When I was researching for my trip to Senegal I was shocked that there wasn’t more information from previous volunteers, so here is just a few of my many memories from the great experience I had in Senegal, through the programe ICS, working with the charity Y care international.
Want to volunteer? - http://www.volunteerics.org/ http://www.ycareinternational.org/
On the first day at my host home I was invited to a wedding. It was a beautiful ceremony, and despite my lack of french I managed to understand at least some of it. There was a nice part where everyone in the church turned around and shook each others hands. everyone was so friendly it was a nice surprise.
Although ngl at around 4 nights into being away the main thing I remember is feeling very light headed at being stood up every time they sung a song (which was very often). The upset stomach had hit the day before, my poor team mates in Ziguinchor had a very long bus journey through Gambia which i am infinitely glad I was not on as they stopped every 30 minutes or so for a loo break. I on the other hand was just dehydrated, but thought it would be rude to whip out my 2L water bottle in the middle of the ceremony (in the dodgey rucksack that I had to bring because it was my only bag and I hadn’t packed a cute bag to go with a dress for a wedding)
After my post about the market i went to find photos of some of the things I had made. The skirt on the left was my favorite and the dress on the right finally fit although a little on the short side after 3 trips back to the tailor for adjustments. I swore I was going to wear these again when I got home but the reality is that people just don’t wear as bright colours... we’ll see when summer comes around again. Also look how tanned I was, :’( shame it didn’t last.
Want to volunteer? - http://www.volunteerics.org/ http://www.ycareinternational.org/
Want to volunteer? - http://www.volunteerics.org/ http://www.ycareinternational.org/
Kaolack market, I must have spent many many hours here over my 3 month trip. At home, when I was researching Kaolack I saw that it had the biggest market in Senegal, I wasn’t sure what to expect but nothing could prepare me for the madness. The main streets leading into the markets and some of the inside sections were nicely paved as you can see on the pictures with little shops built in, all tilled. But as you moved further out from the center where the market had grown in what looks like a not so official way there’s more and more tin roof and crates to walk on so it doesn’t get muddy. the result is a sprawling expanse of hundreds of narrow walkways constantly filled with lots of busy people going about life. You could easily get lost in there and you could probably live in there, thinking about it people probably do.
This part of the market is covered in materials, all brightly coloured, bold patterns covering most of the walls. Most of the team at some point bought material and took it to a taylor to have something made for them or as a gift. For the mid de-brief its a tradition that each team has matching outfits made, so everyone has at least one Senegalese style outfit as a momento. I found that if you wore traditional dress to the market you got a lot more respect from people and not so extortionate prices. Although the rule was to at least half anything they asked for when buying things in the market as a toubab meaning white person in the local dialect.
Want to volunteer? - http://www.volunteerics.org/ http://www.ycareinternational.org/
In about week 8 or 9 we went to an agricultural camp in Sokone. We stayed in a school which you can see in the left of the picture, the school was pretty big with lots of stand alone classrooms which we slept in. The main aim of the camp was environmental, we spent a couple of days in the mangroves planting, and a couple of days planting trees in the town.
Trees are such a valuable focal point of a house or community, they are used for shade throughout the day, they might produce fruit or flowers and of course an endless source of entertainment for children. Coming from a place where trees spring up all the time regardless of if you plant them or not I think we took the trees for granted, but actually they can be very hard to grow in the heat. Lets just say without trees I would have been a lot more sun burnt.
This was my favorite tree, we went for walks near by and wanted somewhere to sit in the shade, however the tree was already occupied by a pair of baby goats which were the cutest babies I have ever seen. These goats were so young you could still see the umbilical cord dried up yet they were climbing and bouncing all over the roots of this massive tree it was a great day. Moral of the story - old trees are cool and baby goats are the cutest.
Want to volunteer? - http://www.volunteerics.org/ http://www.ycareinternational.org/
This was the kids club at the YMCA, our team helped out every Wednesday and Saturday we could. We ran games and activities mainly centered round health education in a fun way.There was always a lot of singing and running around, I don’t know how the kids had so much energy especially in 36 degree heat! This is my favorite picture of the kids from my house and their best friend from next door. The activity was to draw a picture of your partner and Suke the girl on the right was very impressed with the drawing of her.
The boy on the left was Jeremy the oldest child in my house, we would play snakes and ladders for hours whilst he laughed at my bad french and mispronounced Wolof. Juliette and Suke were best friends, Suke lived next door and they would come and sit in my room whenever i was in there. We did a lot of drawing and reading whilst I was writing up notes from the day or looking up phrases, One of my books is completely covered in flowers and I love it. The children in my house definitely made my experience so much more fun.
Here’s a song that reminds me of dancing in Senegal, one of the times we went to a club this song played and the whole team got up and busted some African moves (or tried to)
Want to volunteer? - http://www.volunteerics.org/ http://www.ycareinternational.org/
We spent the last night on the sea front before our flight in the morning. It was beautiful and after a long, cramped bus journey the sea breeze was the best thing in the world.
none of us really slept that night, some tried and failed. I didn’t bother, our flight was at 6am so we had to set off from the hotel at 3am. It was an amazing, surreal and even a bit scary experience lying under the stars knowing we would be back at home the next night without the people we had spent the last 10 weeks with. I can say with absolute certainty that I am so happy that I did this.
