My apologies for the delay on new blogs. A lot has been going on personally, my mind cluttered with things that I just couldn’t find blog-appropriate words for. With a pretty solid plan for the rest of my service, I’ve been recently thrown for some loops. A potentially serious relationship ended, because of just that- it was getting potentially serious. A position I thought I had locked, Health Trainer for the July-September training for new volunteers, was given to someone else. And I’m left now with a month of village work left, and 4 more months of floundering until I go home, to do some more floundering.
We all want purpose, and I believe we all have purpose. In the hot hours of the day when the rest of the village is sleeping or sipping tea, I spend a lot of time alone, just writing or thinking. We want purpose for what? Ourselves? Our society? God? We are happiest when we’re busy, entrusted with a great task, and then praised for our good work. But here I am among people who are perfectly at peace of mind drinking tea and surrendering their afternoon to the sizzling, hypnotic sun. I, on the other hand, am restless. I’m running so much, thinking so much of home, obsessively trying to map my life’s route sans destination. Without always 4realizing it, I’m missing Irene, who had some sort of larger-than-life way about everything that kept days at the CSCOM moving. Here in Dombila, we got some work done. We have a little work left to do. But can I really sit here in my hut going crazy through the slow rainy season?
I have some traveling I want to do, but I feel site guilt even now. I’ve worked but I want to work more. Tireless determination. It’s something I long for but it easily fails to launch in 113 degree heat. I want to go to hidden stone villages of Dogon country, and out to Uganda to solve some mysteries regarding an AIDS victim that has haunted my thoughts for four years. I want to run, run, run. And then, I want to go home. My friends are extending their services in other countries: Hunter’s off to China, Caroline to Nicaragua, Chris to Fiji, and others are looking for jobs or preparing for grad school. I could be off somewhere- there are plenty of opportunities for me in Africa and beyond. I could search for a job in a city as I’m preparing for grad school in 2011. But right now, and I know I might change my mind, I can’t think of anywhere I’d rather be than home.
At least there are mangos. More than imaginable. We’ve had short passing wind storms that whip dust into your face and drop mangos like bombs all around. You literally have to duck and cover. I meticulously solar dry the fruit, with the admiration but reluctance to participate from my Malian neighbors.
There is still plenty to keep me busy for a while. School is still in session, and we’re finishing up the health lessons, preparing for the mural project, and training the high schoolers for their physical education final exam (in long jump, shot put, and 100m dash). We have a couple of wells left to finish, as well as a big finale to the project, an evaluation and goal-setting two day conference with Peace Corps Volunteers. We’re supervising the community health workers more closely, and have their first official report review on Thursday. My new homologue and I attended a week long training session at Tubaniso, and returned with more ideas on nutrition and food security. Lauren is also busy raising money for new desks at her school (you can donate through www.peacecorps.gov), launching a soap formation, and training adult literacy teachers.
I’ve been filling up journals, trying to foresee the ending of this story instead of living it. I’m taking it day by day, even now. In truth, I’m terrified of the transition, and I’m longing for some structure and plan. But I have to accept that I’m still on an adventure, and these strange dust storms come at unexpected times. I am not sure where I’ll end up, and why. I just hope that, underneath the scattered and thirsty dirt roads I run, there is purpose.
Tuesday, May 4, 2010
My other job- Playdoh supervisor
Some Christian group came with cartons of Christmas packages for the kids in 1st-6th grade. It was such a mystery as to what was in them, for they were not to be opened until the American patron came. It would have been interesting to meet these guys, reportedly from North Carolina, but I was careful to keep my distance from the commotion. A while back a World Vision truck came giving someones unwanted dress shirts and dozens of Breast Cancer Awareness visors, probably left over from some unsuccessful event. I barely entered the scene, scored a visor from the insistence of the Malians, and for weeks afterwords, paid the repercussions.
“Aminata! Aminata!” I’d hear passing on my bike, “I didn’t get a hat!” “Where’s my teeshirt?” Ahh! I have no part in this! What would give you the idea that those boxes of unwanted clothes were my doing? Oh yeah, I’m white.
Needless to say, I made sure I had no part in the Christmas boxes. But I would be called into duty. Kids came home with pretty sweet boxes, filled with little toys, candy, soap, toothbrushes, even princess underwear that the boys constantly poked fun at Madu for receiving. Yet some things were just plain confusing. I had to stop Sali at the pharmacy for completely opening the chemicals in an instant handwarmer packet, school girls were rubbing glue sticks on their lips, people were approaching me for explanations of smelly candles, tree ornaments, glow sticks and lufas. But the most mysterious item of them all was first brought to attention by the middle school math teacher. “Aminata. We’re all wondering. What is ‘plaaeydoh?’”
Playdoh was a frequently found treasure in the packages, but misinterpreted as soap, cooking oil, chewing gum, or candy. All throughout the village, people young and old were trying to wash themselves with Playdoh or make it into an afternoon snack. It was getting too much.
