One Day at a Time



This is my host sister in villag Fatu.
She is in the middle of pounding dinner which will be rice and peanuts with sugar



There is a saying here that goes “slowly slowly is the one who catches the monkey by the tail.” And after a year of being here with that I realize Gambia is a chinese finger trap, the more you struggle, the more it seems like you are in an endless prison of sunny days under trees where few things ever get done. Lately though, I have been letting go and realizing that I only get to take it a day at time.  With this view, I occasionally have a tendency to forget about America and forget about my life back there waiting for me a year in the future.  This has meant that I have been neglecting my blog in favor of more wholesome pursuits like enduring  two weeks of intestinal parasites and starting my new job as a trainer of aspiring village bee keepers.  But before I get into what has been happening lately I would like to catch you up with my month of January…

I have now stayed at Leybatos with both my Mom and Sam. It is a wonderful and innexpensive beach hotel on the ocean. It has some beautiful sunsets!

First I had Samantha visit me for New Years.  We kicked off our new years by watching fireworks on the beach, particularly dangerous when the fireworks are shot over the ocean with a strong off shore breeze raining sparks down on us. This was fine for our hotel, but the one about 5 minutes walk down the beach promptly has sparks go into its roof and caught fire at roughly 10 minutes into the new year. This meant that our real New Year’s show was watching the beach front of the Kombo Beach Hotel burn to the ground. I did not have a camera on me at the time of the conflagration, but came by the next day to survey the destruction.

Other exciting adventures we undertook, was visiting the local craft market, where we purchased many paintings… and one drum.

Shek the local painter from whom I have purchased about 10 paintings off of

I took this picture for Aaron... meet Lamin Sonko the maker of your drum.
This is him with your drum right after he carved it



We also made a mermaid from Jeremy on the beach





After that we visited my village family, who as always were overjoyed to see us, and we spent the day entertaining the village kids, drinking the local green tea brew that everyone is fond of, and eating the local fair.  The family I have in the village is amazing! This is the place where I learned Wolof and ate for the first time from a communal food bowl. Other than that, they do not have many of the characteristics of other village families, mainly the kids are well behaved and quite, yet engaging in a way that is more than just curiosity. I feel like I have a real connection with each and every one of them. And it has been awesome to have my mom and Sam see what an incredible family they are and have a real cultural experience.

One of the children in village always has a snotty nose and what I would describe as "Ancient looking eyes"

Domada a traditional Mandinka dish. Peanut sauce rice and veggies.

I always thing the veggatable sellers at the market are so pretty. They wear all these colors and have piles of veggies that are so beautiful

We also toured my new work as a trainer of rural bee keepers. The NGO BEECause Gambia has many value added products they derive from their use of honey and wax. Sam helped label bars of freshly made beeswax soap and pour honey into small glass jars...

 

Locally sourced turtle...



Bob the cat... the chillest cat I have met since Larry the cat at the Metge family house.





Threw this one in, we ran into a conkoran on the streets. Traditionally used to scare off evil spirits that want to posses freshly circumcised young boys, they are also have a part time job dancing and assisting the protection of the village at ceremonies



We also had a night of watching dancing and wrestling at a local compound. The national television station was there, and for the third time in my service I danced on national TV... Apparently it has been made into a commercial for furture wrestling matches at that compound. If I can find the commercial I will post it, but I now get daily texts from Gambian friends who say they say me on the TV dancing for a commercial. I am speechless as to how far this has gone...

Very poorly lit, but basically two people come lock up in a sand pit, and whoever can throw the other to the ground the wins. The end. Then the process repeats until the 20 or so wrestlers have all been in a match together.

There was crazy fast dancing before the match... as I said earlier I danced here, but was probably the worst. Compared with these girateing balls of energy... I am just the dancing Toubab.

Ok... so my mom was here, then I did some traveling well, when I finally got back to my house there were some mice.  We were sitting down when one walked right up to the door and began drinking water from a small pool of water from tea I had just spilled. After scaring it back into the corner behand my stored camping backpack and old camping matress we discovered 5-7 adults (who scattered) and an adorable nest of baby mice INSIDE the old camping mattress. My love of creatures put me in conflict as to what to do. Just then the trash man knocks on our door. While after doing mouse impressions and figuring out the word for mouse is "jena" he comes in and begins stomping on them with little or no consoltation while I run around scooping up the mice in a cereal bowl and a broom and placing them in a rice bag. Eventually most ever mouse was rounded up in a bag that was sent to the dump or stomped on by my trash man.



can you spot the mouse by the bike... yep there he is



As an asside the mice later returned and made a nest in the insulation of my fridge where they lived inside it eating my toothpaste and dried fruit... I then had a seperate more dark intervention I call the "jenacide" where I locked the door to my kitchen fumigated the fridge and inflicted blunt force trama to the escapees because I am tired of them returning... sorry guys I value my toothpaste and a mouse turd free house more than your lives. Also you ruined my fridge...  



