How The Name of This Blog Came To Be

This blog was created nearly a fifth of a decade ago, and I'm not sure I ever explained why it's called what it is.

Most members of my Peace Corps training class had never heard of the Gambia when they received their invitation to serve here, much less knew where it lay geographically.

I however, was well versed.

I took a class in college called the geography of conflict, and although we talked mainly about the middle eastern conflicts throughout history, my professor was from Kenya, and he thought it was important we know exactly where all the countries in Africa were. We would have pop quizzes occasionally, asking us to identify ten or so countries on the continent.

In our studying, the way I chose to remember The Gambia was this: The outline of Senegal looks like a pudgy whale, and the little wiggly insignificant bit encapsulated within it is in the perfect position to be its mouth. So, to remember the Gambia, we would always say, "It's in the whale's mouth."



So, not only did I know exactly where The Gambia was nestled geographically, but I also had a flashy catch phrase to go with it when I first got my assignment.

Thus, Abby's Adventures in the Whale's Mouth.