Settling In

Saturday morning everyone went to their respective locations, with only two Fulbrighters staying in Dakar, myself and Anthony (with his wife Alyson). They hadn’t found housing yet, so they stayed at the hotel while I was driven by an embassy van to my host family’s house in Mermoz.

The yellow place on the left is where I live.

That small structure on top in the back

is my room

When I arrived I met my host mom, Mama Soda, my host dad, Tonton Lamine, and their live-in help, Arame. They actually have another American living with them right now, an exchange student from New Orleans, but she’s out of town with her group until next Saturday. They showed me the house: Walking in the front door, there is a hallway straight ahead, with nothing to the right, and a sitting room with a bedroom to the left. The hallway itself holds a small fridge, some shelves for dining ware, and a low coffee table where smaller meals are eaten (which, being a hallway, makes things a bit cramped).

Continuing down the hallway, it opens up to an outdoor hallway and a staircase to an upper part. Off the outdoor hallway on the left there is another bedroom and a very small kitchen (big enough for one person). On the right, the toilet and a separate shower room (both just big enough for one person to stand). Up the outdoor stairs is my room on the left and the dining terrace on the right. Usually breakfast and lunch are eaten in the hallway and the dinner is outside on the terrace, although I prefer to have my breakfast outside on the terrace because it’s usually pretty nice out there. I would be remiss in providing a good description if I didn’t mention that the house in under the direct path for airplanes landing at Dakar International Airport… very often (maybe once every 10-20 minutes) there is a plane that flies over the house, so low I can practically see how clean the landing gear is! I’m already used to the noise… ;)

My room is about 8 feet by 10 feet with a twin bed, a small desk (think school classroom single desk size), a closet, and a fan. I arrived about 11:30, and we ate lunch around 1:15 before I left again. There was an embassy Oktoberfest/Softball tournament going on that Eran had invited us to, so just after lunch I walked over to Ebbet’s Field, which, luckily for me, is only about a 10 minute walk from the house. Ebbet’s Field is a sports field and playground owned by the US Embassy and for exclusive use of embassy staff & their family (except on special occasions such as this). It’s right on the waterfront (but no beach… that part of the coast is rocks/cliffs), so it has a great view and a nice breeze.

I watched some of the softball games, finally got a hard cider (!!!) and met a lot of the embassy staff and other Americans working in Dakar. I stayed until about 5pm, then headed home. Dinner is usually at 8pm, so I had some time to unpack a little before that time. It felt great after living out of a suitcase for the last 6 weeks to be able to actually unpack!

Ebbet's Field

Sunday morning Tonton helped me get a taxi out to Parcelles Assanies, which is another neighborhood in Dakar quite a distance away. I went out there to check out a church that was planted last year by a missionary that my church in Delaware supports. The pastor here, Brett, and pastor Dan at Skypointe in Wilmington went to school together, so he Pastor Dan put me in touch with Brett before I left Delaware. I wanted to check out their church, so they met me at an easier to find location and took me to the small church they planted. Because the church is composed of Senegalese, Nigerian and Togolese members, the service is done in both English and French. After church, Brett, his wife Elise, and their 4 adorable children took me out to lunch, which was very nice! Then they drove around a bit showing me downtown Dakar (stopping at a great coffee place to grab drinks on the go) before dropping me back in Mermoz. I really enjoyed being at their church, and I wish it was closer to where I lived, but I think the distance is going to make it hard for me to go there on a regular basis. There is an international church that meets within walking distance to where I live, so I’m going to check that out and see how I like it.

I was feeling very run down at that point, almost to the point of being sick, and realized that I had had too many full days in a row without being able to recover from traveling so far and the jetlag that comes with, so I spent the rest of the afternoon/evening resting. Monday I was feeling mostly better after having slept really well, but it was also mostly just resting and preparing my presentation for the conference (presentation subject: Service Learning, Active Citizenship, and Leadership Training).

FASTEF

Tuesday morning I went to the university where I will be teaching to meet the head of the ELT department. My counterpart, Mr. Boye wasn’t there of course because he’s at the conference I would be leaving for the next morning. Dr. Coly simply welcomed me and introduced me to two other English teachers who were there. I won’t start until next week because I’m at the conference for the rest of the week, but technically, classes started this week… and I say technically, because while I was there one instructor went to her first class of the semester, but came back about 20 minutes later because only one student had shown up… “I guess we’ll start next week” she nonchalantly says. Welcome to Africa J

Tomorrow morning I leave for Saly, which is the subject of my next blog post J