Ram-a-lam aka Tobaski

Written on November 18th, 2010

For someone who was a vegetarian for a large portion of my young adult like I have witnessed my fair share of ram slaughter. Wednesday marked my second Tobaski spent as a PCV in The Gambia. Tobaski is the holiday that falls two lunar months after the end of Ramadan and its a BIG holiday--Halloween, Thanksgiving and Christmas all rolled into one. The days agenda includes praying, asking Allah and each other to forgive us for any of our known or unknown offenses, eating as much ram meat as humanly possible, showing off the newest and fanciest clothes, shoes and hairdos and going from compound to compound, house to house asking for money, candy or groundnuts.

The morning started with the men, older women, children and Ramatoulie, (the toubab exempted from normal social norms) going to the big mosque in the village for communal prayer. I always go back and forth on whether its acceptable/OK for me to use my toubab card to go pray/observe prayer when (1) I'm not Muslim and (2) all other women my age can't go pray. For Tobaski though I wanted to see what that experience was like and my little sister Fatou was pretty insistent that I go with her. So I wrapped up my head, put on my fancy new complet and headed off. When we got there we set up our mat among all the older women from our side of the village and they all clucked about my clothes and braids and helped me put on my shawl correctly.

The communal prayer was a very moving and powerful experience for me. Now people may want to debated the ethics of participating in a Muslim prayer service as a non-Muslim but for me this wasn't about being a Muslim or not. As we stood and knelt and placed our foreheads on the mat I thought about my blessings and how my experience here consistently reaffirms my belief that kindness and understanding is what can connect us all and that these ideals are more powerful than religion, race, gender and nationality. Finally, I prayed because I could think of no better way to express my joy and gratitude for the place the community of KJJ has made for me within it. After the prayer I shook hands with all the women who truly provide me with so much inspiration and motivation to continue my work here. Any lingering fear of how my act of prayer would be received was assuaged when I came across a teacher from our village later in the day. He told me he had seen me shaking hands with the old women at the end of the prayer. He said that he was very touched and he though "That's what a human being should be." I don't think I can get any better affirmation than that that I made the right decision.

After prayer came the ram sacrifice which starts the feasting of Tobaski. Every compound slaughters at least one ram, with larger compounds having more so in my village of 60+ compounds there were at least 100 rams slaughtered. That's alot of meat. After they are killed and cleaned children are sent all around the village with platters and bowls with piles of meat to be given out for charity. We gave away probably half our ram but received the same, if not more, back in the end so its probably safe to say that my compound, of about 15 people consumed a whole ram. Now half the compound has diarrhea (luckily not me) but that's a story for another day. The entire morning we spent cooking up "sauce" (potatoes, oil, onions, pepper, Jumbo, mustard and vinegar) which we inhaled hungrily around 4 pm with the two neighboring compounds. We all squatted around our bowls and dug in, scooping out sauce with our fingers and little pieces of bread. A very Gambian Thanksgiving.

After lunch was time for the adults to sit around and drink attaya while the kids put on their fancy new outfits and go salibo--which is basically trick or treating. They go from compound to compound in groups of four or five and collect minties, dalasi or groundnuts. The minties they consume immediately while the dalasi and groundnuts (which they sell for dalasi) will either be divided up amongst them or used to buy milk and attaya and radio batteries for a party. The difference between salibo and trick or treating however is that once the sunsets adults head out too. I went with my host sister, Mbayang, and some other girls from our part of the village. We walked along in the moonlight, ran into other salibo-ers, stopped to admire each others outfits and walked on. We stopped into the compounds of friends and family and asked for their forgiveness then they would give us dalasi and we would walk on. After about two hours we had been all over the village and pulled in over D100. By salibo or Halloween standards that's a good haul.

Back in my compound by 11 pm I lay out on my mat, stared up at the almost full moon and listened to the music blaring from some compound on the other side of the village. I had health, happiness and a belly full of ram--if that isn't being blessed I don't know what is.

HIV/AIDS Education Bike Trek!!

Written on November 8th, 2010

Last week myself and eight other volunteers set off on an HIV/AIDS Education Bike trek from Barra to Farafenni (over 110 km). We stopped at five schools along the way, teaching 160 students at each school for a total of 800 students. At the same time two other teams of ten volunteers were doing the same thing in the area surrounding Farafenni and in the Central River Region (CRR) from Janjanbureh to Farafenni. In one week our group of volunteers, supported by counterparts from the National AIDS Secretariat, reached 15 schools and over 2,500 Gambian upper basic (middle school) students, teaching them a 4+ hour lesson on HIV/AIDS risk, transmission, protection and stigma. What a week for Peace Corps The Gambia!
Along with Erica, I was in charge of the planning and coordination for the team that went from Barra to Farafenni. This meant feeding, housing, coordinating and motivating our team of PCVs and two members of the Gambian Cycling Association, Edi and Musa, who joined our team. Based on how inspiring and motivated our fellow volunteers are it was all in all a relatively easy task to keep it all going and together during the week. For the month before Erica and I lived and breathed bike trek but once everyone else showed up our job was made so easy. We had a team of amazing, strong, motivated and competent volunteers who all stepped up and gave their all to make this project a success.
So how did we spend our days? We would wake up every morning and go to the school where we would be teaching for the day. In teams of two PCVs we would break into four classes of forty students each. For the next 4+ hours we would work our way through the lesson "HIV/AIDS: Finding your own voice." The lesson featured lecture, games, drawings and diagrams and drama all aimed at teaching the students about HIV and encouraging them to feel confident to talk about HIV with their friends and family.
For most of the week we taught Grade 9 students and teaching in the Gambian classroom definitely presented its fair share of challenges. For one thing learning here is very strongly focused on memorization and regurgitation. Independent and abstract though is not really fostered and students often fear contributing unless they know the correct answer so getting them to "take a guess" is very difficult. The classroom atmosphere is very teacher centric--the teacher stands at the front of the class and talks at the students. The way we as Americans teach students is in a very child centered way and this is completely foreign to the students. It takes them a while to realize that we're not going to chastise them if they get the answer wrong or yell at them for asking a question if they don't understand something. Additionally, though most of these students understand a fair amount of English there was still a pretty high language barrier. We asked all schools to put two teachers in each classroom to observe and also to help translate things into local language when that became necessary. When the teachers were present, both physically and mentally, it worked out great but when that wasn't the case teaching and classroom management were definitely difficult. There were, despite the challenges, many times during the week when you could see something in a students mind click with understanding. When explaining how HIV attacks the immune system we drew a picture of the human body, the picture looks kind of like a football play with viruses coming in to the body to make it sick and how the immune system, or "blood soldiers", attack the virus to keep the body healthy. On the first day of the trek, at Essay Upper Basic School, I walked into the classroom at the break and came across a group of students all drawing the picture for each other and explaining how HIV works. later in the lesson we played a game called "Hyenas and Goats" where the students take on the roles of baby and adult goats and hyenas to show how the immune system (adult goats) protects the human body (baby goat) and how when HIV takes away the immune system, opportunistic infections (hyenas) can come harm the body. Many times during the week as students got all excited playing this game you could see the wheels of understanding starting to turn in their heads.
Just as the wheels of our bicycles turned this week as we rode from Barra to Farafenni, everyday as we stopped in Essau, Berending, Kuntair, Kerewan and Salikenne, we were able to experience many moments where students started to see, understand and discover on their own. The lessons were never perfect and in every class we were lucky if we had five or six really engaged students--but nonetheless it is those five or six who could make the difference and who will make a difference. As we were planning the bike trek the biking aspect was for the most part merely a way to get from one school to the next without having to find money for a bunch of fuel. But, for me at least, as the week went on biking started to take on a greater significance. As we moved from one place to the next I would find myself looking out across the plains of grass, baobab trees and mound of groundnuts and breathing deeply. I often found myself reflecting on my life here, my service and what type of impact my work and time spent here is having on this little country. I don't believe that I will ever be able to look back and say, "Then, that was the moment that I changed the lives of the people in Kerr Jarga." Rather it will be moments like this, project like this, that touch a few people, a few students, and help them start to think about thing a little differently. Maybe they just understand a little better how HIV is transmitted of how to protect them selves--maybe they remember that we told them they had a voice to speak loud and proud about HIV. No matter how a project like this impacts them the most important thing is that they realize they are the one who controls their future. They are in charge of their own development and they can really make a difference. If one student realized that by the end of the week than the hours and kilometers of biking and my very sore butt as a result will all have been worth it.

