Help put on the Kaolack Girls Leadership Camp!

Hey everyone.  So here's the deal.  Kaolack is putting on a girls leadership camp this year and we need your help to fund it! I will be bringing two girls from my village, and Insha Allah will be doing Theatre of the Oppressed work with the girls at the camp.  This is a really great opportunity to motivate them to see their full potential and stay in school rather than just marrying early and popping out kids for the rest of their lives.  If you're interested in contributing here's the link.  It has much more information put together in an immensely more eloquent way than I just did, so check it out. 

https://www.peacecorps.gov/index.cfm?shell=donate.contribute.projDetail&projdesc=685-163

Every little bit helps so pass it on to all who may be interested. Thanks!

Cheers,
Garrison

Christmas in Popenguine

December = Fail… for blog posting anyways, for everything else it’s been pretty good.  I believe I left off last time telling y’alls about IST and trying to get in the holiday spirit.  Well that was ok I suppose.  On both accounts I didn’t quite get what I wanted.  IST was a bit lacking in useful information and my holiday endeavors were a bit lacking in… well a country that gets excited with me about Christmas.  Even so, Christmas was still pretty awesome thanks to the five wonderful people I got to spend it with, the three amazing meals we ate, and the single best beach house I have ever stayed in…  for the sake of full disclosure I haven’t stayed in all that many beach houses, but regardless it was still awesome! Take a journey with me through images and poetry.

T’was the night before Christmas (in Popenguine) when all through the (beach) house 

not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse (except for Daisy preparing a Mexican feast of epic proportions and deliciousness.  I mean serious deliciousness). 

The stockings were hung by the chimney (wooden giraffe) with care 

in the hopes that St. Nicholas soon would be there (We weren’t taking any chances, hence the biskrem, powdered milk, carrot and letter). 

The children were nestled all snug in their beds (watching love actually), while visions of sugar plums danced in their heads (possibly induced by the fine locally produced liquors we picked up in Warrang earlier that day: Bissap liquor and chocolate, coffee, banana liquor.) And mamma in her ‘kerchief, and I in my cap, Had just settled our brains for a long winter’s nap (…yeah I got nothin) When out on the lawn there arose such a clatter, I sprang from the bed to see what was the matter (the movie ended and we realized we had only 10min to get to midnight mass!). Away to the window I flew like a flash, Tore open the shutters and threw up the sash (Go go go get to mass!). The moon on the breast of the new-fallen snow Gave the lustre of mid-day to objects below (Actually there was a good amount of moonlight) When, what to my wondering eyes should appear, But a miniature sleigh, and eight tinny reindeer (or in our case a church with two firmly locked doors and a previously unnoticed calendar stating that midnight mass starts at 10…) 

With a little old driver, so lively and quick, I knew in a moment it must be St Nick (What the heck, we may have missed mass but its three minutes past 12 which means its CHRISTMAS!) "Happy Christmas to all, and to all a good-night!" 

Okay I may have stretched the limits of our Christmas’s relation to this poem, but I thought it might be fun :-).  Christmas morning rolled around and we woke up to a truly magnificent sight.  No not the beach, not the house, not the presents, or the stockings, something much more magical and amazing.  The biskrem was gone, the glass of milk was empty and the carrot was considerably nibbled.  I asked around and none of us did it, so take that you non-believers Santa visited Senegal!  After thoroughly enjoying our nostalgic Santa excitement we got down to eating our second magnificent meal.  This was a delicious strata courtesy of Kelsey.   

We enjoyed this meal with a lovely woman from Saint Louis whose mother had actually been a Peace Corps Volunteer in Popenguine in the 80’s.  It’s a small world and we really are one big interconnected family.  Full and happy we next proceeded to mass, take two.  This time the doors were not locked and we thoroughly enjoyed ourselves.  There’s nothing quite like mass with a 40 or so person Senegalese choir with traditional drums.  Pretty amazing.  Some of our group got their religion fix that day; I got my choral music fix.  Now what would be next on a PCV’s agenda after church? Well food of course!  That seems to actually be the answer to what’s next whenever PCV’s are together.  Cooking good food really is the main event for every gathering here and for our brunch Kelsey provided some amazing homemade cinnamon rolls.  We enjoyed these while opening our secret Santa presents.  My midday consisted of reading, sleeping, and Home Alone II.  Oh yeah it was that good.  I couldn’t rest forever though because I had to prepare our third amazing meal.   

Two roasted chickens in a lemon butter cream sauce, with julienned carrots, and pesto pasta.  I told you, we really like eating. 

After dinner we made a nice bonfire on the beach and made smores and attempted to light off some fireworks.  I say attempted because we ran into a little problem… the beach in Popenguine erodes away quite a bit every winter and makes the waves rather, big.  I guess we didn’t realize that the tide was coming in so it was quite a surprise when in the midst of lighting two fireworks a wave washed up and put out our fire and knocked over the fireworks.  Don’t worry the fuses had already been lit so they still went off… on the ground… pointed at us… It was a massively good time.  The rest of the fireworks were ruined however, but we had a good time anyways trying to light them and occasionally getting one to launch a few feet.  We finished out the night with a classic, “It’s a Wonderful Life”.  We weren’t able to finish it because we were falling asleep, but it was still nice.  Right before I went to bed I skyped with my family and Hannah.  I must say this was really strange.  It was Christmas as usual at Grandma and Grandpa’s and with everyone on the phone I could picture it so clearly.  I felt pretty lonely hanging up the phone and being back in Senegal.  Apart from that very reasonable moment of homesickness though, it was a wonderful weekend, and I can’t imagine having spent it with any other group of people.  Thanks to Amy, April, Daisy, Kelsey, and Clint!  Merry Christmas everyone!

