Packing List- January 2011 Stage, I hope this helps!!

One of the things that I most appreciated before coming to Mali was a blog entry of a current volunteer that listed everything they packed. This volunteer included a complete list of everything that they packed and then included a reflection upon the list, for example what they use the most here in Mali, what they wish they hadn’t brought, and what they wished they had brought. Soo… since that was so helpful for me, I’m going to do the same for the new Stage that arrives in Mali in February!

Complete Packing List
o 1 bottle of Contact lens solution
o 5 tubes of Oxy spot treatment
o 20 or so Safety pins
o 1 roll of Duct tape
o Bathing Suit
o 1 queen size flat sheet
o 1 pillow case
o Needle and thread (2 of those little clothing repair kits you get for free at hotels)
o 1 Towel
o 1 Pillow
o Hard drive (500gb)
o Netbook Computer, case, charger
o 1 big bottle of Shampoo
o 2 big bottles of Conditioner
o Hair Straightener
o Curling iron
o Gifts (American flag pencils, 1 watch, 1 bracelet)
o Candy (1 bag of pixie stix, 1 bag of pop rocks, 1 bag of ring pops, 1 bag of blow pops)
o Snacks (10 Cup of Soups, 2 boxes of Apple Nutri Grain Bars)
o Underwear (I’m not sure but I think I brought like 30 or so pairs)
o Bras (I think I brought between 8 and 10)
o Face wash (2 bottles of Apricot Scrub and 2 bottles of Oxy face wash)
o Clear mascara (5 tubes)
o Mascara (2 tubes of black)
o Eye shadow (more than 10 colors)
o Eye liner (5 tubes)
o Vaseline lipgloss (5 tubes)
o Foundation (liquid and powder) (2 bottles of liquid, 1 compact)
o Makeup brushes (2 eye shadow brushes, 1 foundation brush)
o Nail clippers
o 2 Emory board s
o 3 Thumb drives
o Miniature French-English dictionary
o 6 pairs of Socks
o 4 Skirts (all past my knees, 1 to my ankles)
o 3 Shorts (2 athletic, 1 pajama)
o 3 Tank tops (2 of which are spaghetti straps)
o Pants (1 dress pant, 2 cargo pants, 1 jeans)
o 10 T-shirts
o 1 Sweat shirt
o 2 Ponchos
o 1 Very cheap Rain Jacket
o 2 Baseball Caps
o Sleeping mat
o Bug Hut 2 Tent
o Sleeping bag (thin fleece)
o 2 boxes of Infinity Pads
o 2 boxes of Tampons
o 2 Bags of travel Toilet paper (3 rolls in each bag), 3 packs of wipes
o Headphones (4 pairs)
o 1 bottle of Body wash
o 2 Loufas
o 1 pack of Hair ties
o 2 Brushes
o Comb
o 10 Headbands
o 2 bottles of nail polish
o 2 tubes tooth paste
o 5 tooth brushes
o 4 bottles of face lotion
o 6 sticks of deodorant
o 15 sets of Dailies contacts
o Razors (8 Intuition refills)
o Glasses (3 pairs)
o Tweezers
o 6 or so Pens
o Small Photo album
o Ipod
o CD player
o 2 CDs
o Ziploc bags
o 1 pair of Flip flops
o UF Gator Pennant
o Letters with stamps
o Medication
o 1 pair of Tennis shoes
o 2 Sunglasses
o Wedding ring
o 2 Head lamps
o Travel pillow
o Backpack
o Adapter plugs
o Playing Cards
o Uno
o Sudoku book
o Batteries
o Solar charger
o Rechargeable batteries
o Swiss army knife
o Money belt
o Calculator
o 2 Books
o Bandana
o 2 digital Cameras
o 1 bottle of Perfume/body spray
o Camera case
o Sticky tack
o Speakers
o Gameboy and 2 games
o Gold bond powder
o 3 Shower caps
o Floss
o Ear swabs
o Mirror
o Mesh laundry bag
o Watch
o Glow in the dark stars
o Jewelry
o SD card
o Addresses of friends and family
o Paper calendar
o Ipod cord
o Biosilk
o Cell phone and charger
o Gum
o Earrings
o Hair wrap
o Bobby pins
o Scissors
o Envelopes
o Notebook Paper
o 2 water bottles (1 Nalgene, 1 Aluminum)
o 2 Pairs of Sandals
o Ipod case
o Camera case

Ok so after reading all of that you’re probably thinking that I am a diva, but that is honestly what I packed. Alright so now that I have been in Mali for almost 6 months I think I can pretty accurately critique my list, so here we go:

-Thing I am the most happy I brought: Netbook Computer! I watch a ton of movies and TV shows and I also use it to charge my Ipod.

-Thing I regret bringing the most: all the Cup of soups I brought, they just didn’t taste very good so now they are sitting in a trunk in my room, I think I ate one of them.

-What I wish I brought more of: 1. Body Wash!! I only brought one bottle and went through it pretty fast. It is possible to buy body wash in country, but for the first two months we are basically stuck at our Home stay sites with no access to stores. 2. Towels! I only brought 1, this was super dumb because what was I supposed to do when my one towel was being washed? I had my mom send me 2 extra towels. 3. Baby Wipes. Toilet paper is kind of expensive here and public bathrooms never have anything so it’s good to always carry a pack on you. I only brought 3 packs, so now I have my mom send me 1 pack in every package she sends me. 4. Contacts. I barely wear contacts (I only wear them when I go out at night), but I’m not sure that the 15 pairs of Dailies will be enough (I re-use them until they start hurting even though you’re supposed to throw them out after 1 day).5.Clothes to go out in. All I brought was a pair of cute jeans and 2 nice tops. I really wish I had brought at least 2 more pairs of skinny jeans and like 5 or so more cute tops. We don't really get a chance to go out a lot, but I've probably been out like 10 times since being here, so yea 2 outfits wasn't enough. 6. FOOD. This is probably the most important. I wish I had brought wayyyyyy more snack food because I am not particularly fond of Malian food. There were quite a few nights where I went to bed hungry because I didn’t want to eat whatever weird food I was given for dinner during Homestay. I would suggest bringing a few boxes of granola bars, and then comfort foods like cookies, chips and candy.

- What I didn’t need to buy, but am still happy I got anyway: Hard drive. Whenever volunteers get together sooooo much file sharing goes on!! We trade TV shows, Movies and Music like nobody’s business. I came to Mali with 6 full seasons of the Office as well as like 50 movies on my hard drive, all of which were very much appreciated by other volunteers.

- What I have yet to use, but I hear will be very useful during hot season: Bug Hut. It has been kind of annoying to lug around for these past 6 months, but people tell me I will be very thankful to have it when it is so miserably hot that you won’t even want to enter your house. I hear that basically everyone sleeps outside during hot season, even Malians!

-Quick Tip: steal a blanket from your Air France flight, I did and I use it everyday!

Alright I think this is all I’ve got, or at least all I can think of for now, so I hope that this helps! And to all of you coming to Mali very soon: We can’t wait to meet you guys!!! But in the meantime live it up in America! Eat all the delicious and terribly unhealthy American food that you can and make sure you spend all the time you can with your loved ones!

IST

So right now I am at Tubaniso for a 2 week in-service training, this means that I have been able to hang out with people I haven't seen for 3 months and I get to go into Bamako whenever I want, it also means that I am going to be bored out of my mind for the next 2 weeks since we have back to back technical sessions. On top of the extreme boredom, I have been sick for the past 2 days. I'm not sure what I'm sick with, but I haven't been able to keep food down. This morning was the first time I was able to eat in 2 days. I don't know what it is about Tubaniso, but everyone seems to always get sick here, for example I was never once sick during Homestay and I was never sick for the 3 months in village, but as soon as I get to Tubaniso I get so sick I feel like dying. Anyway I feel slightly better now, and hopefully I reach full health capacity by tonight because we are planning on going out in Bamako!

So I just want to announce that my 3 month lock-down is OVER!!! I no longer have Peace Corps restrictions on me (in case you forgot, new volunteers are required to stay in village for the first 3 months and are only permitted to leave twice to visit their banking towns), which means I can basically do whatever I want, well within reason. So because I can leave my village, I plan on doing it up big for Christmas and New Years. I'm also very excited to just be able to travel and see the rest of Mali; Sikasso is pretty great, but I wanna see the rest of the country too. I also have plans to travel to Senegal in February which may also include side trips to The Gambia and possibly even Cape Verde.

So you have all probably noticed that I have been slacking in timely blog updates, so in order to catch up I'm gonna fill you guys in on what has gone on since my last post. The biggest thing was definately Thanksgiving. Thanksgiving was so great!! A bunch of volunteers from all over the country came down to Sikasso to celebrate with us. On Thanksgiving day we ate turkey, mashed potatoes, salad, green beans, apple pie, and pumpkin pie. The food was soooo good!! The day after Thanksgiving was Mexican day where we had Mexican food poolside. Unfortunately the pool was kind of green which turned me off so I didn't go in, but we had tacos with cheese (well, velveeta) and guacamole!! Both of those nights we also went out clubbing in Sikasso. It's so much fun to go out with Peace Corps people because we basically take over the club, also everytime we go out I always make it a mission to get the DJ to only play American Music.
Village life has also gotten a lot more fun recently because I have gotten closer to the teachers at the 2nd cycle school (middle school). I have gone and played cards with them a couple times and even watched them play soccer. They asked me if I wanted to play but I was wearing a Tafe (long wrap skirt) so I wouldn't have been able to run, I told them that I would play with them next time (we'll see if that actually happens).

Not the most politically correct place...

written November 19, 2010
HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO MY P.I.C JENN!!

