Op-Ed: Partisan Loyalties Obscuring the Debate for Health Care

The "public option" component of the Obama administration's push towards mandatory health care provision is drawing heat from critics. A lot of the complaints about the public option actually come from a misunderstanding of what the term means.
Having a public option does not mean that the government will be the sole provider of health insurance. Obama has not proposed doing away with private insurance; rather, he has proposed a public insurance plan that will provide affordable coverage to many Americans who are currently uninsured, and who cannot afford or obtain private insurance.
Many opponents to the public option call it "socialist" health care. They are confusing the public option with single payer health care, an system for health care provision that was really never on the table for the U.S. . The single payer system, which exists in many OECD countries including the U.K., Canada, and Australia, is a system where there is one provider of health care insurance (either private or public) who collects all health care fees and pays all health care costs.
Progressives know that a single payer system could never work in the U.S., given the political sway of pharmaceutical and insurance interest groups. Up until Obama's most recent address on health care, they were settling for the public option as the next best thing. Now that Obama no longer insists on a public option, those on the left are disappointed in him, and the provision of public health care has become less an issue on how to most efficiently provide it and more an issue of loyalty to party ideology.
In the partisan playground of American politics, it is unclear what the Americans want in their health care system when arguments for or against the public option are veiled in standard partisan arguments of more or less government.
I would argue that the U.S. has been the black sheep among OECD countries regarding universal health care provision because the question of who deserves health care and on what conditions has never strongly entered the debate. The real issue is: do we believe that all American citizens should have health care?
We know that at least 18% of Americans are uninsured. Private insurers are able to deny coverage to Americans with pre-existing conditions, forcing many to become bankrupt to bay their hospital bills. We know that our system of employer-provided health care is a product of history and not common sense.
So what's keeping us from changing? Could it be that we don't see health care as a universal human right? Do we, as Americans, think that if you can't pay for it you don't deserve it?
Many single payer systems in other countries have morality worked into the structure of health care delivery. In Canada, the abolishment of private providers ensures that all Canadians achieve the same amount of health care, and for better or for worse, most Canadians are proud of the equity principle inherent in their system. Some countries also distribute health care progressively. In Australia's Medicare system, the ethic is that "all Australians should contribute to the cost of health care according to their ability to pay."
Some countries are similar to the U.S. in that they have multi-payer systems - systems where both the public and private sector provide health care. The contrast is that in these countries there is a social safety net; a majority of citizens can access affordable, publicly provided health care if they need it. In France, 90% of all citizens are covered for basic services, and in Germany and Japan, health benefits are mandatory and co-financed by employers and the government.
Countries like France, Germany, and Japan show us that we can still offer a public option and have private insurers at the same time. The American health care debate is so mired in left versus right ideology that we can't understand what a mixture of public and private sector insurers could look like. We also aren't able to frame health care as what it should be: a public good.
As Obama said during his address on health care, "That concern and regard for the plight of others – is not a partisan feeling. It is not a Republican or a Democratic feeling. "Perhaps it will take nothing less than a moral invocation to get us past the partisan politics. When we soften the debate by thinking of real people needing care, then health care can be framed as a human right rather than a political stance.