Watermelons Everywhere

Written on October 27th, 2010

Last week Thursday found me spending the day in the town of Barra--on the far west end of the North Bank where I catch the ferry to go to Kombo. Erica and I had decided to meet at our favorite (and the only) bar/brothel to get a bunch of work done for the HIV/AIDs bike trek. Trust me the irony of our meetings location did not escape us. As I was heading back to KJJ I stopped in the car park to grab a small gift for my family and settled on one of the first watermelons of the season. At 20D (less than $1) it was an excellent choice. It was only later that night as we were sitting around under the stars, chomping on slices with juice running down our faces that it dawned on me, "It's the middle of October and I am eating a watermelon."
Granted the seasons here are very different so the fact that October is when watermelons start to get ripe is more amusing than amazing. The more surprising realization was that I hadn't eaten any watermelon since last November. With electricity, green houses and Americas "super market culture" you can get almost anything all year round, even when its not in season, as long as you're willing to pay the price. Though I'm not a frequent watermelon eater in Vermont in the middle of February I have been to my fair share of brunches where fruit salad prominently features watermelon when there are four inches of snow outside. Here that most definitely is not the case, we eat what you can buy at the market and what you can buy in the market is what can be grown NOW. This inevitably means a lack of variety in our diet but also we get our fill of things when they are in season. For example, right now my family has pumpkin coming out our ears so we have pumpkin at every meal. During the weeks when mangoes were ripe I was averaging two or three mangoes a day. Though I am getting understandably sick of pumpkin I remind myself to enjoy it now because once its finished that's another year before I'll be able to eat it again.
The seasonality of produce here makes going to the market a constant surprise. Two weeks ago at the big market on Saturday I found huge, delicious, juicy cucumbers--a pile of three--for 5D (about 10 cents). Last weekend I searched high and low but no cucumbers to be found. Next time I come across them that will definitely make my day but who knows when that will be.
In my daydreams about home food plays a prominent role, especially spinach, tomatoes, asparagus and strawberries, but as I think about all those things I wonder if I would appreciate them more in America if they were not constantly available to me? I understand and strongly support the argument that we should consume locally available foods rather than eating strawberries in February which come to us via gallons of fuel and subsequent environmental pollution. But there is also something to be said for variety as a marker of good nutrition. A diet consisting of rice, tomato paste, onions, oil and pumpkin is arguably far less balanced and nutritious than eating rice, tomatoes, peppers, spinach, onions, carrots etc. For people in the Gambia and America the factors that prohibit us from eating a balanced diet are in many ways the same--money and preference--but when it comes to access that is where things split. Gambian families don't necessarily have access to a variety of fruits and vegetables all year round while for most Americans they just need to step into the produce section of their local supermarket and they have a cornucopia at their fingertips.
Now I'm not arguing in favor of using gas guzzling trucks to ship watermelons from California to Vermont in the middle of the winter but I think it's important to realize that all the talk of buying locally and seasonally comes from a position of privilege and choice. Where for some it's not a fashionable trend their buying into but rather the stark reality of how they live and eat.
All this being said next time it's snowing and you really want Belgian waffles with fresh strawberries of breakfast, DO IT, all the while thinking of how lucky you are that you live in a place with economy and infrastructure to support eating strawberries or watermelon in the winter.

One of These Things is Not Like the Other

Written on October 13th, 2010

Two weeks ago one of my many aunts here had a baby boy. He is beautiful and healthy, a huge relief after she had a very difficult pregnancy (her ninth) which culminated in our local health center deciding that it was to risky for her to deliver here. She therefore went to the capital, Banjul, so she could have the baby at the hospital there. I gave here the D50 (about $2) it took for her to get there and went to explain to her husband why she needed to go. When she brought home this tiny and beautiful, wrinkly person I knew it was probably the best way I've spent my money in a long time.
The new baby, Mbarra, made me start to wonder how the babies and young kids here perceive me. For the most part I'm fairly certain that the four and five year olds realize that I am (a) not from the Gambia and (b) have a biological family somewhere else that looks more like me. I think however for the babies and two year olds, maybe even three year olds things are a little less clear. I feel like they just see me as another adult in their world who looks a little funny and who can't really speak Wolof. An example of this is my baby host brother, Mam Goor, who is about fifteen months old. At this point I've been in his life since he was five months old. Therefore, I fully believe that he sees me as a member of the family and merely wonders why I look and act so ridiculous. Now that he can walk he comes of to my house and hangs out, I give him food, take care of him when his mom goes to the fields and sometimes even carry him on my back around the village. These actions all send the message that I am the same as every other adult women in his life. And in many ways I am.
Another small child who seems a bit confused by me is the three year old, host brother/cousin/child on loan from Senegal, Bakar Jeng. Bakar constantly blabbers away at me in Wolof and then gets furious with me when I don't understand. Kids in general will blabber at me in Wolof but they don't expect a response because they know I can't understand Wolof like other adults. Something about the way Bakar talks to me however makes me thing that he really doesn't see me as anything more than possibly an albino Gambian.
All this pondering also leads me to wonder how these kids who have such a close relationship with me will remember me after I am gone and interact with other toubabs in the future. The standard Gambian child reaction to white people is sheer and utter terror. Blood-curdling screams, frantic scrambling to get as far away as possible, tears, shrieking and frozen terror have all been my reception. But for these kids who I have the pleasure of spending everyday with they hopefully will not have such a violent fear of white people in the future.
I hope that for these kids their experiences with me will help them to understand and believe in the future that we really are all one people. (This is a favorite bumster line--along with "it's nice to be nice") Bumster or not this is a pretty accurate/positive statement for this situation. Having been in the Gambia for almost a year I have seen first hand how being an honest, open, kind and caring person can make you a member of a family, no matter how much paler you are. The moral of the story is that I hope these kids grow up to realize that though one of these things (Ramatoulie) does not look like the others here she is still one of us.