Here are some random mini stories:
There isn't much of a variety of names here, for example I can't tell you how many Moussas, Oumous, Salimatas, or Brehmas I know, so it's fairly necessary that nicknames be given out. What is interesting to me is that these nicknames are usually not the nicest, or the most politically correct. For example there is a girl here who is named Sita and she isn't the skinniest girl in the village, but I wouldn't necessarily call her fat either, but everyone else in the village does. They call her Sita Ba which translates to big or fat Sita. Another example is my homologue who is a big dude and also very tall; they call him Le Gros, which is French for the big guy. There is also a man named Amadou that they call Amadou Noir, which means black Amadou because his skin is so dark. My homologue and others even joke that how can he be so black? He must paint himself every morning. Coming from an American background where we tread lightly on subjects like these, I find it a little uncomfortable to laugh at these nicknames with my fellow villagers, but it is all quite funny isn't it?
Moms here pretty much let their children eat and drink anything. I don't know how many times I've thought to myself 'aren't you gonna stop him/her, that's covered with dirt!' Mothers will hand their children food that has fallen on the ground instead of eating it themselves. They also will give children water to drink that has been used for hand-washing. It's pretty gross. I can't decide if it's terrible or kinda good because if you think about it, these mothers are building up there children's immunities.
Very few people, especially children, shout out Tubaboo when I pass by now. This is great! I feel like I'm fairly well immersed in my village, and that the majority of people know me. Pretty much everyone calls out my name, Gnire (pronounced gNeer- Ray, I think I may have gotten the pronunciation wrong in my earlier post on Site Visit), whenever I pass by. A few days ago a young woman even called out my name on a bus coming from Sikasso (she was from my village, but I'm pretty sure I had never met her before).
Exciting news! I found someone in my village who can do my hair! This was actually quite difficult because apparently the very simple plaits (braids) that I always get are considered a "modern style" and not many people know how to do them since no one in village ever gets them done. I think the reason no one ever gets them done is because it is kind of expensive to buy the hair (they call the weave/extensions/fake hair Meshi). Meshi costs about 1500 cfa (about $3) a pack and to do my hair I need 2 packs; 3000 cfa is considered quite a lot for something simple like hair. Anyway I'm really happy I found her because I don't like my hair lady in Sikasso; she's not very nice and she doesn't listen to me, however her braiding is impecable. My new village girl isn't the best, but she will do!

Seli Ba

written November 18, 2010
I don't feel very good. My stomach is full of goat meat and I think I might throw up soon. I unfortunately made the decision to eat a good deal of the air-dried goat leg I was given as a gift. I've been given quite a few hunks of meat as gifts over the past two days. Today was the last day of the 2 day Holiday called Seli Ba. That's the Bambara name for it, all I know about it besides that is that in French it is called Tabaski and it is the Islamic Holiday where they kill a lot of sheep. In my village they don't just eat sheep meat, they also butcher cows and goats, so it's basically like a meat schmorgusborg. My stomach can't handle it. Meat is usually so hard to come by in my village that I've basically become a vegetarian. The only meat I eat is the tuna my mom has sent me in care-packages, and maybe a few pieces of chicken no more than once a month (this doesn't include the schwarmas or hamburgers I get every time I go to Sikasso). Anyway Seli Ba has been pretty chill. I expected it to be pretty crazy in Village because it's a holiday, but everything pretty much stayed the same except that people dressed up a bit and we ate a lot of meat. There was also a lot of balofone music. The first night they played until 4am!! I couldn't believe that they could stay up dancing that late (They work so hard during the day, you'd figure they'd be too tired to stay up that late). Over the past two days my homologue and I pretty much just went to all of his friends house's to say hi, or rather to "donner les bonjours" (give hellos). This wasn't that much different from what we do on a day to day basis. The first day was a little different because several people gave me candy and a few people gave me money (not a lot, basically like 20 cents worth or less) for the holiday. My homologue said it was to wish me a good year. The second day, today, all of my gifts were of meat. It was kind of gross to be handed a dried hunk of meat that was just hanging on a string from a tree. I've learned that it's incredibly hard to look grateful when you're disgusted by something. Another interesting thing about Seli Ba, and I guess really all Holidays here, is that everyone likes to get dressed up. What's interesting about that is that all the boys' idea of dressed up is a track suit with a stiff baseball cap, and all the girls have the same complets (full outfits) as their friends. The boys all also get their hair cut so that their heads are completely shaved except for a circle patch of hair on the top which many of the boy's had designs shaved into. It's all very 1980s. The girls look very cute with their little head wraps, but the boys just look ridiculous (to me; this is all my opinion, clearly not theirs).
Besides all of the excitement of Seli Ba, not much has happened. My wrist is basically back to normal, with spurts of pain every once and a while. I've also taken up the hobby of jewelry making which wasn't difficult seeing as my mom sent me like 4 packages full of jewelry making materials. I've made several bracelets, some of them fairly complicated, and even tried making bracelets with a few of the girls in my village. That was interesting because it's almost as if kids here have no creativity, they all want to copy everything you do, so since I made a pink and blue bracelet, all five girls made pink and blue bracelets even though I had more than 10 colors of beads to choose from. Oh well.
In other news, I think I may be getting sick because for the past 3 or so days I have been perpetually tired, like I could sleep all day if left alone. I really hope that I'm not sick because Thanksgiving is a week from today! I'm super excited for Thanksgiving because every year Sikasso hosts a Peace Corps' Thanksgiving dinner/weekend type thing and a bunch of PCVs from all over Mali come down to celebrate. I'm excited for good food and for seeing people I haven't seen for quite some time!

Moto accident

I am currently sitting on the couch at the Peace Corps office in Sikasso. I am on med hold. Why is that? Oh, i just got hit by a moto yesterday morning, and now I have a very painful sprained wrist. I was planning on going back to village for another 2 week stint yesterday morning, but that was before I got hit. All I was trying to do was cross the street. I had made it halfway across the street when this moto coming from behind the roundpoint decided to speed up when he saw me. Malian drivers are weird. I feel like they play this game called 'Let's scare the pedestrian' by speeding up anytime they see someone cross the street. Maybe they think it's funny to see people run the rest of the way across the street scared? I have no idea, but they do this. So anyway he sped up and then I guess at the last moment when he realized he was going to hit me he decided to slow down, and his bike swerved a bit. That was when I decided it would be a good idea to stick my right hand out and try to stop the moto from hitting me, because I have super-human strength? So yea that was a major idiot move on my part, but it was kind of like an unconcious reaction, like how you always reach out to catch something that is falling. My hand ended up grasping the handle bars of the moto for a second and then getting pulled back with the moto because of course the man didn't stop after he hit me. This is what must've sprained my wrist, it getting jerked back with the moto. Immediately afterwards I screamed, but did anyone rush over to help me? NO. Was the street full of people? Yes. I don't get it. Malians are very nice and hospitable, but I've noticed that they aren't ones to rush and help someone when they need it. I'm sure that in the US after getting hit by a moto several people would've asked if I was okay.
So anyway my wrist is in a lot of pain, I can barely use my right hand which is a major issue here. It's rude to do almost anything with your left hand like eat with it, or hand someone money with it. So all day yesterday I had to struggle to put money in my limp hand and painfully raise it to drop whatever coins into the vender's hand. It really sucked. I also spent most of the day icing it and laying down because Dr. Dawn (Peace Corps Medical Officer) advised me to do so. The day of the accident I was in quite a lot of pain, but today it is manageable, but I think that's because I've just taken 800mg of Ibuprofen. So yea, hopefully tomorrow I'm pain free and can head back to village, but until then I'm gonna watch a lot of movies, TV shows and be online 24/7. I've already caught up completely on the Office which I didn't think was going to be possible with my terrible internet connection, and I've watched half the 1st season of Mad Men. I'm really enjoying this technology filled few days, even if the cost of having them is a swolen wrist.

Market day

written October 28, 2010
So market day yesterday was alright. I didn't buy any boiled peanuts or doughnuts, but I did get rice which was great! So anyway here are a bunch of random small stories from yesterday:
1- One of my homologue's favorite things to do is point out how he is "fais Americaine"ing which means that he is doing something that he considers American. For example he will be eating lunch, and instead of eating with his hand out of a bowl on the ground, he will set the bowl on a small table and still use his hand and then call my name and say "Gnire (my name)! Je fais Americaine maintenant!" or he will eat with a spoon and say the same. It's really quite funny, but also kind of annoying because he is constantly pointing it out.
2- I was sitting in the Premiere Adjoint's office with the Mayor and my homologue, and we were talking about Obama and Blacks and Whites in the US. The Mayor asked me if I was on the side of the Blacks or if I was on the side of the Whites (whatever that means?). I told him I was in the middle because I'm mixed and my mom is white and my dad is black so I don't want to pick a side. The Mayor was like "No, no, you should be on the side of the Blacks. You should side with your dad!" and I was like "no, what about my mom?" He then said "Don't worry your dad will be there, and if you go your mom will follow you to the side of the Blacks because your dad is there." It was a weird conversation.
3- I saw my first University of Florida shirt yesterday! Random used clothes get shipped to Mali from all over, so I expected to see a UF shirt sooner or later. Surprisingly enough I finally saw one at my Host Dad's house! A girl who is living there to attend school in my village was wearing it. I tried to explain to everyone that her shirt was from my University and how exciting that was, but they didn't get it. T-shirts and what are on them don't matter to Malians.
4- I saw a pair of shorts at the market today with a "Abfrorombe and Fitch" label on it.
5- The Mayor thought that the capitol of Jamaica was Miami.
6- Another thing that my homologue tries to do to "fais Americaine" is have people pay 50 francs for dropping trash on the ground at his house instead of taking it to the trash pile. He wants to buy a trash can for his house, but until he gets one people will just have to walk to the trash pile.
7- The priest I mention a few blog posts ago, the only Malian I've ever considered (from now on I will refer to him as Hot Priest), came by for a visit yesterday. I had just gotten home after spending the entire day with my homologue and I really just wanted to relax by myself. I already found Hot Priest kind of annoying because every time he has come over in the past he has insisted on a full tea session that takes about 2 hours and has asked me a lot of questions about how I worship and religion which I don't like to talk about. So anyway I heard a motorcycle pull up so I looked out my window and immediately recognized Hot Priest's bike jacket. I immediately ducked down and attempted to hide, I was in no mood to entertain anyone, let alone annoying Hot Priest. Unfortunately for me my door was open (this is a sign for everyone that says 'hey! Gnire's home!'), so he knew I was in there. He came to chat with my homologue so he spent about 20 minutes looking for him which led me to believe that I was in the clear... That was until he had one of the boys who lives with us call out my name at my door about 6 times. After the 6th time I felt kind of bad for making him yell out my name so many times so I finally just went to the door and pretended that I had been sleeping. Hot Priest believed me, but then kept asking me how it was possible that I was able to sleep through the noise of his motorcycle. I told him I guessed I was a really deep sleeper. (Am I going to go to Hell for lying to a Priest??) Anyway just like all the other visits before, Hot Priest insisted that we have tea. He also asked me to bring out my computer because he had brought his USB and wanted to get some music from me. I found this to be very annoying because I don't like flaunting my wealth in village thus I like to keep things like my computer and ipod hidden. I brought it out anyway and transfered 23 songs to his USB, but not before being lectured by Hot Priest about how I need to clean my computer because dust is very bad for it. He also knows very little about computers and doesn't know English, but yet still tried to tell me how to put music on his USB and how to use iTunes, a program I'm sure he's never used before in his life. Hot Priest is sooooo annoying! Hopefully next time I am more successful in my attempt at hiding.
written October 29, 2010
8- A few days ago I ruined my favorite pair of gold head phones by getting them caught in the wheel of my bicycle. Good came out of this though because I discovered that the other pair of headphones I brought with me has what is almost like surround sound! So for the past few nights I have been turning my music up, closing my eyes and pretending I'm at a club. I have my own private dance party. It's great. And what makes it even more great is the fact that I wear a head lamp and a tafe (pronounced taff-ay, basically and ankle length wrap skirt). I'm very hip.
9- There was a GIANT moth on my screen door last night and it was impeding my ability to close my metal door so that i could go to bed. I spent about 20 minutes trying to get it off by poking it with a stick, throwing water on it, and even trying to squirt it with bleach. I eventually gave up and called out to my homologue to get him to help me. He came over and couldn't stop laughing and even called over his wife and friend to see that I was scared of a moth. He told me through laughs "You know it won't bite you," and also pointed out all the water on the ground to everyone. it was pretty embarrassing, but also scary as hell!