Grantee Partners Working Against Exploitation

Submitted by Megan Kauffmann Thursday, August 13, 2009 - 5:24 PM Region Sub-Saharan Africa
Bamako, Mali - Nearly 30 young men were hauling wood, welding, and bustling around what looked more like an open-air high-school theater set under construction than an assembly line. But an assembly line it was, for a carpentry factory. The owner of the small factory, which is locally called an atelier, supervises over 100 apprentices, who work six days a week for at least ten hours a day, receiving a little money “every now and then” for their work.
This is what my colleague Milena Mikael-Debass, GFC’s program associate for Africa, and I saw when we traveled to Commune 5 in Bamako to take a look at GFC Sustainability Award winner Association Jeunesse Actions (AJA) Mali’s activities with young apprentices. In this community, AJA Mali offers afternoon sessions in basic literacy and numeracy for young adult apprentices who have had little or no exposure to school. Most of these apprentices are between the ages of 16 and 25, and these afternoon classes are the only chance they have to learn basic skills, such as how to write their names and how to write out receipts and bills.
Sometimes the owners of these ateliers are reluctant to allow the apprentices a break to attend the classes. When we came to visit this particular atelier, only three or four of the 30 or more apprentices attended the class. The AJ,A Mali teacher informed us that he rarely sees the same faces from week to week.
When we interviewed the apprentices, most had been working at the carpentry atelier for more than two years, and one 17-year-old had been there since he was a young child. The director of AJA Mali told us that it is not uncommon for the apprentices to stay at the ateliers for up to fifteen years without learning anything about methodology or the process of fabrication.
When I reflected on how seldom the apprentices were paid, the long hours they worked, and the fact that the only full-time, paid employee in the entire operation of over 100 workers was the owner, it became obvious that the atelier was exploiting them. I wondered how long the learning process took, and what tools these young people would need to strike out on their own. This was exactly the same thought process that AJA Mali had gone through, and the group created these classes as a response.
While AJA Mali does not have the ability to stop the exploitation, the organization tries to help young apprentices acquire the skills they need to be independent earners. It provides them with entrepreneurial and market study skills in addition to basic education. AJA Mali is filling a role that no other organization is—that of intervening in the lives of these apprentices and providing options for them.
In Mali, the ministry of education is impoverished, and as a result teachers continuously go on strike for better (or any) pay. The strikes disrupt class regularity and dimnish the quality of education for young people. Those who can afford to send their children to private school, while those who can’t afford private school end up letting their children stay at home, sending their children to live elsewhere, or sending their children to the ateliers to learn a trade.
Understanding these constraints puts AJA Mali’s insistence on “educational accompaniment” programs into context. It was inspiring to see this group’s work and understand, after visiting the carpentry atelier, the cultural norms that AJA Mali is up against—making its activities that much more revolutionary.

The importance of transparency for NGOs in Nigeria

The Importance of Transparency for NGOs in Nigeria

Lagos, Nigeria – Having only spent a few days in Lagos, Nigeria, I can’t claim to be an expert on how deep or severe government corruption and efficiency is in this city or country. However, I’ve spoken to many people and asked about their views on all levels of government in their country, and I can say that a general sentiment is that NGOs and the private sector fill an important void by providing services that the government does not.
Private-sector participation in development has already been recognized widely as a global trend, but because of the special mix of hugely profitable private industry and corrupt government officials in Nigeria, the role of the private/NGO sector in providing basic services like water pipelines, roads, and schools is even more crucial to development here than it is in some other West African countries.
A couple of Nigerians told me that government officials sometimes require that private industries establish schools or other development projects as a condition for setting up shop in Nigeria. These kinds of requirements allow private industries to improve their image of corporate social responsibility, and they have the positive effect of improving efficiency and allowing infrastructure to be built more quickly. However, these requirements also allow the government to avoid fulfilling its responsibilities to the public, shifting them instead to the private/NGO sector.
The NGO we visited in Lagos, GFC grantee partner Friends of the Disabled, spends as much time creating brochures for and arranging visits with private companies in the country as it does petitioning the government for funds. Friends of the Disabled’s mission is to help the hearing impaired become self-reliant and accepted in society, and the director has been lobbying the government to include sign language curriculum in public schools. She has to walk a very thin line between negotiation and advocacy, as the future of her organization depends upon government approval.
My experience in Lagos has led me to believe that in countries that have less transparent governments, the ability of GFC’s grantee partners to leverage private funding is incredibly important, as this is likely to be the fastest means of helping them grow as organizations when the government is unresponsive.

Trip to Nigeria and Mali, July 2009

Hello friends and family! Today at 3:30 I'm heading to the airport where I'll have a flight to Paris, and then to Lagos Nigeria. ETA: 4:00pm tommorrow afternoon. Look for daily updates to the blog, if you are interested!

