In The Gambia!

Hello All!

Thank you for checking out my blog. I have made it to The Gambia! Let me preface this post by saying it is a bit extensive because much has happened in the past week. Our group of 35 volunteers arrived to the Banjul Airport Thursday morning after 28 hours of travel. We are now stationed in the Kombo area, which is an urban center near the capital of Banjul, and have spent the past days attending intense training classes (language, cultural, safety and security) and going over Peace Corps expectations, goals, and service. And, not to mention, receiving many shots. Everything is very exciting, new, and challenging!

It is very surreal being here in Africa. I have read much about the continent and its various countries in school, but the experience is overpowering and ever potent. These are some initial reactions that have yet to be contextualized: The smells when stepping off of the plane were earthy and damp, but the ground is dry and sandy. The heat is very powerful. We feel not only the warmth in the air, but also from the Gambian people who have been extremely friendly and kind. Like in Vietnam, there are people outside: walking alongside the road, at markets, sitting on stools - talking. The goats mingle searching for food; they belong to someone but it is not clear who. Property rules seem to be very different with fewer set limits and demarcated boundaries.
The women are beautiful in their colorful clothing.

The individuals in the group range from ages 22-60 and there are three married couples. Half of the group is in the Health and Community Development sector, while the other half is in Agricultural and Forestry. We have been staying in the Peace Corps transit house and will be leaving today for our training villages where we will live for two months with a family to become introduced to the culture, learn and refine our educational and technical skills, and practice our designated languages. Due to the various ethnic groups in Gambia, our group has been divided into three different language groups. I will be learning and eventually speaking Pulaar fluently.

Our Gambian language and cultural facilitators have been great so far and will be accompanying us to our training villages. Each volunteer will live in a family compound and there will be 2-3 other volunteers in each of the villages. I am very excited to move to the rural part of the country. At the same time, it is a little nerve-racking imagining being in the village, spending much time with the homestay family and having very little in terms of communication skills. But I am sure many laughs and smiles will be shared over my inability to wash clothes in buckets, draw water from the well, and eat from a communal bowl with only my right hand.

If all goes well during training these next few months, we will swear in as official volunteers on January 8th. From there, we will move to our village sites, which are unknown to us right now, and begin our community assesments and projects, which are also unknown to us.

I will hopefully be able to keep you updated on my adventures in The Gambia fairly frequently as I will have internet access probably once a month. However, I will probably not have access to internet during the two months in our training village so I will write next when I am an official Peace Corps Volunteer!

I would love love to hear from you all if you get the chance. You can send me snail mail or an email at fagudabrown@gmail.com. Keep me posted on everything, even mundane things that you may not seem interesting! I love and miss you all.

Also, I almost forgot, for those of you interested in any bumster updates... (Bumsters are young Gambian men who "service" older European women on vacation in the country. Older European women are their specialty, but they will go after any white women. They are a large part of the sex tourism business in country). The area where we are stationed right now is only a 10 minute walk from the coast so we have been going to the beach daily. The bumsters are out in full force. We have been warned many times by Peace Corps staff (Gambians and Americans) about these young men. As a female, if you go to the beach alone, you will be harassed constantly by them. Though annoying and the situation is sad, they are very very funny to watch because they work out all day long on the beach with their dreadlocks bouncing. This includes air boxing, swimming, jumping jacks, running, squats, tae bo, etc. While at the beach this weekend, one bumster positioned himself only a few feet away from our towels and started doing push-ups, which was then followed by wind sprints.

Can't wait to hear from you all!