Site Placement and Volunteer Visit

Mosquito Bednet Distribution in Diaobe --->

Site Placement and Volunteer Visit:
Thies, Senegal
Week of April 10, 2010

Site Placement:

We found out our site placements today! Site placement is the village where we will each be assigned to to work and live over the next two years. We have all been very anxious about finding out where we are going and, honestly, tired of being kept in the dark about our future. There has been a lot of speculation about where each of us will end up but I honestly had no idea where I would be placed. I just knew that since I am leaning Pulla Fuuta that I would be heading to the southern regions of Kolda, Tamba, or Kedougou. From what I have heard, the south is the best part of the country to go as it is not conservative (so I can wear shorts and play soccer with the boys), is very green and hilly, the people are very nice and there is no desert!

So, to the point…

My Site:

Coumba Diouma! That is the name of my new home for the next two years of my life! My village, Coumba Diouma (pronounced Juuma) is in the region of Kolda, in the south of Senegal, bordering the Gambia to the north and Guinea to the south. It is the poorest region in Senegal and consists of rural subsistence farming villages. From what I’ve read, Kolda farms cassava, peanuts, corn, millet and rice. Each are seasonal and depend heavily on how much rain comes during the rainy season (June - November). Kolda is suppose to be the greenest region in Senegal, full of trees and grasses, especially during the rainy season, which I am very happy about. I am replacing another Environmental Education volunteer names Annicka Webster. She has been working on a massive mosquito bed net distribution in the region as well as holding causeries, or information sessions, for villagers on malaria, mosquitoes, and the importance of using mosquito nets. I am looking forward to meeting her when I go for my site visit in a few days.

Coumba Diouma is a rural farming village about 1 or 2 km off a main road. The closest “city” is Velingara, where I hear there is a hotel that has cold coke and wifi. You can google earth/map my village! It’s soo cool, I just did it! But there it is spelled Koumbadouma, so look for that. There are about 325-350 people living there and is has other villages dotted around it. There is an elementary school in Coumba Diouma and they farm cassava, or bantara as they call it here, peanuts and rice. I will be living with the chief of the village and his family in a family compound of about 25 people. I am supposed to have a nice, large hut and a decent sized back yard. (but really all I care about is having my own douche so I can go to the bathroom and shower in peace). My new dad is named Amadou Camara and when I visit the site I will be given a new name to initiate me into the family. I am very excited and happy with my placement. I talked to a couple other volunteers who new my site and they say that I am very luck and that I have a very good one. It’s supposed to be very beautiful, green, happy and safe. I can’t wait to see for myself!

Volunteer Visit:

I visited my village the past few days with another trainee, Mike Toso, who will also be my sitemate (closest neighbor). We visited his village first and then traveled to mine and did the majority of our stay in my new home. It was an interesting experience as the volunteer I am to replace, Annicka, will be moving out of what has been her home for the past two years. It is a very hard thing to come to terms with and she did a wonderfully mature job of letting the visit be about me. (I will have to make sure to do the same when I am replaced). Materially, I do have a lovely large hut. It is painted bright blue and has a mango tree painted on one of the walls. I will inherit a desk and chair placed by the window which faces west where I can see the sun set in the evenings. I have a big douche area that is clean and private, and best of all, all to myself! I have a little shade hanger to sleep under at night or rest from the heat during the day. The entrance way is lined with climbing vines with big, green leaves and is cozy and quiet. I have a little space for where a garden could grow – we will see how that turns out, and I have a screen door that doesn’t quite latch leading to my back yard. Physically, Coumba Diouma is beautiful. It is blanketed with trees, grasses, and gentle rolling land. There are seasonal rice fields for acres fenced off plots for bantara. There is space and quiet. It is very pretty.

My new family seem wonderful. My dad, again, is the chief of the village, Amadou Camara, and he lives with a few of his brothers and their families. There are plenty of children for me to play around with in the compound and I am very excited to play games and have dance parties in my hut. The women seem friendly but they are very close to my ancienne (Annicka – that’s what we call the people we replace) so I am a little apprehensive about how they will receive me. But I hope for the best.