Ramadan

Written on September 10th, 2010

Yesterday as I was taking my bucket bath I was listening to the BBC and a discussion program where they were talking about a small church in the US which is planning on burning the Koran this weekend to mark the anniversary of September 11th. The timing of this outrageous act of insensitivity is ironic because yesterday was the last day of the Muslim lunar month of fasting, Ramadan and today is Koriteh, or Eid al Fitar, which is the day long celebration of the end of Ramadan. It made me feel sad that people from my country would feel entitled to completely disrespect all Muslims around the world so heinously because of the horrible actions of a few extremists.
I also found myself reflecting on my Ramadan experience and what it has taught me about Islam. I was gone for the first two and a half weeks of Ramadan but when I got back from vacation in Cape Verde I found KJJ to be very different from when I left it. During the month of Ramadan the entire adult population of KJJ (above the age of 12-13) fasts from before sunrise at about 5:30 am to sunset at about 7:30 pm. During this period they don't eat or drink and they even try not to swallow their saliva--this results in spitting everywhere, health concerns abound but that's a blog for another day. Pregnant women, kids, chronically ill and the very old are allowed to abstain from fasting. Women don't have to fast when they have their period and if you're sick you can take a day off but you have to make the days missed up later after the month is over. Ramadan is very physically taxing and all of the adults in my compound have noticeably lost weight.
For some reason however Ramadan also imparted a vacation like atmosphere on my village. Since the only people eating lunch are the kids they just have left overs from the night before so without the burden of cooking lunch women's work loads are seriously diminished. This meant alot more time to sit around in the shade chatting and relaxing. Also napping during the day became even ore acceptable than usual.
What I enjoyed most about Ramadan was the meals I shared with my family at the beginning and end of the day. At 5 am I would be awoken by the sound of one of my moms or Ndene, my host brother, knocking on my door, "Toulie, Toulie kaay nu xeda." (Toulie, Toulie come eat the break fast) Stumbling out into the early dawn you could still see stars and it was always a little chilly, the six of us would huddle around the food bowl in an early morning daze. Few words were exchanged except the morning greetings and prayers for a successful day. It's hard to put into words why this time was so special but perhaps the best way to describe it is that it was a simple family moment and it was nice to be a part of it. After this very early morning breakfast I would open my windows and fall back into bed sleeping easily until 9--a very large feat here. The day would proceed from there pretty uneventfully: greetings, visiting and exclaiming how difficult fasting is. The day would begin to wind down at around 5:30 or 6 as everyone was so tired and hungry/thirsty they couldn't do much of anything. At around 7 pm we would all slowly gather in the middle of the compound collectively waiting for the sunset and mosques call to prayer signaling that we could eat and drink. To break fast we would eat bread and drink cups of hot sweet tea made from leaves found in the bush. About an hour later dinner would be served and we would all eat until the bowl was licked clean and fall into bed exhausted by the prospect of doing it all again tomorrow. (Maybe that was just me)
Last night we waited to break fast with more anticipation because it was the last day of fasting. The end of Ramadan is marked when you can see the sliver of the new moon. For some villages they wait for the imam to actually see it, so if the night is cloudy for example and you can't see the moon you keep fasting. Some places just accept that if someone somewhere, even in Guinea Bissau or Mali, sees it then Ramadan is over. Last night however we could all see the sliver of the moon clearly so today we party.
This morning we ate breakfast at 9:30!! and since then Yaay Sarjo, Mbayang and I have been cooking sauce (potatoes fried with goat meat, onion, pepper, garlic, mustard and Maggi) for lunch. My compound and the two neighboring compounds will all come together to eat lunch--kind of like a Gambian Thanksgiving. Therefore each compound cooks as much sauce as they can and it all gets put together so in the end everyone has enough to eat. Its 3:30 pm and its raining so lunch will probably still be a while--if this had been yesterday during Ramadan I would be fin but now knowing that lunch is there, cooking, almost ready to be eaten I am about to eat my own arm. But I know that in the end the waiting will make lunch taste that much better and as I've learned about Islam in the Gambia through this experience of Ramadan, it is the collective experience and sharing that makes this place so special. In conclusion, don't burn the Koran, just like everything else we can learn a lot from it if we take sometime to listen and understand.

