A Week in My World - Day 2

Sunday, February 12, 2012

Mornings have never been easy for me to accept, and getting out of bed is often quite the feat. Luckily I have a dog with a bladder smaller than mine (between the two of us we’re up at least once a night, plus out of bed fairly early in the morning) so I was out of bed a little after 7. It was a cold morning again, cloudy and dreary, so I grabbed my blanket and my Nook, wrapped up in my lounge chair, and spent a good hour reading and dozing. Eventually hunger won over my curiosity of how England’s Cousins’ War would end (not that I didn’t already know) and it was time to make oatmeal for breakfast.

I managed to keep the minions out till almost 9 but these days I’ve come to graciously accept when I’ve lost the battle and have to let them in. While opening my door I took the opportunity to go greet my family, then came back to finish morning chores: washing dishes, sweeping my yard and house, getting ready for the day. Normally that takes a few hours as it is, but after the ridiculous wind storms we’d had the past week during my absence, my house was filthy with everything covered in a more-than-fine layer of dust. Which meant I had to wash/sweep/shake out everything. Luckily I have a host of kids more than willing to help! They don’t actually go in my house but they do what they can to help me outside, in between playing with the balls, playing with Moose, and staring at me while I do fascinating things like wash my dishes (somehow it never gets old). 

Sidiki with his littlest sister, Mamine.

Alima even helped me repair a rip in one of my skirts by holding the fabric taut for me. It was a much more successful attempt than many months ago when her younger brother Yaya tried to help me do the same thing: with Alima I only sewed the skirt layers together once! Sidiki’s mom came over to tie her new baby (about a month old) onto Sidiki’s back: at 10 years old, he’s spent about half of his life old enough to carry around younger siblings (he has 5 younger siblings and many younger cousins). 

The morning came and went with chores, and I kicked the kids out for lunch and an hour and a half of rest. Alima had insisted that my floors needed scrubbing, and Allah forbid I defy her 12-year-old forcefulness, so I soon found myself on the floor with an old rag, scrubbing on my hands and knees. My Aunt Mel would be so proud! After the floor was finished we washed the doors, followed by the ɲεgεn floors and doors. Alima did at least twice as much work as I did, but I’m willing to bet my arms were at least twice as sore as hers. Luckily I have long since come to terms with being weaker than she is. By the time we finished we were out of water, so Alima took off on my bike to go to the pump so I could take a quick bath and make my way to the CSCOM to visit my people there before dark. The day went by so fast! Somehow that never fails to happen, despite the lack of meetings, deadlines, due dates, appointments, and cross-town errands. It’s awesome.

Neighbor kids playing.

My dad called me for his weekly hour-long chat, and as usual, Skype cut us off at the hour mark. Alima had sat and listened to about 45 minutes of our English conversation, and while I was waiting for him to call me back she was able to confirm with me that I’d told him about our cleaning adventure. I personally have to force myself to pay attention to other people’s Bambara conversations, a language I sort of understand, and here a 12-year old girl with absolutely no formal education (she’s never been to school) listened to almost an hour of a language she doesn’t know at all and picked up on a conversation tidbit. She is so smart! It kills me that she doesn’t go to school – not that the Malian education system has much to offer (I could rant about it for days, and I’m only marginally familiar with it), nor does her life path offer her many choices, but I feel like she at least deserves the opportunity. Life is so unfair sometimes.

Amadou and Sidiki

Surprisingly only a few kids came to my house tonight. I had extra cabbage stew so I let them all try some, and they all proclaimed its deliciousness. Normally I’d agree with them (it’s one thing I make that I really like!) but sadly this was not my best effort. Sigh. It was nice to hang out with just a few of my faves for the night, and before they left, I promised Sidiki and Amadou I would go to their house tomorrow morning to see a photo of their grandfather, also named Sidiki, who recently died.

After they left, I decided to enjoy the pleasant evening a bit longer and took my book outside to read. I was on my stomach on a mat when I finally registered that I was hearing a weird noise; after thinking about it for a moment, I decided it almost sounded like rain. But that wouldn’t make sense, rainy season ended in October. But wait – it WAS raining! Whoa! I haven’t felt rain in over 4 months!! It only lasted a few minutes, and was just a few sprinkles, but it was exciting. The mango rains are coming!!

A Week In My World - Day 1

A week in my world, starting with the day I finally returned to village after 3 weeks away, and 2 months of only scattered presence in my village.

