TV Dinners

In the States, one of my parents strictest rules was no TV during dinner. Who would have thought I would travel halfway accross the world to break it. Coming to Africa I never expected to watch TV, but my compound owns a TV, and my host brother owns a solar panel so he can charge the battery to run the TV.

Notice the TV in the middle of the picture with the battery sitting in front of it.

I have to say it is a surreal feeling when I realize I am watching TV in the open air in the middle of my family compound in Africa - on a 10/11 inch black and white screen. We only get one or two channels which most of the time are in english or french (the villagers do not understand either). We watch TV about 3 nights a week starting before dinner. Most of the village kids come to watch and sit around the TV on benches, stools, or rice bags.When dinner is ready we huddle around the food bowl with the TV in the background. No one watches while they eat, but meals in gambia are always quick, so afterwards everyone goes back to watching. I usually go to bed.

The kids watch TV during the day sometimes and I think they can watch just as much as kids in America. One day I am positive they watched at least 6 hours during the day and then they pulled out the TV that night. One of the programs they watch is about animals from around the world, and they are amazed when dolphins jump out of the water or gorillas fight. Even the women peek in sometimes to watch a bit.

Baby Alex

Ok not baby Alex, but Baby Pateh (my African name). Last week I had a baby named after me. In The Gambia every child is named after a family member or friend which could explain why there are so few names in The Gambia. Seven days after a baby is born, the parents hold a naming ceremony, a big party, for the child. People dress up, eat meat, and sometimes listen to music if the family has more money.

I showed up to one last week in the morning around 11am. I almost missed it because I thought the ceremony was the following day. After I sat around for an hour, the family decided everyone had shown up. I went into the room where a man shaves the baby's head. In this case he only shaved a little hair in the front and a little in the back ( it depends on the family, but some shave the whole head). Usually only women watch the baby's head being shaved. Then I went outside and sat with all the men on mats and chairs to pray for the baby. After prayers the father decided the name of the baby to be Pateh after me. Even though I have heard they sometimes name the baby after people with more money so they get presents, I was honored. The men passed out Kola nuts, a bitter nut which gambians like, and the prayers were over.

Baby Pateh and his parents.

Since the father picks the name of the child, the mother sometimes picks a separate name for the child. In that case the child has two names. My father is called Mamadou, his mother's name, which is used by my family, but in the next village people call him Habli, his father's name. Depending on the region of the country the mother's or father's name is preferred.


Next everyone sat around drinking attaya and talking while the women cooked the meal. Right after prayers we were served coos and sour milk with sugar (which I now really like). I remember the first time I had sour milk in training village I almost vomited, but I have grown to like it. Sour milk is milk left to stand for at least a day. It is chunky and on the fourth day goes bad. In the evening we ate the main meal. Depending on the wealth of the family they kill a chicken, goat or ram. In this case they slaughtered a goat. The goat tasted really good since I never get meat in village. As it got dark I rode my bike home.

Resurrecting a Library

Even though I am an environment volunter, many of us choose to work in the local schools especially during the first three months because teachers speak English, and we can work in the garden or help teach classes. I went to help at a school in the next village (my village has no school). At first I went to help in the lower basic school (grades 1-6) because it was something different than sitting in my village all day long. There I have been learning more about Gambian culture and the local community through their teachers.

One problem was that I did not really know what to do when I went. The garden master did not need encouragement because he has a great garden of carrots, green onions, eggplant, cabbage, and tomatoes. A few children are assigned to a bed and they are in charge of watering, weeding, and planting. The school sells the vegetables to earn a little extra income and puts the vegetables in the lunch food bowls. I suggested I could teach in the classrooms, which the headmaster said was good, but he did not give me any instruction as to what I should teach or which grades. He just said "go". The kids also do not speak english well. So far I have not taught a class, but I plan to in a couple of weeks, about deforestation in the Gambia.

After inquiring about their library I figured out what I wanted to do. Now my project and reason for going to the school is to resurrect the library. Their library was a big dusty cobweb room filled with books stacked on tables at one end of the room. The rest of the room was empty except for an old chalkboard with some numbers and a date from 2005. The room looked like it had not been used in months. I started by going through the books. Most of them are targeted for beginners which is good, and they had some basic math books which look promising. They also had two boxes of which on top were written "Geography Discard." The books are all written before 1975 and have titles such as Surveys for town and Country Planning and Intro to Geomorphology. I am sure a library in England decided they no longer wanted these books and decided to donate them, a worthy decision, but why the books ended up in a primary school in the Gambia I do not know. I asked the teacher in charge of the library about the books and he said they were important because the teachers could read them. Current volunteers said schools will always ask for more books because they can show off how many they have. It is a source of pride. The usefulness and how much they are used are usually not considered.

Inside the library

The kids have an hour lunch break where they have the opportunity to go into the library. The librarian does not open the room unless I am there. I try to go twice a week. The other days he chooses not to open it. At first the kids were hesistant to come in, but by the second week a bunch of kids came. They look mostly at the pictures instead of reading, but some do read and at least they are exposed to the outside world of knights, planes, and exotic animals. Recently I have decided to work on math. I write problems on the board and the kids solve them. I realized the kids even in grade 5 and 6 still have trouble doing basic addition and subtraction problems. I have seen some interesting counting methods from drawing lines on the board to moving from their hands to their toes to counting on their chest and thighs. I think I want to work on math skills because if the kids stop school, the english they learn will be useless, but math they will use in their everyday lives. I want to start a math competition when I get back. I am hoping it will motivate the kids to study outside of class. As a reward I am going to let them draw with my crayons and markers.

The room is extremely bare. I am going to try to brighten the room up by posting fliers on the walls including maps, pictures of the sun, moon, and earth, and other stuff that would expose the kids to the outside world and stimulate them to learn. Any ideas would be appreciated.

