Thursday, November 26, 2009

Factoids


#1. Senegalese don't use toilet paper. It's water and your left hand, kids.

#2. Senegalese children shake hands! It's so charming, I can't resist them even with sandy, sticky hands and runny noses. They would walk over to shake hands and I would melt every time. It should be noted, this applies to any child old enough to walk. If a Senegalese child can walk they will walk over to shake your hand.

#3. Most women still wear traditional clothing, all made by one of the many tailors in town.

#4. Donkey drawn chariots are used frequently. A woman arrived at the clinic in labor on one.

#5. Senegalese love Barack Obama.

#6. Senegalese are experts at recycling, reducing and reusing. They would put any self respecting American environmentalist to shame. The main motivation is that they don't have a waste disposal system or landfills and can't afford luxuries such as paper towels even if they were available.

#7. There is a very high rate of polio (or some deforming disease) in Senegal. There were many severely handicapped people even in the small town of Mboro but these people are treated well by everyone in the community.

#8. Africa is expensive. There. I said it. It was over $2 for a dozen eggs, bananas were about $ .75/pound and a lady tried charging me $3.50/pound for green peppers at the market. Granted, they always try to give you the Toubab (whitey) price but some of these prices were the ones we paid AFTER haggling.

#9. Select areas of Mboro had running water all day. Our house only had it at night. Sometimes it would turn on at 6 pm. Sometimes it would turn on at 10. Power outages were common.




















#10. We washed our clothes by hand. I think everyone in Mboro did as well.
#11. Senegal is predominantly Muslim and in Mboro they had a call to prayer 5 times a day starting just before sunrise. They prayers were piped through loud speakers so you could hear the call anywhere in town. People kept prayer rugs with them at work and home.

#12. Polygamy is legal in Senegal and a man can have up to 4 wives.
#13. Senegal has a low AIDS rate...only 2%. Not bad for Africa.

#14. There is a belief in at least some parts of Africa, Senegal being one of them, that having sex with a virgin will cure AIDS. This results in the frequent rape of young girls (there was one at the clinic who was only 5 years old) and many countries have billboards and posters up trying to debunk this myth.

#15. The mosquitos there carry both malaria and dengue fever. The ones carrying dengue bite mostly during the day, the ones carrying malaria bite mostly at night.

#16. Most African slaves brought to America were brought from Senegal. About 3 million of them were held and processed on the Isle de Goree a short ferry ride from Dakar.

3 comments:

  1. I love reading this. So interesting/thrilling/ sad/intriguing......
    Didn't know any of these factoids. I am wondering what the breastfeeding rate is? Do most women there breastfeed?

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  2. lst off the human beings brought to the West were not slaves. They were Africans who were stolen from African and enslaved, worked without pay and their progeny provided the fuel for the industrial revolution and the economic prominencd now enjoyed by the west. Our beloved Continent still provide 75% of the world's resources and Black, Brown and people of Color are still the work horses that give you the opportunity that you have. Also while many people were stolen from the West. My Idren came from all over the Continent. A good dialectic to study so that you can better overstand is that poverty is not an inherent characteristic. People are poor because others are rich. Study the relationship and you'll better understand the dynamic. Know the history before you name them facts.

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  3. While I may not approve of polygamy, rape of women for any reason (rape occurs in the West and unfortunately is a weapon of war so let's not get it twisted, at least it's culturally accepted and it's not cheating which regularly occurs in the WEST. Polygamy served and continues in many areas to serve a societal function by allowing women to have other women help them with the work of women. Again get your history straight before you state your facts

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