Cooling off in Kombo

We just finished our IST (In Service Training), which meant gathering here in Kombo for a week with my the other members of my group for additional training, information sharing, and collaboration on projects. It was great to see everyone again, even though the week was packed with activities and seemed to go by very quickly. A new development in my role here: I've been chosen to help lead the training of the new group of education volunteers who are scheduled to come here in July. I think back to what I was doing this time last year, and I know what these new volunteers are going through right now. It's a difficult and exciting time. I also remember how I felt when I first arrived here almost a year ago now. We were all working on adapting to new languages, cultural practices, food, and climate. In addition, the training schedule was exhausting. All of these things together made life pretty overwhelming, so I was grateful for the advice and guidance I recieved from the volunteers who helped lead some of our training sessions. This is why I am excited to meet the new group and, hopefully, be as helpful to them as some of the volunteers were to me. Along with this new job comes several additional responsibilities... one of which I'm working on this weekend with Blair and Doug, who were also chosen for the same thing. This means I am delaying my trip back to Fatoto for a few more days. While I'm happy to be out of the heat for a while, I'm anxious to get back to my classroom and continue teaching. Hopefully, we can finish this work by Tuesday, and I can be back to school on Wednesday. After this week, I'm motivated and excited to try some new ideas and work on some additional projects that I have plans for... I think the next few months are going to fly by.

Gambian News

One thing that the Peace Corps has emphasized repeatedly is that volunteers should always stay out of politics. When there are political elections, we are instructed to stay away from polling areas. We are not supposed to have detailed conversations about our political beliefs or become involved with any group with politcal goals. And we are definitely not supposed to post our politcal beliefs on the internet. Although we must keep our political opinions separate from our work, it is utterly impossible no to be affected by beliefs and the resulting actions of Gambian politicians. Especially when those beliefs are encouraged by the President himself. So I am not going to share my opinion of Gambian politics. Instead, I'm just going to share an article that I recently read from a Gambian newspaper called the Daily Observer. This is from the January 18-20 edition. You can find this and more Gambian news at www.observer.gm.

"President Gives 7 Buses to 7 Schools
In yet another show of the importance he attaches to the education sector, President Yahya Jammeh has made a surpise donation of seven buses to seven schools in the Greater Banjul Area. The buses were presented to the students and their principles at the 1st anniversary of the HIV/AIDS Breakthrough Celebrations held at the July 22nd Square in Banjul, yesterday. The beneficiaries are Muslim SSS, Gambia SSS, Mindaw SSS in Farato, JC Faye SSS, Nusrat SSS, Saint Augustine's SSS and The Gambia Technical Training Institute. The American type buses will help ease the transport problems confronting student commuters to and from their various schools. The president, in addition, promised to provide 1000 liters of fuel for each of the buses after which the schools should be able to run the buses on their own. 'I will give 1000 liters of fuel, After that I don't know you, and you don't know me. Is that a deal?' He asked the excited students who answered in the positive.
The president also used the occasion to announce his ability to treat stroke and skin cancer.
'If you have a stroke there is a 99 percent possibility that you will walk again. Already I treated one with stroke and he is today walking. If you also take one dose, you will be ok from skin cancer' he said.
HIV/AIDs Cure
Groups of cured patients were in attendance to thank the President in person for their well-being. Moving speeches were made by two of the patients, and Dr. Mbowe and SoS Malikck Njie (full speeches to be published in the next issue of the Daily Observer).
In a jovial and happy speech, the president also cautioned those who have now been cleared of the pandemic to be careful as his medication is no gaurantee against re-infection. To that effect he said 'It is not a guaranty that you will not be re-infected if you are careless. I make it clear that my medication clears AIDs from your system. We only discharge you if the machine that first tested you and said you have AIDs again says you have been cleared of it. To say the virus is now curable does not give you the chance to be careless.'
NO WAR
The president emphasized that his cure of AIDs is free and purely based on humanitarian grounds and not a fight against pharmaceuticals that are making billions in fortunes due to the pandemic.
'Making my treatment free does not mean fighting anybody. Those who see the treatment as a threat should think of Allah as human beings are His assets,' he concluded."

