5 Week Challenge Part 1: Initiation

I made my first village friend today.  She lives in my compound and is always the very first to greet me whenever I return home. Always on her face she wears the biggest of grins which somehow manages to grow even larger than its limits whenever I start dancing to her clapping and rhythmic clicks (#saylafreak) – like the Grinch’s heart when the Whos of Whoville start Christmas caroling despite the fact that all their presents have been taken.  And although she is incessantly covered in dirt, with sticky mango hands and trains of snot pouring out of her nose like melting silly putty, she is, nonetheless, unimaginably beautiful.  Her name is Allahmuta and she is 5 years old.

Allahmuta and I officially became friends (at least in my mind), the day we invented the “car game”. This is a game in which she climbs onto my lap, takes one of each of my hands in hers, and then pushes left or right as if she is driving a car and turning the steering wheel. I, being the car, respond swiftly by leaning ferociously into the turn so that we both go almost entirely horizontal while simultaneously making the associated vroom, screetch, reving, acceleration, and bumbling motor sounds with my mouth as I see fit.

I can’t say she is someone I will confide in ever, or whose shoulder I will cry on in my darkest of days, but I know I can depend on her.  As soon as I get home she is at my side. And as soon as I sit down she climbs onto my lap and turns her gaze to me, enticing me with her big black eyes to play the car game or toto-toto-ta (like duck-duck-goose) or something else. She is a wonderful face to look forward to seeing every day.

In my first days in village it is these simple human-to-human connections that I cling to.  After initial installation into their village, Peace Corps Senegal volunteers are challenged to stay in their village every day for 5 straight weeks to fosters language learning and relationship building that will be a crucial foundation for the two years of service.  Five weeks may not sound like very long in the scheme of things but it is a long time to relinquish all activities you are used to doing that are not culturally relevant here.  Once volunteers have been serving for a few months it is not uncommon for them to go escape to the Peace Corps house in their regional capital for a pause every couple weeks in order to take a day to eat whatever they want, speak whatever language they want, use the internet, spend time alone (which is otherwise not culturally appropriate), etc. for the sake of preserving mental sanity and physical health over the long term.  Staying in village every night for 5 weeks is truly a challenge.  Less than a week in I am already growing tired of the rice and leaf sauce, devoid of any real taste or nutritional value, that we eat every day for lunch.  So in these 5 weeks, I have to concentrate on the positives. And these most basic moments of true understanding and connection – linguistic or otherwise – give worth to my whole day and my presence here in this new and exciting but strange and confusing place.

Another one of these moments came my first day at the hospital. My anciens spent much of their time there and I was advised to do the same in order to make connections for future projects. Therefore, after a few days of setting up my hut and sitting with my new family, I decided to wander over.  I wasn't exactly sure what to expect since I had not yet met my official Peace Corps work counterpart, a midwife who works at the hospital.  I knew that most people who work there only speak French and Wolof so communication would be an issue. Before even arriving to the hospital however, I ran into Dr. Ba, one of three doctors staffing the hospital on rotation, who offered me a ride in the hospital car.

Upon arrival he showed me around and introduced me to some of the people that, I’m sure, will become very familiar faces.  He then offered me a white coat and invited me to sit in on patient consultations. After having worked in a hospital in the US and having had extensive training on the American philosophy of medical privacy, I was a little hesitant to accept his offer on the basis that I do believe these patients, regardless of their geographic location, deserve privacy, dignity and respect.  However, I also knew that having a general understanding of the types of health issues prevalent in this region would be crucial for my work, so I begrudgingly accepted.

All of this, mind you, took place somewhere linguistically between French and miming. I have almost no faith in my ability to speak French given that I have never in my life taken a French class and my usual methodology for speaking French is to speak Spanish with what I believe is a French accent and hope that it is understood.  I didn't say much all morning because of that, and because I didn't want to get in the way of patient care.  But when all the patients had been seen, Dr. Ba then turned to me and began to ask me questions about myself.

He started with, “What state are you from?”

I answered that I am from California.

His face illuminated with recognition and he said, “Like Tupac?”

“Yes,” I said. “We are from the same village.” (Tupac also grew up in Marin County).

Very bemused he said, “Really?!? So tell me, is he actually dead?”

We then proceeded to have a conversation for a good ten minutes, in French, about the fate of Tupac, the whereabouts of his body, and the type of people that might initiate such a conspiracy theory about whether or not he faked his own death.  In the end we agreed to disagree. He believes that Tupac is still alive. While I would not be disappointed to discover that is the truth, I myself am a little skeptical.

