The one with catch ups and christmas

Because I haven’t been too good at keeping up with this:
For some reason I didn’t think anyone was reading this blog, and so, to save time at the internet café... I somehow just decided to ignore it. For some reason I figured everyone had facebook. TUNNEL VISION. Now I realize that’s not the case and Well with the helpful push of the Old Man, I decided I should not only update from awhile ago, but continue keeping this thing up.

Here are some old posts that I had put up on facebook that will hopefully catch you up:


Don't tell mom you might be sticking around for awhile.....
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Thursday, December 17, 2009 at 6:37am Edit Note Delete
So I was thinking, what could I talk about that I haven't really mentioned much about, especially since I have computer time RIGHT NOW... You usually find all these great blog posts written in the sand in my concession or spelled out with some other means that just end up getting lost in the Sahel. So I really should get better about that. I was thinking about my kindergarteners (who I miss extraordinarily) and thought about how great (and naughty) they can be. I was thinking about the days that discipline can really be a problem. One day I wanted to have the students make a tree nursery (it gives them something hands on to do, keeps them a little busy, gets their little heads to think about the environment. If you remember in the past I posted that a few kids and I started a nursery in my concession, and another kid thought it was more fun to pull the seedlings out of their plastic pots.... oooops, and some people think you have to protect tree pepinaires from animals (goats and sheep) I have to protect mine from extra curious children with extra wandering hands. Well I got to school with some fertilizer, plastic pots, and some moringa seeds. We got all of the kids to come outside. I handed out all of the plastic pots and asked them to all wait patiently to get some fertilizer. Well, most of them thought that if they didn't give me their bag right away, they were not going to get in. There was a lot of pushing and a lot of "Ne taa file (here is my bag)" with 40 some bags about two inches from my face. I had to remind them a few times "Bee be na do soro (everybody is going to get some)" The greatest thing about this... they understood the importance of tree planting...and when they did eventually get their pot filled with dirt, I asked them to sit and wait patiently. What happened? The kids sat... NO FIGHTING...NO running around... Sitting and calmly talking with each other...Not a single complaint that someone was "Kele tige (picking fights)" They sat chatting... with grins. Another really awesome part? THey were not expecting to keep these things, they wanted to do this because they knew it was for me. Not because they were getting something free. I love those kids. Another great thing I love about my kids is during Observation time, I usually spend walking around (the kids are less likely to start trouble if the teacher is closer to them it seems) Well the kids will grab my hand and look at me with these angel eyes "I sigi, nan ka baroke (sit down, lets talk)". Well as soon as I sit down, They get this huge slyful grin on their face and turn to their friends and start saying "LOOK I got Nana to sit next to me... and we are going to talk" There are a few boys in the class that seem to make it a competition amongst themselves to see who can get me to sit down first and the most. I love those kids. They are getting a little better at not picking so many fights when I am around. I appreciate this... one less kid to wipe the tears and dripping snot from their face... Here is a quick shout out to Mom Dad and the Fam.... thanks for the package... I love that when I asked for one of my old jerseys, I got three! Chloe and Matt, thanks for throwing in a little extra special! I miss you guys Christmas is around the corner...what...maybe 8 days or something. This will be the second Christmas in Mali...and yet again, I will probably have to be reminded the day of Christmas that it is Christmas.... though this year I am pretty sure I will be spending it with the lovely Natasha and Amber! Really excited about that! It is funny how in the states that as soon as Thanksgiving dinner dishes are wiped up, santa is sitting in the mall and Christmas songs are constantly played in every store and on the st cloud radio station 24/7 that I would listen to after I spent thanksgiving at home. Well I have been singing Christmas songs since July...and well...I guess I could just get better at knowing my holidays. I asked if there was a santa here, my friend told me yes...then I asked the obvious...well "is santa malian... or just some toubab?" I got maybe one of the best answers possible "Santa can be any of those things, it is whatever Allah sends our way" I can't sit much longer... I'm going to help Mario get breakfast ready... Miss you all, wish you best holidays... let me know what kind of Santa Allah sends your way!
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an update....finally
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Tuesday, December 8, 2009 at 4:51pm Edit Note Delete
So once again, it has been a little while since I last updated. I hope to be able to capture all of the great things that happened, once again… excuse a little disorganization since computer time is pretty limited for me. I wish I remember dates so that I could at least get this somewhat chronologically organized, I’ll try my best. So this was a little bit before Thanksgiving, on a Friday, I had two of my really good Peace Corps friends come visit me at site. Amber, who is one of my closest volunteer neighbors (a “short” 70 km away… a nice three hour ride on maybe the nicest road in Mali ) and my friend Natasha, originially Madagascarka.. but now a great addition to the Koulikorokaw family. I love these girls, they are my support and great entertainment! Love these girls! So as I started to say, it was a Friday in early November, I met them at the Carangandala (where a lot…maybe 4 a day…. of cars drop people off, also a good place to get fried fish). I was so ecstatic to see their poor tired faces. For such a short distance… it is still a real long, dusty trip. I appreciate that they took the long trip to make it out. As soon as they got out of the car all of the people in town kept asking questions. “DID YOUR SISTERS COME TO VISIT??” well not exactly my sisters but yeah my family for sure. We were busy greeting people, getting the girls some fish to eat (not much access to fish in Amber’s village) and then made the walk to my house. Amahfah came to meet us and help with bags. Both of the girls have heard all of the stories about Amahfahso it was like they knew him, now they could finally put a face on him. See him in the flesh! We made the trek past the school and got several shouts from all of the school kids, past the grin of men that sit Sogorelakaw fe, right near my house. These men (probably my father’s age) were more than thrilled to finally see that I have some toubab friends. The girls got to wash