Install and Three Weeks at Site
I have completed my first three weeks at my site in the region of Kedougou! It feels good to have reached this milestone (albeit, an arbitrary one) and made it to Christmas. After swearing-in, I rode down to Kedougou in a roomy sept place (old 8-seat Peugeot station wagon) with two other volunteers. Only three were in each car because we were bringing with us all of our luggage and bikes; the roofs of the cars were full. We spent two days in Kedougou with a host of current volunteers who accompanied us to the market. There we bought buckets to store food, benoirs to do laundry, soap, bleach, brooms, food, stoves, trunks, mattresses, and everything else needed to furnish our huts. The two days went by quickly, and soon enough it was December 4th, install day. I waited nervously at the transit house as the sept places arrived one by one to take us to our sites. I was the second-to-last to leave of the eight who installed on the 4th. The same current volunteer who visited my site with me during PST came to help me install. We rode the hour to my site, moved my suitcases and bags into my hut, and then she was off, back to the transit house. I was on my own.
My family consists of my host dad, his two wives, my dad's nephew and his wife, my brother and sister who are 12 and 13, my brother who is 9, and the nephew's kids who are 1 and 3. The nephew and his family live in a different compound next to mine, but their kids spend the day in my compound and they eat every meal with us. I am named after my dad's nephew, Mamadou Traore. This is my new name; I am no longer Fadialy Sane.
At my site, my days are filled with sitting in my yard, wandering to neighboring compounds to introduce myself, going to the rice fields, taking naps, playing with my host brothers, and sitting far away from the fire that my family makes every night. I have been trying to spend as little time in my room as possible and to instead sit in my yard when I don't feel like walking around. Even so, I still spend about an hour in my backyard in the morning cooking and eating breakfast, a couple hours after lunch in my hut to "nap," and a little time in my hut before I go to bed. Sometimes I am able to study Jaxanke or write in a journal when I am sitting in my yard with my family, but if the young kids are around it is nearly impossible to work for more than about 5 minutes.
When I do spend time in my room, there is no newspaper, no crossword puzzle, no TV to watch, and no email to check. As a result, I have been flying through books faster than any other time in my life. There is a lot that I want to read while I'm here, and I hope I can make it through them all. I got a big folder of Kindle books from another volunteer and the Kedougou transit house has a large library of books left by former volunteers. The books at the Kedougou house are covered in dust and spiderwebs (as is everything that has not moved in a couple weeks), but they are plentiful.
Right now it is the "cold season." It is sometimes a little chilly in the evenings, but never cold enough for me to want to warm up by a fire like my family does. Mornings can be fairly cold. I don't know the actual temperature, but probably in the 50's. My hut often stays a little warmer than the outside during the night, but I am usually cold with just my sheet. It quickly warms up by around 10 or 11am to the point where it is too hot for me to want to be outside in the sun for a very long period of time until about 4pm. It is at least in the 90's during this hot period of the day.
One thing that was difficult for me during my third week in site was the news that two of my fellow Jaxanke volunteers decided to return to the US. I had been planning to spend Christmas at my site, but after hearing this news I was somewhat dispirited and decided to come into the Kedougou transit house to spend the holiday with other volunteers from the region. After spending some time with other volunteers I will be ready again to head back to my site and keep working on my Jaxanke.
Some more pictures coming soon.
My family consists of my host dad, his two wives, my dad's nephew and his wife, my brother and sister who are 12 and 13, my brother who is 9, and the nephew's kids who are 1 and 3. The nephew and his family live in a different compound next to mine, but their kids spend the day in my compound and they eat every meal with us. I am named after my dad's nephew, Mamadou Traore. This is my new name; I am no longer Fadialy Sane.
At my site, my days are filled with sitting in my yard, wandering to neighboring compounds to introduce myself, going to the rice fields, taking naps, playing with my host brothers, and sitting far away from the fire that my family makes every night. I have been trying to spend as little time in my room as possible and to instead sit in my yard when I don't feel like walking around. Even so, I still spend about an hour in my backyard in the morning cooking and eating breakfast, a couple hours after lunch in my hut to "nap," and a little time in my hut before I go to bed. Sometimes I am able to study Jaxanke or write in a journal when I am sitting in my yard with my family, but if the young kids are around it is nearly impossible to work for more than about 5 minutes.
When I do spend time in my room, there is no newspaper, no crossword puzzle, no TV to watch, and no email to check. As a result, I have been flying through books faster than any other time in my life. There is a lot that I want to read while I'm here, and I hope I can make it through them all. I got a big folder of Kindle books from another volunteer and the Kedougou transit house has a large library of books left by former volunteers. The books at the Kedougou house are covered in dust and spiderwebs (as is everything that has not moved in a couple weeks), but they are plentiful.
Right now it is the "cold season." It is sometimes a little chilly in the evenings, but never cold enough for me to want to warm up by a fire like my family does. Mornings can be fairly cold. I don't know the actual temperature, but probably in the 50's. My hut often stays a little warmer than the outside during the night, but I am usually cold with just my sheet. It quickly warms up by around 10 or 11am to the point where it is too hot for me to want to be outside in the sun for a very long period of time until about 4pm. It is at least in the 90's during this hot period of the day.
One thing that was difficult for me during my third week in site was the news that two of my fellow Jaxanke volunteers decided to return to the US. I had been planning to spend Christmas at my site, but after hearing this news I was somewhat dispirited and decided to come into the Kedougou transit house to spend the holiday with other volunteers from the region. After spending some time with other volunteers I will be ready again to head back to my site and keep working on my Jaxanke.
Some more pictures coming soon.
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