Round 2

Me in my garden

The first three months I have had little work to do. I decided to turn my backyard into a garden. Since a clay wall fell down in my small back yard years ago, the ground is extremely hard. When I arrived in village, I immediately went to work building a compost pit of grass, cow dung, and mango leaves. I then made a small garden bed planting cucumber, tomatoes, bell pepper, carrot, and eggplant. They germinated nicely and I was excited about the potential of giving vegetables to my family to show the benefits of gardening (currently nobody in village has a dry season garden). But I should not have jumped to conclusions because two weeks later, the birds attacked. They ate everything but three small cucumber plants which they continue to nibble on until today so the plants cannot grow. My family told me to put thorny branches and plastic bags, but to no avail, the birds kept coming.

Round 1: Birds win

I did not want to give up so soon because how can I convince the villagers to garden if I give up so easily. For round two, I decided I would try an onion bag to cover the bed. It would give the plants a chance to grow and I did not think the birds would eat older leaves. I planted carrots and transplanted some eggplants from the local school. I thought I had a good plan. I even planted some trees to transplant later into pots. Unfortunately it was not a fool proof plan. As the carrots grew, they grew through the holes in the onion bag. The birds now sit on the onion bag and eat the leaves. I tried stringing cassete tape over the beds, but it did not help. At night the frogs dig around uprooting the carrots. One night I counted over 30 frogs in a bed 1.5m by 1m. Also, my eggplant attracted a small bug that caused them to get sick and even though I used a local pesticide made from tree leaves, it did not work. Also, about 1/3 of my tree seedlings would mysteriously die from morning to night. They were healthy when I woke up and by night they were all shriveled up. I suspect termites.

Round 2: Still undecided - Edge animals

For round three I am planning to put a mosquito net over the beds to stop my biggest problem - the birds.

Election Results

No this is not a post about the American primaries even though I am following the race as much as I can from my small radio in village. The Gambia had area council elections, similar to state legislatures, about a month ago. For the most part it was uneventful with APRC (the ruling party since Jammeh took control in a coup in 1994. He has won three succesive presidential elections) winning 101 or 102 of the 114 seats throughout the country.

The day after the elections I asked someone how the elections went and he said: "They went well. There was no trouble or fighting. " At first, I was surprised by his answer. I expected some excitement when his candidate won or sadness because his candidate lost. The thought of "fighting" due to an election was not the first issue to come to mind. In the States, I am never worried about the outcome leading to armed combat. I temporarily forgot how in most parts of Africa fighting is not only a possiblility, but many times a reality.

My district/ward was more interesting than most parts of the country. The current APRC candidate had an opposition candidate while most APRC candidates run without opposition. The opposition candidate lived in a neighboring village. However, his father, the village's alkaloo (the head of the village), was deposed. (The Alkaloo is a descendent of the founder. When he dies, the village usually meets to decide the successor, but it almost always remains in the family. The villagers can decide to vote out an alkaloo, but it is rare.). I am not sure by who, but a new alkaloo was appointed. The deposed alkaloo was told he could not be alkaloo if his son was running against an APRC candidate. The village is split in alegencies and the police are solving the matter.

My Mom's purple finger after she voted

Most adults in my village voted. They are given a small rock to put in one of the two boxes. Each box has a picture and the name of each candidate because most people are illiterate. [sidenote: I started teaching my mom how to draw 1 to 10 and say them in english]. After they vote they put their left hand in purple ink.

A Typical Day at the village

I guess there is not a typical day in the village, but my day usually goes somewhat like this. (Keep in mind that we are getting to know the people and their customs in the first 3 months in village)

5:30-6:00am - Most people wake to the sound of the call to prayer, but my village is small so it has no loudspeakers and no one sings the prayer. Instead about three times a week, I usually wake to the sound of honking as the gele (the bush taxi) comes rolling through my village to pick up customers traveling to Barra (the ferry crossing to the capital). When I travel to the capital, I take this gele.

7 am - Wake up and immediately go to the pump to fetch water to bathe. The water in the morning is slightly warmer than water left out over night. I also try to be the first or second one at the pump because I do not like cutting in front of the women to pump (In village, men do not wait in line at the pump).

7:15-8:30 am - I take a shower, water my garden, sweep, and make my bed. I also make something for breakfast because I am always hungry when I get up.

8:30 am - Greet my family, and read on my front step.

9:30 am - Eat breakfast with my host father and a couple of his kids. My father gets a separate food bowl from the women and the men. Most of the kids eat with the women or the men, but a couple of the younger ones eat with my father.

10 am - 2 pm - I do not have a daily routine, but I usually do one of the following; a village walkaround where I walk around to each family compound greeting and chatting with the families (it is a great way to learn about people), help in the fields or construction (so far I have helped people make fences and build a house), go to the school, or visit a nearby village.

2 : 30 pm - I eat lunch with my host father.

3:30 pm - I usually sit around with my family, play soccer, or read.

5:30 pm - The sun has started to set. I take a bucket bath, work in my garden, and snack on something.

7:00 pm - I usually go outside and sit on the bench in my compound. It gets dark around 7:30. Usually some of my family members are outside and I listen to them talk or I sit by myself if no one is out yet and watch people moving back and forth across the compound.

8:30pm - Dinner time.

9:15 pm - After the women eat, I tell my family I am going to bed. I close my front door, brush my teeth and lay in bed. I usually read, write in my journal, or listen to the radio before I sleep.

A Blessing and A Curse

Living in a small village with a host family has been a blessing and a curse. I would not trade this experience, but it has been difficult. I wrote this blog post a couple weeks ago, but time has given me some perspective. My old post was basically a rant of my frustrations. The past few weeks gave me time to gain a better understanding of the culture.

