Latrine Construction in Ndorong-Sereer

We in Ndorong want to say JOKANJYAL MAYU (thank you so, so much) to all the friends and family in the States who helped make this latrine project possible. The community has completed 36 latrines thus far and more are currently under construction. Ndorong plans to be finished with all 63 latrines before the end of August. Again, for those of you who donated, we cannot thank you enough for your generous support. You have helped enable a positive, lasting impact for our community’s health for many years to come. Below are pictures of our progress. Thank you.

Each family has dug a 2.5m x 2.5m pit for the latrine in the back of their compounds. The width and depth is more than sufficient to contain waste and prevent overflow.

We kept the 504 sacks of cement locked in an unused room near the main thoroughfare. Each family will use eight sacks of cement for their latrine.

Ibu and Samba load sacks of cement onto a donkey cart to bring to our compound. These sacks are 50 kilos (110 lbs) each!

Gravel used to mix in with the cement to create a durable cover and base for the latrine. This pile is completely gone and we are now using gravel leftover from the new school construction. New latrines, new school, what’s next…running water?

Pipes used for moving the waste from the ‘seat’ to the pit. The 6m pipes are cut into three 2m pieces, each family receiving one piece.

Each family received eight sacks of cement. Four of those sacks were used to make the bricks and the remaining four were used to cement the bricks together and make the top seal. Bricks are left to dry for two or three days before construction.

Local mason Alieu Diouf laying the foundation for a latrine.

Working hard or hardly working? Masons Alaiji Sow and Alieu Diouf taking a break from the toil.

A few families wanted to build two separate rooms over the pits, one a bathroom and the other for showering.

A single pit latrine used for both showering and relieving oneself.

Alaiji and Samba mixing cement with gravel to pour over the cover to make the seal. The metal wire was fastened together to form a grid over the sheet metal, serving as a solid base for the seal.

Pouring the cement over the sheet metal.

The seal is complete and being left to dry. A room with a seat will be built next door with the pipe running from the seat into the pit.

The finished product, a completed latrine and room. In the background are the separate rooms for showering and relieving oneself. The pipe runs underground into the pit.

Another sealed latrine.

Kids filling up the ‘tippy-tap’ hand washing station. The person washing their hands will step on the stick at the bottom to pull down the plastic bedong releasing water.

The ‘tippy-tap’ in action. Hands free of germs!

Ramadan and Korite

Ramadan, the holy month of fasting for Muslims, was observed in Senegal on June 18 and recently ended on July 17. During Ramadan, we break fast before dawn with bread, dates and tea then abstain from eating or drinking anything until sunset. This is a very difficult month for everyone, but especially for manual laborers who must work outside during what is arguably the hottest month of the year. Farmers must plow and plant their fields, masons are scrambling to finish houses before the heavy rains, taxi drivers have long journeys ahead of them, and not an air conditioned office in sight. The fasting lasts for a month, beginning and ending with the slivered crescent of new moon. On July 17th, the entire village gazed west into the rose-blush dusk, searching for the first sight of the slight pale finger-nail of a moon. The following day was Korite, a day of pure, unadulterated feasting. Groups of young men dressed in their finest bou-bous, led the tour de Ndorong, visiting each family asking forgiveness and sampling their cuisine, typically macaroni or cous-cous served with onion sauce and goat meat. This Korite, our family cooked roast duck with vermicelli, onions and potatoes. After stuffing ourselves silly and reveling in the fact that we can drink water again, the village silently agreed to a mass siesta. Below are a few pictures of the celebration.

Farmer use horses, donkeys, and cattle to plow their fields after the rain. Farmers plant millet before the rain and peanuts and corn after the first heavy rain. Thus far, the rains have been promising.

Ya Fatou and Mamjaara in their newly built kitchen singing the duck to remove hard to pluck feathers.

Kids wearing their Korite’s best stop by asking for candy and small change. The angry pose must be really in this year, I promise, all of these kids got candy.

My adorable nieces, Hadioum and Ndeye Awa, and nephew Tijane in matching floral print.

Nuffie Satu and Baby Fatou out for the count. Korite revelry is a marathon, not a race.

Myself and host mother Ya Fatou.

Myself and host sister Mamjaara.

My counterpart and his wife wanted to honor my family by naming their newborn baby, Elaine, after my mom. She’s wearing the outfit my mom sent from the states. Look at those cheeks! Too adorable!