all of the red dust off of themselves and we got to sit and relax a little. After resting a little bit we decided to get more fish and meet up with the group that I hang out with outside the Veterinary pharmacy. I don’t think I have mentioned these guys all too much. When I started working at the Jardin d’Enfants, a trek dugu kono every morning, I would usually see Moussa the OHVN rep hanging outside the pharmacy. I greeted them every morning, recognizing the vet tech, but unsure of where I could place him. I had greeted him many times, he seemed to know me, but I was really unsure. Well after a little investigation (basically I just asked him why I knew him) I found out that we had met one late afternoon outside my house. The mayor had to give me a letter and had sent this young man (named Basine sometimes we call him Lassie) and Jeliba to deliver the letter to me. This letter actually had a really huge impact on me… not going to get into to much detail but it really got me thinking about things. Anywho I remember specifically now he looked at me and said “you are impossible to find… we’ve been looking for you for hours… here is a letter” and then they were off… It would be months before I would talk to him again. Well as I started to explain, I started hanging outside his pharmacy everyday after school. Seemed that we actually had quite a bit in common and were having really great interesting conversations everyday. He is interning at the pharmacy right now. Originally from Segou he had decided to go to vet school and got thrown into Nyamina to work at the pharmacy for his internship. He has worked now in the town for about two years, now must do another unexpected two more years. I think the thing we have in common is that we are both so far away from family. Though his family is only in Bamako, he works EVERY single day, there is really no opportunity to go home except for Seli fitini (Ramadan) and Seliba (tabaski) for basically a total of 6 days a year… not easy. Anyways I had to show the girls the middle of town and I figured that we could also meet the gang that I always hang out with. It was so much fun, walking down through town, pointing out all the random places and people t hat they have all heard stories about, but now got to experience in real life. Walking down the streets, speaking English, all of my friends in town in shock to see three of us! We got to Market, which has some really awesome trees in the middle of it… the nicest place to come to during hot season because of all of the shade. We stopped by Segouba’s boutiki so Amber could get an ice cold coke, and then headed to Lassie’s pharmacy. All of the guys were hanging out there making dablahni (an ye foronton ka la) hibiscus tea with so much ginger in it you would think it was hot peppers… but DELICIOUS! We got to hang out and talk… mixing some English, French and Bambara. The guys were clueless on the English, which just made it easier for me to explain stories right there without being too obvious. Sun was about to set so we decided to head back to the house and then head to Diarralakaw fe my Djatigi’s house. We hung out and talked and had dinner. It was a lot of fun, I don’t remember the last time I had laughed so much. No one could wipe the smile off of my face. The Coulibaly boys (Basoumana and Bakoumba around 11 years old) were just in love with Amber and Natasha. We took advantage of that and kept teasing the boys. We decided to head home and get ready for the dance that DJ was holding in Keybarabougou (I can never pronounce this… let alone spell it) Imagine a large round mud hut… with adjoining room connected to it. Very cool place, but can get hot when the dance is packed. Well both Natasha and Amber know DJ, so it was fun for all of us to reunite again. I really wanted to show the girls how different my village can be. The difference is totally night and day. Moments you can feel like you are broussie kono… next it feels like you are in the big city. Also at the dance we got to see Amber’s work partner’s, Aliou, wife. We spent some time dancing, spent some time chit chatting, and called it a night a little past midnight. The dance was completely on the other side of town so it takes a good 30-45 minutes to walk home. We got home, gossiped a little bit and then past out from exhaustion. It felt really nice to sleep in. We slept in and once we got ready for the day we headed back into the middle of town to market to buy some fresh fish that we could cook up. We probably bought a little TOO much fish… and spent hours alone cleaning it out…. Go figure. And spent a few more hours after that cooking it, but it was great. We later walked to the river to go take pictures and check it out. Amber got some really awesome pictures that I’m trying to get up on facebook, but computer was being a little slow. The trip was just a real lot of fun…. We got up super early Sunday morning so that they could catch transport… it was FREEZING out. I couldn’t believe how cold it was. It was really cool to have them come visit me at site. I cannot say that enough. We hear so many stories about each others sites, but to really really experience it… that is what really makes it worth it… everything comes full circle. SO MOM AND DAD… maybe you guys could come visit???? Or any other friends… it’s really not as bad as you think. I went to school for a few days and then needed to go to Bamako to go grab a box waiting for me at the bureau. Well I also got a call from the Med people asking me to come in because I needed to get some extra stuff checked out. It would seem that I would have to go to Senegal to get some tests done (nothing serious and I’m fine) They wanted to send me out the 30th of Nov. I thought… well cool Tabaski is on the 28th so I can celebrate that in village and leave the 29th and get to bko the 30th so that I could catch my flight to Dakar. I really didn’t want to go. I got teased by volunteer friends “Audrey why are you crying about going to Dakar… Who gets ‘forced’ to go to the beaches of Senegal” well… I do… the site rat does. Go figure. So I went back to site and talked to a few friends explaining that I had to go back to Bamako that next Sunday. “No… you can’t do that… no cars will be leaving Sunday…” Well it turned out that I would have to leave Friday meaning that I would spend holiday in Koulikoro… not bad, I just really wanted to spend Tabaski with my host family, since it could be the very last one I spend with them. Not completely out of luck though, Thanksgiving was on Thursday, so I did get to share that with family and friends. Wednesday I had Bamoussa (Bamako soccer player) and Amahfah go to market and buy some chickens. That night I made some chicken and fries for us to celebrate Thanksgiving early and really to thank them for helping me when I was sick earlier that week. I’m talking really super gross sick. They took good care of me. We didn’t have school Thursday so I was able to cook an alternative Thanksgiving lunch which was salad fries and chicken. Not exactly how we celebrate it in the states, but still good. I explained to them what Thanksgiving was for us back home. What it meant. How thankful I