Let it snow let it snow let it snow!

Oh the weather outside is frightful

But the fire is so delightful

And since we’ve no place to go

Let it snow let is snow let it snow

Translation: It’s really really hot outside and everyone is burning garbage but since I’m stuck in Senegal I may as well get into the Christmas spirit!  It’s really more of an emotional translation than a literal one. 

Yes the Christmas Season is upon us.  The streets of Senegal are filled with cheer as everyone begins their shopping and starts putting up lights.  The traditional Mango tree in the center of town is filled with ornaments and the Talibe are being extra nice so that Santa won’t give them coal.  Also far from the usual fare of rice with fish, the training center is now bursting with the smells of fresh baked cookies, apple cider, and scrumptious honey baked ham… Hmmm now which part of this fantasy is the least likely to be true?  Eating pork in a Muslim country, or the Talibe being nice so that they WONT get coal?  I’ll let you be the judge.

Yes I’m a little Christmas crazy right now, but when you’re thousands of miles from home in a third world Muslim country it’s either let Christmas uneventfully pass you by, or grab your Santa Hat and paper snow flakes and make it happen yourself.  I was very well educated in the lore of Santa Claus as a child and I don’t remember anyone saying that he skips over Africa so look out everyone I’m rollin out the red and green carpet pour le Pere Noel. 

Luckily I am here at the training center where my Christmas activities won’t be so strange.  I’m not sure how my family in the village would react to me putting ornaments on a Baobab tree.  So here’s the plan.  Firstly decorate the training center with an absurd amount of everything Christmas: lights, trees, snowflakes, etc.  Step two watch every Christmas movie known to man.  Step three, sing carols, buy presents, and generally prepare for Christmas.  Step four celebrate Christmas with my best friends in country and eat copious amounts of baked goods. 

Surely I am somewhat in denial that Christmas isn’t quite going to be like it is back home in the states, but I’m going to try god damn it!  In all honesty this is pretty strange.  I’ve never spent Christmas away from home, but hopefully it will turn out all right.  To everyone back home, enjoy the holidays and cherish your chance to be with family and friends.  I would trade every present just to be there with mine.  Speaking of presents… Don’t send me any!  It’s really expensive and consumerism is so America’s thing.  I am like soooo much better than that now (can you hear the sarcasm?).  But seriously it’s expensive and there are more important things than stuff.  If you feel so inclined to get me a present, do this instead: go to www.kiva.org and make a $25 loan to someone in the developing world (preferably in Senegal).  Don’t send me a kiva gift certificate, loan for yourself.  After Peace Corps I will most likely be a poor starving actor and I’ll just end up withdrawing the money as I need it.  If you make the loan, having fancy non-arts jobs and what not, you will probably be able to keep reloaning that $25 dollars and it will thus do much more good.  Who knows you may even come to like helping third world development and loan even more.  I’m just trying to save the world here.  Actually this is an entirely selfish venture to make Santa think I’m super good so I’ll get more presents.  I hope he doesn’t read blogs.  Fingers crossed ;-). 

Happy Holidays Everyone! And Happy Hanukkah to all of my Jewish friends celebrating right now. 

Garrison

Mental Health Update

Well I'm a little over 6 weeks into my service now and I thought I should give y'all, and myself really, a little evaluation of my metal health.  Don't worry it won't be as boring as it sounds.  I'm at the training center in Thies again after just 6 weeks at site and it really is kind of surreal.  The shift from PCT to PCV is huge mentally and being back here is showing me how much happier I am now than I ever was during PST.  Looking back at journal entries and blog posts from those first few months its a little embarrassing how much I was freaking out.  For example when I first got here I was absolutely terrified of leaving the training center to walk around Thies, and now that just seems absurd.  Initially I was willing to get ripped off rather than actually try to bargain because bargaining was uncomfortable.  Yeah now not so much.  In fact now I will argue at length in order to get the price down by just a couple hundred CFA, less than 50 cents. Also I used to just smile when kids called me Toubab or asked me for money.  Now I tell them they’re rude and ask them for money.  The list goes on and on. 

I think the big difference now is that I’m past the giant wall of swearing in and I can actually see what my life is really going to be like.  I have to say starting to plan projects does wonders for increasing one’s perception of self-efficacy.  The little things help too, like not having to live out of a suitcase or being able to cook food for myself if I’m tired of rice and fish.  Those who know me well know that I’m a bit of an old man sometimes, so it’s also been nice not being around so many people and being able to go to sleep when I want. You may think that’s lame, I think it’s amazing.  My hut has become my little cave of restful solitude and I already miss it.

Don’t get me wrong things are definitely challenging, but now they’re challenging with a somewhat visible purpose to life which helps make things more bearable.  Other things are just purely frustrating though like having the Alhum driver blatantly overcharge you by 500CFA.  I knew the appropriate fare and I knew he was ripping me off so I told him so, and then proceeded to argue for a while until I got frustrated and may have insinuated that he was being racist.  There was also the time over thanksgiving where a cola nut seller grabbed my broom, I had just bought a broom, and wouldn’t let go unless I bought 2 kilos.  Yeah I started in French then switched to Seereer and then finished in English because neither of those previous languages got my point across.  It was pretty funny though because when I switched to English he started copying everything I said.  I made him say some pretty unfriendly things about himself.  Ok so maybe my mental health isn’t 100% perfect but the more comfortable I get here the more I can’t stand people being disrespectful to me.  I personally think that making the cola nut man say he was an ugly rude disrespectful stupid man was good for my mental health.  I also like my new tactic for dealing with people who call me Toubab.  I turn around and call them African. I did this to a group of Moto drivers in Kaolack and they loved it.  This is something I never would have imagined doing when I first got to country. I’ve grown so much :-). 