Cold Season Gardening in Ndorong-Sereer

This year, the women got a head start on cold season gardening season planting onions, green peppers, hot peppers, okra, daikon radish, cucumbers, tomatoes, cabbage, and lettuce. They were one of the first to arrive in the weekly market with heads of iceberg lettuce so big, people thought it was a new type of cabbage. The women have sold all of their lettuce and have already transplanted a second bed. The women have also just harvested their onions, each group yielding around forty pounds of onions. Below are a few photos of their hard work!

Second round of lettuce nurseries growing in discarded bowls and plastic water containers. The lettuce is started in containers because the ants eat the seeds if they are planted directly in soil. This lettuce has been transplanted and is currently being sold.

Beds (5mx1m) of iceberg lettuce. Each group has a bed of lettuce, each head is sold for the equivalent of 20 cents.

Beds of Daikon radish (3mx1m). This variety of radish is ready to harvest in a month and a half and bring in a decent amount of money per kilo.

Top: Aissatou Laube and her harvest of radish.
Mid: Douda Ndiaye, helping his Mom, Seega Ndiaye, pick radish. Douda is the namesake of the husband of the first Peace Corps Volunteer to serve in Ndorong-Sereer. Shout out to Barbara (Coumba) and Douda Camara!

Onions grew much better this year than our last attempt. Much more vibrant and vigorous, undoubtedly due to the additional manure constantly worked in every two weeks. These have now been harvested and are being left to cure.

Mulching cucumbers, cabbage, and bitter tomato (Jaxatu). Our well has been running low for the past few months due to the weak rainy season, thus we’ve been mulching and watering once a day to help conserve water. These efforts have noticeably helped restore the water level in the wells.

Green pepper, hot pepper, and tomatoes, planted in individual zhai holes (holes amended with manure and bermed to better retain water). These are a huge money maker for the women.

Ami Faye and Mann Faye pulling water from the well. I’m so proud of all of the women and their hard work!

Please donate to help build latrines in Ndorong-Sereer!

Open defecation is a serious health issue in our village. It is not uncommon to go outside and find a child squatting to relieve themselves out in the open, right in the middle of compound or the street. Adults are more discreet and venture into the fields, however rarely bring soap along to properly clean themselves. Often, people will dig a shallow hole or trench for the family and put up a millet-stalk fence for privacy. This is certainly a better alternative, but since the holes aren’t deeply dug nor reinforced with cement, the holes collapse every rainy season (sometimes even before the rainy season) and with the heavy rains, follows the waste floating throughout the village. People are aware of the health implications of open defecation. They see the parasites living beneath their children’s skin from playing in the sand. They know not washing their hands afterwards is a source of their stomach aches, diarrhea, and pink eye. The omnipresent flies landing on feces and then on our food and open sores is a primary source of giardia and infection.

Latrines provide a space that is safe, sanitary, centralized, discreet, durable, and dignified for the entire family to utilize. Our vision is to have one latrine for each family compound, a total of 63 latrines, each equipped with a “tippy-tap” hand-washing station. Additionally, our village will host a series of seminars led by Peace Corps Health Volunteers about the importance of frequent and thorough hand-washing.

This was not my idea of a project for Ndorong-Sereer. Coming in as an Agroforestry Volunteer, I’ve been focused on helping protect farmers’ fields and gardens using live-fencing species, establishing cashew and mango orchards, creating community woodlots, and helping graft improved fruit varieties. This project has been entirely orchestrated by the community. The community has organized meetings to discourse at length the importance of constructing latrines and how they can improve the health of the village. Everyone agreed latrines would benefit the village and agreed to provide at least 25% of the grant total from both in-kind contributions and cash. They held more meetings to discuss advantages and disadvantages of different latrine designs. After deciding on a simple yet effective design, attractive because of its durability and efficient use of materials, the village masons stood up and voluntarily agreed to work at a reduced wage to help with construction. The men followed, willingly volunteering to dig the 2mx2mx2m pit for women-run households whose sons and husbands have left for the city. The village chief then called a meeting for the local masons and me to discuss costs and logistics of materials and transport. Here is what we determined.