was to have them in my life. They seemed to really enjoy the meal and it was really good to be with them. Coincidentally my host dad mentioned that it was a lot like Tabaski. So in a way I got to celebrate Tabaski with them early. I was hoping to get an outfit made for Tabaski, but unfortunately, my early departure would mess things up a little. My tailor friends had a pretty hefty work load. In fact, I don’t think they slept. During the day I would meet them at the usual work space, using the old type of sewing machines, hand operated/use a foot pedal table to run them. At night they moved to where they were running a generator and could work with electricity. Bayni has this machine that he can do some really amazing beautiful broiderie. It was seriously awesome. It was Thanksgiving night I went to go find Soumaiila the tailor. I ended up running into my girlfriend Mariam. This girl: one of the most independent, confident girls I know in town. Lassie says she is not going to find a husband because she is a kele tige la (picks fights). I disagree, she’ll find a really good husband, just maybe not in my town. She was also looking for Bayni and Soumi so we walked together and hung out in the generator generated electricity. It was strange and fantastic all at the same time. It was really cool that night because it seemed like all of my friends seemed to be hanging out there that night. We got to just chill and talk. A little past midnight I told them I should probably go because I would have to catch a bus in the morning. When I got home I went to go see if Amahfah was still awake. I really wanted to say goodbye to him that night rather than waking him up early in the morning. We hung out and talked a little, said our goodbyes and Friday morning I was off. I got to spend Saturday with the Maiga’s across the street in Kkro. We cooked all day together and just goofed around and talked. It was really really nice. They really took care of me and I just had a really great time. I spent Sunday mentally preparing myself for Monday morning. I’m not good at traveling. Well let me edit this a bit. It’s a confidence thing. I can travel Mali, I’m comfortable with my language that I feel for the most part I can get around without issues. Language is huge… HUGE… as a shy person, I find it really hard to talk to strangers and new people… but Bambara really helps me combat that. How that is? I’m not sure, but when I tell people that I really really am shy and afraid to talk to people, they don’t believe me. Go figure right? “But you are just going to Senegal Audrey… what are you worried about, I mean you majored in French” well… once again… it's the confidence thing. I can understand tons and tons of French when it is spoken to me. Unfortunately, usually when people speak to you, you usually should respond right? Well my French… I start to speak French and it completely turns to Bambara…. AHHHH this is going to be a problem right. So I was going to Dakar, by myself. Unable to speak the local languages of Wolof and Pulaar (though our Fulfulde is somewhat similar though I am no way fluent in Fulfulde) and unable to find many people that speak Madinka (a Bambara dialect, understandable, more importantly madinka would be able to understand my Bambara at least) French was the only thing I could really count on. Well when I got to the airport. I greeted the guards and an English speaking Norwegian at the front doors. Looks like the plane was going to be a few hours late. We would have to wait. I helped played translator so that was fun. What was really nice was that I got to sit and speak English with this man from Norway. Really nice guy. It definitely helped ease my worries about traveling. It was fun to shoot the word with the people at the airport. You have no idea how much I really appreciate being able to speak Bambara. The airplane was nice, and the flight was less than two hours. We got in pretty late past 9 pm. As soon as I walked out of the plane I could smell the ocean air. I would have to say that is the one thing that I would really miss about Dakar. It felt like I was back in North Carolina or something. Really really good smell. Airport wasn’t too much of a hassle and Peace Corps had sent a driver to come pick me up from the airport so I wouldn’t have problems finding the bureau. The driver was a really nice guy named Moussa. He dropped me off at the bureau, I was so exhausted and just ready for bed. I woke up Tuesday morning and talked to some of the other volunteers hanging out. It was interesting to compare our Peace Corps experiences. Countries right next door to each other, many similarities but still even many many differences. It was cool. I met a volunteer named Laura who was really nice to show me around. Tuesday night we headed into the middle of town. WOW. When I first got to Dakar, I had only seen the outskirts and thought that Dakar and Bamako were quite similar. Wow, once you really go into the center of town dugu kono…. DAKAR IS A COMPLETELY DIFFERENT PLACE. Developed, crazy developed. The strange thing was to see the lack of motos in the streets. Bamako is covered in motos. I barely saw any in Dakar. We ended up eating dinner at the French Cultural center I had chicken and gnocchi made from sweet potatoes which were amazing. Breakfast usually consisted of pastries from the French bakery down the road. I was a little nervous about traveling around too far by myself because of my lack of confidence in my language skills. Dakar is pretty nice, but let me tell you, I was really excited to go back to Mali. While walking around people would try to speak wolof to me, unfortunately I couldn't answer so I would respond back in Bambara. This actually worked with one guy who spoke Madinka so we had a little conversation. One other guy said “I be di” (how are you) in passing but I was so caught off guard that by the time I figured out he was speaking Bambara he was already long gone. Then there was a guy at the grocery store talking to me in French. I tried my best speaking some French. He kept asking me for my number when finally I just broke down and started speaking in Bambara asking him how he was going to understand anything I said if my French was so bad. Somehow he thought it would work. I just laughed and apologized saying I couldn’t do it. Saturday morning I woke up early and got a ride with Moussa back to the airport. There was a man from Boston that was also going and we were actually taking the same flight, but he was going to go to Addis Ababa. It was fun to hear his story and tell him mine. It was nice to have him at the airport so we could talk and I could also calm my nerves. Cat in the airport? Yes…. The flight out of Dakar was really cool because we got to fly over the coast for a little bit so I got to really check out the ocean. I do wish I would have gone swimming, but I will be honest… it almost seemed a little too cold to go to the beach (I am probably going to freeze to death when I go back to Minnesota…. AH) but the flight was good make up for it. Crazy to see such a large body of water. Next time I go to Senegal I really do want to check out the lighthouse and maybe some