Tag: Adam

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Political Situation in Senegal (update)

We last wrote about the political situation on our blog in July 2023 after Senegal had experienced a week of intense riots across the country. Things have been relatively quiet since then, until just this past week.

On Saturday, President Macky Sall announced an indefinite postponement to the election which was supposed to take place on February 25th. I (Adam) was taking part in a softball tournament that day at a field owned by the U.S. Embassy. When Sall made his announcement (around 3pm), the Embassy immediately cancelled the tournament for the day for fear of protests breaking out across the city. While Saturday remained relatively quiet, protests did materialize Sunday night into Monday morning. These protests (even peaceful ones) were met with strong force from the police who quickly used tear gas to break up any demonstrations.

On Monday morning, Senegal’s Parliament met to vote on the decision to delay the presidential election. At around 10pm and after a full day of debating, police were called in to physically remove members of the Parliament who opposed the bill and were trying to prevent the vote from taking place. After their removal, the bill passed and the elections were postponed until December 15th. This effectively extends President Sall’s presidency, which was slated to end on April 2nd since he has already reached the two term limit, for another six months.

Many are calling this move a “constitutional coup” and are saying that Senegal’s democracy has died with this delay of the presidential election. If you’d like to know more, you can click on the picture below to read a New York Times article which does a good job summarizing what has happened recently.

We ask that you join us in prayer for the following things:

  1. That democracy and a fair election process would be preserved.
  2. For peace here in Dakar and across the country.
  3. That protests would be peaceful and would not lead to the destruction of property and the loss of life like was seen last summer.
  4. That God would use this political situation to draw Senegalese people to Jesus, the Prince of Peace, who alone provides true and lasting peace.

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Death Defying Masonry

A month or so ago we had a new wall A/C unit put into Evie’s room so that we could move her out of our room and into her own. The A/C units here have two parts to them: the unit that is mounted in the wall on the inside and a second box on the outside of the home. Depending on the location, this exterior unit is usually hung on the outside wall or placed on a balcony or rooftop. In our situation, Evie’s room is on the second floor and so it was easier to place the exterior unit on the roof and then run the cables up to it. This required making two holes in the exterior wall of our home for the cables to pass through.

Very quickly after the A/C was installed some birds began making a nest in the hole right behind the actual unit inside Evie’s room. It quickly became apparent that the sound of a mama bird making a nest in the wall did not have the same soothing effect that one might imagine when they think of the relaxing sounds of bird calls in nature. So we hired a mason to come and patch the two holes. He came with a really large ladder to reach up to our second story, but apparently it was not quite tall enough. I took him up to the roof to see the higher of the two holes which was high enough on the wall for him to patch from our roof, but I told him he would need a ladder for the other hole. He was in the process of tying some ropes together and he turned to me and said, “I’m making one”. He processed to create a loop in the rope which he tied off and threw over the edge. He then climbed over the edge of the roof until he could step down on a small perch above our window. From there he climbed into the loop of rope where he sat. He mixed some cement which he balanced in his lap and filled the hole. When he was done he simply climbed back up the same way he went down.

I was terrified this guy was going to fall and kill himself but this was clearly a normal practice for him. At the same time, I couldn’t help but laugh when I thought about the OSHA workplace safety poster that had to be hung in my bank office back in the States. I also was sure to call Selina to tell her to run outside and take a picture 😀 (see below). I told him after how much he scared me and that in the United States what he did would never fly. I also showed him the picture Selina took. He just laughed, told me the picture was “jolie” (pretty) and asked me to send it to him. It was a reminder that every task and interaction we have is a cultural learning moment for us!   

-Adam

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Hot Season

Now that we are a week into November, we are very excited for the imminent (we hope!) end to our first hot season here in Senegal. Many of you have asked us about the hot season so we thought we’d write a post about our experience.

