Making a Duck Pond

First of all, let me clear up a confusing issue. I know any ornithologist reading my blog have cringed every time I wrote the word ‘duck.’
It seems that my feathered friends are not ducks. They are geese. (Do geese see God? One may ask.)
According to the Gambia bird book, and other knowledgeable sources, the ducks are really geese. Nevertheless, they are tasty and like water.
Ever since I brought my three duck/geese (Henceforth referred to as ducks, or burro in Mandinka, even though yes, they are geese.) back to Hella Kunda they have been sadly with out a place to ‘take bath.’ I finally bought 2 bags of cement to make a duck pond with, and Chinese and I constructed a very fine pond for the ducks.
From tracing the pattern to actually digging out the pool and laying the concrete, I think it expanded about 3 or 4 inches on all sides from the original shape. It ended up about 1.2 m² and 1 foot deep.
Let me just tell you, that is a big pond when you are filling it bucket by bucket from a pump 3 compounds over.
I contracted an army of small boys, aka the Peace Corps Football team to fill the pond for a 100 dalasi contribution to their fund. (Peace Corps is the name chosen by the boys because I am helping sponsor the team. The boys all contribute 5 dalasis a week, and I match the funds once a month. They’ve been through 1 football so far, and bought another one with the funds they raised. Next they want to buy football jerseys with numbers. I’m trying to help them fundraise for that.) They boys hauled approx. 600 liters of water to fill the pond. It’s actually almost a swimming pool.
And the ducks really like it. Chinese and I also built a fence around it to keep various donkeys and goats from drinking from it. We also wanted to contain the ducks, but they don’t stay w/in the fence.
Right now there are 9 ducks, but I want to eat some soon…

Bednet Update

The Against Malaria Bednet Campaign has been a huge success! Some of the nets have been distributed, and the rest are awaiting transport from Senegal. I plan on attending some of the distributions and educational programs, so I’ll keep you updated on what happens! Once again, thank you so much for all the support!

Thank You!

I have to say thank you thank you thank you to everyone who has sent me letters and packages over the last few months! You are amazing and make my life so much better! It’s fun to share the things with my family and friends! Especially Oreo Thursday! And I’m going to have a BLT Day in Basse for Peace Corps Volunteers with the bacon that was sent! You enrich my life with your generosity and love! Thank you!

Oh, The Gambia

Cars in America are wired to require the key in the ignition to run. Not so in the Gambia! I was in a gelly when I looked up and noticed there was no key in the ignition, but we were driving down the road…

I’ve seen seplast drivers (I believe this is the correct term) hotwire their cars to start them on numerous occasions.

Most recently, I was in a car heading to Kombo. At a police checkpoint the driver had to show his documents (registration etc.). He used his key to unlock the glove compartment and retrieved the documents. After he returned them to the glove box and locked it we started to drive away. As we pulled out, he returned the key to the ignition. The car never turned off, and was wholly unaffected by the removal of the key.

Groundnut Season

Chinese and I went to Bakadaji to sell Fatou’s groundnuts (peanuts). We brought 1/3 of her harvest to sell: 60 kilograms. Bakadaji is a groundnut consolidation point. There are consolidation points around the country to gather the groundnut harvest from farmers for resale. The idea is to give all the farmers a fair price for groundnuts, and get the harvest to a centralized point for storage, shipment, resale etc.

The groundnuts are repackaged into standardized bags and weighed. The farmer is then immediately paid for his harvest and the groundnuts are loaded onto trucks. In the past the process has had some problems with getting the farmers paid, but this year everything seemed to run smoothly. For the 60 kilos we were paid 500 dalasis. That’s about 8 dalasis a kilo. For the amount of work put into each kilo it’s a ridiculously low price. It translates into fractions of pennies on the hour for labor per person. But it’s the going rate for groundnuts nationwide.

Marathon March

This year for Christmas I was at a tourist camp called Tendaba that Peace Corps uses every year for training. I came in to do training for our new class of volunteers. I had a really sweet tree ID scavenger hunt. My friend Jes and I ran sessions on AgFo project stuff the 23^rd and we got to know the trainees. There were 35 of them, 18 in the AgFo sector; the others are Health and community development sector. Then, on Christmas eve we spent the day on what’s called Marathon March.

This was a little dramatic. It’s 26 k through a national park and the bush, along the river, and back through a rice field (aka mud up to your waist!). Jes and I were the volunteer leaders, and this guy Lamin was the guide who has been doing this for several years. The march started off great at 6am. At about noon we reached this sweet escarpment overlooking the river. Things went downhill from there.

Lamin, in his infinite wisdom, started bushwhacking parallel to the river, instead of bushwhacking a right angle to the river. We walked about 3 k through grass that was 3-4 meters tall (aka up to 12 feet!) (Lamin also forgot to bring a machete- so we had none.) we stopped to rest and I checked in w/ lamin after taping a girls ankle. He claimed we were only 15 min from the river. We headed out in the same direction. I have this problem with trusting people I know are wrong just because they are in positions of power and experience. Silly me not trusting my gut… 3 k later another stop- it’s getting later (you can’t make good time bushwhacking through the giant grass) at this point lamin is stopping every so often to climb trees to look for the river above the grass. And we kept going in the same direction, parallel to the river that we should have reached by now. Finally, about 10 k from the escarpment (or maybe more- I’m not sure) Jes and I said enough. Our poor trainees were getting out of water, and everyone knew we weren’t where we were supposed to be. Lamin got pissed that we were calling him out and started getting agitated, but Jes and I calmed him down and tried to get focused on the best next step.

At about 3:00 we decided to go back the way we came (yes if you are lost you should not try to retrace your steps, but we were essentially heading straight east, so we weren’t actually lost lost. We knew where we were (if this makes sense) but we didn’t know exactly where we were. The river was to the north and the road was to the south less than 10k. at this point it was a matter of getting the trainees back in one piece)

So we turned around. I got on the cell phone with our training manager to tell him we’d be late, and please send a car for the ones who were worst off and out of water.

We trudged into the entrance of Kiang National Park just as the car came with 20 l of water. It pulled away with 12 trainees and the rest of us retraced our steps (now not lost) back to Tendaba, where we arrived at 6 pm. A 12 hour hike. No biggie… Jes and I were just happy to get everyone back in one piece.

Did We Need That Part?

On my way to Marnies site the gelly suddenly made a loud noise as something fell onto the road behind us. We stopped and backed up on the road to the parts laying in the middle of the road. The apparante (apprentice/helper) jumped out to pick up the pieces. They looked suspiciously like pieces of a disc break or other moving, necessary part.

But we kept driving- at a snails pace! We had to stop again to pick more pieces up off the road, and the gelly limped up the road, finally arriving at Marnies village almost an hour later.