Update from Pulaarville

The last few weeks in Senegal have been a roller coaster of travel, some work, and a lot of emotion. Since I’ve stated in my first entry that this blog is going to be very light on the emotional side of things, I’ll continue the trend by focusing primarily on the work and travel aspects in order to catch you all up to speed.

Work—My job as a Sustainable Agricultural Volunteer has a primary focus in assisting rural Senegalese men and women increase crop yields through the introduction of new seed varieties and the reinforcement of positive, sustainable, planting, maintaining, and harvesting methods. The five main field crops PC extends and works with in Senegal are rice, corn, millet, sorghum, and beans. From a work perspective, however, there is little for me to do at this time with the five main crops because they won’t be planted until the rainy season (approximately 7 months from now). Instead, in order to keep busy and keep sane I’ve been trying to maintain secondary projects I inherited from the Volunteer before me (beekeeping, fruit tree maintenance, and winter season gardening to have more disposable income, just to name a few), as well as try and introduce new vegetables to winter season gardens and improved poultry raising practices.

About two weeks ago I ran up to Dakar in order to purchase seed potatoes for my winter season garden demo plot---1,300 potatoes later I came back to Kolda with the ambition of making potatoes a potential sixth mono-crop in the southern region of Senegal. Super ambitious--yes, potentially a catastrophic failure---absolutely. I sank my own money into the project because at this stage of things I am still a new Volunteer to my village and have only just begun the process of gaining their trust in terms of my agricultural knowledge and dedication to working for and in the village. I chose potatoes as my newfound obsession because for as long as I can remember my family back in VA has grown potatoes, and because if all goes well potatoes have the potential to be not only a huge money maker, but a relatively dependable added source of food and nutrition. If all goes well the potatoes will be in the ground (and off my hut floor) in the next week or so, and harvested around the time I come back from IST in Dakar.

Poultry raising thus far has been slow going, but my first model chicken coop should be finished within the next two days. In a couple weeks the first chickens will be relocated from within my family’s compound to the new roosts, and in theory begin a more balanced cycle of protein/money generation. I’m looking forward to the work not only because of potentially very visible results, but because I’m going to be working very closely with my youngest brother in the village. Not only is this brother one of the coolest Senegalese I’ve met in country, he is only thirteen but already driven to do well in school and eventually pursue his one passion in life---helping animals. That’s right, he’s still in middle school but wants to be a vet. No matter how the project works out in the long run its going to be a lot of fun to work with him because he’s one hell of a hard worker.

Travel—As mentioned before I’ve had to travel a lot recently, both by going up to and back from Dakar. For those of you who have mentioned possibly wanting to visit me during my service, this can be an extremely uncomfortable trip crammed into a sept place, but there are definitely ways to mitigate any and all of the negatives. Lastly, having made the trip from the south to Dakar and back I can unequivocally say that I will probably never venture north of Dakar throughout the remainder of my service. Sure there are some nice beaches and St. Louis to the far north, but I’m perfectly happy with the monkeys, vegetation, and rainfall south of the Gambia.

Emotions--Having really started to settle into my site these last few weeks I’ve had a lot more down time to reflect on family, friends, and home. Whereas “home” is now a more flexible entity, thoughts of family and friends are always with me. I miss you all tremendously, but the phone calls, emails, and letters keep me on the level, and stop me from every getting too high or too low. On this side of the Atlantic things continue to improve…my host family/village feels like family more and more every day. This in turn gives me more and more motivation to work my ass of throughout my service in order to potentially improve their quality of life, no matter how incrementally.

Love you and miss you all, post general questions here, or if you’re like some of my friends and have more off the wall questions---email davidpshames @ gmail.com

PC service actually starts.

Well everyone……long time no update. Two weeks ago I was installed into my village and officially began the “real Peace Corps experience.” PC admin wants all of us in the new stage to cool our heels for three months before starting any work-related projects, but those who know me well will understand that this is simply something I am unable to do. I spent the majority of the first week at site working with the corn harvest and clearing up my backyard of overgrowth, and then spent the majority of the second week working down by my village’s rice fields where I’ve started a second garden. The work is physically demanding only because of the heat in my opinion, but entirely satisfying because I can just as easily improve my Pulaar in a cornfield as I could sitting in my hut staring at a textbook.

My family situation in the village is very similar to my situation in Mbour. Once again I have a gigantic family, but this time with 7 brothers. Some of the brothers love to work, some of them hate it, and several are currently attending school in a much bigger village 6k away. My “father” is the chief of the village and is as far as I can tell relatively conservative for Pulaars in the Casamance. He and I typically eat lunch and dinner together, which is a lot of fun because it provides time to pepper him with questions my brothers typically wouldn’t know how to respond to.

