Day 11 - Hanging at the Island

Saint-Louis is beautiful.  There’s also another island right next to it that I think we spent part of the day on, but to be honest I don’t really notice when we switch between the two.  This area is definitely supported primarily be the fishing industry, there are boats and fishermen everywhere.  They seemed to be building some boats too.  I try not to look too much at the heaps of fish because I still don’t really like seafood, and I get creeped out by dead things staring at me, but there are piles of them everywhere.  In the boats, on the sides of the street, in buckets being carried on peoples’ heads, and in the carts pulled by horses.  At one point I glanced down towards the gutter, and it was just a stream of blood from the fish which had been gutted.  Once you get past all of that though, the islands are pretty cool.  There are vendors everywhere, and the architecture is really cool and colorful.  I spotted a couple of pelicans out in the water too.  We saw a bat last night, they’re absolutely huge here.  They remind me of the ones that you find in the zoos in the U.S.  We went to the beach, and the water here is absolutely gorgeous (minus the pollution – this entire country has a huge problem with that.)  We visited another art exhibit too.  Many of the collections of art here are associated with a program called OFF, which allows anyone to view the exhibits for free.  Goats are pretty much everywhere on this island.  It turns out that the animals that are outside of our houses back in Dakar aren’t goats, they’re sheep, they just don’t have wool the way American sheep do.  Thiem says that many families here keep sheep so that they can slaughter and eat them later.  Kenisha says that her family told her they just keep them as pets though.  Saint-Louis is a very small island though.  Everyone here seems to know who we are, I think they identify us as ‘those white people from the UCAD bus.’  A lot of people were waving as we drove through the streets.  I think we stand out a lot because buses aren’t typically that big in Senegal, most people use Car Rapides or taxis when they need public transportation, and the Car Rapides aren’t that much bigger than U.S. vans.  Our hotel is wonderful though, it's very modern for this country.  It has hot showers, which are fantastic, and really soft blankets.  I think we're all going to be sad to be heading back to Dakar tomorrow.