Girls Reproductive Health Talk

Disclaimer: This post is about an activity that I had no part in planning or organizing. All of the credit goes to my wonderful sitemate (fellow PC volunteer in Taredji) and his work at the local health post, the Dispensaire Donaye. I was a mere observer, and these are my observations.

A few weeks ago, I had the pleasure of attending a health talk that my sitemate planned. His hard work brought together 12 girls ages 12-17 to talk about reproductive health, sexuality, and women’s rights. These girls were chosen to attend because of a scholarship program that PC Senegal runs called the Michelle Sylvester Scholarship (MSS) Program. The girls are in the top of their respective classes and went through interviews to be chosen for the scholarship (I hope to continue my sitemate’s work with the scholarship program so expect future posts on this).

The sage-femme of the Dispensaire Donaye led the talk. My sitemate provided the talking points and some informative diagrams and statistics, while the sage-femme did most of the talking. The discussion included basic anatomy, STDs including AIDS, protection, abstinence, marriage, and financial independence. The girls were very engaged throughout and participated heavily in the discussion. What was most impressive, however, was the conclusion of the talk. Each of the girls decided of their own accord to be “ambassatrices” or female ambassadors to their school and spread this knowledge to all the girls at the Donaye College (middle school) and Lycee (high school). They took it upon themselves to organize, gather phone numbers, arrange with the sage-femme to meet again, and to formally talk to each grade level in turn.

After talking with my sitemate at the end of the discussion, we both agreed that it went surprisingly well. He was actually shocked at how responsive the girls were and how they organized. Here are some reasons we came up with as to why it was so successful:

1. The Sage-Femme

Bare with me this is the longest one. I promise the other reasons will be shorter.

Short story: When my sitemate first approached the sage-femme about the talk, she was mildly indifferent.

“Sure, sure. I’ll talk to them.” However, when my sitemate gave her the slides to reference and confirmed that she would help lead the talk, she told him that he should just lead the talk himself. At that point he was confused.

“You think they will actually listen and talk to me about this?” As a man in his 20’s, it seemed improbable that teenage girls would open up to him about sex.

The sage-femme responded, “Sure, why not?”

            “Because they are teenage girls?”  replied my sitemate.

“YOU WANT ME TO DO WHAT?! WHY WOULD THEY NEED TO KNOW THAT?”

Clearly, there had been a miscommunication about the age group of the attendees. This reaction from a sage-femme, a woman who sees a lot of teenage pregnancies and STDs, really surprised me. Even so, the sage-femme went on to lead the talk after some encouragement from my sitemate.

The sage-femme at the Dispensaire Donaye is a stern-looking woman with a strong speaking voice. She is the kind of woman who demands respect and inspires confidence (important to young girls who are nervous about talking about sex). She treated them like adults and also was very open to questions. She expected and demanded participation. The sage-femme knew exactly how to talk to these girls (in a way that me or my sitemate probably could not have done). Her presence was the most important reason for the success of the discussion.

The fact that the sage-femme was so reluctant then went on to give a great talk that the girls were very responsive to was extremely justifying to a self-doubting Peace Corps volunteer. What can I possibly do for this community with my limited knowledge of Senegalese culture, the language, and agriculture? Well, I can inspire others in the community to take action who otherwise would not have like my sitemate did with the sage-femme. Without his push, the sage-femme would have never felt compelled to talk to this age group about sex, an age group that is in the more dire need of information. Without my sitemate and the sage-femme, these girls and all of those they go on to instruct would never have gotten a formal sexual health education.

2. Girls as Leaders

Secondly, the girls themselves were already leaders in their communities to begin with. Through the MMS application process, they had already proven to be hard-working, driven, and intelligent. They are in the top of their classes despite cultural practice dictating that they do all of the housework that their male peers are spared.  While me and my sitemate were shocked that they began to plan out future talks all on their own, we probably shouldn’t have been. Because of their own initiative and drive, the girls took initiative on their own to organize themselves and continue talking about reproductive health.

