Migrantion, Music, Moussa mmmmm

Can you believe it has been one full week since you've gotten the news from Bzurk?
You can probably guess, its because I "does work" that I havnt been able to update
Also I have no Internets chez moi.

Give migrant domestic women Weekly Day Off by signing this petition!
They deserve it. Articles 23 and 24 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights say:

• Everyone has the right to work, to free choice of employment, to just and favourable conditions of work and to protection against unemployment.

• Everyone has the right to rest and leisure, including reasonable limitation of working hours and periodic holidays with pay.

FEBS continues! and its going pretty fast. I submitted my funding request to USAID yesterday (I walked it there and handed it to them, I felt like a beast). I have a few other leads on places to get funding but if you or your organization wants some corporate social marketing in Africa you should think about investing in Femmes Ensemble pour une Bonne Santé, we're not asking for much.

I have had a pretty chill week. I finished Life of Pi. Its a good book and a fast read. A son of a zoo keeper who has 3 religions has an adventure that is terrible and wonderful. The book makes you think. The beginning and the end are really terrific and the middle is like the struggle of Hemingway's The Old Man and the Sea I really recommend reading it if you haven't already (I know this isn't cutting edge stuff here).

I'm going to start Siddhartha by Hermann Hesse today.

I have started listening to African music and can listen to nothing else. As of now I'm listening to:
Amadou and Mariam
Les Freres Guisse
Putumayo Presents Africa Acoustic

Have I mentioned my boom box yet? It is my favorite thing in my apartment.

Heres a silly pic of my friend Moussa and I. I went to a wedding at his house on Sunday. Pretty fun, lots of Wolof. It was cool. Everyone was dressed all nice and the food/beverages were great. TONS of people. Our friend from the office Coumba got married in a crazy fast ceremony to Moussa's best friend. She's like my age and was a beautiful bride. Félicitations! Someone was snapping pics and the wedding, maybe Moussa will be able to get them to e-mail them to me... hahaha, or maybe not!

Alls well that goes well here in Senegal. Big meeting today (hopefully) where we can get a bunch of logistics figured out about funding, designing and stuff like that. I will have the logo, t-shirt designs and more specifics of the FEBS strategy ready to go for blog postage soon. Peace out WORLD. and happy birthday David Zamostny, I miss you tons. Remember this game from June, 2001? I do.

On y va!

Here we go!

Last night at my neighborhood rugby bar run by some dude from the South of France they played a bunch of music videos which is awesome because that was the first TV I have seen since I've been here. I saw Lady Gaga and Beyoncé's "Telephone"
Have you seen this craziness? Gaga is wild.

Youssou N'Dour: public health advocate, Senegalese, amazing African music. What else could you ask for in a film? Nothing: I Bring What I Love

Today human rights watch came out with a report exposing the system of exploitation and abuse in Senegal where thousands of boys, between the ages of 4 and 12, called talibés are forced by their Quranic teachers, called marabouts, to beg in the streets seven days a week.
These tiny beggers set up shop between my office and my house so I pass them often. Vraiment, they are everywhere. When I pass them they repeat "cent franc" (100 cfa, 25 cents) until I give them money or they give up. Sometimes I give, sometimes I don't. When I don't they usually follow me for about a minute, their clothes caked in dirt, their thin arms stretched out, skin scarred, and usually they are not wearing shoes on the dangerous sandy streets of Dakar. Sometimes they look so young, like babies. At that age I was a soft, naive, Woodlin Elementary School student. A completely different life. More than anything else I have seen or experienced in Senegal, the daily lives of the talibés remind me how lucky I really am. Please read the press release here.

Life continues here, nothing too major. I can't go to frisbee tonight which is lame because I have to go and get all these questionnaires done. C'est la vie. Alright, gotta go. D'accord, jusqu'à la prochaine fois.