“Dusu,” I said to my college at the CSCOM one day after vaccinations, “You want to come help me do a health animation at the school?” We went together, but not to talk about sanitation or malaria, but to explain to each class: This is playdoh. It’s a toy. Do not eat it!
“People are going to kill themselves!” Shaka exclaimed hanging out with the boys under my hanger. “They have no idea what any of this stuff is! If you weren’t here Aminata, we’d have some big problems. These gifts are crap!”
“They’re not crap,” I said, but couldn’t help agreeing with Shaka when he commented that they will all just turn into piles of trash in the next few months. That money should have gone to help fix the road, he decided. When did he get so insightful?
Nevertheless, kids are excited about the toys. They’ve never gotten anything like this before, so its special and exciting. I’m even a little jealous. It looks like packages I’d get from home, all of the M&Ms and life savers and such. Sweet, sweet America. Complete with a “Jesus loves you” blessing. I know even Shaka appreciated it, at least for the aspect of his favorite subject, cultural exchange. “When I become a big patron, I’m going to send boxes of Malian stuff to American school kids.”
“What would you send them?”
He had to think about that for a while. “Bicycles.”
These programs have a place in what we’re doing, as a simple act of kindness. Kindness can go a long way, but is not the only answer to these deep rooted problems. I’ll spare you another lament on the controversies of charity and development work, and leave you with the true moral of the story: Think twice before you send playdoh to Africa.
“Aminata! Aminata!” I’d hear passing on my bike, “I didn’t get a hat!” “Where’s my teeshirt?” Ahh! I have no part in this! What would give you the idea that those boxes of unwanted clothes were my doing? Oh yeah, I’m white.
Needless to say, I made sure I had no part in the Christmas boxes. But I would be called into duty. Kids came home with pretty sweet boxes, filled with little toys, candy, soap, toothbrushes, even princess underwear that the boys constantly poked fun at Madu for receiving. Yet some things were just plain confusing. I had to stop Sali at the pharmacy for completely opening the chemicals in an instant handwarmer packet, school girls were rubbing glue sticks on their lips, people were approaching me for explanations of smelly candles, tree ornaments, glow sticks and lufas. But the most mysterious item of them all was first brought to attention by the middle school math teacher. “Aminata. We’re all wondering. What is ‘plaaeydoh?’”
Playdoh was a frequently found treasure in the packages, but misinterpreted as soap, cooking oil, chewing gum, or candy. All throughout the village, people young and old were trying to wash themselves with Playdoh or make it into an afternoon snack. It was getting too much.
“Dusu,” I said to my college at the CSCOM one day after vaccinations, “You want to come help me do a health animation at the school?” We went together, but not to talk about sanitation or malaria, but to explain to each class: This is playdoh. It’s a toy. Do not eat it!
“People are going to kill themselves!” Shaka exclaimed hanging out with the boys under my hanger. “They have no idea what any of this stuff is! If you weren’t here Aminata, we’d have some big problems. These gifts are crap!”
“They’re not crap,” I said, but couldn’t help agreeing with Shaka when he commented that they will all just turn into piles of trash in the next few months. That money should have gone to help fix the road, he decided. When did he get so insightful?
Nevertheless, kids are excited about the toys. They’ve never gotten anything like this before, so its special and exciting. I’m even a little jealous. It looks like packages I’d get from home, all of the M&Ms and life savers and such. Sweet, sweet America. Complete with a “Jesus loves you” blessing. I know even Shaka appreciated it, at least for the aspect of his favorite subject, cultural exchange. “When I become a big patron, I’m going to send boxes of Malian stuff to American school kids.”
“What would you send them?”
He had to think about that for a while. “Bicycles.”
These programs have a place in what we’re doing, as a simple act of kindness. Kindness can go a long way, but is not the only answer to these deep rooted problems. I’ll spare you another lament on the controversies of charity and development work, and leave you with the true moral of the story: Think twice before you send playdoh to Africa.
Run to Kati
It had been talked about so much it had almost become a joke. Someday, we’ve been saying since last year, Shaka and I are going to run to the city of Kati. I tried writing training plans for him, get him to stick to some routine. However, I’d be ready for an afternoon run to find that he was cross-training by pulling water in the garden or that he went out to chase some rabbit through the fields with a sling-shot, or he was biking all around town doing his father’s errands. A week would go by and he’d only hop in a couple of my runs for 20 or 30 minutes. Then when he’d finally buckle down and run for an hour, it’d be like nothing. He was a natural, and just ran to the beat of his own drum. So finally I abandoned the notion of a routine, and proposed that we just do it.
We’d kid each other by backing out, or suggesting that we run even further than Kati, or that we’d each do it with one of the kids piggy-backing. I think we were both a little nervous, on my end, I was nervous that I was pressuring him into doing something he wasn’t ready for or he didn’t want to do. We decided to break up the 19 mile run by running 5 the afternoon before, spending the night at Caroline’s in Dio, and then run the remaining 14 at the crack of dawn. I wasn’t completely convinced he was serious about it until he showed up at my door, wearing the new jelly sandals I had picked up at the market, complemented by knee-high rainbow and heart studded socks with “LOVE” printed on them. They were another treasure in the infamous Christian gift boxes.