of the islands around. My favorite part of the flight, the pilot telling us to fasten our seat belts as we were going to land in Bamako. I couldn’t wipe the grin off of my face. I was so happy to be “back home” The airport people teased me saying my trip was too short, I said I missed Mali too much. What was even greater was as I left the airport looking for the Peace Corps driver I saw Tieman who was the driver to pick me up. It had been quite a while since I had last seen him. He laughed, said he didn’t realize it was me he was picking up because they just gave him my American name. Most people at the bureau call me by my Malian name so he was in for a little surprise. We got to the bureau and I found Yacouba and he was excited to see me back so early. And probably even more excited to see that the med stuff wasn’t anything to serious that they would have had to send me home. He asked me to help me out with training and to give a presentation to our partners about being a Peace Corps volunteer. I asked him if he was sure that I should do it, I felt like I wasn’t the best candidate. He gave me the pep talk of a lifetime, and hinted at me doing a third year. It definitely gave me a little more confidence in myself. It was the talk that I have been really needing. After spending some time at the bureau I headed out across the river to go hang out with Ablo and Barou. It was really fun to see those guys. It had been awhile since I had last seen them. Barou… if I could say he reminded me of anyone.. I would say he really reminds me of my brother Matthew, just a little bit cooler (sorry matt). We hung out, made tea and talked a lot. Ablo’s friend called Bad Boy (I cant pronounce his real name and conveniently both Bad Boy and Ablo call each other Bad Boy) came and joined us. Bad Boy is from Bandiagara and speaks a dogon dialect, French and English. He can understand Bambara, but not so good at speaking it. He and Ablo met each other in school. So we all sit together and speak English together, throw in some French and Bambara. Barou knows very little English, but that doesn’ stop him from throwing in ideas of his own. Really funny smart kid. I keep telling him I’m going to find him a nice wife. I went to kkro to hang out with Amber and talk with her. It was really good to see the girl. Natasha was also at the house so we all got to shoot the word and hang out. I really love those girls. I plan on going back to site tomorrow, I really miss everyone, I will be good to see everyone. I also printed off a few more pictures for my fam and the Coulibalys and it will be really nice to see the dog again. I have really got to hash out a presentation that I would be really proud of on the life of a peace corps volunteer. I’m really thrilled that I get to give the presentation in Bambara, but now as I look for words I feel like I can’t speak it well enough (funny how lack of confidence can really make things difficult but also overconfidence can lead you to choke) That is a sort of update… I know really long, and doesn’t even describe everything that has happened. Crazy this place is like home now. Funny how that works. Chloe might be right… I may never leave!
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what a coincidence
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Wednesday, October 14, 2009 at 10:04pm Edit Note Delete
I be bo min? i ka ameriki dugu togo a di? (where are you from, what state?) I be bo California walima New York? (are you from California or New York) N ka dugu togo Minnesota (I'm from Minnesota) Minnesota be ameriki wa? walima france? (minnesota is in the US or France) Minnesota be Ameriki fen jumen fe? (where in The US is Minnesota) so all of the time I'm asked where in the states I am from...is it close to California or New York... unfortunately.. not at all... occasionally asked if it is close to Texas... one time asked if it was close to Chicago (that is the closest I have ever gotten) THOUGH... one of the guys I work with... Mama, lived in Hugo MN for a little while (small small world huh?) and today I was hanging out with Ablo and his friend Youssouf. Youssouf told me that his uncle was in the states and and I asked which one. He paused for a moment and then told me "Minnesota" I started laughing and asked if he knew which city. He didnt know and I kept laughing. He asked me what was wrong and I said that I was from Minnesota. He smiled at me... paused for a minute.... then said in english... "What a coincidence huh?" life is good
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I NI FAMA SA!!!
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Wednesday, October 14, 2009 at 9:06pm Edit Note Delete
So I spent the last month at site. Time really flew by actually. The first week back at site seemed like forever. I eneded up getting back to site to find that all of my friends had left town... except for a small few, which just meant I needed to make some more friends right? We finished up the last week of fasting with my host family and it went really well. We celebrated Ramadan by killing a cow and eating rice and sauce for breakfast for five days. Everyone dresses up in their bazan and new complets, it is really fun. I got in trouble for not showing up to last year's duminkeyoro (eating place) for three days so I was told that I would have to "woro sara" meaning pay with Kola nuts. well since it is mostly just women that I eat with, they don't really care for Kola nuts so they said I could pay with candy. I did and they told me I can't screw up again during Tabaski (december). No problem. So we have a nice breakfast in the morning and then hang out all day. It was great because my friend Bamoussa *(the soccer player) came into town for a couple of days and we got to hang out some before he returned to the big city! Also, since fasting month ended, Invitations kicked up which meant a lot of dancing and macaroni eating at 3 am every night for a week straight. Plus DJ came back from Koulikoro and was hosting soirees about every night the week after. My friend from Koulimana decided to continue his studies in bamako. A few days before he left for Bamako he found me at my host family's house and I decided to "send him on the road" as we were biking about miway between my village and his village I told him I would turn around because it would probably get dark soon. He kept teasing me because it had been so long since I had been to his village that I should stop by and say hi. I agreed. We got into town and so many people were shocked to see me. I saw many of the kids that I hadn't seen since school had let out. They all asked me about specific friends of theirs, teased me about never coming into village, etc. We stopped at Djeliba's house and his mom asked if I would stay the night there. I told her that I was going home immediately. She did not like this, especially since it would be dark soon. We had spent so much time greeting people that it was dark before I got back to my bike. I gave in and said that I would spend the night there. It was great because I also got to see my friend Badian, he sleeps next door to me. I got to meet his family and he took care of me