Journal Entry from 3/5

Once again, my mother has given me some ideas about what to write in my blog. I know it must appear strange that I am at a loss for words, however, I am accustomed to things here. With that said, I think I will begin with a normal day in the life of Brooke (god I feel conceited writing that but hopefully it will be interesting enough...) Note: this will be more an account of the places rather than the activities.

My apartment is a small cluttered one-bedroom with a balcony. When I wake up in the morning I use gas to heat water for my morning coffee. Fortunately I have a refrigerator so I can keep food – mainly spreadable cheese, bread, juice and yogurt. The milk here is powder…it is delicious.

I am able to walk to school although the walk in itself is an obstacle course. Grand-Yoff is bustling so I am constantly trying to avoid people, goats, children, cars, trash, horse carriage things (driven by people of course,) holes in the sidewalk, and random pieces of metal that crowd the ground. I am so glad that I got my Tetanus shot. After a block or two of walking on the main road which is scarcely paved, I turn onto a dirt road which leads to the school. I am constantly hounded by random children as well as students who require a handshake or something resembling one. Throughout the day kids approach me (as well as other adults) to shake hands. This is a custom here, to shake hands with children along the road or at school. If your hand is busy or holding something you simply offer up your wrist for them to shake. Come to think of it, I am really glad I got my Meningitis shot as well.

The school is very plain on the inside. Some of the classrooms have electricity, some do not. The floor of the classrooms is cement and poorly laid cement at that. There is a chalk board in each classroom as well as wooden benches/desks (attached to one another.) Supplies are extremely limited at the school. If children have pencils the pencils look as if they have been handled by a dog for a few days – without erasers and terribly chewed up. Most of the older students use pens to write, however, there are only one or two white-outs for the school. I was in a class one day in which the students were taking an exam. I was in charge of the white out passing it from student to student. Every 10 minutes or so, a student from another class would come to take the white out for use in another class. (If you are reading this, thank you Ana for sending me some white-out, it was greatly appreciated.)

Students dress in anything from jeans and a tee-shirt (resembling an ordinary American kid,) to traditional African dress, to wearing a head-dress in adherence with the strict Muslim code. Surprisingly, even though Senegal is a predominantly Muslim country, one would not think so judging by how women dress here…especially in the clubs. One day while in downtown Dakar I saw a woman wearing what looked like traditional Senegalese dress (made-to-order, bright colored fabric, short sleeved with a boat neck and a long fitted skirt) but the pattern of the fabric was the Chanel Cs. I was sooo pissed that I didn’t have my camera because, well just because I thought it was great. It was like Senegal meets runway Paris.

I eat my meals everyday with Mama Diara, an extremely gentile, caring woman. She lives very close to my apartment so it takes me only a few minutes to walk there. Walking to her house I pass many boutiques (equivalent to a NY bodega,) tiny stores selling clothes or house wares, a small school (itsy bitsy by our standards,) hardware stores, etc. Again, the streets are very busy here. There are apartment buildings a few stories high, tin shacks and houses along the road. Everything appears to be under construction considering it is either not painted or not entirely built.

Mama Diara’s house is located off a main road (which is off the main road) in a small alleyway. From the outside, one can see a white wall with a large brass door painted light blue. It is very quaint I might add. When opening the door you step down onto an open dirt space which houses their goat and restroom. A curtain covers the opening to the main living area where normally, I find Mama Diara sitting happily on the couch watching TV and tending to the meal. The room is small with a TV, telephone, two couches and a chair. Even though the spaces are small here – I never really feel cramped. Maybe it’s because Senegal is such a communal place where people find comfort in being around one another. Branching off from the living room there is a small bedroom where Mama Diara sleeps. If you continue walking a few steps after entering the big blue door and passing the goat, you will find another bedroom. In actuality, Mama Diara’s house really is under construction so I am not really sure how things looked before or will look after once they are finished. Regardless, I have come to love this house.

3/?/07

I visited Goree Island last week on a field trip with the students. It was an incredibly beautiful island, which is slightly ironic considering the amount of bad things that took place there. Goree Island is where the European’s housed the slaves before shipping them off to their various destinations. “The House of Slaves” is a large round building painted in a bright red color. The house is filled with small rooms labeled on the outside with “femmes,” “garcons,” and “enfants,” (women, men, and children.)

After visiting the “House of Slaves,” and the various museums we spent the rest of the afternoon on the beach. I decided to go swimming in my sports bra and skirt –which turned out to be the perfect attire. The students were ecstatic that I was swimming…

The following night I left for Thies (pronounced Chess) with a teacher from the school called Sorna. She had invited me to spend the weekend there with her and her family. I was excited considering that I had heard a ton of people talk about Thies which is approx. one hour and a half from Grand-Yoff. Sorna and I arrived just in time for lunch. We ate and immediately left for the market to walk around. It was extremely hot so we left fairly early to return home. I was a bit on the tired side so we crashed around midnight after a little excursion on the town.

In the morning Sorna and I walked to the local market to pick up food to prepare for lunch. Everything is prepared fresh so we bought just enough for the meal. It was understood that I was to prepare the meal for lunch (chepujan sp?)with the help of Sorna. This is the main dish in Senegal so I figured I would give it a shot. It was much harder than I had anticipated and it took about 3 hours to prepare. I now realize why the Senegalese people say “eat, eat, eat” at every meal. It is because the meal took three hours to prepare. No exaggeration.