“Why are you laughing?” He asked.
“Nothing it’s nothing. Your socks, they’re high that’s all.” He starts to roll them down. “No! No! Please don’t. Leave them like that.” Caroline had to see this.
The three of us spent the evening playing cards and strolling the town. I was nervous he wouldn’t be able to eat in an unfamiliar setting, and at first he was reluctant to even admit he had an appetite. But as I watched him wolf down a large plate of beans and pasta I realized that this was probably the best meal he’s had in a long time.
Shaka didn’t sleep that night, fighting the heat inside Caroline’s house. Nevertheless, he was up with the dawn, left for his usual morning wander (he likes to just walk around a little in the morning), and joined me for some bread and coffee. I let him fix his own, and boy do Malians like their sugar. In the silence of the sunrise, we hardly spoke, except to crack a few jokes. “Let’s just run home.”
But he was all business as we set out on the road in a slow trot. The first 5 miles or so were like any other run we’ve done. We chatted away, about the buildings we passed, and what could be inside that mysterious cement factory, and how far the train tracks go. He kept asking me if we had arrived at Diago, a village about 8 miles from Dio, starting 10 minutes into the run. Does he realize how long this is going to be?
I clocked us at a safe 8:45 pace and forced him to take a sip of water after 75 minutes. He was doing fine, and I think enjoying seeing these new landmarks on the gloriously paved road. After about an hour and a half we arrived at the poste, the truck stop about 3 or 4 miles out from Hunter’s house. It was there we took a ten second water break, and there that Shaka stopped talking to me. I told him we were 20 minutes out, knowing it was more like 30 minutes. His eyebrows hardened, and his arms took wider swings. “It’s not your legs or your body that will get you there now,” I said, “it’s your courage.” We treaded on up a gradual uphill. A few minutes later he replied, “My courage is ‘a baana’”. ‘Finished.’
Yet he refused to stop or to slow the pace. We reached the city, and I knew that he thought every house we passed was Hunter’s. Little did he know we still had a couple of miles. “Yes we can!” I said in English. He thought we had arrived. Oh, not yet.
Cresting the last hill, just 600 meters from the finish, he proposed we walk a bit. “No way! I said! We’re already there!” So he picked up the pace, somehow landing softly on a rocky ground in flimsy plastic sandles, automatically corrected his posture, and soared. I did a little cheer as we rounded the last corner, a minute over 2 hours, slapped him a bunch of high fives, and caught his embarrassed smile toward the ground.
We found Hunter still asleep but prepared with Shaka’s reward of cocunuts and cold soda pops. The day was a bit awkward, walking around the city, showing the quiet Shaka things he’d never seen before- the jail, the hospital, the internet café. I bought him some yogurt, which he loved, and we made avocado and egg sandwhiches for lunch. We relaxed in Hunter’s house with fans and tile floors, and I asked Shaka if he had ever bathed in a shower before.
“No,” he replied, “Have you?”
I turned it on to show him, and he jumped back in fright at the water spewing from the shower head. But when he emerged looking clean and content, I asked him how it was. He nodded. “It was alright.”
We watched a movie with Hunter on his computer, and Shaka said he missed his mom. The whole day, I wasn’t sure if he was glad we came or not. We piled in a bush taxi to get us back to Dio, and then he biked alongside me as I ran back to Dombila. We passed an old man who asked, as they do every market day,“Hey, did she run all the way from Dio?” Shaka answered yes, and biked by. Then he turned around and replied, “Do you think Dio’s far for us?” And I told him of the great feat that we had just accomplished- running to Kati. After that, Shaka opened up and talked with such enthusiasm about Hunter’s house and the Kati market. “We gotta go back,” he said. “But next time, we’ll take a car.”
“You didn’t have a nice run?”
“No, the run was great!” he said. “But next time, we’re taking a car.”
Monday, March 15, 2010
There is an air conditioner over my head
Well as you could see from the date of my last blog, it has been a while. I’ve been in site for way too long this time- about 5 weeks (minus one quick less than 24 hour stint in Bamako). It feels so good to be sitting in front of a computer I can’t even tell you. I’m at the new Peace Corps Bureau under the air conditioning, and with temperatures threatening to break 110 degrees, it is certainly a blessing. The last couple of days I’ve been useless, counting down the hours until my escape. Even my Bambara is cloudy. I always feel like I want to stay in site as long as possible but this time I’ve learned that once it gets too long, you grow stale and restless until you get a little refresher. So I hope that this will be one and that I’ll return renewed and ready for action.
