Breaking the fast of Ramadan on Saturday evening at the home of the Dow family

We broke the Ramadan fast again at the home of the Dow family. This is the extended family of teachers we'd visited the evening before. We spent some more time with the matriarch this time. She is funny---and does speak some English. Professor Tim Longman from BU accompanies us for the first few minutes to lend the event some additional gravitas and importance. The leaders are keen to explain our presence to people---emphasizing our scholarly interest in the extraordinarily tolerant Senegalese society.

We bring some coffee this time as well as some "swag" from our colleges. I give the matriarch a NOVA umbrella---which she loves(hopefully). This is one of those little things we teachers get as a reward for attending the week long professional development orgy that is now required for NVCC employees at the beginning of the semesters. Since it is like going to the dentist to appropriate any "swag" for endeavors like this, I often squirrel these things away for times like this. The matriarch explains that this umbrella can be used for her next trip to Mecca. She has been twice in her life, an extraordinarily expensive thing for the Senegalese. She shows a photo on the wall of her in her Hadj finery when she was much younger.

I also give the son, Babacar, some NOVA earbuds. The boy, Ousmane, gets some lollipops which result in a symphony of sound.