Saturday, February 11, 2012

Today ended my 4-day visit to Chrissy’s village, which followed a series of travels to Bamako for some special Peace Corps opportunities that included an international health conference in the capital, and the chance to join a team of Malian doctors and a CDC worker in the south of Mali to do surveys for people with symptoms of lymphatic filariasis: my favorite parasitic worm disease (it’s fascinating, I swear!).

We left around 11:30am and headed down the brusse (bush) paths that lead to Jim’s village, Zana. These paths were a bit more difficult than the ones from the main road to Chrissy’s vill but still pretty good. Brusse paths tend to be anywhere from 5 feet wide (big enough for a donkey cart) to just a small bike trail. Although paths split off a lot, many of them were made during Rainy Seasons to skirt around small areas of flooding, and they often rejoin with the main path a short way away. Chrissy tried to give me reverse directions in case I should ever go alone to her vill from Jim’s. 

Baobab Tree

She said when she first moved to her village another PCV friend of ours came to visit and said she would learn to tell direction using baobab trees. He was right! Chrissy’s directions follow something like this: “You’ll follow this path for a long time and eventually it will want to split off, but if you remember to follow the bushes you’ll be fine. The path splits right after the huge baobab tree that is only half a tree now. After the split, keep following the path and keep an eye out for these landmarks: you’ll go under the double tree and a little while later you’ll pass by the only palm tree in the area. It should be on your left. Keep riding and look out for the baobab tree; it’s the only one on this side of my village, but if you look to the right you’ll see another one. Keep riding and soon you should be able to see the school, and then you know you’re on the outskirts of my vill.”

That’s how we do directions in brusse. :D

It’s really cool for me to see other PCV’s villages. Like Chrissy’s, Jim’s vill is way off in brusse and very different from mine, but it’s also very different from Chrissy’s, despite their close proximity. Chrissy and I rode alongside the fields into the edge of town, past the ditch where Jim is building a bridge so his community can get to market during Rainy Season, and into Jim’s concession. His dugutigi (village chief), homologue (Malian counterpart), and jatigi (host family) are all the same man, which is pretty unique for a PCV. Jim’s house is also unique: he lives within the family’s concession, but the way his house is situated he basically has his own concession at the same time. His family is small (very different than Chrissy’s) and he has a lot of privacy (very different from me!). We spent a very pleasant 3 hours at Jim’s house, eating lunch and laying around on the ground chatting. That’s one of the nice things about Peace Corps: you don’t have things like television and Sporcle to fill up the time so you’re kind of forced to have actual conversations!

Eventually it was time for us to leave. Chrissy rode back to her village and Jim and I headed out in the opposite direction to try and get me home. He’s been to my vill before but his homologue had told him about a shorter, more direct brusse path that we wanted to try and find. Unfortunately, the route wasn’t nearly as simple as Jim’s homologue’s directions seemed, and the path wasn’t nearly as nice. Several times my bike came to a stop in the sand and I had to get off to push a few feet before it was solid enough to get going again. It was a frustrating ride at times.

Brusse.

At one point we came to a big fork in the road. Jim, who was in the lead, stopped and turned to me and said, “What do you think?” Oh boy. Asking me for directions is rarely a good idea, and this was my first time here, in the middle of this particular nowhere, after all! We blindly chose a direction – it was the wrong one, of course, but luckily a few minutes down the road we passed a lone house and Jim happened to know the owner, so after stumbling over my Malian name (of course!), which Jim and I both repeated twice each, the man gave us directions and we turned around to go back and take the other fork. That was the only major path division; the rest of the way was “fairly” straightforward and we passed a few villages and field workers who pointed us in the right direction. However, lots of little paths kept turning off, and I didn’t envy Jim trying to find his way home again soon!

As we entered the edge of my village I started to feel just a tiny bit nervous, especially because the people we passed greeted us without using my name – was I gone so long they’d forgotten me?! But we’d come through the side of town I rarely visit, and I’m sure the site of two toubabs threw people off balance. Because as soon as we entered my own territory it was clear that I hadn’t been forgotten! I swear, the kids in my neighborhood have some sort of secret communication; we’d barely reached my house when everyone came running over! I was turning a million directions all at once, trying to listen to everyone as they raced to share their news first.

He's so big!

Apparently the lock on my concession door had broken awhile back and the kids had been climbing the walls in order to bring Moose food. I’m so thankful for their dedication! So one of my brothers climbed over to let us in and Moose came running out. He’s so HUGE!! I knew he would get bigger while I was gone, but I still couldn’t believe just how big he is. He jumped all over the place, so excited, and I was so excited to find I can still pick him up like a child by grabbing him under his “armpits” and swinging him up (an event Mailans find hilarious) – but I won’t be able to do that for much longer. It was pretty evident just how he’s gotten so big: a HUGE pile of toh was sitting in Moose’s bowl. They certainly took good care of him!