The last five weeks have generally been great, though I’ve been a little homesick, especially after a recent tragedy back in my hometown. (My continual prayers go out for the Cannon family). Little annoyances can get to you in village after being around for so long. People asking you for stuff (I tried as an experiment to keep track for a week, but lost count after about 3 days and over a dozen requests), people interrupting what you are focused on to give you a zillion greetings, you know, all that normal everyday stuff. And I found myself getting a bit detached, my dreams of post Peace Corps life becoming more and more serious and frequent. I know I toyed with the idea of extending my service, but with the way things are going in such a natural and fulfilling progression, I think that in September, I’ll be ready. I can visualize the next 6 months, the competition and follow up of my projects, and I know when it’s time to go, I’ll be thoroughly satisfied. And then…? Who knows? I’d like to get a Masters in Public Health but that wouldn’t start until July 2011 at the earliest. I want to be home for a while, but also want to travel and see East Africa (Uganda, Kenya, Rwanda). I want to research a story out there that I had written a play about in college and maybe even do some volunteering. But I still strive to embrace this unique life I’m living now. Watching malnourished babies get fat and plump never looses its enchantment. One day I’ll leave this village for another refresher, like now, to get a break from the annoyances, but the difference will be that I won’t be coming back. And who knows, when I’m back, it might be those little annoyances that I’ll terribly miss.
But I’m still happy, still doing great, and still thinking of all of you. And I have only had one foot infection since I came back that didn’t even require oral antibiotics. Life is good.
The last five weeks have generally been great, though I’ve been a little homesick, especially after a recent tragedy back in my hometown. (My continual prayers go out for the Cannon family). Little annoyances can get to you in village after being around for so long. People asking you for stuff (I tried as an experiment to keep track for a week, but lost count after about 3 days and over a dozen requests), people interrupting what you are focused on to give you a zillion greetings, you know, all that normal everyday stuff. And I found myself getting a bit detached, my dreams of post Peace Corps life becoming more and more serious and frequent. I know I toyed with the idea of extending my service, but with the way things are going in such a natural and fulfilling progression, I think that in September, I’ll be ready. I can visualize the next 6 months, the competition and follow up of my projects, and I know when it’s time to go, I’ll be thoroughly satisfied. And then…? Who knows? I’d like to get a Masters in Public Health but that wouldn’t start until July 2011 at the earliest. I want to be home for a while, but also want to travel and see East Africa (Uganda, Kenya, Rwanda). I want to research a story out there that I had written a play about in college and maybe even do some volunteering. But I still strive to embrace this unique life I’m living now. Watching malnourished babies get fat and plump never looses its enchantment. One day I’ll leave this village for another refresher, like now, to get a break from the annoyances, but the difference will be that I won’t be coming back. And who knows, when I’m back, it might be those little annoyances that I’ll terribly miss.
But I’m still happy, still doing great, and still thinking of all of you. And I have only had one foot infection since I came back that didn’t even require oral antibiotics. Life is good.
March 8- Women's Day
The sun was getting hot and I was still sitting at home. I had put off our second meeting for International Women’s Day until last Friday, which was a big mistake. We were completely disorganized and unprepared, so much so that the small group of 6 women and 3 men decided that we would meet bright and early, 7:30am, to finish the preparations for our day-long Women’s Day campaign. I took the day off of regular Sunday baby weighings for the occasion. People started rolling in at about 9:00, and by 10:45 we were all still sitting around, waiting for the rest to show up.
Women’s Day in Mali , annually March 8, is centred around the idea that women should take the day off of housework, relax, and let the men pick up the slack. But with expensive theme fabric sold every year to wealthier women who attend Women’s Day parties, the misconception around the country is that if you can’t afford this year’s fabric, then it’s not your holiday. I had meeting a couple weeks back with some of my closest lady friends (it feels good to say that, me and the girls), and though we knew that fabric was out of the question, they also said that having a Women’s party would be difficult because no one would put in any money for it. Instead, we decided we would “yala-yala,” walk around town that is, and try to raise awareness for what Huit- Mars is and how women can take it as a day of celebration and relaxation, no matter how much money they have. We wanted to convince men, by having them sign a petition, to take on women’s work for the day as a sign of respect and appreciation. These activities would be on March 7, so that men would know to get their butts up and draw the water at the break of the next dawn. Our small group would pitch in money to take a lunch break, catered by some brave volunteer men. Sounds like a good idea right?
Well I was getting jittery. We decided to not go around town until after lunch, so we sat some more. And boy was it getting hot. We had a few laughs as the three men peeled the vegetables and sifted the rice. The cooking team was led by Baru, a regular ham who showed up in a striped suit looking like a ragtime dancer. He has a reputation for being the only man in town who can cook, and does so periodically at his home. It was all good and fun but we still didn’t have a song. Or a skit. Or a plan. All we had were these nifty flags that I made the night before out of some extra fabric Gneba had lying around. The last few people trickled in just as lunch was finishing up. Let’s get going people!
