A Typical Day

7:00 am: Wake up via the beeping alarm on my watch,which I never take off. I use the bathroom and wash my face/ brush my teeth in the kitchen sink. I go back to my room and change into a tshirt and long shorts or capris.

7:15 am: My host mom has set out breakfast and I take some French bread with butter. To drink, I have powdered coffee with powdered milk and a cube of sugar all mixed with boiling water.

7:35 am: My coffee is still too hot to drink but I've finished eating so I take my cup back into my room, where I check that i've backed everything I'll need for the day in my backpack. I always carry pens, pencils, my journal, an extra notebook, a calender, two first aid kits, my glasses and contact solution, a water bottle half-full, wallet with both senegalese and american cash and various ids including passport and immunization record, camera, iPod, and cell phone. I grab some toilet paper from the bathroom because almost always you need to bring your own and a book to read (if the book is in french, I bring along my dictionary too).

The driver who picks up my host father (the director of he pouponniere), Benjamin (the French volunteer we live with), and I should be here around eight, so I spend the rest of my time usually writing emails to send later on once I have wifi or reading or listening to music. I finish my coffee and brush my teeth again.

8:00 am: The driver comes in an ONG Vivre Ensemble. Often, other people who work at the pouponniere but whom I do not know are in the car and we all say hello. The pouponniere is really only ten minutes away but it usually takes us between 45-60 minutes to get there because we stop at the market, the post, a different part of the market, any other places Tonton (host father) needs to go. In the meantime, people are coming in and out of the car. I just stay in my seat though and enjoy the ride.

9:00 am: We usually arrive around his time, give or take a few minutes. I remind Benjamin to meet me at Tonton's office at three and head straight for the secretaries office, which has the best wifi connection here. I check my emails and send off anything which I wrote previously and has been sitting in my inbox.

9:10 am: I walk to the Unite Familiale section and greet all the maternal assistants. Usually the kids are alreay out and abot either playing outside or sometimes in wig building blocks or various donated toys and stuffed animals. I set my backpack down inside on a high table where everyone else puts their bags and head to where the kids are. One or two, like Daigan, always want to be picked up immediately so I pick someone up and find a chair and just hang out. Sometimes the kids have a structured activity, such as drawing, around ten or ten-thirty but sometimes not.

12:15 pm: Around this time the younger kids (pre-school age) are fed. There's abot ten of them and they get some type of baby-food-like mixture. If you're given a bowl to feed these kids who don't eat on their own yet, you find a seat and seat 2-3 munchkins in front of you and spoon feed them.

The older children are undressing at this time and when the younger ones are finished being fed, they are also undressed and cleaned up and given a cup of water to drink.

12:35 pm: All the kids go to their assigned beds and lay down. The younger ones sleep until three, the older ones never fall asleep but just wait for their food to come. The maternal assistants take a break now and talk and usually us volunteers write in our journals or step out for a few minutes to find wifi. It's not unusual to have to help a wandering child back to his or her bed.

1:45 pm: The older kids' food comes. Like the adults, the kids (stripped to their underwear) all eat out of one big bowl and they eat with their hands. Their lunch is usually rice and fish. After they are done eating, they use the bathroom or clean up, drink a cup of water and go lay down again.

2:00 pm: Food for the adults and us volunteers comes. The unitie familiale eats together but volunteers from the other sections all eat together under some roofed picnic tables. The food is the same but I just take lunch with my section to go wth the flow of the day. There are from five to ten people Ewing out of our lunch bowl. Most of the volunteers bring their own spoon to eat with and most of the assistants eat wth their right hand. No difference, everyone grabs a seat around the bowl and eats lunch- fish and rice. Mbour is a coastal fishing city so fish are common and cheap. Unforunately, being cooked with all the bones and everything, it's difficult to get a good piece of meat with your spoon. More often than not, I eat just the rice. At the same time, one assistat is not eating and is making sure the older kids are cleaned up and she's washing their dish and putting everyone to bed.

2:15 pm: I'm finished eating so I quickly move my seat to make room for the others. I drink some water, make sure I've had enough to eat, and ask if the assistants need me to do anything else before I head out. They're still eating and the kids will be sleeping until three, so no. I won't meet Benjamin for another 45 minutes so I go back to the secretaries' office and check my email, respond, and look up anything I need on the Internet.

3:00 pm: Benjamin finds me or vice versa because Tonton's office is right next door to that of the secretaries'. We walk to the front of the pouponniere to find someone to drive us home. Maybe I buy some beesop on the way out. Okay, unless I'm in a hurry, I buy beesop.

3:30 pm: With any luck, we've found someone to take us home. The drive rarely takes more than twenty minutes or so because we only drop people off.

4:15 pm: I should be home by now. The rest of my afternoon is free. I take a shower every other day now while it's hot so the cold water coming from the shower is no problem. I'm usually tired so maybe I take a nap or I read or write in my journal. If there is electricity, I might get on the web at home but really only to upload pictures to my blog because that's the only thing I can't do on my iPod touch. Since electricty has been scarce and at the very best, unpredictable, lately, I try to not spend so much time on the computer and instead use this time to charge my iPod or phone, alternately.

9:00-10:00 pm: I'm starving! Dinner is anytime after nine but the sooner the better. If I was able to, I had a snack of maybe a couple bananas or a mango when I got home bu maybe not. Dinner is usually one of two things: dish one is rice and fish again, with varying sauces; dish two is gabanzo beans, onions, and little chunks of beef served with bread. After dinner, I brush my teeth and help the two elementary-school-aged girls I share a room with do the same. They just recently got their first toothbrushes and they actually like to brush teeth. We go to the bathroom together because they think using the Western-style toilet is funny and then I change into pjs. I tell everyone I see "Bonne nuit" (goodnight) to be polite and head to bed. Double- check my mosquito net is secured (as I write this, I have over 150 bug bites but I don't know from what and they don't bug me so I don't care) and then I sleep until morning.