Guede Chantier Strikes Back

Tuesday 10 February 2009

It has been a few days since we have arrived at Guede Chantier, and life here is taking a little bit more time to get used to. I am living in another homestay with a family here, but this time I am living with two Senegalese students, Marcel and Emanuel. The culture in the village is very different from that of the big city, and it is like getting used to a place all over again. Again I don’t know the language or customs. Becoming fluent in French is also going to take a lot longer and a lot more work since I am being submersed in 3 languages at once, French Wolof and Pulaar. My family here teases me a lot since I don’t know the languages well. Even when they speak French, the accent is so different that it is difficult. But it is only week number two in Senegal, and I have many translators/classmates to help me when I am in doubt.

When we first came here, it was a bit overwhelming, and the entire population of children came out, and I could not turn my face anywhere without having some ones eyes on me. Here, I cannot walk but two feet without some one yelling ‘toubab’ at me. It is very interesting indeed, but I am getting used to it finally.


The facilitators of the classes here have stressed the need for us to be flexible, and I am beginning to understand why. Nothing is certain here, and everything is left to the whims of fate. No stress.

We have formed our groups to work on our development projects, and I am working on health in the village with a Senegalese student named Assiatu, or Aicha for short. We have been given the project of creating a guide for basic health issues in the village that unites traditional and conventional treatments. So far we have met with our mentor from the health clinic in town and gotten a great deal of great information. I am still very curious to see how the traditional doctor and the health committee in town will answer the same questions we asked at the health clinic, which were about the major health issues in the village, the prevention, and how to cure them. However, through the first interview I have discovered many things that are pressing, such as a few issues with malnutrition caused illnesses and some problem with people drinking un-potable water. I wonder if my energies can be put to better use with a nutrition program or a sanitation education program, but we shall see. We have only just begun our research.

The village is very peaceful, especially at night. Though I can always here the distant scream of a child who might have seen me out of a window, “ HÉ TOUBAB!!!!”








Wednesday February 11, 2009

Today was very slow, and the entire morning was spent waiting for people to make appointments with other people so my group could continue our project. Something very funny happened though. I happened to be walking past the elementary school when it let the students out for lunch and I was chased by about 30 children chanting “toubab” to a rhythm. T’was hilarious until I was struck with a mob of children with runny noses that all wanted to shake my hand. We managed to meet with everyone we needed to meet with. Everyone was glad to work with us, which I was relieved to find out since the medecine traditionelle had a few bad experiences with people taking his secrets.