A Whole New World....

Hey everyone!

So, I haven't had the chance to blog in FOREVER so I have a lot to say, but the battery on this computer is going really fast so I'll just keep it fast. As a side note one of the girls just found a lizard in her pile of clothes, which is pretty amusing, I'm real glad it wasn't me though....

Where to begin....well Saturday morning we flew out of RDU (Raleigh-Durham) to JFK (New York Airport) where we sat for about four extra hours before flying to Senegal. We finally got here at about 8:00 Sunday morning, so we just stayed up for the rest of the day. It's so different here as I'm sure you can imagine, but it's absolutely nothing like I thought it would be!

We're staying in a pretty nice hotel, well nice for Africa at least I'm sure most people would NEVER stay here in the US, but like I said things are a lot different...

This is hard there are so many things I want to say, but so little time, hmmm....well today was our first day on campus after some training Monday and Tuesday and just getting to know the city the past few days. I actually got to go talk with some girls I met at an event last night. There are 9 or so of them sleeping and living in one little room, it's pretty crazy. It's probably about half the size of my dorm room last night but being shared between that many people, however, the girls are sweethearts and I love them to death! We talked together about our beliefs, they explained some of the Islamic faith to us and we explained Christianity to them.

We also just talked about our different cultures and the kinds of music they listen to. They taught me how to dance to their national music called Mballa (?) and let me tell you I'm not good at it, of course I can't dance to our music in the states either. Despite all of this fun, all of these girls have had hard lives, much harder than I can ever imagine, so please pray for them because I have come to care for them so much even in this short amount of time!

Other than today though like I said we've had a lot of training and such just about how to approach situations and things like that. We've also been immersed in their culture eating Senegalese food (which isn't bad and I think I'll come home gaining more weight...), and walking around Senegal learning things are, as a side note women in Senegal are considered very worthless. As a white woman in Senegal there are certain things that are hard, but everything is much easier as well. For example many comments are made to us (mostly in another language so I have no idea what they are), but more people are willing to approach us and talk to us. In short I like it here a lot and I'm learning and experiencing so many things! Thanks for all your support and I love and miss you all! God Bless!