Stealing Ice Cream from a Toubab...

Oh your sweet skin melting in my mouth, giving me chills down my throat. I have been waiting for this moment for some time and I couldn't wait any longer, so I decided to eat the chocolate shelled, vanilla filled ice cream in front of the store. It seemed like the perfect idea, before heading back to the regional house. Yet, on this particular night it could have been the worst idea ever. There were unexpected guests that came towards my friend and I, as we both stood there enjoying our ice cream. The kids were out having a night of fun because on December 5, 2011 is the Senegalese New Year.

The Islamic new year is somewhat different then how we celebrate new years in the States. It is more like Halloween if you want to compare it to something. The start of this holiday begins with good food, such as rice with vegetables, chicken and onion sauce. The next day is when the party begins for the children. The boys dress up as girls and the girls dress up as boys. Once they have their costumes on they are out the door visiting neighbors to collect money or candy.

So, while we ate our ice cream a few of the children came up to us and started to as for our names. This normally happens so we were use to this, but then my friend (who's name shall be Mamadou) decided to give them candy. I thought to my self that if we give them candy then they will probably want more. So, I continued to eat my ice cream. Mamadou decided to go into the store and buy more candy for the kids. By the time that he had returned the number of children had in increased. I still tried to mind my own business hoping that they would find any interest in us, but more and more kids continued to come. They finally surrounded us and crowded us to the point that we could feel hands all over the place. Mamadou passed some of the candy that he had bought out but they fought to try to get more from him. As I stood there I could feel random tugs on my hair, I would look back and the kids would have smile on their face like nothing happened. Half of the ice cream to go, I was almost done until suddenly a hand came out of no where and my ice cream was out of my hands! Blessed be! They had stolen my ice cream! What thieves! We couldn't handle it anymore with the loud foreign shouts and the abusive handling that we mounted our bikes and road out back home. Thankfully the kids didn't try to follow us back to where we were staying, which could have possibly happened. We were free! Free at last! With two less ice creams since Mamadou lost his during the bike ride back, sadly he hit a bump and his ice cream hit the floor. So, with two less ice creams and a lesson well learned the day couldn't have been any better!

Two broken hoes and a bucket continued...

So, the story that I wanted to get to that related to the title was about the last day that we were leaving the garden. We were told that we should collect all of our tools and bring it back to the center. While we were gathering our tools and leaving a man starts to chase. We look back to see who it is and to our surprise it was the school director yelliing at us in Wolof. We have absolutely no idea why he is so up set until one of our teachers helped us out with the translation. Apparently he was complaining about us not leaving the materials for the garden. The school director had made a comment to us be fore about how bad our garden was looking. He also told us at the time that if we took the garden tools away he would destroy our garden. This made no sense to us because we were told that we had to bring the tools back. Also, we are not suppose to supply them with materials. If they want to continue the work they need to get their own materials. We already provided free labor for them and also a demo. The school director was just really on a power trip, I hate to say. He had not good intentions for the community and the children that the garden could benefit for.
I was shocked at the un-professionalism that the man had when he tried grabbing the bucket with rope and pulley in it. Which they told us to buy before had because they didn't want to share theirs. Also, what was left of our tools was ridiculous, not only did they want to take our bucket but they left us two broken hoes and our wheel barrel which was in alright shape. Yet, we came with a lot more tools then that. They seemed to just all disappear. While our teacher argued with the school director on the next course of action was made sure that we kept the bucket close so he would try to pull another fast one. If he took that bucket we would have felt as if we lost our pride over the garden, not to sound over extravagant but its true! So, all in all we made it out of the school grounds with our bucket and one broken hoe :/

Two broken hoes and a bucket

Back again at the training center and trying to distress from the last language and tech tests that we had today. The last week of CBT (Center Base Training) also known as our home stay, has been kind of an emotional challenge. There has just been so many changes in the past two months that it is at times hard to keep up. That's probably why just a small glass of coca cola makes my day. You never really know how the day is going to be here, some good some bad so many unexpected things to occur. For example, two and my friends and decided to go to the post office, we weren't exactly sure where it was so my friends host Dad went with us. This is just some random information, my friends host Dad is so Patron it's funny. He is such a religious person yet something about him make it seem like he's up to no good.

