Written by Ndeye Awa Gueye (CorpsAfrica/Senegal), Lahcen Chancaf (CorpsAfrica/Maroc) and Emas Potolani (CorpsAfrica/Malawi) 


Hello Dear Readers,
 
This is our first cross-country blog done by three CorpsAfrica Volunteers, Emas Potolani (Malawi), Lahcen Chanchaf (Morocco), and Awa Ndèye Gueye (Senegal). After an amazing and far-fetched ten days of the All Country Conference, October 4-15, 2016 in Morocco, Emas Potolani proposed to work on something together and involve three Volunteers, one from each country. The idea was to implement a simple project that all Volunteers might adopt and share with the communities they live in when they go back to their sites. Actually, this project can be done in one day by three people or less - and with no money.

We wanted to follow up on the Global Hand-washing Day (GHD), which is a campaign to motive as well as to mobilize people all around the world to improve their hand-washing habits by washing their hands with soap at critical moments throughout each day. The GHD takes place on October 15th of each year. The event is indeed dedicated to raising an understanding about the significance of hand washing with soap as an efficient way to prevent disease and save lives.
 
Our cross-country team of Volunteers from Malawi, Morocco and Senegal decided to design and test a prototype of a hand washing device. This prototype was to suit and fit the cultures and traditions of the people in the three countries and beyond.  The device is known as Tippy-Tap. It’s a hygienic, simple way to wash your hands with soap appropriately without necessarily touching the device with your hands, and especially in remote areas where there is no access to running water.
 
After working tirelessly on our design, we tested our first prototype in Azzaden Valley in the High Atlas Mountains in Morocco. It turned out that the people in the community liked our prototype so much to the extent of asking us to install the Tippy Tap on their front yard so they could be use it to wash their hands. Although there is access to running water in the village, the villagers in the Azzaden valley found the Tippy Tap convenient and efficient in the farming fields where most people spend the entire day busy with their daily agriculture activities. This doesn’t mean that they don’t wash their hands in the fields, but the device will be an added value and make a difference in the way they use water.
 
Emas shared with us how the Tippy Tap is used in communities in Malawi to enhance sanitation. Community members assemble the Tippy Tap right outside a latrine and people wash their hands after. The interesting thing is that although this hand-washing devise is very simple to make and only requires less than 20 minutes to put together, not many people make it. Emas shared with us the amazing strategy he uses when teaching the his students on how to make this hand-washing device. We believe this is a great strategy in making children agents of sanitation, even when they go back to their homes. Children quickly learn and pick up new techniques and starting this simple revolution with them would indeed yield more positive results that would entirely amaze us all especially in sanitation.
 
We noticed that it was a new technique in the Azzaden Valley and we thought that joining our efforts in sharing our knowledge through this cross-country project would help our communities in Malawi, Morocco and Senegal and would be a good step towards fostering sanitation practices. With locally available materials in our communities, such as an empty bottle or container, strong ropes, 2 sizable sticks and one stick to support the water container, one can easily assemble a Tippy Tap and practice sanitation all day throughout the year.

Written by Boubacar Diallo, CorpsAfrica/Senegal Volunteer
​
​From Friday, September 16 to Sunday the 18, the village youth grouped together as part of the l’Association Socio-culturelle pour l’Union et la Solidarité des Jeunes de Ndieulbert (ASCUS-JN) to organize the Sixth Edition of the 72H of Cultural Days and Human Investment.
The aim of the association, per its president M. Modou Babou, is "to unite the participants by the same ideals and to create bonds of solidarity between them; To contribute to the social emancipation and civic education of the population. We organize each year the 72 hours of cultural activities of the village. We would like to focus on some of the biggest challenges for us and request you as a collaborator of this 6th edition which will be held from Friday 16 to Sunday 18 in Ndieulbert. Indeed, our association in recent years has mainly carried out social projects, including young people (adolescents, young adults) and those older (between fifty and seventy years). "
It is in this spirit that CorpsAfrica has given its support for planting fruit trees for all the houses of the village with the aim "a house, two fruit trees". Fruit trees are nearly non-existent in this area. Thus, we have introduced a dozen varieties of fruit trees (mangoes, sapoti, Carasolles, Kanel apples, Gola, pomegranate, avocado, etc.) with 154 plants.

