Wednesday, November 11
From the day I arrived in Senegal,
this was what I had been waiting for, it was postind day for myself and the other 60 trainees in my stage. It was the
day our Peace Corp placement site would be revealed. It was when we would learn
where we would be spending the next two years. I had a pretty good idea of
where I wanted to be--in Saint-Louis on the northeastern coast of Senegal. A French
colonial city, it had everything I wanted. And I was feeling optimistic as I
milled around the basketball court with the 60 other trainees.
Here’s the way the placement reveal works. We all meet on
the basketball court, which has a map of Senegal painted on it. Then, once
everyone is there, we are each blindfolded and each of us, at the same time, is
taken by the hand and let to the location on the map of our posting. Not
directly of course; the hand holder pulled me around the map and spun me around
a few times, but I never lost my sense of direction and I knew that eventually
we were heading back toward the west coast, the northern west coast. And that’s
where Saint-Louis is. So my hopes were high when I was stopped in place, facing
eastward on the map. I knew I was near Saint Louis. But then I suddenly heard
two trainees behind me, that is, closer
to the coast. And I knew there weren’t more than two openings there. Sure
enough, when the time came for us to take off our blindfolds I was standing
right on top of a city named Louga. Close, but no cigar. Louga? I knew nothing
about it.
Of course I did some research as soon as I could. The city is about
100k from Saint Louis and 60k due east of the coast. You won’t find much about
Louga on Wikipedia, or anywhere online for that matter. It is a fairly new city
of 250,000 resident on the edge of the Sahel desert.
And then I went there. The next day. We all spread out to
visit our sites. Some had to endure a 14 hour bus ride to reach theirs. Mine,
fortunately was only about two hours to the north of Theis. The Peace Corps car
dropped me at the bus station in Louga where my ancienne (predecessor) was waiting. Ashlee and I grabbed a cab and
headed into the city and her (soon to be my) place. Unlike most PCVs, I won’t
be living with a family; I will have my own studio apartment, complete with a
single gas burner and mini- fridge. (I am already dreaming of having a supply
of cold water!) It's the kind of place you'd pay $2,000 a month rent for in the South Bronx. The bathroom has a decent shower and a western toilet. (Good
thing because the squat toilets are killing my knees.) I also will have access
to the roof.
Louga is a low, sprawling city with sand on the streets.
There doesn’t seem to a building over two stories high. At its heart are three
huge outdoor markets with vegetables and fish, fruit and meat, electronics,
back packs, used clothing, mattresses—anything you could want, though none of
it seems to be of very high quality. We
went to one to buy me a gym bag, and the zippers broke almost immediately.
But before that we went to lunch at my new family’s
compound. There must have been 20 people there and i’m sure it will take me
awhile to figure out all the relationships in the extended family. But they
were all very welcoming and accepting of my pitiful Wolof.
I also got to meet some of the major agricultural players in
town and am looking forward to getting back to learn from them.
Oh, almost forgot, while I was in Louga I got a haircut. I just picked the closest of may many barber shops. The barber turned out to be a young guy with a bit of English, but Ashlee was there too to help out with the Wolof. He was eager to please but couldn't quite figure out what to do with my long straight hair. He had obviously never cut a toubaab's hair before. Those trusty clippers of his just ' work, at least not until the gave me a once over with scissors. Eventually he figured it out--and insisted on trimming my beard too. It all turned out fine. A good haircut for 500 CFAs. That's one dollar if you're counting.
The content of this
blog do not reflect the thoughts, philosophy or beliefs of the U.S. Peace
Corps. The opinions are those of the author alone.
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