A grab-bag of a day

In the land where you could wait for hours for a meeting to start, even though there was a start time, my mood often changes in an instant. I swear I wasn't this irrational at home but something about Senegal has put me and fellow volunteers (Jackie blogged about it a few days ago... yes we read each other's blogs....) on an emotional roller coaster.
I didn't have much planned for today - with the Magal coming up people are all over the place so having meetings is kind of difficult. I spent my morning responding to letters from my World Wide Schools class (more on that another time, and thank you class for all the letters!). Lunch was generally uneventful, reheated chicken, rice, and onion sauce from I think two days ago, and I spent the beginning of my afternoon annoyed at my host dad. I was annoyed for a stupid reason, I've had a head cold/allergies to something and today he told me I shouldn't drink cold water because that's making my stuffed nose worse, it was the general super patriarchal-ness of Senegal that had me peeved.
Around 5pm, I set off to meet Awa, the work partner I gushed about in The Dating Game blog. She lives across town so it's about a 15 minute walk. Today walking there I got yelled at probably more than I have ever in Bambey; they were hissing, yelling Toubab, yelling "madame," yelling about how pretty I was, making kissing noises... everything. I spent the whole walk fantasizing about turning around and just screaming, "WHAT? WHAT DO YOU WANT? WHAT GOOD DO YOU THINK BEING THAT RUDE COULD POSSIBLY DO YOU?" But, alas, I have not yet hit the possibly inevitable breaking point, and I kept walking. Right before I got to Awa's I gathered myself and tried to get out of me "freaking'fracking'Senegal" mood.
Spending time with Awa is my oasis in the desert. We didn't even really talk about the project, just about life in general. We hung out and it was amazing. I really like my host family but it's so nice to have someone relative to my age (she's Noah's age, actually) to hang out with. I've heard the warning that finding Senegalese friends is hard for some female volunteers because you're at a different point in your life as many people your age, which is something I've found to be sort of true - except with Awa. I could continue for hours but I'll leave it at: when I told her that I didn't really like kids (which Senegalese AND some Americans respond negatively to) she agreed with me! She agreed that, though she'll want kids one day, she doesn't want them now and they're annoying - it was amazing! Oh, also, she bought me shoes, I didn't ask her for anything but she said she was in Touba and thinking of me and wanted to buy me shoes! She's so nice!
I walked home in a really good mood and when some 40-something year old woman asked me for money I was able to just laugh it off. A few blocks away some girls that always greet me, by my name, asked me to come over and read to them. They're probably 10 and they had some French homework so I made them read the story for a little then I read a few lines.
I got home around 7:30 aka MARINA. I think I've mentioned it in passing but Marina is my guilty pleasure. It's a Telemundo soap opera and it is SO good. I'll go into more in detail another time, but it revolves around Marina and her recently ex-husband Ricardo, their real son Cheuy (who just found out he was their son - everyone thought he died at birth), their adopted daughter Patricia (who's been kidnapped to a Houston hospital by her real mom who then told everyone she died - Patricia has an unnamed illness that's actually being treated). Of course you can't forget Fredirico (who's in love with Marina and about to marry her) who schemed with the very evil Veronica (who's about to marry Ricardo) to break Marina and Ricardo up. ANYWAY. I was sitting with one host sister who was tuned into another soap (Toubillon de Passions) as my host mom told her to tell the other girls Marina was on... turns out the plan was to watch Marina on one tv in our "living room" so Awa (not the project partner, but a host sister - it's a popular name) could watch the other show on the other tv. It was soap opera heaven.
After Marina was dinner (green bean sauce and bread) and I came upstairs because I didn't want to watch a show in Wolof.
Now I'm off to bed for a few hours before watching the State of the Union.

KO