It was hard to get them up, especially Sungura, the pregnant woman, who constantly complained that we didn’t have this or that in the rice. Now I’m thinking this isn’t going to happen after all. Maybe they did just come for the food. I wanted to prepare the skit but no one would listen to me! They were all just laughing and carrying on like we didn’t already waste half the day. I reverted to my 8 year old self, directing plays in my basement, ordering people this way and that so that it could come out exactly the way I wanted it. They were all so full of energy anyway that they were able to improvised their way though it. A mess of course, but entertaining and hopefully persuasive. Dalfinie and Genba were lying on the mat pretending to be children, but just laughing so hard they were crying. Meanwhile, Teresi’s head is churning trying to come up with a tune to sign our battle cry to. I don’t know who finally started the march but all the sudden the laughter and chaos fuelled us on our feet we were marching through the village.
Teresi started singing and the rest would repeat after her. Baro and some of the children had brought empty jugs to bang on as drums. I had my guitar and was picking up an accompaniment to match Teresi’s song. We made our way through the village, our strange blend of revolutionaries and revellers. If we happened upon a woman, we’d take her millet pounder or bucket of laundry away from her and make her dance with us in a circle. If we came upon a man, we’d explain our purpose and ask for his pledge to help out his woman on the 8th.
“Look at our flag, it’s the flag of women!” Teresi sang.
“Our flag! Look at our flag!” we responded
“Look at our flag it’s the flag of working”
“Our flag! Look at our flag!”
Or we’d add, the flag of cooking, or pounding millet, or washing children, or pulling water, or carrying firewood, or any of the other dozens of things Malian women are expected to do on a daily basis. The man we ganged up on would be a bit uncomfortable at first, but then start getting into the beat, some even danced. And then it would be silent, the man would announce a pledge of what he could do the next day, Daramane would scribe it on our big petition and the man would sign in a colourful marker. We’d check up on them, we promised.
Cheers would then erupt followed by Teresi’s song:
“Where’d this wind come from?”
“It’s a great big wind!”
The sun was certainly burning my skin and I had that weak feeling of dehydration as we marched, but I didn’t care. We kept picking up people as we went- dancing children, women bouncing around babies on their back while clapping their hands, until we became a regular parade. My host dad, surprisingly, was especially jovial and into the festivities. Nothing I planned came through. What came out was better. All assured me that this was going to be an annual event, growing and growing year after year. Even now, I got to learn to relax, let go of the reins, be prepared but flexible and trusting, and most of all, to respect the abilities and the natural flow of doing things inert in the Malians. Sure sometimes I got to swallow my zealousness and sit around for a while, but more often than not, things eventually get up and going. I can’t start a storm, but if I let go and join in the way the wind is blowing, it could be a great big wind.
Through all the fun, I kept looking over at Dafinie. Fatim has gotten older now, and it strains Dalfine’s back to carry her. I could tell she was having fun, she loves to dance as I learned since my first day in village. She loves to spend time with the ladies. But her smile was a removed one, covering a hopeless gaze, Mody was a solid figure that could never be remodled and she knowing that anything we achieved with this little Women’s Rights wind we started would never reach her husband. The group didn’t even bother to go visit her house. It was intrinsic knowledge that Mody would never be on board with such a thing. She’s tired, she’s thin, and though we know we convinced some men to pull the water and pound the millet, Dafline knew that she would be labouring again in the morning, uninterrupted, unacknowledged.
“You want to come over and chat tonight?” Shaka asked on that evening’s run. It’s usually a second hand request- Dalfine is too embarrassed to ask me herself.
“Of course. Is Dalfinie Ok?”
“She had so much fun today! But lately she’s been thinking too much. Too much thinking is not good for a person.” Shaka told me about her hopes of going to Bamako to live with relatives there, leaving Dombila, and Mody, for good. Bamako’s a tough and dirty life for a poor person, but if she has some relatives to support her, it’s better that she hurries herself up and go. I’d like to believe the schools are better there too, anything has to be better than Dombila, and I would love Shaka to have that. She’s waiting for all the ducks to get in line- for Adama’s schooling to get on break, for her older daughter to work out this job at a hair salon, for the gardening to be over.
“If I go, I want to stay there. If my relatives agree,” she told me sitting on the log outside her house that night. “I’m suffering here. Even yesterday I was beaten.” She wants to go, but she seems so defeated, and the distant dream has no clear path of realization for her. It would take not just planning, but some assertiveness on her part. She wants this but she won’t fight for it. Understandable. I’d be tired of fighting too.
“Dalfinie, you need some goals. If you want this of that to happen, saying it and thinking about it forever won’t get you anywhere.” We talked about this for a while and said that next time I come, we’ll write down her plan.
She grew silent, gazing not at the stars but straight ahead. I practiced a bit of English with Shaka, and then went off to bed. Maybe I could have sat with her longer. It seems like that would have been the only thing I could do. But sitting can only get you so far. Eventually the sun gets hot, the night gets deep, and you got to get up, march on, and follow the wind.
