Discussing politics in the dark

So the French classes that I have taken at GW haven't really prepared me for conversations like, "the water does not work during the day" or "were your sheets changed" etc. which has resulted in quite a few misunderstandings. However, I am well prepared for conversations about history and politics. Lucky for me, the daily power cuts have started many a conversation about politics in Senegal.

Senegal is a democracy but President Abdoulaye Wade does not seem to feel like he needs to listen to the needs of the ordinary Senegalese citizen. This is illustrated by the giant statue (designed by North Koreans) in my neighborhood built as a dedication to the African Renaissance. My family and a majority of the population are utterly disgusted by the statue for many reasons. One, it depicts a family who are dressed very indecently for a country where a majority of the population is Muslim and values conservative dress. Second, the statue cost $27 million in public funds in a country where millions live in poverty and 48% of the population is unemployed. This money could have gone far in projects to improve the infrastructure. The torrential rains make the roads impassable as I found yesterday when mid-car rapide ride to my first Senegalese dance class, it started to pour. We pulled over to the side of the road and stayed in the car rapide (which wasn’t waterproof due to the more than ten rust holes in the metal roof) until it stopped. We then had to wade ankle deep in water (and I don’t want to think about what else) to get to class.

Okay so I went on a bit of a tangent there. Anyway, paying $27 million dollars for a statue is absolutely ridiculous when the government cuts power at least twice a day because it cannot afford the price of petrol.

Every time we lose power my family and I sit outside the house on a bench and talk. I really like this time because I'm at school for most of the day so it provides time to talk about politics and have Wolof lessons. One night we used the time in the dark to make milk. I am not exactly sure what the drink is called but that is what my sister said to me when we were trying to think of things to do "do you want to make milk with us" (in french of course). We went to the boutique (tiny convenience stores you can find on almost every street corner) and bought a huge bag of powdered milk, three cans of condensed milk, laughing cow cheese and a bag of mint candies. I was very confused about how all these ingredients would go together, but when combined over heat they made a very delicious, thick, milky and minty drink.

There are a lot of people in my family, this means lots of birthdays! Here are some pictures from two of them:

Here are some more photos from my walk to school:

And some photos from when my host siblings discovered my camera:

That’s all I have time for now. I am off to Toubab Diallo, a beach town north of Dakar, for the weekend so I am sure I will have photos and stories for next week. The first week in October I have a vacation from school so I am off to the Sine Saloum Delta and The Gambia so i'll be doing lots of traveling in the next couple of weeks, (we'll see how that goes as traveling during the rainy season can get very difficult.)

Jamm ak Jamm,

Ba Beneen Yoon