Back at Tubaniso for mid-service training. Talking to experts and fellow PCVs alike to design some serious projects for my village. It’s fun, but also kind of strange being around so many Americans all day- it takes a bit getting used to. I’m also going to some French and Bambara classes- its amazing how terrible my French has become and how easy it is now to speak Bambara. By the end of this three week training, I want to describe to you some of the big projects I am designing for Dombila. Until then, I hope to entertain you with some more details about life in Dombila.
K’an ben fo singe were! (Goodbye until next time!)
Friday, January 16, 2009
A few short profiles
Here are some descriptions of my favorite people in Dombila- more to come in the coming weeks:
1) Cesalo- the youngest of my posse of boys. I love this picture because it looks like one of those “Save the African children” kind of things- like he’s this steadfast kid holding his seriously survival skills in the hardest of conditions. Alright, well he does have some hardships. But really- this kid’s a goof. Your run of the mill, 8 year old goof. If he was smiling in this picture, you’d see that he’s got these two crooked front teath that are way too big for him. He skips around pretending he is a zylophone player, making up little songs that always sound like “Dink-a-dink-ee-dink-a--dink-ee”, and he refuses to get up for school. The whole family will be eating the morning porriage outside and you’ll hear my host dad: “Ba?” (Cesalo’s nickname.) He grunts and moans from inside. “You going to school today?” More grunts and moans. “Get your lazy self up!”
2)Prookie Prookie
Say it outloud. It’s funnier. My coworker, Sali, is my age. A hip, single, stunning girl, always sporting some flashing earings or a new quaff of fake hair (very popular among Malian women). She caught on to the fact that I plucked my eyebrows, she asks me constantly to do them for her, which is a fun event. “Aminata! Prookie Prookie”- the phrase she uses for plucking which always comes in a high squeaky voice with her motioning to her eyebrows and squinting her eyes. It’s fun hanging out with Sali because its like being one of the girls again. When all the women are gone in from prenatal counsels, she’ll sneak on the scale to weigh herself. Barely 110 lbs, she squeals for joy when she gains weight. If she’s a little light, she’ll pout and make up some excuse, “Well it’s because I’m hungry. I haven’t eaten lunch yet.” Then I’ll step on the scale and she’ll congratulate me for being so fat. She has a little crush on Hunter, one of the other volunteers that came to visit my site all of 3 hours one September afternoon. One morning she exclaimed “Aminata! I figured out why Shakaboubakar doesn’t like me. I’m too skinny! Well that’s ok. If he marries me, he’ll take me to America, and I’ll get really fat.”
3) My host mother, Gneba, is in many ways a little too much like my mother from the United States. She is the woman of the house- and when she’s sifting her millet to make dinner- she is queen of the kitchen- and the rest of the family knows better than to get in the way of her work of art. (The major difference here is Gina’s chicken parm is much more of a work of art than Gneba’s “to”.)
And then I got sick. For about of week I was out with a fever, cough, all those wonderful cold things. My host mom forbids me to bathe without heating my water, from riding my bike without a dust mask, and especially- running. One day, I still had a cough but my body was feeling better, but Gneba had forbidden- FORBIDDEN me from going out for a run. It had been a week since I had done any sort of physical activity, so I was getting antsy. I was about to go out and jog in the fields, when she entered our consession- I hid behind my door. With a bunch of giggling, tattling children around all the time- this never works.
“Aminata- why are you hiding from me?”
I sheepishy showed myself and approached her with my head down.
“Take OFF your running shoes. Take OFF your running clothes and go sit down and drink some tea.”
“It’s really alright, I’m only running a little.”
“You are not smart, Aminata!”
I went out for 10 minutes, my lungs burning and my head pounding. I came back, threw off my running shoes, sat my but down and drank some tea with my host dad. The queen of the kichten was stiring the pot on the fire and looks over to me. “I told you so.”
The market at Dio
I have dubbed the market at Dio the most obnoxious place on earth. If I can avoid it, I do. Which is never. Every Saturday morning, I seem to find myself making the 7k trip to stock up on peanut butter, eggs, and whatever fruits are in season. Besides, since everybody in a radius of about 10 miles goes to Dio for market and Saturday, if I didn’t go, what the heck else would I do? Every woman magnetically flocks to Dio, walking miles and miles in lines like ducklings, with their babies sagging on their backs and large baskets of god-knows what on their heads. I always felt especially bad for the milk sellers. A whole utility bucket of milk is pretty hard to carry on your head. And if it falls- unlike other goods- its done. I was once on a soutraum- the brushie Malian form of transportation, with a milk seller. As always, people were crammed on top of each other. An unfortunate milk seller saw the fruit of her lengthy labor spill all over the vehicle’s floor, and the rest of us enjoyed a nice ride with curdling, un-pastersized, whole milk sloshing around the hot tin below our feet.