The traffic

Today I went to the Ackand Art museum and saw a digital presentation of traffic patterns in New York. The streets, cars and traffic lights looked like Pac Man roads and the artist arranged it so that the same pattern never crossed the screen more than once. I felt priviliged to have this bird's eye view, and it reminded me of being on a plane at take off or before landing and seeing the land parcelled out neatly in clean geometric lines. Stadiums look comprehensible, insignificant and pretty from that height, dwarfed by the natural world representing itself in a way it can't on a day to day basis for us suburbanites. The green squares, the dusty rhombuses, the rivers cutting through everything....all of that seems like chaos on the ground level but looks like a clean design from the plane's height.

I thought today how nice it would be if we could envision our lives like that - see the big picture. When I get annoyed with disappointments, distractions, and an inability to be where I want in life, I wish I could zoom out and look at my life from the plane. I wish I could see from the plane just how beautiful and orderly the big picture will be.

But that is life - I guess we fumble through it at times.

Readjustment

So yeah, RPCVs can be cranky.

Because we go through a kind of reverse culture shock. I know, some RPCVs might roll their eyes and say that it's cliche to use the term culture shock, that the term makes simply readjusting seem like a complex.

Whatever. All I know is there are some things about being back that are hard to get used to.

Like when I stepped off the plane and everyone was white. That was pretty weird! Dakar's not like that! And how everybody started walking real fast out of the terminal. I was thinking to myself, what for? It's not as if all of these people have connecting flights! Plus-- in the Atlanta airport they have all of these neat paintings on the wall. So I walked slow, and I refused to get on the Tarmac. I looked at the artand I was deliberate with each step. (There was one lady on our neighborhood walking path walking slow with her child. I had a hunch she wasn't american. Americans have a time crunch. I got close and heard she was speaking something slavic. Walking deliberately is a skill I hope to keep)

Once in the other terminal waiting for my connecting flight, I also had to notice how one out of every three people were holding a tall white starbucks cup! Wow.

And then there was the experience of driving the car again, on a saturday. Not only did everyone own SUVs, but, like me, everyone was in a car, driving from one supermarket to the next. It was a beautiful day outside and we were all in these boxes. It's like the saturday activity of americans...get in the car and go buy something.

Then I had the experience of somebody walking right by me, me trying to make eye contact to say hello, and the person totally ignoring me. How can you walk right by somebody with no one else around and pretend you don't see them?

And fast food. Does anyone cook for themselves anymore?

Then there are just the differences that don't have any good or bad conotations for me. For example, light switches. First of all, I'm not used to them and second of all I don't know where they are on the wall of my house anymore. Second, faucets. I can drink the water that comes out of them. And I can brush my teeth with that water, too. Sweet. Third, the floors aren't made of dirt, so I don't have to wear shoes inside and have gritty feet all the time, and the 3 second rule applies once more.

There are also good cultural differences here. For example, people are listening to my every word here. It's startling. In senegal, I used to ramble off all the time and no one would listen. And that was ok (: But here, in English, I can speak how I want more often, and it just comes out and, oops, people are listening. why are they listening so closely? (:

It's ok being back. but really, just ok. I miss adventure. I miss challenge. I'm itching to get out again......

September 30, 2007. Yesterday, I left the village.

As I’ve gone through the process of leaving my village, the things people say have impressed me.
When I visited the marabout, Ma Ansou Nyiang, to say goodbye, he taught me this lesson; “when you have no riches, life is not easy (‘felee’).” When you have riches, life is not easy. When you are in bad health, life is not easy. When you are in good health, life is not easy. When you have no husband and family, life is not easy. When you have a husband and family, life is not easy. So Muñ (Suck it up).” The idea is that no matter how much material wealth and satisfaction you have, life can still be difficult. So you have to be patient and weather through the tough times, because there will always be tough times.

