"Unconditional love is loving your kids for who they are, not for what
they do… it isn’t something you will achieve every minute of every day.
But it is the thought we must hold in our hearts every day."
There are things that make my two families very different and there is one thing that makes my families exactly alike. Mom, Dad, three kids and a dog, is what I grew up with and is the idea of immediate family that I always had, until I came to Senegal. In Senegal, you’ve got your immediate family and then you’ve got your “family”. That's the first thing that makes my two families very different. You know the phrase “It takes a village to raise a child”, well here this is especially true. Instead of five people and a dog in my household, I live with between 25-30 people, all related to me. In my family compound alone, I not only have my mom, dad, brother, and sister but also my four aunts and their children and sometimes their husbands, my moms co-wife, her son and daughter-in-law and their kids, as well as her two other daughters, my grandma, grandpa, and three teachers. Then in my village, almost everyone is related to me in some crazy way or another. Because of this, children run all over the place without their parents even knowing where they are at times. I have been sitting outside with my mom multiple times when she calls for my younger brother and he doesn’t answer. She will then ask someone if they have seen him but if they don’t know she doesn’t even get up, just waits for him to show up eventually. My cousins are called my sisters and brothers, my dad is all of my cousins dad as well. Every women has a yaay in front of her name, which means mom. All the women in a compound take care of every child as if he or she were their own. Recently, one of my little cousins has even taken to calling my mom his mom. So in Affe, it really does take a village to raise a child. I think this phrase is true in the U.S as well however, in different ways. As I was growing up, I was lucky to live in a safe neighborhood that watched out for one another. So my siblings and I could go out to play in the morning, come back for lunch, go out again, and make it back in time for dinner without my parents really having to worry too much about where we were(but of course my mom always wanted to know ;-) ). There were lots of kids in the neighborhood and everyone looked after all the kids. I wouldn’t say this is the case everywhere in the U.S. We also grew up with extended family around us, so going to grandma’s for the day was a common occurrence as was going to my aunts house after school while my mom was working. As nice as this was for my family and I, Senegal is an exaggerated version of this. In spite of all of this though, I feel that my real family is much closer than my host family here (second reason). My sister, laura, told me a funny story once about when her and a teammate were watching the movie It’s Complicated, if you haven’t seen it you should, and there is a scene at the end where all the kids are laying in bed together and Laura’s teammate comments that the movie is weird. Laura says, Why’s it weird?
Teammate: How close they all are, it’s not realistic
Laura: Oh….I thought that was normal
Now this may not be the norm for every family but for mine it is, and I bet that you find it more often than not. And definitely more often than you do in Senegal. The closest you get to that here is mom’s and their kids sleep in the same bed but that’s about it. Family dynamics here are very interesting to me coming from a family that is so close. Women are mainly in charge of child care although my host dad will help from time to time with crying children. During my time in village this past month I paid closer attention to family dynamics….here are a few things I observed. My host aunt whom I am named after got back from a trip after three weeks and she came to our house to greet everyone, including my host grandpa (her dad) and all they did was shake hands and greet for five minutes, talked for another five, then she got up and left. Even when she greeted the other women it wasn’t how I would greet my family after being gone for threeish weeks. It was like she had just come over to say hi for the evening. At least that’s how it seemed to me. There was no hugging or kissing or affection of any kind. Now, this sounds cold but they have their own ways of showing they care, they have respect. All of this being said I believe they do all love each other just in different ways. There are so many customs here to show respect for other people that I think the displays of affection never caught on. Senegal has respect, the US has affection.