I went home for lunch that day though, reflecting on my conversation, riding a whole new high from this moment of understanding. If three days into village life I am having debates about the mortal fate of famous rappers in French, I can’t wait to see what my French becomes after two years here.  And I can’t wait for more moments of connection.

Dr. Ba also asked me at one point what I wanted Senegalese people to know about Americans and I told him that we are more alike than we are different.  He provided several points to the contrary regarding our government, the structure of our families, our language, our skin color, etc. but I believe these moments prove otherwise.

Maybe he doesn't like American politics regarding the utter disregard of the United Nations processes or the growing acceptance of gay marriage. Maybe he grew up in a family with a father that had two wives and 15 children.  Maybe he speaks Pulaar at home, Wolof in his community and French in schooling and business.  But we can both get in on a conversation about Tupac.

And somehow I think that speaks to more significant things we have in common as humans, as music-lovers, and as citizens of this world.

May 9th, 2014

On May 9th, 2014 I participated in a ceremony at the house of the Lewis Luekens, the current US Ambassador to Senegal, in which I took the oath to officially become a Peace Corps volunteer.  After 2 long months of intensive language, cultural, health and safety training I am finally moving into my village tomorrow where I will be living for the next two years.

A picture is worth a thousand words so here a few to capture the whirlwind of the last few months of training...

My CBT (Community-Based Training) host family's home and my home for the last 2 months in Mbour, Senegal.

My host family's sheep that regularly attempted to eat my clothing off the clothes line.

Four of my beautiful CBT host sisters on the day of their eldest sister's baby's baptism (from left to right: Fista, Aja, Aminata, Mami)

My CBT host father and his first grandchild at 3 days old.

Some spunky neighborhood girls who taught my to dance at my host niece's baptism.

Me and baby Jameela on the day of her baptism/naming ceremony.

My host sister, Fista, making beignets. NOLA is never too far away...

CBT Family Party at the Thies training center after the completion of training (From left to right: my host sister Mami, my fellow PCV/host sister Kadi, My host mother, myself).

Lamine Savane, my LCF (language-cultural facilitator), and myself.

Some really great people (From left to right: Arielle Kempinsky, Becca Singleton, Tess Komarek, me).

May 9th, 2014 - Swear in of the newest class of health/CED PCVs at the Ambassador Lewis Leukins' house in Dakar, Senegal

The "Gou Crew" - aka the PCVs who are all headed to Kedougou for service - alongside our Peace Corps Country director and former Kedougou volunteer, Chris Hedrick. (From left to right in the back: Michael Lachance, Aaron Persing, Chris Hedrick, me, Nicole Aspros. From left to right in the front: Caroline Johnson, Kadi Magassa, Arielle Kempinsky, Tess Komarek, Laurie Ohlstein).

Me and Mamadou, the health program director

And if a picture is worth a thousand words, I guess a video must be worth a million. The entire ceremony was broadcast on Senegalese TV.

Say La Freak

For me, exercising is a ritual of sanity.  I do it to stay physically healthy, yes.  And I do it because I genuinely enjoy certain forms of exercise like playing volleyball, hiking or running.  But mostly I do it to blow off steam and to clear my head. Exercise keeps me sane.

Finding the time and place for exercise here in Senegal is a little trickier than it is in that States however. For safety reasons and because there are no indoor facilities (i.e. a gym) or other well-let areas to exercise at night, potential exercise hours are limited to daylight hours.  Furthermore, because of the atrocious heat that is thrust upon us during the day there are very limited hours in which the heat is not SO oppressive as to keep you from moving any muscle that you can’t help moving; namely the early morning or early evening. During the hot/dry season in particular (here we have 3 seasons: hot/dry, cold/dry and rainy) that lasts from about March to June, it gets up to 120 degrees in the day and settles in around 100 overnight in some parts of the country.

In general, I try to convince myself to go running in the morning because that is the coolest time to go. I will run from my homestay house down to the beach where a lot of Senegalese people (mostly men) generally go to play soccer, wrestle (Senegalese wrestling is a big sport here), and work out.  I will pause to stretch and do some calisthenics while watching the fishermen in long, colorfully-painted, wooden boats out on the water. Then I will run back. All in all it is a very pleasant form of exercise.

However, if I got to bed late and want to sleep in, or otherwise have things to do in the early-ish morning (the sun doesn’t rise until 7ish so my window for running is usually only open from 7-8am), my opportunity to go running disappears and my sanity starts to go along with it.