for a little bit while Djeliba went on some errands. Turned out that it was a good night to stay in Koulimana because their DJ was holding a dance. We danced the night away, drank tea, played a lot of cards, ate some zame at 3am and then headed to bed. I woke up a little bit after five to head home. I wanted to make it home before too many people saw me coming into town. Djeliba's parents gave me a chicken and sent me off on my way. Well the chicken did not like the idea of hanging by its feet on my handlebars that when I stopped to put air in my leaky tires it wriggled out of the noose on its feet and started hopping around. I hadto chase it around for 10 minutes before I captured it. Later that week my host brother was going to go to Bamako to start 10th grade. On wednesday night I met up with him and gave him a gift. He was shy to accept it at first but I told him he had to accept it. He was very thankful. The next morning I dropped him off at the boat landing. It is really weird not to have him around anymore. We had gotten really close the past couple of months. wierd not to have him around. The end of Rainy season has been a real bummer at my site due to the fact that it has been over a month and we only received a tiny trickle the other day. I'm talking maybe three rain drops. It's been getting cooler at night but really really hot during the day. So hot that you think rain is going to come, the clouds even get dark, and then... bang... the clouds are gone. Cold season will be starting up here real soon, which makes me happy, less mosquitoes and cooler temps! I have been gardening in the women's garden. They were shocked to see that the stuff I was growing was actually growing! I planted some watermelon, melon, and okra. The watermelon is beginning to flower and my melons and okra are already fruiting. Unfortunately worms are attacking my melons and I have been trying some organic remedies for that. Now that cold season is starting I finished preparing all of the rest of my plots. I just need to add a little bit more fertilizer and plant my seeds. I want to plant some cauliflower, cucumbers, lettuce, cabbage, carrots, potatoes, maybe some tomatoes, havent quite decided yet. The only nice thing about the rain not coming is that I don't have to pull out grass everyday. I've made some new friends due to the fact that all of my other friends are gone. One is the farm animal veterinarian. He is about the same age (a little older) from Segou but currently working in my village for the past two years, has two more years to go. The other is the younger brother of my teacher friend. He is a tailor and a soccer friend. I used to occasionally tease him (i didn't think he was Niaminaka) until I found out that he was Seyba's brother. Then things made some sense. We hang out everyday chit chatting the random. One of the young kids that sleep in my concession surprised me one day with a puppy. A really small thing that was probably taken away from its mom too early (but is more than happy to eat solid food) That made my day. I have been looking for a dog for ever now. The puppy is great. Can't really walk around with me much yet. We go and eat breakfast/lunch at my Djatigi's but I usually leave the pup at home when I go out and about. We did go fishing together the other day, but turns out that my pup loves the bait more than the fish do and ate all of my worms. Our fishing trip ended early and we didnt catch anything, but no worries it was still nice to watch the sunset sitting by the river. BEAUTIFUL! My friend Boulkassim told me that they needed help at the Jardin D'enfants (think preschool/kindergarten) and thought that he would ask me since I love kids so much. I thought he was pulling my leg at first but I went this past monday and it turns out that there is only one teacher for about 40-50 kids... she has a lot of work on her hands. I told her that I would be in Bamako this week but when I return to site I would love to collaborate with her. She was excited to have me join her. I am really excited about that. Well... I'm out of typing juice for the moment... so I'm going to take a break. QQuick thanks to Cochs for sending the pictures OMG. they were great! Seriously made my day. If any of you have some pictures you want to send to me that would be awesome, I'm starting to decorate my house little by little with pictures, plus my family and friends here love to see pictures from Ameriki. HOOK ME UP! miss you all hope all is well with everything back at home!
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Getting my Ramadan on
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Tuesday, September 1, 2009 at 10:02am Edit Note Delete
Well, here in Mali, a lot of people run the Calander by the moon. Which is convenient for learning Bambara because the word for month and moon are exactly the same=kalo. So I was walking around village one night with my friend Demba (also called mafah, not to be confused with Amahfah), I think this was Friday night and we see a group at Traorelakaw fe praying outside "Did people fast today?" and earlier as Demba, Karamoko, Diarra, Abu and I were sitting hanging out in the afternoon, they kept looking at the sky, "the moon is out, the moon has come" which meant that our fasting month would start. Well to not look like a complete fool I waited until I was walking home to search for the moon. Mind you the sky was still light.. I couldn't see anything and had no idea what they were talking about. So a lot of people in my village in preparation for Ramadan said that they would start fasting (sun) on Sunday... but a few people started Saturday (myself included) and even fewer had started Friday. So what is the fast like here for sunkalo (the fasting month). Well people get up early to make suburi(the name of the meal they eat before sunrise). This will usually consist of moni and leftovers from the night before. My suburi usually consists of moni that my host mom gives me and macaroni or cucumbers or a nice peanut butter and jelly sandwich. I also try to drink a gallon of water, which only makes my last hour of sleep really shotty because I constantly wake up to take care of that. So I have usually been waking up at 415 or 430 to get stuff made, and a little bit before 5 i go to wake up Amahfah because he can't wake himself up. Imagine this, huh, I have not needed an alarm to wake up for this while at site, huge thanks to my internal clock, the prayer call in the morning and my huge fear that I will miss out on suburi and water drinking which would make for an impossible fast. SO the whole day is spent, no water drinking, no food eating, no chewing gum chewing...etc... Until the sun falls down (as you can see I'm translating my Bambara word for word..oops) People usually break fast by drinking water, drinking kinklyba, eating furufuru or bread, drinking cafe (lipton, milk, sugar) and a few other things including moni. Most people gather around the radio or tv, waiting for sun tige(the break of fast) and when the time hits, there is this music that plays with gunshots and calming music.... let me tell you, it is the most relieving sound IMAGINABLE. When I arrived at