Typing with a Different Type of Type

I'm testing a new font size and color in hopes of increasing readability. Let me know what you think. (Unfortunately, eblogger often doesn't do quite what you tell it to, even when you select options from its own menus, so there are and will continue to be some inconsistencies.)

Currency Converter Replacement

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I couldn't get the previous Currency Converter to work, so I've replaced it. To see how the fluctuations in the dollar are affecting me, just do the following.

1. Click in the FROM field, press the "U" key 5 times to choose USD, and press ENTER.
   
2. Click in the TO field, press the "C" key once to choose CFA BCEAO Francs,* and press ENTER.
3. Click the GO button (above the FROM field).

* INTERESTING TECHNICAL DISTINCTION: CFA BCEAO Francs (Bank code: XOF) are West African Francs, used by 8 countries, including Senegal. CFA BEAC Francs (Bank code: XAF) are used by a different consortium of 5 CENTRAL African nations. Both currencies are tied to the Euro, and at the same exchange rate, but you can't use XAF Francs in XOF countries, or vice versa. In addition, a few other countries in the region have their own currencies, and do not accept either XOF or XAF Francs! (For more details, including color-coded maps, search for "CFA Francs" on Wikipedia, the source of the info in this paragraph.)

Good news: as of today, the dollar has rebounded from its recent low of 400CFA to the dollar to (today) 446CFA to the dollar. So a box of breakfast cereal today cost only $7.84 instead of the $8.75 it cost two or three months ago. And a pound of bananas is down from $1.50 to $1.34.

I don't know if any of you are interested in all this, but I am--especially the cost of food!

It's raining, it's pouring...

As I write, I can hear a downpour of refreshing rain outside my open windows. This is the best rainy season West Africa has had since it spawned Hurricane Katrina a few years back. Recently, we've had rain every day or two!

Food supplies are still low for many Senegalese, but there's good hope of a good harvest ahead!

Currency Converter

I've just added a currency converter "gadget" at the left--under the SUBSCRIPTION buttons. You, too, can watch the value of the dollar go up and down in comparison to West African Currency! Just press the CONVERT button for the latest exchange rate.

UPDATE: This converter didn't work so I replaced it. For instructions, see my August 28 post.

Your Support Dollars at Work

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Friends often ask me about the cost of living in Dakar. It depends a lot on how I choose to eat.

FOOD. I generally buy western food imported from Europe and, sometimes, the US. I went grocery shopping today and bought the following.

1 box of breakfast cereal
2 large boxes of skim milk powder
2 boxes of fruit juice
4 fruit yogurts

My total bill was 17,110 cfa. Even at last week’s improving exchange rate of 450cfa/dollar, that’s $38.00!

If I consistently ate Senegalese style (mostly rice, with various vegetable or meat sauces very high in oil content), I could eat for about $3.00 per day.

FUEL. Today, I saw gasoline for sale at 798cfa per liter, diesel at 808cfa. That comes to $6.71/gallon for gas, $6.80/gallon for diesel. Most vehicles here use diesel.

I don’t often buy fuel. When I need to travel around town, I either take a taxi—$3.50 to $5.00 per trip, one way, depending on distance and traffic—or use a school vehicle and reimburse the school about 70 cents per mile.

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NOTE: The ALL COMMENTS button doesn't do anything since I don't have this blog set up to accept comments from readers. But eblogger didn't offer the option to suppress the appearance of that button.

CAVEAT: I have not personally used this feature. (I don't need to subscribe to my own blog!) If you do, please write to tell me if it works. (The last time eblogger added a similar feature, it did not work for every one of my friends who tried to use it. I'm hoping this one is more reliable.)

And the word is...(the envelope, please)...

to find the mYsteRy word, which I unwillingly omitted from the August 15 post, check this paragRaph--simply find The capItal letters scattered aBout, reveRse their sequence, and there you'll hAve it.

