Fêtes, Fêtes, and More Fêtes!

Bonjour! 

My time in Guinea has absolutely flown by! Hello 2013!

My First Fête de Tabaski

So I wasn't perfectly clear on what this specific fête (celebration/party) was for, but I never really know is happening during Guinean fêtes. The fête is for the story of Abraham and the sacrifice of his son. For the fête, sheep are sacrificed as an offering. Of course, my village went all out and sacrificed several sheep, goats AND cows. However, I was not present for the sacrifices as I rode my bike to my friends village (Kankalabé) on Friday to celebrate there! The ride to Kankalabé was approximately 30 kilometers, but it was fairly flat and even some great downhills! I was with another volunteer so we stopped and took some cool pictures! And I only fell off my bike once which is a great success for me! In Kankalabé, we went with some villagers to a soccer game which required even more bike riding. Unfortunately, I managed to crash into some rocky water, but it wasn't terribly grave! The game ended late, but we still decided to bike back! I made it almost completely back when my bike hit a large patch of mud and I fell completely over. Covered in mud, I managed to laugh and cry at the same time! One of the Guineans with us gave me his shirt to try and get the mud off my face. My clumsiness definitely followed me to Guinea! On Saturday, we got back on our bikes and rode to another friend's village about 15 kilometers away to celebrate the fête again! We had lots of rice and sauce and of course, really really tough goat meat! It absolutely poured rain that night and the next morning we rode back to Kankalabé through the huge unavoidable mud holes. Mud everywhere. We caught a taxi from Kankalabé back to my village and the taxi driver laid down cardboard because we were so dirty! So overall, my first fête de tabaski was successful with about 60 kilometers of biking, great eating and so much dancing! 

Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving is a huge family celebration back in America for my family. For that reason, I was really nervous about how I would celebrate this American holiday without my parents, brother and all my awesome cousins! Thankfully I made the decision to go to a friend's village to celebrate with about 10 other Americans. It was a long process because I had to ride my bike 18 kilometers to Labé and then find a taxi for the 2.5 hour ride to her village. Her village is breathtaking and the people were incredible welcoming. Most people in her village tried to change my name from Mariame Diallo to Mariame Baldé which always makes me laugh! We had three volunteers in our group who are absolutely fantastic cooks and we ate incredibly well! Chicken, stuffing, pasta salad, green bean casserole, mashed potatoes and gravy, quiche, bean dip, pumpkin pie and banana chocolate pie! Pictures of the delicious food are posted to Facebook!

Guinean Birthdays?

So in Guinea, birthdays aren’t really celebrated as they are in the United States. In fact, some people don’t even know the exact date of their birth! But I still wanted to celebrate my birthday in my own way! One of my Guinean friends learned how to sing Happy Birthday in English, which was both hilarious and wonderful! I went to Labé the weekend following my birthday to celebrate with some volunteers! One of my friends made some delicious mac and cheese and another made a great salad. All in all my 25^th birthday was full of love and fun!

Christmas

Unfortunately I found myself in the country’s capital with some health issues during the Christmas season. Currently, we are still searching for the solutions but I am confident that we will be successful soon! The great thing about being in the capital is being surrounded by great volunteers who are more than willing to go to the market for me or just sit next to my pathetic self on the couch and hug me! I also got to meet the new volunteers that got into country about a month ago. It feels weird that we aren’t the babies in country anymore! The newbies were a lot of fun and only in the house for 2 days so it was just a quick visit for Christmas! We all had a wonderful Christmas lunch together complete with turkey, mac and cheese and cookies! My folks sent a bag along with some people coming into Guinea with my Christmas presents so I am looking forward to my personal Christmas again in a few days! Thanks mom and dad! Love y’all! But truly I am just happy to be in this country with great friends, loving neighbors and goofy students! It’s been a spectacular Christmas!

Other Random Things

·        I got a puppy; her name is Tonka. Guineans are scared of dogs and it’s so funny to watch them around her!

·        My students are slowly learning! My classes are tiny and all my 10^th graders work really hard! They all want to pass the qualifying exam at the end of the year!

·        I have lost an incredible amount of weight. Turns out when the only way to get to Labé is to ride your bike up a mountain that the weight just falls right off! Send me some belts. Or some new pants!

