My Dream Sensibilisations

One of the activities almost all PCVs do during their service is lead sensibilisations.  As many times as I’ve asked, no one knows what this really translates to in English, but it is basically when volunteers go out into the community and spread some sort of knowledge.  For example, going door to door with a picture book and explaining the causes and preventions of malaria.  Or leading a short skit about responsible life choices and condom use.  Basically, the goal of a sensibilisation is to give community members the knowledge necessary to make informed choices and incite behavior change.

Usually sensibilisations are similar to what I mentioned before, dealing with nutrition, malaria, environmental protection or conservation, or girls’ education (to name a few), but sometimes I really wish I could give a sensibilisation that would help improve my own life here.  Some of the ones I’ve dreamed up:

• how to make a pizza: Pizza making is really most limited by the lack of ingredients, but it never hurts to be prepared for when cheese finally makes its way to Kankan.
•  proper street crossing behavior: This would generally center around what I consider a golden rule: look both ways before crossing the street.  I would bet at least 65% of traffic accidents are caused by someone literally stepping into a moving motorcycle.
• arriving on time: One of the first things we were told in PST was how nothing ever starts on time in Guinea and to expect it and bring a book, but after hours of reading my kindle in waiting, it would be nice if people were a little more prompt.
• the joy of puns (plus a side sensibilisation on sarcasm): People aren’t much into wordplay here, which means I am approximately 50% less funny than in America.  Also no one ever laughs at the following joke:

An English and French cat, both named 1-2-3, have a race to cross 

the English Channel. The English cat won because un deux 

trois quatre cinq (that’s 1-2-3-4-5 in French, for you Anglophones, 

pronounced ‘un deux trois cat sank’).

• customer service: A favorite joke among volunteers is how hard it is to get people to sell you something.  You walk into their restaurant and no one is there, then search around and when you finally find the madame she looks really offended that you’ve asked to buy a bowl of her rice.  There has been many an occasion where I haven’t bought what I sought out to just because it was so difficult (and I am lazy).
•  line forming: In general, occasions that would normally call for lines in America (the bank, buying something at the corner boutique, mosquito net distributions), are dealt with in a somewhat orderly crowd.  Usually, at the bank, everyone puts their ID cards in a perfectly straight line in front of the teller and then stands in a jostling crowd just behind, straining to hear their name called.  The crowd thing tends to work because people get exasperated and demand service in about the same order in which they arrived, but sometimes I just don’t feel like pushing my way towards the front to shove my money into the rice lady’s hand.  Luckily, there is always a kind-hearted Guinean crowded next to me who is more than happy to do so for me.
• girl scouts: While the girls empowerment and training part of this would no doubt be great, I’m really just in it for the cookies.