I was asked to share with you some of my personal experience in The Gambia where I will intern for the World Food Programme in the upcoming 6 months, starting as of September 10th. Since this is my first blog I will keep the story short n sweet as there is not much 'adventorous' information to be told, yet, except on some sort of 'adventurous' experience in my hometown during the preparations.
I am currently in Belgrade enjoying the last week of intensive sunshine and few days off full of swimming, sports, going out and just switching the mind off. However, thoughts of The Gambia are becoming more and more present especially as some things still have to be arranged. Tried to get my last vaccine against rabies yesterday but nowhere in this city I could find one!?! Doctors look at me as if I fell from Mars with my 'stunning' demands to get the third preventive injection and this in a country where entire herds of straying dogs characterize suburban and rural streets (dead or alive) and where rabies is not an uncommon phenomenon according to the WHO. So the third one will have to wait for Maastricht. Yes, countries in transition have currently other priorities, but summertime here is absolutely unbeatable.
If you wonder where and what Gambia is, well for now it suffices to say that it is one of the tiniest African countries, both in terms of territory and population size, situated on the continent's west coast, swallowed by Senegal and facing the increasingly fish poor waters of the eastern Atlantic. The World Food Programme briefly summarizes The Gambia's international status as "a least developed and low-income, food-deficit country with a predominantly subsistence agrarian economy. It is ranked 155th out of 177 countries in the 2006 United Nations Human Development Index with 69 percent of the population living below the poverty line" and almost 30 percent of the population being undernourished. Hmm... sounds like a perfect recipe for social tension and some conflict... However, on the other side it is perceived by many as a stable and well-governed democracy in the region with tourism playing an important role for the country's economy. Still, when I read the news of journalists being recently interdicted I can not but ask myself to what extent the country is really in the condition of 'sustainable peace'. I guess this observation will be subject to a better judgment once I will be in the field and wen I will get a better feeling of the situation in the country. I am absolutely looking forward to meet some The Gambians at the 'smiling coast' of Western Africa. Heard already many good things about the country and its people. But for now, time to get out of the internet cafe and enjoy some Balkan sunshine. See you!