Last Day in Dakar

Happy Father’s Day! Today is our last day at the homestay and tomorrow we travel to St. Louis. In the morning, we visited the S.O.S village which is a village for orphans or children whose parents can’t take care of them. Many of these children’s parents are on the streets begging for money so instead of raising street children, the kids go to this village. There are 150 kids living in the S.O.S. village and they stay there until they are 16.

 The village was very typical Senegalese because many of the children who grow up and leave the village return to give back to the community. It was inspiring to hear the story of the current director of the S.O.S. program, Mr. Kutin. He was the first child taken in by the founder of the S.O.S. program. The children at the village live with a substitute mom and aunt. These mothers and aunts have to go through tests and training before being able to work at the village. It was also interesting to find out that the job of the mother and aunt is a paid job.

 

The children at the village make beautiful toy cars, toy Vespas, and tissue boxes out of recycled materials like Sprite cans. We were able to visit one of the houses at the village. The house we visited was really nice. Ten kids lived in the house, three kids to one room. All the children were so polite and shook each of our hands. The house was pretty big and one little boy loved to have his picture taken and then look at himself in the picture.

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After the village, we went back to the Baobab Center to say goodbye to Babacar, our favorite Gambian (just kidding Ousman). We all loved having Babacar as a guide in Dakar. He would stop traffic for us, translate things for us, and helped protect us from street vendors. He helped us so much and all of us loved him! We are going to miss him when we go to St. Louis and the village. So the rest of the day we were able to do what we wanted and spend time with our families. Mary, Aimee, and I ate lunch at our house. We ate this traditional Senegalese dish called Chebujen. We also drank this drink called Bisap which tastes like very sweet grape juice. It was funny because we liked it at the beginning, but after more sips it began to be too sugary. Our grandmother has a very commanding presence and what she says you do. She kept on telling us to finish the drink so all of us had to chug it all down even though we were full. Then in the late afternoon all of us walked to each other’s houses to hang out, but we all missed each other because everyone was looking for everyone else. Tonight’s our last night in Dakar and many of us are looking forward to the six hour bus ride to St. Louis in the nice, air-conditioned bus!

See you in about a week!

-Sam