Our inventory includes:

• 504 sacks of cement, each $5.31, total $2,676
• 18 large poles of #10 rebar, each $2.76, total $49.74
• 6 large pole of #8 rebar, each $2.76, total $49.74
• 63 carts of gravel, each cart $8.29, total $522.27
• 20kg of metal wire, each $1.66, total $33.20
• 5 back and forth trips to transport all materials, each $36.48, total $182.39
• 63 reduced mason wages to construct each latrine, each $16.58, total $1,044.54

As you can see, even the smallest contribution is an enormous help. Just $2.00 can fund more than a kilo of metal wire for a latrine. A mason’s wage for one latrine is covered with $20.00. You can sponsor a latrine for an entire family for only $81.91. We need your support to raise $4,095 to help fund our vision of providing a latrine for every compound. The community has invested $1,065 in cash and is very enthusiastic and eager to begin construction. We are grateful for any amount you have to offer, please help contribute to improving the health of our village!

You can Donate Here!

Something’s Cooking in Ndorong-Sereer

For many villages in Senegal, cooking is a balancing act; a large cast-iron pot precariously poised atop three misshapen stones over a dancing open flame. Much of the heat is wasted, dissipating into the enclosed cooking hut instead of tightly directed at the bottom of the pot. This inefficiency requires more wood and more time spent cooking in a smoke-filled room. Every day, women venture further and further into the neighboring protected forest to harvest a rapidly diminishing supply of dead wood. The law forbids people from cutting living, or “wet”, trees, but when the supply is scarce, what other option is available?

There are, however, ways to reduce the fuel load and the amount smoke while cooking in the same amount of time or less by using improved cook stoves. There are prefabricated portable iron stoves for sale in larger cities, but a high up front cost often dissuades people (especially men who don’t collect firewood, don’t cook, and don’t sit in a room saturated with smoke three times a day, but who have tight control over the finances) from purchasing them. Clay stoves, entirely free and made with local materials, appear to be a more enticing alternative.

In February, I accompanied four very motivated women from my village, Mariama Diouf, Ami Diouf, Haddie Ngom, and Kumba Diouf, to the CREATE! center in Fass Barigo where we learned to make clay stoves. The stoves are inspired by the three stone cooking method, but built to fully enclose the cooking pot. This concentrates heat of the fire to the pot while significantly reducing the amount of wood needed in the three-stone method. Since less wood is being burned and the wood is being burned at a higher temperature, cooking with the clay stove also produces less smoke. In the training, the technicians did an awesome job in demonstrating how to build the cook stoves and after the lesson, we were able to build one by ourselves.

Upon returning to the village, the women set right to work in collecting materials and inviting their friends over to learn how to construct the stoves for themselves. If a woman wants a stove, she collects the materials beforehand and helps out building a stove at another compound. When it’s her turn, the original four women, those who want a stove and those who built the last stove come by to help. After the stove is built, she goes on to help construct a new stove the next compound. Below are photos of the stove-making process and the women with their finished stoves.

Millet chaff sifted to separate the chaff from the fibrous stalk. A medium sized stove requires around two large buckets of sifted chaff. Millet chaff is found in huge piles in the field where women winnow the grains from the chaff.

Clumps of clay are dug from the clay quarry nearby the village. The clumps are then pounded until fine like sand.

A bucket of sand, a bucket of millet chaff, and a bucket of clay and many enthusiastic hands are essential ingredients for a clay stove.

Women vigorously mixing the chaff, sand, and clay. Adding water and mixing until evenly moist. Its important that the mixture not be too wet or else the stove could topple over. Once adequately moist, the mixture is made into ball form to be pressed down around the mold of the pot.

The rock is levelled to the appropriate height depending on the size of the pot. One hand with thumb up for a small pot (2 kilo), two hands thumbs down for medium size pot (4 kilo), two hands with thumb up for large pot (7 kilo).

The stones are spaced evenly seven finger lengths apart from each other. The pot is then balanced on top of the stones. The stove will be constructed form-fitting the stones and pot.

The clay balls are pressed down hands width from the stones. The clay is layered until its two finger distance from the lip of the pot.

Haddie Ngom (left), Ami Diouf (center), and Mariama Diouf (right) nearly finished with a stove. The base and smoke holes remain.

Finishing the base, a single layer of pressed clay, and cutting the smoke holes. Nearly finished!!

The ladies and the finished clay stove. From left to right; Mariama Diouf, Ami Diouf, Haddie Ngom, Haddie Diouf, Hoija Diouf, Ya Fatou Saar (my host mother)

Thus far, the women have completed thirty cook stoves and there are many more to come. I’m so proud of all of them and their hard work!

