Stopping to smell the roses (or in my case the wanjo)...

Gambia can be overwhelming to the senses, but not necessarily in a bad way, but in a good way that I want to remember in detail. I have been trying to keep a list of things that I see, hear, smell, feel...so when I am an old lady and looking back on this whole experience I can remember small but essential aspects of my life here.

Touch: this really depends on the season. Right now it is cold season, so despite my knowledge that the temperature can't really be considered "cold", I find myself feeling chilly at night and cuddling around the fire in the middle of our compound with the rest of my family trying to stay warm. During the days, cold season is a God-send and it is such a relief after a long hot season to not sweat profusely all day. The warm Harmattan winds are blowing down off the Sahara, bringing dust but also a nice breeze. Sadly, hot season is quickly returning and is a totally different story. While I have yet to experience the hot, dry season that will start sometime in February, I have heard horror stories about hot stagnate air that just bakes everything till what is lush countryside during the rains is nothing but red dirt. The rainy season is probably best of both worlds because while it is hot and humid, the cooling rains come every afternoon bringing much needed relief. Plus rainy season is mango season so that always deserves extra points. As far as other forms of touching, I don't really have much human interaction, and I miss hugs. It is completly okay for friends of the same gender to touch, and it is very common to see grown men walking down the street hand in hand but Gambians don't tend to hug each other like I would with friends in America. There are definilty some strong taboos against people of the opposite gender touching one another and I almost committed a cardinal sin when I tried to playfully smack my friend Ustas's (an Ustas is an Islamic teacher) head when we were joking around. He jerked his head quickly away and told me, in a friendly and not at all angry way, that I should be careful because unmarried women are not to supposed to touch the heads of men.

Taste: The flavors of The Gambia are intense. It can best be summed up by lots of pepper and oil and lots of sugar followed by even more sugar.

Smell: When I first stepped off the plane in Banjul, my first thought was "it smells like Africa." The smell is hard to pinpoint but I was first introduced to it back on my Semester at Sea travels and have vivid smell memories of driving through Tanzania. The best I can describe it is a mixture of smoke, earth, wood and something sweet and musty at the same time. That doesn't really do it justice so you are just going to have to come to Africa to smell for yourself...

Hear: Prayer call from the village mosque, laughter, women pounding rice and coos, roosters, drums, generators, radio programs, the same Wolof music coming from several surrounding compounds giving a really ghetto surround sound effect, chatting, kids playing, goats, donkeys braying, girls playing their stomping and clapping game, Harmattan winds rustling the trees, cars on the road linking Dakar to Banjul, shouts of joy or anger during football season, Arabic chanting....

See: I see things that are strange and upsetting like: children pulling the heads of live birds, teachers flirting with students, corporal punishment, women doing a disproportional amount of the work while men sit on the bantaba (rest area) drinking attaya, sickly dogs, poor grades, a 14 year old boy dying because of a snake bite, children dying from worms because the family lacks the knowledge of warning signs and money to take them to the clinic...
But also I see things that make me smile and give me hope: children crowding around a book excited to learn and share what they have learned with their friends, older women teaching younger women a trade and business skills, members of the Girls Club excited to learn debating, the whole village turning out to watch a football match, babies being born and naming ceremonies, teachers who are passionate about the job and want to help children, a grade 9 girl coming to my compound and asking what courses she needs to take so she can become a pilot one day, my host brother Ousman getting an aggregate 24 on his high school entrance exam and getting into a good senior secondary school....

I have undoubtedly forgotten many things that I appreciated in the moment but was quickly overlooked as I became busy with some other task. I am sure this list will grow as I spend even more time getting to know the people and culture of The Gambia. I thank God for the experiences I have had my first 6 months in country, all the wonderful people I have met and formed relationships with and the countless things I have already learned and I look forward to all the exciting and unexpected experiences yet to come in the next year and a half!