It really does make me happy though looking at how comfortable I’ve become.  It feels cool to be totally fine with walking around a crazy third world city and crack jokes in the local language.  That’s freakin cool!  How many Americans in the entire world do that? Not many and call be arrogant but I’m pretty proud of that.  I’ve certainly come a long way from that first week of wanting to get right back on the plane.  I have a long ways to go for sure, but right now as I take stock on how far I’ve come, I think I’ve done alright.  Those are my musings for the night.  Stay tuned for pictures of Thanksgiving, All Vol, and IST.

Cheers,

Garrison

Laughter and Grief

If you really want to know a culture look at two things, how they laugh and how they grieve.  The laughter will show you their joy and the beauty of their humanity, and the grief will show you how much they really value that joy as the gaping hole that is the absence of a human life throws into sharp relief what has been lost.  The Senegalese laugh hard.  They are always smiling and seemingly ever ready to take joy from the world around them.  A world which in all honesty often gives them little to be joyful about.  This absolute love of life means that the Senegalese grieve hard as well.  Loss of life is absolutely devastating to them and they grieve it like nothing I've ever seen.  The men sit quietly weeping while the women wail.  I've experienced few things in my short life as primal as the Senegalese funeral of a young man killed in a car accident that I went to this past week.  And that's all I have to say about that. 

Tabaski, Abraham and God

Bon Tabaski!  For those of you who may be a little out of the loop, Tabaski was Nov. 17^th and I gotta say it was quite a good day; from the perspective of me as a human that is.  From the perspective of a sheep it was a very very baaaaaad day.  Sorry I had to.  For those of you still out of the loop Tabaski is the celebration of God providing a Ram to be sacrificed so that Abraham didn’t have to murder his son.  There are more euphemistic ways to say that, but why ruin the vivid imagery.  Christianity and Judaism have this same story of Abraham and Isaac but in Islam it’s an especially big holiday.  Every family buys a Ram or two or three, depending on finances, and has a truly grand old feast.  For weeks leading up to today you would be hard pressed to find a single car traveling in Senegal that didn’t have at least one sheep strapped to the roof.  Like I said bad day to be a sheep.  My Tabaski though was awesome.  I’m still stuffed.  It started out with a trip to the mosque in the morning for prayer and ritual.  I don’t really know what was said, but it was nice.  At the end of the prayers everyone got up and shook each others hands while asking for forgiveness for anything they may have done to the other person.  I really liked this part.  We need more things like this in the states.  After the mosque we went into the town and started killin some sheep.  The Imam killed the first two and then everyone proceeded to their respective houses to kill the rest.  I personally watched 7 sheep die today.  It wasn’t pretty.  Anyone who eats meat though, I suggest that you watch an animal be slaughtered at least once so that you can be an informed meat eater.  Too many people are in denial about where their meat comes from.  Let me fill you in.  It comes from cute animals with soft petable fur and adorable faces who have mothers.  There you go.  Now accept that and keep eating.  I did.  The food was truly delicious and my family even invented a new way to torture me with it.  They call it “Advance”.  This lovely bit of maniacal generosity involves feeding me and a few other people our own bowl first since there are lots of people and they want to make sure we get enough.   Of course when the second round of food comes no one knows that I have already eaten, so they still force massive amounts down my throat.  Maniacal generosity indeed.  After lunch we sat around and chatted, drank tea, met relatives who came in from out of town, and generally basked in the glory of the day.  Twas a truly good day.  Summary over.

I should probably leave it there but I’m going to do the stupid thing and add in personal commentary on the subject of religion.  I know I’m stupid for doing this, but I can’t keep my mouth shut.  Disclaimer: this is a commentary on the story of Abraham and Isaac, which belongs to Christianity, Islam, and Judaism, and thus I am not commenting on any specific faith, just faith in general.  Ok bases covered, here we go.  I do not like the story of Abraham and Isaac one bit.  It strikes me as an example of both man and God at their absolute worst.  What is there to celebrate about this story? Should we be celebrating that a man was so devoted to God that he was willing to murder his own son? Or maybe we’re celebrating that God was merciful and saved his disciple… from a problem that he himself created.  This story is down right scary.  I’m not naive I understand what is being celebrated: God rewarding devotion.  I understand it perfectly well, I just think that it’s completely wrong. 

