Back in Senegal! (5/31/10)

For those who haven't already heard, this summer, as a part of my graduate studies, I'm headed back to West Africa. I have an internship with an NGO called Trickle Up. They work in the microfinance sector working with micro-grants (small grants that go to the poorest of the poor to help them start small businesses and to help them start to make more income). I'm going to be helping them initiate some new monitoring and evaluation systems (which will help them to look at their program, how its working, the impact its having, etc) more critically. I'm pretty excited about it. I start on June 13th.

But, before then, I have a couple weeks to visit Senegal! Woohoo! I arrived in Dakar the day before yesterday (the 29th), after a 12 hour layover in Casablanca. Not such a bad deal considering the plane arrived around 10am. I had the whole day to check out the city, visit its huge mosque, etc. (the mosque really was quite impressive). Today, I am spending the day in Kaolack, my former home. Tomorrow, I will head to the village to say hello to everyone. My replacement (the volunteer who came to Ndiago after me) just arrived here at the regional house, so it'll be good to catch up before heading off tomorrow.

I hope all is well with everyone back home!