3. Girls familiar with PC Sessions

The next reason for the success of this discussion is again related to the scholarship. As part of the MMS program, my sitemate and other volunteers in our area held sessions with them previously about women’s rights and the importance of the girls’ education. This is important for two reasons.

First, they were already familiar with the format of sessions and knew they would be expected to participate in an open discussion. This format is very different that what most young people would be familiar with in school. By having attending prior PC sessions, they were prepared to participate.

Second, having worked with each other in similar sessions before, the girls were comfortable talking about a potentially embarrassing topic. They girls had been give the chance to establish peer relations before the reproductive health talk and had credibility and confidence in each other, giving them the courage to speak their minds.

4. Size and Location

Finally, the size and location was perfectly chosen for this type of discussion. The Dispensaire Donaye is a small health post situated on a large piece of land surrounded by a fence. There are a couple of buildings where the nurses and doctors see patients, and there are also a few outdoor shade structures. One of these shade structure is where the meeting was held. By chance, the design of the structure allowed the girls to sit in a circle. Rather than being in a classroom where the instructor stands at the front of the room and everyone merely listens, sitting in circle outside further encouraged discussion and made the session seem less formal. Also, the size of the group was ideal for a small group discussion. With 12 girls, everyone was given a chance to speak, and the girls were not intimidated by having too few to or too many other girls listening to their experiences.

While I hate the use a buzzword, this is the type of project that is the definition of sustainability. My sitemate identified the natural leaders in the community (the sage-femme as well as the girls) and gave them an idea for a project. The rest was more or less carried out by locals. Hopefully, the sage-femme and the girls would attended the session will be inspired to continue talking to more young girls. All of this will happen without any more work by the Peace Corps Volunteer. And hopefully, I can figure out ways to make my own small projects in agriculture as sustainable and successful as this one.

My New Home

I have finally been able to take and upload pictures of my room and my compound. I've been busy completing the base line survey of my community to see what types of projects they might be interested in doing and to learn more about my surroundings in general. When I am finished with that I'll post a summary about what I have learned. Also, I have finally gotten a new address. It is posted on the side bar, but here it is again: 

Meghan Mize

B.P. 6

Ndioum, Senegal

West Africa

  For now, enjoy these pictures of my house! 

My bed, mosquito net, and some of my stuff

My desk, clothes rack, and front door

View from one of my windows

View from the other window

View from my front door onto my family's compound

My bathroom

My water jug, filter, and gas cook stove

The wall where I keep all my stuff and pictures my niece and nephew drew me 

My desk (props if you can spot the D-unit) 

The shade structure and the building my room is in (behind the cows) 

Milk

My family's cows in our yard

I have just moved in with my sort of maybe permanent family in Tareedji. Tareedji is located in the Futa (a general region in the north of Senegal). This region is predominately made of herders whose wellbeing depends on livestock as a source of milk and meat. As such, I have been drinking a lot of milk.

Milk in Senegal is a completely different substance than in America. In America, most people buy their milk at a grocery store. It comes is a carton. There are a few select and consistent varieties of milk: nonfat, 1%, 2%, whole, heavy cream, etc. In America, milk is pasteurized and refrigerated. Typically, Americans consume milk in cereal, to bake or cook with, as a additive to certain beverages i.e. tea an coffee, or to drink from a glass. Close to none of these hold true for Senegalese milk.

Senegalese milk is as varied as it is mysterious -- at least to me as an American outsider. Clearly it is not mysterious to my family. It comes in many forms from sweet to sour, warm (from the outside temperature or from the cow itself) to chilled, creamy and smooth to chunky and somewhat curdled.

In Tareedji, people also consume milk in many ways Americans do not.

·      After milking the cow into a wooden bowl specially designated for this purpose, Senegalese people either use a large ladle or drink the warm milk straight from the bowl.

·      Another common way to drink milk is to mix the milk in a large jug with water and sugar until the milk fats have consolidated. You are left with a sweet watery-milky drink with milk chunks floating in it. Sometime, people drink this from cups or, again, from large bowls with a ladle that is passed from person to person. This milk is surprising good, especially when served chilled (from ice that you buy from a boutique in small plastic bags—not a refrigerator).

