I spent the last week of October in Senegal. This was my second trip, my first was in March of ‘05. This trip only furthered my view of Senegal as a land of contrasts. March was hot like, Las Vegas hot and it was very dry. There was little vegetation and you could hardly see where the previous years crops had been harvested. October showed us the end of the rainy season and we experienced one of the last rain storms. This storm was more what I would envision a monsoon to be like. It was preceded by a lightening storm for more than a half an hour followed by a tremendous down pour that flooded the sand surfaces of the vacant lots and streets. All this rain transformed the Senegalese landscape from the city to the rural villages. Everything was green. Areas that we saw goats and sheep picking through garbage before, were overgrown with green vegetation. Farmland that appeared to be barren dry land previously was now full of millet stalks, watermelon plants and peanut plants. But for a person from the Pacific Northwest of the United States, this weather came at a price. A muggy, humid, hot and sweaty price! :) The temperature was the same as March but much more humid. I also discovered the importance of sunscreen for those not used to being so close to the equator. A beautiful drive in the back of a truck out to the villages turned into a great example of why I should always wear suntan lotion! My sunglasses turned my face into a pink and white raccoon pattern. I learned that the Wolof have a name for white people that loosely translates into red ears. (Honk-a-nob)
What have I taken away from my Senegalese experiences spiritually? It is often difficult to put into words because so much comes to mind, that I have a hard time getting it out. So I’ll leave that for part II of my Senegalese experience from October 2005. (Rich's note: Hopefully SOON!!)
Tyson P. DePoe
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