I Am A Toubab and So Can You! / Ramadan Begins

Happy Ramadan to one and all! I started writing this post yesterday on the first day of Ramadan, but the power went out and the generators in the computer lab were being funky so I had to get off. The second day of Ramadan is equally good. One thing about Dakar is that there are a lot of power outages- for at least a couple hours every day. It's been going on for about two years now. People just light candles and go about their business. More on Ramadan in a few paragraphs.

I know that you (my family) are very anxious to hear about the continuation of my travels- my internet access is limited to the computers at school in the computer lab (which is sometimes closed and other times occupied by a class). There are "telecentres" around but most of them only have one computer or so and I haven't bothered to try one yet. We'll see how I feel when I have to finish my two final papers. I've gotten a phone though and tonight I'm going to buy a sim card, so I should be working approximately by tomorrow.

Well then! Last week I finished orientation and signed up for classes, and have now had all of my classes at least once. I'm in Intermediate French 2, Beginning Wolof, Senegalese Culture and Society (which is this semester also functioning as a class in cross-cultural communication, and I'm very excited about it), a history class called Colonization and Decolonization focusing on Senegambia (that's Senegal and the Gambia combined-Gambia being the country that is completely surrounded by Senegal except for the Atlantic), and Gender and Development (which is going to be totally awesome because it's all field trips, guest speakers, and movies and we volunteer at an organization that works with girls in one of the poorest areas of Dakar as part of our grade).

On Friday the end of our orientation we traveled to the Baobab Center (named after that lovely national tree) where we learned about different cultural concepts in Senegal and "ate around the bowl" for the first time and tasted about ten different scrumptious juice drinks particular to Senegal. One of the ladies at the center is an artist who coordinates a workshop programme to train women in different arts so that they can start their own businesses. I got her card and she is going to come do a batik workshop with some of us in the near future!

The most exciting thing about Friday however was that our host families came to pick us up! In my case it was a guy who lives down the street from my family and his little sister, who are also hosting a student. The university is in the neighborhood of Mermoz and I'm living in Ouakam, which is a 15 minute bus ride north. Our street is a block away from the far side of the airport. I'm living with a grande famille! Along with my host mother are five sisters, all between 16 and 25, two nieces (daughters of 2 of my host sisters) who are 1 and 6 respectively, and a host brother (the nephew of my host mom) who I think is 28 or so. My host father works in the Casamance, which is the southern part of Senegal, so I have yet to see him. There are also other kids from the neighborhood who hang out at our house, and there are a lot of young people my age on the street who we go visit and who visit us. At every corner there are little shops, like tailors or telecentres, but mostly minimarches, many of which are the size of a walk-in closet but are stocked with everything you could possibly need. We go to different mini-markets depending on what we need for the best price. My host brother keeps to himself pretty much and doesn't eat with us or any of that. My first extended conversation with him was last night when him and his sister decided to have a French lesson for me. So it's basically a house of women! they're always sitting in the living room talking and there's always activity and we're always going to some mini market to get some thing. The TV is always on but mostly people don't watch it (sounds kind of familiar :)? ).

I've been in about five houses by now and they're all very open so that the air can flow. For example, you have to walk outside to get to the washing area and the bathroom but it's tiled and closed off. There are a couple of small rooms beside the bathroom and kitchen that are open (no roof), and one of them has the stairway that's open and leads up to the roof, which is flat, and is where we hang the clothes to dry. There are no air conditioners, but sometimes a fan is on. It's always extremely hot and humid and I am forever sweating. Everyone is very clean and forever taking showers-so I am too (mom) :). The toilet doesn't flush and you just squat on it, which I'm still getting used to, but it's all good.

The food. The food has definitely lived up to my high expectations! I mentioned "eating around the bowl"- for meals the food is put in a large, sort of flat, bowl for everyone to eat out of. Traditionally you use your hands (everyone washes first, and only uses the right hand because your left is for the bathroom. You do everything with your right hand- like eat and accept/give gifts). We did that the first night for my sake I think, but usually we use spoons. There is no stove, so food is mainly rice, couscous, and maybe some lentils with either fish or chicken and some mostly root vegetables. There are lots of spices. I like the concept of eating from the same plate. There's this one dish whose name I forget that is more like a dessert, but we had it for dinner too. It's fattening apparently so it will give you a "fonde"-a big butt- which is desireable here :). It's boiled millet (a grain) with sugar and something else I think, and then you pour this sweetened yogurt over it, or sometimes condensed milk I think, and it's so good! My favorite drink is a popular one in Senegal called bissap. You get a bunch of dried hibiscus flowers, boil them, add mint candies which melt in the boiling water, and I think you add some ginger too. Then when it cools off you add a ton of sugar, and it turns out as this sweet red minty cold drink. Yum! I had one of my host sisters write down the recipe for me, though it's in French.