Lost at Night
I should have been more scared than I was. Well, I was scared, but I made it through. The plateau between Lauren’s site and mine is full of small winding roads that go in and out of rocky fields. Some become larger roads, that temp you into turning on them. Some get smaller and smaller until they disappear altogether. I finally got one route down, but I am constantly persuaded to take the short cuts. I never actually took the ledgendary “school kids’ road” because every time I’d find myself twisting and turning until it took me twice as long as usual to get back.
But when Shaka declined an afternoon run to Koyan, I started on the 4.5 mile road myself. On the way, I picked up a litter of high school kids on their way home. We ran and laughed as they tried their new English lesson on me. Suddenly we parted ways. “This road is much shorter!” they told me. Ahhh… the school kids road! Assuring me they were able to hun the whole way with me, (two of them ended up doing so), I agreed to take this unknown path.
It was indeed shorter. It usually takes me about 38 minutes to run to Lauren’s at a steady pace but today it was just 32. Lauren looked beat. She had just been hit by the disenchantment of returning to Mali after a vacation to Spain with her parents. Homesickness, but even more so, heat sickness. “It snowed in Madrid,” she said longingly. With highs constantly 106 F or above, the heat was starting to get to all of us, even the Malians. It just slows you down. My relief is pouring buckets of water over my head throughout the day. Lauren is considering going all out and buying a car battery that she can hook a fan up to.
But now it was bearable. The sun was going down and it was time for me to make my way back to Dombila. Mistake number one- trying to take the “school kids’ road.” After a good 20 minutes I ended up on the plateau overlooking Koyan again. I gave it another try, which having brought myself back to a place where I could take a familiar yet longer road, was clearly Mistake Number Two. I ran and ran as the sun was quickly setting. At one point lost in the brush, I spotted some school girls and they pointed me toward a path I had long strayed from. “It’s just one road straight to Dombila!” That’s what they all say. It’s just one road when you’re used to that one road and you have your blinders on to block all the other dozens of intersections.
It’s night time. I can still see the trail but I have no idea where I am. I spot a fire in the distance- it must be a hut. If I can just make my way toward that settlement I can ask for help. If I find that I am a long way off from Dombila, I’d break Peace Corps policy and beg someone to take me to my host family on their motorcycle. Or I would just spend the night in the wilderness.
As that thought crossed my mind, I immediately thought of that night, in the second months of my service that I was lost in Dio at night. With Caroline out of town, I called Hunter hysterical. I was wandering around scared to death. It’s an experience I never wrote about on this blog because it would have sent Mom flipping out.
But here, I was just running, and running and running. If I stopped to get upset I would never get anywhere. I’m on this one road now, and I have no idea if it leads to Dombila. I can only pray it does, or that it leads my to a friendly village that can somehow help me get back. I can barely see and from that a Bible verse popped into my head. It’s one that I once chanted to myself during a track meet in college: “Guide my feet and light my path.” (Psalm 119:105). I think it’s the road to Dombila but I can’t be sure. I was just trusting that if I ran, I’d be ok. It did jump at the hissing in the trees though.
And then a crazy man started chasing me through the wilderness! (That last sentence is not true, but Shaka told me to add it to make for a better story as I explained what I was writing in my journal).
When I finally got back I almost hugged my host family. “I thought I’d never see you again!” They laughed and made me promise that I would never again take an unknown road when the sun was setting. Seems pretty intuitive after the fact.
That 32 minute run had turned into an hour and 20 minutes. I relaxed in the compound next to our nightly family fire. Shaka told a story, as we like to do, describing mystery person whom the others have to identify. “This girl has big hair. This girl has a big head” (They often call me “Kungoloba in village which literally means big head) “And she prays to God!”
“That’s me.”
But when Shaka declined an afternoon run to Koyan, I started on the 4.5 mile road myself. On the way, I picked up a litter of high school kids on their way home. We ran and laughed as they tried their new English lesson on me. Suddenly we parted ways. “This road is much shorter!” they told me. Ahhh… the school kids road! Assuring me they were able to hun the whole way with me, (two of them ended up doing so), I agreed to take this unknown path.
It was indeed shorter. It usually takes me about 38 minutes to run to Lauren’s at a steady pace but today it was just 32. Lauren looked beat. She had just been hit by the disenchantment of returning to Mali after a vacation to Spain with her parents. Homesickness, but even more so, heat sickness. “It snowed in Madrid,” she said longingly. With highs constantly 106 F or above, the heat was starting to get to all of us, even the Malians. It just slows you down. My relief is pouring buckets of water over my head throughout the day. Lauren is considering going all out and buying a car battery that she can hook a fan up to.
But now it was bearable. The sun was going down and it was time for me to make my way back to Dombila. Mistake number one- trying to take the “school kids’ road.” After a good 20 minutes I ended up on the plateau overlooking Koyan again. I gave it another try, which having brought myself back to a place where I could take a familiar yet longer road, was clearly Mistake Number Two. I ran and ran as the sun was quickly setting. At one point lost in the brush, I spotted some school girls and they pointed me toward a path I had long strayed from. “It’s just one road straight to Dombila!” That’s what they all say. It’s just one road when you’re used to that one road and you have your blinders on to block all the other dozens of intersections.