The other day, after several missed mornings for running, I was beginning to feel a little anxious and decided that I really want to go exercise but it was already nearing sunset.  I was pondering about where I could possibly go to exercise that would be safe when I realized that my host family’s home had an open roof! I threw on my leggings, grabbed my ipod and yoga mat, and headed up the stairs and outside. It was perfect! I was at home so I didn’t have to worry about being out of my house alone at night. It was cooler than inside the house since there was a decent breeze. Plus, there weren’t a lot of people hanging out on roofs nearby and nobody could see me from the street so I wouldn’t likely be disturbed.

I plugged my headphones in my ears and started going through what I could remember of a routine that we did in an exercise class at Tulane which I frequented. I started with jumping jacks to get warmed up, followed by fancier double-jump jumping jacks and some other kick-boxing type movements.  I was just to the point of blissful, heart-pumping, music blaring, sanity-restoring exercise when suddenly… I heard a snickering creep up behind me. Wearily, I stopped jumping and turned around.  Eight children, all under 4 feet tall, were leaning up against the wall on the roof adjacent to my roof with big eyes and grins so big you could fit a whole slice of cantaloupe in their mouths without moving their lips.

One of the smaller ones - a boy about 5 years old with charcoal skin, scrawny limbs, long eyelashes and a persistent aura of mischievousness, pulled himself up and over the wall from his family’s roof onto my roof.  He then began to hop up and down while flapping his lanky arms to imitate me for the entertainment of his friends and siblings. All of the children giggled and began to follow his lead.

It occurred to me that in that moment I had two choices.

One: Get embarrassed that the kids caught me making a fool of myself, pack it in and forego any exercise.

Or two: Own it. Keep going.

Suddenly, something a friend of mine who just finished her two years of Peace Corps service in Senegal said to me popped into my head:

“My job was basically just village entertainment for two years.”

At the time I laughed at the preposterousness of such a superficial summation of her two years of service but maybe being the village entertainer isn’t such a lame thing; maybe there is power in such a position.  Maybe in some run-around way my exercising production would demonstrate to my audience members that exercise is important. Maybe they would try it out and see that it was fun. Maybe just fun enough to do it themselves?

Say La Freak! is what I say.

Side Bar: Say la freak is a term I am in the process of coining to apply to these situations where white people/foreigners (tubabs as they are called here) in Africa can’t help but stand out and look ridiculous. Say la freak is phonetically how one proclaims in French, “this is Africa” (c’est la Afrique) but in English it sounds like you are embracing the freak-show life.

In this circumstance, say la freak meant that I was not about to stop exercising; I was going to embrace the madness.

Immediately, I ran downstairs to get my battery-powered speaker to attach my ipod so I could play my music aloud for everyone to hear and I proceeded to assume the role of exercise class instructor. Sixteen grubby little hands joined mine, lined up all the way around the edge of my yoga mat, ready for the first series of mountain climbers. Those were followed by burpies, then by Miley squats, then push-ups, lunges, crunches, Russian twists, etc. I offered encouragement with big eyes, big smiles, and overly zealous gestures since there wasn’t any common language that we spoke (these children spoke only Wolof since most were too young to be in formal school where they would otherwise learn French).

Song by song, exercise by exercise we went.  And an hour and a half later, I had completed a pretty good work out.

Many tubabs generally have a hard time with this say la freak attitude towards events. They perceive the laughter of children or adults or whoever as ridicule instead of teasing encouragement. They get embarrassed or frustrated. Often they get angry towards the onlooker for being seemingly disrespectful.  It is definitely understandable that when you have a group of people laughing at you for your weirdness when you don’t see what you are doing as being particularly weird you might easily feel alienated or ashamed.

At the end of the day though, you have to pick your battles and you have to do what you have to do. I had to exercise, so I did. Picking a fight with children over their perception of my work-out routine when they simply perceived it as funny or odd would not have been worth the effort of instigating an argument in a language I don’t speak with children who aren’t likely to care that much about hurting my feelings.

Plus, I just got 8 children to work out for an hour and a half! You know they got their little hearts beating and will sleep well tonight! I can’t say the event really inspired a sustainable behavior change but I can say it was acutely positive for them to get some exercise. And maybe, just maybe, they will show their friends tomorrow about the crazy things the tubab was doing and they will all do more exercise together.

So say la freak. Get weird. If you have an audience, use you stage. Let it empower you.