On September 3rd 2010 myself along with 79 other Peace Corps Trainees were sworn in as official Peace Corps Volunteers. Once we actually got to the embassy, all soaked to the bone because of the flooding rains we woke up to, the Ceremony was really nice. The ambassador spoke, along with the head of PC and then one trainee gave a speech in, in each of the different languages that are spoken across Mali-Bambara, Senufo Fufilde, Dogon, Bomu, and French. After the Ceremony, we had a great lunch at the American Club and then proceeded to celebrate and dance the night away out on the town!
Two days after swear in we then had to say our good byes, see you laters, or for some people see you at our next training because you live really far away! Moving in to site was another bitter sweet moment, I was sad to say goodbye to the friends I’ve made and just spent a great weekend with, but at the same time it is so nice to finally be in one place, a place that I can call my own for the next two years!
My first few weeks on my own at site were eventful at times, but mostly pretty boring! When I finally got all settled in the first thing I did was spray my house with bug killer and clean clean clean! While cleaning I was able to see the saying one mans trash is another man treasure come to life before my eyes! The mud brick wall around my concession fell down in all the rain, so every passer by can see my every move! I started a pile in my yard of stuff that I didn’t need or want, mostly papers, old magazines and books that were quite dirty and termite eaten and no longer legible for the most part. After one trip back into my hut one man was in my yard asking what that stuff was. I told him it was trash. He asked if he could have it, thinking he was kidding I laughed but he took it anyway. When he saw that I had another arm load he helped me take it outside and before I knew my yard was swarming with Malians! I don’t know where they all came from so quickly-but nonetheless I was able to get rid of all the stuff I didn’t want, along with a few things I did want.
Everyday or every other day I hop on my bike with my big jug and bike through the village to the pump. After pumping my arm off or if I’m lucky I can watch some kid pump their arm off, I tie my 20 liter jug to the back of my bike and start the adventure home…I say adventure because it truly is quite the escapade! I’m not sure if you have ever tried to bike with an extra 20 liters tied to your bike, but this is not a solid object! With every peddle the water sloshes from one side to the other throwing off any bit of balance one might have. After having my bike tip over, the water jug fall off, the rubber band break, and gathering an audience of laughing Malian (none offering their help mind you…) I decided I’m just going to push my bike home, which is still not the easiest task…Passing concession after concession…Maruim why aren’t you ridding your bike, its so much easier. After a few days of riding to the pump and pushing my bike home I finally worked up the courage to attempt riding back home and I made it and only had the jug fall off just as I was getting off my bike! I can tell after being here for only a month I’m really building up some Malian Muscles!
One morning I woke up and when I went outside to use the neygen I saw a fantastic rainbow! I ran back in and grabbed my camera! As I took a few pictures I thought to myself today is going to be a great day! I cooked breakfast and was just sitting down reading my daily devotional enjoying a cup of tea and I hear a noise above my head… I look up and see a big nasty rat looking back at me. I scream and he tries to run across the piece of wood we was sitting on but falls off right in front of me and runs into my other room! Completely freaked out I run outside and pace back and forth in my yard deciding what to do next..do I stay in my pajams all day and just leave, or do I attempted to go back into the room the rat ran into to change and then leave. Malians don’t know these are my pajamas, I could pull it off, but I don’t really want to wear this all day. So finally armed with my broom I make a lot of noise and quickly run into the room grab the first thing I can and run back out and change in my yard. Next I head to find my homologue to tell him there is a rat in my house..but of course I don’t know the word for rat! Thank goodness he is the first person I run into! Before I even great him I just blurt out Sounkoro, this morning in my house I saw an animal it ran arcoss my ceiling and fell and ran into my room and I screamed! Of course Sounkoro was at the butiki along with a bunch of other guys just hanging out and as they roar with laughter they say oh Mairum its just a mouse and I say no it is BIG! Still they laugh and tell me not to worry. Later that evening Sekouba gave me some poison and I made him walk all through my house with his flash light before I even came in just incase, but Mr. Rat wasn’t there, and didn’t touch the poison at all that night or the next. Just when I’m thinking I’m in the clear and scared him off I see him again! So after a frantic phone call home..(sorry Mama!) I went and begged about 10 people to come to my house and find the rat and kill him finally one nice guy named Bocar agreed. I showed him were I saw the rat coming and going from and there was a piece of fabric stapled to my ceiling and I knew that’s where he was so Bocar pulled the fabric down only to find a huge hole in the wood lining of my ceiling! So we patched it up with a piece of screen, nails and mud. Knock on wood, but I haven’t seen Mr. Rat since, I’ve seen his friends, Mr. Mouse, lizard, and toad but not rat! Thank the Lord! I still sleep with my radio on though just so I can mask the sounds of night time creepers!!