It’s night time. I can still see the trail but I have no idea where I am. I spot a fire in the distance- it must be a hut. If I can just make my way toward that settlement I can ask for help. If I find that I am a long way off from Dombila, I’d break Peace Corps policy and beg someone to take me to my host family on their motorcycle. Or I would just spend the night in the wilderness.
As that thought crossed my mind, I immediately thought of that night, in the second months of my service that I was lost in Dio at night. With Caroline out of town, I called Hunter hysterical. I was wandering around scared to death. It’s an experience I never wrote about on this blog because it would have sent Mom flipping out.
But here, I was just running, and running and running. If I stopped to get upset I would never get anywhere. I’m on this one road now, and I have no idea if it leads to Dombila. I can only pray it does, or that it leads my to a friendly village that can somehow help me get back. I can barely see and from that a Bible verse popped into my head. It’s one that I once chanted to myself during a track meet in college: “Guide my feet and light my path.” (Psalm 119:105). I think it’s the road to Dombila but I can’t be sure. I was just trusting that if I ran, I’d be ok. It did jump at the hissing in the trees though.
And then a crazy man started chasing me through the wilderness! (That last sentence is not true, but Shaka told me to add it to make for a better story as I explained what I was writing in my journal).
When I finally got back I almost hugged my host family. “I thought I’d never see you again!” They laughed and made me promise that I would never again take an unknown road when the sun was setting. Seems pretty intuitive after the fact.
That 32 minute run had turned into an hour and 20 minutes. I relaxed in the compound next to our nightly family fire. Shaka told a story, as we like to do, describing mystery person whom the others have to identify. “This girl has big hair. This girl has a big head” (They often call me “Kungoloba in village which literally means big head) “And she prays to God!”
“That’s me.”
More mice
I’ve had a few more mice.
After Madou’s innocent wandering into my hut, things started to get ugly. I was missing my ipod for a couple of days, only to be returned by Madou’s oldest brother, Adama. “I found this with your mouse’s stuff,” he said as he handed me the scratched up version of my new ipod. Still works though. Tcesalo, my host brother and accomplice to Madou, stole 5000 cfa (the equivalent of $10) on two separate occasions. Shaka helped sniff them out, with the help of a suspicious butiki guy that wondered where these kids would get their hands on that kind of bill. All was returned, but the ipod was stolen again, Koniba, the third party of the three 9 year old boys, coughed it up that time. And days later the boys were caught setting fire to someone’s straw hanger in the market.
Now these boys are like my own. I’ve grown attached to them. They drive me crazy but I adore them. Why are they stealing from me? Why are they skipping school and getting themselves into trouble like this? I know that my door sometimes tricks me and doesn’t lock when it should, but it’s always been like that and I’ve never had a problem. They’ve been beat and beat by their parents, but the stealing kept going on. Great solution right? Actually, Dafinie’s approach, seeking a traditional healer, seemed to actually have an effect on the kid. He calmed down and was gentler after that. What was in that tree bark medicine? I say we keep some on hand. On the other hand, Dalfinie also told me that she pinched Madou’s ear for two hours straight. That could also do the trick.
It all blew up one day when I noticed instant coffee, water, sugar, and my precious 0% fat powdered milk spewed all over my cooking hut. I didn’t know kids liked coffee around here.
Which one of you was it? I was pissed now, and also feeling incredibly stupid. How many times is this? And I can’t even make sure my door is locked. I went to my host mom at her rice stand in the small weekly market, not realizing I was attracting an audience. Daramane’s mad, Gneba is mad, none of the kids will fess up to it. Damn it Tcesalo’s a good liar. I’m beginning to believe him.
“My heart is troubled!” All the time, Gneba fusses about making sure all the doors and windows are locked. But now I’m realizing that it’s not just about me, it’s mainly about her reputation as a host in the village.
“I’ll tell Peace Corps! They’ll never agree to put another volunteer here!”
“Good! Fine,” says Daramane. “This is your fault anyway!”
“I know,” I came to my senses, “sometimes I don’t realize when one of the locks doesn’t work.”
“No. It’s because ever since the mouse first entered your house you told us not to hit him. Then they’ll just do it again. And ever since you first came here you let kids come under your hanger and play.”
So it was my fault for doing the only thing I knew how to do at the time-play with the kids. I looked at Shaka, he had a tear down his face. It was later I knew Gneba was accusing him as having a hand in the incident, never believing her own son would be involved. Yet moments later, Gneba and Shaka came to investigate. And there were the footprints, specific sandels, just like a cheesy mystery movie. They identified Koniba as the culprit.
“A banna” said Gneba, “it’s finished.” We were never to talk of it again and Shaka and I were to buy new locks for the doors on market day.
A baana? We went on a run and everything seemed fine after that. But those first couple of minutes hitting the trail I imagined myself slapping Koniba-hard. Every time this happens, my tolerance for hitting kids seems to slowly develop. How awful am I!
