Another Adventure with Nate

Nate and I are notorious for our random, half thought-out ideas on things that we should do. This weeks adventure...Ouahigouya pool day. We had talked about it for a bit but I hadn't decided if I was going to go or not. Nate's infinite line "Come on Karina. It will be cool," is what got me. So he wakes me up yesterday morning and says that we are leaving in 10 minutes. I get up, throw my swim suit in my backpack and we head out the door. The plan was to go to the bank before hand but of course we didnt make it in time and all the money we had was enough to get us to Ouahigouya and that's it. So of course we decided to chance it and go anyway. The bus ride was fairly pleasant. It only took about 2.5 hours to get there, and the view was nice. When we got there we were both really surprised at how developed it really is up there, at least in Ouahigouya. For those of you who don't know Ouahigouya is in the north (a region I hadn't yet been to).   It was crazy nice there. A lot pf people throw out the world "Ville" to describe things that compared to Ouahigouya are just big villages. Our bikes however, did not make it on the bus with us so they were coming later. Fate was on our side because we found a bank that was open til 15h on a Saturday! Unfortunately fate threw us a curveball and the pool actually was closed because they were treating it! We headed all the way up to Ouahigouya only to not be able to use the pool. Sad sad day. We did however spend a lovely day eating good food and drinking. It turned out to be pretty good. 


Today is a cloudy/rainy day so Nate and I decided to head back to Ouaga. There is no point in staying there if there was going to be no pool day. So back to Ouaga it was. There are so many people at the transit house the have finished their service and they are all getting ready to go home. I didn't much feel like socializing that much so I headed to the bureau to get some work done and spent most of the time playing in the internet and talking to Ebben. It's been nice chatting with him. Now I need to stop playing around and do some work. :)

Mid-service conference

This week we had our mid-service conference. I can't believe that we have already made it this far. The days are long but the years are short, honestly. The first morning was medical stuff. We all were either at the dentist or at the med unit. That took an incredibly long time, but it all went well. I had lunch with Nate and then we headed back to the the hotel for afternoon sessions. We did a lot of sharing about our experiences and lives in village. It was cool to hear about all the things that people are doing and how their adjusting to being in village. I went to the dentist and had my teach clean. My favorite part was being able to be roommates with Su-dawg and laughing all night like we did at IST. I learned a lot.

Prom

A Mid-Service Night's Dream...prom number 2. There seems to be a trend in the fact that we always have to have a prom whenever we are together. This prom I would definitely put in the win category. Of course Su and I wore matching outfits...(as cutest couple duh!). We drank and danced all night long! It was an amazing night with amazing friends. Ismael and Seydou came as well and we all had a great time. I can't wait until COS prom!

What's to Come 

One year down...one to go. This time is almost going by too fast. I talked to my mom today about staying a third year. She supports it. Even though I know that she misses me like crazy, she is still 100% behind me on it. Pool day tomorrow with Nate, we have Camp Glow in the next week, I'll be at Week 10 stage, then Bobo for hanging out with Saiba, then back to Ouaga for the food security meeting. There's a whole lot that I'm looking forward to doing not only in this next couple of weeks, but in the next year. Stay tuned...it's gonna be good.

Senegal/Gambia

Day 1

It was the perfect day to travel. I was super excited about this upcoming trip. I was already sleeping at the bureau so I just went downstairs to meet up with George and the driver to head to the airport. We picked up Nina and Jason on the way. We got to the airport and checked in and sat around waiting for our flight to Dakar. Nina, Jason and I chatted for a while and had breakfast with George. The flight was great. We got a great meal on the flight. We got to Dakar and one of the guys thought that because I was wearing a sling on my right arm I couldn’t write so he filled out all my paperwork. Little did he know that I am left handed, but at least I got to cut in front of everyone. There was a guy getting beat up by a guard for some reason and there were yellow taxis! Our hotel was amazing!!! It was like $125 dollars a night. The wireless was so fast and amazing. Each got our own rooms. After a hot shower we went down to the lobby for a snack. We all shared a plate of chicken, cold cuts, salad, and goat cheese. It was amazing. So tasty! We went out on the town of Dakar. The hotel was so close to the beach so we decided to start there. At the beach there was soooooo many people but the water was so dirty. There was a bunch of dead animals and trash. It was depressing that we were at the beach and very much didn’t want to get in the water. We walked around and I stopped to buy a great shirt from these Rasta guys. It was a pretty epic shirt. I got a good deal because the guys were real cool. We walked around and saw a Tapas bar. We went in and they were playing sweet music and the ambiance was chill so we decided to stay and have a beer. We had peanuts, olives and beer. After we were all pretty hungry for real food so we went to a great restaurant. I had seafood spaghetti; Nina had a pizza and Jason have fish sauce Yassa. It was all so delicious. Issaka called me during dinner to tell me that he was back in Yoro and to see what I was up to. It was nice to hear from him. Dinner was great but we were all so tired from the trip that we just wanted to head back to the hotel. I reveled in the a/c, hot showers and wireless internet all night. Nina and I made plans to go shopping the next morning since we had some time before we had to catch our flight.

