Voting in Senegal

So a few of you may remember that I posted this a week or so ago on FB:

Sorry all - I guess I lied! What's the punishment for lying on Facebook?

For all my best intentions, I ended up leaving my voting materials peacefully resting on my bed while I trudged across town to the post office. Luckily, the trip was not completely wasted - I still got to visit my old MSID program directors since the West African Research Center (WARC) was close by!

And so, today, I went to REALLY submit my ballot. All in all, this seems to be the better solution. The Embassy hosted a Absentee Voting / Oktoberfest party at their private sports field (Ebbet's Field - who's Ebbet?) in town. This meant that I could entrust them to get my ballot to Hennepin County by election day rather than putting the fate of this election ('cause yes, I believe that my vote WILL make a difference) in the hands of the Senegalese postal service.

... and given that I sent some passport documents through the Austrian post back in summer 2009 that still have yet to arrive....

Unfortunately though, I figured that I would just have to settle for only a .jpg "I voted" sticker - one of my favorite parts of election day. Ah well. Guess sometimes you can't have everything...

And so we headed off to Ebbet's Field. This is the Embassy's version of election day:

Proud to have submitted my ballot! Wishing it well on it's journey across the ocean!

My cool new "I voted" sticker.

Family photo of Tostan-ers (me and Kyrra on the L, Meagan and Ashley on R) under the massive American flag tent. GO USA!

The grass was just like in the states! Perfect for lounging on and listening to music. Can't imagine though the  amount of water it takes to maintain it...

I now believe that the way to increase voter turn-out is to welcome everyone with a concert, movie night (the Avengers was showing on a blow-up screen!), and BBQ/burgers.