The Redheaded Wanderer: August 2015

To celebrate international youth day, Peace Corps Volunteers in the larger Kaolack-Kaffrine-Fatick region gathered with thirty-nine Senegalese female teenagers for the 6th Annual Kaolack Girls' Leadership and Empowerment Camp. The sixteen volunteers were joined by four Senegalese women passionate about girls' rights who volunteered their time and talents at the camp. Girls were chosen throughout the three regions by Peace Corps Volunteers and local educators, seeking out high performing girls in danger of being taken out of school or dis-empowered in other ways. The five days focused on self-identity, female health, environment, gender, and future goal setting education.

The goals of the camp were to introduce new knowledge, increase individual self-esteem, encourage critical thinking, and create a peer support network from the group of girls. Our mantra throughout the camp was "know yourself, respect yourself, believe in yourself."

Xam sa bopp. Fonk sa bopp. Gem sa bopp.

From those of us on the planning team, we'd like to extend our many thanks to those involved. From the generous donors to the courageous girls to our guest speakers to those goofy, hard working Peace Corps Volunteers, you all create a wonderful camp for us all.

*Photo credits to Rita Argus, Angela Khong, and Tina Verrilli

TALENT SHOW

To 'break the ice' at camp, we start off with a PC volunteer talent show.
The girls were amazed and alarmed by Angela's flexibility,

An annual favorite, speaking Wolof upside down with googly eyes on your chin. Some of us had more difficulties with keeping they eyes on than others (hint hint, you with the facial hair). The girls and Senegalese counselors whipped out their phones to film the entire skit.

From a culture of dancing, the girls were huge fans of Denise'e traditional Mexican dancing.
Though we strongly suspect the girls were equally impressed by the skirt!

The infamous spaghetti eating contest. The girls are always slightly confused but we volunteers
think it's the highlight of the evening. There was some flagrant cheating and a lot of laughs.

YOGA and TEAM BUILDING

Each morning we split the girls into one of two sessions. An hour of yoga or an hour of team
building activities. Yoga is not a well known sport in Senegal, especially in rural areas
that most of our attendees come from. The first session was full of trepidation, but after the first
couple of minutes the girls got into the rhythm of breathing deeply and stretching.

Leadership games were a huge hit because the students don't have any structured games or time to
just play. It's something we take for granted back home, but here there is no
recess and no fun games in PE class. The games were meant to make the girls more comfortable with
\one another, make friends, and generally have fun.

The blindfolded obstacle course was full of perils, only to be avoided if you and your team had good communication.

The human knot. Since these students have never been exposed to basic ice breakers before they thought
this was such a novel game. Never underestimate the competitive streak of teenagers!

Trust falls with the Safie, one of the Senegalese counselor's daughters and the mascot of the camp.

Another game (which are of course the most photogenic moments). Over the head water cup racing.
Each team grabs a cup of water from the pan in the center and passes it back down the line by pouring
the water over their heads into the cup of the person behind. The final person pours their water into
the bucket at the end of the line. Which ever team has the most water in their bucket at the end of five
minutes wins. There were a lot of wet heads and competitive kids!

Musical chairs was more of a success than we planned. We didn't have music available so
we took turns singing American and Senegalese hits. The icing on the cake was that one of the most quiet,
shy girls at camp won the game to the cheers of her peers!

MORNING SESSIONS

After yoga and team games, each morning was devoted to the information based sessions of the camp.
We brought all the girls together to discuss identity, health, environment, gender, and future/ goal setting sessions.

After discussing what identity entails and 'knowing your self,' the girls made individual Baobab trees.
Just like the strong, beautiful, unique Baobab trees that fill the landscape, each of the girls has her own important identity.
In Diatou's example, she lists her age, nationality, family members, goals, music preferences, favorite dance move, etc.

We then discussed how individual identities combine to create larger group identities. Like how the girls at the camp represented the strong, women of Senegal. On different colored papers the girls wrote "I am important," "I am a woman," "My goals" and drew the corresponding information underneath. We then created a 'Senegal identity quilt' by mixing up all the different papers and taping them on the classroom wall. Below one of the girls explains her "I am important" quilt piece.