Devotion in and of itself is not bad.  Deference to something greater than oneself is beautiful and can lead to great things like humility and selflessness.  It seems logical though that one should reserve such reverence and devotion for something that truly deserves it.  Say God for example.  People generally accept that God is worthy of devotion.  People have said of God that he is perfect goodness and love.  Well now that does sound pretty nice.  If God is perfectly good and people out of their own free will decide to worship him because of this, well that’s all well and good.  The problem comes with this story of Abraham and Isaac where God decides to test that devotion.  God commands Abraham to take his only son to the top of a mountain and offer him up as a sacrifice.  Abraham, my dearest most faithful disciple, murder something you love for me.  Murder your own flesh and blood.  In my name, the name of perfect goodness and love, do something of unspeakable evil.  Do you see what I’m getting at? Any God that requires and tests devotion is inherently unworthy of having it in the first place.  Its petty and childish and exactly the kind of behavior that would get you a time out in kindergarten.  In one of my favorite plays “The Last Days of Judas Iscariot” (Great job Chico State Theatre Dept!) one of the characters asks if God’s love is conditional, “because if it is then that love is rendered utterly false”.  If God loves unconditionally then there is no reason to require or test devotion.  Some might say that God was teaching, showing the world that complete devotion leads to great rewards.  This may be so, but murder is a rather despicable way to teach a lesson.  Perhaps the ends justify the means.  That too has been said before. Yes in fact, right before some of the worst atrocities in history.  God cannot be an ends justify the means kinda guy.  If he is then he isn’t perfect goodness and love, he’s just someone with a lot of power and that is something to which no one should be devoted.  Am I saying no one should be devoted to God, no of course not.  It is neither my place nor my desire to do so.  I’m simply saying that in my opinion both Abraham and God made some big mistakes here, and I hope they’ve learned from them.  Maybe that’s the true lesson here. 

Having a Good Day in Senegal

Hannah had a bit of a hard day yesterday (She got stuck behind a pretty brutal car accident for 2 hours) so she told me to have a good day for her.  Here are my subsequent texts in response to that challenge.  Its just too good not to post :-).

#1 Commencing good day. Step one wake up. Check.  Step two listen to Mika (Blue Eye's-Touches You). Check!

#2 Step three drive to the end of the peninsula to catch a car before it fills up and see the ocean on both sides of me separated by only 50 meters. Check!

#3 Step four wait for an hour in Mbour for a car and then barely get a place (middle in th back) probably just because you're white. Check and win!

#4 Step five get out of the car while they strap baggage onto the top and run into 4 of your friends catching another car after their language seminar. Check!

#5 Step six listen to Mika again in the car followed by a bunch of classical music for the play I'm writing in my head. Check.

#6 Step seven get lost in Kaolack at night, find the regional house, cook some spaghetti, and eat someone elses cake while losing miserably at scrabble... Check!

Step eight involves a phone call to the aforementioned girl but that's far too cutesy and gross to post in a blog.  So why am I posting this random sequence of texts.  Well this day could have been really bad.  For all intensive purposes it wasn't a particularly great day: it was long, and stressful and tiring.  But because I had the mindset that it was going to be good and had to be good no matter what, all of that stuff just became amusing.  We can't control the world around us, but we can choose how we react to it.  I'm no Zen master and on other days I will not be so level headed, but its nice to remember that sometimes you can just choose to have a good day regardless of what actually happens.  There's my wisdom for the day.  Now everyone go have a good day for me :-)

Cheers,
Garrison

My Theatre Company

Fair warning this post has absolutely nothing to do with Senegal.  Ok now that that’s out of the way let’s talk about theatre.  One of my biggest concerns with joining the Peace Corps was how taking a two-year break from theatre would affect my career.  I’ve been keeping track of my friends and their professional progress over the past few months and a few days ago I randomly got really jealous.  In the throws of this mysterious bout of jealousy I voiced my career concerns on facebook.  That’s a bit of a euphemism.  I actually posted a pessimistic status update saying, “I wonder how far behind I’ll be after 2 years in the Peace Corps”.  My friends rightfully shot down this unwarranted pessimism and reminded me that I’m right where I need to be.  I couldn’t agree more.  That being said though I want to share my aspirations here so that, if nothing else, I can put them out of my head and focus on the task at hand.  Here we go:

Most of my theatre friends know that my overall goal is to start a theatre company of my own.  Few people though actually know the extent of my goals… they’re a little ambitious.  Looking at the theatre world today I see the best, most creative, and most valuable work coming not from Broadway or LA, but rather professional regional theatres around the country.  One of the best examples of this is the Oregon Shakespeare Festival in Ashland Oregon.  This complex of three theatres offers a diverse season of professional shows in repertory so that on any given weekend you could see 5 different shows in one place for very reasonable prices.  This ability to see so much high caliber theatre in one place has made Ashland a tourist destination and as a result the town is flourishing.  America doesn’t need another actor trying to make it on Broadway or in LA, god knows there are too many already, but it does need more professional regional theatres, and that is what I am setting out to do. 

This is going to sound arrogant I know, but I don’t just want to make another professional regional theatre, I want to redefine altogether what regional theatre can be and its purpose and value in America.  I told you it was going to sound arrogant, but stay with me.  I am envisioning a theatre company that is completely unified with and nourishes its community artistically, culturally, financially, educationally, environmentally, and physically.  Let’s break that down:

