whatever they say, keep your day job, don't give it away...
I’m fully embracing my new life as a coastal gal in The Gambia! Hanging out at fish landing sites, learning about sea creatures, and working on sustainable management plans, has become the norm. The weather is becoming drier and hotter by the day, but luckily it is still cool at night. The rains will come in about two or three months and the temperatures will continue to increase. Although the majority of my life has been spent sweating bullets in Alabama, I still can’t say that I welcome heat and humidity at all. Mango season is emerging, as well as cashew, so I think I will just focus on that.
The past few weeks have been busy busy on the work front. I have really enjoyed getting to know my colleagues better, and meeting more fishermen! Folks from URI came for a visit, and the Ba-Nafaa Project held a Stock Assessment Biostatistics Training Course, as well as a Sole Fisheries Stock Assessment Co-Management Workshop. Both were very successful and pleasant to be a part of. I contributed a presentation of local knowledge to the workshop, but due to time constraints I didn’t do much talking as it had to be translated by a Woloof speaker!
Co-Management Workshop
Learning Graduate level Biostatistics...I was a facilitator AND a student on this one!
As I’m learning more and more about fisheries, I am also learning about what I find tasty to eat! Butterfish is my favorite at the moment. It is also easy to process and only has one large bone to pull out. I have to block out the mental image of the lips and teeth on this bad boy when I am eating it though!
I experienced the North Atlantic by boat a couple of weeks ago. It was exciting!! I must admit that I was nervous at first, but once we got a couple of miles away from shore I chilled out and it was sooo peaceful. I mapped different areas of interest with the GPS and am currently working on plugging it all into GIS.
Creating a coastal map of The Gambia
Giving Barbara some GPS training in the pool!
Cuttlefish
Red Snapper
Lil' girl
Lil' donkeys working hard, hauling freshly caught fish
Lil' shark fins
Bet ya didn't know you could bathe sheep in the ocean!
Okay, can you tell I LOVE my day job? I promise to make the next post non-workish though! My Peace Corps In-Service Training starts next week; beekeeping and mango tree grafting are on the list. Also, my living space renovations should be completed soon and I will be moving back to village- FINALLY!