​Through this activity, CorpsAfrica encouraged this dynamic youth, committed to serving their community and promoting endogenous development.
Before we started the tree planting, we went to visit the village chief and the Imam. They welcomed the commitment and participation of Ndieulbert's youth and thanked me and the CorpsAfrica delegation for their work in the village. The Imam prayed for the success of our activities.
The tree planting took place on Saturday with a strong participation of the youth and a strong determination of the girls of the village.

​We went door-to-door to educate the population about the importance of fruit trees before showing them the techniques of tree planting and giving them two plants per house.
The distribution of trees was a very rich moment of solidarity and unity. The families welcomed us with great joy and the children were all happy to accompany us.                                             

​After planting the trees, we attended the official ceremony in the afternoon; A solemn moment for the inhabitants of Ndieulbert. The ceremony began with the speech of village chief Bada Diouf delivered by his spokesperson, the great griot of the village, Uncle Mademba DIOUF. He thanked the guests, magnified the work of CorpsAfrica in the village and congratulated the young people of Ndieulbert while inviting them to perpetuate this action of union and solidarity for the development of the village.
After the list of speakers followed Modou Babou, the youth President (ASCUS-JN), Mrs. Dior FALL, President of the GIE of the women, Mr. Assane Dièye Representative of the Director of the school and more.
CorpsAfrica took the opportunity to address the community of Ndieulbert who unconditionally accepted and welcomed me. I took the opportunity to thank all the people of Ndieulbert for their collaboration and the many good things we shared together. I then thanked my host family, my mom Dior FALL, my dad Ndiaga Fall and all my brothers and sisters in the house.

​The 72H of Ndieulbert were moments of reunion, solidarity, dialogue, sharing, exchange and entertainment. Indeed, the event brought together all young people, notables and women to value cultural heritages, pay tribute to the ancestors, and exchange the village's development needs.
Finally, I would like to thank the Volunteers and CorpsAfrica staff for their support. Special thanks to the CorpsAfrica Director Mr. Mamadou SARR who helped us in the choice of fruit trees.
 I would like to also deeply thank the team who came on this trip, Mr Lamine KOUYATE, Mr Chérif HOURY, Mrs DIOP, Ndèye Awa GUEYE and my dear friend Ahmeth NDOYE.

Du vendre 16 au Dimanche 18 Septembre 2016, les jeunes du village regroupés au sein de l’Association Socio-culturelle pour l’Union et la Solidarité des Jeunes de Ndieulbert (ASCUS-JN) ont organisé la sixième édition des 72H de journées culturelles et d’investissement humain.

L’association a pour objectif selon son président M. Modou Babou « d’unir les personnes animées d’une même idéale et  de créer entre elles des liens de solidarité ; de contribuer à l’émancipation sociale et à la formation civique de la population.  Nous organisons  chaque année  les 72h d’activités culturelles du village. Nous voudrons par cette présente mettre l'accent sur quelques-uns des enjeux les plus grands pour nous et vous proposer comme collaborateur de cette 6éme édition qui se tiendra du vendre 16 au dimanche 18 Septembre 2016 à Ndieulbert.  En effet, notre association au long de ces dernières années a essentiellement mené des projets sociaux, incluant des jeunes (adolescents, jeunes adultes) et des moins jeunes (entre cinquante et soixante-dix ans). »

C’est dans cet esprit que CorpsAfrica a apporté son soutien pour le reboisement de toutes les maisons du village en arbre fruitier avec le concept «une maison, deux arbres fruitiers ». En effet, les arbres fruitiers sont quasiment inexistants dans cette zone. De ce fait, nous avons introduit dans le village une dizaine de variétés d’arbres fruitiers (Mangues, sapoti, Carasolles, pommes kanel, Gola, grenade, Avocat etc…)  avec 154 plantes.
    
