Firstly, it's quite likely the power might cut off whilst I'm writing this as it's the fourth time that I've tried! So unreliable.

So I've been here two weeks now and everything seems to be going smoothly. Louise and I will leave for Joal on Thursday. I am really looking forward to seeing where we'll be actually living for the year, although we still have no flat yet and will be living with our host to begin with. Teaching starts on October 5th, I look forward to being a little busier!

Kaolack has been becoming more and more familiar as we've been able to explore a little bit. I've been spending the mornings mainly learning Senegalese cooking although the kitchen at the back of the house is so hot and all there is to sit on are tiny stools so you end up getting very hot and very uncomfortable! Most of the same things go into every meal though so I'm getting the hang of it. Most of it just involves pounding some chilli and pepper, cutting one of many, many onions, taking the maggots out of the rice and fanning the charcoal stove. It's a very sociable activity though and I've been learning a lot of my wolof whilst cooking. Today whilst it was stewing Adama took me to the market to get measured for this matching African skirt and top the women here wear. They are really beautiful and I was hoping that I'd get a really nice one but I made the mistake of asking Fadouba to choose the material for me... it's an extremely garish orange and green clash. How flattering. I'm sure it'll look nice once it's all made up though...

The power today has been horrendously unreliable. Today it was off during the day between 9am and 9pm and they didn't have enough fuel to power the generator for the playstation shop here so it meant there was no custom at all. Gareth and Orlando are really struggling to begin their teaching properly because the computers keep cutting out and they're supposed to be teaching IT, a bit of a challenge to say the least! We only really use the power for lights and the fan at night so when it goes off at night it gets unbearably hot for sleeping. The other night it went off at 11pm and didn't come on again until 4am so we went and slept on the roof. It sounds so nice and it really is when it's a clear sky with a full moon and there are more stars than I've ever seen but at the same time there are quite a few downsides, for example, the hard concrete floor, the mosquitos, the frogs ribbeting, the dogs howling and the constant prayer call singing. I'm getting pretty good at sleeping through anything! Luckily that night the boys had brought Fanta and chocolate home for a treat which made me sleep just a wee bit better. Also lucky was that there was no rain that night.

A couple of days ago it rained all day. And by rained I mean it really rained. Everything flooded and I actually felt cold for once! Never before have I appreciated feeling cold so, so, so much. We went out and stood in it for a while until the family made us come in for fear we'd freeze. But now, of course, it's hot as ever. When we were coming down to Kaolack for the first time it really struck me how green everything was but apparently it's only like this in the rainy season and in the dry season everything is dust. Also everything is flat. Quite literally everything. It makes Senegal an amazing place to watch storms though because you can see the lightning for miles and miles. We haven't seen that much wildlife what with being in the city and all the past wee while apart from the many, many sheep, goats, scraggy cats and occasional massive cow on the street but also thankfully not many beasties either. There's been a few lizards and ants and wee cockroaches but most things seem to keep to themselves and the spiders seem content to stay in the corners of the rooms and munch on mosquitos. There have been a few gigantic rats on the street but nothing too terrifying! Hopefully later on I'll have the chance to visit some of the national parks to see some proper Senegalese wildlife.

Today I attempted the first bit of exercise, bar pounding chilli, doing shuttle runs on the roof. It failed miserably. It was just so hot and everyone just shouted 'toubab' at me so I gave up. It made me feel a little less lazy though. The shouts of 'toubab' have gone from being a novelty to being very annoying to being just the usual. It does get slightly frustrating though when people you know call you toubab in conversation. I'm definitely far more aware of the colour of my skin here thanks to those shouts. The four of us have been given Wolof names now though. Louise has the same name as one of the girls in Master Ps family, Adama and I am Awa. Gareth is Assane and Orlando, Ouseynou. Epic names.

Well that's it for now as someone has kindly informed me that j'ecris un roman, in other words I think that means they want to use the computer. Probably head back to the house soon for a good sleep. Last night we found a little boy sleeping on the stairs landing who had come in off the street. I nearly tripped over him he was so small and fragile looking. It wasn't a very pretty or kind sight but I really hope he's found somewhere to stay tonight too and that he'll be alright...

Anyway I don't think I'll have easy access to internet in Joal so until I do ciao and hope everything in the UK is hunkydory!
Kirsty... or Awa! x