Whenever you walk anywhere in Dakar you are bombarded with "Talibe," little boys with tin cans begging for money. They beg to anyone, anytime, anywhere: when cars are stopped in traffic, when you're buying something at a store, when you're walking alone or with friends. This is especially true of course if you are a toubab, like me. Everyone in Dakar assumes (with good reason) that any white person is extremely wealthy, and we are compared to people here. It's really hard to say no to the little boys who are so young and so adorable and clearly need clothes and food. There are different theories about where this money goes, but one thing is for sure: they don't keep it. Some of the boys are paying back families for providing them with a Koranic education, but more likely, the money is going to their Koranic school teacher for his pilgrimage to Mecca. Whether or not it is actually used for the pilgrimage is unclear. Either way, I am definitely not giving them money unless I know it's going to their food and clothing. So, in the mornings I usually take the rest of the bread from my house, which is for my breakfast anyway, and bring it with me on my walk to school. Instead of giving the boys money I've been handing out the bread and making sure the whole group of them gets a piece. Yesterday after school I was buying matches at a small store on the street and a little boy came up to me, tugged on my shirt, and pointed to the cooler. I opened it and told him to chose something. Out of the mineral water, the juice, and some other healthy choices, what did he chose? The pint of ice cream. I wasn't about to argue with that choice so I bought the ice cream for him in addition to my matches. Apparently some kind of silent alarm went off to all the other beggars on the street because they came bolting over to have some ice cream. They were so excited I was afraid they were going to eat the container! It was so awesome. I watched them go nuts for a minute or so but then I started to feel too good about buying starving children some ice cream so I had to snap back to reality and not bask in the cuteness of it anymore. It's hard knowing there is so much more I can do and so much more that they need, but I also know that I can't save every homeless little boy in Dakar and that buying them ice cream was still very meaningful for them for that moment.
Our group is really bonding well and we have so much fun together. We have really long lunch periods so we get to just shmooze and tell stories and bond. It's so satisfying to be with an entire group of people who had the same thought process about going abroad as I did. All of us preferred Africa over Europe and all of us had the same stories about defending our decision to others before we left. We just all understand each other so well and are completely on the same page. It's really special and we feed off each other so well.
I'm still working on putting up my pictures on my blog. I've tried to start taking more "real" pictures of things because I feel like so far my pictures are mostly very pretty buildings, the ocean, etc. That is totally not a realistic depiction of Dakar but those are what struck me first, I guess. Even though Dakar has beautiful buildings and beaches it also has garbage, homeless people, stray animals, dilapidated buildings, etc. Even though I am adapting surprisingly smoothly, things aren't that smooth in everyday life in Senegal and I want to make that clear. It's really challenging living in a developing country and I even say that as a white American living in a middle class family. So, my point is that it's not all cute puppies and good food. Sorry to leave on a sad note but it certainly is more of a real note.