In village I am living with a host family, but I have been trying to figure out if they view me as a renter or as part of the family. I am sure it will change over time, but in the beginning I definitely felt as a renter. I have been told Gambians will never view me as one of them because I am white which automatically sets me apart as a rich man. Only time will tell how close I become with my family, but I think I am starting to feel more comfortable with them.

Another source of frustration comes from my family and villagers asking me for things such as a bandaids, my phone, a papaya, or attaya. It is difficult because at first I thought they targeted me because I am a toubab, a rich white person, but I have started to notice people ask each for things all the time. The difficult part is that I will always have money on my phone, bandaids, or medicine which most villagers will not. I cannot give it to one person without everyone asking me for it, so I have to say no, but in Gambian culture I cannot say no. I need to find an excuse to say no such as "I do not have" or joke back, but it is difficult for me to tell people I do not have it when I do. I always feel guilty afterward. If I leave the village, I can guarantee I will be asked by someone for money, bread, candy, or something else. I have grown accustomed to it because it no longer bothers me, but it is definitely an annoyance.


At first I thought the men in the Gambia were lazy. People here are always saying the following: America is good, Gambia is bad;
America is better than The Gambia; The Gambia has no money.
What frustrated me is that I saw men not working, drinking attaya (People spend about an hour or two sitting, talking and brewing tea. They do this at all times of the day, after breakfast, afternoon, and night. I consider it Gambia's national past time) and complaining they had a lot of work such as fencing to make. I am starting to realize the men are not necessary lazy just unmotivated. I have heard men say if I went to America I would work hard and make a lot of money. They say in the Gambia I work hard, but I have nothing. My host father told me he use to cut wood to sell for firewood and to fix radios, but he does not have money to show from it. He now just farms. I think they do not see the benefit of working hard. It is something we take for granted in America. I assume if I work hard in America, I can make money; but I think most people in the Gambia do not feel the same way.

So where does that leave me? After two months in village I am starting to feel comfortable with the villagers. My language knowledge is increasing and I am starting to understand better what people want (well, at least the small amount I can understand). I have set my boundaries high in village such as not letting kids in my house, only now eating with my family, and resisting giving my family presents. Current volunteers have told me not to give too much or the family will start to expect presents. And I guess I am also learning to come up with excuses...

Job Description

Many people have asked what I will be doing in The Gambia for the next two years, and I have to say it is really up to me. The Gambia is experiencing extreme deforestation. In the 1960s about 50% of The Gambia was closed canopy forest. In the 80s, closed canopy forest decreased to 7%. I am sure the number has continued to fall. Fewer trees increase erosion of fertile topsoil to wind, salination due to over use of cropland, and desertification as the Sahel approaches from the north. A major reason for the drop in forest stems from a population boom. Higher population means people cut more wood for their homes, fences, and firewood. Even with recent government regulations attempting to stem the speed of deforestation, it has continued with great speed.

As an Environment volunteer, it is my job to help gambians deal with their environmental problems and hopefully help them reverse them. I have great flexibility to pursue projects I am interested in and needed in my area. I am located near the Senegal border on the north bank of the river and it is one of the most deforested areas in the country. I constantly hear that I should plant more trees, but it is not easy. First, it is difficult to convince a farmer to plant trees when he sees no immediate monetary incentive. Any tree planted also must be protected from the goats, cattle, and sheep which adds labor. Goats and sheep are easy to raise and therefore a good source of income, but they are turned loose in the dry season. They eat everything that is green which includes new trees. Therefore trees must be protected which brings up the second problem in my area, fencing. Fencing is hard to come by. Local fences are made from wood, coos stalks, or local grasses, but they take a lot of work to make and wood is difficult to come by. Barbed wire is expensive and if not watched attentively goats can make gaps allowing them to get in.

Project areas I am interested in.

• Planting trees. One way is to plant fruit trees. Many villagers are already interested in fruits trees. There are many mango and papaya trees found throughout the villages. I plan to encourage planting fruit trees and I want to introduce some other species such as guava, sweet sop, and lime which are more rare in the region. I also would like to start a woodlot to sell the wood for timber. I need to find the right motivated counterpart who is interested in the long term. Most people here think of the "here and now" and not what is best in the future.
• Live Fencing. One solution to the lack of fences is planting trees and shrubs to act as a fence. Using plants with thorns or latex sap will hopefully create a thick impenetrable barrier. A solid fence without holes is difficult to create, but I want to try different combinations to see if they will work.
• Gardening. None of the women in my village grow crops in the dry season. It could be a great way to increase the nutrition in their diets because they eat few vegetables. Villagers could also sell some veggies at the local market and make some money. Lack of fencing creates a problem, and chickens have been known to destroy gardens. Other pests such as birds and insects have devastated peoples' hard work. [Birds have eaten almost my entire vegetable garden.]

I am also interested in income generation. There are a few projects villagers can do and I am specifically interested in solar drying and beekeeping.

The most difficult part of our job is finding the right person, what we call a counterpart. I think most men are not motivated around here, but there are a few people who work hard and are interested in trying new ideas. It is important to find these people, and they are the best to work with. My job for the next couple of months is to find the motivated 5% [as some people call it] who would be willing to work with me on projects. One thing I have been told over and over again is that nothing changes quickly, and it is easy to get frustrated. I am trying to take things slowly and see how and where I can help in my village and the surrounding communities.

What to send Alex, fyi [from his Mom]

[from Lolo, Alex's Mom]
You all should know that Alex will not be on email until February or March now; he is on his 3 month challenge. But he has a cell phone and you can call him; call me or send me email if you need his number. Isn't technology now amazing??? No electricity, no running water, but phone coverage...

We spoke to him on Christmas eve and he sounded in great shape.

