SUPERstitions

First, before you read all of this, I need your help. I'm headed to Europe in exactly a month. I'm not even going to get into the mental freakout that accompanies this impeding date. I'm not ready to leave Senegal although I am getting more excited about western luxuries such as bagels and hot showers and not seeing cockroaches in my room every night. Anyways, back to you: I'm going to be staying with my host family for about a week and a half, then I'm headed into the south of France to deposit my friend Leia at a farm, and finally (this is where you come in) I'm traveling by myself to Greece to meet my mom. I have about 10 days between France and Greece and if anyone has any recommendations on places to go or on people to stay with, I would be forever grateful. Italy and Austria are already on the agenda....although I'm not sure exactly where I'm staying yet.

Now, as a reward, here are some superstitions that are not ALWAYS followed in modern Senegal but are fun none the less. The first list are the ones I've noticed/heard and the second is what our program gave us before coming:

-Before leaving the house you pour water outside the door and, if you're driving a car, you always baptize the car before leaving.
-Don't talk about numbers: no exact ages, years spent living places, family members, etc.
-Don't eat with your left hand unless you're an evil spirit
-Don't walk at night, not because of muggers but because of evil spirits that like to come out at night
-Don't complement babies or beauty or anything that could go wrong later and thus be blamed on your complement
-A lot of people wear gris-gris which are essentially good luck amulets for very specific desires. They're usually pieces of paper with Koranic writing somehow enclosed in leather that you wear on your body. You've got to take them off during dirty activities such as sex and toilet business.
-Don't eat with your hand on the ground because you would be pushing on the ancestors


- By pouring hot water on the ground it is believed that the hot water burns our ancestors who are under the ground.
- Pouring cold water at the door of your house first thing in the morning before talking to anyonein anticipation of a good day.
- Dream seeing raw fish or snake is a child or sign of pregnancy.
- Dream seeing a gun or a bullet not used means betrayal or disappointment.
- Dream by a man of seeing a horse or car means a new wife.
- Dream seeing white cloth means you will see a dead person.
- Dream seeing a monkey means downfall to you.
- Dream laughing means you will experience trouble.
- If you put on your shirt inside out, and you discover it yourself you will have good luck.
- If a monkey or pig crosses your way and you don't mention it, you will have good luck.
- If a black cat crosses your way you will have bad luck.
- If a praying mantis creeps over you and you don't chase it until it goes away, you will have good luck.
- If you sweep at night and throw the trash out it is bad luck.
- If you buy perfume for a girlfriend the relationship will not last long. Money is given instead.
- When cutting someone's hair you should not throw the hair away because if a bird finds it and makes a nest with it, the person will have constant headache.
- If a pregnant woman looks at a baboon, her child would resemble it.
- A shooting star represents the death of a prominent person.
- If your left eye itches you will see someone you missed.
- If your right eye itches you will cry.
- Expectant women should not eat eggs, otherwise the baby will be deaf and dumb.
- People avoid doing things (for instance, laundry) on Wednesday because it is a day of bad luck.
- Children should not eat fish because it hampers their mental growth / makes them stupid.
- You don't cut finger nails of babies and young children because it is believed that they will become thieves.
- Never sit at the doorway because evil sprits might hit you and you will die.
- Don't answer a call at night because you might be answering a devil.
- Do not bathe with much water, if your quota of water finishes you will die.
- Do not buy or sell soap, needles, or charcoal, etc. at night.
- A widow should not go out of her home during her mourning period.
- Houses should not be swept at night.
- People should not put their heads in their hands.
- Whistling is forbidden at night.
- Some family names are related to animals. Therefore, people named Sarr for example should not hurt camels or eat their meat.
- If a very beaufiful woman finds it hard to find a husband, or when the men who date her die a short time after the wedding, she is said to have a spirit lover.

Love love. Sorry about the uninvolved post, I've got final papers and tests and 30 more days to take advantage of this experience!

Food

Eat your hearts out:

These are all in my kitchen. Spices, the single gas burner, a nice photo perfectly illustrating the clash between tradition/modernity, and ONIONS for an army (or for a giant household of 14ish).