October is said to be the worst month as the rainy season has ended and the humidity builds without any more showers to bring a reprieve. During October the average high temperature during the day was probably in the mid-to-low 90’s, or in the mid-to-high 90’s with the heat index. And if you are out in the sun it feels much worse. The temperature doesn’t really drop off at night, which has been one of the hardest parts of hot season because you never really get a break from the heat. In the middle of the night the temperature remained around 90 with the heat index. Because of this the temperature inside our home probably averaged in the high 80’s or low 90’s. Turn on a stove or oven to cook and the temperature in the kitchen can easily climb into triple digits.

All that being said, in some ways, hot season was not as bad as we expected. We felt like we could continue to function (most of the time) and I (Adam) was not grumpy 100% of the time like I thought I might be. We are very blessed to have air conditioning in our rooms to sleep at night. Without this, I am sure that this hot season would have been very different. In fact, a common question asked here in Senegal as part of the greeting process is to inquire about how someone slept the night before. We’ve heard many times over the last several months from students or our house help that they have not been sleeping well because it’s just too hot.

Just the other night our electricity went out at around 10pm and remained off until roughly 2am. Without having air conditioning or even a fan to circulate the air, the heat was truly oppressive. Thankfully our kids stayed asleep for the first couple of hours while their room remained somewhat cool, but eventually woke up because of how hot they were. I spent much of that time sitting in a folding chair in front of a window just hoping for a breeze. Many Senegalese will actually sleep on their rooftops during hot season and I was contemplating how to make this happen for our family right before our power was restored.

We’ve found that during the day if you don’t move much and if you stay in front of a fan, it’s not too bad. But once you remove any part of that equation, the sweating is quick to start. For example, and this may be TMI for some of you, we’ve found that often the worst room in the house is the bathroom because there are no fans or airflow. I proudly follow in the footsteps of my father in spending too much time on the porcelain throne. However, this way of life is not kind to me here. The picture in this post that you might think is me after coming home from a run. In fact, that is me after coming out of the bathroom. Here’s to the end of hot season!

-Adam

*The day after typing this we had what we believe is the cold front that will usher in the cooler season! A breeze could be felt all day and the temperatures were in the 80s with a much lower humidity as well! I’ve declared that the end of hot season will officially be a holiday our family celebrates 😊

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Clarity of Call

I recently joined a men’s Bible study in which we’ve been studying the Gospel of John. As I was reading through John 1, I was really struck by the actions of John the Baptist.

In verses 6 to 9 we are introduced to John the Baptist as one who was sent by God to tell people about Jesus, “…the true light that gives light to everyone” (John 1:9), and prepare them for His arrival.  

Later in verses 19 to 28 we see John being questioned by the religious leaders about who he is. He openly denies being the Messiah, Elijah or the Prophet and instead responds to their questions by quoting the book of Isaiah saying, “I am the voice of one calling in the desert: ‘Make straight the way for the Lord.’” (John 1:23). John had a very clear understanding of who he was and what God had called him to do.

Verses 29 to 34 describe to us the scene when Jesus approaches John in the wilderness and John realizes for the first time that it is Jesus (his own cousin!) who is the Messiah, the Light that shines in the darkness and gives light to all people. John calls out, “’Look, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!’” (John 1:29). Though not described in this gospel, we know it is at this time that John baptizes Jesus, after which the heavens open up and John sees the Spirit of God come down like a dove and land on Jesus and then the voice of the Father declares from heaven the pleasure He has in His Son Jesus.

It’s a truly remarkable scene. This is the moment John has been waiting for, the revealing of the promised Messiah, about whom John says, “’He is the one who comes after me, the straps of whose sandals I am not worthy to untie.’” (John 1:27). This is the One the Israelites had been waiting for for hundreds of years. This meeting is made even more incredible by the fact that Jesus requires John to baptize Him, after which John is a firsthand witness to one of the clearest examples of God’s Triune nature that we have recorded in the Bible. He baptizes the Son. He hears the Father speak from heaven the love He has for His Son. He sees the Spirit descend from heaven and alight on the Son. What an incredible scene this must have been to take it!

