Hi All!
Inshallah we will return to thematic blog posts shortly, as
purely chronological posts are a touch lame but do serve their purpose of
keeping you all abreast of the goings on here, though in a slightly delayed
manner, what with their once-monthly publication. Think of it as a really interesting magazine subscription,
that’s free, and like many magazines, more photos than substance! Maybe soon we’ll include posts like 10 Sexy Ways to Snag a Second Wife! and
go full-on Senegalese Cosmo. In order to do that we’d have to learn
a lot more slang and thinly veiled sexual puns in Wolof. We have a hard enough time just
speaking in the proper tense, so we’ll probably just stick to topics like food
and/or transportation here. But
for now, enjoy reading about what we did in March! In order to save myself from using the phrase, “and then
after that we…” over and over again, I’m going to break it down into
events/themes. Hopefully it’s
deliciously digestible.
Permaculture
Challenge!
One of the final elements of our PST2 training was what was
called the Permaculture Challenge.
For those of you not familiar with permaculture, it is a school of
thought and set of design tools that aids in designing closed-loop agricultural
systems that, as closely as possible, imitate nature. A bit jargon-y, but it’s hard to discuss the super-hot topic
of “sustainability,” especially in agriculture, without eventually arriving at,
and recognizing the elegance in, permaculture. The challenge took us to Youssoupha Boye’s farm (he’s one of
our agricultural Program Technical Assistants, or PTA). There we were separated into 7 groups
(4-5 per group) and given a section of his field (ours was ~16m x 20m) in which
to design and implement a program that demonstrated our knowledge of
permaculture. We had from 9am to
4pm and would be graded half on design, and half on implementation. The coolest part, was that Youssoupha,
a lover of permaculture, would then have his laborer complete the
implementation and plant things in accordance with our designs. It was really cool to not just be going
through the motions, but rather helping a friend, and wonderful man, improve
his farm and the livelihood of his family.
Four of the groups had very interesting plots of land with
soft, rolling topography, dappled shade from the giant acacias overhead, and very
close water access. In other
words, space perfect for really aesthetically pleasing terraced beds in which
one could plant vegetables, with water-hungry fruit trees beautifully interspersed
between. The other three groups
(one of which was ours) all had relatively flat, shade-less (and, dare I say,
mundane) plots of land, which would only be well-suited for field crops and
less-finicky fruit trees.
For those of you who know Kait well, it’s not surprising
that she had been chomping at the bit for this day for quite some time. In fact, AgFo volunteers aren’t invited
on this field trip (just the SusAgs and UAgs) but she got special permission,
because premaculture is kind of her thing. We weren’t even supposed to be on the same team, as they
were assigned randomly. We were
just clever enough to stand exactly seven people away from each other: Gaming
the System 101. Being no fool, I
knew that having her on my team was just a sensible investment. Especially since the prize was 2000 CFA
per person at our favorite watering hole.
We knew we weren’t going to have the coolest final result, since our
plot was relatively “blah,” and rather large, so we threw all of our eggs into
the really-well-thought-out-design basket, rather than the
really-cool-implementation basket.
When other teams were digging beds and zai holes and building terraces
we were still sitting in the shade (which was not located on our rectangle) and
discussing/drawing our design.
Each group was allowed to ask 10 “yes or no” question over the course of
the day. Through deliberative,
some would say miserly, use of the questions, we were able to gain a wealth of
information about what Youssoupha wanted to grow in the space, and with this,
and a rock-solid knowledge of the permaculture tool-box, we were (read: “Kait
was”) able to create a beautiful design involving intercropping field crops and
nitrogen fixers, shrubby windbreaks that also grow edible beans, pole beans climbing
millet stalks, a contour berm to slow water run-off upon which we planted
trees, grasses, and other climbers, just to give you a small glimpse into the
intricacy and interdependence of the design.
We built the contour berm in relatively short order. Unfortunately to fill our plot with the
zai
holes in which we recommended the millet (our central crop, around
which the rest of the design revolved) be planted, we would need to dig just
shy of 600 holes. Granted, a zai
hole for millet is only 30cmx30cmx20cm, but digging 600 of them means
displacing ~11 cubic meters of soil, which is quite a bit. We got about 100 dug, along with each
of their necessary berm on the downhill-side, before we ran out of time.
