Howdy folks!

I know I’ve mentioned the heat before, but it’s hot. Ridiculously hot. My mom sent me a thermometer in the mail and on an average day it’s about 105 degrees…in my room! So outside in the sun it’s probably 120 easy. I’m not exaggerating when I say that some days I really don’t stop sweating. However, I’ve made peace with the heat. At first I was trying to outsmart it. I had countless strategies to try to keep my room as cool as possible…move the fan here at night, here in the morning, keep my door shut at this time, close it at this time, open the window this much and put the fan here, etc. You get the point. But it turns out you can’t outsmart the heat here. It just knows. It knows how to seep into every corner of a house and stay there. It knows how to linger in the air and be carried by the wind. It knows how to stick around at night, even when the sun has been set for hours. It knows how to saturate a mattress and sheets so you want to sleep standing up because it’s cooler than laying on a mattress. It knows how to keep chap stick constantly melted and make the thought of a hot shower revolting. It knows how to make you hot through to your bones. I’m telling ya, it just knows. Either that or I’m just dumber (quite possible).

Anyway, my turning point came when I was at a friend’s house and met her grandfather, who seemed to be at least 75. The grand father’s grand father was the guy who first settled and started my town (another story all together). Even before he started talking much, he just struck me as one of those old people who’s seen a lot and has processed it all, so that now every time he opens his mouth he says something wise and meaningful. He asked me how I was doing with the heat, and I said that it was hot. He chuckled and told me that you just have to accept it. He said if you accept it you’ll be all right, but if you don’t accept it, you won’t make it. My first thought was, yeah okay buddy, easy for you to say, you’ve probably never lived in an air conditioned country, you don’t understand the glory that is air condition. Then I realized, duhhhhhhh, of course he’s right, he’s the wise old man who’s grand father started this town, why didn’t I believe him at first? And why havn’t I figured that out for myself yet? Must be the heat that’s making me dumb. Damn it, can’t use that as an excuse anymore, gotta accept it…

So I guess the whole concept of accepting things you can’t change isn’t particularly earth shattering or even new, but ever since then the heat hasn’t really bothered me! Alhamdouliliah!

Work wise things are kinda sorta starting to almost maybe be starting to go. This is an example of why I say kinda sorta almost maybe: I went to a week long training in Thies (the city I had my other main training) with the president of the women’s group, named Aissata. The training was about starting a project like the project the women’s group wants to do, but it didn’t turn out to be as relevant as I had hoped. We spent at least two days discussing the difference between a vision, goal, objectives and activities. That’s all fine and dandy, but I was hoping to learn more specific stuff like how to go about getting funding for projects. Regardless, the training ended on a Saturday, and after the training Aissata went to Dakar. That’s also fine and dandy, because I stopped in St. Louis on the way back. However, the next weekend I had to go to a meeting for all the volunteers in my region, and when I left that Friday she still hadn’t returned from Dakar. I got back on a Monday, and went to talk to her on a Tuesday. I asked when she wanted to meet to discuss the project. She couldn’t Wednesday, so she said Thursday. I went to her house on Thursday with all my stuff ready to start work, but she had visitors so she said “tomorrow.” Ok. I went back the next day, but she had visitors again. She said “tomorrow.” I went back again, and we actually discussed the project a bit. Now we need to have a meeting with the other presidents of the group. So yesterday she was supposed to talk to the others and decide on a day to meet. I’m at internet today, so tomorrow hopefully I’ll know when the meeting will be. It will probably be a similar process with the next meeting….a few days delay here, a few days delay there, only a few people will show up so we’ll have to have another meeting, then another few more delays, etc. After several weeks we’d basically just established that we needed to have another meeting. It’s nobody’s fault, it’s just how things are done here. And that’s why I say things with work are kinda sorta almost maybe starting.

There’s other random stuff I’d like to do, but a lot of it will take funding. There’s another women’s group in a village about 2k from my town that wants funding for a water pump, so I’m working on that.

And here’s a classic developing country scenario: I was at the town’s “college” (basically the equivalent of middle school), and I was talking to the headmaster dude. I was asking him about the computer situation (if there were any available for the school to use), and he told me that somebody had just donated 10 computers to their school. That sounds pretty amazing, right? It is amazing, considering the school doesn’t even have electricity or a room to put the computers in! He assured me that it would be easy to get electricity to the school if we had a building for the computers, so I told him I would look for funding. A few days ago I was at the college again and it looked like some construction was about to take place. I asked him what it was, and he said a building for two new classrooms. Then I asked if they were going to be able to build a computer room, and he just responded, “No, that’s what you’re gonna do for us, right?!?” Eeeeeeeeeeeeee. No pressure there! I also found out that the guy who donated the computers just happens to be a candidate in the upcoming legislative elections. Tut tut tut. It all makes sense now.

