beneen

I’ve now been in my village for 12 days. My first week of internet is up, and my plan is to go to Saint-Louis for the day on Tuesday, so I’m not going to spend the phone credit to re-up until after then. What can I say? Life is good.  It’s been blissfully cool the last three days, today being the best, meaning that although I sweated for a solid four hours today (not bad), I am now sitting in my room with the doors closed, wearing a long sleeved shirt.  I really wish I had a thermometer though, because I swear it can’t be below 70 degrees outside, and maybe 74 in here.

The cool weather has been especially lovely given the content of the last four days.  Four days ago, my host dad died. He doesn’t even live in my compound, and I hadn’t actually seen him since my volunteer visit a month ago, but it’s been an affecting experience. First I want to mention how people here deal with a death. I was ascending in my room when I noticed there was an abnormally loud human-made noise in the distance. It quickly became clear that it was wailing. Then my neighbor said something to my host sister-in-law (the woman of the house I live in), who let out one mournful “waay!” I was coming out of my room by this point, realizing the obvious. He’d been sick in bed since I got here, and … yeah. So we immediately walked to his compound, where the whole village was gathering. And women were wailing. I’m getting chills just thinking about it, the emotion was so raw. In general, people here don’t cry. I think I’ve mentioned that before. But in this case, it’s a full on deluge, and then it’s out of your system, I guess. Seeing that kind of mourning is powerfully moving. And being in the presence of such recent death, seeing the body removed, was… impossible to describe really. So I’ll just say it was hard. It hit the button of being so far from all the people I love when life is so precious, and you never know when it will end. I don’t think I can or should expand upon that. It’s pretty obvious why that was hard. 

Then, we spent the next three days having the funeral.  As in, family and friends came to visit, and there were people everywhere. Sitting, talking, drinking attaya. And meals are done communally. I already live with a bunch of people I’m struggling to get to know, or at Least learn the names of, and suddenly there’s an explosion of people in town who I don’t know, who don’t know me or what I’m doing here, and just know I’m the toubab.  I cannot tell you how many times that first day I heard a random stranger tell their neighbor “she doesn’t understand anything.” Which was hurtful and insanely frustrating. And of course all the people here that are kind and supportive were occupied with the activity of the funeral and having visitors. It was a very isolated day, and thankfully my mom called. Frankly, I needed to know my family at home was okay because of a completely irrational associative fear, and I needed someone I could be completely honest and vulnerable with about how crappy I felt about everything at that moment. 

So yeah, I love you mom! And I did start this blog with life is good, so I’ll get to that part J

It’s not really anything specific. I mean, today there are still a handful of funeral visitors, and there’s a whole new group here for a baby presentation thing. But Life is Good. After the phone call with my mom, I actually said a petitionary prayer. This is not a thing I do often, though I have nothing against it, really. That’s a whole other waxtaan.  And pretty immediately thereafter I had exactly what I needed. So, then I got to have the fun thought that, people argue when things like this happen over whether it was a prayer answered or a psychological shift. Was the change external or internal? But I don’t see a disagreement there. See, I’ve been playing with dichotomies again lately, and paradox has become so constant a realization in my life that it hardly bears mentioning. Point is, I guess that too is one. But it’s not. I mean, a paradox is a set of things that seem mutually exclusive, but in fact, aren’t. Nothing seems mutually exclusive anymore. Least of all this old thought about internal or external change.  Rambling now… would love comments about this.

Yeah, and the whole dichotomy thing keeps coming up for some reason. Like, back-to-Adam and Eve-style. It feels like a shift is coming, but who really knows. I remember realizing when I was young the “truth” that had Eve not eaten the apple, they wouldn’t have had the knowledge of good, because it only exists in contrast to evil or bad. But as Victor Wooten so wonderfully put it, “the ultimate truth is the infinite passing away of previous truths.” And at this point I’ve got the passing away of that one, just in that it doesn’t ring true anymore, but what does that mean? What comes next?