Here are a few more pictures of little James. He's starting to develop a personality. It's a fun thing to watch. Last Sunday, I took him with me to the crowded "Lumo," or weekly market, in Fatoto. I carried him on my back, African style, which certainly attracted a lot of attention, but it was amusing. As I often as I wish that I could avoid contstantly being in the spotlight, sometimes, I just have to embrace it and have fun. I will never "blend in" to my African village, and while there are definitely days that I just feel like hiding from everyone, I'm learning to be more comfortable with all of the extra attention.

naming ceremony pictures

Finally, here are some new pictures:




Here is Samba Njie, looking especially handsome for the naming ceremony of his new baby boy. Samba is the second eldest brother in the Njie family and the head of my compound.












Baby James... isn't he cute?












































Teachers and staff from my school (and that's my house in the background)

Sorry

Just read through my blog for the first time in months and realized that I have been awefully repetitive lately... sorry! It just takes so long to get from one screen to the next, I never check to see what I wrote last. And then I forget about it. I'll do better next time!

Day to Day

Here are some things I typed up a few days ago...

I am sitting on the island of Janjanbureh, which is a small, historic island on The Gambia River. I am here for a short break from school visiting some other Peace Corps Volunteers and exchanging ideas for science experiments and community projects. It is quite peaceful here. I have been very busy for the past month. It’s nice to relax and reflect on some of the things I have been through lately. When I am in village, I often think of things I would like to type on my blog, but then when I travel to Basse or to somewhere with internet, I loose the inspiration, or I get so frustrated with the computer that I am working on that I give up and just type something quick or nothing at all… so now that I am borrowing a friend’s computer, and I am not feeling rushed, I would like to share some of my every-day experiences…
This is my daily routine in village. I wake up before sunrise and go for a run. It’s the best part of the day for me. Half of the village is still asleep, so I don’t feel rude about not stopping to greet all of the people that I pass along my way. It’s also much cooler in the mornings. Now, when I say cool, I mean it’s in the low 80’s, or maybe even just under 80 degrees if I’m lucky. But at this point, that’s cool, crisp weather for me! When I begin my run, it’s still rather dark outside… I run westward towards and up the big hill (“big” is also a relative term… what I once thought was tiny, is now a large hill to me!), so by the time I turn around and run eastward home, I get a nice view of the sunrise. After a quick bath and a cup of instant coffee, I ride my bike to school. In between classes, we take a 25 minute break, and local women come to the school to sell breakfast to the students. The most common food item sold is beans and bread. You can order a whole loaf of bread or a half loaf of bread. The bread is pretty much the same everywhere in The Gambia. It’s a white loaf about 6-8 inches long which looks something like French bread. They cut the loaf open, put beans inside and top it with “sauce.” The sauce is usually onions and small pieces of pasta cooked in oil with spices. Gambians love oil, so if I don’t specifically ask them not to, they pour some of the oily sauce over the beans, then add a couple extra spoonfuls of plain oil. Sometimes, my bean sandwich is dripping in oil… I’ve tried to explain that this is too much… my favorite bean sandwich lady usually knows I don’t want the oil, but sometimes she forgets. Other women sell just plain bread with sauce (no beans), fish on bread with sauce, or a bowl of something called ebe, which is a fish and cassava soup (cassava is kind of like a potato or a yam). Breakfast usually costs me about 5 dalsai (that’s roughly a quarter).
The morning shift ends at 1:15, but I teach after-school classes on Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday, so I on those days I leave at about 3:00. On Thursdays and Fridays I leave earlier. Right now, the weather has gotten very, very hot… so by the time I leave from school, I’m usually covered in sweat and ready to cool off. One of the best things that has happened in my life recently is that my favorite bitik owner (bitiks are small, local shops) just bought a refrigerator. He now sells bags of cold water, but the degree of coldness is unreliable. The areas of Fatoto that are wired for electricity only get current at certain times of the day, and on some days, there is no current at all. But even so, the water inside his refrigerator will still be cooler than my own warm (or just plain hot) water at home. So I’ve been leaving my water bottle in his fridge, and I go to pick it up after school. I drop it off again in the evening so that it can cool again for the next day. It’s amazing how much of a difference it makes in my day to have a little cool water.