We knew our implementation score would be kind of in the
toilet, but had faith that our design was excellent. After all the judges (the Training Coordinator, PCVLs, PCV
guest trainers, and Youssoupha) conferred later that day, back at the TTC, they
decided that they would be unable to pick a single winner, due to differences
in plot-type, and because those who had great implementation had crappy design,
and vice versa. They settled upon
giving one prize for design, and one for implementation. To the great surprise of virtually no
one (since most know of Kait’s love of, and skills with, permaculture) but to
the exhilaration of the four members of our team, we won for best design. The only thing better than cheap,
ice-cold beers after a long day of laboring in the sun is free, ice-cold beers after a long day laboring in the sun. And there was much rejoicing, but
little high-fiving, as most people had more blisters than they would like to
admit.
The Triumphant Return... to Tassette
The end of our time at PST2 marked our first return to our
CBT family in Tassette, the big family in the little town that defined so much
of our early experiences in country.
You’ll all be happy to know that they’re all in peace only. We were slightly dreading it, or more
specifically really ready to be heading home to Géo. However, we knew it would be like all of our phone conversations
with the Thiaw clan, we dread it ahead of time (knowing we’ll have to speak
with every single member of the family over a scratchy phone connection that
makes understanding Wolof next to impossible) only to have big smiles on our
faces, so happy to have done it afterward. This was indeed the case. We had a great time!
Relevant changes since we left…
Mohammed is waaay bigger, though just as smiley! The family thinks we know Wolof so well! This is obviously not true, except when seen in comparison
to where we were when we lived with them.
It’s like having a two-year-old, who can speak enough to ensure their
basic needs are met, leave home for a few months only to return a six-year-old
who sometimes talks about things in the past as though they’re happening right
now, and occasionally says something totally nonsensical, but is generally
understood okay. On one hand,
that’s four years of growth in fewer months. On the other hand, imagine a six-year-old discussing
agriculture with a farmer who has 40 years of experience and that’s how silly
we feel sometimes. One pleasant
side-effect of our enhanced language skills is that we were able to understand
about 25% of what our maam (grandma
for those of you not taking Wolof notes) said. This was a huge uptick from our previous level, when we were
hovering between .5% and 1%.
Technically what is probably the biggest news is our aunt (Fatimata) who
got married in December, just after we left, is now pregnant. (Pregnancy is not discussed here,
largely out of superstition, evading the evil-eye and all that. We’ve even heard it referred to as “a
problem in her stomach” by one of our work partners.) It didn’t come up, until Kait put together that she said
she’d been tired and sick a lot lately, and then she didn’t eat hardly anything
at lunch. Kait asked about it in
as culturally sensitive a way as possible, and they stared, wide-eyed in
amazement at her deductive prowess.
“You see everything!” said our yaay.
 |
| No family photo is complete without the random, unknown neighbor inserting himself into the photo. In this one we were lucky enough to capture said character picking his nose and eating it. Jackpot! |
Other than that, life is pretty much as we left it, though
perhaps a bit quieter without the pack of Americans spicing things up for
everyone. Luckily, the day after we visited, Tassette was to get another group
of PCTs from the most recent stage of Health and Community Economic Development
(CED) trainees. We hope that the
second trainee to live/learn with them has to deal with fewer of the growing
pains than we had to, what with our being the first. We specifically and repeatedly reminded our family about how
we didn’t know anything and couldn’t say anything when we first arrived. Hopefully they will remember, and not
insist upon comparing the new PCT’s Wolof at the beginning, with our Wolof
now. It seems obvious to us that
this would be a completely unfair comparison, but it happens pretty frequently.
Those of you who know Kait know that she loves to find
connections anywhere and everywhere, and that many things, people, and events
often come “full circle” in her life.
Before coming to Senegal, her Aunt Janet saw a documentary about Tostan,
an American NGO in Senegal working toward female education and empowerment.
Aunt Janet told Sue about it, and Sue bought the book, However Long the Night,
that chronicles the history of Tostan through the biography of its founder,
Molly Melching, and gifted it to Kait to read before departing for
Senegal. Turns out that
connections between PC Senegal and Tostan abound (Molly is a Peace Corps
Senegal RPCV- Returned Peace Corps Volunteer- herself), and that we have come
across various clues of Tostan’s education initiatives in various communities
where we have studied, visited and worked. This was pretty exciting.
In Tassette, our family had several Tostan books from the
Tostan female literacy classes our mother attended. Other host families had
these as well, and sometimes the women talked about attending Tostan classes to
learn about reading.
When we returned to Tassette, where we had lived for months
on and off, imagine Kait’s delight to find the 3 women (our host mother, and
host mothers of 2 other volunteers) most important to our experience in
Tassette in the middle of a Tostan early childhood development class. Imagine
her further delight, when after sitting in on the class for half an hour, the
teacher asked if she understood what they were talking about [in Wolof]. She
did! They were discussing and demonstrating the importance of tactile and
verbal learning in early childhood development. This is where it really came full circle.