We made Ceebu Jeen (Senegal's national dish literally meaning fish and rice) with Ramadan, his sister, and their devil nephew Junior.++ 1 kilo rice =

Which you eat communially!! YUMMMMM
Junior got Cocacola in his bottle. Questionable decisions.

Then we went back and made them chicken strips and garlic mashed potatos but you all know what that looks like...

Food here is super tasty, no complaints. Per usual I'm going to be lazy and just make you a list

• Breakfast-Safeway style baguette with butter and nescafe (nothing special)
• Ceebu Jeen-fish and vegis stewed whole in a tomato-based sauce then removed so you can cook the rice in the same sauce. There's also a 'white' variety but I'm not entirely sure how you make that one other then leaving out the tomatoes.
• Yaasa poulet or poisson-white rice topped with thick onion sauce (that they also put in sandwiches, on salads, and anything else that needs a little flavor) and served with either fried whole fishies or lemon chicken.
• Maffe- beef (I think) and sweet potatos cooked in a thick tomato qnd (fresh) peanut (butter) sauce and poured over white rice or couscous. It's hard to pick a favorite but this one might be it. It's super earthy tasting and super delicious.
• Supocanja- this is the only dish I HATE here. It's a slimey okra and tomato sauce filled with fish chunks, fish bones, sea creatures and little else. It's usually poured over white rice which is nice because you can dig out the rice from below, however, my family once served it alone with spoons which was a horrifying experience.
  

Lunch is always a variant of the above dishes. I got really lucky with dinner at my house: we almost always have a salad with grilled meat/fish and onion sauce as opposed to most households' preferance for hearty starches and sauces.

love love

Out and about

Although I typically don't like talking about myself in these things (too bad that's what blogging usually entails) I feel like I should let all of you know what's been keeping me away from the glow of the (janky Senegalese internet cafe) computer screen. Here you go, another bulleted list because I love them:

• Mon-Thurs/Friday: classes, lots and lots of hours of classes. I'm taking African music and dance, Continuity and change in Senegal, History of Islam in Senegal, French lit, and Wolof. We typically have class from 9-12 and then again from 3-6. I am also volunteer once a week in a class of 5yr olds at an orphanage. I would love to be able to talk about how wonderful the volunteering has been but, unfortunately, it has been the exact opposite. It makes me realize how screwed up an education system can get. Ask me about it some other time.
• Toubab Dialaw: We spent a weekend at a pretty well-known dance school/hotel playing the jimbes, dancing, and eating delicious food. It was amazing. Check it: http://www.jantbi.org/
• Mboumba: We went here with our kooky music/dance professor to be in a music festival he helped organize. There was very little actual organization. It was somewhat like Reggae on the River in that it was along a river in a tiny village with tons of stars and mosquitoes but there was no booze or weed or dancing. There was, however, a big name star with fire dancers (Baaba Maal). Word that white people were in town spread fast and we were followed around by a herd of children the entire weekend, regardless of whether we were eating, walking, driving, sitting, sleeping, etc; it didn't matter. It was kind of like being a celebrity except we were just a silly spectacle the entire time, they even dressed us up like the locals. It was a once-in-a-lifetime experience for multiple reasons...
• Sin-Saloum: MANGROVE FOREST. Nuff said. This was amazing/beautiful/breathtaking. We stayed in an ecovillage which was pretty touristy but very cool regardless. Did some exploring on kayaks and on foot. Saw one of the most magical events of my life. Took hot showers. Swam. Learned pottery from lovely village ladies who dig out the clay themselves. It was supposed to be preparation for our individual village stays in two weeks but I'm not sure who they're kidding.

• All of Dakar's islands: Goree (you know about this one already), N'Gore (touristy but beachy and relaxing also only 300m off the main land resulting in a group of us swimming to the island.) Madeline (The Senegalese think this island is filled with bad spirits because there are mini baobabs and other strange wonders on the island/nature preserve, we had a left-handed redhead with us so things worked out okay. It was a nice break being somewhere that was the opposite of chaotic Dakar.)
  Love you all, enjoy the photos!!