• Artistically:  First and foremost this company needs to offer the highest caliber theatre possible.  It would produce a variety of works both classic and contemporary in repertory and would support the production of new plays through workshops and full fledged premiere productions.  This would ensure that even though the company is regional it would still be relevant to the rest of the theatre world and contribute to its evolution. 
• Culturally:  This company would truly be a part of its community with dedicated social areas such as a restaurant/ jazz lounge, coffee shop, book store, and beautiful outdoor areas.  It would be an open space for the community to gather regardless of that particular evening’s theatrical offerings.  Beyond simply a place to gather it would also be a place to investigate local issues by offering workshops in social community based theatre as a means to open forums of discussion on relevant issues in the community. 
• Financially: Too often theatres take from their communities financially through constant calls for donations.  This company would support its community financially by bringing in tourism and boosting the local economy. 
• Educationally: This company would offer extensive educational outreach programs such as youth theatre classes, free performances for local school children, small scale tours of performers to surrounding areas, and performance opportunities when available for local children and young adults. 
• Environmentally: Every theatre built by this company would be certified LEED Platinum and every show would strive to eliminate waste in all aspects of production.  For some reason the theatre world sees it fit to investigate the worlds problems and claim high moral authority while taking more than its fair share of world resources.  It is far from convenient or cheap to make sure that sets are recyclable and energy use is minimal, but we cannot pretend to be exempt from our obligation to reduce our carbon footprint just because we’re making “art”. 
• Physically: This company would literally feed the surrounding community through the implementation of a substantial organic rooftop farm.  This might sound indulgent and in no way theatrical, but what better way is there to connect with a community than to feed it?  The United States is arguably the most prosperous nation in the world, and yet there are people who cannot afford to provide proper nutrition to their families.  Beyond just this there is a crisis in America of centralized food markets that require unsustainable amounts of energy to produce and transport food.  America needs more locally produced organic food in order to feed future generations in a sustainable way. Food from this farm would be provided free of charge to local schools and low-income families, and of course to the restaurant/ jazz bar. 

This is not the model of traditional professional theatre and it will not be as profitable, but there is just something fundamentally right about theatre feeding its community so completely.  It harkens back to the reason that theatre exists in the first place, to bring communities together to try to understand the world just a little better.  The traditional model of professional theatre may investigate the world, but it doesn’t bring a community together.  I feel like I don’t deserve to make theatre if the only point is to make theatre.  There has to be something more, and this feels like something valuable. 

Like I said I’m a little ambitious, but here’s the real kicker.  I need probably between 20 and 40 MILLION dollars to build this complex of theatres.  So if you know any billionaires who are loose with their money, forward them this post ;-).  I don’t mean to be flippant.  In all seriousness I have a lot of work to do before I can even think about building a theatre.  Firstly I need to learn how to make some seriously good theatre and that probably means grad school.  All of this is for not if the theatre sucks.  I also need to find the right town to do it in and gather some pretty talented and dedicated technicians, designers, business people, actors, directors, stage managers and friends.  I think maybe I’m a little selfish with this project, because I want it all.  I want to be able to do professional theatre while living in one place and having a family, I want to be able to feel like I’m contributing to my community, and most of all I want to hang out with my friends.  Why do theatre with strangers when I can do it with my favorite people in the world?  Just sayin.  Steppenwolf did it, why can’t we?  Ok there are a million reasons why we cant, and maybe its impossible, but what good ever came from only doing things that are possible.  People said that it was impossible to dig Africa out of poverty but here we are.  Huh.  I guess this post is about Senegal too.  I honestly have no idea how this is going to happen, but its something that I can see dedicating my life to create.  I think it’s worth it.  There we go Universe, I put it out there, now mull it over for a few years and I’ll get back to you when I’m done here.  See you then!

Cheers,

Garrison 

P.S. Theatre 150X kids so at the end of the semester you’ll have a project where you have to write a manifesto of what you think theatre should be… take it seriously, you may try to make it happen for real some day. 

Even the Best Laid Plans of Mice and Men

Well as of 11:00am Friday October 15^th I am now officially a 100% bona fide Peace Corps Volunteer!  But hold on there are a few stories to tell before we get to that point.  I titled this post “Even the Best Laid Plans of Mice and Men” because things have been a little interesting lately.  After beach weekend we all went back to village for one final week.  This was relatively uneventful, we had language class, went to the boutique to chat, went to the fields etc.  The big event for the week was the party Lauren and I were planning for our final night.  I was planning to buy three chickens and Lauren was going to buy potatoes and veggies and we were going to have a feast.  I say were because it didn’t happen.  Firstly the village of Ngoudiane mysteriously ran out of chickens… like completely… that one threw me for a bit of a loop.  Then my LCF came to my house and told me that one of the elders in his host family had died so a big party wasn’t appropriate anyways.  That next day instead of preparing a feast I went to my first Muslim funeral, which consisted of a lot of sitting as they prepared the body, and then some praying at the mosque, which I was graciously allowed to participate in, and finally taking the body to the cemetery.  In many ways it was very similar to funerals in the states with the one exception of there being absolutely no women present.  I’m not going to go into that too much this early in my service.  I’m still at the stage where I need to observe rather than judge; I’m not ready to open up that can of worms.  So yes I’ll leave it at that for now.  After the funeral the general consensus in village was that I did a very good thing by coming.  People knew that I didn’t know the person but they appreciated the gesture.  Instead of a feast I ended up buying my family some soda and we shared that while listening to American music and dancing.  It was a pretty good time after all. 

After we got back to Thies we only had a few days until swear in and they flew by.  Firstly I found out the results of my technical and language proficiency exams.  For tech I got nearly 100% and for language I got Advanced Low!  To put that in perspective Peace Corps only expects us to be Intermediate Mid by the end of PST.  Needless to say I was pretty pleased.  My big task for this time was writing a speech in Seereer for swear in.  That was nerve racking since it was going to be broadcast on Senegalese national television, but everything worked out in the end.  Well everything except my outfit.  Thing that went wrong number 2: so everyone for swearing in is encouraged to wear traditional Senegalese clothing.  I had thus gone to a tailor to have some clothes made the week before.  When I went to pick them up however… well lets just say I don’t think I have ever seen such a large V-Neck in my life.  I had shown the tailor a picture of a collar with a slight dip in it and he took that to mean lets give this toubab a booboo that really lets him rock the chest hair.  No worries I just wore a white t-shirt under it.  It wasn’t the most stylish thing to do, but at least I was presentable for the US Ambassador and Senegalese Government Officials.

