Peace Corps Senegal

Things have been good lately. I’ve been busy, and I’ve been here for a while so I’m slowly getting to that point where life at site is *semi* comfortable. I’m not constantly on edge like I was in my first month here, and Fanaye is really starting to feel like home. However, I’d be lying if I said I’ve been perfectly happy and content. Along with that feeling of comfort, also comes the loss of that “honeymoon – everything’s new and exciting” period. It’s starting to settle in that I’m here for the next year and a half… which most of the time is a relief (because how else would I make any sort of difference), but sometimes feels like a pit in my stomach. I think at the core of the tiny desire I have to leave is loneliness. No matter how many new friends I make, or how great my Pulaar gets, Fanaye will always feel lonely. I love my “Gogo Kane” (my Senegalese name) personality here. But it’s not the same as me back home. There are certain aspects of my life that I can’t share with people...

I recently read a book about Molly Melching, who is an American woman who came to Senegal in 1974 on a student exchange program. She ended up never leaving, and eventually founded an NGO that would go on to educate virtually all of Senegal about female genital cutting, which helped end the tradition in most Senegalese villages. One of the biggest keys to her success was how deeply she integrated herself into Senegalese culture. Like the Peace Corps, her NGO (which other than herself, is entirely Senegalese run) greatly values understanding the culture of a community, and what it’s people value most. It was an incredible, inspiring story, but I often think of one small part of it. Molly described her experience assimilating into Senegalese culture as “coming home.” The hospitable, kind, sharing, joking culture of Senegal made Molly feel like she fit right in. For me (and most other foreigners visiting Senegal), this hasn’t been the case. I think that bothered me early on. I was putt...

-           The cockroach incident: Ohhh boy let me tell you. I. hate. cockroaches. There’s no living creature that scares me more. I’ve had a roach problem ever since I moved in, and I was proud of myself for kind of sort of getting used to it…. There would usually be one or two in my bathroom every time I went in. But I got good at scaring them away before going in, and for the most part they didn’t leave the bathroom. But last month (rainy season means bug season) it started getting out of control. There would be 3 or 4, and it would be hard to scare them all away.. plus I was starting to notice them in my regular room. So when my Senegalese friend told me he sold cockroach killer spray at his store, I was so excited.  -           The stuff was supposed to kill them instantly, so when I saw one in my bathroom that night I decided to just go for it. This was such a mistake, because wh...

                Good news! I’ve been so incredibly busy lately, which any Peace Corps volunteer will tell you, is a real gift. I’ll detail my projects in a bit, but for now, let me just say that creating sustainable change is really really hard in practice. We talked our ears off about how to make our projects sustainable during training. The last thing we want is to be that development organization that comes in, spends a lot of resources, pats themselves on the back, and then leaves the community in the same place (or worse off) than they found it. This concept seems obvious, and it’s hard to find a decent NGO that doesn’t have the word “sustainable” somewhere in its mission statement.                 But now that I’m in the meat of it, actually trying to get projects going on the ground.... there are so many roadblocks that get in t...