Note: So, just to give some back ground on my friends host Dad he is a person that studies the Koran and people go to him for help or information. He seems to be well respected in the area. He also carries lots of money all the time, why? I don't know. One day we were in class and he pulls an American hundred dollar bill from his pocket like it was chump change. Where the heck did he get that???

So, back to the story....We thought that it was going to be a walk away but instead it was more like a taxi car away. It ended up being at the big market near the beach which also is where most of the tourists hangout. So, were were dropped off at the market and walked over to the post office. My friends Dad leaves us because he has some type of business to take care of. We were greeted by seated women with their hands out ready to receive money. After waiting for some time Coumba and I decided to scoop out the market for a bank. We walked down a few ally ways to discover a few uncrowded streets which at the time felt like bliss. We finally got to the bank and Coumba was able to grab some money out. When we were done we went back to the post office. We didn't spend too much time there, or at least I didn't want to spend too much time considering I hadn't eaten anything and was really craving for a egg and bean sandwich. Let me tell you that those sandwiches and cafe toubaab make my day! Anyhow, on our excursion to find such a sandwich at the market was more then what we expected but not more then we bargained for. A man had come up to us and started to do the formal greetings. He was a sketchy guy that smelled like booze and we quickly tried to get away from him. When we did he immediately tried to find his friend that spoke Mandinka. The Mandinka guy was kind enough to show us one of the best places to get Kingkiliba ( this is a tea they have, not sure with sp?). While I ate the sandwich that I was so hoping for, I had also ordered the tea. It was amazing! It tasted like eggnog and for anyone out there who really knows me...I love eggnog! The whole time that we were there we were surrounded by Wolof speakers that tried to communicate with us but we had to translate everything through the guy that showed us the sandwich shop. Once we were all done eating we came out of there with some what of an overwhelming feeling of the question "What just happened?" We were brought to this place by a stranger and communicating in so many ways imaginable. In addition the streets were filled with cars, trash, sellers and buyers, there was no way to focus on just one thing. We were able to make it out alright and make it to our language class with some delay but all in all we had a pretty interesting experience out in the market.

Stories to tell....

Back in Thies once again! Good to be back yet missing my family back in Mboure. Just got of the phone with my host brother. I think it was the funniest conversation I have ever had yet with my host family. It mainly consisted of Mandinka greetings and then some "kachatting". I am going to say it is a mix between Mandinka and english which pretty much means small talk but there was a twist our converstion. We had a lot of laughing, not because of a common joke that we had, not because we made a joke, the real reason was we didn't understand each other at all. The only thing that we could do was say yes and laugh. Also, my host brother is a lot like his father, because when I greet my host father he always has a smile on his face and he always greets me laughing. Like father like son.
So, this wasn't the only good laugh I got this week. True story, so, my friend Vieux(yes it means old in french and that is what is parents named him)Sydi from my Mandinka group (...and his real name will remain anonymous)came to his the next day with a great story. So, some background information first they have septic tanks here in the compound and some are stable and some just get really weak on the top. So, Vieux was walking around his compound and steps on top of the cement portion of the septic tank and falls through with one leg in and one leg out. His leg was knee deep in crap and huge cockroaches. He was lucky his whole body didn't fall in, haha, I guess that would have been funnier! Sorry, Vieux!

