Blogs from Dakar, Cape Verde Peninsula, Senegal, Africa - page 11

Hello Friends, Wow! We are really back in Africa! It feels funny in some ways; we wanted it for so long, it is hard to believe that we are actually here. Well, first off, we did not receive DJ’s passport in time for the family to travel together, so I left with Keagan and Kaijah on the 26th of March, and Djibril stayed behind with Leila and DJ. They arrived on Easter morning so we were able to hold Easter Bunny festivities together. Kaijah’s first comment at the airport was that Dakar was very busy and noisy. If you have ever been to an airport in Africa you can see the truth in that statement…people jamming articles in your face with the hope that you will start shopping at 4 a.m. after a 28 hour ... read more

Today was our first full day in Senegal. Unbelievably, I'd somehow not packed my journal. (Listen, I've forgotten my passport before--more than once--but never my journal. I was practically dry-heaving in withdrawal. S produced composition books from a suitcase of goods she'd brought to give and trade and let me have one. See? That's why I keep her around-- not just for comic relief--there's also notebooks, Peanut M&Ms, hand sanitizer, toilet paper--but I'm getting ahead of the story... First impressions of Dakar? Not good. After rendezvousing in Casablanca then sleeping warm and fed (twice!) on the plane, we were jostled through Immigration and wound up at the baggage claim turnstile. As luck would have it, my bag was the first one off, weighing in at, what was it again? 50 pounds? S' was next, weighing only ... read more

So believe it or not...i choose not because it makes me too sad...i have exactly 5 weeks left in Senegal starting today. I can't believe the semester flew by so fast, I feel like I've hardly been here at all. I finally feel like I've found a place in the routine of life here -- everyday i speak more and more wolof and I explore a little more of the city and come to know it a little bit better. there's still a lot of things that i want to do -- will do -- before i leave, namely travel up to St. Louis in the northern part of the country. I think we might be trying to plan it for not this coming weekend but next weekend. We'll see. So I have yet to start ... read more

So i know it's been awhile, but because we are wrapping up our in-class part of the semester, i have about 4 different papers to write...in french, mind you. and with the inconvienent and unpredictable electricity black outs that are very common here in Senegal, it's often difficult to have a productive writing session. but as we say here...garawuul (meaning s'est la vie, or a rough translation would be, oh well...). The last couple of weeks we have had some extra free time during the week and some of us have found time to become a little more adventuresome. seeing as we've already been in dakar for a month and a half, why not start venturing out on our own? i started last week by venturing into the very intimidating "marché sandaga" which is a huge ... read more

and your response would be "Walekumsalaam". This is "Peach be with you" in arabic and is the common greeting here in senegal. Greetings are a very important custom in senegal; when you enter a room it is expected that you shake the hand of every one there. it is actually seen as a sign of hostility to not greet people you know. but even when walking in a store or up to a stand everybody starts the conversations with "assalaamalekum". the title is also representative of another important time of the year here. We are about 2 weeks into Ramadan, the month of fasting for Muslims. from the time the sun comes up in the morning to the time the sun sets at night they do not eat or drink. i've heard the hardest part isn't ... read more