dakar daze

(this update is from last friday but i got sick again- just a short bug- and then we moved apartments; so i didn't get a chance to post it!)


Wow! So we’ve been running from one meeting/celebration to the next the last few days. The weather in Dakar is gorgeous and actually a lot colder than I imagined, especially at night. Let’s see, on Monday Mike’s advisor invited us to come meet her for a feast to celebrate the return of a friend’s wife from Mecca. Everyone was incredibly well dressed (which seems to be a trend here) and welcoming (also a trend) and afterward we went to her house to discuss the project and our backgrounds and interest in it. While there we met up with one of her students, “Laye,” who is actually a resident surgeon at the university and now our good friend.

He immediately volunteered to drive us wherever we needed to go and get us settled in (he’s currently searching for an apartment for us with his extended family and friends). We are having dinner with his family on Sunday, which we are excited about. Below is a pic of him in front of the psych hospital that we visited on wednesday, where we will be observing next week.

Later in the day we met Mike’s host family from five years ago, when he was in Senegal as a study abroad student. The mother is half French and half-Senegalese and quite a character, fun-loving and incredibly honest and in-your-face. The daughter was clearly very happy to see Mike and had gotten married and had a son in the time since Mike had seen her last, which I’m sure was a bit strange for him to think about. The other brothers and sisters weren’t there, so we had a small gathering topped off with a visit from Mike’s old drum professor and friend, “Pape” (pronounced “Pop,” this means “junior” in wolof, but it becomes a person’s name at times). Pape came over with his brother and their drums to say hi and even gave me my first taste of Senegalese drumming (which is amazing).


Pape invited us over to spend time with his family the next day, and we happily (though somewhat tiredly) accepted. We got there and were immediately greeted by the extended family and treated to cheebu jen, the national dish which consists of fish and rice steeped in an array of flavors and vegetables (more details on this later), and the family photo album. I struggled to respond to questions in my limited French and Mike struggled to remember his once-decent Wolof. In the background, the brother and cousin were busy making a big drum called the sabaar (see pic), which, along with playing the drums, is their family trade. In fact, Mike will be buying a smaller “talking drum,” or tama from them soon (this is the instrument he learned to play with them 5 years ago). By the way, if anyone wants a senegalese drum made, please email me and i will help you buy a drum from this amazing family.

The visit made me feel like I was getting a real taste of Senegal (a far cry from the neighborhood where we are staying with its high rises and foreigners, etc). It ended with a drink of the special green tea, which they make in tiny batches in an elaborate process that ends by decanting the tea and swooshing it between cups several times (see pic). The flavor is like carmelized green tea and quite strong.

The family invited us to their drumming gig last night at a young woman’s birthday party, which was incredible. Before the guests arrived, the guys set up with their drums and started practicing, which was awesome. They would pick up a beat and then just go crazy with the variations. Mike had fun learning some of the rhythms, which they clearly enjoyed teaching him. All the guests arrived dressed in gorgeous fabrics and headwraps or fancy American-style dresses or some combination of western and Senegalese clothing. They clearly enjoy getting dressed up for each other and getting together. It is a very gender-divided ceremony with the women attending and dancing, and the men drumming. It was cool to be there and see the interaction between the drummers and the woman dancing (usually it is just one woman at a time, and she dances for about 30 seconds or a minute in front of the drumming group, who vary the beat according to how she is dancing) and the overall energy in the room (people got really into the music, which was the main point of the event). well, i'm off, but i promise more pics soon!

ps mike totally looks like an ipod commercial right now with his dreaded hair, dancing, and of course, prominently displayed mp3 player in mug-me-white (luckily we’re inside right now).

day 2

stopped in to upload the post from yesterday and now find myself typing on a french keyboard, which is totally bizarre. in any case, today i woke up a bit sick (i think from the sleeping funny and plane germs) so we took it "easy" today and just walked up the main street along the water into the downtown area, stopping along the way cause i wasn’t feeling so great and meeting my first batch of extremely friendly and welcoming locals .

the coast is beautiful and i'm sure i will enjoy it even more after i kick this headache. so far mike is in culture shock- apparently the city has changed a ton since 5 years ago. there are lots of tourists and expats here living in luxury or studying abroad or what have you. Anyways, i think he’ll be fine soon and hopefully i’ll pick up enough french or wolof to not make a complete culo out of myself everytime i open my mouth- we’ll see...

first day in dakar

(written yesterday)

well we made it to Dakar, after all, and now I’m waiting for water to boil into tea and getting ready to do some yoga in the fabulous apartment one of the people in mike’s program is letting us stay in with another friend of hers while she’s gone (went home for the holidays and is coming back in a week).

the two days’ airplane journey was fun as always (the flying time was almost equaled by the amount of time I spent waiting in the airports). I read vonnegut’s entire new book in the borders book store in logan airport (I was in boston for a few days before we took off for Senegal and got to visit with friends from university and mike’s family). it was great, though very different from his novels, and a humorous kick in the butt to think about some of the really important issues the world is facing right now (I guess you earn the right to be a bit concerned and upset and speak your mind once you turn 80).