The kids were really excited to see me again and everyone helped me take my things inside. They were also really excited to see Jim, whom they’ve met twice before but not seen for about 6 months. Jim’s last name is Coulibaly, just like at least 50% of my village, so he’s a particularly awesome toubab in their eyes. Jim hung out for a little while and my brothers insisted on getting their photo taken with him, but the day was ending quickly and he needed to find his way home before dark, so he soon took off. I’m so impressed he made it home, and in good timing!

Jim with Shina

Jim with Sinali

One of my older host sisters had been away and delivered her baby, and now she was back with her 37-day old daughter, Worokia, a Christmas Baby. :) I fawned over her for awhile, and of course was peed on, which, as you’ll remember, is considered to be good luck for me (duh). My host fam’s puppy Koniakunte (Konia for short) has also gotten really big and he and Moose are so funny together, wrestling around while the puppy’s mom watches over them carefully. 

Konia and Moose

I went to Djeneba’s house to greet her family, then came home and let the kids stay until dark when I told them I’d see them in the morning - they were surprisingly agreeable to not coming over for the night. I was exhausted and passed out next to Moose by 9pm – it was an awesome homecoming indeed!

Letter to My Friends

Hello Friends!

It's extremely bittersweet for me to return to this blog, 4 months after my last post and the unexpected end to my Peace Corps Service. I've spent most of the last 4 months traveling both internationally and within America and it's been wonderful to see so many loved ones and places. 

Now that I'm a bit settled down again, I'd like to finally post the blogs I wrote back in February. And once I've finished with that, I do want to explain what happened in Mali, why we were evacuated, and what's happening now.

Thanks for reading, and I hope you enjoy hearing a bit more about how I lived my day-to-day life in my village shortly before I left. That's a question I'm asked a lot, so hopefully this will give you a better idea of Michelle in Mali!

Much Love,

Michelle

The End of Michelle in Mali

It is with great sadness that I find myself having to tell you all that I am no longer a Peace Corps Volunteer. Instead, I am a Returned Peace Corps Volunteer (RPCV), meaning I have officially completed my Peace Corps service.

As many of you know, Mali experienced a coup d'état about 3 weeks ago - a mere 5 weeks before the next democratic presidential elections were to have occurred. I have a lot to say about this coup, and I hope to write a future post about it, but right now I'll just say that due to the political instability caused by the coup, and the instability in the north of Mali which was enabled by the coup, Peace Corps Mali evacuated the country last Sunday, after 41 years of uninterrupted service. It is an extremely sad time for all of us.

This blog post is for 3 purposes:

1. To let you all know that I am safe.

2. To let you know I am no longer a PCV in Mali.

3. To let you know that this blog isn't finished!! I had a bunch of blogs ready to go when the coup happened - I just hadn't had time to post them yet. I still have some of my story to share. I will post these blogs in the next few weeks once I'm back on my feet somewhere, and I'll also write a little bit about the coup d'état and what's been happening in my life since then. 

Thanks so much for sticking with me and I hope to see you back here over the next few weeks!

Love,

Michelle

Books I've Read in Mali

Certainly not my most interesting post, but since I do so much reading here (catching up on the past 9 years!!) I thought I'd post a list...just in case anyone's interested. (It's totally ok if you're not at all interested).

*Titles in green are about Mali/Africa.

*Titles in blue I think are absolute MUST reads. There won't be many. Not that I don't like the rest, but a few really stick out as everyone should really read them.

Nine Hills to Nambonkaha

Monique and the Mango Rains

Segu

Sons and Lovers

On the Road

Dharma Bums

Don’t Let’s Go to the Dogs Tonight

The Wonderful Wizard of Oz

The Marvelous Land of Oz

Icy Sparks

The Woggle-Bug Book

Ozma of Oz

Chicken Soup for the Volunteer’s Soul

Strength in What Remains

The Last American Man

Sundiata: An Epic of Old Mali

Hannah’s Dream

Dorothy and the Wizard in Oz

Without Buddha I Could Not Be a Christian

Dancing Skeletons

The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants

The Second Summer of the Sisterhood

Girls in Pants

Twilight

New Moons

The Mermaid Chair

The Road to Oz

Sisterhood Everlasting

Eclipse

The Namesake

The Emerald City of Oz

Three Cups of Tea

The Patchwork Girl of Oz

Mango Elephants in the Sun

Breaking Dawn

The Cruelest Journey

The Short Second Life of Bree Tanner

The Wives of Henry Oades

A Life Inspired
The Heart of the Matter

The Count of Monte Cristo

Tik Tok of Oz

The Last Summer (Of You and Me)