People shook my left hand when I left, instead of my right. I was wondering why. The first time it happened with Na Khady, and them Na Jen, and then Na Degen, and I gave them all my right hand, not understanding the coincidence. Later when Fap Lamin, Seynabou, Satu and others helped me bring my bags out to the car, they all gave me their left hands and I was too flustered to realize it until fap lamin slowly gave me his left hand and told me “May we see one another again” ( " In madir fa jam"). Then I finally got it. It is a way of expressing a finality, but expressing hope that it be otherwise, that we see one another again.

People often said blessings for me when I visited them these last days. They always began with “Yassam” which means “May” and then generally say “May you go home in peace” , “May you see your mother and father again.” “May you get a nice job and make lots of money” “May you have a husband and children” “May we meet again”. Na Khady always likes to say, “Yassam o ret fo jam, gat fo jam.” (May you go in peace, arrive in peace).

I visited many compounds before leaving, the first of many was Na Ndeye Saxo, an older elegant women who has a beautifully rich way of speaking seereer. She said to me that having a guest begins and ends with a “Roxon” (helping one lift or take off a bag on their head). You help them take their bags off of their head when they arrive, they stay with you and you do your best to take care of them, and then you help them put the bag back on their head when they leave. The idea is that eventually, you will repay them should they come visit or should a relative of theirs come visit.

This sentiment is strong. Everyone asked for my address as I left because they think one day they might arrive in America and be able to call on me for help. I hope that someday some Senegalese person does give me a chance to repay the hospitality by coming to my home.


Now that I’m finished and know I am not returning any time soon, I am waxing nostalgic. I am wondering when I can ever do anything so brave and adventurous again, so meaningful and unique. It was hard, and I am overlooking that now that I get to go home.

I have learned some major life lessons. For one, a person needs to be a strong hard ass in this world not to get swallowed up by it. You need to know what you want and where you are going. You need to be firm in your decisions. Bravery is a quality that will help you get what you want out of life in every aspect. The benefits of trying something you are scared of far outweigh the risks involved. If you’re scared of doing something, you must force yourself to do it. FEARLESS. Adventure brings you happiness.

A second big lesson I’ve learned: No use fretting because things always turn out all right.

A third big lesson: Patience is the virtue that also helps you get what you want out of life. When facing decisions, like career choices, take a step back and say, “wait- just wait.”

A fourth big lesson: Life is short. Don’t waste it by following rules. Enjoy yourself.

A fifth big lesson : People people people make a person happy. Big families, big social networks- a real community is key to happinness.

A sixth big lesson: It's easy to see what other people are doing and follow them. But if you don't watch out, you get used to it and there comes a time when you need to find your spine. When you can't ask, "Well, what are you doing?" When it doesn't matter what they're doing.

May 26, 2007




Subject of this email: vacation. I went on an awesome vacation to a place called Cape Verde, which is a series of islands off the coast of West Africa. They call themselves "Euro-African," which is pretty apt, because they are not fully one or the other. The people are all descendants of Portugeuse colonizers and the slaves they brought when they founded the uninhabited islands.

There are a lot of factors that make you question calling Cap Verdians Africans. Most people are lighter skinned that continental Africans. The cuisine doesn't have Maggi msg spice cubes and is kind of bland, which is decidedly not West African. The dress is different too, girls wear mini skirts and lycra tank tops from China, and boys attire is kind of between Euro trash and American. They speak a Creole of Portugeuse, and they have a lot of ties with Brazil and Portugal, where many go to university. Most of the household income comes from remittances.
\u003c/span\>Many houses have hot water showers and tiled floors. \

The place has a character unlike any other I've ever felt in a country. The people are so relaxed, and anything goes. This is especially true for sexual conduct. The reason I know about this is because we stayed with a Cap Verdian Peace Corps Volunteer who was dating a Cap Verdian guy. We hung out with her and her friends and learned that pretty much no one is faithful. Fathers often have children with many women, and that marriage is rare because "divorce is expensive." It is common for Cap Verdians to ask to date you for a week, but explicitly limit it to a week. I guess just to give it a try?! You might have one person you date for a long time, but you can date other people on the side all the while. I think Senegalese share this attitude, but have the discipline of the polygamy doctrine holding them back.. For Senegalese, if you want another woman, you must marry her, and not have more than four wives in the end. The difference also is that Cap Verdian women are also free to date whomever they want, whenever (this could never be possible in Senegal. Girls are looked down on if they date in my village, hence why I don't date villagers). It's an interesting perspective, so different from the average American's.

