WAIST

After bidding goodbye to my mom - and the luxury of the Radisson Blu - I headed east to the PC training center in Thies for the annual West African All Volunteer Conference. The 2-day event brings all of Senegal's 240+ volunteers plus a handful from other countries together to discuss projects, best practices and training. It is one of the few times all of PC/Senegal gets together and is a good chance to see out of region friends. While no sessions were truly earth shattering, I saw many interesting presentations and got excited about new things to do back at site.

Before going home though, there was WAIST aka the West African Invitational Softball Tournament. This annual event is hosted by the Dakar expat community and includes teams from Peace Corps, the US Embassy, the International School of Dakar and anyone else interested in 3 days of mediocre ballgames. Each PC/Senegal region fields a themed team, while other countries take the games semi-seriously and the legitimate teams actually bother to practice beforehand. Team Kolda was themed "South of the Border/Wild West" in reference to our position south of The Gambia.

As usual, Kolda-ites ran in many directions with their costume choices but we maintained a modicum of cohesion with outfits ranging from marriachi band members and mexican peasants, cowboys and saloon girls, a taco, a pinata and Ms. Chaquita Banana. I spent the first day as "spring break cabo" and the second as "border patrol." We successfully forfeited every time. I played in just one game, wore no shoes, missed the one pop fly that came to center field and scored one run! Despite a nasty head cold that rendered me voice-less for a week, it was a great time.

Due to the influx of homeless PCVs, generous Dakar dwelling expats agreed to take many of us in for the weekend. I had a fantastic homestay with 7 other girls, a real house with hot water, TV and living room furniture. We were well fed, if not entirely well rested due to a few very late nights out.

To add to the fun of formal WAIST activities, each night is a themed party. This year we had a talent show, PC Prom and date auction, and the grand finale dance party. Despite a few broken chairs, pots, mirrors and bones it was a great time.