Many of you have asked what you can send him. As usual, Alex said he doesn't need anything. At this village he gets some fish and one vegetable (squash at the moment) besides the rice.
He says he can buy most things there in the capital, since there is one Western market. But he needs to get there and they cost money, which he doesn't have much (and he wants to live like one of them).

When pressed, here is what he said are items that can be sent:
- letters, of course; it will make his day. It takes about one month either way. They go to PC headquarters and they distribute once a month.
- magazines (he has Newsweek and Economist subscriptions already)
- books, especially books about Africa (history, novels, etc)
- power bars or energy bars (they don't have those there)
- individual oatmeal packages
- trail mix (no chocolate because of the heat) and dried fruit are hard to find
- meaty things: beef jerky preferred; canned tuna or chicken
- nuts, canned fruits, canned beans, etc.
In small cans since he has no refrigerator.

Thanks for caring.
cheers, Lolo

A Typical Travel Day in The Gambia

[Note from Lolo: This is a partial post - Alex couldn't finish it before he had to go back to village. Since he is now on his 3-month village challenge, I don't expect he will be able to get access to the web to finish it until March... but I thought it was interesting - his description of his trip from his village to Banjul, the capital which is in the Kombo region]

I am glad to finally have made it to the capital region for our Christmas gathering. My day began at 4:30 a.m., and I arrived at the Peace Corps dormitory at 3:30 p.m. What should have been a 3 to 4 hour journey turned into an 11 hour adventure.

The trip into Kombo for Christmas started the night before, when my host brother called the Gele gele driver to let him know we, my two peace corps friends and I, were traveling the next day. One gele will pass by my village if the driver knows he has customers.

4:30am: We woke up; the driver is known to come as early as 5:00 and we had to be ready or he would leave without us. By 6, he was still not there, which was of no concern because there is no schedule. My host brother tried calling him, but his phone was turned off. At 7 I was worried, because I have never heard the gele pass by after 6:30. My host father called and found out he was not coming.

7am: We then walked 1.5 km to the next village where a morning gele leaves. After a 20min walk we arrive in village to find out we just missed the gele. The next gele would not come until early afternoon. We decided we did not want to wait because the geles usually have to wait to fill up or might not show up, and we did not want to risk losing a day of travel. We checked on a donkey cart to the main road from the village which is about 8 km. The driver wanted to charge us 400 Dalasis (22 Dalasis to the dollar) which we thought was outrageous. We decided to walk back to my village.

9am: Upon arriving back at my village, we decided we could walk to the main road where it would be easy to catch a gele (6km) or try and get someone in village to take us on a horse cart. Someone whom I knew offered to take us for 250 dalasis. We thought it was a lot of money, but we did not know the price and it was cheaper than the other guy. I figured the guy in village would give me a fair price becuase the village was small and we are not suppose to bargain with people in village. We decide to take the donkey cart, because we have bags and it would be far to walk.

9:40: Finally left our village again on donkey cart. Once we got to the main road, we stood by the edge of the road trying to wave down geles. We waited about 30 minutes to find a gele which was not full. After a 40 min ride, we arrived at the ferry terminal.

12:30pm: We arrived in Banjul by ferry. We walked about 15 minutes to the car park only to find there were mobs of people. Many people were coming home from the village after Tobaski. When the volkswagen buses pulled up people would mob the door making if difficult for the people trying to get off. It took us an hour of pushing and shoving to get in one of the cars, and we only made it because some gambians were friendly and basically pushed everyone out of the way to let us on.

close to 3pm: Rode by bus for about 25 min to the next car park to switch taxis, and take a new van to the Peace Corps residence. We treated ourselves to GamJuices, similar to flavored icies, but made with real fruit.

3:35pm: We finally made it!!!!

Happy holidays

Merry Christmas. I am back in Kombo for a couple days to celebrate the holidays. It does not feel like Christmas without the lights, decorations, and music, but we have a potluck dinner with turkey, mash potatoes, desserts, and secret santa tonight. It should be a good Christmas, and we watched Elf last night to get in the spirit.

A view of my village with some of the local kids.

So I did not make the three months in village due to Christmas, but the two weeks in village have been a challenge. The first first three days were the roughest. At one point in the middle of the day, I layed down on my bed completely overwhelmed asking myself what am I doing here. Slowly I am started to feel more comfortable with my family. I still have difficult speaking to them and understanding what they are saying, but I am learning. I found a tutor at the local school, and I plan to start lessons with him when I go back. Some days are better than others, but everyday I try to find one good thing I did. If I am feeling down, I go for a walk in the fields, read, write in my journal, or text a friend.

In village I have a lot of time and not a lot to do. I still need to learn about the community and the people before I can begin any projects. I mostly sit outside teaching the kids the ABCs, reading, or listening to conversations (trying to understand them). I dug a garden bed in my backyard and planted vegetables, but otherwise I have not done any work. I visited some of the local villages and some of the peace corps volunteers near me.

The village kids on Tobaski.

So far my family is nice, and patient with me. Most of my conversations end up with either them or I laughing because we do not understand each other. Usually I say something that does not make sense or I cannot get a sense of what they are talking about.

A couple days ago we had Tobaski which is a big muslim holiday. I think of it as their Christmas. Everyone dresses up in nice clothing and does make up. They kill a goat or sheep (meat other than fish in the food bowl is a rare treat) for the food bowl. At night the kids go around in groups and ask for salibo, kind of like Halloween. The villagers give the kids money with which they buy candy or biscuits.