Baboon Island/River Gambia National Park

To my great excitement Sam and I did get to travel to probably the most wild and seneic place in the Gambia. The River Gambia National Park was a place I had traveled to with my mom but was not able to get any photos because my camera died... this time however I was able to get a few once in a lifetime shots. Along with the enjoyment of nature it was fully worth returning.

The Termite mounds are enourmous there...

So our the Baobob trees!

at the departing dock I snapped a nice little photo of the Kuntaur Rice Mill with added small children

On our way in we saw a number of fisherment



This is the clearest shot I got of the hippos we saw. We only saw their heads above water.



Here is our guide.

and here is one of the many chimps that the park protects on the islands

My best crocodile photo... we saw a bunch of these guys. It was amazing!

Dakar Softball!

After another overland sufferfest (one coming one going) to Dakar, Senegal I had to say good bye to Sam. I had timed the trip so that I could then play in the West African Invitational Softball Tournament that is hosted ever year in Dakar. We practiced, we prepared, and we grew out our intimidating facial hair! None better than Mike's, that's why all my best pictures centered around him.

and in the end, after some incredible hard fought games and ties and tie breakers and finals... we got 2nd place out of 16 teams... not bad for only 3 practices and a bunch of us being hung over from previous nights of drinking!

Notice the red mark on my friend Brain's chest... he took a softball to the gut for the team, sliding into second or third I believe

That's all I have in me for now! I am dedicated to posting on my blog more. Sickness, travel, visitors, and new work asside, I am out of excuses and will bring you more of my African adventures soon. Next will be what has happened lately, but I am all tired out as it takes forever to organize a blog in the Gambia!

Seeing The Gambia with New Eyes: A Story in Pictures

After 11 months of cultural integration, I have finally had a visitor. You may have noticed that my posts have become less and less written and more and more pictorial.  Slowly even that has gone away as I have stopped seeing this country as anything but ordinary. My fascination with the following things in The Gambia have ceased to be amazing and just started to be normal: 

• Goats
• Small Children
• Trash
• Dangerous Public Transportation
• African Dress here
• Cool Birds
• Scary Spiders
• The Beautiful Crafts and Craft Makers Here
• The Level of Poverty in the Gambia
• Wild Dogs with torn ears and bones sticking through their skin

Everything now is just same old same old. 

THANKSGIVING AND A PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION:

Well the Presidential Elections of the Gambia were held on the 24 of November, and Peace Corps fearing violence which seems so prevalent today in Islamic presidential elections ordered that we stay inside our houses for ...4 days. This was a very lonely thing to do on Thanksgiving so I cooked up a colorful thanksgiving feast of 

Pasta with some veggies. It was quite tasty though I had no one to share it with. Thankfully for my Thanksgiving lock down there was no violence and The Gambia had a peaceful election and we were freed after 4 days. Or as I call it the 4 day yoga, GMAT, magazine, book reading retreat.

Mom's Trip

ACT ONE: I Think I may have pushed her a little hard off the plane

So, if you want to see America with new eyes go to a country and see this getting off the plane. This is the Bakau fish market in the evening right as the fishing ships are coming home and the fish are being sold on the streets near the boats where they are caught. 

So you can see the fish on the street. On the right you can see a Gelly... the SUV public transport of the Gambia!

So with very little sleep I took my mom bright and early to watch a seminar I was teaching on how to teach illiterate women business skills, something that I have had experience with in my time at IRD and working with wives of cashew farmers attempting to process cashew. 

Here are my visual aids complete with pictures of the village to illustrate complex business concepts. 

Afterwards, we saw a fascinating presentation on FGC/FGM Female Genital Cutting, a practice that affects about 3/4 of the women in Gambia. This is horrifying!

Then lunch at a small shack... with Omar the guy who loves to cook for Peace Corps volunteers. The next day was the Peace Corps 50th Anniversary Parade... where we walked and walked and walked... and then met everyone's NGO's and counterparts from across Gambia an idea sharing conference called Peace Corps in the Park which included traditional dancing and drumming and one African bush squirrel.      

Walking down the Main through fair of Gambia. Happy 50th Anniversary Peace Corps!

Some of the best African dance I have ever seen!

WARNING: Secret Squirrel....

So my future employers at the bee keeping NGO: Bee Cause has a son who is taking on an animal rescue project called "having a pet squirrel" I forgot the kid's name but I will refer to him as "Mick's son" for this brief exchange I saw occur when first seeing the squirrel.  

