I’m so sorry that I haven’t written in so long, it’s a rare day when I get to have internet access.
Now that I’m officially a volunteer my life has slowed down drastically. I’ve moved into my house in San and bought furniture and dishes which has helped make it more homey. One day I devoted to just making my house a home buy “sewing” curtains and hanging pictures up. I was just starting to feel comfortable when I woke up a few night ago with this huge lizard staring at me through my mosquito net… there was screaming involved. My days are pretty simple, I wake up around 6 and clean my house and make breakfast and sit outside for a couple of hours reading and studying Bambara then I make lunch then sit for a few more hours chatting with my host family or counterpart sometimes playing cards and always making tea. Several days I’ve biked to neighboring villages to meet the mayor and doctor and teachers and pastor and village chiefs, etc. I’ll be working a bit with a shea butter association in addition to my village association and I’m getting started on painting a mural of the world map at t he school (my friend had to explain to the teacher that there were more than four continents…). Every day is certainly an adventure. On Thursdays I bike to dJely where my market is at (about 9kilometers away). To say dirt road is being generous it’s more sand/gravel/dirt currently mixed with water as it’s the rainy season. Needless to say, by the time I make it market I’m covered in mud and dust which is made all the more entertaining because I was in a skirt the first time. I’m almost exclusively in skirts but I quickly learned that while I can bike in a skirt and stick to social norms, I can’t wear a skirt and maintain my dignity while riding a bike.
On Sundays I go to church with my family which is surprisingly similar to church back home. The choir is unbelievable and while I understood very little of the service I had a good time. The men and women sit on separate sides of the church with the kids in the front and in the middle. In the afternoon of that first Sunday my sister took me to the church and there was a ton of singing and dancing then we started walking and kept walking out into the middle of the African wilderness to a huge lake. It was a baptism. The minister waded out into the water and then one by one about 20 people were baptized by being dunked in the water after saying a prayer, it was fascinating.
This past Sunday, pretty much changed my life. I got up and got ready for church when my counterparts wife came up to my house and told me to get my bike, her son had to be taken to the hospital because he had malaria. My counterpart was already there so the two of us biked to the doctor’s office. When we got to the hospital the little boy, Izac, was lying on the table screaming as the doctor tried for about an hour to get in IV in. Apparently he was severely dehydrated and impossible to find a vein. More than once I almost puked…it was hot and there was a lot of blood and needles, but I held his hand until they finally got the iv in. Later I was sitting on another bed and watching the family and overwhelmingly powerful to see that human nature is universal and the love parents have for their children transcends national boundaries. It was incredibly moving to see them bent over their son praying and holding on to each other. These families have so little that perhaps their bond is even stronger as they rely on each other exclusively and izac is their only son, he’s six.
Right now I’m in San, about a 30 kilometer bike ride from home to do some shopping and get the internet but I’ll probably be heading home tomorrow or Wednesday. I hope you all are doing well.
Love,
Cait
August 23, 2009
I've just returned from my site visit and can you believe it, I've got a horse!! I haven't seen any horses in Mali but i come to San and there are horses everywhere. Not exactly in the condition that horses in KY are kept, but it's still comforting to hear neighing at night instead of the donkey bray. I left in typical Mali fashion about two hours after arriving at the bus station loading the bus in the pouring rain. i had to disassemble my bike which was pretty entertaining and by the time i made it on the bus which stank of sweat and body odor and other most unfortunate smells, i was covered in mud and soaking wet. We finally left and headed toward Bamako which should have taken 30 minutes took about two hours. We picked up some more people and filled up with gas and then changed the tire (because apparently none of this could have been done before we left). I'm finally starting to dry off a bit when i have to get off the bus to help push the bus back into gear and then run to get back on the bus. It was absolutely hilarious. We broke down a few more times once for 3 hours which was painful but all in all it went pretty smoothly...then we hit a cow. It was quite a day
The San volunteer house is fabulous with electricity and running water and an internet cafe real close by. It's got all the amenities of a big city but is pretty small city. I opened my bank account the next day and then wandered around a pretty cool market. Of course it's rainy season so I'm constantly covered in mud and the market was no exception, but it was pretty fun. My volunteer buddy (who showed me around for a day or two) and i left on our bikes and road for about two hours to my new home. My butt was burning and i was dripping in sweat, but it was awesome to bike by these farms and villages in Africa just doing their daily chores, it was pretty surreal. Off the main road I'm about 5 kilometers on bike on pretty terrifying roads of mud and rock and bushes. I'm already becoming quite a proficient bike rider as it is my only reasonable means of transport.