On environment day, we discussed how humans interact the natural environment. When we first asked the students to explain their environment, they only listed buildings in the village. We slowly drew out all the parts of a natural habitat like trees, animals, water, ground water, etc. We then discussed how human interact with the environment through wells, farming, buildings, roads, etc.
The girls drew the environments in their communities, notice how Fatou's drawing includes man-made structures including a water tower, wells, buildings, roads, and farms as well as the natural elements like rain, dirt, ground water, and animals.

We ended the session by discussing how ecosystems can change and how we can respect the environment.

At the end of each session we had the students journal about what they had learned.
By pausing to reflect on what we'd discussed, the students internalized the lessons
and created mementos for them to look back on them.

On gender day, Peace Corp's Sidi Toure discussed domestic violence, the importance of education,
and how this generation is part of a revolution for gender equality.
"Two hands are used to put on a skirt, two hands are used to put on pants. They are equal."

We also led a debate about the role of women in Senegal. We asked questions like;
\"Do you want the same life as your mother?", "Should your parents choose your husband, or should you?",
"If you see forced early childhood marriage in your community should you go to the police and report it
(since it's illegal), or should you respect the tradition?" For each question there were girls who
believed in both sides and vigorous debate ensued.

Our goal for the debate was to encourage critical thinking, both in the moment and in the future.

On future/ goal setting day, we brought in the CED (community economic development) Peace Corps
staff to discuss how income generation works and play the BEST game. The girls were split
into teams, given businesses via a loan program and had to generate enough income to
eventually pay the loan back. It was a great learning experience, the girls got very competitive, and
they were able to articulate all the lessons from the game before staff did the debrief at the end.

The teams planning out their loan payment.

AFTERNOON SESSIONS

In the afternoons, we split the girls into rotations to do activities that corresponded with the day's theme.
We did pre- and post- tests to see what information they retained from our morning sessions, art,
social geography, skits, and various other sessions.

On environment day, we made reusable bags from colorful Senegalese fabric.
In the next year, Senegal will start charging for the use of the currently free ubiquitous, black, plastic bags.

In our social geography sessions we discussed how the day's theme is different around the world.
Denise and I discussed the various challenges to eating nutritious meals including how the environment
affects each country's ability to grow food, proximity to water (for fish and exports), national GDP,
average family size, and (most importantly) choice.

On health day, the girls drew what they need to choose to make a nutritionally sound lunch.
Most of them chose to draw a healthy version of the national dish "cheeb u jen" (fish and rice),
laden with vegetables and a limited amount of oil and MSG.

A general first-aid session.

On future/ goal setting day, our CED volunteers talked to the girls about career planning. After listing three things they wanted to achieve in the next 10 years, the volunteers helped the girls think out the step-by-step process of achieving them. For example, if a girl wanted to start a family, become a doctor, and graduate from school, what order would those come in and what additional steps are needed to become a doctor? Extra schooling or training? What languages will you need to speak, etc. It was an excellent session as the girls started mapping out the steps to achieving their dreams.

SPORTS

No matter the activity, the girls loved to play. Water balloons were a huge hit! (Especially when the girls started aiming at PC Volunteers!)

Most girls have never swam, so getting wet in the mangroves was one of the
highlights of many of their experience.

Our final sports activity was an enormous game of capture the flag with water balloons.
Over forty participants, several hundred balloons, and almost a hectare of playing space equals a lot of fun.

the PEOPLE involved

Goofy PC volunteer camp counselors, who said we were fit to be in charge of all these kids.

Behind the scenes prep and planning.

Some of us try to work hard, but those Peace Corps drivers just love to tease us.

A huge thanks to all those volunteers we worked to the point of exhaustion.

Sidi sharing a moment with our Senegalese camp counselors.

GIRLS TALENT SHOW

The final night the girls put on their own talent show. They made their own skits, dances, and
songs to surprise us PC Volunteers. This was a lengthy skit about how to address early marriage
in your communities, including a respectful inclusion of community leaders and parents.

Below, each of us PC Volunteers was imitated by one of the girls or Senegalese counselors.
They were surprisingly astute, capturing our mannerisms, favorite word choices, and dance moves.
Favorite props were glasses and the outfits we used at our dance night.

The girls singing Celine Dion's "Mother and the Child."

DANCING

The most successful event was our 'Sabaar' or night of Senegalese dancing.
We brought in a local drumming troupe, sat the girls in an enormous circle, and danced until exhaustion.
Above is one of our Senegalese counselors showing off her moves.