Family Meals

Senegalese families sit and eat communally around a bowl. It is also very common to have a person pass on food to the person next to them. Everyone needs to eat from their section and it is considered rude if you reach for food in someone else's section. It is best to eat what is in front of you and look at what is happening around the bowl. And if you do not like something someone gives you, you can return it to the middle of the bowl. The center of the bowl is used to place pieces of food you do not want to eat. Anyone can take from the center of the bowl. With hot peppers, one must squeeze with their spoon or their fingers to get some of the juice and mix it with rice.

DO NOT
-Put bones back in the community bowl
-Eat with your left hand directly or indirectly, even if you are left-handed, try to use the right hand
-Take food from in front of another person-you have to ask
-Mix large quantities of different ingredients, even if it is in front of you. Do it by spoonful.
-Take a large amount of food just fro yourself
-Sniff the food

The left hand is only used for the toilet, so do not eat with your left hand, even if you are using a spoon. In terms of religion, if someone eats with his or her left hand, they are said to be in control of Satan.

I have noticed a lack of variety in their diet choices. The Senegalese eat rice everyday with little to no vegetables. Their diet is made up mostly of carbohydrates (i.e. rice). All the dishes in Senegal have rice. Rice is the main food in Senegal. It seems to me that you JUST cannot get away from eating rice EVERYDAY. Although they eat fish (good source of lean protein), vegetables and fruits are scarce in their diet. One might have a fruit at least twice in a month if one is lucky. This brings me back to my Nutrition class where I learned the difference between the poor and the rich in terms of having access to food. A wealthier person is more able to provide himself and his family with more food containing more nutrients than a poor person. The general assumption is that the more money you have, the more food you can purchase. But I have also come to conclude that does not necessarily mean that you are buying nutritious foods. Some of the underlying factors that may play a role in having/not having access to nutritious foods may be the individuals' socioeconomic status, the price of food or their education among other things.

I also assume that the more educated a person is, the more knowledgeable they would be about daily nutrients consumption to have a balanced diet. Futhermore, if more people in the family work, the more money they would have to purchase vegetables. However, if no one is working in the family, it is highly probable that theu would not have a varied diet and would not be consuming the necessary nutrients/vitamins. The same ordeal goes for people who are uneducated in which it would make them less likely to spend money on buying vegetables because they might not think it is important. This situation is complicated and requires some thought as I go through my experience. I am being trained in Behavior Change and the determinants of Behaviors that would help me assess why people do/not do a certain behavior (i.e. washing their hands or not using mosquito nets). It can also go both ways where the educated person may not understand the importance of consuming nutritious foods or the nutritious foods are more expensive than the staple food (rice or millet). Therefore, in this case, only aselct few would have access to nutritious foods. Overall, the gap between who does/does not have access to a balanced diet is palpable in Senegal.

For example, I tossed a piece of carrot to my cousins and sisters around the bowl throughout my stay, and they tossed it back to the middle of the bowl. From my observations, I think that my family is well -off and all of them have been to school. This comes to show that although one may be educated, they may not understand the importance of having a balanced diet or probably have never been taught by their elders, or in their communities of the benefits of nutritious meals. As I pointed out earleir, those types of food may be too expensive in the marketplace.

The same concept applies for washing hands between each meals. Typically my family washes their hands without soap. This can exacerbate unwanted infections, malaria among other outcomes. There may be other confounding factors or determinants of behavior that may contribute for their behavior such as not washing their hands with soap.  This was very interesting to see once I got to my training site after our training on Behavior Change.  Although I am not coming with the idea of changing the system. The Senegalese can still eat meals with their hands which by the way has been a very difficult task for me so far. I just think that I would want to introduce the idea of using soap throughout my service. Inshallah (If it is God's will).