Tabaski: Faith, Forgiveness, and a Feast

The months before the Tabaski holiday in early October, the cities of Senegal are bleating with sheep. When travelling, it is not uncommon to see sheep strapped to the top of station wagons, buses, horse carts, or even stuffed in a sack, neck poking out, and seated on a moto, eyeing passing cars with cool disdain. Tabaski celebrates the inveterate faith of Ibrahima who was commanded by God to sacrifice his promised son, Ishmael. It is said that before the fatal blow, God recognized and rewarded Ibrahima’s faith and replaced Ishmael with a sheep, which is why a sheep is traditionally killed and eaten on Tabaski. Tabaski morning, families dress up in their newly tailored outfits and attend mosque for special prayers delivered by the Imam. After the service, people ask forgiveness from their neighbors and give blessings for the upcoming year. The head of the family then brings out the sheep to be slaughtered and processed in accordance with halal practices. Many dishes are prepared and sent out to relatives, friends, and those unable to afford a sheep. Later on in the evening, the children roam around the village asking forgiveness and coins. Below are photos from my family’s Tabaski.

The head of the household, Modu Ndiaye, and nephew, Bobacar Ndiaye, bring out the Tabaski sheep for slaughter.

The sheep is slaughtered in the halal fashion. The animal is blessed, its throat is slit with a sharp knife, careful as not to sever the spinal cord, and the blood is drained.

Now our family’s turn. We weren’t able to afford a sheep this Tabaski, but a goat will suffice.

The slaughtered goat and sheep. Or as my mom used to say while passing roadkill, ‘oh they’re just sleeping’.

The blood is let into a hole and left unburied for three days. Gris-gris and traditional medicines are sometimes dipped into the blood to increase their potency.

My host father, Ba Modu Ndiaye (wearing white cap), and nephews, Alieu Ndiaye and Samba Ndiaye, preparing the goat. The goat is skinned, gutted, and butchered. The children like to keep the hide to stretch over empty metal pots to make drums.

The sheep skinned and gutted.

My host mother, Ya Fatou Saar (right), and sister, Mamjaara Ndiaye (facing camera), hard at work in the kitchen. Tabaski staples are macaroni, potatoes, and onions.

Cooking up some french fries. In the background, mischievous chickens enjoying a pot of broth.

The finished product! Sheep and goat meat with macaroni, fries, chopped onions, and dense village bread. Tabaski is a marathon, not a sprint. It’s custom to eat at the neighbors and have bowls of food sent over, so it’s all about pacing yourself. Come and eat!

Baby Cherkh Diouf eating a fry. Don’t bother me, I’m eating.

Nuffie Satou Ndiaye sharing bread and sauce with Cherkh.

Top: Roakhide with baby Fatou (my host mother’s namesake) in their Tabaski outfits. Right: My nieces Hadioum, Fallie, Ndeye-Awa, and Kumba.
Bottom: The girls showing off their Tabaski loot.

Rainy Season at the Women’s Garden

The rains started very late this year, so late that Ndorong-Sereer and the neighboring village of Yerwago called for a rain ceremony, last performed in 1999. Women from the village dressed in men’s clothing and danced for hours on top of the grave of an elder whom was said to have had ‘xom xom’ (wisdom), ‘yeef yadju’ (wide thoughts) and could seduce the rain whenever he pleased. The rains came a week later and have been consistent since, arriving three to four times a week. Though much meeker than last year’s rainy season, when everyone was stranded in village because the roads were completely inundated and there was no access to fresh fish or veggies, the current rains have done an adequate job at keeping our soil saturated for our thirsty rainy season veggies. The women’s garden is lush with daikon radish, okra, eggplant (the third round!), green peppers, sweet potatoes, and bitter tomatoes. We’ve also been able to transplant papayas and a live-fence of Acacia nilotica, a thorny, nitrogen-fixing species which, in addition to protecting the perimeter of the garden, the bark is also used to treat stomach ailments. Oh yeah, and the garden expanded a bit.

Remember the trench we dug for the tree sacks (if you don’t, scroll down to the previous post)? All filled with trees! Each group has 30 cashews, 30 mangoes, 5 papayas, 5 oranges, and 5 lemons.

A medley of mangoes growing in tree sacks. Each woman brought five seeds from their preferred mango variety. In Sereer, you don’t ‘naam’ (eat) a mango, but ‘mool’ (savor) a mango.

The Acacia nilotica live-fence which will replace the chicken wire and grillage fencing that is already falling apart. A. nilotica is a fast growing thorny species with nitrogen-fixing roots and massive amounts of leaf litter which help add much needed nutrients to the soil. When the tree matures, the bark is shaved and boiled to treat stomach pains. We out-planted more than 500 A. nilotica to complete the live-fence. Weeding around the trees is not my favorite activity in the garden.