Cape Verde: Escape from the Open Monestary

Written at the end of August 2010



It dawned on me at the beginning of August that I had been in the Gambia for almost ten straight months. Time seems to have flown by as I adjust and settle in to life here but at the same time ten months straight in the Gambia....is well...ten months in the Gambia and needless to say I was very happy that Fern and I had had the foresight in June to plan a week long vacation to Cape Verde--a small country made up of a group of islands in the Atlantic off the coast of Senegal. Now first of all, I have to clarify our use of the word plan because it helps explain a lot of our trip; by plan I mean we bought plane tickets and took vacation days. I guess we figured if we could figure out Gambia a week in Cape Verde couldn't be that difficult.
And it wasn't--far from it actually--CV was everything we were looking for in a vacation destination even if we didn't know it. Beautiful, relaxing and completely different from the Gambia.
We flew from Dakar to the capital Praia (on the island of Santiago) on Tuesday August 17th. We got in in the early evening and took a cab (like an American cab with all the windows and doors working and AC!) to a budget hotel from Lonely Planet (a book that would save our butts many a time). Once settled in we set off for our first CV dinner at a restaurant that we would find out later was ridiculously overpriced. But it was our first night and we reveled in it--drinking a bottle of crisp CV white wine from the island of Fogo and listening to a traditional music performance. The next morning we were up early, actually an hour earlier than we needed to be because we didn't realize there was a time change between CV and Senegal, and at the airport to catch a flight to the island of Sao Vincente to visit the city of Mindelo. Our early time at the airport allowed us to rediscover a love of vending machines that we never knew we had.
Once in Mindelo we spent the next four days losing ourselves in its winding cobblestone streets, parks and pastel colored houses. We probably walked every street in the city enjoying the intermingling of colonial and modern buildings. The hotel we stayed at was right up the hill from the public beach so we were able to spend our afternoon lying in the sand, splashing in the waves and respectfully admiring all the Cape Verdians who were also enjoying a day at the beach. That was one thing that particularly struck me in CV was the amount of leisure time people had. One night after an amazing dinner of pizza piled with ham and pepperoni we stopped in a park to enjoy our post-dinner ice cream cones. While there we got to observe Mindelo's hoping nightlife which seemed to consist of walking around the park and/or watching people walk around the park. The teenagers were all dressed in their best outfits and walked and chatted in groups of three or four. Younger kids rode scooters or chased each other around and older women and men sat on the benches talking and no doubt gossiping about the scene. It was very refreshing to see after coming from somewhere where people, especially women, basically work from the time they get up to when they go to bed.
This outward display of enjoyment and relaxation emboldened us to truly embrace these virtues as well. We drank bottle of red wine at lunch, ate pizza, salami, cheese and crackers. We stopped in little bakerys to buy cakes. I spent a few hours one night eating a succulent grilled lobster. But more than anything else in Mindelo we had ice cream and coffee. The pursuit of these two things became a bit of a singular obsession. Once we got to know the city we would go on walks but really we would take walks between different ice cream locations. The ice cream truck at the beach came to recognize us and in one day alone we had probably six ice cream cones (in our defense however the cones are small one or two scoops--like gelatto). Hand in hand with our pursuit of ice cream was the pursuit of coffee particularly espresso in the form of cafe au lait but realistically anything that wasn't instant NesCafe. The best coffee we had in Mindelo was at a seedy-ish bar/cafe with Avril Lavigne posters on the wall across from the bright pink municipal palace. It was rich and creamy, so good that we had two--except two of these coffees on an empty stomach turned out to have the same effect as perhaps vodka shots and we left feeling giddy and a little intoxicated--but maybe it was just because Mindelo was so beautiful.
Our initial reason for traveling to Mindelo was not however the prospect of ice cream or coffee but the annual 3-day Baia des Gates (Bay of Cats) music festival. Friday the 20th was Fern's birthday and also the first day of the festival. We got up that morning eager to see what a CV music festival would be like--by 10:30 we were flying out of Mindelo on a public transport mini bus (aluguer) that took us over barren hills and on windy two land cobblestone roads to the Bay of Cats, "Baia". Turns out a CV event is very much like any event in the Gambia. When we arrived there at 11 it was very clear that nothing was starting until much much later (the stage was only 1/2 assembled). So we admired the bay--shallow turquoise water edged by black volcanic looking rocks which broke the waves off the shore, all with the backdrop of soaring black and brown hills. So after wandering around a bit and wading in the bay we headed back to Mindelo and amused ourselves with ice cream and wine until that evening when we headed back. Baia was transformed by 5 pm! Beautiful, eerie CV music was blasting from a band onstage, tents were pitched all along the shore and the entire area was ringed with stalls selling beer, grilled meat and even ice cream. We reveled in the fun concert atmosphere making friends with the Senegalese selling crafts and speaking to them in Wolof/Pulaar, dancing with a young CV man named Allen who danced like Michael Jackson, glove and everything, at a club stall called Delirious and eating all kinds of grilled meat. We listened to three concerts and by 2 am were so tired and full of beer and meat that we drowsily made our way back to Mindelo and fell into bed.
By the next evening (Saturday) we were back on the island of Santiago in Praia and up bright and early on Sunday to make our way to Tarrafal, a small town with a beautiful white sand beach 70 km from Praia on the other side of Santiago. To get there we took an aluguer which snaked its way all along the coast. It was breathtaking driving through the green hills and valleys, stopping in small towns with markets in the cobblestone squares. The smaller villages featured houses clustered around the road with their backyards opening out into nothing as the hill abruptly slopped down. Once we got to Tarrafal we knew we wanted to spend the rest of our trip there. Our reasonably priced hotel was right on the beach and the day we showed up happened to be the day of a hip hop festival so dance music was pumping out over the speakers was beautiful CV men and women, young and old walked along the beach chatting, swimming and dancing. Fern and I sat back mostly in awe. Donuts, chicken skewers, meat sandwiches, fruit and beer abounded and reveled in the bounty. Monday morning however brought a transformed, empty beach as all the beautiful Cape Verdians went back to life and work and we were left with a pristine white beach on which to lie in the sun, eat torta and read trashy books. We had been attracted to Tarrafal because the Lonely Planet claimed it had a fire grilled pizzeria and on our last night said restaurant did not disappoint. Tuesday morning we bid Tarrafal goodbye and headed back to Praia where we spent our last day getting our fill of wandering down cobblestone streets, shopping in Chinese shops (which we found everywhere--full of cheap clothes, jewelry and makeup) and eating donuts and ice cream. Wednesday morning (August 25th) we were once again at the airport to early and after a four hour delay found ourselves leaving Cape Verde behind and headed back to our homes--mud huts in the middle of Gambia. We both agreed that the vacation was just what we needed. Getting a little reacquainted with semi-civilization was refreshing but in the end I just wanted to get back to my village, get back to work, get back to my family and friends and get back to speaking Wolof. And in the end isn't the best part of vacation the fact that it refreshes you and reinvigorates you to go back home. So for that I would like to thank Cape Verde: its beautiful beaches, hills, people and ice cream.

"Chum-On": Cape Verde (86 photos), by Lindsey Green

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Green Thumb

Written on August 7th, 2010

A wonderful part of being a Peace Corps Volunteer, other than getting to live in a foreign country and helping people, is having lots of free time to do things you've always wanted to do but never had time for. You can read all these books you've always meant to read but never had the time to, try new hobbies, practice drawing, write poetry etc.
One such activity for me is gardening. Despite my last name I've never really has a very green thumb. I love being outside and observing nature but I've never really been one for growing things. I'm the girl who couldn't grow a potted flower in a Ben & Jerry's pint container that you just had to water and I'm pretty sure my senior year at Beloit I killed a cactus. Also, gardening has always kind of intimidated me.
Here in the Gambia however its the rainy season. This means most members of my village are spending a considerable amount of time in their fields and when they're not in the fields they're resting/exhausted from all that manual labor. Needless to say they have neither the time or energy for health talks or demonstrations or project planning meetings. Also, school is out so I don't have peer health or health lessons to fill my days. This drastic slow down in my work, along with the arrival of seeds from Courtney in a package made me think I should get off my butt, face my fears, and start gardening.
I decided to set up the Lindsey Green Inaugural garden beds at the skills center because of the good fence and hand pump but realized after I committed that I had picked an extremely public space, meaning my successes or failures will all be out there for the village to admire or criticize. But as they say "What better place than here, what better time than now."
So this week my army of small boys and I tackled the skills center project under the watchful, and sometimes overly critical, eye of my counterpart, the chain smoking attaya drinking skills center manager.
We cleared a patch of land and made three raised beds. Today I planted my first crop with seeds from Grandpa Bill, carrot, beets, squash and beans. I'm cautiously optimistic that it will work but also prepared for absolutely nothing to grow.
My gardening exploits have obviously got me thinking about how much of my Peace Corps service is a game of trial and error. Everything is a risk and I feel like most activities have a fifty-fifty chance of success or failure. Though this is sometimes incredibly frustrating and discouraging I also think, when else in my life will I be able to so freely just try things for the hell of it and see how it goes-whether that's gardening, a shorter haircut or a community development project.
Though I've signed up to spend two years of my life helping the development of the Gambia, I also have been given the chance to try whatever I want, within reason, for the next two years. This freedom gives me the opportunity to try to make innovative change in KJJ but also to expand myself. If I want to try vegetable gardening why the hell not? If I want to try poetry I can grab a pen and write, if I want to have short hair I can do just that. When I get frustrated I feel its important to remind myself of this and to not let fear or self-doubt discourage me either. I might dry out/drown/kill all of my plants but whats the hurt in trying??

Down on Baay Waly's Farm

Written on July 14th, 2010

Since the rains really started to fall at the end of June almost everyday my compound empties out from about 8:30 am to 12:30 pm as everyone goes to work in the fields. In my village the main crops are groundnuts and coos (a type of millet-like grain). For the first few weeks only Baay Waly and the boys went to plow and sow the seeds but now that seedlings are beginning to pop up everyone goes out to weed and hoe. Today that included me.
Now that school has finished I'm much less busy with health lessons and peer health club meetings so why not spend the morning "working the land"?

Baay Waly's coos fields are about 1/2 kilometer outside of KJJ so after breakfast Yaay Amie and I walked into the bush. Once at the fields we all spent the morning bent over at the waist weeding and thinning the coos. For the record coos and grass/weeds looks exactly the same so in my mind this was not an easy process. As usual I was quickly deemed slow and incompetent so my host brother Ous had to lead me up and down the rows saying "Ramatoulie start here." While Alhagie walked beside me assessing and correcting my work. "Ramatoulie, get rid of this. Leave this. Reduce this. NO!!! Don't get rid of that, that's coos"

It was a beautiful day with a blue blue sky, white white clouds and green green fields and trees. I realize that I had the luxury of reveling in all this beauty because I will not be going to work in the fields everyday for the next few months. But nevertheless it was a nice day to be out in the bush.

