Tuesday, July 19, 2005
Tambacounda, Senegal
After a very productive stay in Sedhiou where El Hadji Malik, the acting director of the regional hospital, gave us a significant amount of information on the Senegalese government's national HIV/AIDs sensitization projects, we headed east to Tambacounda. It wasn't long until we were back on sealed roads and we flew though towns gleaming as the sun glanced off the more wealthy villagers' corrugate roofs. Old men on bicycles leisurely pedaled with faded brown beanies protecting their heads from the sun and their austere Muslim kaftans blowing in the wind. As we drove through colorful and chaotic weekly markets sprawling across the main road, music once again resounded in the Stingray from our newly repaired radio.
Traveling through rural francophone Senegal has also given me the opportunity to speak Puular regularly again, which I haven't had much of an opportunity to use since leaving my Peace Corps village two years ago. While Nate and Tuuli were able to navigate our way through the majority of checkpoints and customs stops with their French, it felt useful to be able to throw some local dialect around when otherwise I felt like the mute driver.
When we reached the hot and sprawling city of Tambacounda with time to spare, we stopped by the regional Peace Corps transit house and planned a number of meetings with locally based counterparts for the following day.
After a very productive stay in Sedhiou where El Hadji Malik, the acting director of the regional hospital, gave us a significant amount of information on the Senegalese government's national HIV/AIDs sensitization projects, we headed east to Tambacounda. It wasn't long until we were back on sealed roads and we flew though towns gleaming as the sun glanced off the more wealthy villagers' corrugate roofs. Old men on bicycles leisurely pedaled with faded brown beanies protecting their heads from the sun and their austere Muslim kaftans blowing in the wind. As we drove through colorful and chaotic weekly markets sprawling across the main road, music once again resounded in the Stingray from our newly repaired radio.
Traveling through rural francophone Senegal has also given me the opportunity to speak Puular regularly again, which I haven't had much of an opportunity to use since leaving my Peace Corps village two years ago. While Nate and Tuuli were able to navigate our way through the majority of checkpoints and customs stops with their French, it felt useful to be able to throw some local dialect around when otherwise I felt like the mute driver.
When we reached the hot and sprawling city of Tambacounda with time to spare, we stopped by the regional Peace Corps transit house and planned a number of meetings with locally based counterparts for the following day.
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