Last week I participated in a four day Village Consultation/Mobile Clinic (VC/MC) visit to a true African village about five hours from Dakar. It was my first experience of overnight in a village. I knew from my previous day visits that village life was tough, but this three-night stay allowed me to view the hardships 24/7.
There are several small villages near where we visited. This village was located about three miles from a small town and 10-15 miles from a medium-size town. We walked about a city block from where we slept to the make-shift open-air clinic. Along the way we passed the two-room school made from millet stalks and tin. We arrived at our destination at dusk on Monday night. Thankfully, several of our volunteers had brought lanterns because, even though there were poles and wires for electricity nearby, it was not hooked up. I’m sure that is another story.
Discovering that the village leader, who had organized the visit, and his ‘any day now’ pregnant wife had given up their bedroom for the ladies of the Wellness Team, reminded me why the Senegalese are known for their hospitality. Their bed and a foam mattress on the floor provided sleeping space for the four ladies. Two of the men slept next door, three slept in the van, and two were outside. Due to the heat, I slept outside one night and experienced how cold it gets in this semi-desert area at night.
The clinic was near a crossroads of sandy trails in this semi-desert area. I could see several compounds from the clinic area. One day I saw two camels in the distance and was disappointed when I discovered these huge beasts of burden weren’t coming near us. Another day we all scattered as two donkeys chased each other into the clinic area. Goats were frequent visitors to the clinic and wandered throughout all the village compounds.
Dinner time for the Senegalese is usually 9 or 10 PM, which means cooking in the kitchen hut in the dark for village ladies. A little meat, usually with several bones, fat, and a few portions of vegetables in a sauce over rice, is the usual lunch and dinner. It is served on a large round platter on the floor where five or six people eat from the common platter. A tablespoon for eating was provided for us, but the villagers always use their right hand. Fluids, usually water, are served after the meal. Long baguettes of bread with chocolate spread, butter, or cheese spread is breakfast every day. The instant Nescafe coffee, is served with breakfast, but I got the water boiling early so I could have my first cup before breakfast, as is my habit at home. This was one of the few habits from home I was able to keep. Now for the other essentials.
Picture a small, free standing concrete building with two tin doors side by side and you get an idea of the bath room and latrine facility. The latrine is a ceramic square with a designated place to put you feet and standing up is the only option. Sorry ladies! Bring your own toilet paper or wash with water from a kettle provided is how the system works. The odor was controlled compared to many villages I’ve visited. The bathing section is partitioned off by a concrete wall and had a drain, shelf for soap and a bucket for bath water.
When I made the short trip to the compound for a “potty” break, I saw a grandmother sitting under a large tree on a wood and twig box-like seat that also serves as a bed at night. She had seven or eight preschoolers sitting or playing by the bed. Once, I noticed a switch in her hand and all the little ones lined up on the bed.
By the morning break-time, the older children had made the short walk to school. Mothers and girls were doing chores such as washing and hanging laundry, cooking lunch, or sweeping yesterday’s trash from the sand yard. Adolescent girls were helping with chores because, after a girl gets older, she may quit school since her future job of childrearing and homemaking doesn’t require education above whatever grade the father decides. On one trip to the compound area I watched as a young boy of about fourteen brought three 20-30 gallon containers of water from the nearby well on a donkey cart.
People in the village lead a tough life. Jobs are mostly in the cities, so agriculture is the occupation for the majority of the men. The men who have found a job in the city travel back to the village on the weekends. The architect who had arranged for the Wellness Team to bring the mobile clinic to this area actually worked in a nearby town and came home after the work week. The older men of the village have positions of authority that involve governing the village, and/or sitting in the pleasant, open air, community building, gossiping. Children go to bed at age appropriate times often under the tree on the box like bed, which later is moved inside the family hut after it cools down. Local people were in bed later than me and up before I heard the roosters perform their early morning crowing routine.
Senegal villages are usually hotter than most US camping areas. But in village life there is no going home after the camping. This is your life day in and day out. I have complained plenty about my life in Dakar without air conditioning, dishwasher, washing machine and dryer, etc. But compared to life in the village, it is easy!
Kittie Messer
Dakar, Senegal