It’s a pretty cool experience to read about an organization
doing good work in a foreign country, and after traveling to and integrating
into that place, learning [one of the] the local language(s), and establishing
relationships with people, to see firsthand the work of that organization.
 |
| Kait, Xadi Ka, Adama Diop, and Aida Diop. Four powerful women. |
The Tostan teacher was so excited that we were there, and
that we understood what was happening in her class, that she gifted us with a
book that has become a favorite for our siblings. They can’t yet read Wolof,
but they love to look at the pictures and make up their own version of the
story. We can’t read Wolof well
enough to completely understand what’s happening in the book, but as far as we
can tell, it’s similar to the plot of Dr. Seuss’ book about Star Belly
Sneetches, except instead of there being a conflict over who has stars upon
thar’s, there’s conflict over length of neck… and less clever rhyming. Morale: appreciate differences and love
everyone!
Coming Home!
Although our visit to Tassette was delightful, we were both
so ready to get home to Géo and the
Diops.
Our time away was by far
the longest we’ve been away yet (and hopefully the longest we are ever away,
unless perhaps we come back to America for a while) and we really missed our
family.
Upon arriving home, we
found that our family may have even missed us more than we missed them. Our mutual happiness, and our love of the town that has come
to be our home can best be summarized by the well-known
Docteur Maestro Keïta song. We’ve all heard it! Don’t be shy, sing along!
We immediately fell back into the swing of things: “human jungle gym” and “trot trot to
Boston” with the kids, deep conversations with baay, and snuggles with yaay and
the pets… though not simultaneously.
We’ve decided that we’re happiest when we’re home in Géo with our
family. Since we know so many PCVs
have troubles with their site/family and are in constant need of escape to regional
capitals to maintain their sanity, we are incredibly grateful that at our site,
with our family, we are happiest.
Teeth and Absence of
Teeth
This month brought many exciting development in the field of
teeth. (Dental enthusiasts read on!)
Our yaay has some tooth issues.
They began when she was pregnant with Papa Gorré but probably weren’t
helped by her insatiable love of sugar and boundless hatred of vegetables. Anyway, the end result was a few trips
to the Guinguinéo hospital to have several teeth removed. For those of you who have had teeth
removed that weren’t quite ready to fall out on their own, you know how painful
it can be. She was out of
commission for a few days after one of the visits (in which she had four teeth
yanked) so we volunteered to make some meals for the whole family.
We treated them to such American delicacies as grilled
cheese and mac n’ cheese. Only baay,
his employee/our quasi-brother Sidy, and our cousin Ndiaye liked the grilled
cheese. The little kids preferred
plain bread, the little Cretans!
Mac n’ cheese, however, was a raging hit for all parties involved. Even yaay was able to eat it, as it was
quite soft. The funniest part of
the mac n’ cheese mean was baay’s comment when we brought it out… basic translation:
“You should teach Bani (yaay) to make meals like this. It is healthy. It has no oil.” Kait and I exchanged humored glances,
but refrained from telling baay that although there is no oil in the dish,
that’s only because there was a ton of margarine in it and enough powdered milk
to feed all the kittens in town, to say nothing of the “vache qui rit” cheese
wedges. I think it’s good for
everyone’s health that yaay is good at making ceeb u jën, despite the oil in
it, and mac n’ cheese remains an exotic mystery.
There are three other members of the family who are actively
losing teeth, though mercifully because they are in the life stage in which
this is normal. One of them is
Soda, who had been wiggling a tooth for several weeks, but was always a bit
squeamish when it came to the actual removal of said tooth. I have vivid memories of my wonderful
father stepping up to the plate for all the Fritsche kids when it was time to
lose a tooth, and as gently as possible giving it a stout yank, and rewarding
us with both praise and a frozen treat.
I felt like I had the playbook down pat, so I volunteered to help Soda
with the removal. She kept
insisting that I remove it ndank ndank,
or “slowly slowly.” Promising to
do just that, and using a bandana for grip, (dad always used a paper towel) I
promised to yank it on ñett (three). Benn, ñaar YANK, ñett. A smooth release, only a little
bleeding, and a smile back on her face almost immediately. If she was mad at being deceived by the
classic “we’ll go on three” deception, she didn’t show it. I regret not having a radi (frozen little baggy of fruit
juice) to stand in for the Mr. Freeze pop I always got, but I at least had some
salt water for swishing, and some ice water for drinking. All-in-all, it was way more of a glimpse
into my future, which I hope is largely defined around fatherhood, than I would
have expected from a commonplace dental procedure. Heart-warming stuff.
