“I know it costs more, but the reason this taxi’s more expensive is because it’s BIGGER and NICER than the other ones! Trust me!” reasons Mouktar, the Senegalese taxi driver. He then climbs into the driver’s seat and slams his door shut, which is followed by the passenger seat’s window shattering all over the poor gentleman sitting there. Oh local transport….. sigh. More on that later.
Merry spring time everyone! I’d love to say I’m also enjoying the first birds of spring, the first peaks of sunshine, the blooming of flowers (and for those of you in Seattle and DC, the blessed cherry blossoms), but let’s be honest, every day of my life here the weather is like I’m in the movie “Groundhog’s Day”, except that I’m greeted with weather that feels like the middle of a sticky humid Midwestern summer. That being said, life is still good, and these past couple months have even seen some interesting travels!
SENEGAL SUBLIME
Senegal has been a country I've always wanted to visit. In fact, ever since I became infatuated with Africa, I’m pretty sure my first goal was to see Senegal. Why? I’m not really sure… maybe it was when I saw them playing in a World Cup oh-so-many years ago… or maybe it was when I discovered it was a French-speaking country. Whatever the case, Senegal had been stuck in my mind as a travel destination for a while, and as you can imagine, I was giddy with excitement when I learned I would be spending the Midyear conference for the ELF program there.
So to describe it… wow, what a country! Even though it’s still in the West African region, Senegal feels worlds apart culturally from Togo. It has an eclectic blend of both Sub-Saharan African culture and North African/Arab culture than makes it very pleasing to the eyes, ears, and tastes (and which reminded me a bit of Djibouti, surprisingly). Trendy young Senegalese roam the streets past colorfully robed men in lovely Aladdin slippers sipping delicious sweet green tea in cafes. Various smells of pastries, incense, and at times mouthwatering dishes of fish float out of shops, all back-dropped by the enchanting call to prayer... it really is a special place.
DAKAR AND BEYOND!
My first five days were spent in Dakar where I attended the mid-year ELF conference, which was wonderful y therapeutic. While there are ELF Fellows all over the world, I think those of us in Africa face a unique set of challenges, so being able to reunite for a few days to vent our frustrations, share our successes in trying circumstances, and just have fun was a great experience. Teachers really are a great set of people! Dakar is a fabulous city. In the centre ville part of town, known as ‘Plateaux’, it almost feels like a European city, both in the design, feel, look, and smell. It’s actually relatively modern, but has a sprinkling of old colonial buildings thrown about that are enough to remind you of the historical significance of the country.
As far as outside of Dakar, I journeyed to several interesting locations. I took a 20 minute boat ride to the small Island of Gorée. While peaceful and full of old colorful homes, the Zen experience vanishes once the realization sets in that most of these lovely looking abodes were actually “slaves houses” that held slaves in rather cruel conditions. Apparently the island was a major transit point for shipping slaves out to the rest of the world . I have to admit, it’s a little weird to be out here and see where slaves were actually shipped out. I’ve also visited a slave house in Togo, as well as a beach where slaves where loaded onto boats to sail to the Americas. As an American who was taught about slavery, the civil war, and the civil rights movement, it’s a bit creepy to see where all of this started on THIS end. To see the shores and homes and realize this was where the capturing and imprisoning actually took place… it kind of gives me goosebumps.