My two host moms and I inside my compound on Tobaski


from wikipedia:

Eid al-Adha (Arabic: عيد الأضحى ‘Īd al-’Aḍḥā) is a religious festival celebrated by Muslims and Druze worldwide as a commemoration of Ibrahim's (Abraham's) willingness to sacrifice his son, Isaac, under the order of Allah. It is one of two Eid festivals celebrated by Muslims, whose basis comes from the Quran.[1]

Kombo

My time in Kombo is coming to a end. Today is my swearing in ceremony where I become a real Peace Corps Volunteer. Every month or so I should come to Kombo to take money out of the bank, check e-mail, stock up on food, or hang out with other Peace Corps volunteers. We stay a short distance from the beach, and it is relaxing to go for a swim or walk along the sand. I am fortunate to be near a beach instead of a land locked country.

To get from my site to Kombo or anywhere else in the country, I travel by gele-gele or bush taxi. They are these big vans where the drivers cram people tightly together. In a seat where they should fit four they put five. The geles are in two conditions; old and falling apart. Traveling back from my site I rode with another Peace Corps trainee. We bounced around on the road squished between people with our bags on our laps. I have to pay extra to put a bag on top, so I try to take a small enough bag to carry. The main north bank road is newly paved which is a miracle because most roads are in bad shape. Only a few roads are paved, but it is often smoother to drive next to the road than through the potholes.

Site Visit - First thoughts

I visited my new home for the next two years. The village is small with less than 100 people and 7 compounds. I have the second smallest village for a peace corp volunteer in The Gambia. I live in a compound with my host father and his brother. Each of them have two wives. There are a bunch of kids and it is extremely difficult to figure out which kids are part of my compound and which ones are part of others. Even my older host brother who speaks good english could not remember everyone when I made the family tree with him.


The area is extremely deforested and even the village has few trees. The villagers do very little gardening, but a few have some casava plants ( a plant of which you eat the root, similar to a potato). The village has a lot of cattle, and one of my host brothers is a sheperd for my father's herd. Everyday they come through the center of town to fetch water from the open well. The water table is so low that they hook a donkey up to a rope. The small boys then run with the donkey away from the well to draw up the water. It is fasinating to watch.


I do not know most of what goes on in my town, but I have two years to find out. Within a short bike ride are a school and a few villages which are all included in my work area. There is a lot of flexibility as to where I can work. Once I familiarize myself with the area, I can decide where I want to work and what projects I would like to do. Possible projects include alley cropping, gardening, soap making, poultry, bee keeping, fruit drying, and much more. Currently I am interested in live fencing, woodlots, and grafting, but I will need to learn what the villagers want, and what I think is feasible. I will try to blend their interests' with my own.

I am back in the Kombo area for the next week where we, the trainees, will visit government agencies, NGOs (non governmental organizations), and Gambian Associations such as the Beekeeper's Association to learn about the groups with which we can work and support. If I pass the language exam on monday, I can be sworn in on December 7th and become a Peace Corps Volunteer. I head to site on the 9th.

Thanksgiving [11/22/07]

I finally have access to email and the internet for a couple of days...
I am back in Kombo for Thanksgiving. All Peace Corps volunteers came to Kombo this year because today was the celebration of 40th Anniversary of Peace Corps The Gambia. The Peace Corps held Thanksgiving at the US Ambassador's House. Mashed potatoes and pumkin pie have never tasted so good.

On Saturday I leave to visit my permanent site for a few days. I am excited to finally see where I will be living for the next two years. Training is almost done. After site visit, I have a week left in Kombo and if I pass the language exam, I am sworn in as a peace corps "volunteer" (promoted from trainee).

I have been in The Gambia for two months, but it is amazing how quickly my perspective has changed. Around our dormitories here in Kombo, I was amazed at how nice the buildings looked. I remember when I first arrived, I thought the area looked a little run down and dirty. I also had a bag of fritos the other day. I like all chips except fritos for which I have a particular dislike, but they tasted great. We joke here that somethings are Gambian good. Items which normally taste bad are considered good.

Difficulties

Training is ending. Recently, we found out about our living/permanent sites; I will be placed on the North Bank of the river, near a town called Kuntair, close to the Senegal border. My village is a small Fula village and I will replace a current volunteer. I look forward to site visit where we go to our site for a few days.

I have a short time left in training village. So far I have been really happy and adjusting well to the different culture. The language, though, has been the most difficult part. I am learning it, but I have been hesitant to use it. Some trainees in my village are really good at talking to villagers. I know the only way to get better is practice. We leave our training villages for Kombo on Thanksgiving. We will celebrate the holiday with all the Peace Corps volunteers in country.
It is hard to believe training is almost done; time has flown by.

Bumsters (Toubab Part 2)

I need to clarify Gambians usage of Toubab. Toubab means visitor or stranger but it is now used to describe a white person. Most African countries have a word with a similar meaning. It does not have a negative connotation. As a white person in Africa, I attract a lot of attention.

When all of us trainees travel in the Peace Corp small bus, people are always yelling Toubab as we pass. It is not in a derrogatory way; they are merely stating the fact we are passing by. Many people wave to us. Some kids get really excited and run following the bus. Sometimes the attention is not passive and we get hassled. Stopping in a market, people (mostly kids) ask for anything they can see with us, e.g., a bottle, a pen, a camera or candy. It can be annoying.
A more intimidating form of harrassment comes from the Bumsters. They, mostly men in their late teens/early 20s, hang around tourist locations and ferry terminals. At one ferry crossing they surrounded our group. They start by friendly asking your name; they slowly break the group apart. They do not understand personal space and stand really close to you. The women in our group had it the worst. The bumsters asked the girls for money, if they had a husband and if they wanted to get married. They do not take "no" for an answer, are very persistent and keep trying (Some tourist women apparently look for sex or a husband.).

Kids and bumsters on the street can be a nuisance but there is a way to deal with them. We were taught and I found out it works well to ignore them and keep walking; they will eventually give up. Gambians also joke a lot. If someone asks for an item, I turn it around and ask them for something. Once this girl stayed by my side for 10 minutes asking for a donut; finally I asked for her shirt as a trade. She looked confused and walked away.