What really struck me though in studying this passage was what happens next. John 1:35 says, “The next day John was there again with two of his disciples.” John had just had this incredible experience. He met and baptized the Son of God. He heard the Father speak and saw the Spirit descend like a dove. What does John do in response? He wakes up the next morning and goes right back to where he was, doing exactly what he was doing before. Even more, verse 36 tells us John sees Jesus passing by and so he calls out, “’Look, the Lamb of God!’”. The two disciples that were with John then leave and follow Jesus instead.

I tried imagining myself in John’s shoes, thinking about what I would want to do here. There is no doubt in my mind I would want to go with these two disciples and follow Jesus. I would want to get to know Jesus, learn from Him and see what He was going to do. Instead, John stays. Not only that, but He points out Jesus to his own disciples so that they can leave him and follow Jesus instead. John continues in the role God prepared for Him, pointing people to the Light who was to come (and who has now come).

There is a very evident clarity of calling seen in John here. He knows what his role is and what his role isn’t (becoming a disciple of Jesus). As much as I think John would have loved to follow Jesus, to listen to Him teach in the synagogues, to be taught and poured into as one of His disciples and to see Him perform incredible miracles, this is not God’s plan for John. And John knows it. And because he knows it John has this incredible humility to stay and perform the role God has for him while at the same time sending off his disciples to follow Jesus.

Later in John 3:22-23 we read this, “After this, Jesus and his disciples went out into the Judean countryside, where He spent time with them, and baptized. Now John was also baptizing at Aenon near Salim, because there was plenty of water, and people were coming and being baptized.” So John is still at work, proclaiming the coming of Jesus and baptizing. An argument breaks out between John’s disciples and another man, and they come to John saying in verse 26, “’Rabbi, that man who was with you on the other side of the Jordan (they are talking about Jesus)—the one you testified about—look, He is baptizing, and everyone is going to Him.’” We read John’s reply in verses 27 to 30, “’A person can receive only what is given them from heaven. You yourselves can testify that I said, ‘I am not the Messiah but am sent ahead of Him.’ The bride belongs to the bridegroom. The friend who attends the bridegroom waits and listens for him, and is full of joy when he hears the bridegroom’s voice. That joy is mine, and it is now complete. He must become greater; I must become less.’”

In case we were wondering if John was embittered, feeling like he was left behind while others get to follow Jesus, these verses show us this is absolutely not the case. John is full of joy. He knows the role He was called to, and because of this clarity of call John reaps a harvest of humility and joy.

I have thought much about this idea of clarity of call over the last couple of weeks since studying this text. We have been in Senegal for nearly 9 months now, and are still very much figuring out what long-term ministry will look like for us. My prayer is that God would give me greater and greater clarity of call in the months and years to come, that I might serve Him in humility and joy in whatever work He calls me to.

-Adam

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Wolof Worship

As we mentioned in our August newsletter, we have decided on a church to plug into. It is a small (40ish people on an average Sunday) church with Senegalese leadership. The service is held in French and Wolof, the largest local language here in Senegal. While the sermons go back and forth between French and Wolof based on who is preaching that week (they are always translated live into the other language), most of the songs we sing tend to be in French. However, this last week all of the worship songs were in Wolof. The woman who usually leads worship on a keyboard just starts singing a song and everyone else joins in. There is no projector with lyrics and although they do have hymnbooks, the song being sung is not usually announced.

This last week, however, someone in the congregation shouted out the number of each song as it started which allowed Selina and I to follow along and do our best at pronouncing the words to the songs. Thankfully the worship is very lively and we are in a small room, so I don’t think anyone heard our voices!

Above is a picture of one of the pages from the hymnbook. While we had no idea what we were singing, it was a joy to stand alongside our Senegalese brothers and sisters in Christ, praising God in Wolof. It was a great reminder of why we are here. We know that amongst the Senegalese, there are those whom God has called, but who have not yet come to call on His Name and be saved.

As Romans 10:14-15 says, “How, then, can they call on the one they have not believed in? And how can they believe in the one of whom they have not heard? And how can they hear without someone preaching to them? And how can anyone preach unless they are sent?”