Cap Verdian volunteers got it made. Not only do they live on an island, but they have spectacular and difficult hikes that stretch on up and over the mountain peaks.
It is so goregeous, where it is dry, the crags are breathtaking and where it is wet, the sugar canes and ornamentals make the valleys very pretty. We hiked for four days in the valleys, drank the local brew and tried our best to speak with the locals in gestures and bad bad spanish, making all the "s" sounds like "sh". I call portuguese the "dishwasher" language. listen to it sometime and you'll know what I'm talking about.

It was kind of a bummer to come back and see polluted streets, beggars and everyone haggling right and left. But we will manage to readjust to Senegal.

Suck it up

Lately I have been particularly sensitive to the Wolof concept of "Muñ." Muñ is loosely translated as "grit your teeth and bear it," or "suck it up." It's how people hear deal with disappointment, you stay quiet, you hold your head high, and you silently barrel through it. They are such a tough people! They tell me that I do an ok job muñing, being so far away from my home. But I really don't have disappointments of the same magnitude as them! Lately I had to muñ when the cows ate all my peppers. I made a half groan half holler when I saw the stubby leafless stems, but afterwards, I muñed. The women here are told to muñ when they are having babies. No screaming, can you imagine? When I burnt my figure at the beginning of my service on some hot ash, causing a huge bubble to rise, I cried a little (what a fool I was!) and I have been ceaselessly teased since for not muñing.
These days I have also made some funny observations about medicine in Senegal. Usually older people get most of their medicine from plants in the countryside; every leaf or twig they bring back almost always cures diarrhea or constipation. They don't have any cure for headaches, though, so most people buy "Perecetamon," the French aspirin that they pronounce, "Prestamon" and that they find sold half price at the garages because they're expired. Mostly every illness, if its not stomach related, can be classified as "cibiru" (fever or malaria) or "fatiguement" (tiredness). I basically urge everyone to see the village nurse to get the real deal. They sometimes ask me for bandaids, not to cover any sore, but to put over the area of "fatigue" in their body so that the bandaid's mysterious occidental healing powers can seep through and ease the ache. Lately the kids in my compound come in every night asking for one, but really they just want my attention (: I especially love the kid who asks for bandaids but won't touch food after I've ate some of it because he doesn't want to turn into a white person!
Oh, the kids. They have their own version of "punch buggy" that I have been taken with. It's called "chodok," and you punch someone and say "chodok" and then they have to catch you and punch you back. The moms don't like that I'm encouraging this in their children. I play too much with them. The other day, I was cleaning my backyard and carting the trash out to the countryside, because that's what we do here, and the kids were begging to be allowed to push the wheelbarrow and saying thank you, Fatu, afterwards. Hey, no problem!
In other news, my sister Seynabu just had a baby. The little girl, named Khady, is 3 kilos, which is 6 pounds! That is heavy and healthy for a Senegalese baby. We are all very happy, but Nabu is very tired. This was a big deal baptism, and lots of fun for me, since Nabu is 23 like me and we get along really well. So I am glad all is safe. And they call the baby a "tomato," which is also what they call foreigners, since we are both a kind of shade of red.
Work is going fine. The cashews are about to be ripe, so I am repairing my fruit dryer. I am about to do a seedbed of tomatoes and eggplant. And my music class is the highlight of every week. We are learning rhythm and they actually understand a lot of it! The French nursery rhymes we sing are always a hit, too. Soon I hope to go on vacation, and then the rainy season will come, and then, BAM this wild crazy Peace Corps lifestyle will be over. That's the way I like to look at it (:

Foam Soaps

On my three week visit to America, perhaps I am experiencing a little bit of culture shock.

