im here!

hi everybody! nanga def! these international keyboards are a pain in the patootey. so here goes, anyway. i got to the paris airport with a couple of kids from my program and we did the whole awkward hang-out-in-the-airport-and-play-cards thing for a while, then took a second flight to dakar. i slept on the wrong flight, meaning that the jet lag really caught up with me. im good now, in any case; last night was the first that i didnt wake up at 5 am to the muslim call to prayer. yup, you hear that from the mosque all day, but its really quite beautiful waking up to this rumble of prayer from the whole city.
anyways, we stayed at a hotel the first night because it was late by the time we got off the plane. the airport was complete insanity. i mean, COMPLETE INSANITY. goddamn. like a thousand people pushing and screaming and sweaty and outside, another hundred trying to grab your bags and take them to a taxi. our group (15 americans) was rushed to this giant bus which weve taken everywhere so far so as to be a completely and utterly conspicuous bunch of toubabs (white foreigners) stared at like fish. good times. we drove around the city a lot on the first day and got out to walk in the markets and eat bitter cola nuts and change money at the bank downtown. again, lots of hassling and selling of everything from socks to djembes to giant piles of stinky fish. our program leaders are awesome and when we're together we've sort of reached this happy english-french medium, franglais at its best. people are either really friendly or really cold but mostly tolerant of our giant group. the last two days we went to Goree Island for a tour and to this big lutte which happened to be taking place this weekend. Goree is where the slave trade in Africa originated and it was really a very moving and interesting tour. There were all kinds of Toubabs there, even some koreans who were completely lost. we strolled around and sat on a beautiful beach and i swear there must have been fifteen women who very flatteringly addressed us and pushed their wares in our faces. As for the lutte, its a sort of combination of wrestling, slapboxing, and football, and the actual big match between two giant half-naked dudes was preceded by four hours of dancing, speeches in wolof, and chants praising the politicians which apparently everybody in the stadium resents, since its all related to the upcoming elections and is mostly a lot of bull. the matches themselves last about three minutes, tops. the big one we saw was between one dude named the bombarder and the other was nicknamed Tyson so all his fans in this giant stadium were waving american flags. needless to say, we cheered for tyson.
on to the family! my host grandmother, maman amitié, has 7 kids, some of whom live with her, some down the street, and two in france and america. they each have at least three kids (and at most 8) so its a big family. in my house now we have the adults jo, didi, and a couple of others who i believe are just visiting, then there are a bunch of kids, the baby Souann nicknamed Sosou, Jean-Paul, 17, Samuel (Samu, 10), Renee (Rene, 15), Fifi, 14, Jean Baptiste (JB), 21, and Mamie, 25. There will be another exchange student very soon in my room (Rene is sleeping there for the moment) and there was also a student from france just visiting who left the other day. There are tons of people sleeping on the floor on mats or on couches. Across the street there are a lot more cousins whose names escape me but thats ok because they havent gotten mine either yet. my family calls me Lee or lili since about 2 days ago, i told them my dad did that and they liked it a lot. so now weve got Fifi, Didi, and Lili. They speak mostly french, and are very french in general compared to a lot of families, meaning that they do the Bisou kiss kiss on the cheek a lot and speak very little wolof which is fine with me for now. the house has a beautiful courtyard with a garden where the dishes get done and where the old dog, arture, lives. hes really old and sort of rotting so nobody really pets him, but people dont seem to pet dogs in general and they arent allowed in the house here. poor old Arture. Inside theres a front room with a table and couches and a tv which is way more central to down time than i expected. then the kitchen is off to the right and two curtains go through into the rest of the house. there are three bedrooms i walk through to get to my room but people seem to either sleep really deeply or just not ever be in their rooms. one also walks through another couple of rooms to get to the bathroom. the senegalese dont use toilet paper and lots carry around water in case they use the public bathrooms. so you go and then take a little bucket and use your hand to rinse yourself. americans sometimes can use toilet paper in their families houses but my familys toilet doesnt flush(you have to very forcefully splash water down) so if i wanted to use it, id then have to carry the used stuff all the way through the house and outside, so im just kind of like, when in rome, you know? always the left hand is associated with that because the right hand is associated with eating and introducing. maybe thats way too much info, sorry! laundry day is wednesday so ill get back to you about how that works. they have a maid who comes to do it. but everyone also washes their own underwear daily and like literally hides it while its dryingand its like a huge no-no to ask anyone to wash them. as for keeping clean, the senegalese are extremely clean and shower at least once a day. there is no hot water but its not terribly freezing and i could always heat some up on the stove if i wanted.
the dishes get done in huge tubs outside in the courtyard and i do them with Fifi or Rene after dinner. Meals are taken as a family and eaten from huge round metal plates. a lot of families eat with their hands, but mine uses spoons. We had a cultural orientation where we learned to eat with our hands, among other things. You use your whole right palm (never EVER the left, that's like the biggest faux-pas) and scoop it into a little ball with rice and meat and ususally a little bit of potatoes, cabbages, or carrots. you only eat directly in front of you and make a little trough with your fingers, and the mother or whatever woman is serving with cut meat and distribute it to everyone as they go. One of the girls on the program is living with a family that doesnt even touch the bread to break it in the morning. my family is much less formal. oh yes, breakfast is baguette bread and butter or cheese or chocolate spead which is a lot like nutella but with peanuts, so i love it. i'm missing vegetables though - i think the first thing im going to want when i get home is like a giant applebees salad. i honestly have no clue how anyone ever manages to poop without fiber supplements, its just bread and meat and potatoes and cabbage et cetera, its all delicious in any case but im totally going to gain another me while im here what with maman amitie all insulted when i only eat like four pounds of food at dinner and take only a foot of bread at breakfast.
dirt and bugs and power outages are a fact of life here. i mean there are ants all over the place, and the mosquito netting saves my life at night. but i feel very safe, my street and neighborhood has a guard, people are so friendly and especially my family is very understanding of all the differences because theyve had tons of exchange students. I thought my host sister mamie was a little cold at first but it turns out we both just needed to open up a little. i met her boyfriend last night - theyre very cute and have been together a little over a year and so then of course i broke out the family and friends photos for everyone and they liked it. they absolutely loooved the jelly bellies and chocolates, and ive found that since dinner is around 9 pm, they eat dessert first around 8.
anyways im going to eat lunch of fish and couscous for about 2 buccks with the rest of the group, and then were going to a museum later. yesterday was a little lonely until the evening but it gets better and better and more comfortable and ill probably go out with JB this weekend dancing and to church to see mamie solo in the choir. theres just lots to do at the moment and im trying to throw myself in there and be who i came here to be. ill be watching out for your responses and emails! im going to try to use skype at the cybercenter sometime soon. kisses! miss you all.
love,
lili