Back from Guédé

Wednesday April 8

I’ll be in Guédé a week as of tomorrow. Things are going slowly, but they are going. There seems to be a lot of sitting around, and I have been keeping myself occupied with many things, mostly the people around me. Whether I’m trying to teach the village kids play some guitar, which is more of a test in patience and my ability to deal with a dozen kids all grabbing at my guitar at the same time than anything else, or having my host sisters teach me some Pulaar, there is always something. It seems I’m speaking more French than before too, mostly with my host siblings who are like 10 years old than with anyone else. My little sister here told me she didn’t like my hair and that I was very stupid since I could not speak Pulaar. She said even the little children could speak Pulaar. Sigh… I’m always getting burned like that by my host family here, though it’s mostly hilarious.

I’m a little worried about a few of the other Americans, they seems to be letting stress and culture shock get the best of them, combined with some conflict in the groups, and other things. A lot of us are sick this time too, with all kinds of stuff, from Dirty D to asthma to stomach problems and colds. Surprisingly I am very well physically, which is funny since I was deathly ill last trip and ill the first trip as well. And emotionally, well I’m good unless I go around the people who are having psychological issues.

We have only met with our group once during the trip so far, it seems they are always in the field working, and have no time. The last meeting went well though and we have a plan set for the next weeks. We are trying to make he group official, but are having difficulties. The real Health Committee is a group of elders that serve as a relay between the people and the Health Center. We want them to allow our group to be an extension of the health committee, so that there is official status for the group and they continue to work after we leave. It seems that the old men don’t want to give up any power, but we will try to convince them that they will lose nothing and even have more power. We have arranged to do sensitization in each of the 6 districts of Guédé, having the first meeting on the home of the President of the Health Committee.

Including the traditional healer in our plans has been difficult. We initially wanted to include him as a main proponent of the project, but we have been unable to do so. We are just going to him and asking for advice on what we are doing and for his approval. I really hope we can find a way to include him, as the traditional healers command much respect in the village, more than that of the modern doctors at the health center and maybe more than that of the health committee, not to mention the fact that they are the main source of healthcare in the village. Indeed we need to find a way to include them, especially since our mentor, the healer of the fisherman, took me as his son, so my Senegalese name is now Medoune Mousse Fall Diop.

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Wednesday April 15, 2009

So today is the second day of the actual sensitization. We began yesterday, at the president of the health committee’s house. It went well as far as I could tell, although I can only grasp the gist of what is happening if anything at all, since everything was in Pulaar.

We have met with another group of younger people who had done some training for a sensitization campaign on health before long before we had arrived, with ENDA (another NGO) but had stopped. ENDA had not provided any follow up mechanisms in their techniques, so low and behold, nothing was happening. At least all that training will not go to waist.

The group is taking a lot of initiative, and we have left the work of communicating and explaining the sensitization materials to the population to them. Already they have decided to change the way they are doing things. They are doing action research, as we say, or reflecting on the methods they are using and seeking to improve them. Rather than just talk to the people that they are trying to sensitize, they are going to create a sort of dialogue, and ask the people what they know first, and then expand on that. And after every sensitization they sit and discuss what could be changed for next time and what is working well, etc.

We had our first run in with the power situation and the health committee. Aicha, my partner in the project, and myself were thanking the president of the health committee for letting us use his house, and Aicha made the mistake of posing an idea to Eliman, our mentor for the project, that the president had given to us. The President got very agitated, from what I could understand, he wanted all the credit, he said it was not Eliman who decides this, it was him, he was the president, he was in charge of Eliman. Wow…. We have to be careful when comes down to this. We have managed to make the group semi-official, under the health committee. Basically giving the health committee the power to tell the sensitization group what to do. It’s very difficult to just empower everyone without disempowering anyone, but I think we are doing alright so far.

The president of the health committee also promised me a house, a field, and a wife if I convert to Islam.

The actually sensitization went well, and we sat on mats and about 15 to 20 people showed up plus our group of sensitization, about 20 to 25 people. I found it interesting, during the meeting one of the women who was speaking, her baby began to cry, and so she just started breastfeeding right there, and continued talking. It was no big deal. Can you imagine of that happened in the US, at a similar event. Even in Dakar, that would be a little riské. It seems that urbanization and westernization also brings with them an objectification of the human body.

I’m really starting to enjoy the village life, although I don’t have to go and do back breaking labor in the fields all day. My siestas and joking with my host family or freaking our small children who come up to me screaming “TOUBAB! TOUBAB!” Well many kids actually know my name now, so they just scream that now. I think I will miss Guédé Chantier. Although, my skin is going a little crazy, its like being in junior high and other people are braking out in rashes all over their body, or fungus, or are suffering from horrible diarrhea and fevers. We’re a sad bunch. I think a lot of westerners would not be able to handle it here for a few reasons though. On example is my Turkish toilette here… which has all kinds of shit flying out of it… from maggots to flys to ants to things I can’t identify… maybe ill take a picture next time so you can really see it all.

Anyway, that’s all for now.