Here’s one thing I know: this place is beautiful.  Clear bright stars, full of constellations I do not know (hint, anyone who wants to send me a star chart of what I’m seeing, I will love you forever.) I made friends with a baobab today. He was just like “hey,” and I was like, “wow! I’ve never taken the time to hang out with you before! Let’s be friends” HAH! Yeah. Not losing it. I was like this in the states. During the day time the sky is a blue I’ve never seen before. Like, lighter around the edges with a darker, slightly grayed center. What is this about? I have no idea. And I adore all the livestock roaming around. My favorite chicken lives at my family’s main compound, and I love her because she’s kind of messed up. Like, sometimes she just starts to fall over, for no obvious reason. And she seems to be constantly distracted and like, freaking out over the flies or some kind-of chicken fleas if those exist. Why does this mean she’s my favorite? I dunno. I saw another great one today that looked like its feathers were on upside down. They were all curling out instead of curling slightly down around its body… The people must think I’m a touch crazy for how often I just stare, enraptured, at chickens and/or goats. Hate to leave it on that note, but that’s all I got right now. 

Day 4

I want to get this down while it’s fresh.  Today I started to fall in love with my village.  I mean, with the two kids in my family it was immediate. They’re two and four months.  Adorable!  But like everywhere, there are people here who are just lovely and kind, and some who… aren’t. Sometimes.  I went to a gathering of the women’s group yesterday, and got pretty frustrated.  I kept hearing people call me toubaab, the generic term for white people or outsiders, when they know my name is Rama Niang.  I also kept hearing people say things that sounded a lot like “she doesn’t understand anything” and “she’s not smart.” And otherwise there were so many people talking, I couldn’t really understand much.  Women here get loud. AAANYway… Today they gathered again. They just sit on mats, drink attaya, eat peanuts, and sort massive amounts of beans or do some other kind of group work.  I had to go again. Letting go of discouragement as much as I can.  So, I was sitting with some women who were talking really quickly, and I heard one say “She doesn’t understand anything.” Right Next to Me! So I said “Who doesn’t understand anything?” with just a hint of friendly indigence. This made all the other women laugh.  I finished with “I only understand a little, do I do not understand Nothing.” HAH! Small victory… As the meeting continued, I had to get up.  The woman on the other side of me was really nice, so it wasn’t that I had to get away from these people. It’s just that my back has been sore all day.  I’m not used to the amount of sitting on the floor, squatting to use the toilette, pulling water from the well, and Mostly, carrying it back home on my head that goes on here. Being lovely, they got me a chair, without even the slightest hint of condescension.  Here I must mention Ami Niang.  She is one of my new friends. She’s amazingly lovely, quick to defend me, and always trying to teach me new things and give me peanuts.  She made the chair bit happen.  So, as I sat there, listening, watching, as the sun set (it gets freakishly, fairy-land beautiful here at sunset), I was drawn into stillness.  Strangely enough it was the moment I noticed how loud everyone was getting that I was pulled into this awareness of deep quiet peaceful abundant-ness. And then everything was fresh. And I just felt this Love for the noises, the faces, everything. The air came alive.  This woman near me was talking very loudly and very intensely while waving her finger in another woman’s face, and it was beautiful! Yeah.  What else can I say? From there everything was beautiful. I chatted with a couple little girls, helped break up peanut cakes, and then we all went home!

With a little help from Orange...

A quick word that I’ll upload when I can about my first day at site.  This is a small village.  It’s about 450 people, 3k down a sand road from a small town on the national highway. It’s all sand, but like my beloved Mboro has a surprising amount of foliage.  So, frankly, it’s beautiful. And it’s hot.  Yesterday I tried to take a nap, but was woken every few minutes by either the grossness of the sweat completely covering my body and the feeling that I was baking alive, or by the grossness of the flies that seemed to think my sweat was a tasty marinate for my baking flesh.  Today I’m going to try spending those extremely hot parts of the day being social by lying under a tree with people. Less hot there because you can at least feel the breeze.

The people here are wonderfully kind, and threw a second party for the day of my arrival, as I had missed the one they threw a day prematurely…  No one seemed at all upset. They just wanted to know if I enjoyed their hospitality. 

A present on my first night: I made my bed after sweeping thoroughly, to dispel the mistaken assumption of a large number of ants that this was, in fact, their room.  I laid out my yoga mat alongside my bed as a substitute for carpeting or a floor mat. Right before I got in bed I removed my shoes, stepped onto my mat, and barely noticed in time that something was seriously amiss. Just next to my foot was what looked like a spaghetti noodle covered in pepper.  But the pepper was moving.  And so was the noodle, albeit slowly… Upon further inspection I realized that this was actually a centipede being eaten by a gang of ants. What a treat, on my first night, to have this happen less than a foot from where my head would be! I thoroughly squashed everyone in this little party, turned my yoga mat over to deal with the mess later (like, today, soon probably), and thanked god for the cocoon like comfort of my mosquito net. 

