JOX MA XAALIS!

Not too much to report, other than the fact that tomorrow morning, all 40 members of my stage will no longer be the newest volunteers in country! Tomorrow morning the newest stage is arriving, making my group the "sophomores" of the Peace Corps community here. The past week has been relatively quiet. I've been helping my leather workers learn how to use Excel, which has been enjoyable. Every time they come across a new feature in the program, they are absolutely stunned, so it's been fairly entertaining. I've also taken pictures of some of their products so that I can add more photos to their website (www.pcsenegal.org/artisan). Currently, we're also working on getting a set of sample baskets and leather bracelets sent to our U.S wholesaler so that a full order can be made in the near future. It's been nice to finally get down and do something concrete, as opposed to whimsically discussing work opportunities.

A briefcase made by my work partners

I've also started riding my bike quite a bit. Essentially, I need to leave my community (too much sand) to be able to ride anywhere, but I've found some dirt trails that lead into the bush that are a blast to ride down. I particularly enjoy the scenery when I get far enough away from the national road. With nobody around, and no trash in sight, this landscape can truly show off its natural beauty. Those moments are short lasted, however, as often someone will walk down the road and attempt a typical conversation with me, usually going something like this:

Me: Nanga def? (How are you)
Random Senegalese: May ma sa velo! (Offer me your bike!)
Me: Menuma def loolu, amuma beneen velo (I can't do that, I don't have another bike)
Random Senegalese: May ma sa montre! (Offer me your watch!)
Me: Yalla Yalla, bay sa tool (Go farm your own fields, essentially telling him/her to stop begging)
Random Senegalese (As I ride off on my bike): JOX MA XAALIS! (Give me money!)

The next Lance Armstrong? (My little brother and namesake, Fallou Gallas)

As you can imagine, those types of requests can get frustrating. Even today, 2 adolescents, each wielding a machete, ran after me yelling for money. I'm sure they were harmless, but if there are 2 people (regardless of age) running after me with machetes, I usually don't stick around for too long. Other than that, things are going great here and I'm still loving it. I'm eagerly anticipating the baseball season as spring training is in full swing! Hope everyone back home is doing well. Ba ci kanaam!

W-A-I-S-T

Firstly, I want to apologize for the lack of recent updates. I have been moving a ton and really have not had time to say anything worthwhile here. However, I have officially completed my training and have also survived WAIST. The end of IST was very helpful, and it provided me with tons of project ideas should I run out of work. The highlight of the 3 weeks was when the CEO of a import company (who had done business with my local basket makers in the past) came by to visit Ngaye and talk to me (as well as the 2 other volunteers working on these projects) about coordinating a large order for baskets soon. Thus, starting in the beginning of March, my closest neighboor and I will be going back and forth to the villages trying to get around 2000 baskets sent to the U.S. I'm really excited about this work, since it affects over 100 women in 9 different villages. When these orders are made, the women weaving the baskets earn on average 3-4 times their normal wage, so they are quite eager to get going as well. In addition, as some of you may remember, a few volunteers took some footage of local artisans in Ngaye and the basket villages when I first moved here. I have been asked to help my closest neighboor edit the footage in order to make it into a short documentary. I've always enjoyed working on movies, so that's another project I'm eager to get started on.
As for WAIST...it was probably one of the funnest experiences of my life. For 4 straight days, volunteers from Senegal, Mali, Mauritania, Guinea, Gambia, and other countries played softball and partied the night away. It was especially nice being able to stay with embassy families since they fed us american breakfasts for 4 straight days (and also didn't mind that we came back at 5am most nights). Our Dakar region team made the playoffs but lost in a really tight game to Kaolack region (who got 3 place in the whole tournament, so props to them). It was a ton of fun and I'll definitely be looking forward to attending next year. A few highlights from the weekend include bartending for 250+ people, stealing Chinese flags from palm trees at 3AM, and (sorry for this next one grandma) getting licked on the arm by a crippled prostitute ("EW!" translates into all languages I found out). All in all, a great time, but I am happy to have returned to Ngaye and have some work set up for me. I'll post some updates about my work in the following week or so so stay tuned. A bientot!

1st picture is of my friend Darren on the ride to Dakar with a Senegalese youth engaging in the traditional ritual of picking your nose for 30 minutes in a public location.
2nd picture is one of the many softball games played during WAIST.