Senegal

Well, its hot season now here in Mali, so to escape the heat (and take a break) Dave took me to Senegal for a little vacay. He'd been to Dakar twice before, but since I'd never been we decided we could both use a little beach time. Overall I think Senegal was really nice, really modern in some ways that Mali will take a long time to achieve. The people weren't as friendly or as helpful as I've found Malians to be (especially in central Dakar) but everything else was great.

The first half of our vacation was spent in a little beach town a little south of Dakar. It was rather quaint; we stayed in a nice, simple hotel owned by some foreigners, and spent a lot of time on the beach eating and reading. It seemed like it was more of a hippie-ish influenced town, at least the area where all the foreigners came to vacation. Guys would hang out on the beach all day, doing nothing but working out or chatting up tourists or playing music; I was amused to see a lot of buff looking guys around, looking to act as "host" for any group of foreigners willing to take them on, preferably women. But the atmosphere was definitely relaxed, and thankfully they seemed a little used to tourists (although of course they were also looking to gouge us in some ways financially) so we were left to do our own thing.

Dakar was a little less hassle-free. Although Dakar was a surprisingly modern city, with skyscrapers, real downtown, good restaurants and plenty of foreigners walking around, there were also a lot of street hagglers and vendors who loved a white face. Walking around we got interrupted a lot by everyone selling everything. We also got interrupted by Senegalese just wanting to talk to a foreigner. I'm sure a lot of it was non-sincere, since Dakar has something of a reputation for being full of pickpockets and muggers, like any large city. But other than being annoying, the vendors did nothing worse to us.

I was a little surprised by how many foreigners live in Dakar. There is clearly a bigger expat community here, not just of Americans and French but other Europeans and Canadians as well. A lot of them work with NGOs, but I feel like a lot of them also just like living in Dakar and setting up businesses. Unlike Mali, there is also a larger community of affluent Senegalese. Where it seems that in Bamako only the expats and a few Malians are frequenting the expensive restaurants and the foreigner shops, in Dakar there were as many Senegalese teenagers lining up to get ice cream as there were foreigners. So although most of Senegal remains mired in poverty, the capital itself seems to be doing well.

One field trip we took in the middle of our vacation was to the island of Goree, which is really just a tiny isle 40 or 50 miles away from Dakar. What was significant about it however, was that it used to be a transport stop for the slave trade. There is one house turned museum on the isle for tourists to visit; it was interesting/ depressing seeing the cave like rooms downstairs where Africans were held before being shipped across the Atlantic. One can forget here after a while what happened for so many centuries here, but Goree was a stark reminder of all that terrible history. It also had a more recently distinguished history of being a French military post during WWII; there are several antiquated missile shooters and bunkers scattered around the island. Unfortunately, people have since taken over the bunkers as their homes, so there isn't that much to see except the outside of these things. But Goree was probably my favorite part of the trip; there is a history there that you don't see with a lot of other places. The architecture was beautiful; large, colorful mansions with yards full of flowers and balconies where one could just sit to watch the day pass by. We actually stayed in one of these mansions; we had a room to ourself, that looked like it was meant for an island governor or some well-off lady. There were old-fashioned shutters on the windows and a little balcony overlooking the courtyard. It was a rather romantic place to stay on the island, despite the sad history of the place.

And now here we are, back in Mali. I know many of you are wondering how my solar panel project is going; so am I. I head back to my little village soon, so I promise to give everyone an update next time I am in town and can access my blog again. I will try to put up more pictures next time in town as well; there are plenty left of my parents' trip, and now I will have plenty to show about Senegal.