Now the main event: swearing in.  The ceremony took place at the US Ambassador’s house, which is both ginormous and beautiful, and was really quite nice.  Its amazing how normal multilingualness has become to me.  All told there were 6 languages spoken during the ceremony.   The intro was in French, occasionally someone would address us in English, occasionally someone would talk in Wolof , and there were speeches by new PCV’s in Pular, Wolof, Mandinka, and yours truly in Seereer.  Everyone said my speech went really well which was nice.  One of the coolest parts of the ceremony was having the Ambassador issue us the oath of service.  It was very official and even included us swearing to “protect the constitution of the United States against all enemies both foreign and domestic”.  So watch out all you constitution haters I got my eye on you!  All jokes aside it was actually a very proud and surprisingly patriotic moment.  It certainly makes me take this commitment a little more seriously.  I’ve been thinking a lot about politics lately with the election coming up.  I am proud to say that I did my civic duty and voted abroad.  Even so it feels strange to not be up to date on the issues.  My brother is going to John Stewart’s rally in DC and I am more than a little bit jealous, which is weird because I’m sure that I’m doing more good serving in the Peace Corps than participating in the craziness of American Politics, but still it feels like I’m out of the loop.  But I digress, I still have more to tell you about the ceremony… well not the ceremony per se, but something equally important: THE RECEPTION!  We walked out into the back yard to the beautiful site of bowls full of sliders and chicken, and caviar, and shrimp, and pizza, and brownies, and apple tarts, and lemon tarts, and…                 sorry I had to take a break to wipe the drool off my face.  All in all it kind of felt like being fed our final meal before execution.  It was really pretty amazing.  It was also really cool to talk to the Ambassador and get a few pictures with her. 

Thing that went wrong number 3: So everyone in Africa loves Obama.  No really they absolutely love him.  You’re confused, its ok, let’s clarify.  So how much does Senegal love Obama?  So much that they sell Obama underwear and boxers!  This is immensely amusing to me and I will be buying a pair very very soon.  Now this in and of itself is not TTWWN3 (Thing that went wrong number 3, its PC of course I used an acronym).  TTWWN3 was bringing this up in the course of a conversation about Obama with the US Ambassador… Yeah that probably wasn’t the best idea.  It wasn’t that big of a deal, but who really wants to make a faux pas with the US Ambassador to Senegal.  Lesson learned.  Check.

There were definitely some things that went right these past few days, like going to Massa Massa for our last meal in Thies.  Massa Massa is a real restaurant, and while that may not sound so amazing, it is quite rare here.  The cuisine is a mix between French, Italian, and Belgium and is absolutely delicious.  I had a wonderful lasagna with a few glasses of wine for 7mil, which is only about $14.  Oh yeah you know you want to visit.  Very soon though that is going to feel expensive once I’m subsisting on a village living allowance.  In the mean time though it’s delicious, and I definitely want to go back to try the Lapin du Mon Grande Mere (Rabbit of my Grand Mother). 

This is Senegal so things can’t go right for too long.  TTWWN4: Everyone going to the Kaolack region was told to be ready to depart at 2:30 on Saturday the 16^th.  We all scrambled to get packed in time and then proceeded to wait for another 2 hours for the driver to get to the center.  It turns out they thought that we were leaving on the 17^th.  We were also supposed to have 2 busses for all of our luggage and only one driver showed up.  As any good group of PCV’s should we went with the flow and crammed the last two seats of the bus from floor to ceiling and made it work.  It was actually all pretty funny and illustrated the need to be flexible in the Peace Corps.  I actually started writing this blog post on that bus ride which brings me to a side point: TED Talks! I listened to two great ones.  The first provided a very optimistic look at third world development and our prospects for a world without poverty.  Here’s the info TEDTalks : New insights on poverty and life around the world - Hans Rosling  (2007) (video) 

http://www.ted.com/talks/podtv/id/140

The second looked at what actually motivates people and produces innovative solutions in the workplace.  The answer may surprise you.  It didn’t surprise me; this has been my dad’s business philosophy for as long as I can remember.  Its great to see it affirmed in such a cool way though. TEDTalks : Dan Pink on the surprising science of motivation - Dan Pink  (2009) (video)                                               

http://www.ted.com/talks/podtv/id/618

Both these talks couldn’t have been more perfect for me to hear right at the beginning of my service.  They show firstly that what I’m doing is valuable and has the potential to help at a critical time in third world development, and secondly that I’m part of an organization with a management philosophy that can actually produce results.  Side note done, back to Senegal.

Once in Kaolack all the current PCV’s greeted us at the door and cheered.  Kaolack is the biggest region of volunteers in Senegal and it seems like a pretty cool family of people.  We ordered some food and started to get to know everyone and it was a really great time.  I also met one of my Toubacouta area neighbors, Byron, and found out that he was a theatre major too, and knows about Augusto Boal and wants to collaborate on some theatre projects.  My situation just keeps getting better and better.  Probably my favorite thing that happened in Kaolack though was the cooking dance party.  I decided to cook up a big pot of spaghetti bolognaise for whoever wanted to chip in for the ingredients and this turned into a grand old group cooking event complete with America music and dance moves a plenty.  Not only was it fun, but my bolognaise was delicious!  Alas the vacation had to end though and the next day we said goodbye to all our friends and our new regional oasis. 

