Last Friday was Korete, the party for being allowed to eat food again. I began to realize that it is celebrated very much like Easter in the USA. Instead of going around for chocolate and bunnies the kids run around to all the houses of friends and family and are given a ton of money. Instead of watching 'The Ten Commandments' (1956, DeMille) everyone watches the parallel, still four hour version on the prophet Mohammed (let me tell you that you never see him, get's very challenging to figure out why there is a gap in the crowd the first couple times). But best of all, everyone gets incredibly dressed up and lots (too much) of good food. Maybe it is more like our Easter, Halloween, and Thanksgiving all on the same day!
Saturday, I decided to go meet up with a couple of friends to go into town and the beach, but sadily the rain god disagreed with our plans. So I spent 20 minutes walking through almost hurricane like conditions where I finally ended up hitting Noah's (Ark) flood so I ended up taking cover with some nice Senegalesse women in an abanded house for a couple hours! So much for plans. Luckily, it was still a good time and one of the ladies owns a vegetable stand, so I got an in with the veggie lady, Awa! I've been eatting tomatoes like apples almost every day since.
Sunday was probably the longest day of my life. I sat around, watched TV, napped not once but twice, read an entire book. The book was amazing. It is called 'So Long a Letter' and written by a Senegalese woman in the 70s/80s and discussing polygamy, family life, and everything else. I loved it and you should all read it, if you haven't already. What was very interesting about it is that my host mom is a second wife (and the husband lives with us most of the time) and my host sister, 35ish and has two kids, is I believe a first wife but her husband lives in the USA with his second wife and other son. So brought up a lot of things that seemed parallel to my life here.
My room, where even Katie, can read a whole book!
Classes are still going really well, so that has been good. I have a couple papers coming up and more and more homework so I'm finding things to do with my time. Public health is still my favorite and everything else is most definately getting better! I did just get a field trip canceled and our rural visits have gotten pushed back a week. Though neither of those things are all that shocking.
Now for a few stories of life with the Wade family! A story I forgot to tell, so I have been telling you all about how Bebe Cher and Mohammed enjoy going through all my stuff, well, sometimes they find things they shouldn't be finding - like tampons. Tampons. That thing you aren't supposed to talk to eight to ten year old boys about. So Bebe Cher pulls it out and starts asking about it, "What is this? What do you use it for?" And the girl that I'm teaching English to started dying in laughter but she told me to not explain it to them. So, after asking a few more times and after they got used to the response of "go ask you mom" Bebe Cher finally just looked at me and goes, do you stick it up your butt?!? Well, let's just say I died in laughter and they haven't bothered me about it again.
Bebe Cher, up close
And now onto the family and food story! Now that Ramadan is over lunch is the biggest meal of the day so they have chebugen (fish and rice) and all the other crazy rice meals, without me. Dinner is much smaller. There is either yogurt and millet, peas and meat, pasta and chicken - and always lots and lots of white bread! So, I believe that my crazy food stories may be coming to an end... The other big thing about all these meals is you are not allowed to drink while you are eatting, you can have your water only once you are totally done with your meal. Let's just say I have not gotten used to that addition yet.
Bonus of breakfast and dinner: Sit on the roof
Ba ci kanam,
Katie
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