After more than two months of form-filling, back-and-forthing, grass cutting and anticipative discussion involving 2 meetings of 4+ hours EACH, SCHOOLS HAVE FINALLY STARTED! I am now a proud teacher of two 4m (3rd year of middle school) and two 6m classes at the CEM, one premiere (penultimate year) class at the lycee, and one 5m (2nd year of middle school) at a local teacher-owned school called Kangame. On top of this, Katie and I are jointly running English an...

Ah, what ridiculous toubab optimism it was that allowed me to think that soon after writing that last blog we'd be starting teaching. Of course nothing of the sort has happened, our new starting date is Monday but…we'll see. In the meantime we've only been enjoying the BIGGEST FESTIVAL OF THE YEAR - TABASKI!! The build-up has been immense, and by the time we were in the midst of the Dakar markets on Tabaski eve the hair-braiding, beautifying, buying of cloth...

Welcome to a blog post of what has definitely been the craziest weekend yet of my entire life. I've diced with death, been momentarily star struck, been closer to a police baton than I'd have liked, and just about managed to dodge a riot. However I'll backtrack a bit to before this weekend… Seeing as the schools are yet to start, Katie and I have been getting involved in some other areas. After meeting Connie, the local Peace Corps worker in Joal, and her hu...

Like Darwin's finches, we are slowly adapting to life in Senegal. Katie and I have managed to get around to most parts of Joal, including the port, local church, hospital (see below), various shops and markets, schools, and around our little area of Caritas in Joal. We've even mastered the art of hopping from one small rock to another whilst carrying a bicycle in an effort to get to the main road without falling into the small swimming pool that has formed as a...

On Monday morning all eight volunteers crammed into Mr. T's brother's car to make our way to the British embassy in order to meet the British ambassador to Senegal. We were very generously invited into the ambassadorial house to enjoy some chilled drinks (bliss!) in the air conditioned drawing room. Now, don't get me wrong, I love Senegal just as much as the next Francophile, however that hour and a half we spent sipping tropicana orange juice with ice made of ...