Market Day

Last week during market day they killed a cow outside
of my bedroom window

January 14, 2011

In Mali I frequently find myself wondering "what day is it?" The work week, Monday- Friday does not exist here (or at lease in the villages it doesn't) the same way it does in The States. The only day that I can rely on to keep me grounded with some concept of the passing time is Friday.

Friday is market day in Samene. Each week with out fail I am woken up by the bustling of activity in the town center which is located adjacent to my house. Vendors from near by villages ride in on donkey carts lugging everything from watermelons to fabric to repaired (and sometimes still broken) radios.
Although these vendors are looking to sell, Friday is also a time for socializing.

In addition to being market day Friday is also the main prayer day for Muslims. Meaning all the villagers don their finest clothes and when prayer call blares out mid-afternoon they all flock to the mosques and pray in unison, moving fluidly and in sync from standing to kneeling and back again.

Only after this is done does market day truly get underway. Women carry pots into the square and set them up to cook. The sounds and smells of hot oil crackling waft through the air. Men sit and chat in small groups while drinking tea and buy from the women who carry buckets on their heads filled with fruits, juices, fish and various fried foods.

By far, Friday is my favorite day in village whether I am sitting with the mend drinking tea or helping a fried cook farni (fried dough balls-- almost like doughnut if you have lived here long enough and have a wonderful imagination) I always know that I will have a good day.

Harvest

November 2010

The month of November marks harvest season in Mali. During this time everyone from young to old goes to the fields to cut millet. As this time has fallen during my three months of integration (not that the period of integration will ever end) I joined my homologus family everyday for nearly a month out in the fields.

As my only familiarity with any sort of "harvest" was that I heard the word while watching an episode of "Sex in the City" (the one where Smith is in the play in dreaded Brooklyn) I clearly found myself facing quite the learning curve. But after the first few days, several gnarly blisters and quite a bit of sunburn I quickly learned the proper technique of holding the knife and that a hat is an essential part of the millet cutting garb.

Millet is what I and most Malians eat on a regular basis and is one of the major agriculture crops produced in Mali. Millet is used to make a few different foods including Couscous, moni and to (pronounced "toe").

To is the most popular food and is usually, at least in my case, made in large quantities in the morning and then reheated throughout the day; this is a popular practice especially when families are going to the fields. The women will gather sticks around mid-day and build a fire then set the bowl of to on top. I must admit that I enjoy the second round of to better than the first- in my mind I think of it like cold pizza always a little bit better as leftovers!

The Brat Travel Guide describes to as " (a) moist, millet-based dough with a consistency similarly to plasticine" and if that wasn't appetizing enough for you its a greenish-gray color! To is pared with a sauce which is what makes or breaks your to experience. There are a few sauces traditionally served with to is a green okra based sauce, called fondly by Peace Corps Volunteers "snot sauce," because of its slimy texture. The sauce is what makes or breaks ones to experience. Then there is my favorite sauce which is tomato paste based.

To certainly took some getting used to; in fact, when I took my first handful of to a few months ago I thought to myself "There is NO WAY you can eat this for two years!" and I mastered the technique of swallowing before I had to feel the texture of it in my mouth. I must admit however, now I enjoy to. Although certainly if I had a menu in front of me it would not be my first choice but from time to time (if I didn't eat it everyday) it would be a nice treat; and there you go Peace Corps-- another volunteer integrating her way through Mali).

Holy SandStorm!

October 20, 2010

Passage from my journal:

Currently waiting out my first Malian sandstorm and lets just say, now I realize why they advise Malian Peace Corps Volunteers not to wear contacts! I was biking around village going to pick up my cell phone which was charging on a friend's motorcycle battery when I felt a slight breeze I thought "how wonderful, its going to cool down for a bit" then not a second later I found myself engulfed in a cloud of dust so thick I couldn't see the front of my bike any longer. I was ushered into the closest hut where I sit now on the floor with several children staring at me while we wait for the wind to die down.

Despite momentarily fearing for my life, the layer of sand that covers my body, the taste of sand in my mouth and my concern that the clothes that hang on the close line outside of my hut are no longer clean, it is pretty cool.

Down my the Riverbank

October 17, 2010:

For the better part of a month I have heard from many people in village that there is a river near by. Only 5km away they would say, not far at all. But for the life of me I could never get anyone to tell me which road would lead me to this river. One morning I woke up feeling adventurous and decided to find this elusive river. Sure enough getting lost only twice I found the river. I was ecstatic, I find that when ever I am near a body of water I feel much happier and I can just sit and stare at the water for hours, granted Bani River is a little different than the beaches of California or Greece but hey, you work with what you got!

I had to get off my bike as the water erosion made it impossible to bike. I was looking for a shady tree where i could sit and read. During this search I ended up stepping in quite a bit of mud and had to go the the river bank to clan my feet and sandals. Here I found women half dressed bathing their children, washing their clothes and dishes. Men where out of colorful fishing boats. I chatted with the women as I cleaned myself and then left to find that shade tree.

Eventually I found the prefect spot- lots of shade, no people around and a perfect view of the brown murky water. I took out my book and started reading when i hear a woman greet me. She told me that we should go into the village together. It would have like to decline but this of course would have been rude. So there we went into the small village that surrounds the river.

She took me to her house which was located in the center of the village. There I found four mud huts, several chicken coops, a few donkeys and lots family members. She introduced me to her family. While I sat there I am sure that most everyone who lives in the village (which is not many) came by to see the white person. They all greeted me and chatted for a bit before they continued about there days work.