For example, what is it with America and foam soaps? I mean the kind where you press down on the dispenser and nothing gel-like comes out, but a nice puff of foam is "emitted." So the bottle, like, does the work of mixing the gel with water before it hits my hands? Do companies think Americans are too lazy to lather?

and American tv is prettty bad. you can only catch music videos on MTV if you watch before 9 am. The rest of the time, there are bad soap operas and shows about the perfect sweet sixteen bash. And the morning news shows like Today and Good Morning America are also very bad, but I guess they always were. "If I correctly modulate my intonation as I'm telling you about which cereals to buy, that makes it news."

I've also noticed how Americans buy so much crap they don't need. And it is expensive crap. Like a 5 dollar hot chocolate. Or balm to protect your cuticles, probably also about 5 dollars. Or they will pay 6 dollars for a quarter pound of fruit that is not in season. Do you really have to have blackberries in December? 6 dollars could buy a beef lunch for 20 people in Senegal.

Argh. I packed all the stuff I got for Christmas in my suitcase and it's going back to my village. Hope they can find use for snowman slippers and foam soap. (:

Greeeeedy volunteer

"Danga ngay" is what i hear as I haggle the price of a cute leather purse down to 3 mill, or 6 bucks. Yes, I am being called greedy in wolof, because I am white and I should therefore have oodles and oodles of money. But if I spent anymore than 6 bucks on that purse, I might have had a problem at the end of my three month payment period, which was coming soon. How to explain that? They will never believe (:

Money money money money. It is a true obsession in this culture. I know a little bit now what it's like to not have enough money to do the things you want, to eat what you want, wear what you want, go where you want. But I still don't really know what it is like to not have enough money for lunch for the family next week. Or not enough to buy prescribed medicines. Or notebooks for school.

So I am making more of an effort now to not be greedy. While before, my 40 $ per month contribution to the family seemed like a lot of money, now I realize that it is only 10 percent of my salary for those three months and that they are 16 people while I am 1 person. It is too hard to watch people have so little and keep money locked in a cupboard. And thank goodness for their integrity, because what they show you of their problems is only what they have no power to conceal--- if people knew the serious extent of their neighbours problems Senegal wouldn't be the light and gay place it is.

We're going to have major problems facing waste in America when we return.

So maybe there is no work?

Things are ok here. I am respected in my village, I am liked by my family and peers. People tell me about their hopes and worries. I get visited all the time! I understand more and more the weird traditions they do.

So from a cultural exchange standpoint, I am doing a great job and learning a lot about how to interact with people who receive information in very different way. I am learning about not being greedy, that's probably been my lesson of the month, but more on that in another blog.

Soon I will start the music class and maybe have hopes of finding funding so that the school can build a cafeteria and have the funds to make free lunches for the kids, that way ensuring a higher attendance and more likelihood of attracting state funding and another sorely needed teacher and batiment. I also want to see if I can get old French books from students at UNC sent over here, you know how the re-selling of French novels is worthless on that campus. I have also told the middle school that I'd love to do an English club of some sort for afterschool.

With my village girls club, we will soon be having a tie-dye formation. Tie dyed material is really expensive here, so hopefully in the future it will be a money making adventure…..I think I'll have a friend do a feasibility study with them.

I am starting a cabbage pépinière and will be working in a much more visible location then the big garden where no one goes. I'll be gardening on my mom's land, and several ladies pass by that area every day, sooo…..I might set up drip irrigation too.

