Ok, I’ve totally slacked on my blog since I decided to stay
on for a 3rd year. My life got extremely busy with the start of
training for our new group of health volunteers, and for 2.5 months I was back
and forth between our training center in Thies and my village (about an 8 hour
public transit ride). So I’ve got much to update everyone on, including the
completion of my well, my move out of village, and my new role.
However, those will have to come in a subsequent blog post,
because today I’ve got much more somber information to share. Last Friday,
there was a fire in my village. Unfortunately, during dry season, village fires
are not uncommon. People cook with wood in small enclosed cooking huts or out
in the open, and if every single ember doesn’t get extinguished, the wind can
come along out of nowhere and ignite the fire again.
This is precisely what happened in my village. Somewhere, a
fire didn’t get put out completely, and Friday night there was a big windstorm
in my village that reignited a flame. Out of the 35 compounds (a household, but
made up of a series of huts in a circle with communal space in the middle), two
completely burned and 4 other compounds lost about half of their huts. One of those
4 households belongs to my counterpart, Sadio Ba, the man I worked with for the
past 2 years at our health hut.
I happened to be traveling for work this week when I got the
call. We were due to spend Sunday night in Tamba before continuing on our trip,
so early Monday morning I got up and went to my village. I only had 1.5 hours to
spend there, but I got the chance to see everyone and make sure no one was
hurt.
And in true Senegalese fashion, I was talking to one of the
men from the households that burned completely, and he said, “Thanks to God
that only our stuff burned and that no one was hurt. Things can be replaced but
people can’t.”
So that’s exactly what I’d like to do – help people replace
what was lost. My dad created a GoFundMe page to collect money for my village and
any donation, no matter how small, is appreciated.
Since I am not based there any longer, I’ve solicited the
help of my two best friends in village that I trust. I will be sending them the
money and asking them to take a survey among the impacted households of what
they need, and then these guys will go to the market and buy the beds,
mattresses, clothes, etc to help replace what is gone.
Help is coming from wherever it can. The day immediately
following the fire, men in the village were cutting down sticks and gathering
dried grass to start remaking the hut roofs. An NGO that works in our village
came and took a census of all the people impacted so that they could try to
provide support. The school is providing new notebooks and backpacks to all of
the children who lost theirs in the fire. People from the village who live
abroad are sending donations.
I never imagined how close I could get to the people in my village
after only two years, but they are my family now. And when your family is
hurting, you do whatever you can to help. Thanks to all of you for your
support, and even if you can’t donate, please keep my village in your thoughts
& prayers as they rebuild what was lost.
*More personal updates to come soon!*
Thanks for reading. Peace & love,
Lindsay
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| My counterpart's house |
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| My counterpart's room. Everything inside, including all his clothes, was burned |
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| A cooking pot |
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| One of the households that burned completely. This is all they managed to save for the house of about 15 people |
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| People are sleeping on their cement platforms while the rooms get rebuilt |
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| All that's left of their harvest. Other people in the village are donating crops so that people have food until the next harvest |
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| One of my village elders. His house lost everything. |
Hi Lindsay, I am so happy to follow your odyssey. Be safe.
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