Pigeon pea (Cajanus cajan) alternately spaced at 2×2 meters apart to serve as a windbreak. Another nitrogen-fixing species which produces a prolific amount of delicious beans.

Green peppers starting to flower and ripen. Always welcome in the food bowl.

Sweet potatoes transplanted by vine in 5x1m beds. One of the easiest vegetables to grow, but still very expensive at the market. The leaves are surprisingly delicious boiled and salted.

Each group planted a Moringa intensive bed with 30 Moringa trees. Once they reach waist height, they’ll be harvested for leaves, cut down to ankle level and grow back again.

Daikon radish leaps from the ground as it ripens. The women intercropped the radish with okra.

Eggplant! This has been the biggest money maker in the garden so far. The women have three 3x1m beds of eggplant which ensure a constant supply every week to be sold at the market.

Young okra flowering and fruiting. Another big money maker at the market since it fruits quickly and often. It’s also one of the easiest to intercrop, as seen here planted near the daikon radish.

Women’s Garden Update

The hot season is swiftly and sweatily moving upon Ndorong-Sereer. We desperately need more trees in this town. While each family compound has one or two massive shade trees providing relief from this heat, the public spaces and unpaved paths are left bare and vulnerable. Parents are yelling at kids to not play so vigorously in the sun, and during the hours between noon and four, working outside is highly discouraged. To make the heat more bearable, we’ve decided to plant 300 trees in the public spaces of Ndorong-Sereer. We set up a tree nursery in the women’s garden and the women have begun filling tree sacks. There are 102 women in the garden and each woman will have 20 tree sacks and twenty trees (a felangaa Roog). A portion of the trees will be for the town, a portion will be for the live fence to protect the garden, and a portion will be fruit trees for the women to bring back to their compounds.

Women preparing the soil mix for the tree sacks. Two parts sifted sand and one part sifted cow manure, mix together, add water until moist, and fill until full. Each group brought their own sifted sand and manure to expedite the process.

Women filling the tree sacks. Each woman is responsible for 10 small tree sacks and 10 large tree sacks. The small tree sacks can support the root systems of thorny live fencing species, shade trees, and smaller fruit trees until outplanting. The large sacks are for planting mangoes and cashews.

A 1x1x0.1m trench dug to prevent the tree sacks from tipping over. This entire trench will be filled with sacks.

In addition to the trees, the women will start pepinieres for rainy season crops including cassava, bitter tomato, hot pepper, potatoes, and perhaps another round of eggplant. The currently planted eggplant is doing very well and starting to flower. It’s been intercropped with lettuce and replaced many of the dying cabbages. The cabbages have been ravaged and deformed by grasshoppers and onions are looking pretty puny. For the onions we’re thinking of making a compost tea, which is essentially soaking a large sack manure or compost in a barrel of water for a few weeks and then watering the plants for an extra boost of fertilizer. The tomatoes are the women’s pride and joy since they are growing vigorously and heavy with soon-to-be ripened fruits. The women also mulched with peanut shells but didn’t like the aesthetic so removed them. We’ll try millet chaff next time.

Eggplant intercropped with lettuce. The lettuce is on the perimeter of the beds.

Okra growing along the berm of the bed. As it grows taller, it will provide shade for the other vegetables in the bed.

Corn planted along the berm of the bed. The corn grows very quickly and provides shade for the onions (note how small the onions are). In the background are the tomato beds.

The tomatoes are thriving in the heat. Wish I could say the same.

Word Play

 

 

 Learning Sereer has given me the privilege to develop an intimate understanding of Sereer culture and way of life. As with any language, there are words in Sereer that can’t be directly translated or captured in English. These are words for experiences or emotions which are entirely absent or whose definition has to be circumnavigated with synonyms and examples that cannot fully capture the potency and exactness of its meaning. For example, there is a word that describes the happiness you feel when warmed by the morning sun. While there are remarkably specific words for obscure feelings or experiences, at the same time, Sereer can be limiting in expressing what in English we consider very real and frequent emotions, like frustration. Frustration simply does not exist in the vocabulary, and the nearest relative is the word which means both an anger and sadness to the brink of tears. Before learning Sereer, I never realized how many words in English can dissect and distinguish emotions, translate specific moods, and represent profound feeling, depth, and complexity. It’s like having one of the most complete, diverse, and esoteric color wheels in the world. Sereer, however, is an entirely different palette, since there are only a few words to paint with. Many words commonly found in the English emotional inventory are dulled, blended, and blurred into levity or vagueness. The ambiguity is not necessarily better or worse, it’s just different and an intriguing contrast. Below are some words I found especially interesting in their definition or pronounciation.