Day 2

The beds were so comfy I had a ridiculously hard time waking up, but I didn’t want to miss shopping. I showered and headed over to Nina’s room. We went down to breakfast and found Jason and George already there. It was an all you can eat breakfast! Nina and I were so shameless when we started. I mean, come on, they had nems and chicken wings. We asked someone who works at the hotel where we could go shopping and he gave us directions to a shopping mall. A REAL shopping mall!!! This mall had real stores, with real over priced shoes and clothes. I couldn’t believe it….also we couldn’t afford anything in the mall. It was a sad situation but it was great just to be there at all. We walked around a bit more and bought hair dye from a super market. I want really light hair so I bought like super blonde dye. We headed back to our hotel and started to get ready to go catch our flight to The Gambia. The flight literally took less than 30 minutes. It was pretty silly. We got to The Gambia and were greeted back Peace Corps Gambia. I got in the car and instantly feel asleep. I couldn’t keep my eyes open the entire way to the hotel. George said that he couldn’t believe how quiet I was haha. The hotel in the Gambia was cool (though not as nice as the one in Dakar). There wasn’t very much to do when we got here so Nina dyed my hair. Unfortunately it didn’t come out really any lighter. It was time to head out on the town so we started out. We walked down a street called “Senegambia” We walked down the end and saw a sign that said that there is a monkey park and a croc expedition when all of a sudden I saw a monkey!!!!!!!! There was a guy feeding it. I freaked out with excitement; I’ve never been that close to a real monkey before. Then another one walked by! A security guy came out with a bag of peanuts. He saw how excited I was and put some in my hand. The monkey came up and took them out of my hand and ate them! The security guy us all peanuts and we fed the monkeys and it was incredible. I couldn’t believe that was happening. When all the peanuts were gone we tried to figure out what we should ask for dinner but we also wanted to watch the Spain v. Italy Euro Cup game. We stopped in for a beer at a really crowded/cool bar. Eventually hunger got the best of us so I suggested that we go back to this restaurant that I had seen that had seafood. That was a great choice because not only did they have an amazing food but they also showed the game so we got to watch Spain kick Italy’s ass. After the game we went to the super market and back to the hotel and met Ben, a PCV from Togo. He was super sweet and cool and we all went out for beers. Then headed back to our rooms.

Day 3

All the Peace Corps Volunteers arrived today!!! I met volunteers from Ghana, Gambia, Guinea, Togo, Benin, Senegal and 2 staff from Mali. Nina, Jason and I kind of showed up to breakfast late and got the bottom of the barrel stuff. We met up with George after to work on our presentations and go over some other stuff. We had a free day so what did we decided to do??? Go to the beach of course! Nina, Ben and I headed to the beach. The sand here is black! The water is warm! Ben didn’t have his swimsuit but he was nice enough to watch our stuff for us while we took a swim. There was nothing that could have beaten that. After a swim we went to grab some lunch because we were famished. We headed to this stand and this lady was selling fish and chips that she grilled right in front of us. It was delicious. Nina and I wanted to go shopping and invited Ben but he wasn’t really down for that so we headed out. We took 2 taxis to get there and the market was huge! It was a little overwhelming and we spent the afternoon there and the only thing we came back with was sunburns and a pagne that I bought. Needless to say that was slightly disappointing. We had to be in the conference room by five so we headed back to take showers but the water was out. In the conference room we had the opening remarks and introductions. We officially met everyone and headed to dinner in the hotel. The other volunteers that are here are awesome. I sat with Ben, Mike, Abbey, Jason and Chase. Abbey was awesome. I told her about our trip to the market and she (being a PCV in Gambia) offered to take us shopping on Friday if our fight doesn’t leave early. Dinner was amazing. There was salad, potato salad, coleslaw, stuffed grilled fish, chicken, beef stir-fry, and fruit salad for dinner. It was raining so we headed up to our rooms and called it a night.   