Onwards and upwards!  Amy Emily and I left Kaolack at 8am to head to the regional government offices in Foundgioune and here we have TTWWN4.  You thought I was done with that motif didn’t you well… well actually I am done.  There are far too many things that go wrong to list or count them, and if I do I will probably go insane.  It simply isn’t healthy, and no one wants to read a bunch of bitching.  Hence forth things that go wrong shall be referred to as funny stories.  So funny story, we were on our way back from Foundgioune when one of our drivers (there were two Peace Corps cars) decided to take a shortcut through bush roads.  This short cut took twice as much time as the regular road and involved quite a bit more mud and hairy situations.  We eventually made it to Toubacouta though and had a wonderful evening beginning with a Tequila Sunrise at sunset and followed by half a chicken with French fries for me.  It was delicious.  The next day I installed in my village, Dassilame Seereer!  Since then it has been a whirlwind of greeting people, sitting with the elders, drinking tea, setting up my room, doing laundry (by hand, for 2 hours with water I pulled from the well), drinking tea, visiting every compound in the village, pretending I know Seereer,  hiding under my mosquito net as I thought my roof was going to blow off in a storm, drinking tea (they really like to drink tea) and battling a mouse.

Oh yes the title of this post isn’t just metaphorical, its literal.  It was my first night in the village and all through the house not a creature was stirring EXCEPT for a mouse: one little mouse chewing a hole in my wall, right next to my head all night long.  This also happened to be my Mephloquine (Malaria Prophylaxis with somewhat hallucinogenic side effects) day and the night of the aforementioned storm.  I kinda felt like I was going insane.  It got to the point where I was so frustrated that I got out of bed, got my machete and waited in front of the wall for him to break through for about half an hour.  A different Garrison might have said to himself “so this is what I’ve come to, sitting alone in the middle of the night waiting for a mouse to break through my wall”.  PCV Garrison however said “come on break through my wall, make my night, I’ll chop your freakin head off.”  Like I said I was feeling a little insane.  The mouse never did break through, but needless to say this meant war.  The next night I was trying to fall asleep when I heard scurrying around my room.  I got out my headlamp and machete and waited again.  Suddenly there he was just sitting out in the open.  He was actually pretty cute which makes me feel kinda bad about what happened next.  Animal lovers be forewarned this gets a little graphic.  Initially I just watched him.  It was like my own little nature program.  I considered just trying to go to sleep and dealing with him later, but then he crawled behind my metal trunk right by my head.  I was not about to let a mouse crawl on me in my sleep so I did what had to be done.  I pushed the metal trunk up against the wall and trapped him and then stabbed my machete behind the trunk.  It was quick and relatively humane if you ask me.  Lots of things can go wrong for both mice and men, although I don’t think that my mouse friend would euphemistically refer to this as a “funny story”.  I texted my human friend about it and he said and I quote “dude you are legit”.  I’m nothing special, that’s just how we do it here in Africa (snaps suspenders and rocks back and forth in my rocking chair). 

Apart from this epic battle life here has been pretty mundane.  My biggest problem right now is figuring out how to deal with my village’s insane generosity towards me.  Its really throwing me for a loop right now.  I tried to discuss what I should contribute towards food cost for my family and they tried to tell me that they didn’t want me to pay anything.  When I was doing my laundry a woman said she would do it for me from now on but wouldn’t let me pay her.  Twice my host dad has brought home extra food from Toubacouta just for me: no one else would eat it no matter how much I insisted.  I feel like I’m not doing enough.  Not just now, even once my projects get off the ground I feel like its not enough.  These people have so little and they give so much.  I have so much and I give so little.  I give my time and my energy but I don’t give this laptop, or my solar panel, or my real American resources.  Its tough.  I feel selfish and guilty whenever I’m not out in the village getting to know people, or studying, or just sitting with my family.  I need time to myself and time to rest, but right now I feel like I need to be working harder in order to deserve all that I am being given.  They say in Peace Corps most of the time you don’t even see the true results of your work.  I suppose I just need to have faith that I’m helping and do the best I can to keep myself happy as well while I do it. 

Cheers,

Garrison

CPW, The Beach, and America... I mean Dakar

Peter teaching Nepali to Senegalese counterparts so they know its freakin HARD to learn another language.

Me and my counterparts.  They're happy trust me, Senegalese just don't smile for pictures.

The entire Stage crammed into two Alhums to go to the beach!

Beach House!

... I can't explain this...

Beer pong :-)

My view in the morning after sleeping on the beach.

At first this appears to be a really nice picture...

An awesome WWII bunker we found.

Are we sure this isn't Santa Barbara?

On the way to Dakar... Yes that is a sheep tied to the top of an Alhum.

Dakar is America...

Case and point!  Club Atlantic is so so nice.

Burger with fries and a coke.

Peace Corps Headquarters.

Pretty darn nice!

I love it!  I don't think I would have enjoyed PC as much during the Bush years...

Am I in Africa?

PC office supply closet.