Last Day in Saint-Louis (‘til Jazz Fest)

First I want to apologize for the horrible writing in my last entry. Suffice it to say I was feverish and overwhelmed.

Second, Oh my goodness. Marathon shopping. Maybe it was supposed to be cathartic, after living on such limited funds for 2 months? No, really it was just to be ready to move into a new house in a new country and live as comfortably as possible.  On the shopping list: coffee mug, giant tin of Nescafe, powdered milk, bed mat, vache qui rit (laughing cow, the best cheese to travel), Internet Everywhere USB, fukki-jai[i] tee-shirts, paint for murals and my room, cooking gear… Not to mention, Saint Louis is expensive. Mostly because there’s so much good food.  I’ve had Moroccan Tajine (Mutton aux Olives et Frites), grilled shrimp with salad and fries, fresh croissants, pizza and a chocolate tart, not to mention the three omlette sandwiches I’ve gotten from the “bean sandwich lady[ii]” in the “place with all the cars”…. That’s the best I can do on that. Note to my mom and dad:  when you come visit, we ARE getting breakfast here at least once. It’s one of my local fave’s.  I’m particularly excited about dinner tonight. I’m cooking my own dinner for the first time since I’ve been here!! I got a red pepper, an onion, a head of garlic, some lettuce and some cheese (Ementhal, I think. The cheapest I could find at the toubab[iii] store.) Enough about food? Probably.

I just got back from my first major solo trip into Saint Louis.  That is, beyond going to the sandwich lady.  It was an elevated experience all around.  So, I’ll share.  I’ve always loved going out by myself to explore new areas.  Since I first moved to DC, it’s been a personal joy. So, I caught a cab from our apartment (on the corniche (this is all googlemap-able, by the way) to a place called La Rosa on “the island,” which is the old French part of Saint-Louis, the tourist-y-er part. La Rosa is a patisserie (pastry shop) and café.  They Have Espresso. Like, real coffee. Oh no, I’m back to food, but just briefly.  This is where I had the piece of pizza and chocolate tart while drinking an oh-so-delicious café au lait.  Two months of Nescafe rekk, and the first sip of café au lait is heaven. For a moment the world disappeared and it was just… real coffeeeeeee…  I stopped in the toubab store next to get a red pepper and some real cheese. A talibe[iv] talked to me before I went in and then just watched through the window as I had a great little chat with the deli-guy (in Wolof (YAY)). I couldn’t help it. I bought him an orange. As always, doing a small nice thing had the expected direct consequences.  

Next I walked to the post office (near the bridge that connects the mainland to the island, for anyone interested in googlemaping this quest).  Frankly, it wasn’t a great experience. The people behind the desk were not kind about my attempts to speak Wolof.  Frankly, I don’t have the vocab to ask about stamps, and they weren’t helpful.  But it’s okay. I got what I needed, brushed the dirt off my shoulder and kept going.  Mostly people here are SO kind and SO helpful. I mean, I walked out of the post office, saw an anonymous slit in the wall, turned in confusion, and three men sitting on the sidewalk immediately helped by pointing me to the correct mail slot. This is Taranga[v].

The market is on the mainland, so I had to cross the bridge.  The Senegal River is Huge here. And there must be a confluence of salt and fresh water. It just makes sense geographically, and you can see a line where darker water meets lighter… its very cool. The whole walk was just uplifting. All the beautiful people made me smile, and my steps were light. That’s a cliché for a reason. I had to slightly stifle a laugh when a man in a shirt that read: I’m Muslim. Don’t Panik. walked by. Definitely a WTF Senegal moment. The market is like the line on a backwards capital D where the corniche is the rounded part. The apartment is nearly half of the way down the D (just barely still on the northern edge of the bay, if you’re looking at a map). When with other volunteers, we’ve always gone to the end of the market and stayed on the D.  My shopping had me right in the middle of the market, so it made more sense to just take one of the side roads, to walk the shortest path. Such a better experience!! You’re actually in Senegalese neighborhoods this way, rather than on busy roads. It was a lovely walk.