Peace Corps gives out a scholarship for one girl per college who has the minimum g.p.a. and who needs the financial assistance. Twelve girls from each school are chosen to apply, and they have to write an essay, do an interview with the Peace Corps Volunteer in their town, and have a teacher write a letter of recommendation. After I'd conducted all the interviews I chose to visit 5 girls at their homes to further assess their financial need. It’s been really fun working with these girls, and it’s kept me busy. Of the 12 girls, only 3 are actually from my town. The others are from surrounding towns and either commute daily or live with a relative or friend in town during the week. The other day when school let out I went home with one girl, who lives about 5-6k away. I already respected these girls, but I respect them even more knowing that they have to wait around in the hot hot sun for a vehicle to come, and pay money both ways everyday! And it’s not like taking a big yellow school bus in the states. There’s no organization or regularity, students just have to go to the road and wait. When a car comes there’s a huge scramble to get on. We didn’t get in a car until the third one came, and it’s mayhem getting on and off….lots of good natured pushing and shoving among the students competing to get in the car, but pushing and shoving nonetheless. After we made it to her town we walked around a little bit. When people would first look at us, they’d be like “who’s this toubab?” Then the student, named Suoudou, would explain the scholarship. I think the moments when she would explain the scholarship were some of the most rewarding I’ve had….this girl is so cute but so very modest and shy, so she explained the scholarship in a very matter of fact way, but I could tell she was glowing and so proud, as she should be! I tried to emphasize that I came because she was smart and worked hard, and she was so modestly proud that I just wanted to give her a hug and shout it for everybody to hear so she could get the recognition she deserved! I don’t think many people from her town go to school, so they probably don’t really appreciate what she does everyday. Plus, she doesn’t really have anybody to practice her French with or study with, which I think is an extra challenge to getting good grades. I can’t imagine going to school and learning everything in a language that I never hear or speak outside of the school walls. I hope that even if she doesn’t win the scholarship she still stays proud of the work she’s done!

Random Africa Moment:

I don't know if this will be all that funny to you guys, but it was still a random Africa moment for me....

Right now is the end of the dry season, and older volunteers say that now is the time for dust storms. They're right.

It's usually pretty windy here, but a few weeks ago I was sitting in my room and there was a GINORMOUS gust of wind...absolutely howling and kinda scary. I shut my window, but I thought I was overreacting at first. Then I looked outside my room into the foyer area and it looked all cloudy. Then I realized that it was dust from the one huge gust of wind, and a second later my sister came running in the house and started shutting everything up. Things were a bit frantic and a bit scary, because the wind was still howling and there was some thunder and lightning. After the windows and doors were shut everybody went back outside. I thought it was a bit odd, and wondered if I'd just imagined all the dust. Then I stuck my head outside and was immediately assaulted by sand and dust, so I went back inside for a minute. Then I decided that I wanted to experience my first storm in Senegal, so I went back outside. It was still ridiculously windy and I was covered in dust pretty instantly, but everyone in my faily was just lazily sitting around outside still. My family was laughing at me cuz I must have been pretty wide eyed and marveling at the storm. Eventually it started sprinkling a bit, but the dust continued to assault me. I just say 'me' because nobody else seemed bothered by it. I dont mind being dirty, but sitting around getting pailed by dust isnt my idea of fun, and I started to question how strong my desire was to witness this storm. Right then my mom told me to go inside to get a headwrap. You want me to go inside just to get a head wrap? Screw that, Im going inside...and staying there!! Have fun getting pelted by dust!

As I walked inside I was thinking to myself how crazy my family was for staying outside during a storm when we have 2 beautiful buildings to go into! Then I realized that I was in Africa, and that maybe getting pelted by dust is a cherished past time. Okay, its probably not. But my family still stayed outside for the duration of the storm. Whatever floats your boat.

Vacation in Ghana

Howdy folks! I hope summer is starting off well for everybody! As you can probably guess from the title, I've recently taken a vacation in Ghana! I have a friend from college who is currently living and working there, and I took my first vacation to go and see him. Two other friends from college flew in as well from the states. It didn’t start off that great, but it turned out to be a blast!

