To-Do

My training group and I had our Close-of-Service (COS) conference last week and I now I have an official COS date (May 1st, 2013!)  and a long list of things that I have to get done before then. With the latrine project wrapping up nicely I can turn my attention to helping run a Maternal & Child Health training, helping to facilitate another visit from the PeaceCare team, participating in the Kedougou Youth Leadership Camp, and handing off my various Peace Corps-related responsibilities.

The Maternal Health training was supposed to happen last November, but there were some... perturbations... during the whole grant-processing  procedure and things didn't quite pan out as planned, but the midwives and Health Center staff are enthusiastic and I'm hopeful that the training will happen in early March so that I won't have to pass it on to my replacement, who will be arriving in early May. I'm looking forward to PeaceCare's visit (cryotherapy training for local health professionals! How can you not be looking forward to that?) and of course, pretty much everyone knows how much I love camp, so that'll be great, too.

It's shaping up to be an exceptionally busy few weeks, but as hectic as it's shaping up to be, I am glad that I'll be busy.

I'm hoping that all the work will help keep me from dwelling on how sad I'll be to leave my host family and my friends here and from fretting about the somewhat intimidating prospect of returning to America. (So big! So expensive! So fancy! So many options for everything!) I'm definitely going to miss Mariama Kesso and her daughter Fatou (above - she's getting so big!). I will miss the kids (Sajou, Tijane, Mankaba, and Diabou, below left) who like to come by my hut in the afternoons (and some mornings, and most evenings) to color and practice counting and insist that I look at whatever they happen to be doing. I might miss Diabou (below right, with marker on her face) most of all. She was the last of the kids to warm up to me, she doesn't talk much, and one time she accidentally peed on my floor, but she's also funny and tenacious and always comes over to offer me peanuts and to help me sweep out my hut. She's a good little friend.

Delivery!

The materials for my latrine arrived! Or, most of them did. Everything except the sections of PVC pipe that will be used to provide pit ventilation was delivered, but the hardware store ran out of PVC pipe. It only took two days for them to get it in stick, but then the delivery truck had some mechanical issues and that took a few more days to fix. Things seem to be back on track now and really, it wouldn't be Senegal if there wasn't at least some sort of minor delay and the driver's a nice guy who gave me a good deal on transport so I can't complain (too much).

The truck drove right up on to our compound and they unloaded the cement into my host mom Mariama's old hut, which luckily is still standing. She had a new square hut built about six months ago and has just been using the old hut for storage, which was extremely serendipitous for me and my five metric tons of latrine-bound cement. People have been digging or hiring diggers to get the latrine pits ready, and once the PVC ventilation pipes arrive (which should happen today, if all goes well) the masons will have everything they need to start installing the latrines themselves.

The truck guys unloaded the iron bars (rebar, you would call it?) on to the ground and my host brother Mamadou and his friends hauled them over to the side of the storage hut. Sajou Ba and Diabou tried to "help" for about ten seconds before they (quite rightly) got scolded away. 

I'm happy to see that things are moving along and even happier to see that people are still motivated and interested in the project. Every time I walk over to the market I see more holes being dug and someone calls me over to ask if the materials are ready yet or tell me that they paid their part of the community contribution and are ready to start. There's still a lot of work to be done but we're off to a good start.