My new friend however, asked me if I like fish and I said "yes," again not wanting to be rude-- I mean these people are fishermen. Next thing I knew she goes into her house and brings out a large rice sack that is tied with rope at the top. She unties the bag and spills the contents onto the ground. Never in my life have I seen so many fish in one place. They were quite fresh as I could see their gills still moving.
She proceeded, while breast feeding here 5 month old baby, to cut 5 or 6 of the fish and cooked them over and open fire. She of course insisted I eat them, and I am glad that I did they were delicious, and now that I write this a few days after the event I didn't even get sick-- which makes every meal that much more enjoyable! After eating together she took me to meet the rest of the village people and then pointed me in the direction of Samene and I headed home.

I am constantly studded by the kindness and hospitality Malians show for complete strangers. While eating it is customary to say to passerby "A ga dumnike" which means come and eat. This is said to everyone who passes while people share a meal together. Although the response is "Ne Farra" I am full it is telling about the notion of sharing everything that exists in this culture.

The Psychology of Sitting

October 12, 2010

"... people in Western civilization no longer have time for each other, they have no time together, they do not share the experience of time. This explains why Westerners are incapable of understanding the psychology of sitting. In villages all over the world, sitting is an important social activity. Sitting is not a 'wast of time' nor is it an manifestation of laziness. Sitting is having time together, time to cultivate social relation"
                                                                          - Andreas Fuglesang

Before I found this passage among my many Peace Corps issued reading material  my biggest complain is "I have nothing to do" and "I am always board." But this is because i defined sitting as doing nothing. I found that I would get myself all geared up to leave my house to visit my Host family, the mayors office, the schools teachers or my homologue and once I reached my destination I would sit and do nothing! After reading this and pondering the passage I realized how true it is; sitting is in fact not a waste of time but rather an integral part of my job as a capacity builder. I am here to integrate to learn of the needs of the people and then to help them help themselves. Central to this is to come to know the people and the best way to do this is my sitting.

Central to Peace Corps mission and definition of development is "Development is a process, not a project" it is during these sitting times that conversations, can be had and the process of learning of needs and desires takes places; so, here's to sitting for two years!

If Twitter Existed in Village

Now, I am not sure if this is a good idea or if I will keep it up much after this entry but while in village there have been so many moments where I thought to myself wow, this is a perfect twitter moment. I never kept a twitter while I lived in the states, except for once as it was assigned for a class, so I am not sure if I am doing it right but hopefully these few moments will give you more of an idea what life is like in village.
I give you-

If Twitter Existed in Village:

October 12, 2010

Started to sleep outside in my tent because the heat in hut is getting unbearable, woke up this morning with a cockroach ( the size of a fairly large rat) on my leg, and who needs coffee to jump start their day!

October 14, 2010

Nothing makes you feel more like a catch than when a man buys you a fish!

October 14, 2010

Learned how to cook rice on an open fire, I could barely do it with a rice cooker in the states!

October 15, 2010

Happy International Hand washing Day! (you're welcome for that piece of information, now wash your hands)

October 16, 2010

Asked a group of kids what they were eating, as a bowl of what I thought was food was in front of them. They laughed and said it was mud.... gives you an idea of what Malian food looks like!

October 16, 2010

Got my first "icky finger" from the budget secretary in the mayors office... whoa lucky day!

October 17, 2010

In an attempt to integrate I think I drank river water- God help me!

October 19, 2010

Just came to the realization that if there is ever hair in my food while I am in village its got to be mine! Comforting!

October 19, 2010

And have come full circle, saw a cow birth today--and to think, I used to think the miracle of life videos from high school were bad!

Spitting, a Malian Art

September 18, 2010

When preparing myself to move to Mali I knew that there would be a number of things I would have to become used to. When I made the list in my head, and a few on paper, it always contained things like the food, dress and language but never did I once think about spitting and this in Malian is a prevalent activity.

Let me first discuss Malian tooth brushing. I have only seen women do this- which of course makes me wonder about male oral hygiene. The process goes something like this: a woman will be walking and suddenly stop and move toward a tree or bush or anything with branches and remove a one, she will then de-leaf and when applicable she will de thorn the branch and break it into a manageable size (manageable meaning, easy to fit in your hand and long enough to reach back into a those hard to reach molars). Then she will chew on one end exposing the inside and making that edge become something like bristles on a toothbrush. For the next 10 minutes or so she will scrub her teeth with it.

Now, it is impossible to discuss the act of tooth brushing without a through discussion of spitting (or at least that is what I am going to do next) and it would be doing Malian tooth brushing an injustice not to include this discussion here, for Malian spitting is an art. An art which every Malian has mastered from young boys to elderly women. An art that is practiced and distributed everywhere- inside the house, on the way to the mosque, while eating dinner, after eating dinner, while drinking tea, while preparing breakfast, while playing cards, while talking with friends, while on the bus, while sitting on MY porch- you get the idea.

The art, however, is not in the location but is in the act. There is the projectile spit which is like a bullet. I would be willing to put good money on the fact that if one of these were to hit someone they would require medical attention. Then there is the arch, the person leans back ever so slightly and created a perfect arch from their mouth to the ground. Then there is the sideways spit. This one is always done effortlessly and usually in the middle of a conversation. In the middle of a sentence they will quickly snap their head to one side spit then continue on without missing a beat. Its brilliant.

I am sure there are other types which I will be sure to keep you updated on as I observe them (because I am sure that you all are very curious about this topic, and if you have actually read this far into this entry I commend you).
I must say that with this in both of these areas, (tooth brushing and spitting) I have yet to "integrate" and not sure if I ever will. I still enjoy my Crest with Scope- but who knows, its only been three months.