Grand Finale Quoi

Some of you might be wondering what I'm doing still on "AfriKate" and out of the States. Wasn't I supposed to be done with Peace Corps by now? Yah... I AM! I am officially an RPCV. But... I'm still here...

That is because, among many things, my dear college buddy, BooBoo aka Ryan Lindsay is visiting and we have a grand adventure ahead of us. We spent quite a bit of time living it up in Dakar stalking rumored embassy location to get our Visas. Now we're in home sweet-Kedougou soaking my mini-Herman (remember those pictures of Jordan's neck-crater?) Then we will go back to my village on a bike ride on which I will come as close as possible to regret over N'ice Cream (we have had at least quadruple the number of ice creams as we have visas). I will say goodbye and it will not be pretty. Then we will go back to Kedougou, and embark on out to: Guinea, Sierra Leone, Liberia, Cote D'Ivoire, Ghana, Burkina Faso, Mali, and back here to N'ice Cream. I mean, Dakar. (INCHALLAH). We will be accompanied by Roxy, Mary, and Andy and Annicka to Sierra Leone. THEN Booboo and I get to see my dearest MB in Cambridge and probably embarrass the living daylights out of her with our heathen ways. But she will forgive us.... right? I hope to also meet Kate in England and fly back with her to the great US of A to an airport swaying with adoring fans and readers of AfriKate who will swarm the arrivals gate with plates of nachos and oreo-milkshakes. Right? This will be at the beginning of August. (INCHALLAH. I can't stop saying this; it is like a nervous tick. Just let it happen.)

For better documenting and organization and normal perspective of this entire thing, please see BooBoo's blog. It is much better: http://backpacknomadic.net/

As for all that's been happening while I have been neglecting this blog... It's mostly about saying goodbye now. This is predictably wrenching. Except for it being hot season, it really is an awful time to leave. Yeah, two years is a long time, but if your going to a foreign senegal-exy, you kind of need it. My language came slowly and only now do I feel very confident in it. It's like I put in my pulaar-contacts and now I can see the whole scene clearly. Maybe I don't know the name of that bush on the scene but at least I can tell it's a bush and it's the one we get our tooth-sticks from. (does that make sense?)

It's been more fun in the village than ever before because everyone showers me in praises and proclamations of love everywhere I go. (So, if this doesn't happen when I'm in the States, I gotta warn you all, I might just have to come back... It's a good gig.) Their tune as far as females go has completely changed. They first used to say, "You know, I was worried about you being a female, but now I see that females can do just as much men..." Now, they are saying, "Females clearly are way better than males and do so much more. Look at what you've done! You can't leave!" I'm sure my replacement will prove to them that this isn't quite true either though. But it's still LOVELY to hear, even if I keep squirming feeling like I don't deserve to be hearing it all.

We've also been playing a lot more now that my focus is off of work. I've taught a little bit of "karate" to some of the more mature kids. I'd been promising them I would ever since they saw the photo of me breaking a board, and man, are they pumped! They are really so cute about it. We're treating it like a secret club and they're even practicing in secret! I told them not to teach any of the immature bullies anything. I'm also teaching juggling since mango season is perfect for it. I've got about four kids who are pretty good at it now, and we're even trying to add tricks like bouncing them off our knees. One juggle-focused day, I looked around and saw boys balancing long bamboo poles on their hands and feet and a girl sliding mangos down her legs in a rapid pattern, in the exact same ways I did in that Michael Moschen juggling show in high school. How incredible that they all so naturally do what I and a bunch of other prep-schoolers paid hefty chunks of money to learn to do. This is something I'll really miss: natural life. Waking up with the sun, knowing how to run on rocks in the night, discovering tricks and abilities naturally... It all feels so right. In the States, we withstand hurricanes of passive un-discovery and forget how to move naturally and sit quietly and make toys from mangos. With the advertisers choosing how to stimulate us, we forget how to move for ourselves, and can barely balance sticks without someone literally selling the idea to us in an advertised workshop.

Other things I started because I'd been intending or promising to ever since I got here: braiding my hair and learning arabic. The hair was an awful idea, as I promised all the village enthusiasts that it would be. I took pictures for proof of how hideous it was, but unfortunately (or fortunately), my USB broke with the strain of acceptance. It broke, actually while I was writing my 50-or so page COS report (single spaced) and brought me to tears until I remembered a desktop I'd saved it to. It's sad that I lost so many photos, though...

As for the arabic, I don't remember if I shared yet that technically, I'm a muslim.... Hahaha, only technically, though. That is because to technically convert to Islam, you have to repeat the words, " Ashahadu anlaa ilaaha illa Allah wa ashahdu anna Muhammadan rasoolul Allah" (I bear witness that there is no god but Allah; I bear witness that Muhammad is the Messenger of Allah) three times (here, at least... I don't think across the world it has to be three.) So my sweet dad said, "Hey Hadiatou, say this..." And I said, "Okayyy!" and had no idea what was going on except that he was giggling at my prononciation. I realized only several months later that that is what happened. Oops! As for learning arabic, I'm not really. My dad teaches Koranic school and it sounds and looks so cool on the wooden prayer tablets. I'd always meant to learn a bit of it, but it's a bit late now. It's kind of handy to know a bit when I meet, for example, Saudi Arabian imams who can do flips 12 feet up on the Dakar trampoline and who then buy us coconuts.

It was interesting learning the prayers and talking to my dad about his philosophies of the religion while also reading the memoir, Infidel (read it!). I've read many other accounts as well that shadow my perception of Islam's influence. I won't get into that here, but I'll just say I'm very glad to have my amazing family and trampolining imams to remind me that the goodness in people more often prevails. I've met far more militant Christians than militant Muslims, which I think says a lot since this is the first really religious place I've lived. But this is a long conversation, so you can just go ahead and buy me a taco platter in America to continue it in person, hmm?

Other fun village finale things include the Anti-Early Marriage party that the middle school kids planned. They performed skits and songs and organized a huge party. I'm so proud! They asked me to be the guest speaker, which was really sweet and cute. I talked about how women didn't use to work in America either until WWII and then we had an intellectual and economic boom when we had double the work force.... etc. Neene Galle and I then did a village-wide sex-ed talk, which was sort of embarrassing for us all. We showed gross photos of STDs (her choice!) and I did a condom demonstration using water bottles with the orange gatorade one representing disease. Otherwise, we are having fun just playing in the shade. Our new hobbies are trying to do pushups or balancing tricks I learned from martial arts. And of course, Uno.

It is going to be so hard to leave these wonderful people...

Anyway, I plan on continuing updates on this blog during the trip, but I really recommend Ryan Lindsay's blog for better and more frequent news. Thanks for keeping up!