Musser Party of Five

Bonjour Amis et famille! We hope you are all doing well.  We did not post an update last week because we were on our way back from a restful staff retreat to Saly, a coastal resort town about an hour south of Dakar.  The kids stayed back with friends, so Lindsay and I were blessed with some time just the two of us to rest and have fellowship with other DA staff.  We had a pool and the beach was a short walk away.  It is a popular destination and many people from France own houses there.  We unfortunately did not take many pictures (too busy relaxing I guess), but here are a few: A view from the beach. There were also a few monitor lizards that made their home at the resort. Our villa It was a great weekend away from Dakar, connecting with co-workers & friends, and preparing for "Spiritual Emphasis Week" at DA. Spiritual Emphasis Week is a week where a speaker from the US is invited to come t...

Bonjour!  I hope this posting finds you safe and dry following hurricane Florence.  We must apologize for that!  If you look at the map of its path, you will see that it started just off the coast of Senegal.  I (Tim) became a bit of a weather geek tracking Florence.  I think how it works is that storms work their way across Africa and sometimes turn into tropical depressions when they hit the Atlantic.  It has inspired some funny facebook postings like this one: In talking to friends and family, we were reminded of how quickly an event like Hurricane Florence can disrupt our lives and our sense of being in control.  That is something that, we too, have come up against A LOT since being in Senegal.  We frequently deal with power outages at school and at home.  Internet works most of the time at both places, but isn't as reliable as what we were used to.  I find myself often trying to enter grades or plan my lessons on Google Docs,...

Our Fruit Guy and a trip to the beach! Bonjour amis et famille! We hope this post finds you doing well!  This week, we have finally gotten some rain.  Unfortunately, the streets of Dakar are not well equipped for drainage, so when it does rain, there tends to be some flooding.  It does make for an adventurous walk to school as the roads near our house flood a bit, so you have to strategically choose which sidewalk on which side of the street carefully or you may find yourself with no way to go but in deep water!  This is a funny post that has been going around on FB around here from a local restaurant called Willy's: Now, some places in Dakar do flood like this most times when it rains, but not really near where we live.  I had to be at school early Friday morning for a staff meeting and had to run there in the rain.  I was pretty wet when I arrived, but dried pretty quickly once I got into my air conditioned classroom. Let me introduce you...

Hello family and friends! We are beginning to get in a routine here.  One of the biggest challenges we have faced is grocery shopping for 5 (without a car) and dinner planning.  We have 3 small grocery stores in our neighborhood, 2 within pretty close walking distance, and the other is almost a mile away.  Each has things we like, so we tend to hit them all during the week.  There is a larger store in the city, but it is a drive from where we live and I can't check out a car yet, so we rely on friends to take us when they are going.  It is kind of like a 3 story Super Walmart or Target, where we can do all our grocery shopping.  This may sound boring to you, but it has been a struggle to figure out the most efficient way to do it in a country where there isn't much efficiency.  We are definitely learning patience here...nothing happens quickly! One thing we are thankful for is rain!  We are in the rainy season, but there hasn't been much ra...