Oatmeal

written October 26, 2010
I've just stuffed my face with a BIG ole bowl of oatmeal (and burned my tongue and the roof of my mouth while doing it). It was great! I've also had 8 Pixy Stix, a handful of Nerds and one incredibley melted Reese's. I taste America in my mouth, and it's great! I know for sure that the thing I miss the most (besides friends and family of course) is American Food. You all don't know how lucky you are to just be able to hop in a car and have your choice of making a delicous meal with yummy groceries, or just pulling through some drive-thru. You have no idea what I'd give to be able to have a burrito from Taco Bell right now.
Oh so my Dad's birthday was yesterday (HAPPY BIRTHDAY DAD!), and I celebrated by eating Nerds, lots and lots of Nerds. I also spent the entire day at the Mayor's office because they were having a meeting about this year's budget. Now why was I there you may ask? and the answer is that I have no clue. My homologue carts me along to every single meeting at the Mayor's office, and every single meeting is in Senufo, so basically that means I sit for hours in silence not knowing what is going on. I'm an Education volunteer, so it made sense when he brought me to the meeting about the running of the schools and all of the issues they were having, but there is no reason why I need to be at meetings like ones about the Mayor's budget. The meeting yesterday was more than 5 hours long!! Normally I just sit in the meetings and listen intently even though I don't understand anything just to be polite, but yesterday I gave up on politeness and pulled out my book. The funny thing is that I wasn't even the only bored one in the room! The Premiere Adjoint (2nd in charge under the Mayor) had his head on the table, and a representative from the village over was snoring!! There is only one thing that I like about attending meetings at the Mayor's office, and that is that I get to eat lunch with them, which means I get to eat rice and not Toh!!!!!!! When I eat with my host family I only get rice once or twice a week because my host dad can't afford to feed his family rice everyday, instead we have Toh or Couscous, both of which I find disgusting.
Anyway not much is going on in village right now except that both the Primary and Secondary schools got Stagiers (student teachers), so now we have enough teachers so that no classroom should be unattended, or at least that's what I would think, but is not actually the case. Yesterday, for example, I went by the Secondary school to meet the stagiers and noticed that 2 of the 3 classrooms were left unattended; only the 9th graders were being taught while the 7th and 8th graders were left alone and were fooling around. This is unbelieveable to me because The secondary school has 3 permanent teachers, 2 stagiers and the Director. Why is it that only one of them was teaching? This is something that I definitely want to change about my village. I want to point out to the teachers that their job is to teach, so during the hours of 7:45- noon and then 3-5 Monday through Friday they should be in the classroom, and that whatever else they have to do can be done during the very long lunch break, afterschool, or on the weekend!
Allow me to end this entry with something I'm very excited about: tomorrow is RICE DAY!!! at my host family's. It is also my village's market day which I love because it means I can by the Malian version of a doughnuts and boiled peanuts! yummm!

school day

written 10-11-2010
Today I single-handedly silenced a crammed room full of 100 plus 7 graders... for like a minute, then they went back to screaming and laughing because there was no teacher there to keep them in check. So today was my first day going to my village's secondary school (grades 7,8 and 9). It is a 3 roomed school house packed with kids and only 2 teachers and a principal (my host dad). There is an English teacher, a French Teacher, and then the Principal teaches Math, Physics and Chemistry. The French teacher also teaches History and Geography, and I'm not sure if the English teacher does anything else. I knew the Malian education system was bad, but today was my first real-life experience of it. It was pretty awful and I'm truly greatful I did my schooling in the US. First of all, there are close to 130 students jammed into a room for probably 50 students, and just one teacher. The students don't have textbooks and solely have to rely on what the teacher writes on the board, so the majority of class is spent copying down the lesson and very little teaching or learning for that matter goes on. I sat through a 9th grade math class where we got through 3 simple algebra problems! 3! I couldn't believe it! Also these 3 problems were homework problems from last Friday (today is Monday), so this should have been review. The students barely knew how to do the problems, and my host dad pretty much spent the whole class period yelling no at them. I also got to sit in on an 8th grade Englsih lesson. That was painful. The entire class period was spent on a 6 sentence dialogue (class is a little over an hour in length). The teacher just kept making them repeat the sentences of a dialogue that they had written in their notebooks from Friday. The book that they use for English is truely awful because this dialogue went something like this (I'm going from memory, so I think I've forgotten a word or two, but this is the majority of it):
Driver: Don't push me!
Nurse: Oh yes, I remember him. The big one with the cut on his leg. I gave him an inoculation.
Other person: What do you want?
Namundo: Can we sleep here please?
I heard the class repeat that about 30 times. It doesn't even make sense!! The dialogue isn't at all cohesive. At first I thought maybe the teacher had messed it up and left some sentences out, but nope, I saw with my own eyes that it came straight out of the book. The English teacher barely knows any English so he had no clue how terrible this dialogue was. I tried to explain how terrible it was to him, but then he got all defensive so I pretty much just backed down because it is his class afterall, and not mine. I really hope I will be able to help teach English here because they definitely need my help here, although I'm not sure I will be able to because the Peace Corps Education program in Mali isn't focused on teaching, but on basic literacy and things like girl empowerment and youth development. Another issue that I noticed today, which also has to do with the first sentence of this blog entry, is that the teachers here just walk off and leave a class of more than 100 kids to do whatever they want. After the lunch break, my host dad went off somewhere on his moto, probably to another village or something on business, but since there's only him and 2 other teachers, it meant that the 7th graders were left by themselves for 2 hours. They weren't even allowed to go home! They just sat there making sooooo much noise. That's why I tried to single-handedly silence them because I was trying to listen in on the 8th graders English lesson, but I could barely hear over all the 7th graders in the room over. It really made me sad that the students' time was wasted like that. I tried to explain to my homologue that it would even be better if they just went home, because honestly they could actually be doing something productive there. I also told him that if I were my host dad and I knew I wasn't going to be able to teach the class, then I wpuld at least pick the best student to just write that day's lesson up on the board for the rest of the students to copy. Especially since that's what he would've done anyway, just have the students copy the lesson from the board. Gosh this village has some serious Education issues, and I've only just seen the secondary school... there's still the primary school and the kindergarten to visit.

awkward

written Oct. 9, 2010
So I think I have some unconcious interest in putting myself in awkward situations. Just about every week 1 or 2 Catholic Priests come to visit my house to chat with my homologue (he's one of the few Christians in my village). Yesterday it was just the young, newly ordained priest who came by (funny enough, this priest is the only Malian that I have even remotely been attracted to... isn't that irony?). Everytime he comes by he asks me about my computer and whether or not it needs to be charged because when I first got to village I went to the Catholic Missionary to ask if I could use their electricity (solar panel powered) to charge my computer, and that was when I originally met him. Anyway from talking about my computer we got to talking about all of the music I have on it, and from there we started talking about the music he likes. He told me that he really liked 50 Cent! I literally laughed out loud. Can you imagine a Catholic Priest in a conservative country like Mali liking 50 Cent?? A man who has a Parental Advisory sticker on every single one of his albums? This was hilarious to me, so I asked him if he even understood what 50 was rapping about, and of course he said no. So this is where this unconcious interest comes in because I decided to take it upon myself to describe why he, a Catholic Priest, shouldn't be interested in rap like 50's (or Akon for that matter because he is also a big fan of his too). I told him that 50 uses really dirty words, disgusting words, and he didn't get what I meant and kept asking me "like what?" Well I wasn't about to curse in front of a Priest so I just told him I didn't know the words in French. I then tried to explain that most of 50's songs were about drugs and sex. That was pretty difficult. I told him that a lot of songs have to do with the rapport between a man and a woman in the bedroom (Why do I always seem to breech the topic of sex with Malians and then not know how to be specific about it?). Anyway what I did say actually worked because he said "Ohhhh! His songs are of a pornographic nature?" and to that I was like "Yes!!" and then changed the topic immediately. I think I should just embrace my interest in awkwardness.