A lot of people in my village go to market up the road every Wednesday. I was asked to go and I wanted to get a few things so I agreed. They arrange for a bush taxi van to come to our village and take us to the market, wait there and then bring us all home. So being the guest I get to sit upfront. Instantly regretting every fight I had with my sisters to get the front seat because it’s defiantly not the best seat to have when traveling in Mali! First of all the van was packed full with about 25 people four people upfront with me not counting the driver, and the van needed a few men to give it a running start while the driver held two lose wires together. Our journey to Sido Sugu (market in Bambara) starts off smoothly for the first five minutes, then we have the last 7k of the 8k rode swerving from side to side to miss pot holes, ditches, puddles, donkey carts, people on bikes, and randomly lost sheep or cows. We come to part of the rode that is completely flooded so the driver makes us all get out and walk so the van doesn’t get stuck in the mud. The Malians take of their shoes, hike up their skirts and go, I on the other hand take my time trying to walk in the least muddy spots and I come to a point where its just a huge puddle, of course being the last person to get back to the van I just decide to step through the puddle instead of making a scene of attempting to jump over it and miss. Wrong choice! Should have attempted the long jump because the puddle was so deep I instantly sunk into the mud and had water clear up to my knees sending the Malians into a fit of laughter that I’m sure will still be ringing in my ears two years from now! So they made an executive decision to not let me walk through the mud on the way home I had to stay in the van with the driver. So everyone gets out and the four other people sitting up front with me hand me their bags to hold. The driver decided the best thing to do is just floor it through the flooded road, not knowing how deep the puddles are mind you and we hit a huge ditch! I went flying clear out of my seat, throwing all the packages in the air and landed right in the driver’s lap! Completely embarrassed I lose all of my Bambara and start apologizing and asking his he was okay and as I attempted to gather all the bags and items that fell out of them I started laughing and found that I couldn’t stop!
I find myself hanging out at he Butiki with Sekouba the store owner and the many villagers who hang out there too. Sekouba has become like the older borther I’ve never had, he helps me a great deal and I’m so thankful for everything he does! I hang out with him because he talks slowly and clearly and is very easy to understand. He also knows how to explains words I don’t know other than just saying “oh you don’t understand” like other Malians. Sekouba has two wives, Tenna and Mado. Tenna has become my Malian bff! She is so funny! She lets me “help” her cook and she cooks really good Malian food so I never go hungry. Tenna, and her sister Fana turn the outside of Sekouba’s butiki into a hair salon at least once a week. They asked if they could braid my hair, and to be honest it is a lot easier to deal with braided and a lot cooler too so I gladly agreed. The first time it took Fana three hours to make 25 tiny corn rows of braids and it hurt! I left it for a week or so and then took them out, taking them out took an hour next time I’m going to have a Malian do that part too! A week or so later everyone kept asking “Marium when are you going to get your hair braided again? You speak much better Bambara with your hair braided!” So I sat through the yanking and pulling for another two and half hours and got my hair braided again- I have a feeling this is going to be my new hairstyle for the next two years.
