An ye yala yala Mali kono kosobɛ...

My sister's visit to Mali has just come to an end. We had a very eventful and enjoyable 'yala yala' across the country. Below is a brief summary of our excursion:

On Sunday, December 19th, Kim flew into Bamako. We immediately took a bus to travel up to Carrefour, then rode the rest of the way to Djenné on a bashɛ. The bashɛ to Djenné has to cross over the river Niger on a ferry to get into the city, and the bashɛ in front of us actually got stuck on the beach while driving onto it. I had to help the other men pull the bashɛ onto the ferry with a rope - just one of the many nuances with our transportation.

We spent Sunday evening and Monday in Djenné. Djenné is a very scenic and distinctive city full of large mud brick buildings, including the largest of the sort in the world, the famous Grand Mosque of Djenné. It was very cool to see the sights, but the Monday market was a bit overwhelming, as the local traders hassle tourists to no end to buy their goods.

The Great Mosque of Djenné is the largest mud brick building in the world, and is the focal point of the city. The weekly market every Monday is situated in front of the mosque.

The City of Djenné is a network of narrow alleys winding between multi-story mud-brick buildings.

On Tuesday, we took another bashɛ out of Djenné; this time a smoother operation, however uncomfortable it may have been. We arrived in the city of Sevaré, where we waited for another bashɛ to leave for the city of Bandiagara. There, we stayed overnight and began our Dogon hike the following morning bright and early.

Our Dogon hike was 6 days/5 nights, and involved us traveling from village to village along the southern portion of the 'falais,' beginning at Djiguibombo at the South end of the escarpment up to the village of Dourou, veering off the last day to visit the beautiful village of Nombori. I must give a shout-out to our guide, Ibrahim, who is Dogon himself and was incredibly accomodating and informative throughout the trip. If anyone is planning a trip out to Dogon Country, I highly recommend hiring Ibrahim as your guide. Just drop me an email and I will give you his contact information.

I cannot say enough about how incredible this experience was. The natural scenery, with the mountains, plains, and encroaching desert lands, was stunning. When you take into account the villages situated upon these lands, and often carved into the sides of the rock cliffs, the result is nothing less than breathtaking. And beyond that, the culture of the Dogon people is just as unique as their architecture, and it was incredibly interesting to hear about their history and take in their customs.

A definitive highlight for me was roaming the villages alone, unguided, where I found that although the Dogon people speak their own language, the majority of them also speak some Bambara. So I was able to effectively communicate with the villagers along the way, learning even more about their culture and their way of life. It was fascinating to me to see the subtle differences between life in a Dogon village and life in a Bambaran village (my village). I plan on returning to Dogon country before my time in Mali is up to hike the Northern section of the falaise we unfortunately did not have time for.

I took many pictures of the sights along our travels, and I feel that this is the best way to share our experiences:

Wood carvings supporting a meeting place 'gwa' in the Dogon village of Kani Kombole.

IST and the month to come...

I am now at the end of IST (In-Service Training), a two-week training period at Tubaniso, the Peace Corps' training facility just outside of Bamako. The first week was spent on technical training, such as learning the methods to construct various Water and Sanitation facilities, including latrine slabs (already had that one down!), irrigation systems, drinking water wells, etc. The second week, with our homologues, involved learning meeting strategies in order to better assess the needs of our community and encourage community involvement, and thus sustainability, in our projects.

It has been somewhat of a long two weeks sitting through these training sessions. Quite frankly, I am ready for a vacation, which is great because I am about to embark on a three-week excursion through this expansive country with my sister. Our plans right now include heading East into the city of Djenné on Sunday, December 19th after she flies into Bamako, taking a 5-day guided hike through the cliff-side dwellings of Dogon country, spending a few days at my site, celebrating New Year's Eve in Ségou, enjoying a few relaxing days on the banks of Lake Manantali in Mali's Western Kayes Region alongside monkeys and hippos, before heading back to Bamako for a day or two before my sister flys back out on January 7th. Unfortunately no Timbuktu... there's some sketchy characters up there.

After this vacation, I plan to return to site and begin laying the foundation for my remaining two years of service. The first step is to form a Water and Sanitation Committee in my village. Once we do that, I can hold discussions with the villagers on what projects we will tackle together to improve their living conditions. The first two items on my agenda are hand-washing education and replacing the two broken pumps currently in the village. On Thursday, I received a cost estimate from SETRA, the local pump manufacturer, for the latter. The next step is to discuss with the village their contribution to the project, including financial, labor, and material contributions; then to write a funding proposal through the SPA (Small Project Assistance) program of U.S. AID for the remaining amount.

A busy final week at site for 2010...

Pig Pickin', Peace Corps Mali style.

