I arrived safely in Thies after about 34 hours of travel... and so far i love it! All of the volunteers with me are wonderful! They are all so nice and sweet and open minded. We've been having a lot of training so far... i've taken a few Wolof language classes, and we had some cultural classes where I had to carry a bucket of water on my head, taste some different food and drinks, learn about religion, and different ways to dress. There was also a "Tam Tam", where a fews senegalese played the drumbs in our training center, and we all danced around in a huge circle... it was SO much fun!!! I received a pretty cool mountain bike, and today I learned how to take care of it, and how to fix it.
It's pretty hot here so far, and this is the end of the cool season, so I don't even want to imagine what the middle of the hot season will be like!
I haven't yet learned where I will be staying for the main part of the two years, but it will more than likely be in an urban area. At first I was REALLY nervous about this, because traveling from Dakar (the capital) to Thies, the scenery of the urban areas can be quite intimidating. However, after walking around in Thies yesterday (the 2nd or 3rd largest city in Senegal), urban areas seem a lot more managable.
There are 6 other people within my group of volunteers that are doing Urban Agriculture with me... 2 girls and 4 boys. The program sounds super interesting, however, we haven't had any training with that as of yet.
I am SO happy that I brought a water bottle with me, and my Teva sandals, because without either, I would be lost. I probably didn't need to bring as many clothes as I brought, and I probably should have brought some index cards (to study the langauge) and maybe a sturdy bag to carry my daily things around (i have a cheap cloth bag that works, but it'll probably get worn out soon). I'm also pretty happy that I brought all the candy and gum that I brought, because it is so dusty here, and the candy and gum help to keep my mouth feeling somewhat clean.
I can't believe that I've only been here for a couple of days, it feels like it's been 6 months already... on our first real day in senegal I was telling a fellow volunteer how I enjoyed our language class the day before, and she looked at me weird and said "that class was this morning, we flew in last night!" So thus far, keeping track of time has not been too easy.
Anyways, I am done for now... please keep in touch and write letters!