Senegal. Want to volunteer? - http://www.volunteerics.org/ http://www.ycareinternational.org/
One of my team mates found a very tiny kitten on the street that followed her for a while but was too weak to carry on. We left and waited for the mother to show up but she never came and the kitten was far too young to be on it’s own so we brought it home
My team mates host family agreed to take it in but were a bit baffled as to why she wanted to keep it and give it a home.
Nearly every house hold has a dog, they’re useful, they guard the house and any animals that may be about. Cats on the other hand aren’t very useful and eat fish or chickens which are the main sources of meat, consequently there are lots of stray cats on the street.
So we take this little kitten in and after lots of hand sanitiser for us and a bath for her she was very cold, despite the fact that it was 35 °C outside. We wrapped her in a towel and was soon fast asleep.
Over the next week she seemed to come on so much, she was eating and walking around, even being playful. Her rescuer called her Bundow which means tiny in Wolof. Very sadly she didn’t make it another week and despite being so small (but still having the strength to climb out of the box she was in (pictured)) passed away.
Lots of our Senegalese friends didn’t understand and laughed, one of our team mates was relieved because she was terrified of cats, her reaction to a kitten walking up to her would be my reaction to a tarantula.
Senegal- The dancing is amazing. This is a performance put on by a Spanish NGO that we were invited to, they did a short drama piece in Wolof about hygiene, it was very funny and really engaged the audience. Before this started there were drums and women would run into the circle and dance away. It was the coolest version of a dance off i’ve ever seen. There was a traditon where if someone thought you were a good dancer they would give you an item of clothing.
Want to volunteer? - http://www.volunteerics.org/ http://www.ycareinternational.org/
Everyone is so open and accepting about religion, it’s something I really admire about the culture. There is no shame or stigma attached to marriage between religions. Within families that I met the mother could be a Muslim and father a Christian, the family would celebrate both religions holidays and the children could choose to be which religion they chose.
The family that I stayed with were a christian family, it was Eid while i was there and with my family we looked for the crescent moon to mark the start of the celebrations and the next day we went to friends houses and celebrated with them, it was a very good day and I have very fond memories of it.
In the day I had several lunches (Senegalese hosts love to feed their guests) at a friends house, mainly consisting of chicken, chips and salad. In the evening I went to my UK friends host home where the rest of the team met up and had music and vermicelli under the stars on the roof.
Senegal, Ndiobel- The remains of my favorite dish yassa, this one was pork you also got chicken or beef.
Want to volunteer? - http://www.volunteerics.org/ http://www.ycareinternational.org/
Senegalese food
As you can see from the picture people traditionally eat with their hands, most people on a day to day basis eat with spoons or forks for spaghetti, I never quite managed to master eating rice with my hands but everything else was fine. It is polite to eat with your right hand and it would be considered very rude to eat with your left as this is your washing hand. Read more for the types of food.
Breakfast- Every day I would get a baguette, I put chocopain on it which is basically Nutella. You can also easily get jam, dairylee cheese triangles or just butter. My family also gave me coffee every morning and seems to be a big breakfast thing.
Lunch- most days my family would cook variations of Thiebou dieune (which I thought was pronounced jib-ju-jen) which is the traditional rice and fish dish of Senegal. This would come with vegetables such as carrot, cabbage and sweet potatoes. Other things we ate consisted mainly of rice and then some kind of meat if not fish, usually mutton, chicken or pork, always with onions which may or may not be spicy.
Dinner- Dinner varied a lot. Some of the regular dishes were spaghetti, vermicelli (really thin noodles), rice pudding, chicken and chips, peas, and cous cous. There are 2 types of cous cous, one as you would find in the UK and the other we referred to as ‘sand’. The sand usually came with condensed milk and was not a favourite in the group.
There were also little boutiques everywhere, literally on every corner near the YMCA. From these you can get sachets of yoghurt which great, mini packets of crisps pretty much like wotsits, Biskrem which are biscuits with chocolate in the middle and other various cakes that vary from shop to shop but were all good. There are also petrol stations which are more like a mini supermarket; the one we went to was also air-conditioned!
We went to a few restaurants both for lunch and dinner. You can usually get the traditional rice and fish as well as omelettes, hamburgers, hot dogs and a favourite of ours was fatayas which was like a pitta bread filled with chips, a fried egg, some kind of meat, onions and possibly other things.
The main focus of our work was educating young people about health. For this we would run causeries with young people about STI’s and AIDS, these were interactive sessions where we informed them of the causes, symptoms, and treatments whilst dispelling any myths and misunderstandings.
Over the summer I spent 10 weeks volunteering through the government program ICS, working for the charity Y care international, known in the UK as YMCA, links to all these are on my page senegalandback.tumblr.com
This blog is a place to share my experiences, spread the word about the good work Y care are doing and hopefully inspire people to travel and have their own adventures :)
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