some of Senegal.

This past weekend the other volunteers and I went to the city (town?) of Saint Louis. It’s a really interesting place. It’s an island, and it has a colonial history. I think it was the first French colony in Senegal, way back at some point in the past. Because of its French colonial routes, it is also a little more Christian than most of the other towns, which means they actually have bars worth frequenting in the night. I partook in some of that both the Friday and Saturday night, and it was fun. One thing in particular that was interesting and actually quite hilarious was the insistence the bars had on having mirrors and having the mirrors strategically placed. At first, you think, ‘’ok, this makes sense, its a small place, the mirror makes it look bigger, cool.’’ But the reason or logic behind installing the mirror doesn’t actually matter, what matters is how the locals use the mirror. No word of a lie, they all, every single one of them, will dance facing the mirror, staring at themselves, and some of them will get within inches of the mirror. So, I had some drinks, was in a foreign city within a foreign land in which i knew only my one coworker who came to the bar with me, and I decided to have some fun mocking the locals. I tore the dancefloor up with my sweet moves, all whilst staring at the mirror, only an inch separated me from the reflection of myself. And when I wanted to just laugh at how ridiculous it all was, I had to stay serious, because there was a local to my right and to my left and they were all doing the same as ridiculous mirror dancing as me (though with way worse dance moves than mine),and they were doing it with straight faces. It was probably some of the most fun I’ve ever had at a club-type of bar.

Did not take any pictures at the bar, though. In Senegal, you have to get peoples' permission in order to take a picture with them in it, even if theyre just in the background, or they will get very upset and overreact and try to fight me.

A picture of a part of Saint Louis, the city (town).

We also spent time at the beach and explored the island. It was a good weekend.

Day 62

Unfortunately the desert was the only excursion we went on in the month of June, but July promises to be much better in that regard, as we’ve already planned a weekend in Saint Louis and a weekend in Mbour. It’s been a great summer so far. Next week is the last week of school, and after that a lot of the kids will likely leave for the rest of the summer. Hopefully a good number of them stick around so as to make things more interesting around here. It rained last week – only once, and for less than an hour – but it still rained. It was the first time since I arrived here that it has rained, which is pretty cool. The people around here, adults and children alike, kind of freak out a bit when its raining, which was pretty amusing to witness. They’re just not used to it.

Heres a picture of all of the kids.

Another thing they aren’t used to is white people with beards. I’ve been asked on two different occasions why I colour (dye) my beard. I wasn’t asked whether I coloured my beard, because that, to them, is obviously the case. I just told them it’s natural. I wonder if they think I colour my eyes blue. Maybe I’ll tell them I do.

On the topic of things that people are and are not used to. This marks the first time in my life (I’m pretty sure) that I’m living in an area that had an army-enforced Curfew in place. Its a 9 0’clock kerfew, and its been going on since June 23^rd. This is because last week the president tried to change the constitution to allow him to stay on as president with only 25% of the vote in next year’s election. The Senegalese responded by burning cars and protesting, so the President said ‘’nevermind.’’ But a couple of days later more protests broke out. A jehovas witness church was burned down by hundreds of protesters, and also the Senelec building in Dakar was burned down. Senelec is the Electrical company. The protests were a response to the fact that in Senegal the electricity is only working for about 5 hours a day. Since then the electricity

has been pretty good. Cool. Hopefully things cool down now and people stop burning cars and buildings. I’m still sceptical about the motivation behind the protests though, I don’t think it’s merely a coincidence that these protests occur only a week after the Canucks lost the Stanley Cup. The day of seventh game of the finals, I heard more car horns being honked on the street than usual, and I’m pretty sure it was in anticipation of the big game.

So despite the Curfew, my coworkers and I actually went out the past two nights. We got invited to a wedding on Wednesday night. The connection is that the bride did the hair of one of the women I work with. So we went. It was cool to experience a Senegalese wedding reception, though we didn’t attend the actual ceremony. Last night we went to a nearby bar thats literally 64 meters away from the Daara. I had no idea it existed until we had two new volunteers come to the Daara that had been here the year before and said ‘’hey, lets go to the bar that’s 64 meters away.’’ or something like that. So we went and it was cheap and it was good times.

here's a picture with the bride. I do not know her.

Tomorrow we’re taking all the Daara kids out to Sendhou beach, which is outside of Dakar. It’s to celebrate the end of the school year. Should be a fun time for everyone and a good celebration for the end of the school year. These two kids, we'll call them Cheikh and Fallou, will probably be pretty excoted about it.

Day 51

Part of the job involves running activities for the kids, and some of those activities have been pretty sweet and have been good times for everyone (i.e. we had a big water balloon fight), but others were rushed and although they were good times for some, they weren’t the best times for all. The picture below shows the winners of a quick relay race activity that we had, the kids sitting off to the right in the shade are two of the many kids that did not win. We took a group picture of the winners, and then we wanted to take a group picture of everyone (aka participation photo). But that didn’t end up happening. This group of kids, that otherwise is completely fascinated by cameras and would love to be photographed and photographed again until the battery dies, just sat there and said ‘’no.’’ That’s pretty typical of losers though, I’m sure the winners would have acted differently in that situation.