Forgiveness. I imagine all of the boys eating coconut under my hanger. Maybe friendship and generosity would humble them. Or maybe I’ll just become a troll, reading, writing, strumming my guitar under the hanger, shooting disapproving glances at trespassing children.
But since the past couple of weeks, things have gotten much better with Tcesalo and Madou. They are regaining my trust donni donni and I’m also being harder on them about lying and getting into trouble. I think they are starting to respect me more, but they keep coming back under my hanger, which means despite all this, we’re still pals. And I know they aren’t just coming back for the ipod thank you very much. I banished them for a while, but after some apologies and promises, they are back coloring and dancing like before. Shaka’s been especially good, and has made it his duty that his little brother doesn’t become a thief. All the kids look up to Shaka, so if he keeps with them, God willing, they’ll straighten themselves out.
I’m still keeping my eye on Koniba though. He’s shifty.
After Madou’s innocent wandering into my hut, things started to get ugly. I was missing my ipod for a couple of days, only to be returned by Madou’s oldest brother, Adama. “I found this with your mouse’s stuff,” he said as he handed me the scratched up version of my new ipod. Still works though. Tcesalo, my host brother and accomplice to Madou, stole 5000 cfa (the equivalent of $10) on two separate occasions. Shaka helped sniff them out, with the help of a suspicious butiki guy that wondered where these kids would get their hands on that kind of bill. All was returned, but the ipod was stolen again, Koniba, the third party of the three 9 year old boys, coughed it up that time. And days later the boys were caught setting fire to someone’s straw hanger in the market.
Now these boys are like my own. I’ve grown attached to them. They drive me crazy but I adore them. Why are they stealing from me? Why are they skipping school and getting themselves into trouble like this? I know that my door sometimes tricks me and doesn’t lock when it should, but it’s always been like that and I’ve never had a problem. They’ve been beat and beat by their parents, but the stealing kept going on. Great solution right? Actually, Dafinie’s approach, seeking a traditional healer, seemed to actually have an effect on the kid. He calmed down and was gentler after that. What was in that tree bark medicine? I say we keep some on hand. On the other hand, Dalfinie also told me that she pinched Madou’s ear for two hours straight. That could also do the trick.
It all blew up one day when I noticed instant coffee, water, sugar, and my precious 0% fat powdered milk spewed all over my cooking hut. I didn’t know kids liked coffee around here.
Which one of you was it? I was pissed now, and also feeling incredibly stupid. How many times is this? And I can’t even make sure my door is locked. I went to my host mom at her rice stand in the small weekly market, not realizing I was attracting an audience. Daramane’s mad, Gneba is mad, none of the kids will fess up to it. Damn it Tcesalo’s a good liar. I’m beginning to believe him.
“My heart is troubled!” All the time, Gneba fusses about making sure all the doors and windows are locked. But now I’m realizing that it’s not just about me, it’s mainly about her reputation as a host in the village.
“I’ll tell Peace Corps! They’ll never agree to put another volunteer here!”
“Good! Fine,” says Daramane. “This is your fault anyway!”
“I know,” I came to my senses, “sometimes I don’t realize when one of the locks doesn’t work.”
“No. It’s because ever since the mouse first entered your house you told us not to hit him. Then they’ll just do it again. And ever since you first came here you let kids come under your hanger and play.”
So it was my fault for doing the only thing I knew how to do at the time-play with the kids. I looked at Shaka, he had a tear down his face. It was later I knew Gneba was accusing him as having a hand in the incident, never believing her own son would be involved. Yet moments later, Gneba and Shaka came to investigate. And there were the footprints, specific sandels, just like a cheesy mystery movie. They identified Koniba as the culprit.
“A banna” said Gneba, “it’s finished.” We were never to talk of it again and Shaka and I were to buy new locks for the doors on market day.
A baana? We went on a run and everything seemed fine after that. But those first couple of minutes hitting the trail I imagined myself slapping Koniba-hard. Every time this happens, my tolerance for hitting kids seems to slowly develop. How awful am I!
Forgiveness. I imagine all of the boys eating coconut under my hanger. Maybe friendship and generosity would humble them. Or maybe I’ll just become a troll, reading, writing, strumming my guitar under the hanger, shooting disapproving glances at trespassing children.
But since the past couple of weeks, things have gotten much better with Tcesalo and Madou. They are regaining my trust donni donni and I’m also being harder on them about lying and getting into trouble. I think they are starting to respect me more, but they keep coming back under my hanger, which means despite all this, we’re still pals. And I know they aren’t just coming back for the ipod thank you very much. I banished them for a while, but after some apologies and promises, they are back coloring and dancing like before. Shaka’s been especially good, and has made it his duty that his little brother doesn’t become a thief. All the kids look up to Shaka, so if he keeps with them, God willing, they’ll straighten themselves out.
I’m still keeping my eye on Koniba though. He’s shifty.
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