Water for Elephants

The Pact

Fool

When Rain Clouds Gather

Love in the Present Tense

Around the World in 80 Days

Coco Chanel and Igor Stravinsky

Song of Solomon

The Scarecrow of Oz

Great Tales and Poems of Edgar Allan Poe

Heaven is for Real

The Three Musketeers

Snow Falling on Cedars

Angela’s Ashes

The Lost Princess of Oz

Glinda of Oz

The Help

Lucky

Vanishing Acts

Into Thin Air

The Blonde Theory

Second Glance

20,000 Leagues Under the Sea

Bridget Jones’ Diary

The Red Tent

The Road

The Magic of Oz

Live, Life, and a Polar Bear Tattoo

The Lady of the Rivers

The Thirteen Clocks

The Women of the Cousins’ War

The Tin Woodman of Oz

Keeping Faith

The Adventures of Tom Sawyer

The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo

Have a Little Faith

Atonement

Chicken Soup for the Soul: Devotional Stories for Women

Say You’re One of Them (also about Africa)

The Girl Who Played with Fire

The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest

We Are All the Same (also about Africa)

The Hunger Games

Catching Fire

Mockingjay
Born to Run

Christmas in Mali - The End

Although we couldn’t believe our trip was coming to an end, when we woke up on the 26^th, all of the big events had come and passed and we were ready to get going. We tied our bundles on our backs and set out to go back down the incline into village, through the town and out again, past the gardens and stretches of sand, and finally to the base of the steep climb up through the pass – what would undoubtedly be the hardest hike yet.

Rather than Christmas music, we decided to go with “get up and go!” music that would keep our spirits up and our legs climbing – starting with the theme song to Rocky: “Eye of the Tiger.” We made good time, but even so we were still overtaken and passed by a man and a woman, the woman climbing in flip-flops, a fancy, not-so-flexible Malian wrap skirt and long sleeve shirt, and with a baby tied on her back. It’s ok, our egos were long gone by this time. We even asked her to take a picture with us! Definitely one of my favorite photos from the trip.

Wooden ladder in the pass

We made it across the wooden ladder, through the uphill pass, walked back along the bridge, and had almost made it through the Wasteland when the Black Eyed Peas’ “I Gotta Feeling” came on the iPod. Well come on, you can’t not dance to that song!! So we stopped right where we were and had a mini-break in the form of a dance party. Ibrahim shook his head at us and commented, “I always get the crazy tourists” and then grabbed Michaela’s camera out of her pocket so he could capture the moment.

Dourou, where we’d left our bags, wasn’t much farther away, and soon we arrived, amidst the usual chorus of Ça va le bonbon?? (This village was particularly bad about that). I couldn’t believe it was over already – and yet finally! My feet were killing me. My shoulders probably would’ve fallen off if I’d carried my bag those last 2 days. We’d walked 44km (a little over 27 miles) in 4 days and celebrated the most unusual Christmas holidays I’d ever experienced.

A wonderful trip!!!

Christmas Day!!!

I can tell you, I’ve never had a Christmas Day quite like this one before. Instead of the usual Christmas Craziness at my houses, I hiked 7 ½ miles across the middle of nowhere in Mali. Talk about making memories!

It was a really nice morning. We woke up in our MegaBed and wished each other a Merry Christmas! and then did our Secret Santa gift exchange that we’d planned back at Thanksgiving. We’d hauled our presents for each other throughout the hike for this moment and it was totally worth it. (Not surprisingly, I’d lost one of Christina’s presents back in San – I’d hidden it somewhere in the house when she arrived, forgot where I hid it, and found it over a month later in the freezer). My presents were whiskey and chocolate. Chrissy’s were butter and fireworks. I’d say we all know each other pretty well, and did a damn good job buying for each other on a small budget and limited options! :D

Merry Christmas!

At breakfast, we celebrated with hot chocolate (real, Amεriki hot chocolate!) that Christina had brought, and cookies that she and Michaela had picked up at the toubab store in Bamako. Michaela’s mom had sent her sparkly snowflake garland, so we decorated our Santa hats – even Ibrahim’s! We also decided that as a Christmas present from us to ourselves, we were going to hire porters to carry our bags for the day. Also an excellent gift. So we loaded up all the important things (cameras, iPods, my speakers, etc) in my small, drawstring backpack and headed out to explore the village of Begnetouro.

