update from Toubacouta

Bonjour, tout le monde!

I am here in Toubacouta, which is a rural part of Dakar in the Delta region, near the Gambia. We've been here for 3 days, and we leave tomorrow. What an incredible experience it's been!!!!

Unfortunately, it started off not-so-great because I somehow got sick about a week or so ago. I started off with a sore throat and stuffy nose, then a headache and nausea, then I think I started becoming feverish and could not sleep because I was so hot and sweaty, and I was just overall miserable. Eventually, Marie, my little 12-year-old host sister, accompanied me to the pharmacy down the street where I purchased some antibiotics and some powder that you mix into your water and it is jam-packed with vitamin C and other goodies (sort of like the African/European version of Emergen-C, but tastes 50 times worse) and relieves flu-like symptoms. I've been taking those religiously since Monday or Tuesday or so, and things have already started to feel better so I will just keep going with them until I am back to my healthy self. Today was the first day I really had my appetite back, which is a good sign, so let's just keep our fingers crossed for good health in the future.

Anyway, so things in Toubacouta have been quite an experience. Village life in rural areas is so different than city life in Dakar... I love the communities that villages are built around, and everyone here is so welcoming and nice... not that they aren't in Dakar, because that is far from the truth. But maybe I just like the more traditional, non-Westernized version of how Senegal used to be, an element that the villages retained when Dakar became more cosmopolitan. Yesterday we went to this village (Soukouta) at night and hung out with the villagers and I got to play/dance with some cute little kids, and we watched this traditional folk-lore-ish dance troupe perform, and they were INCREDIBLE.

Yesterday we also went on this insane excursion where we hiked (or "glopped") through mud for a while until we got to this wide open patch of mud surrounded by mangroves, and we reforested an area of mangroves that had been destroyed by commercial oyster farming. It was really rewarding to see the effort of 50 or so people, because in no time at all, we had planted so many, just because if everyone does 10 or 20 or even 100 plants, multiply that by 50, and that is a lot of freaking mangroves in a short amount of time!! Plus the walk through the mud was such a crazy, incredible, insane experience that I just could not even describe.

Today, we went on another mangrove expedition where we took boats down the Delta and looked at beautiful mangroves and then ended up at this island called "Ile des Coquillages" (Shell Island) which is called "Diorom Boumag" in Wolof. We went on a cool hike and saw some BEAUTIFUL views of the river and the rest of the island, and we stopped at this tree called the "Arbre des Griots" where they used to hang dead griots (the shaman-type women singers who I believe told the future in song?) because they were too spooky and potentially-cursed to bury and put back into the earth and they would contaminate future generations. From a western point of view, this makes no sense, because eventually a hanging corpse will decompose and end up back in the earth anyway, but putting science aside, I understand the symbolism and it is actually quite interesting to me. I actually read in my guidebook that in Yoff, which is a region of Dakar, there are these healing ceremonies that take place once a month. Although Senegal is predominantly Muslim, there is still a huge element of mysticism and native, animist spirituality, which is just fascinating to me. I would love to find out more about all of this and perhaps even attend one of those ceremonies!

But anyway, another cool thing that we did in Toubacouta was attend a traditional wrestling match ("une lutte") which was SO COOL. It is so insane to watch... lots of almost-naked muscular Senegalese men doing these crazy trance-like dances and then breaking into very organized and ritualized wrestling. The whole time I was wondering how it does not simply erupt into chaos like so many American sporting events do, where a fight or a riot breaks out and then pandemonium ensues. Here, though, sometimes you would see someone react negatively when they lost the match, but it was all so contained and ritualized that there was no real violence post-match, which was interesting.

So that is pretty much all that has been exciting that I can think of, but naturally, I will keep everybody updated on more cool things to come in the future. I found out from Waly, our program director, that there are several possibilities for internships for my service learning project in Dakar. One option is this school for mute children, teaching them to form sounds, and another is for teaching children English or French in school. All of these sound cool, but during a passing conversation, I heard about this hospital in Fann (the same region in Dakar where my school is) called "L'Hopital aux fous" which is basically a loony bin. I would be SO INTRIGUED to see what mental health care is like in another country, especially one so different from the United States. I think it would be INCREDIBLE to work for them, and give me such a cross-cultural experience in psychology, which would just be sooooo cool. Waly said he'd see if he could get me a contact there, and I am keeping my fingers crossed because that would just be such a valuable experience.

Anyway, now it's time for me to end this post because I am outside in the main lobby-area of our hotel (which is SO NICE by the way) and starting to get bitten by crazy amounts of mosquitos, so I am going to end this. I will write more another time!