Friday, July 18, 2014

Ramadan

The time is 7:35PM. I'm sitting in our dimly lit hallway/living room/dining room listening to my host mom bark orders at the kids as she prepares "dogu," the afternoon snack to break fast. The sun is almost set and in the distance I notice the Mosques quiet down as they prepare for the approaching belch of prayers. This has been my favorite time of day for the past two weeks. The city slows down and all the families get together to pray and eat. Sweet symphony. 

I must admit I had never given Ramadan a moments notice before this year. I suppose I had heard about it and knew that it was a time of prayer and fasting but that was the extent of my knowledge. Well I certainly know about it now. I have tried fasting from both water and food for two days in a row and that is no picnic. So I really admire my people here who do this for a whole month. The way it works is you cannot eat or drink anything while the sun is risen. So you can wake up at 5:30 to eat but after that you must wait until 7:43. Then you break the fast with a date, sandwich, coffee, and juice. Then you go pray for a while. Dinner in this house is around 9:30/10. 

I think the reason I've enjoyed this so much is because Ramadan is supposed to be a time of forgiveness, friendliness, and prayer. People have been very curtious or at least quiet. Visiting other homes has been a treat as well since many people break fast with pastries and delicious juice. But it has led to a little stir-craziness so I've been out exploring the rural parts of Mboro some days. Here's what I've found. 


Anyway it is time for me to go eat my date. Bon Ramadan!

Thursday, July 3, 2014

The Greatest is Love

         Our month-long tour of my current life came to a brief halt yesterday morning when Lizzie boarded her 11AM Delta flight 271 for JFK. I had no idea how quickly a month could go by. And I had forgotten how happy I could be just having a conversation with her. Being together here that long had me almost believing that 8 months apart was no time at all. Which made it even harder to see her walk away into the terminal. I was slapped back to realizing 8 months WAS a long time and 12 is an even longer time until we will see each other again. But as I kept saying throughout her stay "I signed up for this." Which is true, and I am still fully committed to my stay here in Senegal. But, beside gushing, the actual purpose of this post is a suggestion from Lizzie. She encouraged me to write a post to other people considering the Peace Corps while in a committed relationship. So I guess the best I can do here is tell a little about our story and how we make it through the tough times.

         The topic of the Peace Corps came into our relationship a couple months after we started talking to each other. We weren't "going out" but whatever it was, I wanted to end it. I knew I wanted to do the Peace Corps and I knew a relationship would not last. I'm glad I was wrong. She insisted that we don't worry about that but rather see where we end up. Two and a half years later I was offered the ticket to Senegal. I accepted and the relationship did not faulter. And I guess that's due to the honest conversations we had leading up to that decision. We actually did the corny Peace Corps relationship scenarios and read the literature they had on how hard it is to maintain one throughout service. We consulted volunteers' blogs and talked about some strategies for when I left. And I really think this all paid off. We had fights, especially in times of transition and around holidays when stresses were high. But despite that, we tried to understand each others' lives. We don't downplay each other' challenges and we don't judge. We trust each other. I know those sound like general good traits to have in a relationship but this is what held things together and it started before I left. 

           Additionally it's been extremely helpful to have some hope down the road. For me, looking forward to Lizzie's visit to Senegal was torture but the only fuel I had left. While she was here we talked about plans for another trip so we can have something not so far in the future. From now on it's going to be important that we don't keep our plans vague but rather have some kind of vision for the next year. 

           But I don't want to make it sound like it has been all struggles and hard times. Today is tough and maybe the next few days will be just as hard. But her visit here has given me a new energy and a new perspective on this country. She looks at frustrations differently than I do and she gave me new ideas for some of the work I'm doing here. And I know she will tell people from home all about the journeys we had here. If I can learn to look past the pain of not being with her for another year and look forward to doing good work here and staying in touch with home, there is definitely a bright side to all the struggle. For those thinking of taking this on like we have, I'll only give one piece of advice: don't go into this half-hearted. All or nothing.