Mamadou and the Donkey Cart

My host brother Mamdou and his friends had to haul a bunch of rice sacks from one part of town to another, and to do this they employed a donkey cart. 

I really don't like donkeys here. They're scary. They can (and do) kick out for no reason, and they charge around through village like huge, bellowing bats out of hell, coming perilously close to demolishing anything (or anyone) in their paths. Also they tend to have awful, oozing sores (from fighting and beatings and general neglect), which is less scary just sad and hard to look at. 

In any case, the donkeys that (as far as I can tell) my host family owns are in decent shape and Mamadou was obviously quite pleased with himself and when they passed me in the market they took all the painting supplies I was carrying and brought them back to the house for me. They're good kids. 

Driving the donkey cart down Main Street.

More Birthday Cake

I am pleased to share my birthday with Marielle, another Health PCV from my training group, and this year we had a remarkably delicious birthday celebration. With help from Jackie we made veggie spring rolls with peanut dipping sauce in the afternoon, and very tasty squash and sweet-potato soup (the secret ingredient was oatmeal, no joke) with double-butter garlic bread for dinner. 

Later in the evening we brought out the cakes (one chocolate, one double-Ghirardelli-chocolate) to be decorated, set ablaze, and blown out.

 

It was a great birthday and a very nice little break from village life. Even if you aren't fasting, Ramadan in village can start to wear on you a bit. Food is scarce during the day, dinner usually isn't ready until well after 11 o'clock at night, people are tired, and if you're not going to the mosque there isn't much happening in the evenings.

Experiencing Ramadan in Senegal has been really interesting, but it was also really nice to get together, speak some English, hang out around the kitchen table, play music, eat wonderful food, and catch up with people. We also took a bunch of with Katie, the other most recent birthday girl, and I modeled of my fantastic new shirts from my birthday packages.

 

Summer Birthdays! 

Hey, look at this thing I made.

Rainy season has begun in earnest, and that means long, damp afternoons spent in my hut, making tea, listening to podcasts, writing letters, and, most recently, sewing things. I've mended some tattered t-shirts, stitched up my mosquito net, hemmed some pants, and made a replacement pouch for my Diva Cup. (Most female PCVs here use menstrual cups because tampons and pads are not readily available. And also because they're pretty great.) It's been a long time since I sewed anything by hand, but I fussed around and pinned things together this way and that way and it came together eventually.

Tah-dahh

It was a challenge to make the stitching even, but I did remember to how to sew it inside out, line everything up, and measure it correctly. (Thanks Mom!) I was/am particularly proud of myself for making a functional drawstring to close it. Proud enough to show it to pretty much everyone who was hanging out at the Regional House, whether or not they had any interest in either arts & crafts or Diva Cups.



I also showed it to my host family; they were impressed, assumed it was a coin purse, and I didn't correct them. They also thought it was novel, a woman knowing how to sew. In Senegal tailors are almost exclusively male, and sewing is definitely considered a male activity. Not that anyone was offended, just a little amused, and now sometimes when someone on the compound needs help mending clothes or something they send a little kid to fetch me so I can come help, since I'm "very competent with the sewing."