Another fun event happened in Mboure, it seemed like it was going to be another normal day in the garden. We went to our friends compound to get the watering cans, pulley and bucket for the well. Came back into the school ground where are garden is located and started drawing water from the well. At this point children for various locations come and try to help. Some times we know where they come from and other times we don't. So, this day we had a visit from a lot of boys and one of the Peace Corps trainees sister. The kids started to get a little over baring in the garden, trying to get our attention by snapping at us and hissing. We couldn't understand what they wanted and what they were trying to say and all we wanted to do was water and get out of there because it was really hot. So, we tried to ignore them but then it just got worse. Coumba, (another Mandinka in my group)got so upset that she started chasing the kids. These kids had no fear. Not saying that Coumba wasn't scary enough but they actually found her rant to be amusing and started to play off of it. The kids then started to throw rocks and even the eggplant that they had pulled off premature, at us. Man, what were we to do??? We were obvious of how upset we were at them for being in the garden and messing around. So, we closed janky garden wire gate that we had up and Vieux stand there to make sure that they wouldn't come in while the rest of us tried to finish watering the beds. That day was so stressful that we had to get out and do a little cool down walk. We then called our Pularr friends to let them know what had happened in the garden because one of the girls was their host sister. We found out the next day that the host sister was telling her family that we were the ones throwing rocks at them and that they didn't do anything. Hmmm...Pulaar kids.

Back in the grove of things......

Well sort of. So, I am back at my homestay. I really missed my family here after a long week away from them. The bus had dropped me off right at my door step and my family was right there to greet me. My language has been getting better I tell ,y family, domanding domanding (little by little in Mandinka). I know it will surely come and when it does I will be dreaming in Mandinka.
Our garden is looking good, except for some bug infestation on a few plants but other than that everything seems to be staying green. Next week we are going to be having our counterpart workshop for a good two days. Each person gets to make a small introdution on sessions. My counterpart acctually called me the other day and I really didn't know what to say to him. I have a feeling that he misses his Peace Corps Volunteer. The family that I will be staying with for the next two years is a fairly medium sized family. Sadly the mother had died while giving birth. So the only women in the house is the grandmother and the daughter of about 13 years old. There is much to do in the village when I get there and I cannot wait to call it home. Yikes time is up right now for the internet! until next time.

VV Site Pics!

Volunteer Visits!

Just came back from seeing my site. It was a great experience getting to see where I will be living for the next two years. It is a really small village with about 140 people living there. It is surrounded by fields of corn, cotten, upland rice, peanuts and sorghum. My site is close enough to the city were I can just bike in if I want and yet still be out in the bush. It is a pretty sweet location. There is a hut that I will be staying at with a small backyard. I can't wait to get my hands dirty when I start my garden and demo garden in the front. There are a few projects that I would love to do there like starting a rain water catchment system for the village because they only have one really deep well. It takes a lot of work for them to pull water, so hopefully if we get some more sources of water they will be willing to start more home gardens. The Peace Corps Volunteer that is there now was very helpful. She was able to introduce me to people and show me around. I have big shoes to fill considering the amount of work that she had done with her village and her family it seems like it is going to be hard to full fill her achievements.
We went on a bike trip to a master gardener site near my village. It was a wonderful bike ride with green everywhere and some pretty amazing termite mounds. The village that the master gardener site is pretty patron with cement beds outside a clay oven and there very own well in the compound. The huts were covered in squash vines and it was surrounded by fields and fruit orchards. The only down side is that the temperature is really hot. Tambacunda is known for how hot it is. Let me tell you I was sweating in places I normally don't sweat at until I got here, lol. All in all it has been a pretty good week. We are going to be going back to our home stay tomorrow and I can't wait to see them!

