Cute Overload

So, maybe you thought that just because I'm single and childless I wouldn't be churning out look-at-this-baby posts, but I'm here today to tell you about Fatou. Fatou is adorable. That is just a fact. She’s chubby and boisterous and as gregarious as a person can be without being able to actually talk yet. Now that she’s old enough to not forget me every time I leave for a few days, she likes to come over stand in the doorway of my hut, waving "bye-bye" and chattering away in baby Pulaar.

A few weeks ago, at the Tuesday lumo market, her grandmother bought her a new complet outfit and her mom, Mariama Kesso, bathed her, dressed her, doused her in baby powder, and brought her by for an impromptu photo shoot before she had a chance to get it all dirty.

Look how cute this baby is. Cute and smart and sassy. She's got the adorability trifecta going on. I cannot even handle it.

Maternal and Child Health Training: The Last of the Work Stuff

In March the maternal and child health training for "Neighborhood Aunts"that we've been trying to get off the ground for months actually happened, and despite some communications difficulties (the cell phone network went down for a week and a half) it went really well. “Neighborhood Aunts” are women who have been selected by their villages to serve as point people for disseminating important health information and encouraging healthy behaviors. Because they live and work in the community they are ideally placed to serve as health resources and can encourage healthy behaviors, such as attending pre-natal visits and seeking early treatment for malaria. 

For the most part, the midwives would lead a discussion or lecture, and then the women would break into small groups to practice leading health talks and having conversations about a given topic. Then, one by one, they would practice leading a health talk with the whole group, and the midwives would add or correct things as needed. The training was based on the "Neighborhood Aunt" curriculum laid out by the Senegalese Ministry of Health, and the schedule went like this:

Day One

·        Orientation and discussion of roles

·        The importance of advocating for ante-natal care

·        Pre-natal visits, attended births, post-natal visits, and miscarriage

·        Family planning and reproductive health

Day Two

·        The importance of advocating for child health (0-5 Years)

·        Vaccinations, seeking early treatment for illness and injuries

·        Community mobilization methods, implicating community leaders

·        Creating and managing community health funds

           

Day Three

·        Planning, implementation, following up, and reporting activities

·        The importance of the "Neighborhood Aunt"

·        Evaluation and distribution of monthly activity reporting forms

·        Review and closure

There were also group discussion about why maternal health is important, and the participating women spoke frankly and passionately about how women are often undervalued or seen as replaceable, and how that needs to change. They had the chance to ask all sorts of questions, talk about the reasons that people in their communities wait until the last minute to seek medical care, to discuss why some people are opposed to family planning, and to reaffirm the importance of having "Neighborhood Aunts" in a village.

The Community Center where the training was held is also where local youth can take vocational courses for trades like tailoring and catering, so the lunch and coffee break prep for our training also served as a practicum for a group of catering students. It was really fun to hang out during lunch and coffee breaks, both because the people serving the food were intent on showing off their skills and because all of the women were so obviously delighted at being served a fancy lunch that they didn't have to make from scratch themselves. I think it made them feel important, which made the training feel more important, too.

Once the chairs were rented, the radio announcements made, and the lunches all paid for, my main role was just to sit in the back of the room, taking pictures, occasionally holding fussy babies, and nodding approvingly whenever anyone looked over at me. About half the participants came from other villages, took three whole days out their lives, to attend the training, and it was great to see most of them really enjoying the training, asking good questions and taking their role very seriously. Best of all, the midwives were really pleased, and after the training wrapped up they talked and talked about how to best implicate the newly-qualified "Neighborhood Aunts" in their attended birth and pre-natal visit promotion activities. 

Merry Happy!

Ahh, the holidays. We decided that last year's Christmas in Popenguine just really could not be topped, so we settled down for a pleasant, low-key Christmas and it has been very, very nice. We've been staying at my friends' place, where there are two cats, a washing machine, and a little Christmas tree decorated with small gourd ornaments. It's lovely. Marielle baked pumpkin muffins and Marie and Sarah L. just came over for Christmas breakfast. We're all up in Dakar to meet family and friends who are flying over to visit. At this point we're all counting down the hours and looking forward to (and fretting slightly about) showing our guests around and introducing our American families to our Senegalese ones. 

Merry Christmas from West Africa!

So, whether you celebrate Kwanzaa, Saturnalia, Yuletide, Christmas,  Hanukkah, Chrishaunakwanstice, or abstain entirely from all the of the many winter festivals that there are out there, I hope you're well and having a lovely day, wherever you are. 

Chocolate-Frosted Wonderland and the End of the World

Well, despite all the entertaining speculation, yesterday came and went and the world saunters on. The PCVs in Kedougou were pretty confident that at the stroke of midnight somewhere the world wouldn't come crashing down about our ears, but we made a day of it anyway. A team of crack sous-chefs helped to make a veritable vat of End of the World Chili (it was just chili) and I baked a Farewell Cake, which Rob and Owmy liked very much despite their faces in this photo. Joseph, however, was unimpressed. 

Patrick built a fire (that no one could really sit too close to because it was too hot) and gave a somewhat-salacious-but-ultimately-heartwarming an End of the World Speech while we all roasted marshmallows and we were all quite happy that the end was not nigh.