Anyway, the Dio market was obnoxious at first, when I was new to the area, and no one knew me. Everyone wanted to know who I was, where I came from, and most importantly, what I wanted to buy. All the yells of the kids, “Tubabu! Tubabu!” were easily ignored as well as the calls of the sellers, “Come here white woman! You buy this! You buy that!” Now, not only do they call to me, but I know about half of the people personally and to ignore them would be a put down.
“Aminata!”
Oh hi! How’s the market going?
“Don’t you want to buy some [insert good]”
Sorry, not buying it today.
[At this point, the conversation most always moves into joking cousin. If the person’s last name is amenable with mine, I am her sister, so why do I not buy? If it is a feuding last name, I am worthless because I eat beans. I have written before how useful bean jokes and joking cousins are to integrating into Malian culture. The joke that hasn’t gotten old in centuries- it still cracks people up every time. But really, to us Americans, it DOES get old after a while. To go from point A to point B in the market involves stopping to great EVERYONE, and appeasing them with the appropriate bean joke after a series of lengthy greetings- well, it gets exhausting.]
Strolling from bean joke to bean joke can be quite exhausting… I just want my freakin peanut butter!
In Dio, half of the people think that I am the Dio volunteer, Caroline, or Masaba. So I must answer to multiple names, and be especially on my toes when they call me the right name- this is a hint that I should know the person. So I almost always pretend I do, though getting people’s names right is still a chore.
If I do make it to the peanut butter, I find 5 women sitting under a hanger, side by side, all selling peanut butter- separately. It’s like the 4 gas stations on each corner of the intersection- but same price, quantity, and quality. If I buy from one, the others wonder why I didn’t buy from them. I should really try to keep track. “Are you going to make peanut butter sauce?” they ask- (The idea of a white girl cooking is apparently very funny).
“No,” another one will say, “These white girls- they put peanut butter on bread!”
And that just kills them up. Meanwhile, I’m standing there, watching sun go down, as I’m trying to decide if I can get everything I need and get back to Dombila.
I then go get my eggs from the butiki- this little arab boy works there who has a big crush on me, and always asks if I want the really big bag of powdered milk. Nice kid but very slow at math. Afterwords, I go get my fish from my fish man. He’s this old gruffy looking man who comes from the North region by the Niger river. The fish one can buy at a Malian market are blackened, dried, and curled up. Yup, hard and crispy as can be. And no, I don’t cook with these- I give them to my homolouge and my host family. But when I’m served one, steamed over a plate of rice- I think happy thoughts about Omega-3s and protein, close my eyes, shove it in my mouth and spit out the bones. The head is another story. So I greet my old smiley, squinty man, who gives me some of his fish and tells me how the roads were for his trip in the morning. I’d like to hang out and chill with him for a while, but unfortunately his stand is in the danger zone- the goat-meat guy’s zone.
It is at this point, after buying my fish, that without fail I will be grabbed by the goat meat guy. There are a couple of these guys that hang out, steaming a whole goat and selling little pieces of meat. This one’s a big, sweaty, boisterous fool with a little sly moustache. “My wife has come!-[that would be me]- Surely you buy meat today.” He takes my arm and leads me over to look at the beauty that is the bloody ribs of a newly slaughtered goat. Irresistible. Ever since I once bought a few pieces of meat to bring back to my family- he thinks I’m gonna buy him out every time.
Then it’s looking for bananas. For some reason, the banana sellers just can’t sit still. They don’t hang out on a little stand like the rest of people. They wander around (“yala-yala”) with the banana’s on their head- and there’s only a couple of them. So when you spot them it’s like Where’s Waldo- but they disappear into the crowd just as fast as you spot them. So I find myself pushing through the people on the road following the floating yellow head on the other side of the crowd.
Only to be bothered by the bus drivers.
On the road there are cars with stacks and stacks of goods on the top and van (soutrums) and their drivers bouncing around bugging people (especially me)- “Where are you going? Bamako! Kati! Bamako!” Well obviously, you must be going somewhere, you have a backpack on.
“Here. I’m staying here.”
No, you don’t understand white girl- where are you going? What car do you want to get on?
I don’t want to get in your junky car! I just want to find the banana lady!
And if I make it through all of this- I hit the road to Caroline’s house, greeting every single person with lengthy Bambara salutations on the way. Whether she’s there or not, I sit for a few minutes, catch my breath, and put my eggs in my bra (I figured out this is the only way they won’t break on my return bumpy bike ride.) I miss Wegmans.