Par cet acte, CorpsAfrica  encourage cette dynamique de jeunesse engagée à servir leur communauté et promouvoir le développement endogène.
Avant de commencer le reboisement, nous sommes allés rendre visite au chef du village et l’imam. Ils ont salué l’engagement de la jeunesse de Ndieulbert  et  remercier Boubacar et la délégation de CorpsAfrica pour leur travail dans le village. L’imam a formulé des prières  pour le succès de nos activités.

Le reboisement a eu lieu le samedi avec une forte participation de la jeunesse et une détermination forte des jeunes filles du village.
 
Nous avons fait des portes à portes pour sensibiliser la population sur l’importance des arbres fruitiers avant de les montrer la technique de reboisement et de les donner deux plantes par maison.
La distribution des arbres était des moments très riches de solidarité et de communion. Les familles nous accueilli avec beaucoup de joie, les enfants étaient tous heureux de nous accompagner.
                                                    
Après  le reboisement, nous avons assisté dans l’après-midi à la cérémonie officielle. Un moment solennel pour les habitants de Ndieulbert.  De ce fait, la cérémonie a commencé avec le discours du chef de village M. Bada Diouf prononcé par son porte-parole, le grand griot du village tonton Mademba DIOUF.  Il a remercié les invités, magnifié le travail de CorpsAfrica dans le village et félicité les jeunes de Ndieulbert toute en les invitant de pérenniser cette action d’union et de solidarité pour le développement du village.
Après la liste des orateurs se sont poursuivi avec Modou Babou le président des jeunes (ASCUS-JN), madame Dior FALL, présidente de la GIE des femmes, M. Assane Dièye représentant du directeur de l’école etc…
CorpsAfrica a saisi de l’occasion pour s’adresser à la communauté de Ndieulbert qui a accepté sans condition d’accueillir le volontaire Boubacar Biro DIALLO. C’est ainsi que j’ai remercié toute la population de Ndieulbert pour leur collaboration et les nombreuses bonnes choses que nous avons partagé ensemble. J’ai ensuite remercié ma famille d’accueil en l’occurrence ma maman Dior FALL, mon papa Ndiaga Fall et toutes mes frères et sœurs de la maison.

Les 72H de Ndieulbert c’est des moments forts de retrouvaille, de solidarité, de dialogue, de partage, d’échange et de divertissement. En effet, l’évènement rassemble tous les jeunes, les notables, les femmes  pour valoriser les patrimoines culturelles, rendre hommage aux ancêtres, et  échanger sur les besoins de développement du village.
Enfin, je remercie les volontaires et le staff de CorpsAfrica pour le soutien moral. Mention spécial au Directeur M. Mamadou SARR, il nous a aidés dans le choix des arbres fruitiers.

Je remercie au fond du cœur l’équipe qui a effectué le déplacement avec moi, M. Lamine KOUYATE, M. Chérif HOURY, Mme DIOP Ndèye Awa GUEYE et mon très cher ami Ahmeth NDOYE.
​
CorpsAfrica, j’aime.
Boubacar Biro DIALLO
Volontaire CorpsAfrica 2016.
Département de Bambey.
 
 
 

​Tasawouf, or Sufism is a school in Islam founded to deepen the spiritual knowledge about God. And that goes through a deep understanding of oneself that leads to the true understanding of the Divine. Sufism has different schools and ways, and it exist in many different countries with different levels. 
​
In Senegal, where Islam is the religion of almost 95% of the population, Sufism exists immensely in the country. You can perceive that even during the first day in this country. Wherever you go in the streets, you see the pictures of the Marabous (leaders of Sufism), and most of the shops here are named after these leaders. In general, we can find in this country at least four “Tariqas” - Murid, Tijen, Khadr, and Laine, which refers to the way or the school of Sufism that each person follows. Each Tariqa has its own rituals that are slightly different from the other, has its holy place where the Sheikh and/ or the Founder is buried, and has its day during the year when its followers perform a pilgrimage-like trip to its site.  