Who Benefits? (Part 2) Or, That's Water through the Dam

A magazine article I read last year complained that western companies come to Africa, harvest the natural resources, and then take those resources elsewhere for further processing, refusing to let Africans take part in the more lucrative steps in the manufacture of goods. That sounds selfish until you realize that the infrastructure here (I speak of West Africa) is not reliable enough to run large-scale processing and manufacturing plants.

The following story amazes and saddens me.

The Republic of Guinea is extremely rich in natural resources, including minerals and water power. Some years ago, a foreign nation donated huge amounts of engineering expertise and enormous quantities of cement to design and construct a dam on one of Guinea's major rivers. This dam, I am told, could have provided enough electrical power for the entire country, with some left over to sell to neighboring nations. It had the potential to completely revolutionize Guinea's economy.

But when I visited Guinea last December, I found that even parts of the capital city lacked electricity. Entire neighborhoods lighted their markets with kerosene lamps at night. Why? Because the folks in leadership when the dam was being built apparently stole much of the cement powder for their own personal projects and those of their friends. Once the dam was built, it was determined that the cement was so diluted as to be too weak to hold back the river. So, the dam was never put into operation. Now, decades later, this country is still stuck in poverty.

NOTE: I heard the dam story while I was in Guinea. I have done no follow-up research, so it may be off in some particulars either from errors by those who told it to me, or resulting from my less-and-less reliable rememberer, or both. However, I believe it to be true in at least its basic outline. I welcome corrections.

Who benefits? (Part 1)

As much as I respect the Senegalese government (see previous posts), the poor delivery here of such basic services as electricity baffle me. I want to ask someone, "Why are you doing this to your own people?"

During the rainy season (July-December), the power is cut, unannounced, several times a week--sometimes daily, sometimes more than once in a day-- for anywhere between 15 minutes and 10 hours. Apparently, the government, which subsidizes the power plants, frequently doesn't pay the bills on time, so the power company shuts down the plant--or has daily, rolling outages around the city to reduce output.

If there were even a schedule of outages published, it would be immensely better. Then individuals and businesses could at least attempt to plan activities requiring electricity for the times it would be on. (In fact, I'm told this was tried a few years ago, but the schedule was so seldom kept, it was more frustrating than having no schedule, so they quit publishing it.)

I suppose in a predominantly pre-industrial environment, reliable technological infrastructure is not crucial. Much of Senegal qualifies for that description. Farmers and carpenters who use hand tools, vendors with street-side stalls, even taxi drivers in diesel-fueled cars don't care whether the electricity is on or off.

But unlike much of the country, Dakar is not pre-industrial. There are factories, grocery stores, restaurants, banks, and many other businesses that depend on electricity to function--not to mention safety features such as traffic lights and street lights. Computers are common in businesses here, too. Cutting the current without warning is incredibly disruptive to life, businesses, schools.

The president promised last year that power outages would end on a specific day in October. And, in fact, they became very rare for several months. It was wonderful. You didn't have to wonder if you could perform a task (typing, printing, photocopying) at any point during the day. But the stoppages ramped up again in the spring, and have been horrible in the one week I've been back in town.

So, who benefits when the power goes out? Somebody must gain or it wouldn't keep happening.

Suppliers of generator fuel, perhaps? But aren't they the same people who supply fuel for the electrical generators (though perhaps at a lower,bulk price). "I expect," surmised one of my stateside relatives, "that the 'in crowd' (whoever that may be) gets great benefit for maintaining the status quo rather than for improving it. Parties with solutions could be threatening to the in crowd so their barriers to implement solutions are kept high." This is the most plausible explanation I've heard.

Whatever the cause, Africans suffer daily. And, year after year, entire nations pay the price of such infrastructural unreliability. See my next post for a sad example.

Mystery Word

Has anyone determined the word missing from my last entry? Here's the sentence, again.

I'm not a fan of [Frank Gehry's] abstract, seemingly * style, but it is striking.

Email me with your guesses. I remembered it as I drifted off to sleep the other night, but didn't turn on the light and write it down, so it's drifted away again.