Now back to the quote at the beginning and the thing that makes my two families exactly alike. My two families have very different ways of interacting with each other however I think unconditional love is the connection between all families. This is what makes us all the same. It creates bonds that cross oceans. I believe that families are all about unconditional love whether you are in Senegal with customs of respect or the US with customs of affection. My family back home, I know, loves me no matter what. I have definitely messed up in my life but at no point were my parents just going to kick me out of the house and same goes for my brother and sister. The same goes in Senegal. Even though I came here to do a job, I found a family, my family. Most people in the US ask me what my work is here and what I'm doing. We just got new trainees that will be our replacements (eek)! but they keep asking me about senegal and what's it like and what kind of work we do here and I always find myself talking about my family. Even when I'm talking about work, they get tucked in there somehow. I knew I would grow to love the people I lived with but I never thought I would find a family. They love me unconditionally. I may be that weird american that now has a puppy they don't know what to do with but instead of pushing me aside, they learn to love my dog. I am supposed to be doing work but even if I did nothing for two years other than sit in our compound, play with the kids, and help cook they would love it and love me for it. It doesn't matter what I do or don't do as long as I treat them with love and respect I will always be considered their daughter, sister, cousin, aunt. I also believe that unconditional love can stretch across oceans. Even though my American family and my Senegalese families have never met they ask about each other all the time. I believe they are now connected through me and their unconditional love for me. So no longer do I have family in wisconsin, michigan, colorado, washington d.c. but I have family all over the world.
As I near the end of my Peace Corps service, there are a plethora of feelings that can occur every day within an hour. One specific feeling is that of “home”. Through all the different phases of my service my thoughts tend to settle on a specific topic, this time it’s home. Senegal and more specifically Affe, has been my home for the past two years. However, it is now time to start focusing on my America home, as we say here. And the subject that most occupies my thoughts is my America family. I have recently told a few people this that the only reason I really want to go home is because of my America family. However, I have to leave my Senegalese home and family in order to do that. I have begun these goodbyes and they are not easy. This so far has been so much harder than leaving the US. I have gained a family and a home that I may not see again for years. They do not have the good fortune of have skype, but we do at least have phones, it's not goodbye but talk to ya later. I wear many bracelets on my arms now mainly all gifts given to me from my kids and friends, other kids will ask me for them and I always have a very hard time giving them away because I want something that will remind me every day in the US of my home in Senegal. I am terrified of going home and packing this place away as a nice experience in life and so I continue to wear these bracelets in hopes that every morning when I go home I can wake up and even just for five minutes think of my family and my home in Senegal. I have absolutely no idea how to end this blog. My time here has meant more to me than I think I can ever convey and there is no way I can ever thank my family here enough for becoming my family. Senegal may be a small little country in West Africa that know one would be able to point out on a map before I came here but it has become my country and my home. Home is where the heart is....my heart will now forever be split between my two homes.
There are things that make my two families very different and there is one thing that makes my families exactly alike. Mom, Dad, three kids and a dog, is what I grew up with and is the idea of immediate family that I always had, until I came to Senegal. In Senegal, you’ve got your immediate family and then you’ve got your “family”. That's the first thing that makes my two families very different. You know the phrase “It takes a village to raise a child”, well here this is especially true. Instead of five people and a dog in my household, I live with between 25-30 people, all related to me. In my family compound alone, I not only have my mom, dad, brother, and sister but also my four aunts and their children and sometimes their husbands, my moms co-wife, her son and daughter-in-law and their kids, as well as her two other daughters, my grandma, grandpa, and three teachers. Then in my village, almost everyone is related to me in some crazy way or another. Because of this, children run all over the place without their parents even knowing where they are at times. I have been sitting outside with my mom multiple times when she calls for my younger brother and he doesn’t answer. She will then ask someone if they have seen him but if they don’t know she doesn’t even get up, just waits for him to show up eventually. My cousins are called my sisters and brothers, my dad is all of my cousins dad as well. Every women has a yaay in front of her name, which means mom. All the women in a compound take care of every child as if he or she were their own. Recently, one of my little cousins has even taken to calling my mom his mom. So in Affe, it really does take a village to raise a child. I think this phrase is true in the U.S as well however, in different ways. As I was growing up, I was lucky to live in a safe neighborhood that watched out for one another. So my siblings and I could go out to play in the morning, come back for lunch, go out again, and make it back in time for dinner without my parents really having to worry too much about where we were(but of course my mom always wanted to know ;-) ). There were lots of kids in the neighborhood and everyone looked after all the kids. I wouldn’t say this is the case everywhere in the U.S. We also grew up with extended family around us, so going to grandma’s for the day was a common occurrence as was going to my aunts house after school while my mom was working. As nice as this was for my family and I, Senegal is an exaggerated version of this. In spite of all of this though, I feel that my real family is much closer than my host family here (second reason). My sister, laura, told me a funny story once about when her and a teammate were watching the movie It’s Complicated, if you haven’t seen it you should, and there is a scene at the end where all the kids are laying in bed together and Laura’s teammate comments that the movie is weird. Laura says, Why’s it weird?
