Beach Week at Mbour

It's pretty surreal. Here I am in my final week here, in a beach resort campement on la petite cote (the little coast, south of Dakar) listening to everyone else talk about what they did for the past four weeks. I'm not sure this finale ever seemed like it would really happen. The schedule for the week is pretty incredible -- let me recount my schedule from today. We had three presentations this morning from 9 to 11 AM, one on how artists in Dakar perceive their work and are inspired to create, another on Senegalese rap (it's origins and the differences between it and rap in the States,) and one on Latin American telenovellas (daytime soaps) and how and why they are so readily consumed here by this completely different culture. Then I went into the town of Mbour, maybe a 15 minute drive from the beach, and went to the main market there -- the first time in weeks that I've at all enjoyed being a consumer. Lunch was at 1, which is early for Senegal, but at least was still a classic meal of fish balls and onion sauce which is much more delicious than it sounds. Then I spent an hour and a half on the beach, swimming and sun bathing. From 3 to 5:30 PM were three more presentations, these all on Senegalese music. One on the kora which is half way between a harp and a guitar, one on traditional Wolof songs, and the last on the djembe drum. Then I spent an hour and a half prepping for my presentation (the very last one in the entire group, which will be Thursday morning) which was perhaps the least fun part of my day as it is clear to me that I have way too much to say than will fit in a 20 minute time-slot, even with 15 minutes for questions at the end... But rather than let that stress me out, I just went back to the beach with a beer and remembered that this is a beautiful country and that my life here is incredible -- the presentation will be fine and I don't care to stress about it. Dinner was at 8, followed by a screening of the most fabulous short film called "Binta's Great Idea," which apparently won a prize at Cannes a few years ago. It was filmed in Casamance, the region in southern Senegal south of the Gambia which is off limits to us on this program because of a State Department warning. It's the only part of the country with regular civil strife and sometimes even land-mines, all stemming from a complicated history involving post-colonial national identities and regional politicking. It was wild though to watch a film, a beautiful piece of cinema, that looked exactly like what I've been living. It's weird to think about my life here that way, I think it had just finally started to become real to me and not like a sort of fiction.

In general, I'm doing great. But this has been one of the most challenging weeks of my semester, to be sure. Within 72 hours, I had three major and significant things happen. First, I finished my 52 page paper on USAID. As I was writing the dedication, I legitimately burst into tears. To think that I conducted this research, lived in a town as the only white person resident for two and a half weeks, did all this research and synthesis and writing, and had a finished project to turn in on time, it was just amazing. I've learned so much about development work, about poverty, about myself, about the role of the United States in the world and the capacity of people and organizations to give to each other in means appropriate to what they have... it's just incredible to me. But I was pretty pressed for time and stressed out about it all week. I also then made the mistake of rereading my paper on the njaaga njaay (white mini-bus slash van carrying 40 people at once for the equivalent of about 25 cents a ride) back to my apartment, where of course I found sections that were written badly and typos. Because that's what happens when you rush and stress and run out of time. But on the whole, and especially once I do some editing for my own peace of mind, it will be a piece of work I am incredibly proud of. I'm so impressed by how much I accomplished. So yes, first I finished the paper. Then, I said goodbye to my very best Senegalese friends on Saturday, which was emotional and made more difficult by the fact that I still wasn't leaving the country for over a week. If I wasn't emotionally spent enough after those two things, on my last night in Dakar I ended up meeting my homestay family in the children's hospital Albert Waye for a stressful few hours where I thought my baby sister Diarra was on the verge of death. The back-story there is that last weekend she was in a coma (I found this out when I went over there for dinner last Monday) and they rushed her to the hospital where she came out of it within 24 hours. But Monday night had it's own scare -- she was saying that her head hurt, she wasn't eating, she seemed really out of it... She is 2, so it wasn't unusual for her to be tired at 11 PM, but when she fell asleep we were all so nervous that we woke her again, at which point she screamed and cried until she fell back asleep again. I was over there Tuesday and she seemed totally normal, Wednesday too, as Wednesday was Soukeyna's 6th birthday. But on Saturday, even after Bashir had told one of our staff members, Bouna, that he would be at our final party (fete finale) to celebrate the end of the semester, nobody from my family showed up. I walked over there that night to say goodbye, only to find that no one was even home. I texted Aby to say that I would try to come see her on my last day in Dakar before I head to the airport, and she immediately called me back to apologize for missing the event. "We're at the hospital -- Diarra's running a fever." After learning that she was alone there with both the girls, in need of a friend and some help, I booked it over to her in a cab. Diarra was incredibly sick -- a fever of 42 degrees which I think translates to be roughly 107 F. I'm shocked she's still alive. For a little while Aby had to run to the pharmacy to pay for a drug that a doctor later injected into Diarra's wrist when her fever wasn't breaking, and I was left in the waiting room reception area of sorts watching Soukeyna (who at age 6 had no idea how to handle her sick baby sister and why it meant that she wasn't getting any attention herself) and holding Diarra in my lap. Diarra would cry, then become very still and press herself into my chest, and then have full body twitches. She was burning up, I could feel the fever in her skin all over. Eventually Aby came back, and then Aby's mom came to the hospital, then her sisters, then Bashir (Bashir had been out of town in Saint-Louis but got back to Dakar only to find out that we were all at the hospital -- I have no idea why he was out of town in the first place, or why Aby didn't call him to tell him that they were having an emergency hours before,) so by the end I wasn't responsible for anything really except to sit there and be supportive and present. But it was so scary. The doctor claimed it was totally unrelated to the coma, which doens't make any sense to me. Since then she's apparently been doing better, though she's going back to the hospital tomorrow so they can run more tests. It sounds like a brain inflammation disease to me, but it's hard to share that theory when I'm communicating in French... It made my last night in Dakar incredibly emotional and difficult, the end to an incredibly emotional and difficult week, but also reaffirmed for me that this experience has become a complete cultural immersion for me. I think what will be the hardest as I leave will be the idea of so much distance in these shockingly close relationships I have formed.

Anyway, it's late here and I'm getting eaten alive by mosquitos as I sit outside to use the wifi. Luckily I'm taking anti-malarial medications or I'd be pretty nervous, and it's not even the mosquito season! The drugs are making me have pretty crazy dreams, though. Last night for example (Sunday nights are the most vivid because I take the pill every Sunday) I dreamed that President Obama died (how scary!!) because of lung cancer. I was so confused ("I didn't even know he had lung cancer!" I remember saying to a study abroad friend) and then I was watching the news for hours... Weird.

In any event, will try to update again soon, especially about Diarra's health. So far so good, kaar kaar (keeping away the evil spirits from changing what I just said.) Besides that, I'm just slowly coming to terms with the idea that it's the middle of May, that I'm leaving here on Saturday. It's surreal, that's really the only way to describe this feeling... Ba beneen yoon, inchalla.