​When I first arrived to the village where I am currently serving, people thought that I was an American Peace Corps volunteer. But when I told them that I am Moroccan and Muslim, they were surprised and the following interest was which Tariqa I follow, which I answered by none. Getting to know that I am a Muslim with no Tariqa was nonsense to the community. Here, for the most part, there is no Islam outside of Sufism, so, finally, we compromised that I choose one.
​
Most of the village follows the Khadr Tariqa which was founded by Abd-el-Kader Jelani who was an Iranian living in Iraq. Being a member of this Tariqa means that there are more rituals that you should do than other ones. One of them is called Dayra which is a meeting or a session being held by the young girls and boys each Thursday night to sing religious songs about the prophet and the leader of the Tariqa. In my room, the family hangs the pictures of their Marabou and his sons.

“The Sufism and its leaders have a very important role in the lives of the Senegalese”, as some of my Senegalese friends state.  “As Arabic is the language of Quran and as most of Senegalese do not understand it, the Marabous play a vital role to facilitate that and make people understand their religion”, they elaborate.  Therefore, the Marabous tie the link between Muslims and their religion. However, some Marabous surpass this role and act as if they have the exclusive right to communicate with Allah, i.e. everyone should go through them to reach God, which some people, unfortunately, believe in.

Each one in the village talks about the legend of their Marabous. A person in my site told me that his Marabou wrote during his life more than one and half ton of books.  Another person talked about how the French plane couldn’t bombard the residence of their Marabous or even fly above it. I listen and pretend to agree sometimes, because doubting that, as I have before, gets me into intense debates.

The Marabous have a big influence on their followers to the extent that one Marabou can gather hundreds of thousands of people in one call. During the colonization, the Marabous played an important role to make people revolt again France and fight against the French afterwards. However, France succeeded to make some of them work with it and even convinced the Senegalese to fight with France during the WWII.

Politically, we may say that no politician can become the president of the country if they don’t have the support of the big Marabous in the country. As long as the political leaders are aware of this fact, they always try to use the religious leaders in order to reach their political interests. And here we can notice the contradiction on how the secular politicians, who refuse the interference of religion with politics, rush during the elections to get the help from the religious leader.

However, no one can deny the benefits of this Islamic way on the Senegalese. Today, Senegal is one of the peaceful countries in West Africa. Senegal is a country where we have Muslims and Christians living together, we never hear of clashes due to these differences. In addition, Senegalese come from different ethnicities, and each ethnicity has its own language and background, but that doesn’t threaten their stability either.
​
As you read above Sufism in Senegal has its own specialty. Aside from a few bad practices from some “religious leaders”, this phenomenon has benefited the people here. At least people can feel that they have a reference which they trust and follow. Moreover, Sufism helps to assure the stability and peace of the country.

Written by Aicha Mimouni, CorpsAfrica/Maroc Volunteer 

The leadership camp we organized in Tadart was a far-fetched gathering of all high school students of the Azzaden Valley. Throughout the four days of the camp, participants built leadership skills through the direct skill transfer of the workshops and activities which comprised the camp. These included volunteerism, public speaking, self-confidence, leadership, goal setting, and project planning. Moreover, they had the opportunity to practice these skills by applying them to current projects (environmental campaign, help people needed and taking leadership roles in the camp activities, etc.) as well as future projects.

​The project planning component of the camp, in which students spent two hours each day planning and critiquing their future projects, allowed them to practice all the skills learned in the morning workshops (goal setting for outlining their projects, leadership within their groups, self-confidence and public speaking when presenting, in addition to communication between them within their groups, etc.). The project planning sessions were an important step that made the participants think critically about how to do an activity, how to look for partners, how to manage time, and how to work as a group and demonstrate leadership.  

​The best thing in camp was their attendance all together for three days; they worked as a group, they discussed the problems of their villages and they set their goals. They worked and reworked their ideas and they shared them with others. 

