I’ve spent the last 3 weeks traveling around Mali, and it’s been amazing!
Following my last posting, my friend Audra and I took the train back to my site where she spent a few days helping me get used to village again and then returned to her village over in the Sikasso region. I had decided to spend 9 straight weeks at site, only leaving to go to market in Bafoulabé every 10 days or so, and the plan was to use that time for a series of educational meetings. I wanted to do one session a week with two separate groups for the men and women in Dramétou, and after a couple weeks of preparation and delays my two homologues, Sané Kanté and Modibo Dembélé, and I started meeting with members of my village. Due to multiple delays the women’s group was much more successful than the men’s and they even expressed interest in continuing to meet while I was gone. Despite my still limited language skills I feel that I can count the “formations” as a success, and I hope that the things that we talked about during the sessions (mostly diarrhea prevention) will act as a catalyst for community initiated development. Inchallah!
Since I was only doing the sessions weekly I also had a lot of time for other things. I’ve been experimenting a lot baking without an oven (there’s a lot of flipping involved as well as messing around with lids and temperatures - basically I have to stand there the whole time so it’s really hot work, especially now during the hot season…), and I’ve even used my solar oven successfully once with hopes for a repeat not yet achieved. I also planted a garden, which promptly got attacked by chickens and mice, decimating my tomato and carrot sprouts (damn!). Fortunately my moringa survived and has inspired quite a bit of interest amongst friends and acquaintances – hopefully that interest will expand beyond just amazement that the Ameriki muso can actually grow something! I also managed to get my house reroofed and new doors put on my hut. All in all I feel like a lot got accomplished in those nine weeks, especially considering the pace of Mali that I’m still getting used to!
At the end of those nine weeks I said good bye to my village for a while and headed down to Manantali to celebrate Jewish Passover with a few friends. Jake Asher, the volunteer from my training class that lives closest to me put together a truly impressive celebration. After some time there, all of us headed for Bamako, with Jake planning to get off in his village along the way, and we left the house at 5:45 on Easter morning. After getting to the bus station we all loaded our bags onto the top of the bus (next to the ram that was also tied up there) and then waited for our names to be called so that we could board and pick out our seats….and waited….and waited. About 3 ½ hours later we finally left and arrived in Bamako about 9 hours later, and my seat mate got peed on by the sheep directly above his window a whopping 4 times. 10 points for Malian transport!
I spent one night in Bamako loading up on food that’s not couscous, rice, or nyelenkino (I have no idea what it would be called in English – sorry kids), and then was able to take Peace Corps transport out towards my friend Gemma’s village. We rode bike’s the 6km from the paved road out to her village, and I, in my infinite grace, wiped out in a sand pit on the way and barked up my arm pretty well. Fortunately (or unfortunately, depending on your perspective and level of self-consciousness) we were just on the outskirts of Kouro, so I was able to clean myself up right away and then spend the next few days hanging out with Gemma and her friends in village before we headed back towards Bamako on our way to our friend Kira’s site of Faragouran. We were also there for a couple days, in which we watched a couple soccer games, I was able to do a little bit of technical exchange thanks to her current soak pit, wash area, and potable water project, and also got to spend more time catching up. The three of us headed back into Bougani together, with Kira going directly back to her village, Gemma staying the night with me at our friend Jacqueline’s before going back to Kouro, and me getting on a bus for Sikasso.
Since I recently lost my phone, my arrival in Sikasso was a little stressful. I didn’t really know where I was going, so I told the taxi driver to take me to the mission next to my friend Diane’s house and then the plan was to ask around for the ‘white woman’s house.’ Unfortunately there is more than one mission in her part of town, so the people I was asking had no idea who I was talking about. I eventually went into a payphone shop and she had to bike across town to rescue me, but everything worked out anyways. Diane and I left the next morning to go down to visit our friend Beatrice, who was doing a formation in her village. We observed her and her crew in action for a while and then headed over the nearby waterfalls, which were spectacular (if you have facebook you can check out a few of the 70 pictures that I took there…), and then headed back to Sikasso to help one of the new volunteer transfers from Madagascar settle into to her new house there. The next day I hit the road again and went up to Koutiala, where I waited for my friend Audra to get back from a visit with her boyfriend and spent the afternoon with another volunteer, Maridee, at the house there. Audra and I then went to her village for a day before returning to Koutiala, where I finally had a completely relaxing day of no travel and no technical exchange. After that I was on the road again, this time up into the Segou region. I had to transfer in the city of San, but I went all the way to my friend Alaric’s site that day, including a10km bike ride. After a couple days there I got back on the road, and after a short night in Bamako I was back on the road on my way to Kita.
In Kita I was able to see a bunch of my friends, because we were doing a 2 day IST that went fairly well, and now I’m finally getting ready to go back to village. Yay! I have had a really busy, but really great time seeing new parts of the country and catching up with friends, but I truly miss my friends in village, and am looking forward to some down time as well as starting some new work ideas that developed over my 3+ weeks away. Dramétou here I come!