As you may have deduced from the above photo collage, the
other two family members who are losing teeth are in fact not human. Both Happy Cat and Lady Obama are
losing their respective kitten/puppy teeth. We managed to find/save LO’s lower two canines, and are
thinking about getting a gris gris made.
Perhaps we’ll have them made into a charm that will make her not a crazy, wild
beast. Anyway, their teething has
made their already energetic behavior much mouthier. This makes them decidedly not good at their appointed roles
of Mr. and Mrs. The Honorable Ambassadors of Pet Ownership to Senegal. Nothing makes people who are already
scared of animals quite as super-terrified as getting nipped by a puppy, or
pounced upon by a kitten, however playful and non-malicious the animals’ intentions
may be. However, having said that,
some small steps are being made.
Pets: The Feline Ambassador and The Canine
Nightmare
For all my early doubts about the problems we were inviting
by adopting a handicapped cat, I often find myself say, “thank goodness he’s so
handicapped!” This is largely
because he’s pretty physically harmless, and consequentially better at his job
(as stated above). He lacks the
ability to strike with his front paws, which makes him way less scary than any
other cat I’ve ever met. The kids
sometimes pet him, and Fallou even picks him up sometimes.
One day after lunch, Happy Cat wanted to socialize with the
family. We were sitting outside in
the shade and HC inserted himself into the conversation by jumping up into
Baay’s lap and deciding that’s where he wanted to stay. The progression of Baay’s commentary
was a hilarious glimpse into how quickly one sweet pet can warm someone to
their presence…
Baay: Happy Cat,
yaangiy toog ci samay tank! Doo sama moroom! (HC, you’re sitting on my
legs! You’re not my equal!)
Happy Cat:
Prrrrrrrrprrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr
5 minutes pass.
Baay: Kii, xalaat
na ne dafa nekk ñit. (Him, he
thinks that he’s a person.)
Happy Cat:
Prrrrrprrprrrrrrrrrrrr
5 more minutes pass and it’s time to take HC inside to feed
him his lunch.
Baay: Bayi ko!... Baax na, waaye yeewu ko ndank. Mungiy nelaw.
(Leave him! Okay, but wake
him up slowly. He’s sleeping.)
Lady Obama is decidedly less good at convincing people that dogs
are pleasant pets to keep. We know
she’s not to blame for her crazy levels of energy. She’s still a puppy.
A puppy who spends most of the day in a relatively small, but
delightfully plush and shady by African village dog standards, enclosure. Whenever she’s out of her enclosure, she
runs around like a wild beast.
Chasing sticks, killing locusts, harrying cats, eating whatever sheep
guts she can find. We spend some
time trying to train her, but it’s the most discouraging thing in the
world. She’s a crazy thing when
she’s not enclosed. Unfortunately
simply letting her come and go as she pleases isn’t a real solution because she
get’s nippy with the young’ns and even nippier if they run away… what with
instincts and all that. We’ve been
letting her roam at night, which has been good, and also lets her fill her role
as a guard dog protecting the whole family. There are some growing pains, but the family really does
like her, albeit at a distance, and lady does really seem to love her life
here, albeit with a little less freedom than she would like. Everyone is compromising, and each is
better off for the existence of the other. We’re still waiting for her to fully embrace her role as a
canine ambassador. If only she was
a just a little bit handicapped too.
Our Bosses Come A-Calling
This past month, a boss from each of our respective programs
came to Guinguinéo for a “site visit.”
My boss, Famara Massaly, Associate Peace Corps Director (APCD) of the
Agriculture program, came to spend the morning with us, and his visit was very helpful
and interesting. It was great to
get an outside perspective, bounce ideas off of him, and have his fluency in
English and Wolof to make sure I’m on the same page as my counterparts. We chatted with my two counterparts,
and then trucked out to the Master Farm with which we’ll be working. Our master farmer is on a short list of
underperformers, so that visit was mostly us sitting silently while Massaly
gave him the verbal lashing that he needed in a culturally appropriate way that
we would never have been able to swing.
We’ll be checking back in with the MF every 10ish days and hopefully
helping him turn his perpetual short-comings around. Cross your fingers for us… but mostly for our master farmer,
as the consequences of continued failings despite being on the probationary
list won't be particularly good for him.
My boss’ visit was productive, clarifying, and overall quite
enjoyable. Kait’s boss’ site visit
was nothing short of great.
Cherif Djitte, PTA of the AgroForestry program, came to spend
the day with us in Guinguinéo and Nguick.