We worked for about three hours pausing every so often to squat in the shade. After about an hour consensus was reached that I knew how to farm. Phew! I was relieved to know that at least for today I was considered a productive member of the family. After three hours of running after Ous I was told that I needed to rest and was sent to collect bissap leaves for the sauce for lunch. Upon returning I found some very antsy host siblings sitting in the shade of the donkey cart, so what's a good toubab to do? Teach them a song of course! So I proceeded to translate and sing "Old McDonald had a farm" in Wolof. The "eeyah-eeyah-oh!" was every ones favorite part and Yaay Amie even joined in the fun at one point doing a killer impression of a goat. So that was my day on Baay Waly's farm.

Big Love: The Gambia

Written on June 28th, 2010

A few weeks ago I was talking on the phone to someone from home about my host family and she exclaimed, "I never realized you have two host moms" implying that she didn't realize that I live in a polygamous family. So yes folks, I have two moms, Yaay Amie and Yaay Sarjo. Yaay Amie is Baay Waly's first wife and she has four kids. Yaay Sarjo is his second wife and she has five kids but Yaay Sarjo's oldest is probably around 15 so its safe to say that my family has been a big happy family for a while now and has thus had a while to figure out how to live harmoniously.

The fact that my friend hadn't realized that my family was polygamous caused me to consider how, if at all, my life here is affected by this fact. The answer is not a whole hell of a lot, which is probably why I never thought to mention it before. From afar, coming from an American cultural context, it was very difficult for me to imagine living in a polygamous family and furthermore to imagine that I would mostly have positive things to say about it.

First, polygamy is common in the Gambia. According to Islam a man can have up to four wives. Here, it seems to me, the norm is about two. In my village if a man has multiple wives he has two, I can think of some with three and only a handful who have four.

Husband and wife relations here are very different than in America. This is a conservative, patriarchal society so the women are the "work horses" of the family, they cook, clean, raise the children and farm on top of that. The men are responsible, in theory, for financially supporting the family and they are the decision makers. Men and women don't share the same house or bed here and as for sexual rights men hold all the cards.

Due to the women's role in the family polygamy can actually end up being a benefit because having a co-wife means splitting all the work. In my family Yaay Sarjo and Yaay Amie alternate cooking so they only have to cook every other day. If one of them has to do something the other person can pick up the slack. For example, right now Yaay Amie has gone to Senegal for a week to attend her younger sisters wedding/naming ceremony. This is only possible because Yaay Sarjo is still here. For now Yaay Amie is mostly the only one to enjoy this benefit of polygamy because Yaay Sarjo has a ten month old baby but as they get older I think they both will be able to start attending programs out of town. In other compounds this division of labor also holds true and in most compounds there is so much extended family living together that work is split between the multiple wives of multiple husbands.

I think its important to note that my positive view of polygamy, expressed here, mostly comes from the fact that my two moms get along really well. As time goes on I realize more and more what wonderful people Yaay Amie and Yaay Sarjo are. They are kind, considerate and powerful in their own unique ways. They get along because it seems that first, they are friends, second,they help each other and third, they have some groups of friends that are the same and some that are different so they're not constantly together. The other weekend Yaay Amie's friend in Kuntair had an engagement ceremony and Yaay Sarjo and I went with her and spent the day at the program. Because we were gone all day we brought the baby, Mam Goor, with us and throughout the day I was touched by how Yaay Amie made sure Yaay Sarjo was doing OK by helping with Mam Goor and keeping us all fed and full of attaya.

Now, though I think polygamy works well in my family, I am in no way jumping on the bandwagon. As I frequently say, when turning down marriage proposals from already married men, "If I only get to have one husband, my husband only gets to have one wife." My number one problem with polygamy is that it represents an overarching societal patriarchy. Women here are not equal to men and do not have very many personal freedoms. From the time they are girls they have very little agency in deciding how they live their lives or spend their time. The fact that most Gambian women lack these freedoms and human rights can be difficult for me to observe on a daily basis. But this shouldn't lead you to believe that Gambian women are weak, rather they are very strong and from my perspective its because they find contentment within their situation. If you're going to have a co-wife you might as well try to be friends with her and in that friendship something beautiful and powerful can be found.

World Cup!

Written on June 26th, 2010

So tonight was the "Group of 16" World Cup game between the USA and Ghana. I went to Kerr Omar today to work on a project proposal with Asso and Mamet but made it very clear that I needed to be back to KJJ before the game. So at 6:30 I made my way over to the skills center where myself and most of the KJJ male population between the ages of 12 and 45 crowded around the tiny TV. The second I walked in it was very clear that no one was going to take toubab pity on me and support USA to make me feel better. Once Ghana scored in the first ten minutes all hopes of building some base of support for myself within the group was shot. After the first half when we were still down 1-0 Mr. Sanyand, the nursery school teacher, looked at me with deep pity in his eyes and told me "not to be sad." It was interesting because until then I hadn't really thought about how they were perceiving my cheering. I think that my presence is so strange (women never ever attend the matches) and the fact that I know anything/follow football is so unexpected that they assume I am a huge devotee rather than the textbook definition of a fair-weather fan. In addition however I was surprised at the surge of nationalism I felt after we equalized in the second half. Being away from the US in a place like this, representing America as a Peace Corps volunteer definitely makes me watch a game like this much differently than I would in the US. When I talked to my Mom briefly today she told me that they probably would watch and not root for America and I thought, "If I was home that probably would be me too."

After the pain of 90 minutes in an ever growing group of Gambian men with ever increasing levels of rowdiness I still had to sit through the 30 minute extra time. When Ghana scored at the beginning the room erupted in screaming, clapping and dancing and all I could think was, it sucks that were losing but witnessing this explosion of joy makes it totally worth it. As I walked home under the full moon to the calls of victory and apology I was a little sad (but I'm a Red Sox fan so I can handle it) but mostly excited that I would get to see Ghana continue to represent Africa in Africa's World Cup while living in an African village.

[As I type this now, last night Ghana lost to Uruguay in shoot outs. It was very disappointing. Since I was in Kombo I got to watch the match on a huge projector screen at a bar in Kombo. Right after the end of regulation time a huge storm hit and the satellite power cut out. We had to run four blocks in the pouring rain to get a taxi to go back and watch the conclusion of the match at the small Lebanese restaurant around the corner from the Peace Corps House. Needless to say the drizzling rain matched our moods afterwards.]

A Koranic Experience

Written on June 6th, 2010

Today was the Islamic school equivalent of an end of year school assembly and school play all rolled into one. All of the kids and most of the village gathered under a big neem tree and one by one each kid went up and recited (in a very sing-y way) a portion of the Koran. The kids were all dressed in their best clothes--complets, clean jeans and even a "Barack Hussein Obama" shirt. My host brothers, Alieu, Ous and Alhagie were beautifully coordinated--not on purpose--in purple, orange and mustard yellow complets. As each kid came up they turned their eyes down, gripped the microphone tightly and put it as close to their mouths as possible in the hopes, I think, that this would muffle their recitation so not as many people could hear it. Like any good situation of public speaking there were forgotten lines and tears. But my four host brothers all did great. I took pictures of them all with my digital camera, like the good toubab older sister I am, and did feel a surge of pride every time on of them went up. I think its because I know what good, kind and happy kids they are and it was nice to see them each have their moment to shine. By lunch the program was over so we all shuffled home for a family lunch of bena chin and baobab juice. Quite a Sunday!