Amebas

written Oct. 8, 2010
So school has started up again here, and I feel like I should be walking to class with the teens and little kids of my village, seeing as I feel like a little kid myself. I don't see this as a bad thing, just as something very weird. I was just starting to feel like a grown up as I was finishing up at UF, but now I feel like I have been thrown back into highschool. In Mali I have very little Independence. This is for a good reason because I am a foreigner here, and it would be very hard to make it on my own, but still. I am constantly under the watch of some Malian which at times is very annoying to me because I just came from living on my own for thr past four years. I live with my homologue right now, and this just makes me feel even more like a kid because he's basically a father figure, and I have to live with him, so esentially I've moved back in with my father. He very rarely lets me go places by myself, and when I am away from him for a day or more, he calls me to see how I am doing. I think that this is all very nice and caring of him, but again coming from being on my own for four years, I find it to be a tad bit annoying. Oh well, I guess I'm either going to have to get use to it, or set my boundaries as an adult. I'm not sure which one I wanna do yet, because sometimes being babied and having everything done for you is great!
On a more disgusting note, I have Amebas! Yayyy! Except not. You may not know what Amebas are so lemme just throw you a little blurb on how amebas are transmitted from the amazing book Where There is No Doctor: "The stools of infected people contain millions of these tiny parasites. Because of poor sanitation, they get into the source of drinking water or into food, and other people become infected." So yea, I'm one of those "other people." Oh and to avoid disgusting myself even further, I'm just going to refrain from describing the symptoms of having Amebas, you can look that up on your own. This is all very horrifying to me, but I guess that's just what happens when very few people wash their hands with soap in the country that I'm doing my Peace Corps service in :/. Oh and I now have to take 8 pills everyday for the next week! How exciting! -__-

Weird.

written Sept. 30, 2010
So today was a very weird day, a good day, but very weird. I consider all days that I make my way around the village and talk to people besides my homologue good days, and today I did just that. The first strange thing to happen to me was when I was at my host family's house for lunch. One of my host mom's friends was over and after lunch we were basically just hanging out. I'm only ever able to talk a little bit with them because my Bambara isn't that good, and neither is theirs since they speak Senufo.So anyway, I don't know how we go on the subject, but my host mom's friend, a young woman with a couple of kids (she's also the wife of the Secondary school's english teacher) told me that if she washed herself many many times it be possible to become my skin tone. I laughed out loud at this because I wasn't sure if she was joking or not. I had no idea how to respond to that in Bambara so I just said 'c'est pas possible!' (It's not possible). She just started to laugh too, and I said that her skin tone is good, and she pointed to my black shirt and said that my shirt and her skin were the same color. I told her over and over through laughs that it wasn't true, that both of our skin tones were good. A little later she asked me if when I go back to America would it be possible to take her baby girl with me hidden in my backpack, and once we get to America I could wash her a lot with American soap and then she will become the same skin tone as me. Again I burst out in laughter and said it wasn't possible. I tried to explain to them that their skin tone was good, and that there are lots of Americans with the same skin tone, my dad included. They didn't believe that at all, so tomorrow I'm bringing my photo album with me to prove that my dad has dark skin like them.
Today I also, without realizing, showed an inappropriate picture of my mom to my homologue's family and my Bambara teacher. This inappropriate picture was a picture of me with my mom and brother taken after church on mother's day. What it depicted was, gasp!, my mom in a skirt that didn't go past her knees! I have no idea what they said in response to seeing that because they were chattering at such an insane speed and also in Senufo, but I could clearly detect the shock in their voices. Once I knew what they were going on about I tried to explain to them that that was perfectly okay in America, and that women there often wear much shorter skirts than the one my mom had on. They went on to explain to me that a married woman would never wear that because her husband wouldn't allow it. Anyway, sorry mom, but a few people in my village now think you're a floozy :/.
The other weird thing to happen today was that these two teenage boys came to my house and told my homologue that they wanted to chat with me. I had my bucket and shower stuff in my hands when I walked past them and my homologue told me they wanted to chat. Hoping that it was going to be a quick question, I set my shower stuff down and sat in a chair in front of them. The first thing the boy asked me was if I was a Madame or a Madamoiselle. i always laugh at this question, I'm not sure why, but I answered Madameoiselle. Then he was like 'okay Madameoiselle we just came here to say good evening' (this was all in French btw), then he proceeded to ask me if I knew what AIDS was. I said of course and he went on to explain that he didn't believe it was a real thing, instead he felt it was a project brought to Africa by white people. I sat there in shock because I didn't know how to respond to that. The boy and my homologue took this to mean that I didn't understand what he was saying, so he asked me straight if I thought AIDS existed. I told them that I did understand and that of course it exists. He then asked me where it exists, and I said it exists in every continent, even the United States. He then asked me if I knew where AIDS began. I told him that I didn't and he said well if you don't know where it came from then how do you know it exists? Unfortunately my French is not nearly good enough to be able to discuss this topic adequately, but I did my best. I went on to ask him if he thought Yellow Fever was real, and he said yes, and then I asked him where Yellow Fever started, and of course he said he didn't know, and to that I said 'see it's the same thing. I don't know where AIDS came from and you don't know where Yellow Fever came from but they are both real.' I also told him that I knew of people with AIDS. I'm not sure I was able to convince him that AIDS is in fact real and not just a farce created by white people, but I hope I was able to make somewhat of a dent. I found the whole situation to be awkward because I don't feel as if I am all that knowledgeable on the topic of AIDS, and I never like talking about things I don't know all that much about. However I did ask them if they knew how AIDS was transmitted, and he said that it came from someone with AIDS getting cut and then the blood of that person getting on you. I tried to explain to him in my poor French that it can be transmitted through blood but not from something like coughing on someone. I also tried to say that it is transmitted sexually, but I completely forgot the word for sex in French, so I said it came from the thing a man and a woman do together in their bedroom. That was beyond awkward, and I only dug further into the awkwardness by trying to tell them about condoms, but again not knowing the word in French for that. For condoms I tried to use hand signals and said it was the thing in a box that a man uses. Thankfully the sun was going down, so I decided to use that as an excuse to leave that awkward situation and go take my bucket bath. I think they were all just as uncomfortable as I was so I think they were just as glad for me to leave as I was.

Be My Lover

written Sept. 26, 2010
Someone in my village has La Bouche's Be My Lover on a CD or a casette and they have played it pretty much everysingle night and several times during the day for the past week. Be My Lover just so happens to be one of my all-time favorite songs from the 90s, although I'm afraid that this random villager may be changing reversing that. I really hope they tire of it soon because I really don't want to hate that song.
Today I decided I would try and integrate myself into village life by doing something that women do here. I have previously avoided all other 'woman's work' because it's just too hard for me, and I'm also really lazy. For example, I have no desire to pound millet, no desire to go pick peanuts or peppers or whatever the in-season crop is, no desire to learn how to cook over a fire, and no to be able to pick up something scalding hot with my bare hands. Although today I figured I'd help with the corn processing because it seemed easy enough. All I had to do was pick the kernels off of whatever you call the thing that the kernels are attached to, you know the long cylindrical thing in the middle of corn, the part you don't eat. So anyway the corn had been dried so the kernels were very hard and somewhat difficult to get off, but once you get 2 or 3 off the rest come off pretty easy with multiple flicks of your thumb, or so I thought. Turns out those easy flicks of my thumb were destroying my skin. After about 10 ears of corn I looked down to see a GIGANTIC red, bulbous blister in the middle of my thumb. Apparently my dainty hands can't handle the work of Malian woman. It was kind of as if my body was like 'I told you so... there's a reason I didn't want you to do any of those things.'
Yesterday my homologue told me about a pretty common belief held by Malian villagers who have very little experience with foreigners. He said that they believe that white people, and in Mali I fall under this category I guess because I come from America even though there are Malians with lighter skin than me, can see the devil/demons. He said that there is a good chance that if I were to go walking with him, and we came upon a sacred place that someone would most likely shout out to him that he should watch out because I can see the devil and I will bring it to him, and thus kill him or terrorize him, I don't really know what Malian devils do to people once they are summoned. So my homologue and I proceeded to laugh at the thought of that, but then his laughter ceased and he looked me in the eyes and very seriously asked me 'You can't see the devil, right?' and to that I was like 'What?? No, of course not!'

Cinquantinaire!

written Sept. 23, 2010
So the Independence Day celebration in my village was actually pretty cool, albeit exhausting. It was an all day thing starting at 8 am and finishinglate into the night. The first thing that we did was raise the flag. Everyone was all dressed up in their outfits made with the Cinquantenaire fabric. Amazingly enough I was wearing the exact same fabric as my homologue, even though I had only bought it the day before and had picked it out because I hadn't seen very many people with it. In fact only a handfull of people had the same fabric as us. The Mayor and the Premiere Adjoint (kind of like the 2nd in command under the mayor) were two other people with the same fabric, so basically I unitentionally dressed as a VIP. This worked out perfectly because, as usual, I spent the whole day with the VIPs. After the raising of the flag was the start of the bike race. It seems like almost every village in Mali had a bike race (I feel like this is a very French influence, very Tour de France-esque). There were probably 8 men racing and I've been told that they biked 52K total. It took them about 2 hours to complete the race. While the bike race was going on there was a lot of dancing to the balofone and drums and a lot of speech making. There were also a lot of games for the kids to play, one of which was very similar to musical chairs! There was also a 1k foot race and tons and tons more dancing. I tried to take videos and pictures of everything. I even got pictures of the 1st, 2nd and 3rd place winners of the bike race. The most amazing thing is that they all raced in those jelly shoes that I described in a previous blog entry. A couple of the dudes were even wearing cut-off jean shorts. None of them looked like they were participating in a bike race, but I guess they were wearing what they had. Around 1 we broke for lunch. A huge group of men and I went to the Mairie (Mayor's Office) and had lunch there. There was a massive amount of Tigadegena (Peanut Butter Stew) and Rice for us to eat. We all sat in circles of 4-8 around a communal bowl. This made me cringe because there was no soap in sight and I didn't see very many buckets of water so this meant that not only would I be washing my hands without soap, but I would also be washing them with dirty water and then eating with them. The whole time I was eating I was thinking to myself, 'God I'm gonna be soooo sick tomorrow' and 'Uhp, guess I'll just go ahead and shove Giardia into my mouth.' I think in the future I should carry a bar of soap around with me, so even if I am using dirty water, at least I'll be killing some of the germs. Anyway, after lunch we got back to celebrating. The afternoon consisted of multiple dance competitions and an award ceremony for the top 3 highest ranked students in all the grades of the Primary and Secondary Schools. I was called up to hand out some of the wards to the students, and I had to pose for many pictures. The dance competition was smaller than I had expected because I had seen a lot more young people dancing at other village events I had gone to. The most fun competition to watch was the young boys competition. They were all so small, but yet they moved so fast! There were also competitions amongst young men, young women and young girls. Most of these I got on video and will try to upload to my facebook so you can see how crazy Malian dance looks. The last event of the day was the soccer game, where new jerseys and soccer balls were presented. Overall it was a really fun and inceredibley exhausting day. the mayor even joked with me at the end that I must be exhausted because I hadn't taken my usual nap, he was right though.
Oh, I forgot to mention that literally the entire day people kept coming up to me and asking me to get up and dance, and everytime I refused. Each time I kind of froze up like a five year old girl wanting to hide behind her mom because she's afraid of the stranger trying to talk to them. I was afraid that they were going to pull me up and make me dance with them. I don't know why I'm so afraid of dancing with them. I think it may be a combination of me not knowing how to dance like them and me not wanting thousands of eyes on me as I make a fool of myself dancing. I have however danced in public like this before, but that has always been with other Tubabs (white people/ Americans). When I'm with at least one other person I feel comfortable, because for me there is comfort in knowing that I'm not the only one who looks like an idiot. Anyway, Joyeux Cinquantenaire Mali!

