Erin’s Sojourn in Senegal

I’m back in Thilogne once again, and I brought a new dog with me. She’s a 9-month-old African Terrier who I adopted from a volunteer who ended her Peace Corps service. I named her Mon Amie, and although she doesn’t understand the concept of chasing a tennis ball and she would rather eat trash than the dog food I bought her, she is really sweet and docile.

Having a dog here is a lot harder than I thought it would be. Mon Amie is under constant threat of the mean dogs and the herds of goats and cattle. Nobody has a dog for a pet and the street dogs are aggressive and they bite. So, when I take Mon Amie for walks, people stare at her and sometimes run away. As if I wasn’t enough of a freak already in the town, I am now an alien who has a pet lion. However, people are starting to learn that she is a good, American-style dog who can sit on command and likes to be petted, and they think that’s pretty cool.

Mon Amie also follows me around everywhere, which caused major problems with my host father/landlord. Before I brought the dog, I called the house, and my host mother said I could bring a dog, no problem. The day after I arrived, however, my host father started yelling at me after I said good morning to him, speaking in Pulaar so quickly that the only words I understood were ‘dog,’ ‘house,’ ‘bad,’ and ‘Muslim.’ To give some background on Demba, he yells excessively, especially at his 14-yr-old daughter, who is really nice and spends all her free time cooking and cleaning. For this reason, I have not taken a liking to him.

I found out later, from Demba’s nephew, that Demba did not want the dog to stay in my room with me because the Kur’an forbids dogs to be in the home. He told me that it wouldn’t be a problem if it were a goat or a cat, but dogs are not allowed. He said that the dog must stay up against the wall in the yard because the rest of the space is for humans. The idea of Mon Amie having to stay against a wall at all times really upset me, so I tried talking to Demba, explaining that the dog would be in my room for just a few hours a day and that I would build her a cage for when I was out during the day. He refused, saying it was against his religion.

Then, as I was sitting in my room, wondering what to do, Demba barged in with a meter of hose in his hands, yelling that I needed to get the dog out that instant. Demba is blind, so he tried feeling around for Mon Amie, but she was luckily under my desk. I finally got Demba out of my room, and I locked my door. I thought about moving but I had paid a lot of money for the construction of my bathroom, and I also really liked the other members of my host family. I went to Demba and told him that I was willing to compromise. Then he changed the subject and said he had been angry for a while because he felt that I didn’t respect him. He said, “In Senegal, I am your father, and you must respect me.” I told him he was not my father, he was my landlord, and I offered him 5,000 cfa (about $10.00) extra per month to keep the dog with me in my room, and he agreed without hesitating. It’s a shame it had to become an issue of money but at least now everyone is happy.

After a short stint in Joal with all the Heath and Environment volunteers in Senegal, I zipped to Dakar to help out with English Camp for a week.  The camp was located at a high school in the Dakar suburbs, and we had 150 teenagers and 12 PCV camp counselors.  It was a really fun and rewarding experience and I was so impressed with the students’ enthusiasm and knowledge of America.

Throughout the week, we played American games and had discussions about the culture, history, geography, and politics of America.  I thought it was funny that during our cultural discussion, we had two vocabulary words written on the board:  competitive and competition.  While explaining the branches of government, we hesitated while thinking of the number of members in the House of Representatives.  We finally gave up and just said that there were over 300, and almost in unison the kids told us there were 435 members, putting us to shame.  Because all of us PCVs were given Senegalese names upon moving into our villages, we decided to have all the students give themselves American names on the first day of camp, and it was amusing to see what they came up with.

In Jeopardy, they knew our current vice president and what the stars and stripes represent on our flag, but they did not know about Starbucks or the Super Bowl.  The highlight of the week was the day we held the Olympics, in which my team, The Winners, won.

Apart from English Camp, I have been having a lot fun in Dakar, staying with an American host family, eating cereal for breakfast, watching American tv on the Armed Forces Network, and sleeping in a real bed.  Today, Marisa and I are off to the beach in Popenguine for a couple days, before I go back to my village.  Below is a photo from Isle de Madeleine, off the Dakar coast.  Check out more pictures of Dakar and Joal on the right.