The Gambian Sleepover

Written on June 1st, 2010

This past weekend I went on my first Gambian sleepover. I have spent time away from my site in other villages but always in the relative comfort of another PCV's house. This time however I was going to stay with my friend Asso in a village about a 30 minute bike ride from me. After lunch on Friday I set out, not before Yaay Sarjo and Yaay Amie independently verified that I had brought the right amount of complets for the weekends events. I was to stay over Friday night and then attend a big village religious event on Saturday and go home on Sunday morning. I predicted that the sleepover would be a test of my integration, patience, Wolof skill, flexibility and sanity, and in these aspects I wasn't wrong.

I wouldn't say that the principles of the Gambian sleepover are all that much different from the American sleepover: to spend time with friends, see a different family and how they live and escape your own life for a while, they just manifest themselves in very different ways. Here are some of my Gambian sleepover observations:

* As an adult spending the night at a friends usually includes chatting while you prepare a meal together. In this case I illuminated dinner with my head lamp while Asso killed and cooked a chicken for me--a huge honor.

* The imposed rest--while American sleepovers are usually defined by not resting/sleeping, here I was strongly encouraged/forced to rest 85% of the time. When we were not greeting, eating or drinking attaya Asso and her family were bringing me pillows, laying down mats and mattresses all in an attempt to get me to rest. Sometimes it seems the best way to show your gratefulness/comfort in someone elses home is to fall asleep on their bed/in their presence. Don't worry though, my Mom raised me to be polite, so I did take a considerable nap on the bantaba under a large mango tree. When I woke up they were all thrilled, Asso overfed me with greasy rice and then rolled out another mattress and told me to lie down while she brewed us attaya.

* Do you remember how as a kid a huge embarrassment would be if your Mom or Dad made you do a chore while you had a friend sleeping over? Asso's mom, Yaay Mattie, took this to a whole different level. Asso is in her late 30s, but like most Gambians of her age still lives with her family. At around 9:30 pm on Saturday night we were both showered and wearing our complets ready to go drink attaya and milk at the compound of our friend Mamet. (He and Asso are Wolof literacy instructors in the village and very active members of the women's skills group.) As we were about to leave, after feeding and bathing Asso's assorted children, Yaay Mattie told Asso that before we left she needed to cook the sauce for breakfast the next morning. So 10 pm found us in the kitchen hut in Yaay Mattie's backyard cooking chicken and chopping onion. This definitely makes me appreciate that at 35 I, inshallah, won't be living with my mother and even if that is the case she probably won't make me cook breakfast at 10 pm.

Dinner with Alieu

Written on May 13th, 2010

This (Peace Corps) experience can often best be described as a roller coaster in every sense that that word conjures. The most frequent roller coaster element of life here is the emotional mood swings that have become a part of my existence in a way they never were before. Today was one of those days where the best way to describe me would be "a mood swinging bitchy mess." Interactions/any venture out of my house is a an emotional minefield. A lovely morning of mangoes and attaya with fun women or an hour spent in bliss on my mat drawing with my host brothers will be decimated by one stray comment on the size of my butt or the way I speak Wolof. The pendulum swings back and forth at a break neck speed but inevitably on those types of days there comes a moment or interaction where I say--"That's it Lindsey, time to stop trying and call it a day." These moments usually happen at the pendulums extreme either an infuriating or beautiful moment. Luckily today's was the latter.

I had decided early this morning to cook dinner for myself and had bought a bowl full of bissap leaves (I was hoping they could king of imitate spinach) and some garlic and onions to make a kind of "development" spinach noodle curry. I really enjoy cooking dinner for myself three or four times a week because it breaks the monotony of rice and gives me a chance to supplement/balance my diet a little. Cooking can also however be a bit of a trying experience because like everything I do here I tend to attract a crowd of my host siblings who come in my house and all want to help/go through my stuff.

Today however was different, I put on a Bruce Springsteen based play list from my iPod and mentally prepared myself for the "kong kong" outside my door. Tonight however only my adorable and amazing little host brother Alieu showed up at my door. Alieu has become the kid who I spend the most time with, he has a great smile, little voice, pants that are constantly falling down and a killer rendition of "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star." Alieu came into my house proclaiming, "Ramatoulie, today I'm going to help you cook dinner because I know how." So Alieu perched on my food trunk and pet my new kitten, Biskrem, gently like I had showed him. The "help" he provided me was more mental than anything else. He poured the bissap leaves into my pot and then happily munched away on the excess ones. While we waited for it all to simmer down we danced to "Black Betty" and "Up On Cripple Creek." Alieu's smile erased all of the days frustration. When our "spinach curry" was ready I put Alieu's portion in a Tupperware and he proudly brought it outside to share. I had been able to convince him that he was instrumental in cooking dinner so much so that by the end he was proclaiming, "Ramatoulie, the dinner I cooked was very nice!" When the Tupperware was empty he licked the sides clean and handed it back to me, smiling with bissap curry all over his face.

If that's not enough to make you smile than I don't know what is.

Village Matrimony

Written on May 7th, 2010

I just made it through 36 hours of wedding/engagement celebrations in KJJ. The past two days have been all but consumed with Gambian matrimony and it has been a truly fascinating cultural experience. It all started yesterday afternoon. Baay Saney--a relative/close family friend--was sending his daughter Amie to her husbands compound (which is half way across the village). In the Gambia there are many different stages of marriage. First is the giving of the kola nuts which is basically an engagement, next is the "tying of the knots" where the two family heads/representatives finalize the bride price and the couple is then married. After the tying of the knots is the "chit" or wedding ceremony which is when the bride moves to her husbands compound. Years can go by between the tying of the knots and wedding because it can take a while for the husbands family to fulfill their bride price obligations and this must happen before the bride will be permanently given to the grooms family. Before that however the bride can be given on a "loan" to perform certain wifely duties so often, such as in this case, the bride moves to her husbands compound having already given birth to their first child.
But once the wedding ceremony actually happens that's a whole different experience. The brides family and friends will bring all manner of compound essentials (mainly laundry buckets, food bowls and fabric) and money to the brides compound. This is followed by a loud display of all these items. The griots (praise singers) and drummers come and all the women dance like crazy in celebration. After the gifts are displayed everyone eats a lot of cherey, bena chin and drinks attaya.
The attaya is essential because that night is the sabara--which is a whole night of drumming and dancing. Last night I headed to the sabara at around 10:30. At around 11 they started preparing the area, putting together a circle of benches and splashing the ground (and participants feet) liberally with water. At 11:30 they dug a hole in the ground--stuck a big stick in it and suspended a cheap camping lantern from it. Aside from the stars this was our source of light. Around midnight the band--a few standing drums, an under the arm talking drum, calabash guitar and man with a scratchy voice and scratchier megaphone was set up and got started. To my untrained ear every song sounds exactly the same but the women cheered and clapped at the different praises sung in each one. Women and girls ran up to the center of the circle stomping their feet, shaking their hips and moving their butts in ways I never thought possible. Bathed in the starlight it was breath taking and I tried to sit back and absorb the amazing energy. Of course I went up to dance a few times but the best part was in their joy and excitement they really could have cared less if the toubab danced. By 1:30 I could barely keep my eyes open so I joyfully stumbled home in the dark. But the dancing continued until at least 3:30.
Today was the second half of the wedding ceremony where the bride goes to the husbands compound. If she is going to another village a group of older women will usually go with her but because this was all within KJJ we all escorted her to her new compound. This took the form of a cross village procession of singing, drumming and dancing. At the husbands compound all of the gifts from the brides friends and family are unloaded and given away to the grooms family and friends. This is of course accompanied by more singing, dancing and drumming.
An added element to all of these wedding shenanigans is the ashobe. Think bridesmaids dresses on crack. Groups will all buy the same fabric and get outfits made out of it so you look out at a carpet of fabric. It always reminds me of the scene at the beginning of Garden State when he puts on the shirt that matches the bathroom wallpaper. For this wedding we all (myself included) were visions in orange. The older women (like my host moms) had one print and the young women (me and my host sisters) had another but they were both bright orange. Just consider it one more ridiculous and hilarious experience for Lindsey in The Gambia.