fun times

So I'm heading back to my village today. I've had a really fun couple of days in Sikasso! The reason I'm heading back is because tomorrow is Mali's 50th anniversary of it's independence from France, so the whole country is partying it up. Tonight, the night before the big day, my village is having a big balofone (kind of like the xylophone) party. I've been told that all day tomorrow will be a party too, but I'm not sure what they have planned. I know that there will be a bike race on the main road, but since my village is 8k off the main road I won't be seeing that. I'm sure there will be lots of balofone playing and dancing. I'm excited for tomorrow, but at the same time I'm kind of tired and I don't really want to party all day. Also I'm come to realize that I'm not really a big fan of big groups of Malians, because all they do is stare at me, so I'm not really looking forward to that either. Anyway, by internet. I will see you in a few weeks when I come back to Sikasso for a week of language training (October 3-9).

village life

So unfortunately I wasn't able to put up a blog post before I left for my village because the internet was pretty shotty, but anyway since my last blog post I've been in village for almost 2 weeks! I really haven't done much of anything because the first three months in village are supposed to be focused on further language acquisition, however I haven't been doing that either. I'm supposed to have a language tutor, but my village has been pretty slow in trying to help me find one. Everyday I ask my homologue if they've found me a tutor yet, and everyday he says he hasn't talked to the Mayor yet, but that I should know soon. So yea, hopefully that happens because I can honestly feel my Bambara seeping out of me because all I really use is French here since people don't usually speak Bambara here. Although I have come to find out that most people in my village do actually speak Bambara, they just don't. I'm starting to get really annoyed by Senufo. I honestly hate how it sounds and I hate how everyone insists on speaking to me in Senufo first even though they know I don't know any at all. Why can't they just speak to me in Bambara?? My homologue and other villagers keep pestering me to learn Senufo, and I've explained to them about a million times now that after the first 3 months are over I will I have to go back to Tubaniso to take a Bambara language test so I need my focus to be on Bambara not Senufo. Ah well hopefully they will get it soon.

So anyway, as I said earlier, I haven't done much of anything since being here. In the mornings I wake up around 8 am, take a bucket bath, make my breakfast and then do some kind of household chore like laundry or sweeping. After that I usually read. I've read 5 books in the past 2 weeks! I should probably slow down because I'm not going to have any books left. At about noon I walk to my Djatigi's house (basically my host family) for lunch. Everyday except for the first day I have had Toh and it has been disgusting. I can't stand Toh. It's awful. The consistancy is gross and the sauce is nasty. I'm sure I've lost like 5 lbs in the past 2 weeks because I barely eat anything. After lunch I usually have a tea session somewhere; all three rounds, so this usually takes like 2 hours. After tea I take a 1-2 hour nap, and then around 5 I take a bucket bath and then cook my dinner. For dinner almost every single night I've had macaroni and cheese. Ridiculously amazing! Favorite part of the day. I first boil the macaroni over my gas camp stove then I drain out some of the water, add powdered milk and some weird margarine spread that doesn't have to be refrigerated, and then I add 3 triangles of Vache qui rit (laughing cow cheese) which also doesn't have to be refrigerated. Sooooo good. After dinner I usually go outside and hang out with my homologue's family and watch TV with them or I read inside my room. I go to bed around 9, and then I start it all over the next day. God I'm boring.

So I found out that I'm not a cat person a few days ago. Ever since I got my nomination to join the Peace Corps I knew I wanted to get a cat to keep me company no matter where I went. In fact one of the first things I asked my homologue when I came for my site visit like a month ago was if it was possible for me to get a cat in village. So pretty much as soon as I got here he told me he knew of a family with a kitten for me. I was super excited and went to see the cat the next day. It was this super cute female kitten that was white with brown patches and blue eyes. I told the family that I would come get in the next day because I had to pick up food for it first. So the next day I went to the butiki (little shack store) and bought some sardines. the cat was so cute when I picked it up, and didn't fidget or make a noise in my arms the whole walk home. That all changed as soon as I put it down inside my house. From that moment on the kitten wouldn't shut up. My homologue and I figured that it was just crying for it's mom and that it would stop in a day or two once it got habituated. But it didn't. It got habituated alright, and even became a very loving cat, it just never stopped meowing. It constantly wanted attention, and followed me wherever I went. If I even left the room for a second it would start meowing soooo loud! I know this may sound cute to you, but to me it was beyond annoying. After the third day I was already looking for a way to get rid of it. It was so annoying I didn't even bother to give it a name because I knew I had to get rid of it. I was able to pass it off to some random family in the village who was in need of a cat for mice catching or something. I bought the cat on Saturday and was rid of it on Tuesday. It's kind of embarassing that I couldn't handle that small animal, but I guess I'm a low-maintenance pet/ no pet at all person.

These past few days in village I have witnessed a lot of dancing (Ramadan just ended so there was a big party called Seli that day, and I also went to a Soiree held by the Club des Jeunes, basically a youth club, where there was a concert by the Balofone player Neba Solo). I can't handle Malian dancing. Not only does it look like people are having seizures, but it's just too much booty shaking! Senufo dancing is a little different than the dancing that I had seen when I was in Bamako. Here the women, and men too, bend over, stick their butts out and then start stomping the ground at an incredibley fast pace, kind of like they're trying to step on ants. (Mom- it looks just like their doing Kevin's Irish Jig!). The funny thing is that they think their such good dancers! I think they look awful! I guess it's just because I'm not use to it, but honestly it's ridiculous. I'm definitely going to have to take a video of it so that you all can experience it too.

Not only are Malians terrible dancers, they are also terrible dressers, when it comes to wearing Western clothes that is. Their traditional outfits are beautiful, but when they try to look modern it's laughable. I think the 1980s was dumped on Mali. All of the young men wear tight jeans with random pictures and ornamentation on them, with belts with decorative belt buckles, tight shirts, and jackets that look like Member's Only Jackets. The men also pop their collars, and wear militaryish type button ups with fake medals and insiginia. The men also seem to think that a mullet type hair cut is cool here too. The top of their hair is a square cut, and the back is a little longer than the front, i.e. a black man's mullet. They look very much like 1980s Wesley Snipes or Eddie Murphy. The women aren't any better than the men because they wear these super shiny ill-fitting tight shirts over their traditional Pagnes. Fashion here is a hot mess! Oh and I forgot to mention the biggest trend amongst men now, the jelly sandal! I don't know if you will remember this, but I think sometime in the early 90s, when I was in about 3rd grade, jelly sandals were very popular amongst girls. They were plastic sandals that buckled on the side and came in all sorts of colors and usually had glitter mixed into the plastic. Well in Mali, practically ALL of the men have a pair. They're white or clear usually, but they're the same exact things that I was dying to wear as a little girl. Every time I see a 20-something year old dude in a pair of jellies with his tight pants and popped-collar Member's Only jacket I have to bite the inside of my mouth to keep from laughing. Oh Mali.

It's about to begin

So I have one more day left before I'm off to my village for the rest of my 2 years! I'm going to try to come into Sikasso every 2-3 weeks so that I can check my mail and do internety type things. I'm pretty excited to head to my village, but also kind of bummed because being in Sikasso these past 2 days has been really fun. I have done tons of shopping for my house as well as hung out a lot with the 2nd years who are really awesome. I have also had constant access to electricity and internet so that's going to be kind of difficult to part with.

Anyway I have a couple little stories to tell, so here we go:

Three nights ago, my last night at Tubaniso, I woke up to find myself screaming at the top of my lungs (at 1:35 am). Not just any screaming though, I'm talking horror movie, blood curtling screams. The reason for this was that I was having this terrible nightmare that there was a Malian man who had come into my room and was just standing looking at me inside my mosquito net about to kill me. In my dream I sat up and started to scream for help, and that's when I woke up because I realized I was not just screaming in the dream, but also in real life. Upon waking up I also realized that my roommate Eliza was now screaming with me too because my screams had scared her so bad that she had to scream too. Not only was Eliza screaming with me, but my other roommate Deborah was shouting out "Help us! Help us!" just because she had no idea what was going on. There were some people outside of our hut just hanging out, and they all came running to our room to see what the problem was. Through Eliza's screams and Deborah's yells I told everyone that nothing was wrong, that it was just a dream and that I was perfectly fine. Once everyone calmed down none of us were able to go back to sleep, so we left the lights on and I proceeded to watch 4 episodes of the Office. The whole situation was incredibley embarassing/hilarious.

When we got to Sikasso we did this thing called Protocol which means we were introduced to the Governor's office so that they know they have new volunteers in town. We met the assistant Governor and he was super excited to meet us all. He was also super excited for us to give him an American name since we all had Malian names. We all decided that we wanted to give him a really typical American name, but also one that we'd find hilarious. So... we named him Jose Washington! He loved it, and we couldn't stop laughing. It was great.

Guess who's a new PCV... this guy!

