Dear Everyone,

Greetings from Senegal! This message might not be that long because they use funny French keyboards here where the letters are all switched around which makes it hard to type. But I wanted to say hello to you all :) At the moment, I am in Dakar, staying with the family who I lived with when I studied abroad here two years ago: my host mom and dad, 6 of their children, the oldest son's wife and her child, my host father's older sister, her son (the two of them are just visiting for the month), and a cousin who has lived with the family since his father died when he was young. It's almost impossible to spend a moment alone.

I have arrived in the middle of what feels like the hottest part of the year of Senegal. By the end of the day my skin is invariably covered with a thin layer of sweat that dries, collects dust and sticks to my clothing. It is also the middle of Ramadan, which means that most practicing Muslims (Senegal is around 95% Muslim) fast from sunrise to sunset. This means eating nothing, and drinking nothing. Not even water. My host mother actually fasted for five months this year before the start of Ramadan to make up for all the Ramadans when she didn't fast because she was pregnant. I have tried semi-fasting for a few days which means that I have been a wimp and had water to drink but didn't eat. Today I'm doing full fast and there's just a few minutes left till we can drink! My mouth feels like a desert!

During my stay, I've visited two organizations that GFW has funded recently. Yesterday I met with Reseau Siggil Jigeen, a network organization of 18 women's organizations in Senegal. At the moment, they are working on training their members in lobbying, advocacy and building communications capacity. They are also lobbying to change the parts of Senegal's Family Law that discriminate against women (for example, the government taxes women who work in the formal sector more than men because a woman is not considered to be responsible for her family's upkeep and while a women might get medical coverage from her employer, it does not cover her children or her husband because it is assumed that a husband will take care of his family's needs).

Today I visited an organization that works on the issue of violence against women in Senegal. They have offices in different regions of the country where women who have experienced violence (usually domestic violence) can come for legal advice, mediation, and are put in contact with organizations, lawyers, and government agencies that can assist them. (A law prohibiting domestic violence, along with forced marriage and female genital cutting, was passed in 1999). There are currently no women's shelters in Senegal and so in extreme cases women who work for the organization take women who want to leave their husbands into their own homes until they can find a place to stay. There's such a lack of resources for vulnerable women.

I'm going to end here because it's almost time to eat but I miss you all and I'll see you soon. I'll be back in the office on Monday!

Love,
Marlene

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