I was scheduled to fly out of Dakar around 2:30, so I got to the airport around noon, only to find that the flight was delayed. I had a layover in Cote D’Ivoire, and I knew I’d miss the connection if it was delayed too long. I stood around (along with everybody else on the flight) wondering what exactly was going on, but the airline wasn’t really telling us anything, so we continued to wait. Eventually, after at least 2 hours of waiting around and when it was obvious that those of us who had connections were going to miss them, the airline tells us we’d have to come back the next day and they’d put us on a flight with a different airline. I was not a happy camper. I was only planning on being in Ghana for 6 days, now I was stuck in Dakar for another day and my time in Ghana was down to just 5 days.

So the next day I went back to the airport, and the first flight was actually on time. I boarded the plane, got all settled in my seat, then noticed two flight attendants hovering next to my seat. They asked me my name, then if I knew Captain Halasz. When I said no they looked confused and walked away. A minute later one came back and I couldn’t really understand what she said, but I thought she asked my nationality. I said American. Then she said something about Hungarian, so I said my last name was Hungarian. She didn’t really understand, so she just said “come here, come here.” I was totally confused and had no idea what was going on. I followed the flight attendant up toward the cockpit, then she pointed at the pilot. The pilot asked I if I was Sandy Halasz. I said yes. He asked if I was Hungarian. I said yes. Then he asked if I knew Captain Halasz. I said no. Then he told me that he was Hungarian too, and that there were 5 or so Hungarian pilots for the airline I was on. I said cool.

I didn’t really understand that it was a big deal to be Hungarian, but to this guy it was. The next thing he asked was if I wanted to come sit in the cock pit for take off!! Of course I did!! I don’t know much about planes, but I do know if they’re big or small…and this was a pretty big plane! I got all buckled in and wound up staying in the cock pit the entire flight! It was awesome to see the take off and then watch the two pilots mess with all the buttons (there’s a ton of 'em!). The coolest part was probably the landing though. We were flying into Cote D’Ivoire, which is really lush and green, and the airport is right by the water. It looked like paradise!It was late afternoon so the sun was low and the light was beautiful...you could see individual rays poking through clouds, and there's a river that parallels the coast and it was so green and lush and so beautiful! I wish I’d had my camera! It was quite a contrast to all the sand I'm used to looking at everyday. The pilot said that it wasn’t very often that they had views like that, so I was very lucky! I guess that wouldn’t have happened if my first flight hadn’t gotten messed up!

So I'm running out of time at the internet cafe, but basically I had a blast in Ghana! We went to the beach, national park, and hung out in the capital city, Accra. I'll put up pictures eventually!


Random Africa Moment:

It really sucked that I got stuck in Dakar an extra day when my flights got messed up, but fortunately I had 3 other friends who happened to be in Dakar at the same time. I left the airport and met up with them and got some ice cream. We’d heard about a little seafood joint way out on the edge of Dakar that was right on the water. We decided to go there for dinner, and I’m glad we did!

The restaurant itself was pretty much a shack with some shade structures and tables underneath. But, it was right on the water, and I’m pretty sure it’s the most western part of Africa. So that's pretty cool. Anyway, after trying to translate the seafood menu into English, we decided to order a bunch of plates and share them. One of the things we ordered was sea urchin…yeah, the round, black spiky things! (not my idea…I’m not exactly the most adventurous eater!). When we ordered the sea urchin, the waiter told us that they were raw. Hmmmm I don’t know about that guys. My friends decided to go for it anyway. A few minutes later we saw the waiter go around the side of the restaurant and walk around on the rocks and hand pick the sea urchins right then and there! A few minutes later a tray of sea urchins came out, and it looked like all they had done to prepare them was cut them in half. Eeeeeee. Gross. Maybe they kinda gutted them, too, I don’t know. Somebody tried it and said it was good, but I wasn’t ready to eat raw sea urchin. I was focused on eating something else, when one of my friends shrieks and jumps. I was kind of annoyed by the sudden high pitch shriek, because I couldn’t imagine what possibly could have happened. Then I looked over at the plate….the damn sea urchin was still moving!! I almost shrieked too! Not only were my friends eating raw sea urchin…they were eating raw, still moving sea urchin! Double eeeeeeeee. I was eventually talked into trying it, and there was enough lime squeezed on it that it tasted mostly like lime, but now I can say I’ve eaten live raw sea urchin. I guess I wouldn’t be able to say that if my stupid flight to Ghana hadn’t been cancelled!