Teammate: How close they all are, it’s not realistic
Laura: Oh….I thought that was normal
Now this may not be the norm for every family but for mine it is, and I bet that you find it more often than not. And definitely more often than you do in Senegal. The closest you get to that here is mom’s and their kids sleep in the same bed but that’s about it. Family dynamics here are very interesting to me coming from a family that is so close. Women are mainly in charge of child care although my host dad will help from time to time with crying children. During my time in village this past month I paid closer attention to family dynamics….here are a few things I observed. My host aunt whom I am named after got back from a trip after three weeks and she came to our house to greet everyone, including my host grandpa (her dad) and all they did was shake hands and greet for five minutes, talked for another five, then she got up and left. Even when she greeted the other women it wasn’t how I would greet my family after being gone for threeish weeks. It was like she had just come over to say hi for the evening. At least that’s how it seemed to me. There was no hugging or kissing or affection of any kind. Now, this sounds cold but they have their own ways of showing they care, they have respect. All of this being said I believe they do all love each other just in different ways. There are so many customs here to show respect for other people that I think the displays of affection never caught on. Senegal has respect, the US has affection.
Now back to the quote at the beginning and the thing that makes my two families exactly alike. My two families have very different ways of interacting with each other however I think unconditional love is the connection between all families. This is what makes us all the same. It creates bonds that cross oceans. I believe that families are all about unconditional love whether you are in Senegal with customs of respect or the US with customs of affection. My family back home, I know, loves me no matter what. I have definitely messed up in my life but at no point were my parents just going to kick me out of the house and same goes for my brother and sister. The same goes in Senegal. Even though I came here to do a job, I found a family, my family. Most people in the US ask me what my work is here and what I'm doing. We just got new trainees that will be our replacements (eek)! but they keep asking me about senegal and what's it like and what kind of work we do here and I always find myself talking about my family. Even when I'm talking about work, they get tucked in there somehow. I knew I would grow to love the people I lived with but I never thought I would find a family. They love me unconditionally. I may be that weird american that now has a puppy they don't know what to do with but instead of pushing me aside, they learn to love my dog. I am supposed to be doing work but even if I did nothing for two years other than sit in our compound, play with the kids, and help cook they would love it and love me for it. It doesn't matter what I do or don't do as long as I treat them with love and respect I will always be considered their daughter, sister, cousin, aunt. I also believe that unconditional love can stretch across oceans. Even though my American family and my Senegalese families have never met they ask about each other all the time. I believe they are now connected through me and their unconditional love for me. So no longer do I have family in wisconsin, michigan, colorado, washington d.c. but I have family all over the world.
As I near the end of my Peace Corps service, there are a plethora of feelings that can occur every day within an hour. One specific feeling is that of “home”. Through all the different phases of my service my thoughts tend to settle on a specific topic, this time it’s home. Senegal and more specifically Affe, has been my home for the past two years. However, it is now time to start focusing on my America home, as we say here. And the subject that most occupies my thoughts is my America family. I have recently told a few people this that the only reason I really want to go home is because of my America family. However, I have to leave my Senegalese home and family in order to do that. I have begun these goodbyes and they are not easy. This so far has been so much harder than leaving the US. I have gained a family and a home that I may not see again for years. They do not have the good fortune of have skype, but we do at least have phones, it's not goodbye but talk to ya later. I wear many bracelets on my arms now mainly all gifts given to me from my kids and friends, other kids will ask me for them and I always have a very hard time giving them away because I want something that will remind me every day in the US of my home in Senegal. I am terrified of going home and packing this place away as a nice experience in life and so I continue to wear these bracelets in hopes that every morning when I go home I can wake up and even just for five minutes think of my family and my home in Senegal. I have absolutely no idea how to end this blog. My time here has meant more to me than I think I can ever convey and there is no way I can ever thank my family here enough for becoming my family. Senegal may be a small little country in West Africa that know one would be able to point out on a map before I came here but it has become my country and my home. Home is where the heart is....my heart will now forever be split between my two homes.
