Whew, it's been a hectic week. I'm finally at Université Gaston Berger, where I'll be spending the next FIVE MONTHS. Cheese-it thrice that's a long time. I am slowly but surely getting myself acclimated, which proves to be easier here than it was in Dakar. Firstly, the people (men) are much more friendly and less aggressive. Girls seem to be harder to make friends with than guys, but that's neither here nor there. Secondly, it is nice to have things to talk about beyond, "Hey, you're a tubaab walking in the same direction as I am let's be friends!" I've already had some very interesting conversations with very interesting and smart people and I look forward to forming friendships in the months to come.

BUT! I had a couple super-crazy-awesome-worth-recounting adventures in Dakar that I am about to immortalize in narrative form:


Kadjinole Station

So, it was a Monday night and my compatriots and I were desperately in need of some cultural activity not organized by the Baobab Center to break up the monotony of Wolof class morning, noon, and night. We had found an activity listed in the ubiquitous Lonely Planet guidebook that looked fun and relaxing: a restaurant/bar/film viewing site where if you buy food or drink you get to see the movie for free. The guide assured us that it was a must-do, so we hopped in a taxi and made our way down to Kadjinole Station.

The entrance was marked by a London tube-stop looking sign bearing the name of the establishment over a small, slightly dubious-looking door. We entered into a stairwell, with no sign of a restaurant or movie theater in sight. Adventurous souls as we are, we mounted the anonymous stairwell. At the top of the stairwell, we found an empty courtyard, but there were tables and chairs so we figured we might be on the right track. Through the courtyard we went and found what looked like a very large, luxurious living room. There were big comfy couches in brocade and plush fabrics around low tables with candles. And, lo and behold, other people! Well, one other person. We inquired as to whether this was indeed the Kadjinole station where we could eat, drink, and watch movies, and our new acquaintance assured us that we had indeed reached our destination. He invited us to sit on a couple of the couches and rushed off to find the only waitress.

By this point it was about 8:15 and we were all famished (people don't seem to be too into snacking here, which is a travesty, and we had missed our daily trip to the MyShop on the corner to buy Fanta and chocolate). The waitress arrived and we told her we would like to eat dinner, and she promptly left to go find out what the kitchen was making. I did not think that this boded well for our eating prospects and I resigned myself to expect glorified bar food. She returned, told us our options, we ordered, and she left. We had since realized that it was only just past 8 on a monday night, which probably explained why we were the only patrons of such a swanky joint. Moments later, our host friend returned and asked us if we wanted to start the movie. He said that since we were the only people there, it was entirely up to us. He was very nice and asked us how the sound levels were and started the movie. He even put on the English subtitles just for us!

The movie was an odd film about a French man who went to Benin to do business or something and ended up getting all his money and passport stolen or burned and had to depend on the kindness of a burly but warm-hearted Beninese boxer slash street vendor who just wanted to get to Ouagadougou to see his long lost father and they went on a journey of a lifetime and braved all sorts of dangers and ended up happy in the end. It was very French bourgeois in its humor and made us all slightly uncomfortable. But, about half way through the movie, we still hadn't gotten our food and I was beginning to get kind of cranky, when the waitress came back. Remember how I had fairly low expectations for the food I would be served? Boy was I mistaken. We were brought platters loaded with the most beautiful seafood and salad and french fries! on placemats the size of small bicycle tires. And delicious bruschetta to share! Honestly, this was the best meal I have had in years probably. I had ordered the brochette fruit de mer, and I successfully finished off three enormous skewers of delicious tender fish and onions, two skewers of calamari, an enormous crawfish, and most of the bruschetta. There was no rice or mysterious gooey sauce in my life that night and I was a very happy camper.

As we left, we thanked the host generously. He invited us to come back during the weekend at a more reasonable party hour (which means like, 2am here) to partake in their "International Dance Club Night." We told him we would try and that we would definitely tell our friends about this little jewel.