…Anyways, on a less somber note: apparently the island also houses Dakar’s hippie community because my hired island guide was baked out of his mind the whole time. At every important stop he’d leave and return more high, to the point where he starting repeating what he had already said, forgetting things in general, and eventually could barely even form words. After about 40 minutes of that I said “adieu”. Thanks anyways Moustapha! Later I journeyed with another friend up to the northern, more Sahel-esque part of Senegal where, nestled among the Baobab “forests” is the lovely town of St. Louis. St. Louis is a true monument to the colonial history of Africa. It was the original capitol of French West Africa (when most of this region belonged to France), which is easy to imagine as it’s an entire city full of colonial buildings. We took a boat trip near the Mauritanian border to a bird sanctuary (the Djoudj Bird Park), where we saw what felt like 1,000 birds! I’m not even a “birder” but I still thought it was cool! On the way back to Dakar I decided on a whim to stay the night in the Lampoul Deserts… a small but majestic desert, where I spent the night in a Mauritanian tent nestled among the stars and rolling sand dunes. Humorously, after getting hauled out to the camp on the back of a truck, I was informed by the camp manager, ‘Pape Fall’: “It looks like it’s just you and I out here tonight”. As you can’t really avoid someone when you’re stuck in a desert together, Pape and I spent the rest of the time embarking on quite the desert bro-mance: we walked the sand dunes together, drank afternoon tea together, cooked together, and even watched the sunset together. He was actually a pretty cool dude, and I guess if I had to literally be stuck in a desert with one other person, Pape Fall was not a bad guy to have around.
So what else is going on with me? I’ll just give you a few snapshots of some the random things that happened here.
LOCAL TRANSPORT CRAZIES:
Let me just say this: People here suck at driving. Car accidents are one of the biggest causes of death out here. Why “Drivers’ Ed” is not included under any international NGO’s development initiative is beyond me. Driving up to a town one weekend, I even saw an entire semi-truck completely flip off the side of the road (a rather startling affair). Most local buses have seats for 7, but will crowd in 15 anyways. This can lead to some, err, compromising seating arrangements actually, because one time I had to sit in between the driver and passenger and straddle the shifter. This required the driver to reach rather awkwardly between my legs every time he wanted to shift. In Senegal, once the bush taxi filled up completely (meaning 9 people for 5 seats), the taxi still stopped to pick people up, who would just nonchalantly hop onto the car rooftop and sit, feet dangling down the side, as if that was a perfectly appropriate way to travel. I don’t get it.
GYM RATS
I’ve joined a local gym here… something I do everywhere I move to. It’s rather entertaining to observe the different gym cultures around the world. In France and Africa, you are expected to greet and shake everyone’s hand in the gym once you enter, and repeat the ceremony once you leave. Also in France you can get away with spandex, cutoff denim shorts, and pink tank tops. In Togo, the latest trend has been to play a Marvin Gaye CD containing 10 different versions of “Sexual Healing” as our workout soundtrack. Don’t get me wrong, I love the song (as does every bar in Togo), but listening to the instrumental version, cheap cover version, and acoustic version just doesn't put me in the iron-pumping mood. Last week was Celine Dion, so at least we are starting to mix things up.
MUSIC
This actually brings me to another funny point about music here. Of course most music is West African, which is pretty fun and great to dance to. And as probably expected you get a fair dose of American and French rap too. But there are some random bands that have cemented themselves in Togolese playlists that everyone here absolutely adores… like Phil Colins. Togolese can’t get enough of him. I hear him every time I go out, and live bands regularly do reggae remixes to all his songs. I love Phil Collins, but never in a million years would I have thought he would go over well in Africa.
WORK
The current cool project I’m working on creating is a teacher observation CD. We have been facilitating workshops all the time on such “cutting edge” skills as critical thinking, communicative language teaching and group work. However the teachers always nod their heads and then say “This is great, but we can’t do these in our classes because they are too crowded/not enough resources/etc.” However I observe Togolese teachers all the time who DO use these skills in their classes, and do them really well! I would always think, “of only they could observe THIS teacher, then they would know it’s possible”, until it hit me: if I can’t bring the teachers to the observation, I’ll bring the observation to the teachers! So now I’ve been running around Lomé and other cities filming good teachers demonstrating these technique in their classes, which I’ll put on a CD, mass produce, and then distribute to teachers at my trainings so they will all have access to 8-10 teacher observations demonstrating how these techniques can be done in “their reality”. It’s cheap, it's easy… here’s hoping it’s a success!
Okay that will be all for now. The next few months look to be quite fun, and might see me doing some travel outside of Togo for work, so I’ll be sure to update you on all of that. In the meantime however, I hope you are all well and happy, and please send me updates on how you are all doing. It’s always great to hear from friends far away. Take care, et a la prochaine!
Phil
