The amazing education system in west Africa

Thanks to my big sister, Kelly, for getting on my case about not posting in over a week.  Either thankfully or unthankfully, nothing excessively interesting has happened since my last post.  As a result, I'll take this time to lightly discuss the disorganization of the education system.  My classes (both at WARC and the university) are canceled more often than not.

I should probably first explain how my classes here work.  I take three classes at the West African Research Center (WARC): Wolof, African Political Systems, and History of Islam.  I take two classes through the university's Foreign Student program: Dissertation and Civilisation Africaine.  All five of my classes are taught in French. 

I wanted to take some liberal arts classes at the university as well, but unfortunately, classes never really happen there.  Professors are not held accountable, and only about 1 of 10 classes on the course guide actually takes place.  It's the most disorganized system in the history of higher education.  Apparently, (since there are no classes) students do internet research on a desired topic and present a professor with a "summary" at the end of the semester.  Then they get credit.  This explains why African diplomas are not credible outside the continent.

So here is the first email I got last week from my program director:
"Students of the Faculty of Letters and Humanities at the Cheikh Anta Diop University in Dakar are threatening to strike if their scholarship money is not paid.  The students are seeking to negotiate the issue with university and government officials; a spokesman for the students said that if nothing is done by Tuesday, they will disrupt classes and university services and will take to the streets.

As always when traveling, and especially in the area around the University, watch ahead for signs of unrest – columns of smoke from burning tires and debris, and take an alternate route. Never try to force your way around or through a barricade, your vehicle will likely sustain damage, and you could be injured as well." 

Well guess what, those kids didn't get their scholarships.

This email was followed a few days ago by the following (in French, summarized roughly below):

Les enseignants de l'Universite(facultes et IFE) sont presentement en greve. J'espere que cette situation ne durera pas et les cours vont bientot reprendre. 

Si la greve devrait durer sur plus de deux ou trois semaines, des dispositions seront prises pour que les enseignements suivis a l'universite reprennent et soient transferes au WARC. Nous negocierons avec les differents professeurs pour qu'ils vous fassent les cours dans les locaux du WARC.

Je rappelle que quelle que soit la situation, tous les etudiants des study abroad programs ont la garantie de retourner aux Etats Unis a la fin de leur programme avec le total de leurs credits.

Le moment venu, Waly, Awa et Korka discuteront des arrangements appropries avec vous.

Merci

Well gosh, now it looks like the profs are striking too!  They apparently weren't happy that they weren't being paid, nor that the students were having their scholarships withheld as well.  So I may have to have all my classes switched to WARC, since I do kinda need credit from my study abroad experience.

Cheers to one month in Senegal

So, this weekend marked a month of sunshine, Wolof, and call-to-prayer in Dakar.  What else is there to do but celebrate?  After class ended on Friday, about 5 of us took a nice walk downtown along the Corniche to eat dinner and see a Senegalese film at l'Institut Francais.

The Cafe de l'Institut Francais is super cute, super Toubab, and super tasty.  It's quite expensive in Dakar standards, but costs about what I would pay for a meal out at home.  It was completely worth the splurge.  Maybe it was the deviation from Senegalese cuisine, maybe it was the quality of the preparation, but I'm pretty sure this was one of the top five most delicious and memorable meals of my life.  There is a reason why the Cafe is the #4 thing to do in Dakar, ranked higher than the Institut itself.

Our toast to one month down, three to go:

My drink is the purple one.  It was bissap juice and rum.  Amazing.  To eat, I ordered a burger with bacon (the only place I've seen it in Senegal) with cheese, and it came with a salad.  Oh my goodness, I can't even begin to describe to amazing this meal was.  So basically, I won't.

We were running a little late and having lots of fun at the table, so around 8:30 we decided we should probably head over to our 8:30 movie screening.  It shouldn't have been a problem because the theatre is literally about 30 feet from the cafe entrance.  But when we got there, either it was all full or it was too late.  No problem, we go spend that three dollars on N'Ice Cream!