The primary purpose for his visit was to help Kait run a training on
filling tree sacks and building tree peppiñeers (nurseries). When I decided I would write the
rundown for this past month, my mind immediately went here. “Great!” I thought. “I’ll be able to brag about Kait, which
she richly deserves, in a way she would never brag about herself!” It’s hard to recap, for someone who
wasn’t in attendance, how much she crushed this training, but let me assure you,
she crushed it! Everyone was
engaged and participating. Her
Wolof was clear. She kept asking
questions to see if people knew why things should be done certain ways. After she/Djitte taught something,
she’d wait a few minutes and then ask people to recall what they had been
taught, to make sure they were retaining it. After the training, Mackiny, her counterpart, had a
peppiñeer with 50 filled tree sacks, and everyone was really enthusiastic about
making their own peppiñeer and we knew they had the skills to do it. This is not to say that they all will,
but the training went literally as well as it could have.
My impression was confirmed when Djitte spent the bulk of
the ride back from Nguick (~15 minutes) raving about how impressed he was with
Kaitlin. He even said that her
Wolof was better than some second year volunteers, which he assured us he could
say with authority because he was currently on a nation-wide tour of site
visits. We’re both pretty sure
that he may have been exaggerating slightly, or at least aggressively
extrapolating from the fact that we chose to converse in Wolof rather than
English whenever possible, despite the fact that he’s totally fluent in
English. Regardless, he was positively
giddy, which had a similar effect on us.
And there was much rejoicing.
The Migratory
Patterns of the Elusive Tubaab
Two American CIEE (Kait’s former employer) study abroad
students joined us for 5 days, to get a taste of the rural life. It’s a
required part of their program, since the flashy Dakar life is a far cry from
how most Senegalese people live. Though our life in Géo is still very different from how much
of Senegal lives, it’s a lot closer than Dakar. They seemed a bit shell-shocked, but got on with the family
well and for the most part tagged along on our activities in and around
town. Hopefully they had a good
time with their “authentic” Senegal experience.
The most relevant and life-altering migration was that of
our site mate, Rin Maurer aka Mengue Ndiaye, migrating onward with her life and
away from Géo. She is completing
her service and heading back to America.
She will be resettling in the great state of Georgia (which she should
find positively chilly) to attend a masters program at Emory. We’re very excited for her, but she
will be missed, both by us, and the wonderful Ndiaye family she’s left
behind. (as wonderful as anyone
with the last name Ndiaye can be… more on our distrust of Ndiayes in the future
episode, “Ndiayes, and Why They Like Rice SO MUCH!”)
Paradise Found
What makes a lush mangrove delta even more magical? Baobob
trees! Last weekend we ventured to Toubakouta, just a few hours southwest of
us, on the coast. It’s not easily
accessible- think a post-apocalyptic-looking road with more potholes than
asphalt- so it has the feel of being “undiscovered.” There’s a Peace Corps
regional house/office there, right next to a beautiful resort that welcomes PC
volunteers to patronize its well-stocked bar and enjoy the pristine swimming
pool and beautiful grounds, including the dock!
 |
| And the 63cl beers only cost 1000cfa... (translated: the ~22oz beers only cost $2) |
We went there to celebrate the birthday of our ancienne,
Caitlin Healy. We also decided to
co-opt the weekend as a mini-honeymoon for ourselves, as we still haven’t
really had one yet (but our Botswana safari is impending!) It was an incredibly fun and relaxing
weekend! We’re happy to have found
a delightful place to escape that is waaay cooler and waaaay cheaper than where
we had our previous mini honeymoon, The Hotel Relais in Kaolack. How many mini-honeymoons is one couple
allowed to have you may ask… well as many as we dang well please.
 |
| No honeymoon would be complete without a leaky boat, a pretty sunset, and plenty of hermit crabs. |
 |
| Could easily be Florida, if not for the Baobabs on the horizon. |
For those of you considering visiting us in Senegal, this is
what your vacation could look like. That’s of course after we visit
Kedougou in the southeast to see
chimpanzees, Tamba to the east to go on safari in
Niokolo Koba National Park, and
Lompoul to the northwest to ride camels on giant desert sand dunes.
I can almost hear your fingers clickclicking over the
computer keys as you frantically navigate to Vayama or Kayak to look at airline
ticket prices…
In conclusion, it’s been another great month. Despite the fun we’re having here, and
how supported we are, we think of you all often and miss you all very
much! Sending all our love to you.
Looking forward, April will bring…
-The wedding of Sidy, baay’s helper in the dibi, and our
honorary [big] little brother (he’s into weightlifting).
-Peace Corps Conferences for our respective sectors. The
training never ends!
-Focusing on our peppiñeering work.
-Trying not to die as the crazy heat gets even crazy hotter.
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