Food - Part 2

Last time I wrote about food, I complained. I still miss the type and variety we have at home but the food is starting to grow on me. The peanut sauce (they use over the rice) tastes good, and the green leaf sauce does not seem as bitter. While rice, and now coos (a cereal pounded into a fine grain) gets old quickly, I am starting to get used to it. When I become a "real" volunter and go to my definite site, meals will be flexible. I most likely will cook my own breakfast and maybe dinner. I will have time to go to the weekly markets to buy vegetables and fruit, and from time to time I can go to Kombo the capital area (where Banjul is located), to stock up on food from the western super markets. I believe I will be about 4 hours away from the capital area and I can get a 'bush taxi" to go there; it costs about $3 one way.

Upcountry Field Trip

One day, all PC trainees went upcountry to Janjanbureh, formely known as Georgetown, to visit current volunteers at their sites. We saw volunteer projects such as rabbit breeding, sesame farming, poultry raising, gardening, and soap making. We learned about their successes, difficulties and failures; they explained that our projects are trial and error and what works in one place might not work somewhere else.

The location of our hotel was excellent - on the river and covered by trees - but the facilities and buildings were run down. Tourists would probably find the facilities sud par, but the room was only $30 per night. I never thought that I would say this, but I missed my bucket bath. There was a real toilet but the shower was right over the toilet and had very little water, and the water was colder than my bucket bath when I leave it in the sun for a few hours. However one thing I did not miss was the pit latrine; toilets are much more confortable.

Offending a Village

I cut coos stalks for several days to build my garden fence. On the second day, three other trainees helped me cutting and we made a big pile. We decided to carry them on a (white checkered) bed sheet so we didn't get itchy from the stalks rubbing against our skin. We each carried one corner over our shoulder. When we entered town, everyone was staring or pointing; we figured they were laughing at us because four of us were carrying what one women would probably carry on her head.

However, on our third trip carrying the bundle, our trainer stopped us and told us we were offending the village. We were carrying the stalks in the same way as they carry their dead. Since no one had died, it could be a sign that someone would die soon. We felt bad, and not knowing the language made it more difficult because we could not explain ourselves. Thus, our trainer apologized for us but it did not make us feel any better.

The village has had PC trainees for years and they understand we do not know their culture. So this event is a good learning opportunity because when we get to our actual site (where we will spend the 2 years) the villagers will be less familiar with whites' lack of knowledge about their customs. Making cultural mistakes there will not be as easy to explain. The Peace Corps train us but they cannot cover all areas.

The next day a cow died that was borrowed from another village. It was a big deal because villagers keep their savings in herds of cattle, not banks. We wondered if the town would blame us for the death, but our trainer (who by the way is Gambian) said they would not.

I have committed a few other cultural taboos or mistakes since I have been here:
o Rotating the food bowl, which is supposed to cause stomach ache;
o Asking about buying salt at night (buying or borrowing salt, needles or soap at night is avoided. If someone needs salt from someone at night, they will just take it and pay the person the next day.);
o Washing my face with my left hand. Some of the kids looked at me like I was crazy because the left hand is used to wipe.

My First Project

While our main focus in training village is to learn the language, we have to make a garden bed for our families. The project is more for our practice but it gives the family vegetables, if they choose to continue watering.

Most Fulas do not garden especially in the dry season because it involves extra work such as watering. My family's garden was covered chest high in weeds with a small pepper section. My host brother told me my mother threw seeds but did not weed. He said Fulas are lazy and do not want to garden since they are known as cattle herders. Mandinkas and Wolofs (other tribes) generally have good gardens.

My host brothers helped me cut the weeds and dig the bed but the fence was a problem. Two sides of the garden had gaps between the posts. The dry season has started and the animals (goats, sheep and cattle) are turned loose. Thus I cut coos stalks (similar to corn stalks) to fill the holes. I had my host brother help me to involve him so that the family would hopefully view the project not as a "Toubab" (white people) project , but theirs instead. If they feel ownership, they hopefully will continue watering the garden. I need to use this strategy with all projects because many projects fail when the projects are viewed as a "toubab" project, and the volunteer leaves.

Family Roles in Gambia

Since my family is big and confusing and I don't know the language, it is difficult to understand the dynamics of their behavior but there is a clear separation between male and female roles.
Men. They are the head of the household, and expected to provide for the wife and kids. They make the decisions and have control over most of the money. They work in the fields and grow cash crops such as peanuts (groundnuts). They also do all the "hard labor" work such as constructions, fencing, land clearing, and road repair, and they also care for the cattle (Remember, I live with the Fula people, the cattle herders).
Women. Many claim the women work much harder than the men. They run the house; they sweep, cook, clean, collect firewood, fetch water and care for the kids. They work in the rice fiedlds, collect leaves for sauces, and garden. Women keep their own money if they make any selling vegetables, bananas or doing small jobs.
Small Boys. They are the messengers or errand runners. They get things for their parents or family friends such as water, firewood, leaves or coos. They "do whatever they are told". They also are a big help to Peace Corps volunteers because they are full of enthusiasm and ready to help with any project.
Here kids do what they are told. When told by a parent to stop doing something, they stop immediately. This probably comes from the fact that parents hit or beat their kids. Western thought is making beatings less common, but I hear it still occurs. My village has many young kids and babies. I expected to hear them cry more often, but it is rare to hear a kid cry; parents do not baby them. Older kids, even slightly older, have authority over younger ones. When an older kid says stop, they younger ones will listen. There is a hierarchy by age.

