Roughing It

The picture is from my perch in our hammock where I am writing from tonight. It was about 32C here today, although gets a bit chilly at night, down to about 15C. To clarify for those in Calgary, those temperatures are all on the + side!!

Last night we had a great dinner - definitley a "foodie" place for Kim's enjoyment! She even ordered a bottle of wine (C$12). They even stored the undrank portion for tonight - surprising that we even found out they did this with Kim at the table.

Breakfast included the best mini-bagauettes every - I am in white bread heavan!! We lounged around the pool this afternoon, waiting for our 4pm appointment with Mamadou Faye in the village.

Mamadou is the local volunteer with SEM in Palmarin. There are 8 projects in Palmarin that have received loans from SEM/Kiva. Mostly in agriculture and fishing. An example is that there is a goat market there now, so other villages come to Palmarin to buy goats versus heading to a bigger village. Farther away. On the fishing side, ladies who dry fish are able to buy more fish from the fishermen and then she sells them to people who transport them as far away as Mali and Ghana.

The loans make a difference for the villagers - allowing them to do more locally and keep more people employed.

Micro Finance really seems to work. We are fortunate to have been able to see it on the frontlines.

gm