First Week of Senegal River Valley Course

Day 1- My brother is dead:

9 hour car ride to Richard Toll. Found out my brother, Mousa, died… wish I was home with my family. We arrived at this cute hotel with toilet paper and our own bed!

Day 2 –We are in Africa:

Woke up and didn’t want to move. Our prof said we might want to change our shoes because we’re going to walking through mud a lot. We later found out that we’d be walking 2 miles barefoot in ankle deep mud to the rice patty. Oh… and then we’d be walking another couple miles through the rice patty (many times with mud up to our knees) to see the two pumps and the house of the workers. Everything our doctors told us not to do… we did. We had no water, no sunscreen, we walked in miles of wading water, and without no shoes (many got cuts and we couldn’t wash them out). On a lighter note, it was awesome to be in the middle of nowhere and see how the Senegal River affects the farms. The life was a bit incomprehensible for us but incredibly interesting. This all was really really awesome until we started getting really dehydrated and realized we wouldn’t be having water for a couple hours. We finally told our prof that we should go back and we thought we’d never make it back. When we finally reached the van 2 hours later, we chugged.. I mean CHUGGED… tons of water and put on the AC. You would of thought we didn’t have water for days. We got back to the hotel and had to take a shower because we all had at least an inch of mud caked onto our feet.

Met the family and got food shoved down our throats. I ate 2 fish and 3 pieces of bread with onions and French fries. Oh load. Oh yeah, and my dad asked me why I didn't eat too. We sleep in their living room so it’s a bit awkward at times. We have 2 sisters and a brother. One sister is really shy and the other is a sass.

Workers at the Pump

Dancing with sis

Day 3 – Dad’s bein’ a butthead: 7am wakeup call!! Didn’t have to get up until 9:30am. Visited the Diagam (large pump) and the neighborhood surrounding it. Got to see Mauritania and the Senegal River. Went home for lunch and had lots of problems with the family. My dad started talking behind my back to Aya and my problems with not eating enough. Her and I both agreed that we eat the same and more than our dad. Then I was trying to rest, and my sister kept waking me up every 10 minutes. If anyone knows anything about me, it is that I don’t like to be woken up when I don’t have to. So I was incredibly cranky. We debriefed at the hotel with Prof. Thoup and then Aya and I were not excited to go home. Dad still was bugging me about dinner, but I just decided to be rude if he’s being rude to me. We then made attaya for the family and danced with the kids… They love Katy Perry and Justin Bieber. We also taught them some essential American dances like the Chicken Dance, Cotton Aye Joe, Macorina, Hussel, Cupid Shuffle and Thriller (I know Ariana and Pierre will be proud). We then kicked them out of their living room with the intention of going to bed, but we didn’t go to bed for a couple hours. 

Bubble blowing contest

Day 4 - SUGAR: Visited sugar factory and sugar cane fields. Got to eat real sugar cane… soooo goood. Then visited an old colonial home. We then went back to our homes for the rest of the day. We ate lunch with this kid that started crying hysterically when he saw Aya and I (Tubabs). It was really heartbreaking for us. But the lunch was good, only Aya and I made a mess. It takes skill to eat with only your right hand. We then hung around in our room (aka the living room) while our sister sat on top of us for a couple hours. We decided that we felt crowded so we met Erica and Theresa downtown. We drew sooo much attention, which was annoying, but Aya found some nice clothes and doubled her wardrobe for about 6 bucks. I found another pagne for $3… everything is sooo much cheaper outside of Dakar. We then bought some fruit for the family and some guy said it was first time seeing a white girl so he gave me his bracelet (total BS considering he then tried to get my name and digits… ah les hommes senegalais). The family was very excited about their fruit and then gave us goblets of this kinda rice pudding stuff. It was good, but I just couldn’t eat that much. Not to mention, everyone else had little cups… waaay less than what Aya and I had. Aya was a trooper and took some of my food. God love her. We then putzed around until the electricity went out. Our sister said we should sleep upstairs. We will never sleep in our room again. It was surreal. 

Day 5 – Neocolonialism!!: We spent the morning at a fish farm, which was so cool. We then had lunch at the hotel and headed to St. Louis for the weekend. On the way, we stopped at this farm owned by a jerk of a Frenchman. He had no interest in talking to us, and exports all his produce to England… while exploiting the Senegalese land and labor. Needless to say, us liberal arts students were pissed to the max when we pulled away. Even the Senegalese students in the car called it slavery. Our Prof chewed him out indirectly though, which calmed us down. We then arrived in St. Louis and our hotel is soooo cute. I’m rooming with Sarah, the girl from Bylote, and we have toilet paper and AC! We living in heaven. We then had the best dinner right on the river. Absolutely gorgeous. It is clear that this is a French tourist location, and we all going through a bit of culture shock. It helps that we have to be here for class, so we have an excuse. 

So far, there's been so much to do that I haven't been able to think about anything else but Senegal River Valley. It's mostly a good thing. 

Feeling so lucky to have this opportunity.... 

Alyssa