I'm not too sure if I've written about N'Ice Cream before on my blog.  If I haven't, I'm ashamed.  If I have, it proves how good it is.  This funky designed building looks like it belongs in an artsy, urban quarter of an American city.  The ice cream is the best in Dakar.  In case you were wondering about the name, it plays off Wolof phonetics.

Jess and I with our N'Ice Cream:

Since the rest of our program was meeting at Le Mermoz for live music and drinks, we decided we should probably head up there after our ice cream.  Since we had 5 people, most taxis would charge extra for illegally cramming people in.  After a little negotiating fun, we found a driver who would take us uptown to Mermoz for 2,000 CFA, about $4 US.  This was a pretty good deal considering our 5 passengers.  I later found out why, as I sat in the front seat.  The passenger door didn't close, so I had to ride several miles up the Corniche holding my door closed.  Had we may a quick turn, I would have flown out, considering there wasn't a seatbelt.

My smiling face, enjoying the taxi adventure:

 













Le Mermoz was crowded when we got there.  It was a typical Senegalese restaurant/bar.  Open room, plastic patio chairs and tables, no decorations, etc.  The traditional music and dancing was excellent, but unfortunately, we only caught the last five minutes of it.  I ordered Flag, the unofficial beer of Senegal.  It was pretty mediocre.  But for a country whose religion forbids alcohol, what can you say.

Here's our table at le Mermoz:

But all in all, I must admit, I had quite the successful one month anniversaire.  Dakar really is an adventure, and I have three months left ahead!

Field Trip!

This past Saturday, we had a field trip to a monestary and le Lac Rose (Pink Lake).  I woke up too early so there was no breakfast set-up yet.  I ate my last balance bar on the walk to WARC.  Little did I know, I was about to receive a yoghurt and three pastries on the bus.  Ah well.  I got some extra protein.  The ride there was about an hour and a half.  And very bumpy.  For the first time in three weeks, I left Dakar.  Though we were far the heart of rural Senegal or anything, the contrast from city life was clear.  We passed wild baobab clusters, crumbling concrete walls, and buildings held up by sticks.  The roads soon turned to nearly-impossible-to-drive-on-let-alone-navigate red clay stretches, and we reached the monestary.  

Though the buildings were plain and gently worn-down, the grounds were fantastic.  It's the greenest part of Senegal I have seen yet.  The monks grew many plants and even had their own water tower for the dry season.  All the gardens were equipped with homemade irrigation systems.  There were little rows of grapefruit and kumquat trees.

From the grapefruits in particular, the monks bottle their own juices.  They also produce various wines with the help of some village woman, the most interesting of these wines being pineapple.  (I wish I would've been allowed to bring a bottle back to the states.)  They have a building that contains a pasturizing machine, a filling and stamping room, and a large refrigderator to hold all the fresh juice.

Around noon, we visited the chapel and attended mass.  The decorations inside the church were simple but beautiful African depicitons of the Holy Family.  The music was played by the monks with traditional instruments. It was unlike any other Catholic service I've attended, even had it been in English.  We then had lunch.  And wow, it was pretty incredible.  First, we each got a pre-sectioned grapefruit half.  Then salad and chicken and beans and french bread (of course) and rice and yassa and manadrins.  Except, I made it my goal to have an all fruit and veggie lunch.  Given my options, I succeeded.  I did have some bread afterwards, but that was like my dessert.  Overall, the monestary was the most peaceful and tranquil experience yet in Senegal.  Plus, we each left with a bag of fresh, tasty grapefruits.  These will make a nice, healthy substitute to my daily lunches!

We all hopped back on the bus to go to le Lac Rose (Pink Lake).  Too bad the driver had no idea where we were going.  We got a little lost on the twisty roads of rural Senegal, but hey, we got there eventually.  The lake was pink from some distance.  But up close, it looked grossly yellow.  Mémé later informed me that at particular times of day and year, the water color changes.  Everything was also sickly covered in salt.  Then we saw some camels and ran up the sand dunes barefoot.  It was quite nice.  On the bus ride home, nearly everyone fell alseep.  I was next to the window, and it was indefinitely uncomfortable.  The rest of the day was spent with the family, hanging around the house.  Each day, each experience, I begin to feel more comfortable with my life here.