Day 4

6:45am came early today. Headed down for an omelet and baked beans breakfast. It’s a funny combination but surprisingly good. Sessions started at 8 am and the time went by really fast. We did all of our country presentations and I really learned a lot about some of the work that the other volunteers are working on. They are served us fried chicken and meat pies for snack. Fried chicken snack?! That’s crazy talk. We went back into sessions and discussed what it means to be a Food Security Task Force. I’m really looking forward to getting back to site and working on some new projects. We went out to dinner as a group to this amazing pizza place. It’s the closest thing to real pizza I’ve had in the last year. It was fun to hang out with and get to know the other volunteers. George is having a really great time here. It’s a great group, we are all really clicking. It’s really been a good time so far.

I’ve been doing a lot of thing lately about plans for the future, and going over things that happened in the past. Now that I’m in my second year as a Peace Corps volunteer I’ve been thinking about the projects that I should work on in my remaining year. I’m so involved in the FSTF that I think that’s what I want to focus on. I do want to get more involved in the school but also working with my community on food security projects. I’ve also been thinking about possibilities for after my service. There are a lot of 3^rd year possibilities in the food security aspects of Peace Corps. The more I think about it the more I’m into the idea of staying for a third year. I’ve not made any formal decisions but it’s just an idea that I’ve been tossing around in my head.

Looking forward to our field trip tomorrow to a women’s garden and bee farm.

Day 5

Happy 4^th of July!  Today we went to visit a beehive farm here in Gambia. It definitely inspired me to work on apiculture in Yoro. I learned so much about it. I’ve seen some bee houses in Yoro but I don’t know who owns them or if anyone takes care of it at all. I want to definitely go back and do a needs assessment to see if it will be a feasible/ sustainable project to start with my community. We got to taste fresh honey and it was amazing! It was so sweet and delicious. I bought some for my Yoro family and for Issaka. After the bee farm we went to visit a Women’s garden. The garden was very well cared for and it gives women a chance to start a garden and sell what they grow at the market. I thought the garden was amazing but I don’t think that it’s very sustainable. They get all their supplies and funding from some Taiwanese NGO. What happens if the decide to cut the funding? Would the women be able to support themselves and pay for the supplies? I sure do hope so! We had sessions the rest of the day we spent in sessions. We went out to dinner as a group at an amazing restaurant in Senegambia. After that we had beer and fireworks on the beach to celebrate the 4^th of July. Sitting on the beach is fun but also never fails to make me nostalgic. I started thinking about a lot of things and missing stuff. It’s good to think about that kind of stuff sometimes I guess. The night was amazing, we drank and danced and just enjoyed each other’s company.

Tomorrow is the last day of the summit L

Day 6

Last day of the conference. It was lucky that we didn’t oversleep because my IPod alarm never went off. We did our sessions and worked on project plans. We spent most of the time socializing with each other and sharing ideas and projects. We had all shared our project plans and there was a little ceremony where we all received certificates for all the work that we did and attending. We had our last dinner together at the hotel. After dinner we all went out to the “Scottish Embassy” which is a bar here. Nina, Chase and I played a rousing game of “Snakes and Ladders” but as a drinking game…So Fun! Whoever would have guessed that would have been as fun as it was? I was able to talk to the volunteer who works on the beekeeping farm here. He gave me his contact information and told me that he would answer any questions that I have, which is great because I have a lot. We got back to the hotel after making plans with Abbey to go shopping in the morning before we leave. Back the hotel we packed up our bags so that we could be ready to go in the morning. I'm so excited to be going shopping tomorrow. I hope that we find some great clothes and stuff to buy at the market before heading back to Burkina. I wish that we had more time here. Not sure if I'm ready to go back. I do miss Issaka and my friends, and I’m really excited to see Nate this weekend!

Day 7

Back to Burkina today. This morning we met up with Abbey to go to the market and it was awesome. I wasn’t able to buy much because we didn’t really have a lot of time. It was cool hanging with Abbey. She went with us to the airport. Spent the entire day traveling…now I'm back at the transit house J