my Djatigi's house Saturday morning, I told my family I was fasting. My mom was NOT happy with this. She asked if people in the states ever fast, will I be ok, etc. She kept telling me to eat my breakfast but I kindly refused several times. She left for the garden and my host sister Mawa came over to me with last night's zame... which looked delicious by the way, and I shooked my head. She looked at me and asked "so you are really fasting today?" "Yeah" I responded. And she just smiled and said ok that it was totally cool. Host mama Abu came back, found out I hadn't eaten yet thanks to my brother Abufa and she gave me a really concerned look. Tired of my mom's concerns my host dad threw out "well you know if you are fasting... you are going to pray too (we had previously had a conversation where I had told my dad I was learning how to pray and it was coming doon dooni (little little) but he was still really happy that I was trying). I told him no problem, I had already done morning prayer and planned to pray later. Really excited that I was fasting, my host sister told me that I must break fast at their house. Late afternoon I went to their house to find that Mawa was selling sweet potato fries at the corner. I went to hang out with her and talk to my future husband Mami Coulibaly (I asked his father if I could marry him... no problems) 6 pm hit and i look at Mawa "Sun be ka dige i la" (the fast is starting to 'hurt') "Kongo te n na, nka minnogo ba be n na" ( i'm not hungry but i'm REALLY thirsty) "Well don't drink any water yet... you've fasted this long you should wait the little bit of time until the fast is broken." I waited and my host bro Abufa and I headed to the house. Chairs were set up around the radio and we took a seat. The gunshots went off and I was filled with relief "Ne fah (abufa)" abu shouted "Run and get Nana some water really quick" He rushed over to fill up the cup and came and handed it to me. "Don't drink too fast you will make yourself sick" my host mom said. I stopped drinking.. but it was already too late... no I didn't make myself sick.. but I definitely almost drank a liter of water in no time. My host father was also fasting so we ate moni together and it was really nice. "So you think you will fast again tomorrow?" my dad asked. "I would like to" I told him. Seeing that I survived the first day, and was still in very good spirits, my mom was less hesitant in trying to stop me from fasting. She told me that the whole family would start fasting Sunday. She also let me know that if at anytime I want to stop fasting I am free to do it. THANKS MOM! So fasting was going well. I did seven days. People in village kept asking me if I was fasting, when I repsonded yes they would say that I was lying.. so I tacked on the saying Wulye Bilye (i swear to God). Still hard to convince some people though. The fast is not so bad and is actually easier when everyone is doing it. After fast we get ready to pray. My host father goes to the mosque, my host brothers go next door to the Coulibaly's house and Abu, Mawa and I stay at home. Douka (Bina Coulibaly) reads the Korna while one of his son's will call out Allahu Akabaru to let us know when we are to move. As we were praying altogether, I was reminded of this time last year when we were sitting in class. Kelly and I always got to Christian's house early so we could chit chat a bit before class started. Kelly walks up to the concession entrance beaming. "Guess what! " she exclaimed. "Last night my family and I prayed... and it went a little like this" Mind you as Kelly is talking and explaining and demonstrating the prayer technique, she is singing a long, dancing around. She was very enthousiastic... that's our KELLY! I kept thinking WOW.. praying looks so FUN. well granted.. it's not horrible, I really enjoy praying with Abu and Mawa... but unfortunately it is not quite as exciting as Kelly demonstrated. One of my favorite things about praying is... well the first time I ever did the group prayer with everyone, I kept thinking, wow we are really doing this many times, how many times do we do this? Turns out.. a lot.. I still haven't counted because I'm too much in a meditative state to count. Amazingly, I'm not the only one who thinks that praying is a lot of work. All the malians I have talked to joke around about it being like exercise and gymnastics. This just makes me laugh. Following prayer... we wait for my dad to come back to eat dinner. Usually toh or rice and sauce. One night we had Fakoy which is rice with a sauce made from tree leaves. They eat it a lot up north in the Koroboro (Sonrai) areas. My dad was telling me about the dish and then starts to say "Nin denni be se tobili la dat" (this little girl can really cook) at first he was talking about my host sister.. but I realized he was talking about my host mom. I thought it was so cute that he called his wife denni (usually reference to a young girl) and he kept talking about her. It was so awesome to see my dad letting his guard down a little and showing the love he has for his wife. Well as I mentioned before I had left site to come to Bamako to help with training for the last two weeks. I had left on Saturday... and had every intention to continue my fast, but got really worried about drinking a lot of water and not being able to have the chance in 6 hours to relieve my bladder... so I didn't drink as much water as I should have and well... minnogo ye n mine (i got thirsty). I couldn't fast Sunday either because my friend's aunt would not let me fast and told me it wasn't good if I didn't eat the lunch she prepared. My friend had left on an errand so he wasn't around to convince her that it really was ok that I fasted. He came right as I was finishing my meal. Then yesterday... decided to forget the fast one more day. I got to TSO and everyone was asking if I was fasting... I told them I had done seven days... but had to skip a few days. We ate dinner and then Mama said "Wuli k'i taa seli ji taa" get up and wash yourself so we can pray. He was probably joking but I took him seriously and did it. I think I surprised a few at first, but I was definitely happen to get into the routine of praying again. Now today I'm back on the fasting bandwagon. It's nice when you have back up.. other people also doing it. One of my friends and I have been texting daily to back and forth encouraging each other in our fast. Happy Ramadan everyone
Updated about 4 months ago · Comment ·LikeUnlike
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"Bet your going fishing all of the time, my baby's going fishing too" and some other adventures
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Monday, August 31, 2009 at 2:55pm Edit Note Delete
