"So Far...So good"

I visited on of the homestay villages last week to work with some environment and health trainees on gardening. It was really good to see all of them. It's funny, they probably don't realize how much we actually do miss them at Tubaniso. They all seemed to still be doing well, enjoying homestay and surviving culture shock. The village I went to is BEAUTIFUL. There are beautiful rock formations, the area is green, and there is a nice canal coming through. In addition to that, the soil looked great. We prepped a garden plot and just caught up with the gang. I got teased by one of the LCFs for wearing a new pagne for a gardening session. Come on now... it didnt get that dirty!

The following day we had a debriefing with all of the environment trainers to talk about what went well, what could go better, etc. I told Yacouba that I would extend for a third year if he would throw me in that village. So I might not be coming home anytime soon :). (No plans seriously made)

When we aren't working hard setting up our lesson plans and making sure we have things ready for session, we have been hanging out a lot with each other. As trainers we are all so different, but we actually get along real well. We make a great mixture. So it has been fun getting to know everyone better. It's going to be hard for me to go back to site this week, though I really do miss site.

I got a chance to hang out with one of my Bamako buddies this weekend. The best part about meeting new people here is meeting their kids. An adorable 6 year old told me that he would marry me. His 10 year old sister's friend told me that she would do my hair for the wedding. Very thoughtful of her.
So the friend that I hung out with speaks French, Bambara, a few other minority languages and some English. Sometimes I think his English is better than he lets me think it is. Seeing that we mostly speak in Bambara and the occasional french, there isn't much English thrown in. We were sitting talking and he was telling me about a few phrases he had learned from a missionary and some other people. "That is Awesome...cute... " and "So far so good" It was so wierd to hear these phrases come out. He told me he wanted me to explain so far so good to him in English. I got the picture that he already knew what it meant.
It was really nice to just sit down and talk politics, religion and life. Really intelligent, open minded conversation. With the occasional bad joke thrown in here and there.

Needing a motto to kind of sum up this past year. Sum up how I really have been feeling about this past year, but never had the words spit out right in front of me:
and so here it goes.... "so far so good"