·      Similarly, this kind of milk can be poured over Senegalese-style couscous and for some reason I do not quite understand, it ends up tasting like chunky oatmeal covered in banana-flavored yogurt.

·      Plain unprocessed milk can be added to a dried fish/bean sauce and served over couscous for a savory and salty dinner. Note: I have not had this in Tareeji, only in my CBT site in Ngheho.

·      Milk—both plain and with sugar—can also be bought in individual plastic bags which are sold at boutiques.  As with many Senegalese beverages (water, bissap, baobab juice), to drink these, you must tear a hole in the bad with your teeth and drink it from the bag. 

·      You can also purchase milk by approaching any milk sellers (my family for instance) and pour milk from their buckets into whatever contain you have on hand.

Most of these forms of milk are drinkable if not delicious, except straight from the cow. Even though my family serves me unprocessed milk multiple times a day I still find it difficult mentally to personally milk a cow (which I have down twice now!) and then drink its warm milk from the bowl. At first, I told my family “Mi susa” which means I have no courage. But they milk the cows and by cultural obligation offer me some so many times a day that I cannot refuse. Not surprisingly, I have not gotten sick at all from this milk despite what my Peace Corps-issued health book has to say about milk. Most likely Senegalese milk is better for me anyways because of the way the animals are treated here and how the milk and the cows are not pumped with hormones, but who knows. One day I will stop telling my family I have no courage and drink up. 

Picture Time

This is another picture post! Yay! I am currently at the regional house in Ndioum waiting to install to my final site tomorrow. There have been a whirlwind of events since my last post including a beach trip, saying goodbye to my first host family, Taaske ( the Muslim holiday Eid al-Adha), and Swearing In. I am now an official volunteer and will write more about my final site once I move in tomorrow.

                                                 Beach house in Popenguine, Senegal

                                                             Host Family Reception

My LCF and Binta Bah (mother of another trainee) dancing

Me and my favorite host mom Aisata 

Ngheho Training Group 

Counterpart Workshop and Dakar Day

This past week I’ve been doing a lot of traveling for Counterpart Workshop and a trip to Dakar. Follow along with my convenient subheadings to find out more!

Counterpart Workshop

This past Monday through Wednesday, our training stage hosted a Counterpart Workshop at the training center. A counterpart is a local Senegalese person in you community that will help you to integrate into the community, help you assess the community’s needs, help you find projects to work on, and be a general resource for language learning and cultural questions. My counterpart is an awesome woman named Kadiata Bah who runs an organization who runs an organization that teaches agricultural techniques to three surrounding villages near Taredji. She is the perfect counterpart and really understands that my role in the community to be a teacher and help facilitate her work (not to hand out money or be a knight in shining armor). She already has plans to start a demonstration garden at her organization’s location in Taredji and know a lot about the agriculture of the area.

Coming into the Peace Corps with doubts about what I could possibly do to help Senegalese people improve their agriculture system when I have no real expertise or local knowledge, I have been reassured by PC Senegal’s counterpart system. I will in fact be trained in agriculture technics by the Peace Corps and will be passing them along to someone who will stay in this community and is actively working with people in her community to pass along this knowledge. After Counterpart Workshop I have been slightly reassured about the sustainability of my work in the Peace Corps. I will still have to see how exactly my relationship between my counterpart, my community, and myself unfolds, but for know I am pretty content with my function as a volunteer.

Dakar Day and the US Embassy

Yesterday, we took two 25-seater PC buses from Thies to Dakar to see the PC Senegal office, apply for Senegalese residency, and get a general sense for the city. My first impression was that Dakar is practically like any other Western city I have been too. There were malls, bowling allies, resorts, a theme park, museums, organized roads, a highway, and a new traffic signal. Compared to Nairobi (the only other major city in Africa I have been to), Dakar was much more organized from my first impressions, qualified by the fact that I only spent a few hours there.