My name:

My new dad, Amadou, meticulously consulted his wife and other family members about naming me. It took them until the second day of my visit to name me – I think they wanted to feel me out before they decided on a name. It was a very sweet ordeal. He gave me a good look over, examining my personality and mannerisms. Talked with the family and then named me after his wife, my new mother, Ramatoulaye Camara. Toulaye for short (pronounced like the words two and lie, twolie, emphasis on the first syllable –thank’s Mike). It is a big honor to be named after my mother and have her be my tokora and I could tell she was happy about it as well. In pullar, they call the namesake a tokora and often address people as such. Later that day, the kids started calling me Toulaye and it sounded very cute when they said it. It feels great to be welcomed into the family like that and I can’t wait to get there and become a part of the family and community.

Mosquito Net Distribution:

My ancienne, Annicka, has been working on a massive mosquito bed net distribution in the Kolda region for the past few months and holding causeries, or information sessions, on malaria and why mosquito nets are important. There is a massive push in Senegal to provide bed net coverage for everyone in the country to reduce the spread of Malaria. Peace Corps, along with NGO’s Malaria No More, World Vision, and Youssou D’dour, are working to execute the distribution of nets to every bed in Senegal. As a result, Senegal was divided into a series of distribution points where Peace Corps Volunteers and local branches of NGO workers would show up, provide information regarding Malaria and distribute the nets to the population. Peace Corps and the other NGO’s surveyed communities within the divided regions and found out how many nets each household head needed. The nets were then labeled prior to distribution with the household name, quantity and date to keep track of when to replace the nets. Moreover, local police were informed to watch for illegal net sales and health posts were encouraged to send local volunteers to aid in the distribution.

One of the days during my volunteer visit, Annicka had Mike and myself come and help. We hitched a ride from Peace Corps and went to the city of Diaobe. Fun fact: Diaobe has the largest weekly market in all of West Africa. Every Wednesday, people go to Diaobe to sell everything imaginable, from car radios, to goats, to food, and a massive influx of people flock to the market from Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Mali, Mauritania, and from every reach of Senegal. It is an incredible sight. Anyway, back to mosquito nets. Our distribution point that day was a section of Diaobe quartered off by NGO workers that took the initial census of people living in the city. Unfortunately, the way they divided up the distribution points was not by neighborhood but by name, a fact which they failed to tell us before hand that needless to say, caused quite a bit of initial confusion and frustration when trying to hand out the nets. When we got things slightly more organized, we began our work. Before handing out the nets, a causerie was held. A causerie is basically an educational session explaining whatever it is that needs explanation. In our case it was educating people on Malaria, how it is caused, why it is important to protect yourself from it and how to protect yourself. Annicka held the 30-minute causerie to a group of people waiting to take their nets back to their families and held it entirely in Pullar. She talked about how the malaria parasite is passed from one person to another through a mosquito (and not by the sun, or by eating a mango, as many people believe), how to protect yourself at night from getting bit by sleeping under a net, careful instructions about the use and maintenance of the net, and the importance of universal coverage and how it can reduce the ravaging disease. We then passed out the nets and, inshallah, people will use them properly.

The most important part, however, will take place about 2 months after the initial distribution. Local health post workers, NGO’s and Peace Corps Volunteers will complete a massive follow up, visiting every single home and looking at every single bed to see if the mosquito nets are still being used or if they are still there. This should happen right around the time of my installation at site so I am sure I will be one of the people going from hut to hut checking in. Welcome to grassroots.

Thoughts:

After the volunteer visit, I am incredibly excited to get to my site, Coumba Diouma. I am more motivated to learn Pullar and am excited that people actually speak it at my site. I can’t wait to get there and become a real volunteer! Hopefully they will like me and I will have an incredible experience living, learning and working there.