(My Peace Corps friend) Beth: That's a nice squirrel you have there. Does it have a name?

Mick's Son: Yeah.

Beth: What's is its name?

Mick's Son: SECRET SQUIRREL!

Nice :)!

The Bakau Market

 = lots of cool crafts and craft makers and one eccentric rich guy with a collection from around africa.

Well still on the lets go everywhere do everything tangent, the next day we go to the Bakau Guest House where there is one man who has collected literally thousands of masks and figurines from throughout Africa!

So... this is Ali, he is an Egyptian collector of everything African

My good friends Beth and Sharon!

And a ton of really interesting stuff from around Africa!

Afterwards at the Bakau craft market, we meet a mask maker and seller

And an incredible weaver of fabrics...

Act Two: The Village and My Continuing Baby Goat Obsession

Don't ask... just look at the pictures, just know that no goats where harmed in the making of this play! Although one was very very afraid...

So I take my mom to the village where I culturally grew up and became Momodu Ngum. The African dancing pink kaftan wearing Gambian.

After bonding... my mom is elected head of the village and given a seat of honor

Rich Gifts are bestowed on her for her magical "Nurse Powers"

The primary gift was...

All the children in the village are now under her care. The little one does not approve!

On a serious note, we sew my family again and gave them our love and sorrow for the son they lost recently to Yellow Fever. My mom, just as I did fell in love with my name sake Momodu and are now committed to figuring out a way to get him to university in America as he is incredibly bright and has no means of getting an education that he needs to be a meteorologist, something that he aspires to be. So perhaps one day we are seriously considering paying for his ticket and letting him stay with us to go to university… if we can just figure out all the paper work. Here is Momodu frothing the Attai the sugary green tea famous in West Africa as a sugary caffeine filled alternative to alcohol, something that Isam does not permit.

And finally, here is my family, now sadly missing Malik.

Act Three: Babies, Birds, and Baboons

Never have I been to My friend Sharon's site, she is a nurse practitioner working up country at a health clinic in the village. So we decided to visit her on at a "baby weigh clinic" to see how health care is practiced differently in the Gambia.

My mom was impressed at how much all the women cared and were trying to be involved in their children's health care. They come to make sure that their baby's maintain good weight and get all the necessary vaccines to protect form all the illnesses present in West Africa.

To promote children's health here. Baby's get healthcare for free and adults for about 50 cents a visit.

People try to hand me babies and I am always afraid I will break them, they are so fragile!

Birds
We also took a boat trip with a few tourists at the local eco-lodge

A flock of Pelicans

What are you looking at? I'm up here!

Colorful Mr. Kingfisher

Pelicans, Kingfishers, Storks, River Otters, and Ospreys were everywhere, it was great to finally see the wildlife on the River Gambia, for which it is so famous.

Baboons

Finally we went to the River Gambia National Park a protected area where wildlife still abounds. We saw monitor lizards, crocodiles, hippos, 3 different kinds of monkeys, not including chimps and baboons. Sadly my camera ran out of battery and the one I borrowed didn't have the zoom of mine so the best pictures were sadly not taken but the memories will last longer...

The place we stayed at was a Chimpanzee rehabilitation center specializing in helping chimps who used to be pets, at zoos, or part of experiments re-aquatint with the wild. They are placed on an island and left to be free. Most notably Lucy the chimp that learned sign language was released here though she died many years ago.

All in all, my mom had a wonderful time! She came, she saw, she conquered... she was tired and sick at some times, but I feel that a true adventure might need such things. Hopefully she will go back and see America with new eyes. As I will try to go forth and try and see the Gambia once again with a sense of wonder.


BEFORE I GO: WE NEED YOUR HELP!

Finally, if you are going to make a donation this holiday season please consider donating to my friend Sharon Kimball's Project!!! Sharon is my good friend (Pictured above) and she wants to help her women with rebuilding a fence for a community garden to improve health and nutrition in the village. This is a community led project and the women have already raised 25% of the matching funds needed. Unlike any contribution you will make to an aid organization or NGO 100% of the funds will go straight to the impoverished women and children of Sharon's village of Kwinella, The Gambia. Also there is not much time as Sharon wants to help them this coming season as this begins the second year of her service. 


Donate To Sharon's Project


The babies me and mom visited and weighed such as this one will be directly helped by your contribution. THANK YOU AND HAPPY HOLIDAYS!


Xander


aka Alex, Momodu Ngum, The Goat Officiaonado, or the Dancing Toubab

The River Gambia at Sunset

Spend the Day in Peace