·        I have a dance party in my house every night with myself. I am tired of my music on my iPod. Someone download new music (also tv shows and movies) onto a USB and send it to me!

·        I now have three Guinean husbands. One is the Biology teacher at my school. One is a taxi moto man in my village. And one is my friend Mamadou! All three are fun and of course jokes, but seriously let me tell you how tiring it gets to be proposed to every day. But such is life in Guinea!

·        I wrote letters back to those that wrote to me so as soon as I cross path with some volunteers going back to the states, I will send the mail along! Thanks so much for the time y’all take to write letters and put together care packages!

·        During the “winter” months in Fouta (my region) it gets unbelievably cold! No one ever believes me because I live in Africa, but when I wake up in the mornings, I sport a hoodie and some gloves that I purchased in Labé! Crazy huh?

I think I apologize a lot for being so behind in my updating but once again I am sorry for being gone for so long! I am doing really well here and I hope everyone had a wonderful holiday season!

This Post Brought to You by an Official Peace Corps Volunteer!

Good Morning from the bustling city of Conakry! I am passing through for the weekend for some medical tests and fun things like that! Nothing to serious-some of my organs just don't know how to function properly in this country! But we are sorting it all out!

So I was officially installed at my site (the small village of Noussy) two weeks ago (Friday, September 28) and I have been happily settling in since then. The day of my installation, there were many people there to welcome me with food and many handshakes. And of course, some praying! It was fairly overwhelming, but luckily there was another PCV with me for moral support! After the welcoming party was over, the Peace Corps bought all of my buckets, suitcases and of course, my bike into my house and we said a quick goodbye! A few emotions, but I felt ready to get started at site!

School "officially" started on October 3, and my principal told me to be ready to teach 9th and 10th grade math and 7th, 8th, 9th and 10th grade english. I show up early Wednesday morning, only to discover that (of course) the first week is for cleaning the school! Duh Danielle! I hung out for about an hour and then the princial calls all the students (only about 15 of the 100 total were present) into a classroom. He then proceeds to speak to them in Pular (local language) for almost an hour while swinging a stick around. As I do not speak Pular, I can only imagine that the stick was the same stick they hit the kids with. I was then introduced to the kids and they left me to talk with the 10th graders for a while. I did a quick review with them just to gauge their level and it was definitely a challenging process. It is fairly common for students here to have a low mathematics level, so I have my work cut out for me! I was able to speak with my 9th graders the next day and they are in the same position!

My village has been incredibly welcoming for the 2 weeks that I have been struggling to figure out my life! Just last week, I was presented with 5 chickens, a bag of bananas and a sack of beans! Yes, its true, I am now the owner of five awesome chickens! Hopefully the chickens will give some eggs and then when I am truly hungry, I can have chicken for dinner!

My house is almost completely set up which includes using wooden benches as shelves and stringing my killer hammock up between two windows! My village even gave me a couch and some armchairs! Living in Guinean luxury? I think so!

I am definitely loving on my village and luckily, everyone is super patient with my poor Pular skills. Hopefully the language will come more quickly once I have the basics down!

Oh and someone asked me if I see elephants or lions when I walk around! Unfortunately, there aren't those kind of wild animals around here (at least not in my village), but I do see goats, chickens, sheep and cows every single day! Not quite as exciting as a lion, but those cow horns can be pretty scary when the cow is walking right at you!

Now that I am done with training, I have had a little more down time so I will be able to respond to the great letters you have sent! As always, thanks for dropping the letters and packages in the mail! It makes me so incredibly happy to get things from home!

That's all for now! Picture update soon on facebook! Love y'all!

Almost a PCV!

Thank you to those who have not given up on me yet! My internet situation has been extremely challenging and on top of that, my computer decided to stop working for some time. So I will do my best to give you a good update!

We are nearing the end of PST (pre-service training) and I am less than a week away from being sworn in as an official Peace Corps Volunteer (PCV). My time in Dubreka for PST has absolutely flown by and while I am excited to get to site and start my new life, I am going to miss my friends and family in Dubreka very much! My host family has truly become my family. I am so lucky to have started my experience here with such an amazing group of people.

My French has improved steadily over the past weeks and I am finally able to communicate more than just basic wants and needs. Now I move onto the greater challenge of learning the local language of Poular which is the local language in the Fouta area where I will be living.