My living situation is about as close to perfection as I could have possibly hoped for. The hut is on the smallish side, but I don’t have that much stuff with which to fill it anyway. Since this is the first place I’ve ever been able to call my own I’m especially biased but I really think that waking up and watching the fog rise over the huts and fields of my compound is one of the most beautiful sights I’ve ever seen in either Senegal or America.

……….and then there is the food in my village. I’m not going to waste your time or my time complaining about taste, texture, or ingredients. I will simply say that I have lost a little over 40 lbs now since arriving in Senegal, and that the food is plain but has lots of carbs for energy. I definitely had no idea what I was getting myself into when I was sitting in the DC airport, but it IS a West African country and the PC is here for a reason. End of story. Complaining about the food situation is counter intuitive to what I’m trying to do here. If I want to start eating more vegetables I’ll simply grow them.

And lastly, because I’m running out of time and random stuff to talk about, after the first week at site I was given a puppy by one of my host brothers. She is some sort of Senegalese mutt, but is extremely adorable and is definitely headed back to America at the end of my service. I originally thought about not Americanizing the puppy, but rejected the idea on the grounds that my service in the Peace Corps can still be entirely successful as long as I integrate into the community and have meaningful/sustainable projects. How I treat my dog, therefore, has absolutely no bearing on my effectiveness as a Volunteer. This dog is going to be clean, well trained, and is going to eat better than I do for the next two years.

I miss you all a ton. My phone number is on my facebook page if you ever have the urge to call (something I highly recommend doing from skype). I won’t update until I get back to Kolda in another three weeks so stay patient. If any of you have particular questions just post them in the comment section………..Until next time.

Who is coming to visit me?

The following blog is being written after about three hours of sleep and because it has been so long since my last update is extremely random. Be patient...I miss you all.


So life in Mbour is almost at a close. My host family has been nothing short of amazing, but at the same time I'm extremely excited about getting the heck out of the North and getting to work in Kolda. Whereas Mbour is 200,000 and a fairly big tourism draw, my village in Kolda is approx 250 people. Whereas Mbour is nothing but sand, cars, and what seems like a million Wolofs, Kolda is all about clay soil, rice farrows, forests, and monkeys. Anyone who calls me might be subjected to more Kolda-awesomeness....so be warned.

Personal notes. I'm extremely happy in general thus far with my training with the PC in Senegal. Training is training, however. The sessions end up running a lot like certain classes at UR. But at the same time I'm learning a lot of about how Senegalese people go about things like meetings and trainings in general. Language training went from being a really miserable experience that I would dread each day to something I have started to really look forward to. My increased interest in Pulaar has definitely translated to better results. I went from Novice Mid on my first language test (terrible, and definitely at risk of not swearing in on time) to Intermediate Low on the second test, and a virtual lock, Incha Allah, for reaching Intermediate Mid and swearing in after the third and last test. Totally unreleated note, I've lost 25 lbs to date, and am growing a beard. The projection is to be down another 25 lbs by IST which will be in early January. At which time I will probably shave.


Random story/observation time.

Gatorade drink mix is absolutely incredible.

I paid an 11 year old to drive myself and some friends across a four lane highway with a horsecart. The total cost for 7 people to travel roughly 3.5 miles was a whopping $1.20

I dipped into my personal money for the first time to buy fencing for my own garden in Kolda. It wasn't cheap but I worked out a deal with my counterpart whereby I'm basically renting the land for the cost of the fencing. Since field crops extension work won't really be kicked off until the next rainy season which is 8 months away, I should have a good deal of time to work on my Pulaar and work in my garden.

I'm thinking about extending if I make it a full 24 months down in Kolda. If I extend it would be to work in Dakar for an additional 6 months with someone in the PC main office.

My compound was semi flooded with human waste about 4-5 days ago. It is an epic story and extraordinarly worth of a man blog, I simply don't have the space, and most of you won't have the stomachs to read it. Call me, and i'll promise to make you laugh or gag.

Lastly, cause i'm running out of juice. There are things I might have complained about in Amuuurika that I will not EVER complain about for the next decade.

Love you all.

Return to Thiès

Back in Thiès for more training - will visit Kolda for the first time on Saturday.

Loving life and feeling excellent!

Received 3 letters - merci!!

-David

David in South Central

So there is a ton to catch you all up on, but I have to keep it quick because the laptop I'm borrowing is running very low on juice.

I move into my homestay tomorrow, which should be a lot of fun. They drop us off at individual sites and we spend the week doing both language and technical training. The language I have been assigned is Pulaar Fulakunnda, which is the language I'll be using and learning for the next 9 weeks or so of training both at Thies and at my homestay.