I AM NO LONGER A TRAINEE, BUT A BRAND SPANKING NEW PEACE CORPS VOLUNTEER. The very, some-what excruciatingly long 2 month training period is over. Yesterday we were sworn in as PCVs at the US Embassy by the PC Mali Director and the US Ambassador. The ceremony is usually held outside, but that morning the heavens decided to dump out all of its contents onto the city of Bamako. It was seriously a torrential down pour, and the dirt roads turned into brown rivers. The worst part about it was that we were all dressed up in Malian outfits (mine was all yellow with gold embroidery) and we got soaked in them. Unfortunately for me, the cloth my outfit is made out of is incredibley see-through when wet. Thank goodness I was wearing a jacket because I was able to use it to cover up my bright blue underwear that was showing through my skirt. So I spent the entire ceremony with my jacket wrapped around my waist. Besides being miserable from being wet, the ceremony was really nice. The Ambassador gave a really touching speech, and even shed some tears! We all said an oath, and then afterwards 5 of my fellow PCVs gave thank-you speeches in the languages they had been studying (Fulfude, Bomu, Tomokan, French and Bambara). After the ceremony we all took a bajillion pictures in our outfits. We were then shuttled to the American Club where they had a big buffet for us with delicious AMERICAN FOOD (cheeseburgers, pasta salad, fruit salad, potato salad, quesadillas, and french fries). The American Club has a pool, so I spent most of my time poolside trying to fix this awful tan that I've acquired from wearing only shirts with sleeves and skirts that go past my knees. Swear-in Night is always a big party that is planned by the current volunteers for the new volunteers, so after the American Club, the current volunteers (I may also refer to them as 2nd year volunteers now that I am a volunteer too) organized it so that we would spend the night in a hotel and go out to 2 different clubs in Bamako. The hotel that we stayed at was pretty nice (air conditioning, bathroom, tv) and it was basically across the street from the first club. Both clubs were awesome!! I had soooo much fun dancing and celebrating being a new PCV (the clubs were suprisingly similar to American clubs, they even played mostly American music). After clubbing we didn't get home until almost 5 am, and my hair now reeks of old cigarettes.

Tomorrow morning begins my 3 month lockdown at my site (well technically a lockdown besides the 2 times we're allowed to go to our regional capitol, Thanksgiving, and our week long regional language session). My bus leaves tomorrow at 7 am, and from Tubaniso I have about a 6 hour ride to Sikasso where I will spend 3 days buying stuff for my house. I'm super excited to buy a bunch of new things but also kind of annoyed that I will have to move all of these new things into a house that I will only be living in for a few months as I wait for my actual house to be built. Oh well.

So I don't know if you could tell this earlier, but I'm super excited to be a volunteer and be done with training!!

final stretch of homestay

August 20, 2010
So I'm back at Homestay now. I've been here since Tuesday (today is Friday), and I only have until next Saturday left. On the Sunday after next, we head back to Tubaniso for a week, and then we get sworn in as official Peace Corps Volunteers at the US Embassy. Anyway, the past couple of days at homestay have been alright. I definitely wish that I was back at my actual site though because it is so much nicer than my homestay village. In my homestay village I cant go anywhere without being called 'Tubaboo', which is perhaps the world's most annoying word especially when said in the sing-song voice that the children here love so much. I realized today that it would be impossible to sneak up on someone here because a child a mile away will see me coming and start shouting Tubaboo Tubaboo Tubaboo! and then whoever I was trying to sneak up on would be alerted.
I knew coming into Mali that it was probably going to be a little difficult for me to live in a predominately Muslim country, but I had no idea how incredibley difficult it would be. I'm not talking about Christians getting along with Muslims (it's actually super chill here, they could care less that I'm Christian and not Muslim), I'm talking about the extreme lack of sleep I'm getting because of the 4:30 am call to prayer. Also now that it is Ramadan, there is a 3:30 am call for everyone to wake up so that they can eat before the day of fasting begins. Unfortunately my house is like 500 ft from the Mosque so I always get woken up by the loudspeaker. It is almost impossible to fall back asleep once I've been woken up. The worse thing is that It's not just the loudspeaker that wakes me up, but also the chickens, donkeys, goats and dogs that love to make noise at all hours of the night. It's really unfortunate because I'm always so tired during the day which makes language lessons torturous. Oh well, I only have 1 week left here!!
So today I had a very interesting discussion with my host-dad, in French of course because my Bambara is horrible, about the moon. It all started by him asking me if we had a moon in America, and I said of course we do, and he was shocked by this and then said 'but not the same moon, right?' And I was like 'no, we have the same moon.' To that he was like 'no way! That moon is for Mali, you have a different moon in America, a smaller moon.' I couldn't stop laughing because he was completely serious. Between laughs I tried to explain that the whole world shared the same moon, and that there is only 1 moon and 1 sun. I also told him that we shared the same stars too. I'm pretty sure I wasn't able to convince him, and I'm pretty sure he thinks every country has their own moon, sun and stars, or none of those at all. My host-dad attended some school, so I wonder if the teach the solar system at all in school? I think I'll try and find that out.
So 2 days ago I discovered something that will make my next 2 years here a lot more bearable: Vache qui rit cheese!!! (we have it in the US too, except its called Laughing Cow Cheese). This cheese doesn't have to be refrigerated and is spreadable, so I eat it with the baguette that I get every morning, SO DELICIOUS. I ration one triangle of cheese per morning so that I have something to look forward to. Breakfast is now my favorite meal of the day because I get half a baguette with my vache qui rit triangle, a hard-boiled egg, and tea made with powdered milk and sugar. One thing that I find funny is that I'm obsessed with eggs here in Mali! This is weird because I hate eggs in the US. You could very rarely find me eating eggs, and the few times I did, I only ate them scrambled, and I especially hated hard boiled eggs. But in Mali I can't get enough of them! I think it may be because my body is protein deficient, so it craves any source of protein. Whatever the case is, I can eat eggs anyday, allday. I even hope to raise chickens at my site just so I can have eggs whenever I want.
August 28, 2010
I'm very hungry and I can't go back to sleep because the Mosque woke me up (it's 5:22 am) so I thought I'd write a blog post. Today is my last day at Homestay!!! I'm super incredibley excited because I was starting to get sick of this place. I can't wait to be sworn in as a legit volunteer and I can't wait to be back in Sikasso. I only now slightly feel like I'm going to miss Homestay because lastnight we had a sort of Thank-you gathering for all of the host families were we told them how greatful we were that they allowed us to stay in their homes and that they took such good care of us. I invited my host dad and his 2 wives to come to the gathering, but none of them showed up, instead they sent 2 of their daughters in their place (one of the daughters really gets on my nerves so I really was unhappy to see her their instead of my host-parents). At first I thought the reason that they didn't come was because they didn't care, and that they were just as ready for me to leave as I was. Turns out this wasn't true at all. After the gathering, when I got back home, I gave my host parents the gifts I wanted to give them at the gathering (a watch for my host dad, and bracelets for my host moms). They all seemed genuinely happy to receive them, but nothing can top my host dad's reaction when I handed him the watch. The man was choking back tears. It was so precious. I have never ever ever seen him that happy! He could just not believe that anything like that would ever happen. Now because of his reaction I feel kinda bad... and the reason being that it was just an $8 watch from Walmart, granted it looked pretty nice and is probably better than any watch he'd buy, but still. Anyway I was super touched by his reaction, and I now know that they aren't in a rush to get me out of here and that they will miss me, and knowing this makes me kind of sentimental too whereas before I was telling people that there was no way I was gonna miss homestay and that I couldn't wait to get out of here. I think my problem was that I associated all of Homestay with language class alone, which I hate, and not with how nice of a family I got and all the super nice things they did for me.
So anyway that brings me to my next little blurb: I'M DONE WITH LANGUAGE CLASS (*sort of)!!! Yesterday afternoon I took my End-of-Stage (oral) Language test. For this test we have to achieve a score of Intermediate-Mid in Bambara to be sworn in as volunteers. I was EXTREMELY nervous because my Bambara isn't the greatest, and I wasn't sure that I'd be able to achieve inter-mid. So anyway I took the test and I wasn't very happy with myself because I had memorized some pretty advanced sentences and I never got the chance to use them. I spent several hours after the test ragging on myself because of this. I later found out from my LCF (my Bambara teacher) that everyone in my homestay village passed!! I won't actually receive the results from my test until Monday, but I'm super relieved to hear that I passed (hopefully this turns out to be true).
Random tidbit for you guys: So turns out it's shockingly rude to ignore a phone call here. My homologue in Sikasso is now in the habit of calling me everyother day (mind you we can barely understand eachother because my bambara sucks and my french isn't that great either) to ask me how I'm doing and to tell me how happy he is that I'm doing well. This may sound "cute" to you, but it's not, it's actually annoying as hell. So anyway, a few afternoons ago I was getting my hair braided when my phone started ringing. I looked down to see who it was, and yep it was my homologue. I let out an exasperated sigh and pressed ignore. The lady who was braiding my hair and her husband, who was sitting near by, both let out these gasps of shock. That completely threw me off guard because I had the habit of ignoring phone calls quite a bit in the US (not as often as Jenn though). I tried to explain to them that I didn't want to talk to him, but they didn't seem to get it. I later explained the whole ignoring the phone call situation to my LCFS and I got the same shocked reaction from them too! My LCF, once he lost his shock, explained that in Mali you never ignore a phone call because if someone is willing to spend the little money the have on phone credit to talk to you than you shouls be polite enough to answer. So his explanation made total sense and actually made me feel really bad about ignoring my homologue's call. Lucky for me though he called back literally a minute after my LCFs explanation, so of course I answered the phone! Again it was just a call to see how I was doing, and it didn't even last more than a minute. I guess from now on I'm just going to have to put up with these minute-long annoyances.
*it's only sort of because I have to do some language tutoring for the first 3 months at site.

loved it!

I decided to bring my laptop to site visit because I remembered really wanting to journal/blog my first night of homestay. I am going to write a little bit each day so that by the end of the week I will have a mini entry for each day.