The camp was not only an activity that had an end but it was sustainable and youth applied the skills they learnt right after the camp finished. They took the initiative to work on other activities but this time only with our guiding which is something I am proud of. They became leaders of their communities and started thinking about how they can improve their area by their simple available materials at least for the current situations. They thought of how to work in a more organized way, so they reworked their ideas and decided to set up a group that united them and make them always work together; they named the group “Youth Azzaden for Change”. It is miraculous to see how these youths become truthfully aware of their responsibilities towards their communities, and thus, become future change makers. 

Dialogue has been proven to be the most effective way of knowing one another being from your family, friends, country and at worldwide level. Since I became a CorpsAfrica volunteer, I heard that sometime in the future, we would have an All Country Conference in Morocco,  and I was really looking forward to that conference where all Volunteers and Staff from all the three countries Malawi, Morocco, Senegal and those from the Headquarters will be there. I had been hearing a lot of stories about Morocco, that they have good things like jewelries and cosmetics and I wanted to see it for myself, despite knowing that we will be there for an intensive conference.

Apart from hearing from others and reading on the internet about about Morocco, I was also blessed to come very close to the two Moroccan CorpsAfrica Volunteers (Abdellah and Soukaina) who served in Malawi and I happened host them in my village before we went for our Pre-Service Training at Chongoni. That  relationship enlightened me with new knowledge about Morocco, but not everything, because I still wanted to visit and prove everything I had been hearing. Finally I did in the month of October (though we did not have enough time for travelling around). 

The All Country Conference in Morocco was for two weeks, from the 4th to the 15th of October, 2016. All Volunteers and Staff from Malawi, Senegal, Morocco and those from the Headquarters, such as the CorpsAfrica Founder and Director Ms. Liz Fanning, one of the Board of Directors Mr. Marc Douglas, the Development and Communications Officer Ms. Hiba Tazi and our Human-Centered Design Trainer Mr. Garett Mason were there at the conference. The CorpsAfrica/Malawi group arrived to the conference in a bit later but it was so exciting to meet fellow Volunteers and all Staff  who welcomed us very well. Everyone was happy that the Malawi group finally made to the conference in Casablanca where the  sessions took place.

The Malawi group joined the rest of the team during a session that Mr. Mason was facilitating and what most fascinated me was that this session room was full of different languages from all the three countries. The Malawi group was speaking English, Senegal group French and the Morocco group was speaking Arabic, French and English. All sessions and activities were being translated mainly in English and French languages because some could not understand English like the Senegalese and some Moroccans and Malawians could not understand French. That was the hardest part of it because in a session room we had a translator but when we were in our sleeping rooms and the surroundings it was hard for some of us to communicate properly.

Regarding food, most of the meals we were eating during lunch and dinner were Moroccan traditional foods, such as couscous and different types of Tagines. Couscous, according to Moroccan culture, is mainly eaten on Fridays. Bread is also used when eating the Tagine, and most of the places we visited we could find different types of Tagines but mostly taste similar. 

After Casablanca, where all the class session activities took place, we all traveled to the High Atlas Mountains with some stops within the trip to see some of the projects done by CorpsAfrica/Maroc Volunteers. Once there, we were divided into two groups to go to 2 different villages where our fellow CorpsAfrica Volunteers were based and did their projects. A lot of hiking in the mountains took place that some didn’t like, but it was nice and interesting to see how our fellow CorpsAfrica Volunteers did their projects and sustained them. The project that my group evaluated was one of CorpsAfrica Volunteer Hiba Tazi, who worked on a pre-school construction project.

Our main aim was to talk to the different people of this village such as chiefs, mothers, teachers, students and different stakeholders of this project and ask about the project's impact and sustainability. I personally came to conclude that the pre-school project was good for this community after hearing all the stories about the illiteracy levels, and having a pre-knowledge for children about school before starting primary school is always the best way to motivate children to go to school.

In conclusion, the All Country Conference was good. Sharing the best practices and seeing all these projects that our fellow Volunteers have done and are doing were so encouraging. Working hand in hand on our projects with communities will indeed bring development to our countries and the world at large where it will be a better place for everyone to live. Until the next updates, I say thank you very much for always following my work here in Kadewere Village.