Nightime

It seems Gambians sleep little. My village has no electricity; candles, flashlights and moon light are their sources of light. I expected people to go to sleep when it gets dark but that is not the case. At night, my family sits in front of their compound on mats or small wooden benches; they use a flashlight to eat, make attaya (a sugary tea) or to find something. Otherwise they sit and talk in the dark. I usually go to bed shortly after dinner, around 9:30pm. My family says I go to bed early but I get tired from the heat and the day. I am not sure when they go to bed but I have woken up to talking around midnight.
In the morning, they are up before me. I usually wake to the sound of pounding (Women pound for almost every meal.) The villagers (mostly Muslims) also wake to pray between 5 and 6am. My village has a small mosque without a speaker system. A trainer in the next village lives next to the mosque and she wakes to the call of prayer every morning. Even though our mosque is quiet, there are plenty of other noises from goats, dogs, donkeys and roosters, which make it difficult to sleep soundly. I am glad I am a deep sleeper who can fall back asleep easily; some have trouble sleeping. Apparently, there is nothing compared to donkey mating season; I will wait to see if I can sleep through that.

Daily Routine in Village

6:30-8am: At 6:30am it is bright enought to see and I want to do as much as I can because it is the coolest part of the day. I first go outside and greet my family in the compound. Greetings are extremely important, not greeting is rude. I then sweep my little house because dust gets everywhere. I then take my shower/bucket bath after fetching water; then organize my things, eat breakfast, and water my garden. Right before 8am I head to class making sure to greet everyone along the way.
8-12pm: All os us trainees in village (5) gather under the mango tree to have language class with our LCH instructor.
12-1:30pm: We are supposed to practice language skills with our families and the community but our language is not good enough. We usually talk a little but we mostly listen to our host families talk amongst themselves without understanding much. We are starting to understand a word here and there and sometimes we can formulate an answer. It is hard!!! Hopefully we will get good enough soon.
1:30-2:30: Lunch time. Our families provide us breakfast and dinner (rice or coos) but the Peace Corps provides lunch. They bring vegetables and meat and a villager cooks for us because veggies and meat are not usually part of the families' food bowl.
[12-4 is the hottest part of the day. Most people do not work and they usually sit in the shade.]
2:30-6pm. Free time. We usually work in our language manuals until 4pm. As it starts to cool off, people start to work. We work in our gardens, fix fences, plant seeds or walk through the fields.
6:00-7pm: The sun sets. Thus, I try to do many things before it gets dark; I take a bucket shower which feels great because the cool water washes away the dirt and sweat. If I can't do it in the light of the day, I either cast my shadow against the fence (putting on a show for my neighbors) or I cannot find the soap and shampoo in the pitch black.
7:00-9pm: I sit with my family outside in the dark and eat dinner (around 8pm) out of a communal food bowl (men separate from women).
9:00-10pm: I go into my house, brush my teeth, sometimes write in my journal and got to bed.
That is my daily life in an African village in The Gambia!!

Why am I here?

[Note: the next 10 posts were uploaded by Lolo, who received them in a letter from Alex.]

When I joined the Peace Corps, most people asked me why. My reasons have changed over time, but it is difficult to pinpoint one reason. In village, we had a discussion about our reasons for being here. The "cross cultural experience" interested one girl; she wanted to live in a different country learning about their culture while sharing hers. She wants to have a good time and help people in the process but she is most excited about the experience. For another volunteer, the job is "inspiring". He believes Gambians can farm today happily but they are degrading their soil and resources. He wants to help Gambians farm more sustainably to maintain and hopefully improve their standard of living.
My reason to be here is a little of both. I want to help them improve their environment but I feel my greatest impact comes from the cross cultural exchange and the ability to share my experience with you all and when I get back to the States.
The conversation began when one trainee in the village became disilllusioned. He thought he joined the Peace Corps to help, almost to save the people, since they lived in poverty. But he found people here, even though they have very little, to be happier than most people in the States. Even though they work hard, they smile and joke constantly, and they do not joke as a defense mechanism or front. The villagers are genuinely happy with their current lives. Motivating people to change is one of the greatest challenges as a Peace Corps Volunteer.

What I miss the most?

AMERICAN FOOD!!!
I know most people claim America does not have typical food except hamburgers and hot dogs but I miss food from home. Fruits, uncooked vegetables, pasta, Mexican food and salads would taste unbelievable right now. The food here has little variety and is based on rice or coos. For breakfast it is either rice, oatmeal or sour milk; for lunch and dinner is rice with some sort of sauce (either peanut, green leaf or tomato). Sometimes there is meat like beef or fish, but the fish is so small it is all bones and the few vegetables placed in the food bowl are extremely overcooked. Food is eaten out of a communal bowl with a person's right hand. Some people are starting to use spoons but is is uncommon. Men and women tend to eat separate out of different bowls and food is never wasted; someone will eat it or it can be eaten for breakfast the next day.

Toubab

When traveling in most African countries, the locals call white folks "Toubab", or a variation of it (probably corresponding to the word "gringo"). I was first toubabed in the capital area walking down the street with some other PC trainees. It is usually the kids that say it. At first I thought current volunteers were exaggerating how often people say it, but today we went to a weekly market and it seemed that all people could say was Toubab. Everywhere I went people kept saying it. Since I will be here for two years, I will probably get used to it. I heard though that, when one learns the language and can speak to the kids, they stop doing it.

The kids and adults will ask us (the Toubabs) for things like candy, pens, bottles or just anything else. This cycle is reinforced with tourists who throw them those things plus stickers, coins, etc, out of the windows when they travel up country.

Someone who came to Africa as a PC said the toughest thing is not to be able to blend in due to the difference in skin color.

[From toubab.com: A toubab is the generic name for a white person in West and Central Africa... it is not a derogatory term of address and is more especially used in the Gambia and Senegal. Depending on which you wish to believe... the name Toubab has many suggested derivations, amongst which are: A corruption of the Arab word Tabib meaning doctor.. a verb in the Wolof language manging "to convert" (the early doctors and missionaries during colonial times, being whites coming from Europe) or the generally preferred... that it is derived from the two bob (two shilling) coin of pre-decimalisation UK currency when the Gambia was a British Colony.]