So after MUCH MUCH MUCH convincing, I was able to get my host dad Baka (Basinel) to let me go fishing with him (i'm sure many of you have seen the photos). After asking me on several occasions if I really truly can swim, and my answering him with... yes.. you could basically say I was born to live in water. Right mom?So one dayd my dad says "so hey Amadou (Abufa), you and Nana get ready were going to go "Ba Ko" (Ba kofe=the other side of the river) and going Zabanan (to pick delicious Zabans... a sweet tart tasting fruit). I looked at my host dad... and I said.. you are kidding right? The day I'm wearing a complet you ask me to go to work? HECK YES! So we all marched down to the river, paddles and pushing poles in hand, and a boro (sack) to carry our Zaban findings in. It was AWESOME to just be out on the water. It was about 8 in the morning, the women were all lined on the beach washing clothes and dishes. Several shouted to me "hey are you going fishing today" I hollered back "YOU BETCHA" "well allah ka ba dia (may god grant you a good catch)" they replied. "AMIIIIIIIIIIINA Herebi" I responded with probably the largest grin my face had made in quite awhile. I was so excited! Baka started poling us out, looking almost like a pirougue driver in Venice until we got into water that was too deep to pole through and he whipped out the paddles. He handed me a paddle and started to giggle, "You and Amadou can paddle us to the other side" I was beaming with joy I couldn't wait. I am pretty sure he handed me the paddle ready to take it back in an instant... and then he started laughing even harder. "What" I said... confused, I didn't think I was doing it wrong. "Who taught you how to paddle a boat?" he asked. "How do you know how to do this?" I explained to him that when we were kids pops used to take us out all of the time in the canoe and we would canoe around. Plus all those times up on the St. Louis at Emily's house. I kind of became a pro... sort of? We got to the other side of the river and parked our boat and hopped onto shore. We climbed up a small face of the hill to reach this really cute spot where they sell things on market day. Right then I knew we were on our way into "the bush" to get ourselves some delicious Zabans. We walked a little ways and we finally got to this huge bush. I'm talking like tree size... just check o ut the pictures. My host dad climbed to the top, beaming with pride and asked me if it would make a really cool picture. I smiled and snapped his photo. He just kept grining as he chucked Zabans to me to throw into our boro. After we were done with that we headed back to the boat and he turned to smile at me. "Now the work is really going to begin" he said. We paddle further up river and once we got to the spot he had us pointing north. He grabbed onto his net and just as he was dropping it into the water he said "Bisimilah..." and we were on our way. We kept paddling north occasionally adjusting west or east to keep our line straight. As we paddled Baka kept saying "Nana be se, a ba don" (Nana can... she knows) and "Aw ka farine" (you guys are fierce) When the last bet of net was released we just sat on the water and talked. My host dad talked to me about the states, talked about my future plans... talked about me getting married.. asked me if it would ever work with the guy from the states... Then said "well at least people don't get married early in the states...you still have time" "Thanks dad" I thought... but it was true.. and I threw in the ol "Nin allah sonna (if god wills it)" and my host dad added "Allah be na son" (he will grant permission). It was really thoughtful of him. The talk was just really cool and interesting talking about family dynamics. It was the first time since my host sister had died that we had a real good conversation. After my host sister had died my dad kind of grew separated, but we are all growing really close again. We ended up catching a few fish, but nothing tremendous, but it was just a blessing to get to hang out with my host dad like that. And finally have something that really really reminded me of home. Fishing with dad on the river... you can't bet that. On the following time we went fishing I got brave enough to climb the Zaban trees and my host bro got really excited that I could do it. I also got really excited, but had to watch out for the huge thorns the size of dinosaur teeth. And while we were fishing we talked about my future plans and it was really cool that he understood why I wanted to go into teachingrunning out of time... finish laterEDITHe understood that the reason I would like to go into environmental ed is because of the importance and need for role models is today. And the fact that I find that much more important than money. Some other people... like my best friend's mom could not see that.. and got mad that I probably wasn't going to marry her son... and build her a compound in Bamako... BOOO... I got better plans in mindSo... things are on the up and up. with a few downers but life has its twists and turns... I'm back to finish training which is cool because I get to hang out with everyone again... but I'm missing out on a lot of cool stuff at site. A lot of new kids came back into town but will be going back to Bamako... I got to know several new ones... see the old ones who I first met when Ic ould barely speak and so on. But it is really nice to be back seeing Bamakokaw... and some important people.Other good news is that my friend Daou is hooking me up with a new dog. Here is crossing your fingers that this one will make it home with me right?ok... once again... Im going to update later... I havent seen some of these people in awhile
Written about 4 months ago · Comment ·LikeUnlike

Brenda Zaudtke
wow audrey that is so awesome!!! i'm so glad that you are enjoying yourself. i loved your story and i cant wait to see you when you finally come home!!!
August 31, 2009 at 8:24pm ·

Danielle Talbot
miss you...
August 31, 2009 at 11:58pm ·

Audrey Respet
hey momma... I miss you more
September 1, 2009 at 10:14am ·
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The Christmas post!

So the last week I had spent in Bamako helping out with training, spending a lot of quality time with our trainees and Malian staff. Many of whom I hadn’t seen in a few months (since September) so it was really nice to see them. I spent most of my free time getting myself into too much trouble with some of the staff, only because unfortunately I can’t pull the “I don’t understand Bambara, please excuse the insulting remark I just made” It wasn’t real trouble, but they really got on me and started changing things I said to make me look worse. It was a lot of fun shooting the word with all of them. Plus, a few had gotten on a volleyball kick, so the night that everyone went to go see Sean Paul or Habib Kouyate, I got dragged to play.

Ok side note: Yes… Crazy as it must seem… Sean Paul did come to Bamako. Yes Sean Paul the Jamaican? That sings about temperature and having the right stuff for something. When I first saw the advertisement many months ago, I thought it was an hilarious practical joke or, a mock Sean Paul. It didn’t help that many Malians seem to call him Saint Paul. So I just figured… you know, maybe someone that kinda looks like him with the talent of lip synching. Turns out it was the real thing… and really packed… glad I avoided it.

I would have liked to have seen the Habib concert, but unfortunately learned about it too late. That is fine because I got to spend a lot of quality time with the folks that also stayed at Tubani So and was well worth it.