Prayers, Fancy Clothes and Lots o' Meat = Tobaski

I predicted that Tobaski would be an interesting day, and it was to say the least. The already unique cultural experience was compounded by the exceution of Saddam Huessein within days of the holy Muslim holiday. People were not as up in arms about it as people were in other parts of the world but it was definitly a discussion topic. To describe the day I guess I should start at the beginning, but I don't think I can really do it justice with just words:

My vice principal, Mr. Camera, invited me to celebrate Tobaski with him and his family over two months ago. I laughingly agreed, half thinking that he was joking. But after repeated invitations and the assurance that I would be sleeping in the "woman's quarters", I agreed. I arrived at the compound on the afternoon of the 30th. He took me on a tour of Serekunda market and it was absolutely packed with people buying supplies for the next day's feast. You couldn't even move it was so packed and I lost Mr. Camera, who is a failrly short man, several times as we were weaving through the stalls. Following our harrowing trip to the market we went back to the compound and chatted and relaxed for the rest of the evening. The promised "woman's quarters" were a bit of an exaggeration, city living is a tight squeeze of way to many people living in way to small a place, and turned out to be sharing a bed with his daughter and her young son.

Tobaski day I was awakened at 5:00 am by the now familiar call to prayer, but on this day it seemed extra loud and extra long because of the holiday. I dozed off in bed until the men left in their very ornate holiday clothes for the mosque for Tobaski prayers. I got up to help Jeniaba and Savy start cooking the meal but was told that I was to relax. I sat around feeling useless for about an hour until the men came home and informed me it was time to slaughter the animals. This may be cause for excitement for some people but I had been mentally preparing myself all morning to witness the slaughtering of not one but several animals. Just to give everyone some background, Tobaski is the biggest Muslim holiday outside of Ramadan. Every Muslim male is supposed to slaughter a ram (if he can afford it) in remembrance of Abraham's sacrifice of his son and also give meat away to those less fortunate. Mr. Camera opted for buying three goats instead of one big ram so he could give one goat away for charity. Lucky for me, Mr. C's neighbor was slaughtering a ram so I didn't need to miss out on the "fun" of witnessing it. Everyone was highly amused that I had never seen an animal being killed close up and that the animals in America are killed for us. All the sounds kept checking on me to make sure I was getting the optimal view of the event.

After the ram and the goats were slaughtered (which wasn't as traumatizing as I had envisioned but hearing an animal make gurgling noises as the blood drains out of their throat is less than pleasant), the men proceeded to place the goats, fur and all, right on the fire to roast because this way you don't waste the hide and "it makes the sauce nice." The family I was celebrating with is Ghanaian and burning the animal before butchering it is a tradition from Ghana, the Gamibians that were around were looking at then men like they were crazy. Seeing the goat on the fire and torched was probably worse then seeing the throat cut and the smell of burning fur is pretty gross, especially when it gets in your hair. After the goats were good and charred, then men proceeded to slaughter them and I think there was more guts then actual meat. When the whole kill fest was over the meat was taken to the women to prepare and I went out with Mr. C and his friend Kwame to visit our friend Baboucar, who is the head of the NGO that I work with. The remainder of the day consisted of eating a ridiculous amount of food (I even ate goat and ram meat!) and then visiting a ton of people. I was just a long for the ride so I am not entirely sure of who all the people we visited were but it was quite the array and I got to see a lot of the different small neighborhoods that make up Serrekunda - one of the houses was even a wealthy ex-government official where I chatted with a man who went to Tufts, discussed Indian poverty and watched lots of Muslim men in fancy clothes drinking alcohol, several of whom did not greet me either because I was a woman, a toubab or not dressed all that nice.

After a long day of slaughtering, eating, visiting and chatting we went back to Mr. Camera's house and watched the "unbiased" presidential address to commemorate the New Year. At midnight we went to the center of Serrekunda, called Westfield and waited for the New Year with thousands of other Gamibians and it was no Times Square but it was festive with lots of music and fireworks and impromptu dancing. All in all a very positive and at times, surreal experience. After over a week in the city I am looking forward to getting back to the slower pace of life in village.

Check out Tobaski pics on my flickr page (link on the left!)

Happy 2007!!!!!!!!!!!!!!