Getting Technical Skills (a break from village)

Every couple of weeks during the 9 week training we will travel to a tourist hotel camp that has electricity, flush toilets, showers and soda (coke and fanta), where we meet again the other trainees from the other villages - 24 of us. It is only 12 kms for us but it takes 30-40 minutes due to the poor road condition. It is a time to take a break from village life and swap stories and experiences. The best story was told by a guy who missed the lesson about village skills back in the capital. He could not figure out why other vonlunteers had left over "clean" water from taking a bucket bath. It turned out that instead of scooping the water in a cup and pouring it on him, he was standing in the bucket and letting the soapy water fall back in the bucket. I still cannot figure out how he could get both of his feet in the bucket; it must have been very unconfortable.

This meeting happened to us the week of October 15 and we stayed in the lodge hotel for 4 days. There we learned about health and the main component was the technical skill workshops. Since we are "environment" volunteers, we have done garden bed preparation, soil mixture, composting and tree grafting. We also planted seeds so when we return back to the hotel in two weeks we can follow the vegetables progress. It will be important when we go to site to have an understanding of local flora, fauna and crops. It will give us credibility when we work with farmers and villagers.

We also had our first language test. We will be graded low/mid/high in 3 categories: novice, intermediate and advanced. I received a novice high, not bad after 2 weeks in training (language is mostly what is taught at the village). To swear in as a volunteer, a trainee needs to reach intermediate mid. Language is my biggest frustration at the moment because I cannot communicate to most of my host family members or other villagers. My host brother speaks English pretty well, though, and explains a lot about village life. It would be ever more difficult if I did not have him. Hopefully I will be able to understand the language and communicate better soon. I know it will take time and patience, but it is frustrating when I sit next to someone and all I can say are the greetings.

Naming ceremony - Pate Jawo

After three days in the training village, the five PC volunteers (including myself) living in that village had our naming ceremony. We received our Gambian names; I am now called Pate Jawo. Naming ceremonies are big in Gambian culture. Within a week after a baby is born, they do the ceremony. Family and friends get together to celebrate the event. The family chooses the name and shaves the baby's head. The family says prayers and everyone begins to party.

Family is extremely important to Gambians and one's extended family will live in the same compound (group of huts/houses). Gambian families are hard to understand due to polygamous marriages, early death of parents and care of dead relative's children. In my family, the Jawo family, we have both of my grandfathers's wives, my father's brother's wife and their kids and the grandchildren of one of my grandmother's families, before she became my grandfather's wife. If it sounds confusing, it is. There is also the fact that Gambians consider their father's brothers' kids and mother's sisters' kids their own siblings (brothers and sisters). Divorce occurs here too, which I didn't expect; when it happens, the first wife usually cannot tolerate the second wife. So I have this big family and I am not too sure who is who.

Reality Sets In - Training Village

I am staying in one of the handful of villages used by the Peace Corps for training. I am glad my village was not the first one when we came from Banjul because the change was abrupt. When we arrived at the first village by bus, many of us did not even realize we had arrived at a training place; the sign was small and it looked like any other small village we had passed by. The driver announced the village and the trainees living in that village got off. Right away they were swarmed by kids and we took off to the next village. Knowing what had happened allowed us to mentally prepare for our turn, because all we were told beforehand was that our LCH (trainer) would meet us in the village.

When I stepped off the bus at my training village, I had my African moment as I saw kids running toward me with the sight of the small village behind them. It was then that it really struck me that I was in Africa... the thatched and corrugated metal roofed huts, the fields of crops, the goats, sheep and chickens roaming freely made me realize the experience had begun!!

My village is the smallest training village with a population of 100 to 200 people. Therefore it took us less than 5 minutes to reach the center of town. Before we even noticed, we all had a child holding our hand and walking by our side. In front of us was a big tree with a flat cement platform; under it many women and children were lying and sitting - they were our new Moms but we didn't know that. We were not sure what to do for a minute but then we saw our trainer. She took us to sit under the tree with the women; they tried speaking to us. All we could understand was the greetings. We sat there and tried to say the couple of lines in Pulaar we knew. After that, we were introduced to our "host" mother and family. They showed us to our house and we set about doing the basic things such as sweeping and hanging up our mosquito net.

Each volunteer gets their own house/hut. Some look more like huts while others are a type of apartment for the PC trainee in the same structure as other people in the family. They resemble a room or an apartment but the Gambians call them houses. I live in one of these apartment/houses, which is about half of my bedroom at home, divided into 2 little rooms. Because we are PC trainees we have screens on the doors and windows and a cement floor. This is not the case for Gambians; no one has screens but many have cement floors (at least in my village). We also have a small backyard that has a separation that divides our pit latrine from the rest. I am lucky that my walls there (made of wood and dried reeds) are tall enought that I can stand on my pit latrine cover when I take a bucket bath. Some people have to squat or crouch to take their bath. It has been difficult learning to aim while squatting and taking a bucket shower but with time it has become easier.

New posts from Alex that came via letter

As you know, Alex will not have access to email/web until first week of December, when he finishes his training. At that time, he will mail us a CD with the pictures he takes and we will post them.
The next 5 posts came from Alex via "slug" mail and I posted them. Actually, the letter took 1 week from him to the post office in Banjul (the capital), then 1 week from Banjul to Los Angeles. So it appears that the minimum time is 2 weeks, from the village - but the letter did arrive.

It is expensive to send things to Gambia but letters are the normal international stamp price and the post office in America has flat rate boxes and envelopes for books/magazines - fyi. [from Lolo]