Of course, I am also tired and frustrated on the work front, though. Very tired of little things. Trying to work with people who don't respect appointments, not even missing the hour but missing the day, really grates on me, something I have trouble getting over. Not only does it mean in some cases that my only real work for the day has been negated and I have nothing else to call that day productive, but it means also that later so and so will want to schedule a make up appointment during a time when I've scheduled rest or a fun excursion. . I'm just sort of sick of having to dig up my work ideas, like scratching for gold under hard packed land every new day. I rarely dig up any ideas that are workable and valuable. I'm having to face the fact that I have little practical knowledge to offer these people, little outside of mudstoves and compost that can practically help them and that they couldn't do before….and these two things I have stumbled and stumbled and failed over and over again trying to communicate why they are good and how to make them, with person after person. I should not be here as an ag extension agent ):

I don't know. I don't hate it here at all, sometimes I really love it, and I could see myself successfully completing another year, learning and dealing with things little by little as the months slip by. But should life be like that? A constant hope that things will get better, that some work project will be culturally appropriate? I dunno. I am tired and I feel unkempt and disappointed seventy percent of the time.

Is it just normal to feel, once you are used to a place, that you want to move on? That you want to develop another part of yourself? That you want clean feet and pretty clothes?

Are there other development agencies that work better than peace corps? I wanted to work in development, and I feel pretty strongly that this is the best I can do in this field right now. Things won't change for the better until powerful people in the Senegalese government and international governments start spending money responsibly.
I don't have the kind of power to make any measurable change in my village. But I do have friends that sometimes listen to my ideas. i dunno.

a special visitor

African American visitor

August 13th post

So a lot of times in the news youll hear people talking about Africa's problem being a lack of transparency in their financial affairs. If this is true on the ministerial level, it sure as heck is true on the village level. For example, the vet came buy to give de-worming shots two my two little kitties, and we had a really nice conversation in Seereer, and he was so pleased with me, that he refused to take any sort of payment. But of course, he didn't refuse to sort of make eyes at me and hold my hand very long in a departure handshake. So I rushed to give him candy and stickers for his kids so that he didn't feel like he could come back later and claim another "payment". This is all very subtle, and I could be totally wrong, but you know how feelings go. Example number two, less disturbing. My host sister does my laundry for me, but would be embarrassed if I paid her in money. And the fact that I pay a higher monthly contribution than most other volunteers has made me not want to give other money. So I give her clothes and lotion and treats. And regular gifts are an expectation of every Senegalese family. I am often on the receiving ends of these gifts, beignets, cookies, and soapdishes (:, so that is nice too.


More fun cultural stuff… do y'all know what djinns are? They are explained in the Koran, and are apparently spirits, not really good or bad, but definitely clever. And people are afraid of them, because they can make you sick or steal your baby. And apparently they like to roam around at 7 pm, the most beautiful time of the day, which unfortunately coincides with my roaming time. But there is this one sneaky djinn, who if she comes up to you in the form of a normal person and asks to have her hair braided, you will be blinded afterwards for the rest of your life. But all hairdressers know that rubbing charchoal on your fingers protects you from the djinns' blinding powers.

And it's really taboo to joke about seeing djinns. But I can't help doing it. Like the other day when we went to gather firewood my sister said she was scared because she didn't know this part of the countryside. I jokingly told her that maybe there are djinns around and she turned deadpanned and told me not to say that. They are so scared to walk around in the fields and the countryside here, they always think that some giant lion is going to pounce on them or something, and they think I'm crazy for going out alone.

Although I did have that encounter with the cobra....which was pretty dang scary, and I was alone. I stepped on it's tail cuz I didn't see it, it rustled the grass and rose up and I heard it before I saw it and bolted. Luckily, its back was facing me when I stepped on it or I don't know what would have happened. It was this beautiful black and marron colored thing. I sat there on a mound about 20 feet away as it turned it's head slowly from side to side like a submarine telescope on the lookout and then slid back down to the ground.


So in general life is good and very interesting here. I feel so much better about everything now that i've gotten more into the rhythm of how people talk and adapted their easy-going attitude to an extent. I was told the other night that my conversation was "afela", which broadly means "pleasing". I was all a'smiles afterwards.