Speaking of food, Ramadan is great in this respect. Of course there's the fasting, but most of the people in my house don't fast (including my host mom)-though they do get up at 5am before sunrise. My favorite part is when we break the fast at sunset- we ate sweet bread with butter, dates, and nescafe creme. The coffee people drink here is nescafe-powdered instant coffee. This one we had last night comes in individual packets and is powdered cream and coffee, and then we put a bunch of sugar cubes in- very tasty. At the same time on TV they turned to the Arabic prayer chanting with scenes of Mecca and people praying that is special programming for Ramadan. Then dinner is between 9 and 10pm. Everyone stays up until at least midnight just hanging out.

Saturday night I went to a nightclub with three of my host sisters and three of their friends. It took about two hours for everyone (besides me) to get ready and trade clothes. We went to this posh club called the Senat (pronounced sena) at the Hotel Meridien which was verry upscale. (The kind with multiple swimming pools with different color lights in them and large palm trees.) Luckily it was free to get in for some reason. We spent another 20 minutes in the bathroom so everyone could put on makeup. There was too much "grinding" for me and mostly American hip-hop. It was okay, but we didn't leave until 5:30 am, walked a mile for a taxi, and then didn't get back home until 6:30am!! What's more, I had to get up at 7:30am for a trip to downtown Dakar with the students in my program! It was worth an hour sleep though, because we saw the major sites downtown like the presidential palais, American embassy, and Marche Sandanga (this huge market area! People follow you around trying to sell you things. It looks kind of like a flea market only much more cramped and crowded, and some people have store fronts, but they're all really small-like open closets.) We all got coconuts that the vendor chopped open for us so we could drink the milk, then chopped them again so we could scoop out the insides. My group's (6 people) guide was really cool and graduated from the university we're at a few years ago and now works at a bank downtown. After the trip he took us to the naming ceremony of his little nephew, back in Ouakam! The naming ceremony happens when a baby is a week old, and the whole family gets together to eat a lot of food and celebrate. We all got to hold the baby (there's a photo of my somewhere on my friend's camera) and eat. In the evening my host brother and sister and I went with a family down the street to the Point des Almadies- a nice beach spot north of us in the same super rich neighborhood as the nightclub. There were a million little kids and we watched the sunset as a rainbow appeared behind us before it started to drizzle out. Love the rainbows here! It's been raining often, but in large bursts so I've hardly used my umbrella. Most of the streets aren't paved and even ones that are aren't cambered, so the rain leaves huge puddles everywhere that splashes people on the sidewalks when cars drive by. The water combined with heat makes the trash that's around smell particularly bad, but luckily the trash is mostly in large piles rather than evenly spread. There are a lot of cars here, but not an overwhelming amount. Most people can't afford them, so there is a good transportation infrastructure. There are tons of taxis, but there are also blue public buses that go most places, and privately owned car rapides (mini-buses-kind of like big VW buses) that go everywhere. People drive horribly though. In a car rapide on Sunday on our way downtown the day almost became a tragedy when we hit a little boy crossing the street. Thankfully, he was able to stand up afterwards and had many adults around and we called an ambulance, so it was okay.

Contrary to Adam's (my brother) warning, there are not any children slapping me and asking for money. The only people who've asked me for money are the little boys who are talibes- followers/students of different marabouts (religious leaders). They're pretty unobtrusive and I feel bad for them, but most people I've talked to think it's exploitation and don't give money to them.

This Saturday we're going to Goree Island, which was one of the four communes (cities) where people were French citizens during colonization (as opposed to everywhere else where they were subjects). It was the main slave port in the area, although Senegal wasn't one of the biggest slave export areas. I'll have another entry to write by some time next week and will be able to include that trip, hopefully with a couple of photos. I'm still adjusting and the cultural learning curve is a challenge, but that's exactly why I came here so I'm really glad about everything!

Thanks for reading,
Amanda

P.S. I am a toubab. Did I mention this already? Originally it meant white person but it's been extended to mean any type of foreigner or outsider. I and the other students regularly are referred to as toubabs within our families, etc. There are actually a surprisingly large number of toubabs in Dakar. When I see other white people, who are mostly tourists or are wearing sun glasses and driving nice cars, I usually avert my eyes. I've discussed this with my friends in the program and they feel similarly. It's generally awkward. In the US one thinks of outsiders as lower on the power scale and usually with less privilege, but generally it's the other way around here so I've been thinking about that a lot, as I had expected. It's really weird. Why bother flaunting how much money you have, you know? Why bother pretending your back home by walking your dog, going to posh restaurants, and driving your SUV, when clearly you are somewhere else? Why not embrace? I don't know.

P.S.S. This p.s.s. is especially for my mom but anyone can read it: The sheets were a BIG hit! They loved the sheets a lot. And here it's so hot you only use one sheet and don't have anything over you, so it's really like two sheets for them. And the lotion was a big hit too, as well as the coloring books.