After an amazing southern-style Thanksgiving in Ségou, complete with a pig pickin’ and some Eastern North Carolina-style vinegar barbeque sauce I prepared, I had some trouble getting back to site the following day.

After waiting 8 hours, the bashɛ (bush taxi) finally arrived after dark. The driver asked me to pay double the normal fare, sit on the roof, and told me they might not even be able to take my bike. Also considering the fact that after the bashɛ ride, I would have to bike back from my market town in the dark, I decided to cut my losses and spend a couple more days in Ségou before taking another bashɛ back to site the following Sunday.

With my timeframe constrained and only 5 days remaining at site before heading back to Ségou Saturday (today) in order to catch Peace Corps Transport to Bamako for IST (In-Service Training) and my sister’s subsequent visit, I had a busy week ahead of me.

First off, I wanted to complete my Water and Sanitation Baseline Survey, including my supplemental women’s garden survey. I was able to successfully accomplish this task, and in a previous post I went through my intentions from the information gathered therein.

I also wanted to complete an additional Baseline Survey on Food Security, which involved interviewing five men and five women in different concessions throughout the village. I succeeded in completing those by Wednesday morning. I was happy to find that my language has improved to a point where I could be successful on these surveys, even without the aid of my homologue, Lassana, who had gone to Dioro.

Unfortunately, as part of the Food Security survey, I learned some very troubling information regarding the diet of the majority of villagers. Namely, most families have insufficient supplies of food to feed their families during the hot, harvest, and/or farming seasons (covering the months of April through November). This includes millet supplies, the staple of the Malian diet, going bare. When this happens, most families look to borrow food from neighbors while also reducing the number/size of their daily meals. Additionally, most families do not eat enough vegetables throughout the year, often less than once a day, although there isn't a strong consensus on which seasons are the hardest hit.

On Thursday, I began working with Lassana, who had returned from Dioro to work on repairing my ɲɛgɛn (latrine).

'Seliba' festivities and my 'Malian family'

Malian men and boys are currently in the fields every day, harvesting ‘ɲo’ (millet). Unlike the machinery found in the West, Malians perform all of their agricultural duties with simple, antiquated tools. This is a small blade used for harvesting the millet grains from the stalk. I helped my 'jatigi' Koka for a day, and the work is painstaking and repetitive. Millet is the Malian staple grain in most dishes, such as 'to' and 'basi,' which are both generally served with sauce.

Currently we are in the midst of the harvest season and most of the village men spend every day cutting ‘ɲo’(millet) in the fields, while the women pull peanut plants from the field, bring them back to the concession, and pick them off the roots. The rice harvest season is just beginning, and some of the men in my village are spending time in neighboring villages to help with that harvest, as we do not have rice fields in our village.

My 'jatigi' (host-father) Koka, and two of his young boys, Lassana and Abdoullaye, working in the ‘ɲo’ fields.

A village woman 'susu(ing),' or pounding, ‘ɲo’ to separate the grain from the stalks.

With all of this work, the arrival of the Muslim holiday of Tabaski, also known as Eid al-Adha in Arabic, or ‘Seliba' in Bambara, was a welcome distraction. ‘Seliba’ was Wednesday, November 17th. I have previously described ‘Selideni,’ the holiday commemorating the end of Ramadan, and generally, ‘Seliba’ is celebrated in exactly the same way, with a few subtle differences.

The day before 'Seliba,' five 'misi' (bulls) were slaughtered throughout the village. Normally, 'Seliba' involves the slaughter of mainly 'saca' (sheep), but they apparently were not as available in the markets as usual. Refer to my end of Ramadan ('Selideni') pictures for the more gruesome details. I bought two large piles of 'misi sɔgɔ' (beef) to give to my 'jatigi muso' (My host-father's wife) Mama to cook for the next few days, including the breakfast I hosted on Thursday.

My spiffy 'Seliba' threads - an outfit I got tailored in Ségou out of the fancy 'baizan' fabric. It is stiff, waxy, and uncomfortable, but stylish in this country.

Although Muslims always pray five times a day, the main prayer for 'Seliba' takes place in the morning at 9AM. I joined the villagers, lined up in several rows facing East on rugs, in the field between the two school buildings to participate.

Some Initial Reconnaisance...

I am back in Ségou to celebrate Thanksgiving amongst my Peace Corps peers. I am going to get an entry up on the Muslim holiday of Tabaski (‘Seliba’ in Bambara) later, but I first wanted to post an update on the work I am embarking on in my village.

Currently, I am still within the timeframe before IST (In-Service Training, December 6th through the 17th) where we are to spend our time integrating and learning the language. I feel very comfortable on those terms, and I have also nearly completed my Baseline Survey to assist in determining the most critical water and sanitation needs of my village.