Day 1 (August 8)
So I don't think I've ever been so nervous in my entire life. I literally felt like throwing up the entire morning because my stomach was so knotted with stress. This morning we were told to wake up at 4 am so that we'd be ready to leave at 5 am. While eating breakfast my homologue came up to me and showed me his ticket and said something to me in Bambara, so I figured he was saying that he got both of our tickets. After breakfast we went to load the bus, but it turned out that there wasn't enough space for all of us on the one bus so my homologue and I actually got split up. I didn't find this out until later though, so I spent the entire ride to the bus station panicked because my homologue wasn't on the bus. When I finally reunited with my homologue at the bus station it was a great relief, but then I found out that he didn't actually have my ticket and earlier he had told me to go get my own ticket in Bambara. So this news made me panic even more because I thought there might be a chance that they wouldn't let me on the bus, but thanks to my amazing homologue everthing was smoothed out and I had no problems getting on the bus. My bus ride was a very very long 6 hours, although at some point along the trip I found out that my homologue lied when he said he only speaks a little French, because really he speaks beacoup! I was super relieved to find this out because now we can actually communicate, when before I could only tell him about my basic needs in Bambara. On the bus there was a driver and three attendants (they collected the money and helped people with luggage), and after my bus ride when we got off at our stop, all three of the attendants got off the bus and I could see them whispering to eachother. I knew they were talking about me, but I didn't know what about until one came over to me and asked me for my number! lol, I gave him an 'are you kidding me!?' look and then told them all off by saying that they didn't know me, so why should they want my number (all in french). They all cracked up and got back on the bus. My 8k (which is about 5 miles) bike ride to my actual village wasn't at all as bad as I thought it was going to be. I did get covered in mud though because it had just rained. Once I got to the village I found out that I'm living in the same concession with my homologue and his family, not with the chief of the village as I was told. The 2 rooms that they have for me are attatched to their house, and my negen isn't even built yet (everything was supposed to be finished before I got here). I also don't have a hangar in front of my house that can be like a gated area for privacy. What they have provided for me doesn't follow the Peace Corps guidlines, so once I get back to Tubaniso I'm going to have to make sure someone finds out what is going on. Besides my house not being in order, everything else was great! I really like my homologue and his family and everyone that I have met so far in my village, even though hardly any of them speak Bambara (they all speak Senufo, so yay for me having to learn another language when I really don't like language learning!) All in all I'd say that it was an awesome first night, and I think I'm gonna like this place (especially if they get my housing issues situated).
*cool fact: I'm the first American ever in my village, and my homologue said he was going to write "Elizabeth Coomber, the first American in our village" in their history books. Insanely awesome!

Day 2 (August 9)
I feel like I live in Busch Gardens. I know that sounds weird, and I think I'm going to have some trouble explaining this, but I'll give it a shot. So I always felt that amusment parks like Busch Gardens exaggerated the huts and vegetation for what Africa is supposed to look like. I felt this way because I lived in Nigeria for 2 years and never once saw a mud hut with a thatched roof. Well in my village they're everywhere! Almost every household has a round hut with a thatch roof! It looks so fake, just like Busch Gardens, but they're real!
Anyway I did quite a bit today with my homologue. He basically gave me a tour of my entire village. My village has a primary and a secondary school, so I got to visit both of those, as well as the health clinic and a bunch of little random graineries and gardens. I also met the Chief of the village today, he's this cute little old man with coke bottle glasses and a huge smile. He was super excited to meet me, and I also found out that I'm actually the 2nd American to come to my village because the Chief said that when he was a small boy he met an American man and this man gave him 5 francs. I can't believe he can remember something as small as that! Today was another great day!
P.S. there are mango trees everywhere in my village!! I can't wait for mango season!!

Day 3 (August 10)
Today was another great day! It started out pretty slow because after I ate breakfast my homologue and I went to the Secondary school to meet the headmaster there. I also got to sit in on a CGS meeting which is Communite de Gestion Scolaire, which is kind of like a school board meeting. They were talking about the schools budget which I found to be very boring and hard to follow because it was in French, but at just the right time I saw my site buddy walk up. She's a 1 year PCV who lives in a village 12k from me. She basically came to check in on me and see how my site visit was going. She's super cool and very nice. She's staying the night at my place so that she can be here tomorrow for when a Peace Corps official comes to see how I'm doing and to introduce me to the Mayor.

Day 4 (August 11)
So I'm positive that I'm going to love living here. I have the best homologue ever! He literally treats me like his daughter and makes sure everything is perfect for me. I have a couple of issues with my house (I am supposed to have my own negen, but right now there's just a giant hole in the ground, my door is wood when it's supposed to be metal. and it opens with a skeleton key which doesn't fit Peace Corps standards) and my homologue says that there's going to be no problem having those things fixed before I'm installed here at the beginning of September. I also explained to him that I would really like my own concession, even though living with him and his family is great, I just want my own space, and he understood completely, and said that after the rainy season is over he will see to it that a new concession for me gets built! He's so accomodating and hospitable! Today I also got to meet the Mayor, and he seems like a really nice guy that I will be able to work with well. Today was also market day in my village!! It was great! It's not the biggest market, but I was able to buy some pretty cool cloth and some orange and blue (go gators) bracelets. The only thing I don't like about my village is that they speak Senufo here, and I've come to realize that it's going to be very difficult to learn this language because it is spoken with the throat, it sounds very similar to Chinese, and it's almost impossible for me to get my mouth in the right position to pronounce words and phrases correctly.

Day 5 (August 12)
Today was my last full day in village because tomorrow I am going to Sikasso with my site buddy so she can show me around. I need to know where my bank is and where I'll be receiving mail, as well as where the Bureau is so I can get internet access. Today was a really chill day. After my bucket bath and breakfast this morning my homolgue took me to a meeting of the village elders (all men of course) and heads of families. They gathered to talk about me and also about the past school year and any issues dealing with the primary and secondary schools in the village. Earlier in the week I had asked the village chief to give me a Senufo name (really I just wanted a new name because I didn't like Sali at all), so now my name is Gnire (pronounced Near-y) and this means first daughter in Senufo. I got this name because I am their first American daughter, so I'm really happy to have gotten this name! Today I wasn't feeling so well so I told my homologue that I didn't want to go with him to a meeting at the Mayor's office, but that I wanted to go back home and read. So I pretty much spent the whole day reading (I also watched a couple episodes of the Office) except for when I ended up having to go to the meeting anyways just to show my face to those who hadn't met me yet. Overall it has been a really good week, and as much as I really like this village, I'm ready to go back to Tubaniso.

Sikasso, I'll be seeing you very soon

So I'm leaving for my actual site at 5 am tomorrow morning. I'm not too happy about this. I'm already super nervous about going to my site, having to bike 8k, and actually liking my site, and now I'm barely gonna get any sleep. Tomorrow will also be the first time I've ever taken public transport here in Mali. I'm beyond nervous about that! The buses here don't look that great... Oh well, it has to happen, so there's no use complaining about it over and over again. Anyway, right now my biggest dilemna is whether or not to listen to my ipod on the trip to Sikasso. A reason to listen to it on the way is that it'll make my 4 to 5 hour trip faster, and a reason not to is that I should save the battery for the week that i'm going to be in village. Oh and I can't even charge my ipod with my solar charger anymore because it got stolen... One day last week I was charging the solar panel by the school, and when I left to go home I forgot to pick it up. I realized as soon as I got home (literally 5 minutes later) that I left it. I ran back to the school and it was gone. I assume one of the children took it. I told my LCFs what happened and they said that they would ask around for its whereabouts, so hopefully it turns up. I'm not too angry about it because it didn't work too well and I think it was only like $15. Oh well. Anyway, Sikasso Region, here I come!

Site Announcement

So site announcement is something that all of us PCTs have been eagerly anticipating for the past month! It's we finally found out where we will all be going once we swear in. The way that they did site announcement was really cool but also really nerve-wrecking. They made the announcements by region, so that meant that they called out a region and then one-by-one listed all of the PCTs from each sector who will be going there. The whole process and the assignments themselves were kept a big secret, but a few things slipped out. For example beforehand I was told that nobody wants to go to Kayes region because it's the hottest place on Earth. I also didn't want to be in the Koulikoro region because that meant Bamako (the capital city) wpould be my regional capital, and because of that it would lose all of it's novelty and no longer be a big deal to go to. So because of those impressions I had of those 2 regions, my whole body was incredibley tense when the PCTs in those regions were being called out. The one region I REEEEAAALLLY wanted to be in was Sikasso because I heard that it is the most lush region where most of the fruits and vegetables come from (I miss produce sooooo much), and also where they always have a big Thanksgiving party (the reason this is so special is that our first 3 months as sworn in volunteers has to be spent at site, meaning that if you aren't in the Sikasso region you can't come to the big Thanksgiving dinner in Sikasso).
So back to me being super tense. The first region to be called was Kayes. When it came time for the Education volunteers to be announced I was crossing my fingers and praying that my name wouldn't be called, and it wasn't! The next region was Koulikoro, and I again crossed my fingers and said a prayer, and again my name wasn't called out!! The next region to be called was Sikasso. I had pretty much convinced myself that I wasn't going to get what I most wanted because I had basically exhausted all of my luck by not getting Kayes or Koulikoro. They made it through all of the Sikasso announcements and they saved the Education names for last. The Education head got through his 3 or 4 names and got to his very last name, and guess what, it was me!!! I jumped up and threw my arm in the air and yelled out "yes!" and then proceeded to high-five a few people. lol. I was super excited. I got my dream region, but unfortunately I didn't get my dream site. It turns out that I have to bring my mountain bike with me because my village is several kilometers from the main road. I love biking in the US, but biking in Mali is a different story. Besides the fact that it is super hot here and I am constantly sweating during my bike rider, the roads and paths are super terrible, and I often have to bike through nasty puddles and over donkey poop. I also found out that my site doesn't have reliable cell service, so I'm not too sure how I will be making my phone calls. Another thing I got but didn't want was a male Homologue. I really wanted the person I work the most close with to be a woman. i just felt that a woman would be able to help me more, and would be more comfortable around me because a male homologue could feel like he might not want to tell me something because it could be a touchy subject. I don't know. Anyway I actually just got to meet my homologue and he seems like a super nice older man. He speaks Bambara and a little French (or so my info sheet says, but I haven't actually tried to speak to him in French yet so we'll see if this is actually true). I'm glad he looks nice because on Sunday I will have to ride with him on public transport to Sikasso, a 4 to 5 hour drive from Bamako, and him being nice means that the ride will of course be awkward seeing as we've only just met, but not super awkward because he's not a weirdo!

