Substantive Update: Work, Home Life, Food etc.

Work (this may be boring to some of you, so skim it at your leisure):

There are three major projects in the works at FAS right now. The first is the General Assembly of all the FAS members where they'll be evaluating the work they've all done over the past 10 years and setting goals for projects to come. They're all about monitoring and evaluation here (Dad, you'd be proud). They've hired 4 outside consultants to perform case studies and evaluations of their work, which will be presented at the assembly. It's taking place in Bamako Mali in the middle of June. I'm not sure yet if I get to go...but I'm crossing my fingers that I'll be invited. But I've been helping them write, edit and translate materials to present at the conference.

The second project is a consultative meeting of civil society organizations that takes place just before the annual African Union summit. Two years ago, the AU passed the "Solemn Declaration on Gender Equality in Africa", which affirmed a commitment to promote gender equality in the areas of health, education, peace and security, governance, human rights, and economic development. FAS is responsible for monitoring progress in the realm of peace and security. So, my job is to research what different governments (and regional bodies and civil society orgs etc.) have done to mainstream gender into their approach to peace and security. I'll be more or less writing the report that will be presented at the meeting.

The third project is more of an ongoing project to establish the pan-african center for gender, peace and security in Dakar. They've partnered with the University of Peace (in Costa Rica) to provide trainings and workshops for men and women in the fields of peace and conflict resolution and development. Their first training is in July and I think i'll be attending it.

So, that's what we're working on. I'm pretty excited about it.

I'll write more about the people I work with next time....

Home Life:
Last night I made some progress figuring out who is who in my host family. I think my host mother may have told me the first night, but I was definitely not awake or clear-headed enough to follow. So it's been a process to figure out who all the people living with me are. But here is is, in a nutshell:
Coumba is my host mother. She and her husband, whose name I still haven't quite grasped, live there with two of their four sons. He is a teacher but currently works for the ministry of education. They're pretty well-off, certainly at least by Senegal standards. Their two sons are Mustaffa (17 or 18 - he's studying for the BAC right now so I don't see him much) and Ousmane (or Papis, as they call him). I've talked to Ousmane the most because he's around the house a lot and isn't working right now. He's agreed to take me around town and introduce me to some of his friends, because otherwise I don't have much of an opportunity to get out and meet people (I've been told not to go out alone because it's not safe for me...at least not yet since I don't know my way around at all). In addition to these four, the wife (Anty) of one of the other sons lives in the house with her son (Mohommed). He's 4 years old and likes to play cards with me (I tried to teach him go fish and war, but he doesn't really like rules...so it's been a challenge. I'm also not sure he really knows how to count very well yet, which is a barrier as well :) In addition to the family members, Loubna is a Moroccan med student who also lives with us and is quite friendly.

Food:
The food is definitely tastier here than what we ate in Uganda. More spices and flavors. At my host family, I eat alone rather than with the family. I don't know why. My host mother said she always does it that way for students. I'd rather eat with them, but either way she's cooking for me and feeding me and I'm not going to complain! But at work, we eat together Senegalese style. Which means, a big bowl of rice and sauce and various meats and fish and vegetables in a big bowl that everyone eats out of. You take a spoon and eat out of your side of the bowl. For breakfast I eat about a quarter of a baguette and butter, sometimes part of a melon or mango, and some juice and hot powdered milk with sugar (I've opted out of the nescafe option but will probably reconsider because something tells me I might get tired of just hot milk). They don't eat lunch until about 3:30 and dinner until 9 or so, so I've realized I need to snack a bit more than usual. The snacks they sell here are decidedly French - a lot of the same cookies and cheeses I ate in France, so that's kind of cool. But all of the imported stuff is pretty expensive.

Misc...
We had a discussion about polygamy over lunch. Apparently Moussa, one of the men who works here, wants to take a second wife. When they asked me what I thought, I asked why he needed a second wife. He explained to me that in his religion (he's Muslim) he is allowed 4. I said, that didn't really answer my question. One of the women here, Ngara, was on my side. She was giving him a hard time. Apparently her husband wants to take a second wife as well. So I asked whether she wanted a second husband. Moussa told me that wasn't allowed (of course). But Ngara liked the idea. When I asked him why not, he said his religion only allowed it for the men. Then, in Wolof, one of the other men (I don't know his name yet, but he's the maintenance person) said they tried that once and it killed the first husband! Then they continued to argue, in Wolof and I was lost....but it sounded pretty heated. So...yeah. I signed up for classes in Wolof this morning so that I can participate a bit more fully in these and other discussions :) I'll keep you updated as I progress.

That's all for today. Happy Memorial Day everyone. I don't think I'll be celbrating in the traditional mannor this year, but I'll be thinking of you all bar-b-qing in parks around the country!!!