Peace Corps Senegal’s office was made up of a three-story air-conditioned building with a marbled staircase. The offices of the Country Director, the program assistant directors, and the admin are all located here as well as the medical office. We filled out a lot of paperwork and were introduced to all the people who work at the office, which were to a great relief of mine all Senegalese nationals minus the Country Director and one of the doctors.

The most interesting part of this trip was getting to go to the Atlantic Club – a mini-resort with a swimming pool, tennis courts, etc. that PCVs get free admission to. Here, we were met by two representatives of the US Embassy to discuss the services they provide to PCVs in Senegal and safety concerns for us. After that we got to eat American style cheeseburgers, and it was wonderful. 

In terms of  logistics, I found that I will be moving to my permanent site on November 11^th, so don’t send me any more mail until I have a new address or I will never get it.  Until next time! 

Volunteer Visit

Sorry this post is a long one, but there was so much to say about my not one, but three sites I will be working at! If you don’t care to read the details of the cities I’ll be working in and the projects, you can feel free to skip down to the highlights of the trip.

This past week I spent visiting my future permanent site of Taredji. My and my fellow stagemates Raphael and Erin who are also going to the North stayed with a group of volunteers who live in Ndioum, a pretty large town on the Rue National (the main highway throughout Senegal).  We got to see our sites and learn more about the communities we will be living in and the projects we might be working on. My situation is unique among volunteers—I will be living and working in Taredji as well as overseeing projects in Ndioum and Podor.

Let’s start with Podor. Podor is a city of around 12,000 people right on the boarder between Senegal and Mauritania (the two countries are divided by the Senegal River). It is a very historic city and was once occupied by the French and even has a 17^th century fort. The city also gets a small amount of tourism (I saw one French family on vacation with their two children while I was there). A volunteer who is COSing (Close of Service) used to be located in Podor but had to move to Ndioum during the middle of his service. He made a beautiful hospital garden in Podor, which is now mildly run down. I will be taking over this garden and hopefully reinvigorating my work partners there to keep with the project.

                                                                        The fort in Podor

                                                                    Podor Hospital Garden

 Looking out from Podor over the Senegal River and Mauritania 

Lounging on the side of the Senegal River 

Next stop, Ndioum! Ndioum is a regional capital for Peace Corps Senegal. This means there is a regional house there where volunteers in the North can stay from time to time. Also, three volunteers who used to live in Podor now live in Ndioum. It is a fairly large city but somewhat smaller and less organized than Podor. Ndioum is about 40 kilometers from Podor and on the Rue National. Ndioum had a very nice hospital that is currently the largest hospital in the Department of Podor (soon to be usurped by Pate). The director of the hospital is very excited to start a hospital garden there, and the project has already been approved by Peace Corps. Once I install at my permanent site, I will assist the other volunteers in Ndioum to build the garden which will help to cut food costs for patients.

Finally Taredji, where I will actually be living (inshallah, because a home for me there is yet to be found).Taredji is a road town at the junction of the Rue National and the road that takes you to Podor, thus it receives heavy traffic and essentially grew out of its prime location.  Taredji has about 5,000-6,000 people split into two areas of the town. There are two potential projects I am really excited for in Taredji. One is a school garden at a primary school. The director of the primary school is so excited about the garden that he has already fenced off an area at the school. Right across the street is a local CBO that does a wide variety of things including women’s rights, democracy, and trainings of various kinds that I am still learning about. Here, the organization wants to set up a demonstration site to teach farming techniques and best practices to the surrounding villages that the organization already has connections with. This is essentially what my whole job is as an Urban Ag volunteer, so I am really excited to have such a motivated organization to work with. 

Future site of the demo garden in Taredji

Highlights of VV

•       Lounging by the Senegal River and looking out to Mauritania
•     Almost driving into the Senegal River on the way back to the training center
•     Eating hamburgers and cake at the regional house
•     Meeting my awesome counterpart at the CBO who wants to name me after her
•     Climbing to the roof of the old French fort in Podor
•     Sleeping on the roof every night in Ndioum
•     Being woken up to the terrified crying of a baby goat stuck in the yard
•     Being woken up by the sounds of the mosque and Justin Beiber, simultaneously