when they say strikes....

Well, it's the end of my third week here in Saint-Louis and it was a pretty uneventful week.  You got the extent of my class experience from my last blog post because classes did not happen the rest of the week. To clarify, I did try to attend my classes, but no one seemed to show up for them, including the professors.  Actually, it was the students who were on strike this week though.  I think they were striking because of general living conditions being difficult here, like the cafeteria problems I mentioned before.  Instead of improving, the cafeteria wait has been getting worse and worse to the point that you can wait two hours just to enter the cafteria.  The other Madison girls and I are thinking about purchasing some cheapo plastic chairs and tailgating in line as we wait, any thoughts? Just kidding, but it could be fun.  Thursday night was by far the highlight of the week because just as we were about to enter the cafteria after over an hour of waiting, this group of about 20 huge men stormed the entrance and pushed their way in.  One of the girls with me knew one of the guys in rebel force and he told her he was busy and didn't have time to wait so he just went on in.  Sounds good to me...maybe people would notice if I did that though, hmmm.  Oh, and last night I believe there was a fight in the cafeteria. I'm not really sure what happened but people were crowded around the windows and the line did not move a single inch for over 45 minutes.  

In case you were wondering with anticipation about the resolution of my struggles from last week, I have electricity! More specifically, I fixed the problem myself after causing a minor explosion in the outlet.  As it turns out, all I needed to do was flip a switch in the tiny little box on my floor in my dorm and voila! Plus, today I went into town and bought another power strip, third times a charm I guess.  Besides the electricity, I'm pretty much over my cold/flu whatever it was, which is glorious!, but I have yet to fix my bed.  I've actually taken to sleeping on the other side of my bed which is almost normal, and I suppose I could turn my bed around instead of putting my head where my feet are.

With regard to my roommate situation, it's kinda back to the drawing board for me.  My roommate of last week was really a sweet heart, but she transfered to a school in Dakar and moved out on Thursday so I am once again roommateless.  Honestly, it's pretty nice having my own space, but I think it would be good for me to have a roommate because it would be easier to get to know other girls.  Boys are much more outgoing here, and I actually made a friend the other day.  I decided that I would only be friends with someone if I talked to them more than once and they seemed genuinely friendly both times, so it's kind of exciting and we all feel like we are starting to fit in here better!