One of the other reasons I had to help out with training was to help make sure that we were going to have a shea formation ready so that some of the trainees could see a real one being done. To make the formation easier for the women (since we only had a few hours to do it) we decided to prep some shea nuts (sorting, washing, grinding) so it would be ready to turn into butter. Well, Yacou shows me a large bag 50 so kg of nuts. Explains that all I should really need to do is wash them, well that was until we opened the bag. Turned out that the nuts had not been sorted out yet, and really needed to be done. Unfortunately most people were going into Bamako that day so that left me with the gardener Moussa sorting nuts. Moussa had a much better technique than I did. Mine was a little on the slow side, but I was still getting the job done. It did take a good three or four hours though to sift through those nuts picking out the good and bad. Turned out that there was only a small fraction of good nuts, but it was going to work for our butter making. It also took us quite a long time to find a machine to grind our nuts, but luck was on our side. The women were excited to see a group of Bambara speaking Toubabs, we were excited to make some butter with them. The shea butter making process is not necessarily the easiest thing to do. You take the nuts that have been ground into a paste (the good nuts paste looked more like peanut butter) and had some water to it, then you slowly mix with your hands. Once the water is well mixed into the paste, well then you start ‘beating it’. Yes, beating… in fact the phrase in Bambara for this thing is called Kolo goshi, which literally means beat nuts. Its like your whole body gets into it, arms are all over the place, butt is pretty much bouncing around. I think there is some video of me beating shea butter floating around, but I’ll let you try to find it on your own. After beating it for awhile, a little hot water is added, beating continues, and then, once the white oil seems to be coming from the mix, you beat it just a little bit more… and finally you can add a ton of water to separate the butter from the paste. As you add the water, the butter floats to the top. It is recommended that woman wash the butter 5 or 6 times, to the point that the water they are washing the butter with looks good enough to drink. Then the butter is through into a large pot sitting on a fire and boiled, once boiled, it will be filtered and left to sit over night. The next morning the women are to repeat that step, and finally, the butter is ready and hopefully of excellent quality. Malians use the butter for many things here, it is used for cooking, as medicine, and as lotion. Shea butter does have a different taste that what we may be used to, but I have grown accustomed to the taste and do occasional crave it if it has been awhile since the last time I had some. Others say the medicinal properties of shea is beyond this world.
So we had worked to sunset, and then we were off on our way for the last night at Tubani So. I had a great time, but I was ready for training to be over.

Tuesday morning I headed back to the bureau and was lucky enough to run into my BFF Therese and her friend Darby. It was a lot of fun to run into them and catch up. By afternoon I was ready to escape the city of Bamako and head to Koulikoro. I was hoping to see my best friend GQ, but unfortunately his plate was too full to come back for a visit, so we will have to save that for some other time. I got to KKRO and found the house electricity was out, not a big deal, im a broussie kono mogo (person from the bush) so it wasn’t going to be too hard to survive. Except for the fact that since electricity is so available around here, it was a lot harder to find kerosene lamp oil than I thought it would be. I probably spent at least an hour wondering around, but that at least let me explore some new corners of KKRO gare. That night I called Natasha up and said that we should hang, we went and visited her grin down the road (strangely near DJ’s fam’s house) and drank tea with them for a few hours. It is still so weird to me to notice the dynamic differences between people in my village and people here in this big city. I found out that the guys that we hang out with do really cool volunteer work. They are a peer support group that offers a hotline for people who have questions about sex related topics. Mali is a pretty conservative country, so it can be very embarrassing and strange to even talk about sex here. The hotline is really cool in the sense that people can just beep (telephone rings and as someone picks up you hang up… some would consider this prank call… here… it is completely appropriate) the hotline number and the hotline folks will return the call (most people are on a ‘buy credit as you go’ cell plan, so it is not necessarily cheap for everyone to make long phone calls). The caller can ask anything, and the peer support will work with all of their resources to help answer the questions or direct them onto the right path.

Well Natasha told me that she was holding a dance and there would be activities to teach people about HIV/AIDS and asked if I wanted to help out. I was more than excited to do that. She said that she wanted to get an ad and do a short formation on the radio the night before the dance and asked if I wanted to participate. I was really excited. I’ve been trying forever to try to get on the radio in Nyamina, but that still hasn’t worked out. We didn’t do a live show because the guy didn’t show up but we did get to tape ourselves and the guy promised to play it on the radio (whether this happened who knows?). The day of the dance was Christmas. Christmas I kind of woke up, went outside as the sun was rising, sat reading a nice book, and realizing that, wow, its Christmas! Natasha woke up and we hung out talking until her family called her to tell her to go home. I walked with her down to the street to get a bus back to her house and we got some sandwiches before she hopped on. I headed back to the house to find that Brendan, Nick, and Amber were awake, playing some Christmas tunes. I put our Christmas tea on the burner (gingerbread flavored that I conveniently found in my backpack that mom just sent…. The tea is at least two years old… I remember I bought it two winter two years ago… weird) which paired deliciously well with milk! We had a nice relaxing day making no bake cookies, watching movies. Later in the afternoon late evening, Natasha called me to go to her house. Her house was a lot further than I had expected, so it was good I left early. What was crazy is that she was in a part of town that I had never seen before. The government had built a market there so that people would move market off the street on Sunday… the road to the new market is really nice and it almost feels like you are in suburban US for one split second… but of course, no one uses the market, because they didn’t want it in the first place… another sign of bad development. It was really cool to see where Natasha really lived. I always pictured it to be like somewhere else, but it was nothing like I expected. The dance was a ton of fun. I had a lot of fun meeting more of Natasha’s friends and Coworkers. Dancing is always fun of course. And having a Malian ask you in front of a crowd of 200 if you wear a condom when you have sex… embarrassingly not thinking about thinking before speaking and busting out with “OF COURSE!!! CHAQUE FOIS N be manani don” (each/every time I wear a condom). Everyone laughed at my enthousiasm in answering my question… I kinda felt like “doh” did I really just do that. But maybe if the toubab wears a condom… that might influence some others to do it. It was weird to be at a dance that wasn’t in Nyamina. The people in KKRO are mad dancers… The proportion of good dancers to bad was better than that in Nyamina, which only made me more self conscious about dancing. But DJ dugutugi egged me on, so I was up for the challenge. Overall awesome night… No falling asleep early… and that basically brings me back to today. The best part of all of this is that it shows that….I’m still doing some work and having a lot of fun mixed up with it.

So yeah, I’m still alive… loving this place… still trying to figure out the future some, but hopefully things start to fall in place.

Hope you all had some really nice holidays!