Culinary Musings

Written on April 27th, 2010

Oh food. Here in the Gambia it is both my enemy and my best friend. It sustains me, it makes me violently ill, it makes me feel happy, it makes me want to scream and vomit at the same time, it is a constant reminder of my "outsiderness" and a great comfort when the going gets tough.
So, you may be wondering, what exactly am I eating here. As far as Gambian food goes its rice, rice and more rice. My family eats rice for breakfast, lunch and dinner. On a handful of days (like the Prophet Mohamed's birthday) we've substituted rice for cheray which is a cereal called coos, pounded and milled into a flour like substance that's then sifted and cooked. Both cheray and rice are served with a few different kinds of sauces. My family rotates through two most consistently.
The first is called "chew" and its basically rice with fish cooked in an oil (vegetables or palm) sauce with vegetables (egg plant, cabbage, carrot, bitter tomato), onions, tomato paste, salt, pepper, Jumbo (an MSG cube) and hot pepper. Some days I like chew but it is by far the most common dish in my village so I get sick of it pretty quickly. The women love to cook it because it shows that they have enough xalis (money) to buy oil.
The second dish is called "mafe" or "domada" and this is rice with peanut sauce. The peanut sauce is made with peanut butter (which is made from the ground nuts they harvest each year), tamarind, tomato paste, hot pepper, Jumbo and sometimes dried salted fish. Mafe is definitely my favorite because a) the rice is not dripping in oil and b) I can feel all the protein seeping out of my body with every bite of peanut sauce I take. Mafe however is usually the Plan B meal for when the "Yah Boy" fish man doesn't come or there's not enough money for oil.
Another much less common meal is "sauce farine"--flour sauce--which I detest because it is a very watery version of mafe, though I do like the fish meatballs that are usually in it. For special occasions in village we get to have "bena chin" which is very oily spicy rice with meat and vegetables but because of the vat of oil it requires its to expensive for every day meals.
For breakfast we alternate between sweet and savory. Either it is some version of "mbaxal" which is spicy rice with pounded peanuts and green onion, spicy rice with fish or, my breakfast favorite, "churay gerte" which is a porridge of pounded rice and peanuts, salt and sugar.

When my mind or body just can't take Gambian food I have a trunk full of slightly more familiar alternatives. These can be found when I come into the city, in the form of yogurt, egg rolls, hamburgers, falafal, pizza and chwarma. Or in KJJ I have a trunk full of slightly more familiar alternatives. For breakfast I usually make oatmeal or cereal and tea with powdered milk. For lunch I always eat with my family but because we eat the same thing for lunch and dinner I can decide if I want to eat with my family for dinner or cook for myself. My "development cooking" experiments have so far been very successful. I've made curry a few times, macaroni and cheese, ramen noodles with vegetables and egg, tuna and my personal favorite, spicy creamy tomato sauce which is tomato paste, milk, hot peppers and whatever vegetables I can find. I am still trying to figure out what to do with the bags of dried beans I bought after swear-in.
When traditional meals aren't enough to quell my appetite I also have the comfort of cookies and candy sent from home as well as whatever fruits and snacks (salted peanuts, panketos-which are like donut holes, fish pies, oranges, cashew apples and mangos) I can find in village.
So for all my Jewish aunties out there--I am eating enough--and (most) of it is delicious.

"Cocastic"- Better than Fantastic!

Written on April 18th, 2010

So last night Fern, Erica and I, along with some other PCVs went to a beauty pageant--yes a Gambian beauty pageant. It was so ridiculous and amazing I don't really even think I can do it justice in writing. It was one of those times that I was sitting in equal amazement and shock that I had found myself experiencing this and I was eternally grateful that the stars had aligned for me to be able to witness this.

The pageant was called "Queen of Companies 2010" and claimed loosely to be a fundraiser for kids education, mostly it was an excuse for each of the sponsoring companies to get women who work for them to strut their stuff and show their knees.

There were two very Gambian hosts, a male and a female. The male host had some great one liners and hit relentlessly on his female counterpart. She spent the evening scowling and looking confused. The male host started the evening by declaring "Tonight I am going to be the king of all queens," and very clearly stated, "I was informed by an informant that information has been shared." I wasn't quite sure about that one.

The beauty pageant's opening consisted of the eleven contestants participating in a five song opening dance number which consisted of much arm flailing and confused dancing. They moved from the stage to the runway all the while competing for attention and strutting with a combination of grace and awkwardness. At one point the competition for the coveted spot at the end of the runway got to be to much a a girl fell down. After the awe inspiring opening number was the traditional dress portion where each of the girls danced their way out onto the runway and then introduced themselves. Most of them were between 18 and 20 and almost every ones interests included reading (something I've never seen a Gambian do) and surfing the net. They also often mentioned people they admired, popular options were "my mom" and Kofi Annan but the best was a women who stated, "Michael Jackson is my hero because of his love for children." She went on to express the aspiration, "I want to be a surgeon so I can help my people like Michael has helped our people with his music." I took this to be an indication of the lack of news accessible to Gambians--apparently MJs trial didn't make it over here.

After the introductions while each Queen changed into her "fashion" outfits we got a stunning performance by some rap group who lip synched to a song that was blasting over the speakers at a deafening volume while the back up dancers sulked around in their saggy pants and swung around weird yellow towels. After the stunning musical performance an executive from Youki, a Gambian soda company, came up and expounded, "If you try Youki today, your tomorrow will be very different." Seeing as Youki grapefruit has vastly changed how I consume gin packets I would say that is definitely true. After this the Queens did a brief runway show of their Western "casual" outfits. It started out in a very lady like manner with each Queen getting her chance at the runway. By the end however it devolved into women running into each other and bumping shoulders down the runway.

