Xar naa lek Bu Baax (I ate a lot of sheep)

I’ve neglected my blog recently and have many things to share. However, I don’t have the energy to recount my past few weeks, as I’m sure no one would really read past the 5^th or 6^th paragraph, so I’ll try to recount just the big things. Here goes my best efforts and I’ll try to make sure it’s not too dull of a summary.

Tabaski (Eid al-Adha)  was on the 17^th… this is arguably the largest holiday in Senegal and for most Muslims  It is when most people make the pilgrimage to Mecca and celebrates the willingness of Abraham to sacrifice his son.  In Senegal to celebrate it every able adult, usually men, buys a sheep, that will be slaughtered after the mid morning prayer. Then, like korite, the women cook, people eat A LOT through out the day, then at night everyone visits their family and friends to ask for forgiveness.  Like holidays in every culture people talk about tabaski a good month or so before hand. It’s like Christmas except x-mas trees are replaced with sheep and movies with footage of Mecca. The sheep thing has to be the funnies because they are literally everywhere. There is something seriously wrong if a few sheep chilling in burlap sacks and tied to the roof of an alhum. People also love to talk about how many sheep they are going to have and how big they are…really it is sounding more like how we treat x-mas trees as I write this.

Anyways, Tabaski came. Being a good family member I chipped in money for a sheep, Being a ever better volunteer, my ancien came for the festivities. Being a guy he was lucky enough be allowed into the Mosque for the big  morning prayer. I watched my brother, Badji, slaughter and skin the sheep. This was surprisingly less disturbing than I thought it would be and don’t worry I have loads of photos up for you to see.

After eating lots of sheep and fries we had a sheep salad. Having a salad is a little more western and a cause de my lovely sister Sophie. She cooks for an ex-pat school so westernizes her food a bit for Ankit and I. It’s great and I love her for it…The salad even had corn which I ate loads of. It’s just too bad sophie’s work keeps her out of the house soo much, be she is by far my favorite person in the family. (and not just because of the food, but that does help).

At night the kids get all dressed up (this is a mix of traditional and western clothes) and go around asking for money…kinda like Halloween. I did not have enough wecit (small change) but was the lucky recipient of a package with candy corn. Love ya elise, you saved my butt. So I ran down to the corner store, bought tiny bags and gave all the kids candy corn.  I figured it was fitting they receive some Halloween candy, too bad no one said trick or treat. After this Ankit and I got dressed in our Senegalese finest and set out to ask for forgivness.

This was definitely a hoot. I thankfully could get most of what people were saying but also had Badji and Ankit to fill in the rest. We visited all the women in my women’s group and a few family members. It basically went like this at each houee. We showed up, asked for forgiveness, gave them ours. The women listed things they hope god gives us…the common theme was money, health, lots of wives, lots of work, money again….Then everyone  complemented my complet and asked various question about it.  I’m so glad Fatou had such great taste because my complet is a huge hit and makes me immediate friends.  It’s like a super outfit!! Everything was going great until the sun went down and they brought out the pop. Oh goodness. We drank a full pop at every house…I have never felt more full in my life. I started to tell badji he was going to have to do tell them I’ll throw up if I drink anymore. His response was “well you’ll throw up then drink another” Thanks…bit help you are.  Ankit and I finally got home, tired and extremely full. It was good day in all and it was great ot visit the women, because they were so excited and it made me that much more apart of their community.

Now on to Thanksgiving week in Daker..This will be warp speed bullet points b/c everyone knows what Thanksgiving is and Dakar is kinda like America so you won’t be missing cultural info.

□       Left at 4am, arrived at 6am in Dakar, got on a packed mini bus and immediately regretted doing so with my huge hiking bag, didn’t think I would find the regional house in the pitch black and end up wandering Dakar but wound up there unscathed and very proud of my taveling skills

□       Was Charlie brown for our first thanksgiving regional theme party..yes I am aware he was not at the 1^st Turkey day but hey neither were the Nina, Pinta and Santa Maria

□       Played in a mini turkey bowl with some marines, embassy folk and PCs

□       Baked a delicious carrot cake which some drunk person at some of, but not enough to ruin so it still made it to the embassy

□       Tried my darndest to look nice (much harder than I thought it would be) for Thangiving dinner

□       Talked with the embassador for quite a while…she even sat a my table. So did our country Director. I was really excited. ( side note she is from jersey and we bonded over people unjustly making fun of our states)

□       Had a meeting at the pool for a carbon offset program we are trying to start, I hope it goes well for many reasons, but also for the fact that we had first meeting in our bathing suits.

□       Had steak at the French cultural center

□       Went to a bowling alley/poolhall/arcade…won some pool, lost some air hockey and blew up a few pirates

□       Watched OSU dominate Michigan in my jersey, while drinking beer and eating pizza..only downside is that I was with mainly Michigan fans

□       Got talked into stayin Sunday night

□       Stayed with Mary at our embassy friends house. We enjoyed his air conditioning, watched 30 rock and ate chicken dumplings with jello

□       Went bowling

□       Watched Airheads and grownups (the first one is way better) and enjoyed a great night of sleep in a real bed with airconditioning. (Mary and I agreed that we owe mike a huge present for letting us crash in his extra room)

Moral of the bullet points…Dakar is like Disneyland/America.  I had a blast but am happy to be back in Popenguine (and to real life). Also, I will seriously have to consider getting an embassy job, by the way mike describes it, the have a pretty nice set up.

Wow..i’m done. If you made it this far congrats and I will be better about my posts from now on. In’challah.