However, I am currently working on gathering initial information to repair the two broken water pumps in the village. Through some initial reconnaissance work, I have found out that the two broken foot pumps in the village actually used to be India-Mali pumps, which are the hand pumps widely used across the country, and therefore are more easily maintained.

One of the abandoned, broken foot pumps in my village.

Apparently, approximately 7 years ago, there was a widespread outbreak of Cholera in the village, which caused many deaths throughout the village. The Malian government decided that the problem was the hand pumps, so they switched the two pumps to foot pumps in June 2004.

An example of an 'India-Mali' hand pump, common across Mali.

I couldn’t understand what logic was behind that, because regardless of what type of mechanism is used, the pumps are still accessing the same aquifer, the same water. But my sector head found out that the concern resulted from the fact that people in my village do not wash their hands with soap as a general rule. A person infected with Cholera could use the hand pump, in-turn infecting the pump, and spreading the disease to the hands of any subsequent users. Then those users would eat with unclean hands, and infect themselves.

October at Site - Integration and Starting Some Work...

Over the past few weeks, I have felt many gratifying highs and some dispiriting lows. Fortunately, the lows that I have experienced have only been health related, and once I push them out of the way, I feel confident in my abilities and the experiences to come.

I have felt that over the course of my recent time in village, my language skills have improved ten-fold. I am confident in my abilities to communicate with locals on really any necessary topic, and I am able to understand much more of their day-to-day conversations amongst themselves, even with their fast-paced speech. I still need to continue to work on my skills in order to better harness an ability to have deeper intellectually stimulating conversations, but I have plenty of time to work on that.

I am also excited to report that I have begun work on my baseline survey. The baseline survey is a host of questions I intend to ask the dutigi (head of household) in each concession (each extended family) in my village, and is designed to ascertain the water and sanitation practices currently utilized. These include issues related to drinking water quality and availability, ɲɛgɛn (latrine) availability and construction, common illnesses which affect the community, community organizations currently in-place, the community’s desire for a Water and Sanitation Committee, and the women’s garden. I will compile the results of this survey and use them as a guide to determine where my efforts will be best served.

Thus far, I have learned that several of the precious few wells in village go dry throughout the hot season, making the availability of water scarce. Assisting the villagers in repairing the two broken foot pumps is a high priority for me, but building deeper wells may also be required to further address this concern. I have also yet to come across a family in-village who washes their hands with soap, most only use water before eating, and most do not wash their hands after using the ɲɛgɛn. Therefore, I plan on performing some handwashing animations/demonstrations to convince villagers of the practice’s importance to their health. This is just the tip of what I believe this baseline survey will uncover in the coming months.

Mali's Cinquantenaire...

'Sira, a ma ɲe.' (The road was bad.) Because of all of the rain we had been getting during the rainy season, the road to the commune seat had large, deep pools of standing water. Normally I would bike, but instead I opted to tag along on this 'misi wotoro' (cart pulled by two bulls). Not the most comfortable ride, but better than the alternative.

The Cinquantenaire de l’Indépendance, the 50th Anniversary of the Republic of Mali’s Independence was September 22, 2010. This was a big deal throughout the country, including my small community 100 kilometers east of Ségou.

My jatigi's son, Abdoullaye Diarra, keeping the steady hand on the bulls during the ride to the festival.

It was towards the end of the rainy season, and with all of the rain we had gotten, to bike anywhere required wading knee-deep in standing pools of water. So instead, I took a ‘misi-wotoro’ (bull-cart) into my commune seat/capital, which doubles as my market town, approximately 4 kilometers away from my village. I was surprised to see the richness of the culture that was on display so close to my quaint little village.

Some local children posing for the camera. This was all them...

I arrived into the center of town around 11AM. The Mayor of the commune was speaking to the crowd over the loud speaker to fervent ovations. After the mayor finished his speech, a group of local men in traditional hunting/militia clothing fired off sporadic rounds of blanks from their shotguns while dancing along the side of the crowd.

A group of teens, one row of men in purple, one row of women in blue and white striped-shirts and green berets, marching into the center of the festivities. Note the shirts the men are wearing: 'My Dream Barack Obama.'

Next, a group of young teens in berets marched into the center of the crowd to perform to a series of military marching commands. My favorite part… note the purple ‘My Dream Barack Obama’ shirts the young men were wearing. Barrack Obama’s face and name is plastered all over everything from sandals and jeans to playing cards and barber shops. But it is especially entertaining to me considering the man has nothing to do with the nation’s independence.

The first 'jacko' to make an appearance. This is the 'saca,' which is Bamanakan for sheep. Sheep are raised heavily for meat and wool in the region.