My site visit was a few weeks ago and while the whole trip was rather overwhelming, it definitely made me excited for my work here and to get started with other projects outside of teaching. As I mentioned before, I will be living in Noussy which is about 18 km outside of Labe. My school is super small, which is great because I will be able to really focus on my kids and getting them to pass their national exams. Some volunteers have more than 100 students just in one class and I will be lucky to have at least 20. Because I am so close to a major city, there aren't students that walk from other villages to come to the school in Noussy. During my site visit, I met what seemed like the entire community. I only know a few words in Poular, so most of the women just smiled at me, but the men and the kids in school know French so that communication was easier. The market in my village is only on Saturday, so most of my neighbors fed me those few days that I was there. Lots of rice and sauce. Always rice and sauce.

When I sat down to think about what I wanted to write about, it was challenging for me to come up with interesting things in my life. And then I realized that that my daily life here has become normal for me, although I don't think I would have used the word normal 2 months ago. So I thought I would go through a typical day here in Dubreka. Enjoy!

Every morning, I wake up around 6 or 6:30 and untuck my mosquito net to climb out of bed. I grab my bucket and fill it with water from the basin outside my room. Side note: I am super lucky that my family fills this basin so regularly; some volunteers have to get water from the wells outside! I take my amazing bucket shower which just involves dumping water from a small cup onto myself. After my "shower" I wrap myself in my towel which is really just a 'pagne' or a big bolt of fabric which is what women do here after showers. I get dressed in some kind of shirt/dress outfit and then hop on my mountain bike and make the trek to the training center for my classes. Riding a bike in a skirt is definitely a fun activity, but I typically wear bike shorts underneath and I tuck the sides of the skirt in so it doesn't get caught. At the training center, we have language and culture classes, technical training and other random peace corps sessions. We train from 8 AM to 5 PM every day, but I am usually at the training center well past 5 PM. We get a lunch break and we walk to the market down the street to buy whatever food we want for a meal that day. Typically I get some bread, eggs, onions, tomatoes and some cheese and make a sandwhich. Sometimes we all go in together and make a huge salad with basically every vegetable we can find in the market. After training is over, I bike back home and I get my bucket shower on again. Think amazing cold water after being covered in sweat all day. Perfect life. After my shower and a bit of studying/resting in my room, I eat dinner with my mother/brothers/sisters/whoever happens to be there. Dinner is usually a good mix of things. Sometimes I have rice and sauce, potatoes, meatballs, pumpkin, and the list goes on. I have been pretty lucky to have such a great mom here. After dinner I goof off with my brothers or my neighbors and then I usually go to bed around 10 PM. However, if there is current, we usually have a television watching party well past 10 PM!

So that is a typical day for me. Obviously, once training is over that will change, but I will just have to see how it goes. One last bit of information regarding the film that seems to be causing some commotion around the world. I am speaking of the film that was produced that some viewed as offensive toward Islam. My thoughts and prayers go out to the friends and families of all the Americans who were killed in response to the film. A few days ago, there were rumors of anti-American protests in Guinea both in my current city Dubreka and in the capitol Conakry. When I arrived for training at the center, the American embassy had sent military protection for us in case the protests got out of control. Luckily, the protests did not happen and we were all sent home safe and happy! Hopefully things stay like that for a while.

Thanks to everyone who has sent me packages, letters and emails! Its so wonderful to hear from home and get that small piece of america when I open the letter or box. If you are able, keep sending things and speak with my mother if you want to send anything with her! She sends me packages once or twice a month and I a sure she would be happy to include sometime from you!

I guess that is all I have to update for now. I was thinking maybe if you had any burning questions you wanted to know about Africa you could post them on facebook and I will answer them in my next blog. Once again, I am so sorry for the lack of updates. I will try harder once I am finally installed at site! Love to everyone!

Hey Y’all!

I know it seems like forever since I blogged, but my time in Guinea has flown by so fast already! I’ve been living in this AMAZING country for three weeks now and it’s already like home. So here is the scoop on my adventures!

