It’s been a little while since my last update, so my apologies. The last month has been a combination of changing work assignments and fun times. With my artisan work slowly coming to an end, I am preparing myself and beginning to take on work for the next step in my life as a volunteer. With my upcoming move to Dakar in mid September, I’ve been getting myself ready for the work I’ll be doing there. Part of this involved redesigning the SeneGAD (SeneGAD is a group within Peace Corps here that focuses on girls advancement and education) website. You can see the new version here at http://www.senegad.org/. All in all I am very excited to more to Dakar, and it seems strange that enough time has gone by that someone will soon be coming to Ngaye to replace me!
Much like last year, I made my way down to Kedougou for the 4th of July party. Just like the last 4th of July, we ran a 4Km run on the morning of the 4th with the city of Kedougou to celebrate Independence Day. The rest of the day was spent enjoying the pool and festivities that the volunteers down there had set up. All in all, it was a great time. We also spent quite some time watching World Cup games down in Kedougou, which was really fun. Even watching games with my host family is a huge relief from the incredibly repetitive (and boring) Senegalese soap operas! A nice bonus was that the road to Kedougou has been vastly rebuilt, so I was actually able to make the entire trip back to Ngaye on the 5th and be home before sundown!
In a few days time, I will be making a long awaited trip to Sierra Leone with some good friends from my stage. We have been planning on doing this trip since Tanksgiving, so needless to say, I am pretty pumped about it. Sierra Leone has been fortunate to make some fairly significant strides in the right direction given its violent path, and has apparently become a beautiful place to visit once again. With incredible beaches, wildlife, islands, and mountains, I am sure that our week in Sierra Leone will be incredible. I am bringing my camera and will be taking a ton of pictures for everyone to see. Coming back on the 3rd, I will briefly stop by Ngaye to pack some things up and head back to Dakar for the much hyped Close of Service Conference. During these 4 days, my stage and I will be attending sessions on how to readjust to the United States after serving in the Peace Corps. Much of the focus during the conference is on getting jobs back home, and even though I won’t be COSing until next March, I’m sure the information will be plenty valuable to all of us. That’s about it for now, but I’ll post a long update when I get back from Sierra Leone with tons of pictures. Hope all is well back home. A plus tard!