We are so thankful to be here in Senegal, and to have the opportunity to proclaim the good news of the Gospel to the Senegalese. And we are thankful for all of you who have sent us. Without you all, we would not be here. Please join us in praying for the harvest here in Senegal, that many would come to call on the name of Jesus for salvation and that God would raise up local churches passionate about reaching their own.

-Adam

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Political Situation in Senegal

As many of you might have seen in our newsletter or in the news, Senegal saw several days of intense demonstrations and protests at the start of June during which at least 15 people were killed, more than 500 people were arrested and much property was looted, burned and destroyed. Throughout its history, Senegal has been known for its democratic stability in West Africa, so these types of clashes are far removed from the norm. We discussed these protests in our June update, but did not provide any background on the cause which is what we hope to provide for you in this post.  

The current president of Senegal is Macky Sall. Sall was first elected in 2012. At that time, the length of a presidential term was seven years and there was no limit on the numbers of terms a president could serve. In Senegal’s history, there have only been four presidents: Leopold Senghor served from 1960 to 1980, Abdou Diouf served from 1981 to 2000, Abdoulaye Wade served from 2000 to 2012 and Sall has served since 2012. In 2016, Sall introduced a constitutional referendum which reduced the presidential term to five years and introduced a two-term limit.

In 2019, Sall was re-elected for his second term. One of his challengers in 2019 was Ousmane Sonko. Sonko was the youngest candidate to run and ended up coming in third place, collecting roughly 16% of the vote. Sonko continues to be very popular amongst Senegal’s youth and is considered Sall’s greatest opponent for re-election. Sall has stated that he believes his first presidential term should not count against the two-term limit seeing as the referendum did not take place until the middle of his first term.

In March 2021, Sonko was accused of rape and arrested. Those in Sonko’s camp have rejected these charges and say they are politically motivated. Sonko’s arrest led to several days of riots, which much like this year, garnered headlines from across the world.

This charge and the resulting journey through the court system has been drawn out over the last 27 months. Anytime Sonko was due in court, there was the potential for further riots. On these court days, it was not uncommon for the government to issue bans on motos (which allow a lot of people to gather quickly) or for bus transportation to be shut down. However, any protests that did occur were usually fairly small in size and duration. That was until June 1st of this year when the courts finally reached a verdict. Sonko was acquitted on the rape charge, but was found guilty of the charge of corrupting youth, which includes using one’s position of power to have sex with someone under the age of 21.

Sonko was sentenced to two years in prison and due to this conviction, he would be disqualified to run for the presidency in 2024. An arrest warrant was not immediately issued and still has not been issued to this day. Sonko remains essentially on house arrest. Again, Sonko’s proponents say this points to these charges clearly being politically motivated since the government does not seem interested in having him arrested, but only in disqualifying him from running in next year’s presidential election. During this time, Sonko’s party was calling for Sall to publicly announce he will not seek a third term.

On July 3rd, it was announced that Sall would give a speech the following evening regarding his intentions for the 2024 election. In response, Sonko called for his supporters to take to the streets if Sall indicated he would seek a third term. However, Sall announced that he would actually not seek re-election, while maintaining that he has the constitutional right to do so if he wished to. This was surprising and welcome news to many who were bracing for further riots.

Since then, the country has been peaceful. However, Sonko has still not actually been arrested. Some of my students at the English center told me that they think this is the only thing keeping his supporters peaceful and that his arrest would lead to heavy demonstrations again. There is also some skepticism as to whether Sall is truly stepping out of the race. Only time will tell.

-Adam

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We Want to Know About You!

I was recently emailing with a friend from our home church back in Michigan. As a part of this I asked her how she and her family were doing and how we could be praying for them. She responded with a nice paragraph with updates on her and her husband, her kids, and grandkids along with how we could be praying for them. At the end of the email, she made a joke about how she had sent me a lot. I am here to go on record that you can never send us too much!