We flew into Conakry on July 3 where we had to get through the airport and customs and then attempt to grab our tons and tons of luggage. Luckily, the country director and another Peace Corps staff member were there to help us because I certainly had no idea what was going on. Once we finally got out of the airport, there were some current volunteers there to meet us outside and we were all herded onto this Peace Corps bus with our stuff in the Peace Corps cars surrounding us. It was nice to have air conditioning during the drive. We stayed in the volunteer house that evening where I had my first experience sleeping under a mosquito net. We were definitely living in luxury in Conakry with running water and electricity. We had amazing air conditioning in our room!

The next few days in Conakry were full of training sessions in culture, communication, getting ready for home stays and medical information. On Friday, July 6, we took the bus to Dubreka to meet our host families. I will be living with my host family for three months while I live in Dubreka during training. So far I’ve had a blast trying to communicate with my family. The accent in Guinea is tough to understand and my host mother speaks quickly and rather inaudibly sometimes. But luckily, my host brothers are incredible patient with my ignorance and they speak slowly and usually repeat things 3 or 4 times for me. I have two host brothers who are older, one is 27 and one is 14. Fourteen seems young, but males definitely grow up faster here. I also have younger brothers and sisters (actually my nieces and nephews) who help me learn the local language by repeating/screaming the same word for me 47 times. My family speaks Sousou, although there are many many local languages throughout Guinea. Mostly all I know how to say in Sousou is ‘hello’ and ‘how are you’ for the morning and the evening.

Training in Dubreka has been incredible challenging. I have language classes every day, along with culture sessions, medical sessions and language technical classes. It’s exhausting to constantly think in French, especially because my French doesn’t come naturally yet. We train from 8 AM to 5 or 6 PM every day and then I have to go home to a family who only speaks French and Susu. I feel so lucky that my family is fairly conscience of my privacy and my need for rest when I come home after a long day. I’ve definitely had some bad days where I haven’t been able to stop myself from crying, but those days are fewer than the good ones.

I’ve been able to call my parents and a few others in the United States, but its fairly expensive for me to make phone calls so please be patient and understanding if I am not able to call you. My parents have been extremely generous and they typically call me, which is no cost to me. However, I believe it is fairly expensive for them. If you are interested in calling me, my number is 68715875 and in order to place the call from the US, you dial 011224 and then my number. I am currently 4 hours ahead of those of you in the EST!

I’ve started becoming closer with several of the volunteers, especially the volunteers that live close to my host family. I spend a lot of time with Sara (another volunteer) and her family and she spends a lot of time with my family and me. We decided that we are lucky enough to have two families here in Dubreka. Last week, Sarah and me went to a nightclub with her sisters and brothers and one of my brothers. Guinean music is hilarious, and sometimes kind of weird to dance to but it was fun! We requested a few American songs, including Rihanna and Lady Gaga and somehow the DJ learned our names and just kept yelling them during the songs.  

The Peace Corps gave all of us brand new mountain bikes for our service here. I have never been much of a biker, but I am slowly getting better at riding. Its hilarious to ride to work every day and just yell Bonjour to all my neighbors. Mostly the really little kids yell “foté” which means white person in Sousou. The intensity with which the children yell “foté” is absolutely hilarious. I am pretty accustomed to the word now and I just laugh and wave at the kids as I pass by.

Last night I just sat outside and stared at the sky for a solid 20 minutes. In Atlanta/Washington DC/College Park, there was always too much light pollution to count the stars on more than one hand. Here, there are too many stars for me to count! It was challenging to try to explain to my host brother why I couldn’t stop staring at the sky, but I think I got my point across.

In Dubreka, the electicity turns on sometimes, but the schedule is not respected here. I am able to charge my phone, kindle and other electronics when the electricity is on, however I have discovered that I am unable to charge the battery on my computer. You would think as an engineer, I would think to bring a voltage converter but unfortunately I only brought adaptors with me. So my charger provides power to my computer when the current is on, but it does not charge the battery. If anyone is feeling nice, you should send me a voltage converter! Luckily, Sara’s converter is good and she lets me borrow it to charge my computer battery. When the power is on here, my family enjoys watching the television. Guinean television is absolutely hilarious and so much fun to watch. My little host sister just yells at me to watch every 3 minutes when her favorite commercials come on.