There were several goats next to the driveway of our apartment building; two young ones rearing back to butt heads.  Cute! I love the goats. So adorable.  A larger on right next to me sneezed, which made me laugh. Which apparently offended her, judging by the look she gave me.  Yes.  That happened.

Okay, if you’ve made it through this ridiculously lengthy post, I’m impressed J

Now I need to finish getting packed for tomorrow and hopefully find my phone, which may or may not be somewhere in this apartment…. What a day!!

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[i] Fukki-jai: spelling uncertain.  Folks, this is like the second tier of thrift stores. Like, some of the shirts still have thrift store price tags on them.  Strangely enough, I see a lot of people wearing coats in this country, purchased at fukki-jai’s,  It makes me laugh to think the people donate coats to keep people from freezing, and they end up on Senegalese people when the weather dips below 75. Don’t get me wrong, it’s a good thing. Just hard to imagine how that level of adjustment to the heat.

[ii] Bean Sandwich ladies: Women who work in tents made of sheets wrapped around pole-branches.  They have breakfast beans (Yum), onion sauce (YUm), and make fried omlettes with eggs, onions and spices, served with a but more seasoning-salt-stuff and mustard (YUM). Senegalese mustard is in a league of its own. It is AMAZING on anything. Everything.

[iii] Toubab:  Have I mentioned this yet? I am a toubab. All foreigners are toubabs.  Children yell this at you, people of all ages sometimes call you this to your face. Sometimes its offensive, sometimes it’s not.  It depends on how it is intended, of course. So, a toubab store is a store for toubabs. It has shampoo and conditioner for toubabs, food from France, eastern Europe, etc. These store are only located in cities like Thies, Dakar, Saint Louis, surely other cities.

[iv] Talibe: google it. Sorry, but it’s too much to explain.

[v] Taranga: hospitality. Senegal is called the Land of Taranga. They’re famous for it. Example: you’re shopping and its tea time. The shop keeper offers you a glass, even if you aren’t going to buy anything.  Another example: my family in Mboro. Period.

Final days of PST

PST is almost over!  In three day’s I’ll be on my way to Saint-Louis to spend a couple days getting ready to move into my new home. So, I’m experiencing this whole amalgam of excitement and fear all over again.  But, theoretically for the last time like this… for a couple years anyway. 

Unfortunately, I’m sick.  It’s not digestive, for which I’m very grateful. Just a sinus infection with a slight fever.  I’ve been resting a lot these past couple days but did have to take my final language test in this condition.  Still got a passing score though. 

What to say?  There are occasions now where I can actually converse in Wolof, which is Way exciting. There are, however, also situations where I try to converse with people and that language wall is right there… Over the next two months I’ll have to spend a lot of time just hanging out with people to build my vocabulary and get more familiar with the grammar of this pronoun-based language. 

On a linguistic vocab note:  I just realized last night that I took it for granted that Wolof, like English and other Romantic languages I’m slightly familiar with, has six categories for pronouns:  Me, You, He/She/It, Us, Y’all, and Them.  Do all people divide the world in this way? It seems universal, but I’d love to hear about an example that Doesn’t.  The thing in this system that is different in Wolof is that there isn’t any gender differentiation at the pronoun level.  The word for he, she, and it is moom, unless moom is present, in which case you can substitute kii.  This is obviously a differentiation we do not have in English, and I’m curious what purpose it serves/served in this culture. I love these random kinds of thoughts, and would love to share more, but my over-heated brain can’t think of anything else right now.  I need to start carrying a notebook to write these things down. 

What else… leaving my family was hard.  Crying is awkward in this country, and hugs even more so. The night before I left I was crying right outside of the bathroom which our maid Ngone was cleaning.  She’s amazing, and just essentially part of the family there. I told her I didn’t want to leave them, and she told me not to.  There’s a gesture here that means “I refuse.” I couldn’t entirely tell what she was saying until she made this gesture.  It was amazing.  Made me crack up laughing, which is often all you need when you’re crying…. Lovely.

Will write again when I get to Saint-Louis.

For now, I just wanna say, it takes so long to upload pictures on the internet here that for now I’m just doing pictures of facebook.  Sorry for any inconvenience this may cause, but its waaaay easier for me.

Thanks for the comments!! Love you all J