anyways, I spent most of the flights dozing off and trying to learn more French (which is to say, some French) and watching snippets of movies (including an independent African film with French subtitles, a bizarre film called Palais Royale and even some Jojo-style romantic comedy with Reese Witherspoon in it, which alternately guiltily entertained me and made me want to stick a writing utensil through my eye.

when I landed in Dakar I was greeted by the embassy expeditor (yeah, that was cool) who asked me how it was going in French. I could respond- go me!- since that was one of the 5 things I can say in French so far, with the French equivalent of “it goes,” which is to say fine. she then helped me grab my things and make it through customs. the whole process was 99% painless (the one disconcerting thing was that mike had to wait outside the airport when he came to meet me (his flight got in 4 hrs early so he went exploring with some friends he made probably 30 seconds earlier, knowing him, in the meantime. so I wasn’t sure where he was when I was inside, but that was fine since I had the embassy lady to take me to the apartment anyways!

when we got there we realized that our sleeping-bags-on-the-floor idea of crashing with someone was completely wrong. the place is more spacious than we could have imagined (roomy bedrooms, a living room, a dining room, a kitchen, 2 bathrooms, hot water!!! it feels very strange to be living in such luxury- mike says that on his last trip to Senegal he only used hot water once in 4 months and we’ve already had a hot shower since arriving! needless to say, we are more than comfortable right now as we begin to look for a more mike-and-jackie-style apartment and track down some of our contacts this weekend. the sun is shining and the view from the dining room, where I am about to do yoga, includes the sparkling shoreline (ah sun, how I’ve missed thee) with a few rocky piers jutting out and some enormous birds drifting by. the buildings look a lot like other buildings I’ve seen in the developing world- concrete, lots of levels, very rectangular. in any case, I’m off for yoga… more details soon, after we actually DO something!

tying rocks to trees in hampi

this was a tree we paused to contemplate on one of our hikes in the city of hampi, where we stayed for a little less than a week. the faithful tie rocks (using scraps of cloth, plastic bags, and other creative means) to this impressive tree and then proceed to say a prayer while walking around it. if you tie a rock to the tree and follow the rules, your prayer is supposed to be answered.

it was interesting to first come upon it and not have any idea why people had tied rocks to the tree or what you were supposed to do in its presence. it made me want to create an installation with a similar feel.

parlez plus lentement, s'il vous plait

happy new year to all! I spent the new year with my alter ego, “alter,” in Chicago, at a friend’s house downtown. it was really wild to see so many of my friends from high school whom I haven’t spoken to in more than 3 years… oops! yeah, I guess I’m not so good at keeping in touch. anyways, it was fine— I didn’t even really want to go because new years’ celebrations can be so tedious and anticlimactic and expensive, but my alter wasn’t gonna go if I didn’t so I felt like I should put my overly cynical, anti-social tendencies aside and head for the city. the train there was free, which was nice, and packed with suburbanites streaming downtown for the festivities, which was not as nice.

anyways, after the ball ceremoniously dropped in ny an hour before midnight here, we drank some champagne and then waited for our turn… after an hour we counted along with the tv to midnight in Chicago, at which point alter and I decided we were entirely too sober for the rest of the crowd and headed upstairs to attempt to start a dance party. well, of course once dancing, I could not be stopped and spent the rest of the night doing pretty much that. alter’s friend from college/university stopped by, and we had fun trying to psychoanalyze her on account of her boy issues and generally swap alter stories.

on new years day my parents and i went for another of our famous walks in the forest preserves of chicagoland and then watched "the lion, the witch, and the wardrobe." it dutifully transported me back to the anything's-possible, narnical time of pre-adolescence when erin and i used to spend weekends making sketches of tree houses that we would of course one day move into, escaping modern society and all the rest.


since new years, I have been pretty much doing more of the same- cooking elaborate veggieish meals (today we’re making rosemary wheat bread and broccoli soup), trying to square away some projects before Senegal, trying to use cars as little as possible despite living in suburbia, and even learning “un peu du francais.” we’ll see… everything after bonjour monsieur is still way over my head.

on a side note, I officially haven’t seen the sun in a week… yeah Chicago winter.

I’m trying to stick to my yoga routine, as I always feel amazing after doing it, but some days I get up and then get too hungry to want to do 1-2 hours of yoga- doh! having a spoonful of chyvanaprasha (an ayurvedic supplement made with amla and honey and ghee) helps as long as I get going right after taking it. anyways, I’m as always trying to get my parents eating more fruits and vegetables and going on walks every day. they think I’m a health nazi (though I beg to differ), so I have to watch out and not be too pushy with my daily recommendations of what they should and shouldn’t eat and do. hehehe. now if I could just follow my own advice…