If anyone is feeling generous, I would LOVE to see some letters or packages come my way! Send anything you want, but keep in mind the distance the package will travel and the time it will take to get to me. Anything sent here will go to Conakry (the capital) and once a month, a Peace Corps car comes out to our site with supplies for us including packages and letters! If you choose to send a letter or a package, PLEASE keep in mind that it needs to be packaged very well! If you are sending more than one letter, number each letter appropriately in case I get them out of order which is possible. If you have questions about sending anything, contact my mother! Ask around our mutual friends; someone will have her contact information! Finally, if you are awesome and choose to send me something, please keep in mind that there is no trash system here, so it would be great if the packaging was something I could reuse! Thanks in advance! My address is listed below; make sure you write exactly what I have written!

Danielle Hansen, PCV

Corps de la Paix

BP 1927 Conakry

République de Guinée

West Africa

Overall, I am doing really well in Guinea and I am thrilled that I can call this beautiful country home for the next two years. Today, I found out my site for the next two years. For those who want to use Google to check it out, I will be living in Noussy, which is just outside the major city Labé. I am close to a few volunteers whom I have already gotten close with during training. I am extremely excited about learning more about my site and we have site visits coming up in a few weeks! I miss you all very much and I promise I will try and post pictures as soon as possible!

Staging in Philly!!!

Ok first of all, I have no idea why my blog posts are posting in reverse order than what clearly makes sense. I've looked around at all the settings and I even googled the problem, but so far I have found nothing. Obviously, I would like the newest blog posts to appear at the top!

Note: after I published this post, I noticed that this entry was on the top, but the other two are still flip flopped. I guess I will see how it goes from here!

So this morning, I woke up super early and hurried around to make sure that I had everything ready to go and that I wasn't leaving my bedroom in too much turmoil for my parents to deal with! Big shout out to my amazing cousins and my amazing friend Keaton for helping me stay calm this morning!

My parents and Keaton took me to the airport. Luckily, I was able to upgrade because I have such a great father! I didn't think I would cry, but just as I was walking toward the security line, I totally broke down. But all I could do was hug my parents and Keaton and keep walking. It got better once I was on the airplane and headed towards Philly (my staging destination), especially with the comforts of first class!


I made it safely to Philly, collected my million pounds of luggage and grabbed a cab to the hotel we were staying at. We had training/orientation for most of the afternoon, which turned out to be a lot of fun! I can tell I am going to make some great friends! At the end of orientation, our leader handed out paper with all of the volunteers separated into four groups. Each group has a leader who is responsible for many things throughout the entire travel process (passports, tickets tips, head counts, etc)  and OF COURSE, I volunteered to be the leader of my group! Team Awesome!


The worst part of the day was realizing that I had left my brand new amazing rain jacket at my parent's house. I guess it doesn't seem like a big deal to some, but I was not looking forward to getting to Guinea during rainy season without a rain jacket! Luckily, I have the BEST PARENTS EVER! My father discovered Delta Dash, which allowed him to package my jacket and get it on a Delta flight that afternoon and it arrived in Philly this evening. It was a bit of a process to make it back to the airport and find the cargo building, but I am so happy to have this jacket!


Tomorrow, we (me and the other 25 or so volunteers) are taking a bus to New York, where we will fly out of JFK to Brussels and then from Brussels to Conakry. Once in Conakry, we are staying in the volunteer houses for a day or two and then we will get settled in with our hosts families and get the three month training started! Can't wait!


Thanks again for yall's amazing support and I hope to keep everyone as updated as possible!

Welcome!

Welcome to my blog, where I plan to record my adventures in the Peace Corps. I am leaving for Guinea to teach secondary mathematics on July 2 and my service will last two years and three months. Check back soon for more updates!

3 Days to Departure

So its 3 days until my departure and I am definitely feeling the nerves coming on. I will fly to Philly on July 1 and meet up with the other volunteers before our departure to Guinea. On July 2, we fly from JFK to Brussels (7.5 hours) and then from Brussels to Conakry, Guinea (6.5 hours).

I've started the crazy packing process, but mostly my stuff is scattered around my brother's room. I'm hoping to pack the majority tomorrow, because my cousins are in town for my last weekend!

I think my biggest fear is learning how to translate my sense of humor and my personality into a new culture. I've been practicing my French as much as possible, but I am hoping that once I get in country, it'll come back to me!

Thanks to everyone for their support! I know the next few days are going to fly by and before I know it, I will be stepping on a plane to start my next adventure!