Lists

If you were to go on a scavenger hunt in Dakar you would have no problem finding any of the following:

• Animals-mostly sheep, goats, cats, and dogs but sometimes chickens as well and...
• Horses pulling carts-the Senegalese equivilant of a pickup truck
• Garbage absoultely everywhere-sometimes it's being burned in huge piles which helps with finding...
• Smells of all sorts: perfume, meat, fish, smoke, incense, rot, animal, and many which I still cannot identify
• Men wanting your phone number and offering you their hand in marriage (if you're a white female) I already have about 4 Senegalese husbands and counting. It's flattering until you realize you're just a status symbol (for the most part) and baffling because a short, squat, awkward, bug-bitten whitey is nothing next to the beautiful African goddesses who also call this place home
• People selling all sorts of delicious goods such as crack peanuts (sugar-coated peanuts), fruit (so fresh and tasty), cafe touba, and bizarre sandwiches consisting of a combination of fries, mayo, msg buillon (that they use in everything), catsup, spagetti, and a fried egg(who thought of this? would you like some carbs and grease with your other carbs and grease?) or a mush of beans and spices or just spread with chocopan (Senegal's peanut equivilant of nutella)
• Track suits-when people here exercise, they take their attire seriously. Actually, they take all attire seriously and another common sighting is...
• Boubous in stunning patternes and colors, often with matching headscarves (more stylish than religious at this point)

Here are a few of my favorite wolof words/phrases-they're written phonetically so you get an idea of how much fun they are to say:

• Boogana-I want/like. The Wolof language is direct and the verb boog just makes sense: when you like something you usually want it and vise versa. This phrase can be used as a pickup line.
• Jyfunday(noun)-This word describes a plump figure, especifically a woman's rear end. It's a very good thing here. It stems from the word funday which is similar to rice pudding and the prefix of jy means someone who sells. So the jyfunday lady would eat all of her leftovers and get a little curvy and the men would love it.
• Psyy-psyy(adj)-This word is tricky because it means different things to different people(sometimes good sometimes bad). Some definitions include: player, sketchster, sneeky, bandit, spunky, confident....etc.
• Alihumdelilay-Thanks be to God. I say this everyday when crossing the busy street on the way home.

Too much to write. Too much to say. We've also been super busy with a minimum of 5hrs of class a day and planned weekend trips. Blogging is a pain especially with crappy keyboards, but I'll keep trying to keep you guys informed. Also, no spell check=your problem. Excuses excuses but, in the end, I love you all!

This post is not consistant

So, before I write another post I wanted to get you guys some photos that have been hanging out in my camera for a while.
These are all from Ile de Goree. It's an island just south of Dakar that we visited the first weekend. It's in a pretty sweet location so there were lots of battles over it resulting in some very interesting Portuguese/French architecture. It was also one of the main slave trade islands so there's a pretty sad history to go along with the beautiful little island. They say it looks like a piece of cheese, I'm not convinced.

This is my bedroom. It's cozy and I share it with numerous critters. My mosquito net keeps them off my body while I sleep as well as making me feel like a princess. Score.
ATAYA!! You have to pour it from unbelievable heights to make the prized foam that sits atop the sugar tea. I'm not good at it YET but I bought a set and am going to practice until I am a master. Be ready.
Ramadan. My hero. This man is the kindest man in all of Senegal which is really saying something because the country is all about hospitality. He sells us cafe Touba and teaches us Wolof and culture. He makes up words and songs. Example: Jeunehommnomm. He answers "tranquil" with a rolled r when you ask him how he's doing. He gave us all Senegalese names. Mine is Fatukiné. His American name is Toby. Last weekend he invited us to his house to learn how to cook traditional food with his sister (the woman making tea). I will definitely be writing more on him in the near future.

Love love.