On the 22nd of September I had the opportunity to celebrate Independence Day-this wasn’t just any old independence day, it marked Mali’s 50th Anniversary of independence from France. My village Celebrated for four days! The first night we had a dj from Bougouni come and we danced the night away, literally I went to bed at 2:00am and I was the first person to leave the party. The next day no one really did anything all day, resting up from the night before and getting ready for another night of traditional music of drums and song and dance. The next two days of festivities were mixed with weddings and baby naming ceremonies. Nothing really exciting happened on those days but a lot of eating, music, and playing cards.
Speaking of Malian eating- everyone is always offered food if someone is eating, it is rude if you don’t offer some to every person who passes by and sees that you are eating and the only polite way to turn down food is to say your full and even then they offer you some three more times until you are almost obligated to take at least one handful. I never go hungry here, really, I don’t think I could if I tried! So after spending the first few weeks yalayalaing around the village I have found out who the best cooks are in village and usually find myself hanging around their houses at meal times, or even better offering to help them cook. Malians love to see me cook, eat, do anything with Malian food because there is no such thing as a simple meal in Mali. Sorry Rachel Ray but Malians would laugh in utter disbelief at your idea of a meal in thirty minutes. Right now Mali has an over abundance of corn and the only thing they make with corn is toe. Toe is this doughy, sticky, substance that is made from millet or corn. Millet toe tastes and has the nutritional value of a soggy cardboard box-but it fills your stomach nonetheless. Corn toe has much better flavor, like under cooked corn bread but for either dish it is the sauce you dip it in that makes it worth eating at all. Malians make a variety of sauces, everything has a sauce, toe, rice, potatoes..(not spaghetti though ironically) they make a peanut sauce that is really good but usually is only served with rice. Toe usually ges served with oakra sauce. Oakra is a type of vegetable grown here that is rather hard to descried the best I can come up with is a mix between a zucchini and a green bean but it is rigid like a star fruit with big seeds and not a lot of “meat” to it. It smells kind of bad, and when cooked down it turns a little snotty, but actually doesn’t taste that bad.
One day Tenna asked me help her cook toe so I gladly agreed. By the time a got there at 8 in the morning she had already pounded out the corn in to powder and had the oakra cleaned and cut. All I had to do was boil some water and stir in the corn powder-sounds like an easy task but toe is really just a really thick dough, and of course I can’t stir the same way Mailans do and sloshed it all over the place. Then we boiled the oakra and added spices and everything was divvied out into large bowls and set to the side to cool a little before serving everyone in the concession. Of course since I cooked it I had the pleasure of serving it to everyone and telling them I cooked it- they were a little hesitant to taste it at first but when I told them I only stirred they laughed and dug right in sending their complements to the cook- me or Tenna I’m not sure!
At home I would say I liked being around kids and children, but here I find that I lose my patience pretty quickly when they are around. Maybe it’s the fact that they are ALWAYS around, or the fact that I’m a little jealous of the way Bambara pours out of their mouths as easy at water pours out of a pipe. Either way I’m glad school is finally starting soon so it will give us both something to do during the day. Not all the chilfren are bad, one little boy, Lae, has become my Malian boyfriend! He is almost two years old and at first was scared to death of me, until I saved him from the wrath of his Mad Malian Mama one morning when he dumped a bucket of water. Every since that day he has loved me! We walk around and he dances the second he hears music. I can’t decide if playing with him makes me miss Caleb, Sydney, and Gia more or less.
Spending my days wandering around the village, biking through the woods and the fields trying to grasp the fact that this is where I am living for the next two years is at times a little over whelming. Maybe I’ve been reading too much Narnia but sometimes I feel like I’m in a completely different world from the one I’ve known the previous 22 years of my life. Sometimes when I’m on my morning run or biking through the luscious landscape of never ending Mali I find myself searching, searching for the door, or magic wardrobe out of here-the door that will transport me to and fro without missing a second of time at home. The closest thing I’ve found is a wonderful shade tree where I actually have cell phone service. I bike there every Sunday and wait for my family to call and tell me stories and for a glorious 53 minute they transport me out of Africa, or I attempt to transport them to Africa.