Shea Butter Tubs

Shea butter (kare in Pulaar and karité in French) is an extremely popular product here in Senegal. people use it as a lip balm and a body moisturizer and they also cook with it. The struck me as odd but then I tried it, on rice, and it had lovely smooth texture and a warm, nutty taste. It's much better than the soapy, waxy flavor of the bright red-orange palm oil that's also so popular around here. 

Making shea butter is astoundingly hard work. (I've been taking photos of the process and one of these days I'll get around to posting them.) The shea nuts have to be gathered, dried, shelled, pounded, ground, soaked, strained, boiled, re-strained, melted down, and poured into containers. In our area the women's groups often get together to make and sell shea butter. Usually they just pour it into old water bottles or whatever containers happen to be on hand, and a half-liter goes for around 1,000 CFA, or about $2.00 USD. (If you go to L'Occitane and buy a tub of shea butter in the U.S. it will be crazy expensive in comparison, but a reliable source tells me you can get it on Amazon for a very reasonable price.)

Mariama and the Tubs

Awhile back my host mom Mariama went to a training, funded by an NGO, that went over best practices and hygienic processing and packaging methods. They made simple but nice little labels and brought white plastic tubs in liter and half-liter sizes. Mariama bought a big stack of tubs, filled them with shea butter, and is now selling them at a slight mark-up. At some point someone from the NGO will come back and buy up all the shea butter-filled tubs and bring them to Dakar to be sold for a higher price at the markets up there.  

Mariama and Adama and the Tubs

Mariama's really proud of the little white tubs and of how professional and clean they look all stacked up and told me to go get my camera to take a picture of the ones she'd filled so far. I bought a couple, a few other PCVs said they'd like to buy a few more, and before I knew it I had a small shipment of shea tubs to haul in to the Regional House. My host mom was super pleased, we were all impressed with how nicely the shea butter was packaged, and Mankaba, Mariama's youngest son, was just happy that we had the camera out and were taking pictures of things.

"Adama Adama Adama let me take a picture!"

(He took a bunch of photos but they pretty
much all looked like this.)

"Ok that's enough of that, Mankaba. Give it back."

I was glad to be able to show my support for Mariama (she is one of the hardest-working people I've ever met) and also happy to have a reason to stock up on shea butter, since winter (or what passes for it here) is upon us now and my lips were getting dry and chapped. Everybody wins. 

ThanksGouving 2012

This year more people than usual opted to stay in Kedougou for Thanksgiving and we were lucky to have a really good group at the house. I had the great honor (no one else wanted to do it) of coordinating the menu (which was ambitious) and market run, and - with help from Jess, Camille, and a whole host of other PCVs - it all went swimmingly. Except for the grease fire. But no one got hurt, not even the casseroles, so all's well that ends well, I suppose.

Some people cooked up a storm, others formed a house band and kept everyone entertained, and Ashleigh and Jackie spearheaded the Decoration Committee. (Many thanks to Ashleigh's Mom and Ilana's Mom for sending decorations and ingredients!)

 We didn't have real turkeys (chickens are much easier to come by around here) but we did have hand turkeys and everyone was pretty happy about that. There were so many appetizers, chickens, sides, salads, rolls, breads, gravy pots, pies, cakes, and fancy caramel apple cider drinks that everyone had more than enough to eat. Even Marie Christine and Pascale, our wonderful housekeepers, were impressed with how much we cooked and how well it turned out, so we all feel like we were pretty successful at hosting a good Thanksgiving party.

  

Gou Crew & Friends! 

Patrick and Annē, Dish Crew Extraordinaire 

Collapse!

So, we love our Regional House. It's where we come to get our mail, check our e-mail, get our protein fixes, stock up on vegetables, take a break, or catch a car up to Dakar. It's also where we have a fancy marble-inlaid latrine (or douche,* as they're somewhat inaccurately called here) can take a stand up (outdoor, unheated) shower, which is really nice. Or, it was, until the walls of our shower/latrine area started to crack. And then crumble.

The out-of-order latrine at our Regional House

And then, over night, a hole opened up in the floor of the latrine area. The photo on the left another PCV took last week; the other one I took today. We had no idea that the people who built it just dug an enormous pit, covered it with a thin slab of concrete without any sort of supporting structures, and called it a day. Luckily the floor came apart slowly, no one got caught by surprise, and we're already starting the process of having it pumped, re-built (more practically, this time) and will hopefully be able to salvage some of that nice marble from the floor.

All this has really impressed upon me the importance of a good, sturdy latrine cap, and I'll be keeping that in mind as my own latrine project rolls out. No one wants to go douche-spelunking. 

* "Douche" means "shower" in French, but people use it to mean "toilet," kind of like how Americans call toilets "bathrooms."

American Tabaski

This year Tabaski fell on October 26th, and it was the first time I haven't been with my host family for a major Senegalese holiday. I wanted to make it back to my village in time for the celebrations, but between the trial in Tamba, working with peacecare, and a tenacious-and-unbelievably-itchy fungal infection on my legs, it just wasn't in the cards. 

