I want this to be a blog with more than my own words and pictures, so here's some more multimedia. The first video is on empathy, and interesting for me, being involved in international development/NGO/life:
And this video is completely relevant because there's no pork here, obviously:
Thursday, March 17, 2011
Tuesday, March 15, 2011
I constantly get told to eat more
It's been a long time since I last posted mainly because I was in another town. I've been pretty busy the last couple weeks traveling around a bit, and got sick a few days. Consuming the unfiltered water here finally taught me a lesson…. But also, Senegal is having a lot of electrical outages, which is in the news a lot and has been for the past months. I'll talk more about this in a future politics-themed post. But for now, since my mommy is worrying if I get enough to eat and if I have a balanced diet…FOOD!
Senegal is most famous for the spicy dish ceebojen (also spelled thieboudienne, among other ways; pronounced cheb-o-jen). That's a Wolof word meaning rice with fish; ceeb=rice, o=with, dienne= fish. Another, albeit less-often prepared dish, is ceeboyap, or rice with meat. Both dishes can either have red rice, which is spiced, or white rice, which is only spiced with white pepper I think. Typical vegetables include cabbage, carrots, onions, potatoes, turnips, eggplant, and squash, although you might also eat some that has fresh green bell pepper, tomato, and cucumber instead. Most Senegalese, if they can afford it, eat this every day for lunch. I might be sick of it after 6 months of eating it most days, but for now at least it's delicious, and relatively healthy. Here's ceebojen:
Dinner varies more, although there are still only a handful of dishes. Most nights, with the family I eat with, we have either basse or hacko. They're both what we call in English "bean-paste" based. The former has peanuts in it and the latter has some time of leaf (can't figure out a translation) and dried fish. When mixed together with the cornmeal, gritty couscous called lacciri they're both really good. Some nights we eat lacciri kassam, couscous with milk, or millet with lait caillé, which I think we call curdled milk in English. Curdled milk sounds gross to most people, but maybe that's not the right translation, because this stuff is tasty and sweet, making it a good combination with the salty millet porridge or good to just drink straight.
Other local foods are:
• dibi, grilled meat with onions and mustard;
• niebbé, spicy beans, with bread or fries or both;
• tapalapa is the local bread;
• ataya is the very strong, sweet tea you sip from 2-oz. glasses;
• meat with onions sauce, fries and veggies is another lunch or dinner dish;
• café touba is coffee sweetened and spiced with nutmeg, ginger, and cloves;
• cornmeal fried doughnuts, soooo good;
• roasted corn-on-the-cob;
• fruit and peanut vendors;
• and I eat a decent amount of egg sandwiches.
I think my diet here is pretty good because I eat with a family so much. The one thing I found that is missing from my diet if I don't go out of my way to replace it is potassium. My muscles were twitching for days a while ago, and I thought I might wake up with a charly horse one night, so since then I've been buying bananas. Tapalapa, imitation nutella and banana sandwiches and instant coffee make for a good start to my day. Here's me with the family I've become very close to, in one of my local get-ups. Take care, hope all is well across whatever ocean or sea you're reading this, and I'll talk to you soon.
P.S. I almost forgot to mention that the Senegalese eat around a large bowl, sharing food with 2-9 other people, usually. Some people will eat with a spoon, but more people eat with their hands. Eating rice with your hands requires some skill of rolling it into a ball in your fist (always with your right hand! left hand is for other things). I've only eaten with my hands a couple times, but it's interesting.
Senegal is most famous for the spicy dish ceebojen (also spelled thieboudienne, among other ways; pronounced cheb-o-jen). That's a Wolof word meaning rice with fish; ceeb=rice, o=with, dienne= fish. Another, albeit less-often prepared dish, is ceeboyap, or rice with meat. Both dishes can either have red rice, which is spiced, or white rice, which is only spiced with white pepper I think. Typical vegetables include cabbage, carrots, onions, potatoes, turnips, eggplant, and squash, although you might also eat some that has fresh green bell pepper, tomato, and cucumber instead. Most Senegalese, if they can afford it, eat this every day for lunch. I might be sick of it after 6 months of eating it most days, but for now at least it's delicious, and relatively healthy. Here's ceebojen:
Dinner varies more, although there are still only a handful of dishes. Most nights, with the family I eat with, we have either basse or hacko. They're both what we call in English "bean-paste" based. The former has peanuts in it and the latter has some time of leaf (can't figure out a translation) and dried fish. When mixed together with the cornmeal, gritty couscous called lacciri they're both really good. Some nights we eat lacciri kassam, couscous with milk, or millet with lait caillé, which I think we call curdled milk in English. Curdled milk sounds gross to most people, but maybe that's not the right translation, because this stuff is tasty and sweet, making it a good combination with the salty millet porridge or good to just drink straight.
Other local foods are:
• dibi, grilled meat with onions and mustard;
• niebbé, spicy beans, with bread or fries or both;
• tapalapa is the local bread;
• ataya is the very strong, sweet tea you sip from 2-oz. glasses;
• meat with onions sauce, fries and veggies is another lunch or dinner dish;
• café touba is coffee sweetened and spiced with nutmeg, ginger, and cloves;
• cornmeal fried doughnuts, soooo good;
• roasted corn-on-the-cob;
• fruit and peanut vendors;
• and I eat a decent amount of egg sandwiches.
I think my diet here is pretty good because I eat with a family so much. The one thing I found that is missing from my diet if I don't go out of my way to replace it is potassium. My muscles were twitching for days a while ago, and I thought I might wake up with a charly horse one night, so since then I've been buying bananas. Tapalapa, imitation nutella and banana sandwiches and instant coffee make for a good start to my day. Here's me with the family I've become very close to, in one of my local get-ups. Take care, hope all is well across whatever ocean or sea you're reading this, and I'll talk to you soon.
P.S. I almost forgot to mention that the Senegalese eat around a large bowl, sharing food with 2-9 other people, usually. Some people will eat with a spoon, but more people eat with their hands. Eating rice with your hands requires some skill of rolling it into a ball in your fist (always with your right hand! left hand is for other things). I've only eaten with my hands a couple times, but it's interesting.
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