In the background of the above photo there is a soccer game going on. I played in a game a couple of days ago and it was a pleasant experience. It was true African football. As you can see, it was played completely in the sand, because all they have around here is sand. I also played barefoot, there was no water bottle in sight, and I was the only white guy which means everyone thought I was the worst (debatable). There were also no real boundaries or lines; everything was sort of dependent on the honour system. When I first asked if I could play they talked it over amongst themselves for about 5 minutes right in front of me in their language of Wolof. Once they decided which team would mind having me the least, the game started. They kept telling me what to do and giving me tips but it was all in Wolof and for some reason I was saying things to them in Spanish, I guess my brain just thought that since I was playing soccer I must be with Spaniards. Anyways it was 2-0 for the other team and then I did something that put an end to my teammates telling me what to do -- I scored a goal. Rebound just came right to me sort of thing and I blasted it though the crowd and between the misshapen and warped goal posts. We ended up with a tie (stupid sport) but It was quite fun and I enjoyed myself and look forward to playing again.

The Daara school received letters from kids in France a couple of months ago. So we took it upon ourselves to get the Daara kids to write the French kids back. So we helped the 10-11 year old kids write short descriptions of themselves and drawings of themselves. Below is a picture of me helping some of the kids. As you can see from the photo there was a lot of variety in the physical self-descriptions.

A couple of the volunteers and I went to the town of Lompoul which is 160 or so kilometers away and is interesting because it has a desert. It isn’t a particularly large desert, but it has about 3 square kilometers of nothing but great big sand dunes and while you’re in the middle of it, it looks as though you’re in the middle of a great big desert. It was a really cool experience walking around in the desert. The wind provided a nice breeze and although the sand was extremely hot at times it was a great two-day one-night trip and well worth it. We also partook in a short camel ride. Camels are bigger and cooler than I had expected. The next picture wasn’t picked because it was a good representation of the desert or of the camels. It was picked because it gives you guys a good idea of what you really care about; how my beard is progressing.

I wrote this blog post on Microsoft Word, and I wrote it in the couch room with a bunch of the kids sitting beside me and looking at the photos. Anyways the MSWord program has an advertisement on the side and it shows a random white guy with short brown hair smiling. I was asked on no less than 3 occasions whether the kid was me or whether he was my brother. This may confirm that they think all white people look the same. I don’t remember which kids asked me about the photo of the MSWord white guy though, they all look the same.

Day 41

So about the job; It`s pretty awesome. I teach 3 English classes a week, 1 Beginner English class for the kids and 2 more advanced classes for the highschool kids. I also have a couple of one-on-one sessions throughout the week. I’m also responsible for some of the communications, which means I’m working on the website at daarademalika.com which needs an overhaul of sorts, and we’re also going to explore the possibility of a newsletter. The best part of my job, however, is putting together activities for the kids. This can range from simple drawing contests to wrestling tournaments or even a day trip to the beach or somewhere else. I’m not doing this work by myself either, there’s another volunteer here and we work together to make it a better experience for everyone. But that’s enough about the work.

We went to the Casamance region for a week. It is beautiful there and there is fresh fruit everywhere. During our trip, I fell in love with a fruit called Mango. I don’t know if it’s just the Mangos from Senegal, but they are absolutely delicious and I’ve had one every day since.

During our trip we visited a village outside of the city of Ziguinchor. This is that village:

We also visited the city of Oussouye, and we participated in a day of all-terrain biking as well as kayaking. It was good times. It is hard to describe the villages that we biked through. I’d be surprised if more than 20% of the villagers moved out of the village at some point in their lives, but then again I don’t actually know what I’m talking about. We weren’t the first white people to ever bike through their village, so the kids knew enough French to as us for some cadeaux, at which point I told them I didn’t know French. That I told them that in French probably didn’t matter.

And now, some gratuitous photos of some of the kids and the Daara:

The kid on the left in the first photo, we’ll call him Paté for fun, is the same kid as the kid that’s front and center in the second. Why or how he has developed such a finely tuned ability to consistently pull off gang-related hand signs is beyond me, but maybe by the end of the summer I’ll have taught him the most gangster hand sign of all: the thumbs up.

Just as a quick side note: I called that Boston would beat Vancouver in the Stanley cup finals last September, back in the preseason. I think I deserve a little respect and recognition for that. Thanks.

Here's a pic of us when we went to the beach at Ngor.