a buga: to want, to like, to love

a doma: to be difficult, to hurt or be in pain

a fela: to be pleasing, to be delicious, to be entertaining

a mosa: beautiful, exceptional

gim: to believe, to sing

war: to have to do something, to kill

naan: to hear, to understand

delem: tongue, word

teex: wood, medicine

jaffe jaffe: problem

bugee bugee: goals, aspiration

xom xom: knowledge, experience

a jega solo: it has importance

njietnyaakoox: happiness from letting the sun warm you in the morning

A felangaa Roog: maybe, if it is pleases or entertains God

Sereer is also language that resides in the hypothetical happenstance, the eternal maybe, a mentality of indefiniteness. There is no ‘when’, only ‘if’, and whether the situation will happen as planned is always subject to God’s fancy. It is no longer a surprise that the word ‘to have to do something’ and ‘to kill’ are the same word; ‘war’. Discerning the distance of time and space is one of my favorite language quirks to play with. You can describe the distance of a well or village and the expanse of time of by the speaker’s emphasis of ‘aaaaa’. For example maaga = far; maaaaaaga = very far::  yaaga = a long time ago, perhaps last year, yaaaaaga= very long time ago, likely 50 years. Similar to other languages in Senegal, Sereer is frequently punctuated by feeling. You will often hear ‘whyee’ at the end of a favor, a thank you, or a command. It’s not an actual word, just a noise to express a range of feeling from gratitude to exasperation. ‘Koi’ is another feeling sound which describes a sense of endearment and polite playfulness between relatives and strangers. Just as we have ‘really’ and ‘very’ to accentuate the magnitude and intensity of a verb or adjective, Sereer has a repetitive form. If someone really wants or loves something you say ‘abugabug’, if something is really short ‘arabarab’, really large ‘amagnamagin’, very beautiful ‘amosamos’, or something spoken that is very important ‘alayalay’.

As people move to larger cities where Wolof and French are the languages of business and leisure, the Sereer language is beginning to slowly disappear. Even in my road town, many Sereer children speak only Wolof and French since they are not taught Sereer by their parents. However, there are still many Sereer radio stations, musicians, Sereer books, and even several Catholic masses delivered in Sereer. I hope to continue practicing Sereer back in the states and am currently writing down as many Sereer words and proverbs as I can to contribute to a revised Sereer dictionary to help preserve this unique language.

Ndorong-Sereer Women’s Garden

With the help of my counterpart, Bassirou Ndiaye, a motivated farmer, Cherkh Fall, and 72 rambunctious women, what basically was an abandoned lot strangled with weeds has transformed into a burgeoning garden. Bassirou and Cherkh have done an awesome job in teaching the women how to double-dig, level, amend, seed and water the garden beds, which is no small feat (think impromptu dance circles, surprise showers with watering cans, lewd charades with the garden tools, amidst a constant deafening chatter). The women organized themselves into groups of 6 to help each other double-dig beds, establish a watering schedule, and decide on which seeds to purchase. Each group has dug and amended two beds in which they direct seeded carrots and transplanted lettuce. In the next few weeks we will transplant the tomatoes, cabbage, onions, eggplant, and bitter tomato growing in the pepinieres. 

 

Double-dug and amended garden beds (4x1m) for lettuce transplants. The women brought old and ripped mosquito nets to shade and protect the beds from birds and insects.

 

My counter-part, Bassirou Ndiaye, helping transplant lettuce.

Mannae transplanting lettuce into her group’s garden bed.

Cherkh Fall helping level out a garden bed. Cherkh and my counter-part have been an immense help in establishing the women’s garden and teaching the women improved gardening skills. 

Double-dug and amended lettuce pepiniere

Double-dug and amended onion pepinieres. The onion pepiniere shaded with the mosquito net had a better germination rate and grew more vigorously than the onion pepiniere without a mosquito net covering.

Compost pit (1x1m). It shrunk by a third in two weeks. The great thing about a compost pit is that it maintains more moisture and stimulates below ground insect and animal activity. As creatures tunnel to reach the compost, their poop, larvae, and dead bodies further contribute to the nutrient content of the soil and compost. They also help break up the heavily compacted soil.