With everyone else back at site for Tabaski in their villages, Marielle and I were the only volunteers left at the Regional House - it was a little like being the only kids left in the dorms over Thanksgiving Break - and we made the most of it.

 We were joined by Casey, a Mali RPCV (Returned Peace Corps Volunteer) here to make a documentray about West African music, and the three of us had a really pleasant time. (Having a few extra days to hang out in running shorts and shower twice a day really helped with the rash recovery, too.) We cooked super-fancy little eggplant pizzas (thanks Meghan!), baked amazingly delicious pumpkin spice cupcakes with caramel frosting (thanks Marielle's mom and Ashleigh!), called to greet our friends and host relatives, watched new New Girl episodes (thanks internet!) and laughed about Senegal's recent American Idol-style sheep competition (thanks, Sally!). 

 It wasn't a traditional Senegalese Tabaski (no sacrificial ram, no shiny new clothes) but it was quite delicious and I wouldn't have traded it for all the mutton in town. 

Privy Party!

Back in August my amazing grandmother (with lots of support from my equally amazing mother and family) decided to celebrate her birthday by hosting a lovely tea party to benefit the latrine-building project I’d proposed. She called it a Privy Party and it was a resounding success. She raised so much money that I was able to expand the project, increasing the number of latrines that we’ll be able to build.

I can only hope that the latrines
will turn out as well as the tea party did ~ 

My community here is very excited about this project, and I’m eager to start building, but there are still a few weeks left until the rainy season is definitively over and building can begin. I’ll be doing my best to make the most of this time to increase awareness of the importance of latrines and of how to go about getting involved with the project - each participating family will provide a contribution, learn about disease prevention and latrine use and maintenance, and assist with the construction of their latrine. It’s not a hard sell; people around here are generally really enthusiastic about latrine use. Some compounds already have latrines, but they’re often used by a large number of people, leading to the latrine prematurely filling up and breaking down.  Many other houses have no latrine at all, and so people resort to practicing outdoor defecation (a fancy way to say pooping off in the bushes or out in the fields) or settle for using a neighbor’s latrine when they can, which is fine but tends to exacerbate the overuse problem.

I really can’t do enough to thank all the people who contributed to this project – especially my family – but I will do my best to post updates as the project progresses and to (eventually!) send out thank-you cards. It’s been really moving to see how engaged and motivated people are to help other people improve their communities.

My Garden Grows

Over the summer I finally put up some crintin woven fencing and turned the little space between my hut and my host mom Mariama's cooking hut into a little garden. My host family helped me get the crintin and I cleared out the trash and bricks, dug out some plots, and picked out some seeds to plant. 

With the help of Mankaba (above) and his older brother Mamadou (below with the moringa) I planted moringa, squash, cherry tomatoes, wax beans, radishes, okra and cucumbers. I tried to plant hot peppers and bitter eggplant but they didn't sprout. Luckily, Mariama, Mamadou and Mankaba's mother, has a nice garden of her own and transplanted a few seedlings over. My little garden's right next to her sleeping hut and her cooking hut it makes for a convenient kitchen garden - if all goes well the tomatoes will go in maafe tiga (the peanut sauce we eat with rice for lunch), the spinach-ish moringa leaves will go in maafe hakko (the leaf sauce we have with corn couscous for dinner) and the other things will be mixed into cucumber salads, added to sauces, or eaten afternoon snacks.

When I cleared out the garden space I realized that the moringa that Lindsay, the PCV I replaced, had planted a couple years ago had survived the long dry seasons and months and months of neglect. In Senegal people call moringa nebba die, from the English "never die" because it's such a tenacious plant. It was nice, feeling like there was some continuity between my little garden and the one she and Mamadou had planted during her service.

My first harvest of radishes and wax beans was somewhat accidental. I'd gone in only planning to thin  the radishes, which were growing in dense and tightly spaced, but most of them were already big enough to call it 'picking' rather than 'thinning.' I also snapped off a handful of beautiful purple beans (which turned green when steamed) and had a delicious mid-morning snack. Like many other Volunteers who haven't gardened in ages and who are lucky enough to live in southern Senegal (where the dirt seems to be made of Miracle-Grow) watching plants spring up in garden beds and produce recognizable, edible things seems slightly magical.

One day Mamadou planted a little banana tree. It's great, but I'm a little worried about its long-term survival outlook, since rainy season is drawing to a close and bananas need a lot of water. For the time being, though, it's a fun addition. Mariama's bitter eggplant and not peppers are coming along well, and the tomatoes are growing like they're trying to take over the world. I keep having to prop them up and trim them back so they don't cover the plants nearest them.

The squash has started fruit and also to climb up my hut; the tomatoes and okra are sprouting little tomatoes and okras, and the cucumber is blossoming nicely. I'm about to be out of village for almost a month because of work - project-related meetings and trainings followed by a Health summit in Thiès -  and I'm a little sad that I won't be able to keep an eye on my garden. While I'm away I'll check in with Mamadou and Mariama, though, and hopefully they'll be able to start harvesting some useful fruits and veggies pretty soon.