When I get home, I eat the lunch that has been prepared by my family. This is always rice and usually fish, with some sort of peanut-based, or oil-based sauce (once again, more oil). At this point in my day, I usually just look at my watch and count down the hours until the sun begins to set. It’s the most difficult part of the day for me. It’s too hot to do much at all. I’m usually quite tired, so my first impulse is to lie down and take a nap. This is what most of the Gambians do between 2 and 5… is lie around and nap. I can’t blame them. But when I do try to nap, I’m so uncomfortably hot that I just get annoyed and have to get up again. The winds are still strong, but unlike the winds in December and January, these winds are very hot… it’s like opening an oven door. So they offer no relief from the heat… and often make it worse. I find myself experimenting with different ways to sit or lie that may facilitate heat loss from my body. Any surface of my body touching another surface will soon be soaked in sweat, so if I am trying to lie down, I have to switch positions constantly to allow myself to dry off a bit on whatever side I was just lying on. The best position seems to be lying on my back with my legs stretched out and my arms over my head. Any part of my body touching another part of my body generates too much heat, so I try not to rest my arms next to or on my body… I realize this may seem like a pretty pathetic way to spend my afternoon… but it’s what I do… it makes the hours seem pretty long indeed. I often just get fed up with it all and go for a walk. My family thinks this is crazy, but at least if I’m standing, I may get a bit of a breeze on all parts of my body. Bucket baths are my saving grace. I try to wait until as close to 5:00 or 6:00 as possible for my afternoon bath (so that I won’t just continue to sweat as soon as the bath is finished), but sometimes I just have to cool off earlier than that… I can always take another later (and often do).
Once the sun begins to set and it cools down a bit, I can actually focus enough to start doing some work… grading papers, planning lessons, etc. This may take only an hour, but often much longer. I now do most of my work in my backyard. It’s too hot in the house. I bring my small desk outside and sit and work by candlelight. At some point, I take a break to cook dinner, then hang out and chat with my family. Also, students sporadically stop by for extra help, so sometimes I spent a good bit of my time with them. I also spend a good bit of time with little James, the baby who was named after my father. Sometimes, if I have been working for too long and haven’t gone to sit with the family, they just bring him to me. He sits in my lap or lies beside me while I grade papers, or do other work. He seems to like my music, so sometimes we listen to music together and I’ll bounce him around my hut for a while. When it’s time for bed, I sleep outside on a small wooden bed that my carpenter friend built for me. If it cools off enough in the early morning, I get up and move inside, but lately, I’ve slept just fine in my back yard until it’s time to get up and start the day over again. So that’s my day… it’s not the most exciting life, but it’s a good routine for me.
Little James’s naming ceremony:
It is tradition here to hold a naming ceremony a week after the birth of a new child. When Samba (my brother) and his wife, Susana had the new baby, I was leaving for my trip to Dakar… and since the baby would be named for my father, they put off the ceremony until I returned. This was my first real naming ceremony in Africa. Our training village put on a small ceremony for us trainees, to give us our African names, but it was just for fun. James’s naming ceremony was a fun and exhausting process to be a part of. I think the most amazing thing about this experience for me was that how much work was involved in the process. There is no way one family alone can accomplish all of the work required for an event like this. I think about the big celebrations that families in the US have: weddings, graduations, etc. Think about trying to accomplish the same amount of work that is required for one of those events: cooking food, arranging for entertainment, preparing the place that the event will be held to hold hundreds of people… but it is all done African style. All of the food is prepared the way everything in Africa is prepared: from scratch. Chairs and equipment needed for music are all hauled in by foot or donkey cart (we borrowed chairs from my school, and many of the students pitched in to carry them to the compound). There is no such thing as hiring a cook or a caterer. And there is no such thing as buying food in bulk at Sam’s club to be cooked. We slaughtered three goats for the occasion. Women from the community gathered at my compound for two days before the event, helping to pound grains for the breakfast porriage that would be served, and cooking sweets and snacks that would be handed out to guests throughout the day. I watched over 30 women taking turns pounding grains for the event. Even with all of the women helping, it still took several hours to do. It’s also something of a social event and a way of showing that you are happy for the new family by coming and helping with preparations for the ceremony. Like everything else, it is tradition, but it is a truly inspiring thing to watch. The entire community does whatever they can to help. And it all came together beautifully. The ceremony started in the morning and lasted until about midnight. There was traditional fula music as well as a D.J. with a huge sound system (the speakers were sitting right next to my hut… lucky me)… all powered by a generator. There was breakfast and a large lunch/dinner meal. The family had borrowed a donkey cart to haul in dozens of bidongs full of drinking water for guests. Guests from out of town slept on the floor of my family’s hut or with neighbors. Most of the villagers stopped by at some point in the day to show their respect, as well as all of the teachers at my school, the police officers, and many of my students. I was exhausted by the time that it was over, and I barely did anything to help. Overall, it was a lovely event… I felt inspired to be a part of it, and honored that my American family is now forever a part of my African family.