Proof

This is the mansion I live in, unfortunately, this photo doesn't do it justice because it goes on and on to the right. I recently found out there's another story meaning it's 4 stories high. I also recently met yet another inhabitant: a guy from the Ivory Coast who is studying to be a doctor. I've recently been spending some time with him and his friends (from Chad and Morocco) who are both interesting and who speak French unlike most of the Senegalese youth who chatter away in Wolof right in front of the Toubab's (whitey's) face.

I was trying to somehow show how enormous the African Renaissance statue is. It's to the left of Sean's giant head. Lots of money was questionably spent on that bad boy (not Sean).
MAM!!! The process before taking this photo was fascinating. I motioned to her that I wanted to take a photo of her which resulted in a good 5minutes of primping and prepping. She had to rewrap her headscarf, check herself out in the mirror from all angles, and finally drape her veil just so. Then she just sat, not smiling (a shame) looking straight forward until I told her I was done. Most recent Mam story: this morning she asked me if I was coming home midday for lunch by asking "midi?" and motioning eating. I answered "waaw" (meaning yes in Wolof) at which she immediately began to enthusiastically chant/sing "midi! midi! midi!" as I ate my breakfast.
This is a "car rapide" which is essentially a short bus covered in folk art with seating in the back and a man hanging off yelling where it's headed. They're everywhere, going in all directions. Ironically, they're the opposite of "rapide" as they're mostly falling apart and much worse at weaving in and out of traffic than the numerous (also falling apart) taxis. They cost about 20cents to ride but are a bit of a gamble as it's not always clear where they're headed. I'm going to get better at riding them because they inspire joy in a way I can't explain, also because not many Toubabs will brave them.

Since Muslims are supposed to pray 5 times per day, seeing people pray on the street is not a rare event. This was special because these are three 8ish year old boys praying together-entirely unimaginable in the US. Also entirely unimaginable is being woken up every morning at 5am by the call to prayer. This morning, I woke up just before 5 and experienced hearing multiple calls to prayer from all across the city. I have come to find the call beautiful, and hearing layer upon layer of it from all over the city was incredibly powerful. Then I went back to sleep.

Rooftops of cartier Baobab, Dakar.

I have so many more photos to share but it takes FOREVER with blogspot and I don't really want to post them on the facebook. If anyone has any brilliant ideas let me know, otherwise I just keep doing it like this little by little. Also, any requests or questions are welcome...I'll see what I can do.

Fun Facts

-This is my address:
Rebekah Horvath
s/c ACI Baobab Center
B.P. 5270
Dakar – Fann
Senegal


As long as you send me mail that isn't a package before the 10th of April I should get it. I will reply. Promise.

-"If you see a monkey sitting at the foot of a tree, he is either getting ready to climb it or he has just come down." (in French) A young Senegalese man gave us this insight at our gender cultural orientation. It was in reference to platonic male/female relations. He's not a believer and neither are most of the people here. They're also not believers in sex before marriage, public displays of afection, or homosexuality but, since these are "fun facts," we will save the gender blog for a later time.

-There are many ways to caffeinate yourself in Senegal: 1) Nescafe-Instant coffee crystals that you put in a cup with lots of powdered milk and, if you're Senegalase, sugar cubes. This is the locals' favorite. This is the form of caffine I enjoy every morninging with my baguette, my butter, and the homemade blackberry jam I gave my family as a present. I'm not complaining. 2) Cafe Touba- A very strong, sweet, spiced coffee. http://www.bayefall.com/id15.html We drink this with Ramadan our casual culture and Wolof teacher who serves it from his tent located down the street from the Baobab center where we take classes. More on Ramadan later because he is AMAZING. 3) Ataya-The traditional tea served in three decreasingly strong and increasingly sweet rounds, sometimes with mint involved. When making it, they pour it from great hights between tiney cups. I love ataya more than I can explain and I'm going to learn how to make it even though my family doesn't drink it. 4) Expresso- Jess and I discoved a fancy coffee shop down the steet from our houses. We're thinking most of their business is beans and machines but they also sell fresh expresso and thus a little tase of home. They gave us free shots the first time we stumbled in and I don't think they yet realize how worthwhile that decision was.

Enough for now. Love love. (Pictures soon hopefully)