After the fashion portion there was more horrible lip synching and a very strange comedy routine. It was in English but you couldn't understand any of what they were saying. Basically it was two men in skin tight leggings goofing around on the runway and shaking their butts/clenching their butt muscles. They had a field day with all the toubab presence and proceeded to make jokes about us that we couldn't understand other than the brilliant lines, "Toubabs speak out of their butts and kill your mothers." To add to the annoying nature of their performance they stole the lollipop I was sucking on to stay awake. The next section of the beauty pageant consisted of the Queens giving presentations about the companies they were representing. Ms. Africell (a cell phone company) bribed us all with free lanyards and holders for our cell phones. Overall however whatever sales talents these women had was minuscule at best. They mostly just stuck out their boobs to emphasize the company name on their skintight T-shirts. By the time the product presentations were done it was probably close to 2:30 am and we had talent, Q & A and evening gowns remaining. The three of us took quick power naps on sofas in the lobby and were able to stay awake long enough to see half the talent section which consisted of the Queens lip synching to dated American pop and hip hop; think Whitney Huston, Toni Braxton, Beyonce, Cassie, J-Lo etc. They all forgot about the mic they were "singing" into after the first thirty seconds and then proceeded to dance with moves commonly seen in close proximity to a stripper pole. After a rousing number by Ms. Africell with a guitar as a prop it was almost 4 am. As the sun rose over the Gambian beauty pageant we made our way home exclaiming the whole way about the glorious ridiculousness of what we had just seen.

Kerr Jarga Jobe: A Planners Perspective

Written on April 8th, 2010
Dedicated to the past and present staff of The Planning Commissioners Journal

[In a recent email it was brought to my attention that I haven't really described the village of Kerr Jarga Jobe (KJJ) yet for all of you. So here comes my attempt to paint you a picture of a small Gambian village.]

KJJ is a small-ish village of between 60-65 compounds. Compounds can have anywhere from 5 to 35 residents and their respective houses. Houses are usually either square one room grass roof huts, like mine, or row houses with multiple doors that lead into 1 or 2 rooms with separate or communal backyards. Inside the house is used mainly for sleeping resting and seeking shade/temperature relief while doing work like shelling peanuts. I would say that 80-90% of socializing and 95% of work takes place outside. The backyard serves as bathroom, bathing area, kitchen and laundry room. The front or communal space in the center of the compound is used for socializing, working, eating, resting, fires for light and/or warmth, attaya brewing and sleeping under the stars.

My living situation, i.e. the fact that I have a house and backyard of my own is not the norm--usually only the head of the compound has this luxury. For everyone else their days, nights and even beds are shared with their mothers, children, brothers and sisters etc. It becomes easy to understand why American notions of privacy and personal space are not really understood here.

Now imagine yourself standing on Gambia's North Bank highway (a two lane road), your coming from the west and on your left about 1/4 of a kilometer off the road beyond the spindly trees and dry grass you will see the beginning of KJJ. The village center with the grand mosque is probably 1/2 to 3/4 km from the NB road but with time and growth the village has moved from the center out towards the main road. My compound is on the outskirts of town and my compound as well as those around ours represent the most recent settlement in town. There are already compounds being built beyond mine closer to the main road so eventually the village will probably start at the NB road rather than 1/4 km off of it. I suspect because the village has slowly expanded towards the road village resources--water taps, communal sitting spaces under large trees and bitiks (small variety stores essential to Gambian life) are spread out to all corners/sections of the village.

About 100 meters from my compound is the KJJ cooperative which is basically a huge parking lot with a high concrete wall around it where all of the peanuts grown by this and surrounding villages are stored until they are bought en masse by the government. Next to the cooperative is the tap my family uses and next to the tap is the village market under a big tree where every day about six women sell ingredients and vegetables to make lunch. On the left of the cooperative is the "main road" which runs from the NB road all the way into the center of town. On this road is the skills center, small mosque, small school, milling machine, my favorite bitik, the big tree where the guys who sell fish come in the morning, the district chiefs compound (with electricity) and finally the road ends in the town center.

The town center is only notable because of the large mosque with a domed robins egg blue roof which faces a large covered bantaba (a bench on steroids). Now that I think about it the "village center" is historically where the village started. The alkali's (village leader) compound is on the opposite end of the "square," but for all practical purposes it represents the norther edge of the village. Beyond the "square" and mosque the village gives way to an open savanna dotted with baobabs and one dirt path/road leading to our neighboring village, Torro Alhasan.

Aside from the hug bantaba in the center of town, the water taps and to a certain degree the skills center there are not any other public spaces in town. But at the same time even private space is public. To get most places you walk through peoples "private" compounds. The blurring/lack of distinction between public and private space is also assisted by the fact that basically everyone in the village is related in one way or another. The two most common family names are Jobe (as in KJJ--the family that founded the village) and Cham. Here, as it is everywhere else in the country, people don't move somewhere unless someone they know and are related to already lives there. My family is a fairly new addition to the village hence why we life on the edge of town, but my host father moved here because his sister is one of the district chiefs wives. This coupled with the fact that most marriages are arranged means that people move between compounds through marriage. Many who live in the village were also born here and the women who have left have left because they were married to people in other villages. Since my village is fairly close to the city there are a fair amount of people who move back and forth but this is mostly men seeking work and kids whose families send them to live with relatives in Kombo to go to school.

So there's a snapshot of KJJ, I hope I did The Planning Commissioners Journal justice! If you're dying to know more come visit!!

The Compost Pit

Written on April 5th, 2010

About a week ago Wells was visiting me. Inspired by al of his Ag-Fo-ness while we were biking to Kuntair I stopped and with the help of my tall friend collected some moringa seeds. Since I now have seeds sitting on my table waiting to be sown I decided that I should probably get to digging that compost pit I've been meaning to dig since about my first day here. On Sunday I was able to spend the morning on some preliminary digging/hacking at the ground with my machete but blisters, lunch, attaya and dancing at a wedding ceremony forced me to postpone pit completion until today. After a morning of weighing screaming babies and stuffing my face with rice and greasy fish I started finishing what I started. As usual everything I do here attracts a crowd. Pretty soon I had Bakar Jeng perched on my plastic lawn chair overseeing the work and Alieu my five year old, three foot tall shadow friend/host brother wielding a shovel because whenever I touched it he exclaimed, "Ramatoulie, you don't know and I do."

So we shuttled piles of dirt from by the compost pit around the dividing fence to a sunken in spot by my bathing area. Next we swept all the dead leaves and grass which I had been avoiding cleaning up from my backyard into the pit, next went in all of the food scraps I had saved in a tomato can and finally a bowl of foamy kidney beans from a failed attempt at chili. On top was some top soil I saved from Alieu's shovel wielding. As all this was going on Alieu kept reminding me that when we were done I should say thank you to him. So after top soil were we done?

Of course not--we were left with the piece de resistance--animal poop. Something that cannot be found in my backyard but abounds everywhere else in my compound. I went outside to consult Yaay Amie and Baay Waly and was told that everyday Yaay Amie sweeps goat and chicken poop out of the kitchen so if I just give her a tomato can she'll fill it for me--everyday. Judging my work complete I turned to Alieu to say thank you when Alieu asked--"Ramatoulie can I bring you cow poop?"

Never one to pass up that offer I agreed and Alieu and my other host brother Ous scampered off with my shovel and a big tray to collect it. I sat on my stool in the shade waiting and soon enough they were back with Alieu balancing a heaping tray of dried cow poop on his head. Just picture a three foot tall person with a 6 inch circumference tray plate heaped with cow poop on their head, wearing pink stripped saggy gym shorts that were once probably owned by a Florida retiree and an enormous proud smile. We carefully transported the tray through my house and into my backyard and dumped it into the pit. Then I turned to Alieu and Ous and said thank you.
Let the composting begin!