Anyway, the Dio market was obnoxious at first, when I was new to the area, and no one knew me. Everyone wanted to know who I was, where I came from, and most importantly, what I wanted to buy. All the yells of the kids, “Tubabu! Tubabu!” were easily ignored as well as the calls of the sellers, “Come here white woman! You buy this! You buy that!” Now, not only do they call to me, but I know about half of the people personally and to ignore them would be a put down.
“Aminata!”
Oh hi! How’s the market going?
“Don’t you want to buy some [insert good]”
Sorry, not buying it today.
[At this point, the conversation most always moves into joking cousin. If the person’s last name is amenable with mine, I am her sister, so why do I not buy? If it is a feuding last name, I am worthless because I eat beans. I have written before how useful bean jokes and joking cousins are to integrating into Malian culture. The joke that hasn’t gotten old in centuries- it still cracks people up every time. But really, to us Americans, it DOES get old after a while. To go from point A to point B in the market involves stopping to great EVERYONE, and appeasing them with the appropriate bean joke after a series of lengthy greetings- well, it gets exhausting.]
Strolling from bean joke to bean joke can be quite exhausting… I just want my freakin peanut butter!
In Dio, half of the people think that I am the Dio volunteer, Caroline, or Masaba. So I must answer to multiple names, and be especially on my toes when they call me the right name- this is a hint that I should know the person. So I almost always pretend I do, though getting people’s names right is still a chore.
If I do make it to the peanut butter, I find 5 women sitting under a hanger, side by side, all selling peanut butter- separately. It’s like the 4 gas stations on each corner of the intersection- but same price, quantity, and quality. If I buy from one, the others wonder why I didn’t buy from them. I should really try to keep track. “Are you going to make peanut butter sauce?” they ask- (The idea of a white girl cooking is apparently very funny).
“No,” another one will say, “These white girls- they put peanut butter on bread!”
And that just kills them up. Meanwhile, I’m standing there, watching sun go down, as I’m trying to decide if I can get everything I need and get back to Dombila.
I then go get my eggs from the butiki- this little arab boy works there who has a big crush on me, and always asks if I want the really big bag of powdered milk. Nice kid but very slow at math. Afterwords, I go get my fish from my fish man. He’s this old gruffy looking man who comes from the North region by the Niger river. The fish one can buy at a Malian market are blackened, dried, and curled up. Yup, hard and crispy as can be. And no, I don’t cook with these- I give them to my homolouge and my host family. But when I’m served one, steamed over a plate of rice- I think happy thoughts about Omega-3s and protein, close my eyes, shove it in my mouth and spit out the bones. The head is another story. So I greet my old smiley, squinty man, who gives me some of his fish and tells me how the roads were for his trip in the morning. I’d like to hang out and chill with him for a while, but unfortunately his stand is in the danger zone- the goat-meat guy’s zone.
It is at this point, after buying my fish, that without fail I will be grabbed by the goat meat guy. There are a couple of these guys that hang out, steaming a whole goat and selling little pieces of meat. This one’s a big, sweaty, boisterous fool with a little sly moustache. “My wife has come!-[that would be me]- Surely you buy meat today.” He takes my arm and leads me over to look at the beauty that is the bloody ribs of a newly slaughtered goat. Irresistible. Ever since I once bought a few pieces of meat to bring back to my family- he thinks I’m gonna buy him out every time.
Then it’s looking for bananas. For some reason, the banana sellers just can’t sit still. They don’t hang out on a little stand like the rest of people. They wander around (“yala-yala”) with the banana’s on their head- and there’s only a couple of them. So when you spot them it’s like Where’s Waldo- but they disappear into the crowd just as fast as you spot them. So I find myself pushing through the people on the road following the floating yellow head on the other side of the crowd.
Only to be bothered by the bus drivers.
On the road there are cars with stacks and stacks of goods on the top and van (soutrums) and their drivers bouncing around bugging people (especially me)- “Where are you going? Bamako! Kati! Bamako!” Well obviously, you must be going somewhere, you have a backpack on.
“Here. I’m staying here.”
No, you don’t understand white girl- where are you going? What car do you want to get on?
I don’t want to get in your junky car! I just want to find the banana lady!
And if I make it through all of this- I hit the road to Caroline’s house, greeting every single person with lengthy Bambara salutations on the way. Whether she’s there or not, I sit for a few minutes, catch my breath, and put my eggs in my bra (I figured out this is the only way they won’t break on my return bumpy bike ride.) I miss Wegmans.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)