Just kidding

I ended last week with high hopes for my upcoming classes.  Thursday my professors never arrived, I'm not sure why really, I think they weren't prepared for the strike to end so they decided not to come teach.  Oh well, that gave us an opportunity to run into town and pick up our packages.  Apparently, due to strikes within the University administration, the person in charge of picking up the mail from the post office decided not to pick up the mail for over two weeks.  Hence, our Thanksgiving consisted of a much anticipated journey to the post office and then some time hanging out and munching on the American snacks we all received in our packages. The post office itself that day was an interesting experience because, the man who is supposed to examine packages before we are allowed to retrieve them, didn't come in until an hour after we arrived there. That was fun though as we had some nice bonding time with the post office crew, and the suspense made it more fun to receive things from home.  

Friday I had my usual Wolof class, but I believe that the other classes didn't meet because someone somewhere was on strike.  If my classes get going, I shouldn't have class on Fridays, which makes things kind of nice, although I will have wolof and french, so I guess that I means I do have class.  In the evening Carlie and I headed of to choir rehearsal, which was kind of rough because the choir leaders had differing visions for our upcoming concert. One of the leaders named Jeff is a fun, lively guy who loves to dance and sing and has told me multiple times that he aspires to be "a star."  He's pretty showy, which contrasts a little with the other leaders named Celia and Noa who are quieter and generally act like Jeff is crazy.  As usual, i spend a lot time during and outside of choir contemplating the connections between the various choir members.  For some reason I decided that Jeff and Celia are dating and that Celia and Noa are brother and sister, but after rehearsal on Sunday I began contemplating whether Celia and Noa are dating. Kind of awkward, let's hope they're either one or the other... Just kidding, but my point is that from the American perspective, relationships here are kind of cloudy and you never really know how to interpret your surroundings. 

After choir, the other americans and I celebrated Thanksgiving american style by going out to a nice restaurant and have chicken and bananas foster! It was quite delicious, and I especially appreciated the lack of intestines in my meal, which have become a staple of the lovely dishes served up at the cafeteria.  Saturday we ventured off on an excursion to Touba, a city inland of Saint-Louis and home to the largest mosque (I forget how to spell that in english) in all of Africa.  The journey to Touba was about 3.5 hours (one way) by our strange van contraption with a door that mostly closes.  I definitely enjoyed the excursion, the mosque was huge, and apparently ground breaking for Islam because it allows non-muslims and women to enter the Mosque.  Most of the beautiful decor is done by craftsmen from Morocco, and you can definitely tell that the Mosque has a moroccan atmosphere.  According to our tour guide, the Mosque was all (or maybe mostly) privately funded through fellow muslims, and the money they receive from donations contributes to the constant construction going on at the site as well as pays for all of the water in the entire city of Touba.  The entire tour of the Mosque took less than an hour, and then we jumped back in the van and headed home. I'm not sure that it was worth the several hour, slightly nauseating car ride, but now I've seen the biggest mosque in Africa and I can appreciate Senegal a little differently.

Sunday we spent the afternoon at our Wolof professors house, where his daughters prepared ceebujen for us.  Carlie, Emily, and I went early after church to attempt to help cook, but the most we did was smash some spices up in a little bowl.  Strangely, I loved the ceebujen we had on Sunday.  I think it's funny how by the end of my stay with my host family I was sick of ceebujen, and now I love it because it is so much better than the food on campus.  As usual, after lunch we all had a mini adventure trying to get home, because our professor's house was kind of in the middle of nowhere and we couldn't find a taxi to take us home.  Consequently, we walked home, which wasn't too bad except that it was in the 90s and we were walking alongside the highway in the middle of the desert.  Hence, it was a little hot.  Plus, I was trying to hurry home because my roommate lost her keys and needed me to let her into the room. Sorry Juliette! After I got home I left right for choir rehearsal, which was pretty fun, although a little different because Jeff forgot to come.  The concert is this Saturday, and it will be quite interesting.  In theory, we enter the room walking in two lines and dancing in unison.  Yes, I did say dancing, slightly problematic for me, but I'll try to find some rhythm in the short time I have left.  After choir I had to return home by myself because Carlie was sick, and that turned out to also be an adventure.  In order to get home, I had to catch a cab into town, and then take a car rapide to the University.  I'm pretty sure the taxi I got in was also carrying two prostitutes who were very friendly, but kind of creepy.

Classes this week still aren't happening.  The students decided to strike again, and this time they're going at it much more aggressively. They blocked the road yesterday and today, which is slightly problematic because I can't get to town to get an outfit made for the upcoming Muslim holiday next week.  Moreover, this morning after learning that classes weren't happening, Carlie and I attempted to run into town with one of our Senegalese friends. Unfortunately, when we arrived at the gate to enter and exit the University, we found the road block, hundreds of students milling around, and then suddenly strange projectiles being hurled at us.  It seems that the striking is becoming violent with both students and police throwing rocks and small explosives at each other.  I hope they get their scholarships tomorrow for the sake of classes and safety!

I'm not really sure what the rest of the week will be like at this point, hopefully classes will resume tomorrow.  I loaded some more pictures, it was kind of tedious, but hopefully you'll get a sense for what the University is like here. It's a work in progress.  Happy December!