Day 27

Something around 95% of Senegal is Muslim. So I am a minority. One of the more interesting parts about this religion and the culture is a saying that goes Inch`Allah. It means God Willing, and the senegalese muslims say it after every single thing that in any way has to do with the future. meeting at 4pm tomorrow? Inch Allah. And I think thats pretty cool, because its to say that certain things are beyond our control and even if we do what we can to keep our appointments, it wont always be the case. There are two things that result from this way of looking at the future. The first is that everyone is late for everything. Punctuality doesnt exist, it doesn`t have to.If you`re late, it isn`t your fault, god simply did not will for you to be on time, so no worries. The second result is that I as well as any outsider to this religion is going to be creeped out by this. The first time it creeped me out, I was talking to guy and he asked me how old I was. I said I was 21, but that I will be turning 22 at the end of the month... He said Inch Allah. being as my birthday was only two weeks away I guess I took it for granted that I would live long enough to experience it, and he must have thought that was an unreasonable assumption. It isn`t just him though, that`s the culture here. And although it generally has to do with anything that takes place in the future, I think theres a second motive which is to be as creepy as possible about it. When I first told my boss what my estimated time of arrival at the Dakar airport was so they could arrange for me to be picked up, she said she wished me a safe trip, inch allah. Anyway I`ve taken a bit of a liking to this second motive and have used the saying inch allah myself, always sarcastically, and in the creepiest ways I can. But the people are very receptive to it and instead see it as a compliment of sorts, it makes them happy that I`m acknowledging the future is out of their hands.
Anyway, all this to say that 4 of the other volunteers and I are going on a trip for a week to the region of Southern Senegal called Casamance. It is known for being a very beautiful river and rain forest, and is also known for its civil unrest of sorts. Its considered somewhat unsafe, and advised that we be careful. We will be careful, all will be alright, and I will post a blog again when we get back next week.
...
Inch Allah

Day 20

People carry things on their heads here. I don`t, it isn`t my style, yet.

I should probably start by clearing the air a bit. The Daara isn`t exactly what I thought it was. anything I told you before is probably wrong. I was wrong because my boss told me about it in French and because it was during an interview and I wanted to get the job I pretended like I understood her completely and didn`t ask any questions for clarification. The information has since been clarified. Daara means home in arabic (I think), and the idea is that families

who didnt havent enough money to raise their children would send their kids to a Daara which would take the children in, teach them the Qu`ran, and then let the kids hit the streets to collect money for the Daara. The Daara de Malika is not that kind of Daara, it is a modern Daara that receives its funding from IGOs and NGOs and whoever else is willing to help,so that the kids can go to actual school instead and can stay off the streets.

There are about 50 kids living here in this Daara, and I am one of six volunteers. There are also teachers, cooks, maintenance people and friends of the Daara that keep things running smoothly.

Pictures.

Heres a picture of the grounds. There are some neighbourhood kids and Daara kids playing soccer. Sand is everywhere. Other than sand, there is also a couple of classrooms, the library, and the woodworking, ceramics, and sewing rooms in this picture.

Here`s a picture of some of my coworkers and I, we visited the Ile de Goree, which is an island just off of Senegal which was used as a final holding place for African slaves that were going to be shipped to the Americas. The island was used for this purpose for about 300 years. There was no escaping, they would keep the slaves there and fatten them up so that they could be sold for a high price. To make sure that disease did not spread, they would throw any really sick slaves into the ocean and let the sharks take care of the rest. I dont mean to be insensitive, visiting the island was quite an experience, but the picture is unfortunately not really about the history of the island at all but is instead a picture of us with a cool looking background.

The kids have decided that my nickname is Messi, as in Lionel Messi the prolific futbol player for Barcelona. Why is that my nickname? I`m not sure, but they may think that all white people look alike, and they`ve seen a picture of Messi once or twice. It probably also has to do with the fact that his hair is longer than average as well. Beyond that, I have no idea.

Here`s a picture of some of the kids having lunch. I cant really describe the meal. but it wasn`t bad.

This is a picture of some of the kids dancing. Some nights they like to sing and dance and play drums with whatever objects they find. I can be found in the background of this photo astutely studying their dance moves. I will master them.

This is a good picture of Quackpack.

Day 7

Hello, I am safe.
Senegal is great, the weather is great (I havent seen a cloud yet), and my coworkers are pretty cool, and the kids at the Daara are awesome. By the way google Daara de Malika if you want to know more about the place i'm working at.
I have not started actually working yet, they want us to get accustomed to the place and the kids first. Meals are interesting here in Senegal. typically 8 or so people will sit around a large bowl and share. the meals are always rice, with veggies, and sometimes we get some meat as well. There aren't enough spoons for everyone and I even ate dinner with about 7 kids just using my hand. cool experience, but my roommate packed an extra one so I am going to hold on to that.

There is no need for an alarm clock here. The Daara is right beside a mosque and every morning at 5 am someone from the most belts out a 20 minute chant (prayer) as loud as he can. The kids wake up shortly afterwards and they play and make noise and everything until they go to school at about 9. I spend my day playing with the kids, getting to know my coworkers, reading, and I sneak in some exercise and a nap whenever I can. It's not a choice, or a routine, or even a lifestyle. Its more like a philosophy. Next week I'll actually start working. cool.

a little side challenge I am taking part in will involve me not shaving at all this summer. I've got about a week before my beard starts being uncomfortable but hopefully it'll grow on me.

My next post will have pictures and will probably be better overall as well.

If I have access to the internet, I will use this blog. Promise.