some pictures

It has been a while since I have been able to access internet. I began this blog on February 18th, when I was in Dakar. I had access to high speed internet, so I decided to post some pictures, but then I ran out of time to type anything to go with them. When I returned to The Gambia, I went back to Fatoto and that is where I have been for the past 4 weeks or so (I had planned to come sooner, but was delayed by several things, which I'll describe later). I was quite excited to get to Basse so that I could do some shopping and finally finish this blog. Since these things required money, however, I needed to go to the bank first. I had been living off the travel money that had left over from my trip to Dakar, but it was running very, very low. So on Thursday when I arrived in Basse, I came to the bank first thing. And wouldn't you know it? The bank was closed for a holiday. Thursday was the Prophet Muhammed's birthday. And then, as it turns out, Friday was also a public holiday because of Good Friday. And Monday will also be a public holiday because it's the day after easter. On Saturdays the bank is usually open, but who knows? Perhaps they will take another day off to celebrate the fact that they have three holidays in a row surrounding a work day... I swear, Gambians and their holidays. It constantly amazes me. The country is 90 percent Muslim and they need to close schools and buisnesses on Good Friday and Easter. So on Thursday, I realized that I only had 9 dalasi (that's about 45 cents) and no access to any other money for 5 days. Even in a developing country, it's tough to live off of less than a dime a day. Luckily, I ended up finding a buisness that would cash my check for me (which is why I can afford to come to the internet tonight).

So here are the pictures that I posted from Dakar last month. Dakar is the capital of Senegal (the country which surrounds The Gambia). The event I attended is called WAIST (West African International Softball Tournament). It is a softball tournament for whoever would like to particiapte, but Peace Corps volunteers make up most of the participating teams. It's a great opportunity for Peace Corps Volunteers from different West African countries to gather and let loose, or just relax. Some people are there to play serious softball. Some people are there to meet with volunteers from other countries and share ideas for projects and plans in their communities. Some people go just for fun. I was there for a little of all it all, I think. It was my first opportunity to take a trip out of the country since I came to Africa, and that, in itself, was a good enough reason for me to be there. I played on the "social" team for The Gambia (we also had a competitive team, but due to my lack of talent and experience in softball, the social team was just fine for me). Here is our group picture. Our "uniforms" are mesh shirts in the colors of the Gambian flag. The mesh shirts are supposed to mimick what we call "bumsters." These are the guys you can find on the beaches of The Gambia. They wear these tank-tops and lots of large, glittery necklaces. They are there to meet tourists with the hope that they may either get some money from them or, if they are very lucky, trick them into marrying them and bringing them to the UK or the States. Bumsters are one of the things almost all of us volunteers hate about The Gambia since we are all mistaken for tourists and therefore prime bumster targets. Since it feels good to laugh about it instead of getting too irritated, this year, we were the Gambian bumsters.

