At this moment, I think I’m using my passable language skills for a purpose that not many Olmsted Scholars get to experience. Don’t get me wrong, this task involves my university here in Dakar- it’s just not a side of Université Cheikh Anta Diop that I’d expect to be dealing with. What might this endeavor be? Well….

First, let’s judge my school by its cover:

I call this one the “money shot” of all my UCAD pics. Aesthetics take on a new feel out here.

I’ve always liked this tree carcass. It nests happily in the sandy road just outside the wall of my faculté (department). I pass it all the time and think it symbolic of certain aspects of my school. Feel free to draw your own conclusions, because I don’t want to sound too mean….

Behold the entrance to my department. I think someone kinda took a bite out of the wall.This is one of the newest buildings on campus.

I know it’s not fair to judge UCAD’s exterior too harshly- especially when I was lucky enough to attend a ridiculously beautiful and more Megan-tailored university (think perpetually gloomy weather). Still, I will tell you that UCAD has many challenges that are endemic to Dakar as a whole: overpopulation (it was built for 15,000 students and has 60,000 enrolled), unpaid teachers go on strike, student riot when they don’t get their scholarships, admin support is lacking, infrastructure isn’t great….I could go on, but then I’d sound like just another over-privileged American. Which of course I am, even if I’d like to think I’m not as bad as others…

With the craziness that is my university, I have opted to undertake an independent study program that I believe will make better use of my remaining time. I made an appointment to meet with the department’s dean and inform him that I would no longer be a student (because, as my boss here says, you don’t break up with someone via SMS). So I went down there and explained to him my situation in careful terms, and then thanked them for the opportunity to enroll.

His response came in the form of a mile-a-minute delivery on his perspective of the situation. He told me that he was disappointed, but that I will always be tied to UCAD, and my grades are forever good, and that I can come back whenever. All of this front-loaded generosity was then punctuated with him saying that oh, by the way, “We still expect you to pay for the rest of the years of study that you won’t do.”

This logic was a bit mind-boggling. In my head I felt like his words had a ring of something familiar, something like: So what are you saying? When you get divorced you turn in your library card? You get a new license? You stop being Jewish?  And I felt like I wanted to tell him: Smokey, this is not ‘Nam. There are rules.

Okay, not exactly the same, but still- he is trying to shake another 6 Gs of American money out of me for a year of study that I will never do. Did I mention that students in Senegal go to university for free? That’s right, Megan the American must be nothing more than a walking ATM cash cow…

So my task this evening is to write a formal and flowerly-worded letter to the dean- because that’s the only language that native francophones know how to speak. The challenge is to maximize my command of the French language and craft a letter that not only carefully praises the dean and UCAD, but also cheerfully tells them to go and pound sand- you are not getting another red cent from me. This kind of wordsmithing is harder than you think.

The letter is currently being QC’d by a native French speaker, largely to ensure that not too much of my terse New England disposition has made it into the text. I don’t want to create any bitter feelings between me and my ex-university.

I look forward to delivering this letter to the Dean’s office at the end of the week, and I’ll be sure to quickly flee before he can open it. I have no desire to participate in a second round of “Why we’re breaking up” dialogue with him. It was a good relationship while it lasted, and I have lots of good memories- but I’m just not going to pay any further financial support as the two of us move forward separately.

P.S. The French word that we are looking for? C’est l’arnaque. See, I have been learning something here after all.