When you send us family updates, and prayer requests in particular, they are such a blessing to us for the following reasons:

  1. Moving across an ocean, we’ve had to say goodbye to so many dear friends and family. We try to stay connected with many of you, but the reality is that this is just not possible. God has been so generous in providing us with incredible community in France and Senegal, but we still feel the loss from leaving family, friends, our home church and the community that each of us grew up in. There is no replacing these relationships or even the small moments of connection with so many of you on a Sunday morning or while bumping into you at the grocery store or downtown (for those local to Midland). We’ve found that getting updates from you really makes us feel so much more connected. We are happy to send out our newsletters and let everyone know what is going on in our lives, but we’d love to get your newsletters (or just an email is sufficient) so we can know what is going on in your lives.
  2. Further, we love knowing how we can pray for you. We’ve found that when we ask someone how they are doing we typically get a lot of the higher-level items such as job updates, family changes, perhaps moving houses or things of this nature. We love knowing these things (please tell them to us!), but when someone shares with us how we can pray for them, we often get a deeper view into their heart. We hear about what they are hoping for, what is causing them anxiety, what struggles they are trusting God for, what they are passionate about and things like this. This allows for deeper connection.
  3. And of course, when we get your prayer requests we know how to best pray for you! Being in Senegal, we aren’t around to help you move, to offer you an encouragement or a hug on a bad day, to babysit your kids so you can go on a date night or to bring you a meal after welcoming a new baby. But, we can pray and we love praying for all of you! We try and take time each night around the dinner table to pray for two families. If you have not already sent us a family picture (Selina requested this in a newsletter a while back), please do so! We use these with the kids so that they know who we are praying for.

All that to say, we love hearing from you!  Please never hesitate to reach out to us (email, WhatsApp, Facebook messenger and Marco Polo are all great) and let us know what is going on in your lives and how we can support you in prayer.

-Adam

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Observations of Life in Senegal

As promised, a random compilation of things we’ve noticed about life in Dakar. It will be fun to look back on these in the coming months and years to see how we learn and grow in our perception of culture and life.

  • While typically very short, we do experience power outages somewhat regularly (the power just went out as I am writing this post :D)
  • There is A LOT of dust! We are amazed at how quickly things can get dirty in our house. This is one (of many) reasons we are so thankful for our house help Fatou.
  • It is culturally normal to employ a house help and a guard. Some people also employ chauffeurs, cooks and nannies as well.
  • Boutiques (picture little corner stores) and fruit/vegetable stands are very common throughout the city. We actually live directly across from a boutique which is very convenient if we just need to grab a couple of eggs. It is also an added source of security since it is open until midnight most nights.
  • Horse drawn wagons are not uncommon to see around the city as well as goats and sheep (the kids love this!). Our neighbors across the street actually have a goat who we often see in a room on the roof.
  • Roofs are often open spaces, particularly for doing and hanging laundry. Since we don’t have a yard our roof is our only outdoor space.
  • Dakar is a big city (3 million people!) so it’s taking some getting used to since our background is Midland, Michigan (40,000 people). While violent crime is not common, petty theft is. In our quartier there have been some thefts of bags from people riding on motos (“moto bandits”).
  • Because of the risk of theft it is extremely important to ensure windows and doors are locked and closed. All of our ground floor windows have bars on them and even the shutters have locks. We are thankful to have a little gate in the front of our house that locks as well.
  • Extended family will often live together in one house so each room of a house typically has it’s own bathroom. For example, our house has three bedrooms and a total of 4 bathrooms, each of which has a shower in it (another reason we’re so grateful for our house help!)
  • Many main roads are paved, but side roads tend to be dirt/sand which is the case for our road (the kids enjoy that it’s like walking on a beach each time we leave our house). We, however, don’t enjoy the amount of sand they bring into our house in their shoes 😀
  • While French is the official language here, it is usually the second language for most Senegalese. While walking around the city we mostly hear Wolof being spoken. This is the language of the largest people group here. We hope to learn some Wolof phrases and eventually tackle the language itself (especially Adam, our forever student 🙂 )
  • While some foreigners choose to drink water straight from the tap, most buy bottled water or filter it. We have a big filter that we fill each night before bed so we’ve got plenty for the next day.
  • There’s a guy for EVERYTHING. We’re finding this to be especially true as we try and set up our home. Recently we mentioned wanting to buy some fans and our teammate Dave said, “Oh I’ve got a fan guy, let me call him!” This is also true for meat, repair work, different types of furniture, fruits, vegetables, clothing, doctors…pretty much everything! It’s very important to network and build connections here. We are very thankful for the Cousens and other friends we’ve met here who are sharing their “guys” with us.
  • Finding a place (or explaining to a delivery person or taxi driver where we live) is less about an address (we don’t have an address for our house) and more about using landmarks. Trying to do this in French as we adjust to Senegalese accents and run into some people who only speak Wolof has been interesting (aka very difficult). Several times we’ve had to ask a guard or boutique worker to help us by speaking in Wolof to explain where we are.
  • The bugs are not messing around. They seize any opportunity to go for open food or a spill we forgot to wipe up (yet again, thank you to Fatou for being incredible at keeping our house clean!). We are also learning the tips and tricks to keeping things like mosquitos and cockroaches out.
  • We have to wash all fruits and vegetables in a bleach solution. This added work definitely increases our motivation to not let any of our produce spoil in the fridge.
  • Cash is king here. While there are a few places we’ve found where we can use our credit card, we mostly operate in cash (much to Adam’s chagrin). We had a number of large payments to make right when we got here (rent, security deposit, etc.) so Adam was taking daily walks to the nearest ATM to withdraw cash. Adam has joked that these 30 minute walks are his exercise routine for now. Unfortunately, we’ve learned that it is very common here for ATMs to be out of cash so sometimes Adam gets to turn his 30 minute walk into a 45 minute walk to hit the next ATM.