Jay the Tourist

TOURING FRIENDS AND FAMILY. I have returned to Dakar from an 8-week visit to the States. I've been wondering what to write that would be of general interest. I can summarize my trip simply by saying I got plenty (!) of rest, saw a number of family members, a number of friends, and met a few new folks. It was great to see "everyone"!

I put "everyone" in quotes because, to my frustration and in some cases embarrassment, I did not see everyone I wanted to. Thanks to a college-era alumni newsletter, word had gotten around that I was coming to town, and people I haven't seen in 20 years contacted me. As a result of a volatile travel schedule, and also of eventual burnout, I didn't get to connect with all of them. If you're one of them, my apologies. Next time, I hope!

JAY THE TOURGUIDE IN DC. I had two, thoroughly enjoyable, touristic voyages. First, I had the unique pleasure of playing tourguide to four Dakar Academy alums and their father (my former English8 team-teaching colleague) during their 12-hour layover in Washington, D.C. We perused the National Mall between the Capitol and the Lincoln Memorial, taking in numerous memorials and some International Folk Festival exhibits and foods. I may become a docent when I retire.

JAY THE TOURIST IN CHICAGO. Later, in Chicago, I went to Millenium Park--built since my last visit, entirely with private money--for the first time. I didn't know what to expect, but I wasn't really expecting much. I was wrong! It's a destination! Sculpture, indoor and outdoor theaters, gardens, plazas, and more!

The sculptures looked odd or downright silly in tourist brochures, but were, in fact, terrific. The shiny silver "Cloud Gate" (shaped like a huge pinto bean) is both fascinating and fun. One side yields a dramatic, bowed reflection of the Chicago skyline. Up close, you see yourself and other gawkers in humorous distortion. Underneath, you're lost in a magical and indecipherable kaleidescope of reflections.

Though I missed the open orchestra rehearsal at the Jay Pritzker Pavillion, the outdoor theater designed by Frank Gehry, it was a visual blast. I'm not a fan of his abstract, seemingly * style, but it is striking. And the creation of a distinct audience "space" through use of a grid of widely spaced arches over the lawn seating, is both interesting and impressive. (Alas, I missed the wandering BP Bridge, also by Gehry, which looks cool in photos on the Park's website.)

Jaume Plensa's Crown Fountain--twin glass-brick monoliths spouting water into a sloped plaza, and projecting huge video close-ups of Chicago residents--is quirky, but worth the visit just to see the screaming children vying for a position under the foot-wide streams of water coming from the mouths of the citizen videos.

The one disappointment was the Lurie Garden. Entirely walled off by tall firs or junipers, it's invisible from the outside, and it's a good thing. A gently sloping plot perhaps half the size of a football field is criss-crossed by sunken, walled paths. In the remaining patchwork of plots are planted the homeliest weeds and grasses, in the least aesthetically pleasing arrangement imagineable--Nature has never done so poorly on its own. The tallest plants were often next to the sunken paths, obscuring the vegetation further in. My main color recollection is gray, though I was there at the height of summer.

I see from the park's website, http://www.millenniumpark.org/, that I missed a lot. It's on my list for more attention next time I'm in Chicago!

JAY THE ALMOST-TOURIST IN CASABLANCA. Finally, on my return trip to Dakar I had a 12-hours layover in fabled Casablanca, Morocco. Alas, I can neither deny nor confirm rumors that the city does not live up to the romantic reputation it's earned in the US from the movie of the same name. The airline, I had been told, would provide a hotel or a tour of the city. I was going to choose the tour, but it wasn't being offered anymore, so instead I spent the day in a very decent airport hotel in the middle of brown scrubby no-man's-land, with no city in sight. I watched part of the Olympic opening ceremonies on TV (Mini-Review: fantastically creative and clever in places) and ate a lunch of delicious Moroccan food at the hotel's buffet.

* The missing word in this sentence is one of my favorities, but also one
of the hardest for me to remember. I used to keep it written in my wallet to
keep me from being frustrated to the point of distraction in conversation. I'll
fill it in when I finally think of it again.