Youssou N'Dour

One of the greatest treats of my first two weeks in Africa is the opportunity to see Youssou N'Dour in concert.  How could I pass that up?  (Especially for the american equivalent of $24.)  Funnily enough, most of the people there were Toubabs.  That suprised me, but talking to my host aunt the next day, we figured that the tickets were too expensive for most Senegalese to attend.  Plus, the show was at the Institut Francais, which in all honesty is basically the Toubab hub of Dakar.

Here are some of us ladies before the show started:

Our friend Youssou walks out onstage.  He was wearing one very shiny, classy-looking Boubou:

Yeah, we were in the third row.  I could see the little beads of sweat on our buddy Youssou's face.  Here is his friend playing a traditional drum:

We had qutie the fun night.  By the last few songs, I was incredibly tired.  I did find it funny how "African" the show was considering the audience.  Youssou kept alluding to the culture and pride of Dakar, when in fact only about 25 percent of the audience was probably from Dakar.  But overall, it was a fantastic performance. They also played "Seven Seconds" reggae style, which was an interesting touch.

Chez moi: La Maison Tidjani

Before you ask, Tidjani is the family's name.  And today, I'm going to give you a tour of the house.

This is the outside and front door:

This is the view of my street from the front door.  I live in SICAP Baobab.

This is our front door.  Though the street may not look nice, the Senegalese take pride in the entry-way.

This is the view from inside the unit.  If you were to walk twenty feet inside and turn around, you would see the front door again.

When you enter the house, there's a pretty little courtyard with a mango tree and lots of potted plants.

If you turn right after walking in the door, you'll see this pretty little patio.  I eat breakfast there.  If you keep walking straight forward in this photo, you'll enter the kitchen (read below).  If you take a right, you'll get to the living room (also below) and two bedrooms. If you take a left, you'll enter the courtyard.

Had you taken a left above, you would've seen this small entry way off the courtyard.  The doorway leads to my room and Angelica's room.  That tiny door in the far left corner is the bathroom.  Notice how the ceiling stops there.

This woman is sitting on the patio.  She comes every Friday to sell fish to the family.  It looks and smells pretty gross, especially with all the flies.

My bedroom!

My dresser and bed with mosquito net.  I tend to get tangled in it when I sleep at night.

Behind the door, my chair and garbage cans.  Apparently, I'm lucky for having a garbage can in my room.  Most students do not.

The bathroom

The sink.  Very exciting!

The tub (with all my American products).  Also very exciting!

Last, but certainly not least, the toilet.  My host mother nicely puts toilet paper in for me.  The watering can is for the rest of the family.  Again, very exciting!

If you go outside the bathroom, there's a nice little open area and stairs to the roof.

This is where the laundry and dishes are cleaned.  For dishes, Angelica sets up three buckets of water: one for soaking, one for soaping/scrubbing, and one for rinsing.  I think laundry is done in a similar manner.

This is my very open roof.  I like to tan up here because it's quite private.  I'm surprised that my family doesn't use the roof for anything else besides drying laundry (the white lines are clotheslines).  It's quite big and open.

This is the edge of my roof looking onto the street in the morning.  There are huge metal panels that look like they used to be shutters or something.

 So let's pretend you kept walking straight when you got to the first courtyard...

Straight ahead would be the kitchen.  Lots of funny kitchen utensils and cookware you've probably never seen before.  Notice the lack of microwave, toaster oven, and coffee pot.  I do miss those things a little... but mostly just the coffee pot.

If you walk out of the kitchen and turn left, you'll enter the nicest area of the house.  Senegalese families take very much pride in the quality of the living rooms.  It's the central room of the house.  The family and their guests spend a lot of time in here, and it always smells like incense.