Thanks for taking the time to read through these musings!

– Selina (and Adam too!)

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Lunch is Ready!

France is known around the world for its food culture. The classic French dining experience involves many courses spanning several hours spent around the table. The French value high quality food which means knowing where your food is coming from. At supermarkets in France, it is required by law to list the country of origin for all produce. Better yet, buying from an open-air market (think farmer’s market) you are guaranteed to find locally sourced produce, meats, cheeses and breads. Where we live in Albertville, which has a population of less than 20,000, there are three open-air markets each week which operate year-round. To give you a little peak into the French view of food, I wanted to share a picture of the monthly menu for Mia’s school.

You’ll notice a lot of different colors on the menu. Here is what they signify:

  1. Red – These products come from Savoie which is the department Albertville is located in. These are the products sourced closest to home.
  2. Blue – These products come from the Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes region where Albertville is located. This is a much larger area than the department of Savoie.
  3. Green – These are organic products.
  4. Yellow Highlights – These signify an AOC (Appellation d’Origine Contrôlée) product. This label identifies an agricultural product whose production and processing are carried out in a defined geographical area, the terroir, and which use recognized and traditional know-how. For example, if you buy a Dijon mustard with an AOC sticker, this means it was produced in the town of Dijon in Burgandy, France. These stickers are very important here in France, especially when it comes to wine and cheese which are specially produced in different regions of France.

Lunch at Mia’s school is even served in courses, usually with the main course served first, followed by a cheese and then a dessert. What a difference from the cafeteria food and experience that I grew up with!

Bon appétit!

-Adam

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WAM Park

The day exams ended, myself and a few other guys went to a nearby WAM Park to celebrate. The WAM Park is an outdoor waterpark of sorts offering téléski (a cable system which pulls you around the lake so that you can ski or wakeboard, water jumps (think big water slides with ramps at the end), paddle boards, scuba diving, an obstacle course, huge rafts to relax on, a rock wall (over the lake) and even floating cabins you can stay in over night. We chose to do the water jumps and the obstacle course.

– Adam

In this picture you can see the water jumps as well as the obstacle course in the background.
This video gives you a quick panning view of the park. It was seriously cool!
In this video you can see the water jumps being used. At the end of our hour playing on these, I was reminded I am not as young as I think I am!