I also had the opportunity to do a bit of site seeing. Dakar is huge and historic. We took a boat trip out to an island that was originally a major hub in the slave-trade. It was an interesting trip and the island quite peaceful. Here are some pictures....

Dakar is a huge, bustling city (about the size of Washington D.C.), so it was quite a change from village life. In many ways, it was culture shock all over again. I've become so accustomed to my life as a peace corps volunteer that it was a little disorienting to be reminded of the life I lived before I came here... citys with tall buildings, highways, houses with mowed lawns, inernational foods, etc. Housing accomadations for all of the Peace Corps Volunteers were provided by the staff members of the US embassy. They were kind enough to open their homes to a burly group like us. The man I stayed with, Craig, not only opened up his home to us, but also allowed us to use his internet, washer and dryer, and anything else we needed... he even treated us to several delicious meals! He was interested to hear our stories. He seemed amazed that anyone would willingly live for two years without electricity or running water (especially air-conditioning). He certainly made me feel welcome and gave me a different perspective of life in an African country... so if you are reading this Craig... thanks again for everything! It was a wonderful experience!

Since I've been back in The Gambia, I've been very busy with school and family events. I believe I mentioned the birth of Samba and Susana's son in one of my last blogs. (Samba is my brother and the head of our compound). The baby was born before my trip to Dakar, and it tradition to hold a naming ceremony one week after the child's birth... but my family delayed the ceremony until after I returned to Fatoto. The new baby is named James, after my father, and in honor of my family. The naming ceremony was quite an experience. It was held on Saturday, March 8th, but the preparations for it began two days earlier. After school one day, I was taking a nap to escape the heat when I was woken up by the sound of pounding. This is not an unusual sound since all families use large morals and pestals to pound their food, but this was A LOT of pounding all at once. I left my house to find a group of at least 40 women gathered around, taking turns pounding the grains needed for the ceremony. This was just the start of the preparations... for the next two days, my compound was full of people helping with various tasks. It's incredible and inspiring to see how the whole community contibutes time and resources to an event like this. There were hundreds of people at the ceremony. I had a wonderful time. There was traditional Fula music and a DJ (equipped with a generator to power his huge speakers and system) providing entertainment. My family slaughtered 3 goats and dozens of women sat around all day cooking for for the mass of people gathered. I socailized and danced all day. All of the staff from school came, as well as many of my students and two of my toubab friends from Basse (Liza and Sarah, a VSO). I have many pictures, some of which I hope to post next month from Kombo.

The other thing that's kept me so busy has been school. I helped teach at a teacher workshop in Fatoto on March 1st, which I found to be fairly successful and very rewarding. I did a session on lesson planning and another on teaching and learning aids. Thanks to Bess Adcock, my old mentor teacher from the states, I was equipped with a bunch of useful materials for creating teaching aids. Thanks Bess! There are 3 school terms in The Gambia, and we just finished the 2nd term. The end of the term was supposed to be April 4th, but, at the last minute, they decided to change the end of term date to be March 20th, so that the break could fall over the easter holiday (once again, Gambians and their holidays). The best part of that decision was that we were notified with about 2 weeks left in the term, and all of us had to change our teaching plans, schedule last minute tests and make-up work, and deal with all of the usual things that come along with the end of a school term. In addition, I've still been teaching extra classes after school, and trying to continue science club events.

And on top of all of this, the hot season has begun. For the sake of curiosity, I put my thermometer directly in the sun the other day... the highest reading is 124 degrees F, and after only a few minutes, it soared above that mark. It's too hot to sleep in my hut, so I've been sleeping outside in my back yard. I had a special "bed" made and I just bought a sponge to put on it. It's quite nice, really. the mornings have still been cool enough to go running, so I have still been able to exercise, but I'm starting to get worried that they won't be cool enough for long. The true heat hasn't even come yet.

The good news is, mangos are on the way. They are getting bigger and bigger on the trees... they should be ripe in just a few more weeks! I'm very excited.

Well, that's it for now, I'm going to finish before I get kicked off this machine... more to come later!