My first day in 2011

So for my first day in the year, I had no plans really as I was at home and it is only celebrated by Christians. The night before I bought a cake, which I did not end up liking, because it was like eating creamy sugary butter. I shared it cake with my family and neighbors and OFFCOURSE they liked it. I hung out with my family a little, went to a soiree (a party) but there was nothing much there so I left. I ended up hanging out with some friends till the wee hours of morning.

Ok back to my first day in 2011.

As I was walking, going, to say hi to my parents my Christian neighbor stopped me on the road and was like, Hey I was just coming to get you, so you could come eat lunch with us, we are having pig today. As you know Muslims hate pigs, THAT’S RIGHT NO BACON FOR MEL. Anyways, I went over and I had a tasty lunch. My neighbor’s entire family was there, people all out of town coming to celebrate the holidays.

I even drank some wine, like a sip (shh, I’m not supposed to, as I am on TB meds). After that went out, to his friends’ house. Apparently during the festive seasons they just do tour née of each other’s houses and eat and drink throughout the entire day.

At his friends’ house, they were bumbling to say the least. Alcohol and music, dancing in so many crazy and rude ways. Anyways at around five, I was beat and ready to go home BUT THEY STILL HAD A LONG WAYS TO GO. So they convinced me to go to another house, there again it was the same affair. After that house, they brought me back home and continued on their merry way.

It was soo fun watching these people have fun, dancing and hanging out with friends and family. I’ve never seen that much people in Senegal drink together and it was just cool to see the other side of Senegal and how the Christian holidays are celebrated here.  While they were drinking their alcohol, I was just drinking soda.

To top it off, when I came home I had Salad for dinner. This was my first time eating salad with my family, so I guess they too were in the festive mood. It was a BANGING salad too, with tomatoes and eggs, with a twist, here they season the lettuce with magic (OFF COURSE because you cannot cook without magic in this country) then they make a onion sauce that is quite tasty, that is spread all around the lettuce and just some mayonnaise in the center.

FUNNY SIDE NOTE. While out with my neighbors, whenever I got introduced, I got some BLANK Stares, like what the heck are you doing here, you are not one of us and one guy even said, I don’t like you (although it was in a joking way). Just because of my Name. As I’m not a Toubab (white) they automatically think I’m Senegalese and think I am Muslim due to my Senegalese name, Kadijatu Camara. So my neighbor had to explain the situation and who I really was. After that all was Okay and I was welcomed.