Iles de la Madeleine

We had reached our last day in Dakar, and we really wanted to do something fun, cultural, and relaxing at the same time. After consulting our trusty Lonely Planet, we decided to make the trek to the Iles de la Madeleine. According to our guide, these islands are nature reserves and no one lives there and, most importantly, there are no vendors there. Having had our fill of tourist-y beaches where every five minutes you get offered the same necklace or some maraca-type instrument or something, this sounded like a delightful respite. We set out for the beach bright and early, as we had to find some sort of national park ranger to take us out to the island.

We decided to walk to the beach, which we had already tried to do once with no success, but here we were two-and-a-half-weeks-wiser and more confident. The fact that every Senegalese person we knew told us to take a taxi instead did not phase us. So, we walked to the university, around which we were told we would find the right beach. After walking for a good half hour and having been pointed in three wrong directions by three different helpful but not really helpful people, we conceded and got in a taxi. Which promptly took us to yet another wrong place. Where we received incorrect directions from another slew of people. We finally found our way to a dinky shack on the tiniest stretch of beach that had a bunch of tubaabs sitting outside, which indicated that we had reached our destination. We went in and met the park ranger, who was very friendly but kind of shady about telling us how much it would cost, chartered our boat, and went to buy snacks.

A little boat took us out to one of the two Iles de la Madeleine, l'Ile du Serpent. It was a desert-looking mound in the middle of the ocean, with a cove for swimming, a million cormorants flying around, super cool volcanic rock formations, and weird dwarf baobabs that had trunks that were like ten feet wide but only like ten feet tall. We went swimming in the cove, got a tour of the island where we saw great views of Dakar, the fishermen around the island, a rare bird that only lives on l'Ile du Serpent called a phaeton or something, the other of the Iles de la Madeleine called Ile de Lougnes, and so much more!

The cove was divine for swimming, but treacherously rocky. I sustained several minor injuries, but nothing too serious was injured beyond my pride. I attribute my copious slippage to an injury to my left foot sustained early on in the trip that, compounded by the algaeic furriness of the rocks, greatly diminished my usual poise and balance. That's a big fat lie, I fall down all the time and I don't know why I suddenly expected to have the balance of a tight-rope walker the way I was jumping around those rocks, but alas, the still visible bruises on my foot, hand, and arms will serve to remind me to be more careful next time. Despite my gravitational mishaps, it was a beautiful day, and probably one of my favorite things I have done so far.


The Wedding

The night before I left for Saint Louis, this past Saturday, there was a wedding at the house across the street from me. What I didn't realize until I came home from my day at Iles de la Madeleine sunburnt, bruised, and needing a nap is that when there is a wedding at the house across the street from you, there is a wedding at your house, your neighbor's house, and all the other houses within a three block radius as well. I returned to my house d'accueil to find a huge tent blocking my street and maybe a hundred ladies in the most beautiful traditional Senegalese dresses. They were brightly colored booboos (I think that's what they are called) that all looked hand made, and I felt like a huge slob in my jeans and beach-y shirt. My house mother found me and urged me to change into something more appropriate as quickly as possible. I showered, changed and prepared myself to brave the madness that was the street outside my house.

As soon as I walked out the door, I was scooped up by a swarm of young girls who all had names that sounded like variations on Mami who wanted nothing more than to play with my hair and shoot little toy cannon things at me. After being grilled about my marital status, I decided to see if I could sneak away from my gaggle of new friends. I spotted some familiar tubaabs on the other side of the street and went over to seek solidarity in our outsiderness. This proved more difficult than I expected, because the street was packed with the beautifully robed ladies and gentlemen who had all settled into plastic lawn chairs to listen to drummers and griots singing and playing. I forded the river of gold and purple fabric and managed to catch up with some equally overwhelmed tubaabs. Not feeling brave enough to go to the reception that was apparently to ensue, I snuck away with my new housemate and her friend to grab some dinner.

I decided that it would be safe to discreetly make my way back home around 11, thinking that the party in front of my house would have disbanded by then, but I was very much mistaken. I came back to find the older members of the party wailing into a megaphone in Wolof. Exhausted and desperately needing to pack, I pushed my way to my room and sort of passed out on my bed. I wanted nothing more than to sleep, but the ecstatic shouting into the megaphone went on until at least four in the morning. I heard my house mom and grandmother coming in around five. These Senegalese muslims really know how to party.