It's just funny :-)

A Weekend in America

I wouldn’t have thought it possible, but I spent this weekend in America.  It was rather convenient actually as it turns out that America is just a two-hour Alhum ride from Thies to Popenguine.  Ok so not literally America, but qualitatively close enough for me.  Yes this past weekend was the oft talked about and greatly anticipated BEACH WEEKEND, which is apparently a tradition for each new stage.  Now before you start thinking that we’re just having fun and partying here in Senegal keep in mind that this was our first weekend off in 7 and a half weeks.  We left on Saturday after once again getting up at 5:45 in the morning to come back from village.  We had a few sessions in the morning and then it was off to Popenguine.  Everyone had told us that the houses that PCV’s always rent are nice, but oh my god were they nice. They were like any standard beach houses you’d find in socal and with the waves, and beer, and spaghetti, and music, it really was a mini American vacation.  As for the specifics of our debauchery… well I’ll just leave that up to your imagination.  In all honesty though it was pretty laid back.  No one went too crazy and mostly it was just nice to sit and talk with people, and lazily swim in the ocean. 

When we were buying some “supplies” in town we ran into a group of American’s who are currently studying abroad in Dakar.  This was such a fun experience.  They were really excited to talk to us, and thought that it was so cool we were in the Peace Corps and that we would be living in villages and speaking the native languages.  They had taken a few classes in Wolof, but admitted that their program isn’t as intensive so they didn’t know a whole lot.   We helped them find the Toubab boutique and left back to the house with a little more pep in our step feeling just that much more legit in our Peace Corpness. 

I brought my backpacking tent, so when I was tired of the loud house I just pitched it on the beach and went to sleep.  That was really nice as well, although sand is not as soft as one might think.  After breakfast the next day a bunch of us went up to a little “nature reserve” which has a hill overlooking the beach.  It was beautiful.  We all climbed on top of an old WWII bunker and lounged and talked and took wacky pictures for about an hour.  After that more swimming, then reading, then napping, and then back to Thies.  Twas a short trip but it was fabulous. 

Today we went to Dakar for the first time since arriving in Senegal.  If you had told me then that I would ever consider Dakar to feel like America, I would have told you you’re crazy, but now it feels like coming home.  I think initially I had a bad reading on Dakar.  The shock of seeing the trash and lack of infrastructure made me think that this was terrible poverty for many people, but in reality its just bad infrastructure, and sooner or later even though it sucks you just work around the problems like garbage and bad roads and live a pretty happy life.  Looks can be deceiving and while Dakar, and Senegal in general, has problems, living in a third world country does not necessarily mean that people are miserable and starving to death. 

All right so now Dakar.  We started with a driving tour through down town area which looked amazingly like most big cities in America.  After a rushed walk around said area we went to the American Club for lunch.  This was rather bizarre.  The club is attached to an international school and kids use the pool for swim classes.  I couldn’t help but think of the Ojai Valley Athletic Club and how I used to go there as a kid after school, and how these kids are doing essentially the same thing but in Senegal.  There’s a snack bar, a pool, tennis courts, and a volleyball court, all of which I had in the states.  Bizarre.  Lunch there was American enough but still not quite the burger I was hoping for.  We had a few sessions about security and living abroad from the Embassy and then we went to the Peace Corps Senegal Headquarters.  Excuse me if it sounds like I’m repeating myself, but oh my god was this place nice.  I heard a rumor that it may have been donated to PC by the Senegalese government, but I’m not sure.  Anyways the marble staircase and air conditioning and volunteer computer rooms, and awesome medical rooms/ med hut for sickies to stay in certainly showed me the wealth of resources and infrastructure committed to assisting PC Volunteers in Senegal.  It makes me feel special in an odd way.  In another way though its very strange to think of the disconnect that there are so many things that I get automatically that would never be available to my Senegalese friends.  For example I could never take my Senegalese family to the American Club… That’s strange.  As much as I try to integrate and live at the level of my counterparts, I will always be rich and privileged because I will always be an American. 

As privileged as one is though, nature still calls.  And by nature I mean good old number one and number two.  So we were coming back to Thies and got stuck in absolutely terrible traffic.  One volunteer, who shall remain nameless for now, had to pee something fierce so he got out of the bus and went… not in a bathroom, not on the side of the road, but on the truck next to us.  In his defense it was the most discreet way to do it.  Even so though I don’t think I have ever seen a Senegalese man laugh so hard as the one in the car behind us.  Oh we are a dignified bunch indeed. 

Well there we are a short and relatively more rapid blog post.  I got a few more pictures up, but that’s really difficult with internet over here so I don’t know when I’ll be able to post pictures from this weekend.  Hopefully before install in two weeks.  Wow that’s soon.  Oh one last thing.  For swearing in on the 15^th one person from each language group gives a speech in that language to say just some basic thank you’s and what not.  I will be doing the Seereer speech and as it turns out that Senegalese TV comes to film this, so I will be on Senegalese national television.  No pressure… Should be cool though.  Thanks for reading!

Cheers

Garrison

Volunteer Visit Pictures

The Regional house library/ projector wall in Kaolack

Me with my new family in Dassilame Seereer.  The man two to my left is the Theatre Director of the troupe in town..

My ridiculously nice two room hut :-)

Toubacouta.  So so nice :-)

Beer and Patagonia

Cail (my closest neighbor) and Jessica at the Campamonte

The master farmer site

Riding through a herd of cows.

Jessica with dinner. Yum :-)

Me Joey and Jaime in Sokone.

A standard Senegalese Dog.  They aren't as cuddly as American Dogs :-(

The road from Toubacouta to Dassilame Seereer.

Back in Thies with my buds Chris and Greg.