Neex naa wante sur naa!!

I've decided to devote my next few posts to the sense. As I'm a Gerson, I'm going to start with taste, to describe the food here. This is also particularly fitting because I am writing this after eating 2 dinners (and refusing the 3rd).

But before I do so, let me backtrack a bit to tell you about Mboro, the town I am living in. It is pretty large-around 40,000 people live here-so the biggest place I've lived since EB (besides Cardiff). It has a large market and a beach, which is really nice. There are also different neighborhoods within the town, so we're known pretty much throughout our neighborhood. And my family has about 10 people who are always living there and then about 8 people who may or may not live in the compound with me; it's hard to tell.

So now, about the food. I'll start simple. I have drank my first cup of coffee in my life. This was on the first morning that I was here, when I felt badly refusing what was offered to me. It was called cafe touba, and I can say that to me, coffee tastes as bad as it smells.

But, the tea here is to be raved about. Tea is extremely important culturally in Senegal. There is even an art to pouring it - you gain more respect by the height from which you can pour it into a glass (yes, hot tea is drank out of glass) and how much foam you can create at the top (the foam is just decorative and is left in the glass after drinking the tea). The tea is extremely sweet from all the sugar they add and is absolutely delicious; I drink 2 glasses after lunch with my family and sometimes even more during class.

The only other drinks that I have had here are juices and water. The juice is mainly bissap (made from hibiscis flowers - my favorite flower) and baobab - both highly nutritious plants with very sweet, vibrantly colored juice. And the water I run through a filter the Peace Corps provided me with and then bleach it to make it safe to drink. The process takes a bit of time, but it's much cheaper and better for the environment than buying bottled water.

Now about the food, what you've all been waiting for. Everyone here that I've asked says that their favorite food to eat and to cook is coeb bu jen (rice with fish), so it's no wonder that we eat this for most meals. As I described previously in my first post, there is one large bowl that everyone sits around and eats from. We've had up to 13 people around one bowl! The bowl contains mainly rice with a sauce on it, and then fish and steamed vegetables in the center. You eat what is directly in front of you and one of the women breaks up some food from the middle to pass out to everyone. Sometimes there are also fish balls (made of mashed up fish) or meat (rarely here since Mboro is on the coast, though we did eat sheep the night of the baptism). The sauce on the rice differs, but usually it is made up of crushed hot peppers, so it's fairly spicy.

Another dish we have had occasionally consists mostly of lettuce, carmelized onions, and french fries. This is the only dish I am allowed to eat with my hands (even though the rest of the women always eat with their hands and only the men in my family have spoons), and I love eating so many veggies for a meal. It is eaten by wrapping the lettuce around the onions, and it's very tasty.

Then there's my favorite dish here, which I've only had once. It is almost like risotto with some beans and a peanut sauce. I devoured it and hope we have it for a meal again.

I've also tried a dish similar to porridge, which was really good, but I was already full from lunch when I ate it so I didn't have too much.

And, most importantly, there is peanut butter here....I can't even describe how good it tastes. It's literally just mashed peanuts, but much tastier (and more affordable) than the Whole Foods variety. When I put it on an apple...my mouth just waters thinking about it. Senegal is a large peanut producer, so the peanut butter is extremely fresh and may use a different variety of peanuts than in the US. That said, I also eat roasted and sometimes sugar-coated peanuts almost every day as a snack - delicious!

And finally, the fruit. Currently, there are oranges, bananas, watermelon, another melon I don't know the name of, and apples. They are all good, but nothing amazing. But in approximately 2 months, it is mango season, and I can't wait for that.

So, the take-away message from all of this is: I won't go hungry living in Senegal. Senegalese mothers are like Jewish mothers in that they want you to eat. Every time I stop eating even if it's just to chewmy mother tells me to keep eating. And when I'm full, I have to insist that I'm done eating. My key phrase, "Neex naa, wante sur naa" (It's good, but I'm full).