List of Topics

written 8-5-10 (sorry if there's any spelling or grammar issues)
So I have a HUGE amount of info to blog about, so get ready.
Okay, so since my last blog a lot has happened. Seeing as it would take forever to describe everything, I will be giving you all a cliffnotes version of all that has happened in the last (almost) 2 weeks. I don't bring my computer to my homestay site, so in order to prep for my blog updates I fill a page from my notebook with a list of all the things I want to talk about. Here is said list, note that here it can be used as a table of context, if you will:
1.Wedding
2.Soiree
3.Malian men/wedding proposals
4.Sick PCTs
5.Field trips/ restaurants!
6.Museum/American Club
7.Sleeping (so hot, fan)
8.Food (likes and dislikes)
9.My Negen
10.Pokemon
11.Mice (Milk and Sugar)
12.Underwear
...(I told you I had a lot to write about)
1. Okay so I think I mentioned in my last blog that I was going to get to attend my host sister's wedding, and that I was super excited about that. Well... the wedding sucked. It was soooo boring. I spent the entire day sitting on a bench in the hot sun with my fellow tubabs (white people) while the bride spent the entire day inside her little room. I later found out that a common tradition in Mali is for the bride to stay inside all day because once her head has been washed she is not allowed to greet anyone except her husband. So while my host sister was in the room the whole day, all the wedding guests sat around and talked with eachother. There was some dancing to a random beat by some random dude who was playing this teeny drum. The dancing was only done by women and all they do is shuffle their feet and go around in a circle. I've heard that weddings are supposed to be super fun, but I definitely didn't experience any fun at all (maybe my host fam doesn't know how to throw a raging party). One cool thing about the wedding was that my host sister got a TON of gifts. She got all kinds of cloths, buckets, bowls, an armoire, and a bunch of other random stuff! Another cool thing was that everyone had on really cool clothes. I loved all of the bright and beautifully patterned fabrics!
2. A few days ago I got to go to my first Malian soiree (basically a block party at night with lots of dancing that they charge money for entry, and it is usually for a cause). This was super cool because I got special permission to stay at my friend's homestay village just to attend this party because nothing ever happens in my quiet little homestay village. Anyway, we got to the soiree, which was being held at a local restaurant, around 10:30 pm. This was super difficult for me because I'm so use to going to sleep at 8:30 now. My friends and I didnt have to pay to get in because the friend that I was staying with's brother either paid for us or was able to convince the guards to let us in for free. Once we got in we noticed that no one was there except for maybe like 10 people. The reason for this is because parties dont start until like 12:30 here, just like in the US! Once the party finally did get started I noticed a ton of differences between a Malian soiree and a US party. The first is that Malians dance like theyre having seizures. There was no rhythm at all to their dance moves. They were literally flailing their arms in random motion while jerking their bodies every which way. It was hilarious. My friends and I couldn't stop laughing! (I'm sure the Malians thought we danced weird too and I'm sure they were also laughing at us). Another difference is that they leave the lights on. I think this may be because this is a very conservative country and if the lights were to go out, then who knows what kind of hanky panky could occur! Another kind of weird thing is that dudes dance in groups together and girls dance in groups together. It seems that there is gender segregation in every facet of life here, even partying!
3. Malian men are not my favorite men in the world. It seems that almost every other day I get wedding proposals. One of my guy friends in my homestay village with me has several times pretended to be my husband to get the guys to leave me alone. He will be like "no she is my wife, you can't have her!" It can be pretty funny, but also really annoying. Groups of guys will yell at me to come over and talk with them whenever they see that I'm alone, and I always just tell them that maybe I'll come talk with them later... maybe. And then I never do.
4. It seems as if a ton of my fellow PCTs are getting sick! I have yet to get sick *knock on wood*, but others have had some pretty crazy ailments! One of my fellow education trainees got *Gasp* MALARIA! I also know of 2 trainees who have gotten Giardia (disgusting. This one has symptoms like explosive fouler than usual smelling diarrhea and burps that smell like sulfur). Another trainee cut her toe and it got badly infected and she hasn't been able to return to her homestay village in the past 2 weeks. A huge amount of people have had diarrhea and fevers, and I know of one girl who has a parasite. I reeeallllly hope I don't get sick!
5. As Education trainees we get to go on a lot of field trips to NGOs offices and random organizations in Bamako that we will be working with, unlike other sectors who basically just stay at their homestay villages and do language classes for the full 2 weeks. We've been able to visit the USAID office at the Embassy, as well as some other organizations that are aiding in improving literacy and numeracy in Mali. My favorite thing about our field trips is that we get to go to restaurants in Bamako for lunch, and Peace Corps pays! My favorite place so far is this place called Broadway Cafe. It's super nice inside and the food is sooooo good and the ice cream is even better! I got a cheeseburger and fries and then a scoop of both vannilla and strawberry.
6. This past Sunday was what they called a "fun day" for us PCTs. We got to meet up with our entire stage (all 80 of us) in Bamako, where we were split up into 2 groups with one group going to the American Club and the other going to The National Museum. My group went to the American Club first, and there I ordered a cheesburger and fries and then after eating just relaxed in their TV room on a comfy recliner and we watched the first half of The Breakup (a movie I'd already seen). We spent about 2 hours at the American Club and then switched with the other group to go to the Museum. I didn't like the museum at all, but that's just because I don't like art museums. The exhibits were of things like figurines, wood carvings and textiles. The museum was super tiny, but it took the full 2 hours to go through it because our tour guide gave us the most comprehensive descriptions of every last item. I was bored out of my mind, and very sleepy after just relaxing at the American Club.
7.Sleeping is an interesting thing for me here. I barely get any of it. I go to bed super early, so technically I should always be well rested, but it's really hard for me to fall asleep here. There are all kinds of random noises, but the worst thing is the heat. My room basically bakes all day because it has a tin roof, so when I lay down on my bed at night it feels like I'm inside an oven. I usually fall asleeop dripping with sweat. It's pretty gross. As for the noises, I've got the Mosque's 4:30 am call to prayer everyday, donkeys that sound like they're being murdered and roosters that crow like every single hour. Eventually I hope to get use to and be able to sleep through all the noise!
8. Food here is not my fav. I'm basically on a 95% carb diet. In the morning I eat a half loaf of bread with a cup of super sweet milky tea and a teeny hard boiled egg. For lunch I usually get rice with eith a peanut sauce or leaf sauce that has a little tiny chuck of fish in it, and then for dinner I usually get either spaghetti that has been tossed in oil and some seasoning or boiled potatoes/yams with nothing on them and that's it. I am so tired of carbs!!!! My favorite food here is when I get my boiled potatoes covered in a tomatoe and onion based sauce, delicious! This unfortunately has become a rareity. I most often get the spaghetti oil thing.
9. Ahhh the Negen. except not really, because it's more like take a deep breath of fresh are before you go into that nasty thing. At first it was pretty hard for me to crouch over a hole to use the bathroom, but as of now I've gotten pretty good at it, and even find it to be somewhat comfortable. My aim isn't what it should be, but I have 2 years to work on that ;). I hate that I have to do all my normal bathroom activities in the Negen. It's so gross to have to shower and brush your teeth and change and wash yopur face where you and everyone else poops. vom, or should I say foono which is Bambara for to vomit.
10. Pokemon for Gameboy Color is my savior. Many a day when I had nothing to do but sit and stare at the ground was joyfully spent playing pokemon. Unfortunately I just beat the game 2 days ago so there won't be much for me to do now, but I guess I can always start over or just continue to battle my pokemon or catch more pokemon. Everyone laughs at me whenever they see me pull out my gameboy and start to play pokemon, I guess it is somewhat childish of me, but whatevs, Pokemon rock!
11. So one thing that is really starting to get on my nerves is that my room has a serious mouse problem. The mice chew through and eat everything! Earlier this morning my host dad gave me a bag of shelled peanuts and when I returned in the afternoon to get them 3/4ths of the bag was gone!! The mice have also chewed through the bags of sugar that I keep in my room for my morning tea as well as my powdered milk. What sucks is that I have t throw away everything they chew through because rodents carry some pretty nasty diseases here that I have no desire to acquire.
12. So a big taboo here in Mali is letting other people see your underwear, and because of this I can't include underwear in the laundry that I give to your host mom everyweek. Instead I have to wash them in private and make sure no one knows that that is what I am doing. This is super awkward because I am always being watched and I'm sure they know what I've been up to when I come out of my room with a bucket full of soapy water. Oh well.
Wow that took forever! So on top of everything I just wrote, I aactually found out my site assignment today! I'm going to go to bed now, but tomorrow I'll write all anout my soon-to-be site and my homologue!

Back to Homestay

Today is my last day at Tubaniso, I won't be back here until Thursday, August 5th ... sigh. Goodbye internet, goodbye electricity, goodbye delicious food (this is the only place where it is safe to eat salad!) goodbye reliable cell phone service, and goodbye fellow PCTs (except for my 3 village mates). I'm going back into the darkness... haha well not really. While being at Tubaniso I've actually kind of missed my homestay village, which I thought wwas impossible. I miss the little kids and my crappy room, but I think what I miss the most is all of the down time. Here at Tubaniso we're constantly in some training class, there's always something to do. Also the majority of the classes are super boring, just like any normal job training. Every so often we do something fun, like have a panel of PCVs talk to us, but that's pretty rare.
One cool thing that I have been able to do at Tubaniso is watch movies. They have a projector here, so we have been able to watch Up as well as Hot Tub Time Machine. I love Up, and I thought that HTTM was pretty funny but definitely stupid. Also at Tubaniso is this vender dude who sells random things like candy and soda. This has been the only place I've been able to buy Coca Light (aka Diet Coke)! I crave Diet Coke, I'm basically having withdrawls. Everywhere I go I ask them if they have Coca Light, but they never do, it's very sad. Although it was really cool because when we first got to Tubaniso, one of my village mates bought me a can of coca light and sang happy birthday to me. It was an awesome present! I also bought a snickers bar today. It tasted a little weird because I think it was pretty old but it was still a good taste from home.
This Sunday (tomorrow) my older host sister is having her wedding celebration. I get to wear an outfit that they had made for me. I have no idea what is going to happen at the celebration, but I assume a lot of food and dancing. I just found out today that our LCFs (language and culture facilitator, so basically our Malian tutors who live in the homestay village with us) won't be at the wedding. Every Saturday they leave the homestay village to go to their actual homes and families in Bamako (they only live with us during the week). So this means that I'm not gonna have any idea what is going on at the wedding because there will be no one there to translate stuff into English or French. Oh well.
So anyway, lots of reading, I'm reading Pillars of the Earth (I think that's the title?), and lots of playing of Pokemon on my Gameboy Color. Oh I also watch an episode of the Office on my iPod almost everyday. Thank god for technology!