The Moments of Doubt

Did you say butter on my bread? Yes, please. Mornings in my home stay seem to be the most active. At around 5 o'clock the call for prayer begins with a man singing Arabic through the local loud speaker. The fan is on and blowing warm air through my mosquito net as I lay there in my sweat. For a few moments I try to close my eyes to go back to sleep, sometimes it works sometimes it doesn't. So, in most cases I decided to get up and begin my day. My host mother, Satu, is the first on in the compound to begin her day. I can hear her collecting water from the robine into plastic containers to sell around the corner of our house. There are number of ways that my family finds a way to earn some money and this is one of them. The other is the moono in the morning. You can see children in the morning carrying around plastic bowls, they take these bowls to homes that sell this hot cereal. This hot cereal is made out of millet and made by hand. My mother starts making it late at night at around 10pm and she places the millet in a large bowl and moves it with her hand making small little balls by dampening the millet powder a little at a time. I sometimes find my mother falling asleep while she makes her millet. My host father works on a farm near by and for the moment I don't think that he is doing anything. This brings me to the next thing, women here work extremely hard here. My siblings here are always doing something, from sweeping in the morning to cooking lunch and dinner to making and selling soap they are busy with something. The men are required to go out and bring in the money but sometimes you find them not doing anything at all. These are some of the gender roles that you will find her. Women pride themselves when they can fetch the water for the mans bath or make them dinner. Yet, at times it can be too much. A friend of mine had a sister in-law that was working so hard while that she was pregnant she fell sick and her baby had died. Deaths here have been very frequent since I have been here actually. I have heard of a few other deaths from my fellow peace corps friends. The amount of deaths that I have heard of here has totaled to be the same amount of deaths that I have heard in my life time in the states. To the Senegalese people death is a very common thing and in America you don't hear about it too often. More on a lighter note there had been babies born and people getting married, I still have yet to experience these but there still time. More on the experience in the home stay, what more can I say??? There is just so much. To shorten this I love my family, they inspire me because they are such strong women and they help me make it through the days. It has been quite the experience so far and this is still only the beginning. We still have yet to go to our sites and meet our new families that we will be staying with for the next two years. We had the announcement actually this past Monday.
All the volunteers were gathered in the evening and brought to the basketball court in the PC Center. The basketball court has a map of Senegal on it and for placement what they do is blindfold all the volunteers and take them to there sites on the map. They count to three and at the same time we all take our blindfolds off too see where we were placed on the map. I have video of this by the way. I hope some of it gets on the website. Anyhow...I come to find that I am standing in the region of Tambacunda. You can find this city in the East/Southern part of Senegal near the end of the Gambian boarder. I was placed there with four other people in my group. There are three Mandinkas, one Serer and one Wolof speaker. Everyone was very surprised to finally find out where our sites were and guess what! I am here right now! We had a wonderful welcome party of the PCV that are here now. Tomorrow I get to see my site! So, I will have to keep you posted!

Getting started

So, finally getting this blog together. This is my first post and there is too much to say so how about I sum it up. The first two weeks have been learning about the culture, language, about other Peace Corps Volunteers and what we are going to be expecting in the next few months. We just had our first week at our first host families homes and this experience is unique to each one of us. For myself I very much enjoy my family. They are well known in my town. When I first arrived each volunteer is named by the family. I was named after my grandmother "Bambi Camera". I was told that my grandmother is a very important person in the community because people go to her for advice and help. So, when I say my name to someone in the village they say "Oh, Bambi Camara!" Because everyone knows who she is. My mother is a very busy women considering that she has 10 children, at least that is the information that I got when I was trying to do my family tree. My father is a very humble man who likes to laugh a lot. He tries to help me with my language but...hmmm it gets kind of confusing as to what he is trying to explain to me. I have two aunts that also live in the compound. One is married to the chief of the village. He just actually stayed with us the past week. Talk about high expectations.
Oh, haha by the way I am learning one of the seven languages that volunteers learn called Mandinka. It It has almost all of the letters of the alphabet except for z and x. They have this funny looking n with a tail on it which makes a "ing" sound. Learning the language has been the most difficult because our level of the language to begin with in our home stay was pretty much nothing. This past week we were able to a least make a sentence. Hahaha can you imagine trying to go through a whole day with someone not really knowing what they are trying to say to you??? Call it interesting, exciting, frustrating and challenging. Anyhow, I know things will become easier one the language comes and I can't wait! But for now Fo naato! I have language class right now! Miss everyone!