Malian Independance Day

September 26, 2010


Wednesday September 22, 2010 marked Mali's 50th year of Independence from France. Since we arrived in this country we have been awaiting the, what I could only assume would be a large celebration that would mark this occasion. There have been signs up everywhere and a variety of fabrics that had this date written on it. So the day has come and passed and the party consisted of all day long music and dancing, a bike race, several games from the children, and speeches given by the mayor, representatives of the various districts of my village, and Peace Corps (to be fair this was not quite a speech rather me terrified as a microphone was shoved into my face and mumbling something I hope was a greeting and a thank you).
The day started with the raising of the Flag and the singing of the National Anthem and I must admit that I was scratching my head while four young boys started to sign as the flag was being raised and I realized that they were singing in French. As the day went on the French Language punctuated every event. It is odd that a country, celebrating its Independance from France would continue to conduct the majority of their official business in French when many of the people in village don't speak French. I attempted the large challenge of asking a few Malian's why this is, in hopes of understanding their perspective but of course don't understand enough of Bambara to get a response that can truly satisfy my curiosity. I hope to, one day, be able to engage in a conversation in which I can discuss this in more detail; but, for now head scratching continues.

In addition to the bike race and other activities my village slaughtered three cows in preparation for the fete.
I was woken up on Tuesday morning by a child telling me to follow him because the men of the village where killing a cow. I thought to myself, "cool, never seen that before" (so much for vegetarianism) and excitedly hoped on my bike and pedaled to what I can now only refer to as the killing field.

There I was greeted by a large cow and 6 or 7 men each armed with a knife, mind you no one had one larger than your average kitchen knife. Needless to say it took a little time and a lot of energy. I was the only female older than 10 who was there as "women bring life and therefore should not take it."
Malians use every part of the cow and boy are there a lot of parts! They used the hide as a carpet and made 100 piles of meat (placed on top of the hide) and the community split them up. Meanwhile one man started a fire with a few branches and roasted the head and the hoofs. I would look in his direction occasionally and see him picking pieces off and chopping away, apparently its the best part of the cow (second only to the heart) but I just took their word for it; or at least I think I did-- in reality who knows what parts I actually consumed.

I could certainly go into more detail on the process and what exactly I saw but I think you get the idea. Unfortunately (or fortunately, depending on your perceptive) my camera died and I was unable to capture these events. But in two years I am certain this image will still be with me (and remain there the rest of my life) so if you require more detail I will happy to provide it then.

For now, Happy Independence Mali.