We spent our first day on Goree Island and then drove around Dakar, what a frightening experience! Diesel buses, goats, horses and taxi cabs all compete for the road. Somehow you just force your way through the commotion.

We met with the U.S. ambassador, then visited with Oumar Dia's childhood classmate Jibi Gaye, we met Sekou's brother who volunteered to drive us to the village, and we hooked up with Ted Lawrence a Peace Corps volunteer living and working in a West African village for two years.

Ted Lawrence with Bill Masure surrounded by children

Very early the next day we all packed up a four-wheel drive and left the coast for Oumar Dia's village Diorbivol. No air conditioning, 120 degrees, and a view out the window of a world so unfamiliar to anything I had ever seen or smelled!!! Diesel, garbage, human waste and human remains, mixed with the hot air.