23.10.07

ok so there are alot of things to update about...i will try to do this chronologically for my mental state. last week we had an AIDS session called "an AIDS reminder: come home healthy" which included a simulation of writing down specific things/beings in your life that are really important and then crossing them off with the simulation leader going into detail about losing that thing or ability or person or whatever. needless to say it ended in a few of us crying. hysterically. including me. but not because i was sad about losing things, well i was, but also because i was thinking about people with AIDS that lose things that are as important to them as my list was and i felt sad. hands down BEST way to learn about AIDS. then we watched a movie about 5 peace corps volunteers that got AIDS while they were abroad and that was nauseatingly sad too. the next day we visited the "ecopole" which is the poorest area in dakar (it is a pocket of extremely impoverished families living right in the bustle of downtown dakar which keeps them plenty aware that they're poor and isolated) where they are trying to teach the people living there how to make things with trash to sell each year at their exposé. they make everything from rugs out of woven plastic bags to lamps out of wire and bottle caps. their stuff is pretty clever. the area is also known as "le quartier raille" (rail quarter) because the train tracks used to go through there. then saturday we went to ile de goré which is where they have "la porte sans retourne" (the door of no return) in a house where they brought and processed africans that they were shipping overseas with the slave trade. being in that house made me want to scream and cry or throw up. i'm not sure which one. so i had to step out. besides that they island was bea-u-ti-ful. i took bad pictures though. luckily the other ladies took many pictures and we're sharing them. ok now that i've updated the sad parts...let's talk reggae. so saturday night there were some sortie (going out) options and i decided to attend the outdoor reggae concert that was going to be near my house. it cost 1500 CFA ($3) to get in and that included a Flag beer. so three of us ladies attended the concert with one of the other ladies' host brothers and friends and as usual, on senegalese time, we got there after 1 as the music was just starting. and all i did all night was dance, dance, dance. for a little while, i danced two wonderful arm's lengths away from a senegalese man with 1 inch think lenses on his glasses and vaguely reminded me of steve urkel. we danced until after 4am and i still regretted going home because i was having so much fun dancing without being accosted by young men. then sunday i slept until 1am which i felt horrible about but i somehow dealt with my alarm in my sleep and didn't get up until 1. at which point i realized my feet were dusty-filthy. then i went to a soccer game Karack vs. Grand Dakar (kind of like neighborhood vs. other neighborhood) and ooooooh boy was it intense! Grand Dakar is kind of like the ghetto near Karack (i live in SICAP Karack) and i guess their fans are pretty intense and tend to get in fights over the soccer matches but it was calm when i left even though we won 3-1. i heard there was a fight later though. it was really fun. there are some intense djembé drummers there that do. not. stop. they don't use electronic anything either. you just keep track of the score and the time yourself...if you can. the power was out most of sunday so i went to bed at 9pm when it was dark and there wasn't anything important to do. the power goes out all the time here. it even went out today. i am hoping really hard right now that it won't go out before i post this blog too..............................



jamm rekk (peace only) - a positive response to how's your day/night.