Here's what I know (again, sorry for this being incredibly disjointed......time is short), this particular dialect of Pulaar is relatively difficult, but represents only one of the five Pulaar varieties in existence. Fulakunnda is spoken primarily in the Kolda region of Senegal, which is awesome not only because it is exactly where I was hoping to be sited, but also because it means I get to commute from Thies to the coastal city of Mbour every other week or so with the homestay. Mbour is awesome because it is apparently super close to the Atlantic, and because it is a large enough city I will be able to buy most items I need to stock up on.

Kolda seems pretty awesome because it is one of the greenest areas of Senegal, and the farmers there, although still very poor, have decent soil to work with. I've also heard through the grapevine that Kolda's regional house will be at most 30Ks from my actual site and is getting or already has a wifi network---meaning if all goes well down the road I might be able to get a notebook type laptop sent from D.C. and can bike in every other week or so.

Alright, gotta cut this short because the laptop is making noises. Love you all. Please don't worry because I'm EXTREMELY happy with how everything is going thus far. Oh, and I'm basically a vegetarian now just because of the food situation (which is still amazing, so don't worry Mom). I'm currently toying with the idea of trying to adhear to Ramadan's fasting rules.........we shall see how the homestay works out, however, before I make a final decision.

Pulaar expression of the day: how are you = Hono Mbad-daa
word of the day: vendor/seller = njeeyoowo , pronounced njee e yo o woe.

From Senegal

So this is going to be extremely brief, but I wanted to just let everyone know that I've arrived in Senegal and am now writing from a fellow PCT's laptop. Since everything from touching down to this very minute has been too intense to give proper justice in such a short post I'll stick to the very basics.

I'm safe, and the training facility is amazing. Everyone has been extremely supportive and friendly in terms of the PC staff. Fellow PCTs have come from all sorts of different backgrounds and regions which is already making for an interesting and very fluid dynamic.

Senegal is hot. This didn't come as much of a shock, but I figured I'd just throw it out there for anyone who had any remaining doubt. The next couple of days are going to be extremely busy, only to be followed by the start of actual language training on Monday and the move in with a host family. Should be a ton of fun, and provide me with something actually interesting to include in the next post.

Missing you all,

David

and looking at pictures of home on day 1 was definitely a terrible idea.

Last post from the USA, etc.

In the previous post I made a promise of anti over-sentimentalism, which in accordance with (for the time being), I have decided to make this “goodbye USA” post as brief and to the point as possible.


Over the past two weeks I’ve been dragging out my goodbyes. From Richmond to Annapolis and then back to Williamsburg I’ve spent a significant amount of time trying to put in the face time you friends who have meant the most to me over the years. I was planning on naming names, but you all know who you are. You know my reasons for leaving, you’ve placed bets on my eminent return, but above all else, you’ve really supported my decision to go to Senegal. Cue the violins. For the friends I didn’t get a chance to speak with prior to tonight you missed some great times, but you can always make up for it by becoming “followers” of this blog. Not only does that mean you’d get an instant update via email if I was to ever be mauled by lions, but it also means that Kool Aid will rain from the sky on my birthday, and I’ll seem a lot more popular to my fellow PC trainees.

I could have written a lot more on the subject of how terrible I am at saying goodbyes, more especially to my close friends and family, but the violins have all been packed, the band has gone home, and in the next 12 hours I’m headed to D.C. Good luck to you all, stay in touch, and feel free to visit if you ever feel like a LHS or UR reunion is necessary.

My address for the time being (to be changed after swear in and site assignment) is:
PCT David Shames
Corps de la Paix
B.P. 299
Thiès, Senegal
West Africa
If you write Par Avion or Airmail on the package/letter it should reach me within a month, if you forget I might not get it for several months as it will be sent via boat. Furthermore, make sure to write on the customs form that the value contained within the package is less than 20 dollars (makes it cheaper for me to pick up), and use lots of packing tape so whatever you might send isn’t “appropriated” by anyone handling the mail during transit. I’ve read that making religious references in red pen or drawing crosses can also help deter theft.

And lastly, I’ll leave you all with my top 10 most frequently played songs over the past week. Feel free to read between the lines, but I think by now it is patently obvious that I’m going to miss you all.

In no particular order:
Back Where I Come From—Kenny Chesney
James River Blues—Old Crow Medicine Show
People Are Crazy—Billy Currington
Find out Who Your Friends Are—Tracy Lawrence
These Boots—Eric Church
Fast Car—Wyclef
Firecracker—Ryan Adams
The Joker—The Steve Miller Band
Home—Blake Shelton
Sing me Home—Tim McGraw