My house is super cute mud hut with a thatched roof which is so pleasant during rainy season because it is so much quieter than the tin roofs. I've got two rooms and a entry way with my own toilet and a little yard. My counterpart is building me a hangar on my porch after rainy season (during "cold" season). I've got a couple of awesome shade trees and room for a garden that I'll hopefully get started when i move back home. I've been given 5 chickens thus far as gifts and they have been delicious. It was pretty funny because i was sitting and hanging out with my family when my homologue comes stands up quickly and says I'll be back. I going to cut the chicken neck. Bambara is a very straightforward language with no sugarcoating involved. I had a leak in my roof that my homologue quickly fixed and i spent pretty much the whole week chilling and trying to greet as many people as possible. I'm in such a different setting than my home stay that it's a huge adjustment, not bad, just different.
I met all the other volunteers in my area and it's such a fun group. There are 13 of us and such a blast. We get to cook at the STAGE house because we have a stove and we freeze our water bottles to have cold drinks when we're there. I left today and successfully managed to make it to Bamako without any holdups via public transport. I somehow managed to sleep the entire 6 hour drive home thanks to my nausea med the doctor gave me and my fellow volunteers were quite jealous. This bus definitely smelled worse than the other one so i was pretty stoked to be medicated. Riding in vehicles is really the only time I'm painfully aware of no AC and i won't burden you with all the gorey details but you can definitely tell people get sick on these buses often.
I'm in a great mood right now though, i got two scoops of yummy ice cream in Bamako before heading back to Tubaniso and i just showered and feel nice and clean. I'm getting ready to watch some TV on a friends laptop seeing as how i won't have electricity again for a while. I don't leave until Wednesday morning so I'll email again before i leave.
Love,
Cait
The San volunteer house is fabulous with electricity and running water and an internet cafe real close by. It's got all the amenities of a big city but is pretty small city. I opened my bank account the next day and then wandered around a pretty cool market. Of course it's rainy season so I'm constantly covered in mud and the market was no exception, but it was pretty fun. My volunteer buddy (who showed me around for a day or two) and i left on our bikes and road for about two hours to my new home. My butt was burning and i was dripping in sweat, but it was awesome to bike by these farms and villages in Africa just doing their daily chores, it was pretty surreal. Off the main road I'm about 5 kilometers on bike on pretty terrifying roads of mud and rock and bushes. I'm already becoming quite a proficient bike rider as it is my only reasonable means of transport.
My house is super cute mud hut with a thatched roof which is so pleasant during rainy season because it is so much quieter than the tin roofs. I've got two rooms and a entry way with my own toilet and a little yard. My counterpart is building me a hangar on my porch after rainy season (during "cold" season). I've got a couple of awesome shade trees and room for a garden that I'll hopefully get started when i move back home. I've been given 5 chickens thus far as gifts and they have been delicious. It was pretty funny because i was sitting and hanging out with my family when my homologue comes stands up quickly and says I'll be back. I going to cut the chicken neck. Bambara is a very straightforward language with no sugarcoating involved. I had a leak in my roof that my homologue quickly fixed and i spent pretty much the whole week chilling and trying to greet as many people as possible. I'm in such a different setting than my home stay that it's a huge adjustment, not bad, just different.
I met all the other volunteers in my area and it's such a fun group. There are 13 of us and such a blast. We get to cook at the STAGE house because we have a stove and we freeze our water bottles to have cold drinks when we're there. I left today and successfully managed to make it to Bamako without any holdups via public transport. I somehow managed to sleep the entire 6 hour drive home thanks to my nausea med the doctor gave me and my fellow volunteers were quite jealous. This bus definitely smelled worse than the other one so i was pretty stoked to be medicated. Riding in vehicles is really the only time I'm painfully aware of no AC and i won't burden you with all the gorey details but you can definitely tell people get sick on these buses often.
I'm in a great mood right now though, i got two scoops of yummy ice cream in Bamako before heading back to Tubaniso and i just showered and feel nice and clean. I'm getting ready to watch some TV on a friends laptop seeing as how i won't have electricity again for a while. I don't leave until Wednesday morning so I'll email again before i leave.
Love,
Cait
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)