The Escarpment

Ibrahim took us out to the edge of the village where we again walked across the Moon for awhile before coming to the edge of the escarpment cliff. We could look down the horizon and see the Bandiagara Escarpment as far as the eye could see. Always my father’s daughter, I made to climb up an incline to a raised spot on the very edge of the cliff, and was quickly scolded by everyone else in the group, including Ibrahim. Apparently it was too windy and I was being stupid. (Sorry, Mama. Proud, Daddy? :D) Totally worth the view, though.

We hung out for awhile and enjoyed the view and the breeze. Then we headed back the way we came. About 5 minutes later, I suddenly realized for the first time in 3 days I was carrying…nothing. Not even the small bag we’d all shared. Uh oh. I’d left the bag with all of our electronics on the Moon. Crap. Apparently I’d taken the bag off to take this picture, and to try and show off the back of the awesome Christmas shirt my besties in Boston had sent me:

Great picture, right?

Needless to say, no one was pleased with me, and I’m sure Chrissy was (once again) regretting her role as my caretaker, so I headed back alone to find the bag, followed by the calls of my 5 moms not to run on the rocks. Luckily I found the bag right where I left it and rejoined my friends. We crossed the rest of the Moon, passed a pig, and went back into town for one last souvenir opportunity (Daddy, get excited for your Christmas 2013 gift!) before continuing out of village for the next portion of our hike, 7km to the village of Dourou.

It was a nice, easy hike, especially without our bags, and we reached Dourou fairly quickly. It was hot, though. Definitely my first hot Christmas! (But it didn’t stop us all from wearing our Santa hats!). Ibrahim had us take a nice long rest at Dourou, and we also repacked our bags. According to Ibrahim we couldn’t take our big bags with us for the next part of our hike, so we had to prioritize and consolidate what we needed for the night and the following morning. In other words, do what we should’ve done before we ever left San. At first we were going to share one backpack, but we realized it would be an even better idea for each of us to wrap what we needed for the night in a tafe (wrap skirt about 1½ meters long) and tie it to our backs like an African baby. A perfect solution!

We were able to bounce all over the place as we hiked, and the lack of heavy bags certainly made it easier on all of us, especially poor Christina, who, as I may remind you, was suffering from amoebas but still plowing on along with the rest of us. We passed some cool and different scenery: “wasteland” looking rock plains on the edge of a cliff overlooking the bush, and eventually even into some green areas. We stopped for a short break at this bridge.

The last part of the day’s hike was 5km that once again went back down the escarpment, this time on a steeper, more direct path. It took a lot of concentration (in between singing Christmas carols, of course) to pick our way, and Ibrahim’s assistance was appreciated on more than one occasion. But it was a truly awesome portion of the hike! At one point we went down a wooden ladder that had been set against the rocks, all one piece of wood with steps notched into the wood. This hike was tougher than the flat plains, and we stopped to rest often. When we finally got to the bottom, we were soo tired.

Our destination village, Nombori was so close – within eyesight – and yet seemed so far away. We passed many village gardens on the way in, and a few people but not many. That’s because they were all at the Christmas party. That’s right – Christmas party! Ibrahim had planned it so we’d be in a Christian village for Christmas Day. I kid you not, we walked straight into the village, straight over to the party (which was a huge dance circle), and without bothering to empty the sand from our shoes or even untie our packs, we joined right into the dance circle, all 5 of us with our white skin and our Santa hats bobbing along. And everyone was so excited to see us, no ulterior motives included! We were welcomed right into the fold and people clapped and cheered for us and kids grabbed our hands and danced with us. We’d gotten separated from each other in the circle so I didn’t think anything of it when I didn’t see any other toubabs, but suddenly I realized mine was the only Santa hat still bouncing along in the circle – time to go!

We made our weary way through the village, back up a fairly steep, rocky incline yet again, to the campemant where we would be spending the night. As usual, we took our turns with showers and resting while waiting for dinner, but tonight had a special addition – we got to talk to our families in Amεriki to wish each other a Merry Christmas! It was amazing that we even had cell reception – I can’t begin to describe just how remote and off-the-map I felt there in Nombori, but there I was, on the roof of the campemant, under a million stars, 5,000 miles away from the first Christmas I’d ever spent away from home, wishing my family a Merry Christmas. A Christmas Miracle indeed.