The Village People

So I'm back from a three day training seminar in my friend's village. A while back, my boss called me and asked if I would be interested in a Wolof refresher and I jumped on the opportunity.

The village of this particular volunteer is out beyond nowhere and then a left turn - just not the left turn pas the first goat, mind you. Another volunteer and myself had to find our way to Kaffrine on the major highway and wait for the Peace Corps car that would take us to the village in question. This car was also bringing my host, another volunteer and the language teacher. All in all, it was a packed car. I'm so glad I didn't have to take a bush taxi all the way there.

The Peace Corps car picked us up right after dark and we headed off into the bush and very quickly got lost. The driver had decided to go another route unknown to my host. After a few locals who got us nowhere, the driver finally found someone who knew how to get to the village. And of course, he couldn't just tell us. He had to come along. This is very common as knowledge is more valuable than any asset. In the West, we believe that sharing knowledge is key to development, which is a fair argument. But here, knowledge is power. But hey, rice is more important.

Anyways, we finally got to the village around 10 pm and shortly afterwards we had dinner. I went to bed. The driver took off and I don't know what happened to the guide. Oh well.

Now, let me tell you that village life is way different from my cushy pad. My volunteer gets one large bucket of water a day for bathing, drinking and dishes and because of our presence, she got two. Whoopie! 4 days and I showered once! Grumble Grumble.

She didn't have electricity and the first night there I suggested that she have some Christmas lights sent over to illuminate her path to the bathroom. Oh and the crapper! Wow. It's a ce-mented septic tank with a hole on top for your business. Yuck. Again, no running water.

But we did have fun. One volunteer brought cards and another brought gin, so we made it through. In the afternoon, we took bush walks and the agricultural volunteers collected seeds. I just watched. Once evening though, we came across some neolithic stones. I had heard that there were some in a village not too far, but my host had no idea that they were even there. They were upright, porous, red stones in vertical positions that formed a circle, and there were a several of these circles. World Heritage fund needs to pay a visit but the locals have done a good job at leaving them alone.