These are some kids in my village looking at us as we wait for the bus to leave...
I have survived my first two weeks at site! In the moment it seemed like it the days went by ridiculously slow, but somehow it seems like the past two weeks have flown by. Granted I have spent 7 if the 14 days in Dioila with all the other Dioila cow. (Cow means people in Bambara, so if I say Seattle cow it means Seattle peeps, and for future reference Dioila cow consists of Chris a 1 yr. PCV, Me, Irina, Owen and Mike.)
I had a lot of fun (not) trying to get my furniture to my house… and I still haven’t been able to get a normal bed. But all in all things are coming together. If you know me you know that I am sort of anal about organization and what so it is imperative that I get more shelves to organize things in my mud hut! I don’t understand why people here don’t use tables and shelves. Why keep everything on the floor? Especially when they have animals running around wild! Imagine trying to eat and every two seconds you have to throw things and hit chickens so they get away from the bowl you are trying to eat from. All I can think is see… this is why we put food on friggin tables… well not the only reason, BUT had there been a table that would have been a non issue. I just don’t get it. Either way, I now have a table that my stove and food and dishes are on and shelves in my room for my books and clothes. Us Dioila cow said that we were going to have painting parties and paint each other’s huts! I haven’t really come up with a color scheme yet but I think I am going to go with blue and green. I found this mat at the market that I really liked its dark blue and teal with lime green and yellow. I know it sounds gross but its not to bad! Its Seahawks colors for sure so I may be going that route. I am going to the market maybe tomorrow to get fabric to make curtains and to cover things when I leave. The logistics of living in a hut made completely out of mud is pretty weird. It is always so dusty and chunks of my wall always fall off! There are also termites that crawl around the walls and dig tunnels EVERYWHERE, which then makes parts of the wall crumble and fall so I end up with piles of all over. Pretty gross huh? I guess they have this termite treatment that you can buy and sort of paint your walls with it and it helps… I don’t know how it works or if it’s even worth it, I might be able to use it as a primer for when I paint my walls. Hopefully by next time I get computer access I will have all of this figured out!
Ramadan has ended finally! People can eat again, and are more lively now. They had a big celebration they call fet which is the day after the full moon when they get to break their fast and everyone just stuffs their faces all day. I was interesting, we had to go around and visit people and they made us all eat. I am not used to eating very much anymore since the food here still disgusts me, so it was really hard for me. I didn’t want to be rude so I ate a little at each place but it was pretty rough. Then the following day September 22nd is the Malian Independence day. The part continued at the mayor’s office place. The whole town came and they set up big speakers and microphones. It was actually really cool because they had everyone from the community come up and talk about their issues. They had the town doctor and vaccinator talk about the health problems, they local teachers talking about school starting soon and all the issues the local schools have, and about cell phone connection for the village. All of which was in Bambara so I only understood a few words here and there but I got the gist of it. They of course re introduced me to everyone and again explained what I am doing there and had me talk in the microphone in my busted Bambara, which they all got a kick out of… I have also started working with my language tutor (who speaks English by the way!) to translate some of my baseline surveys have to do to assess my community. One of them is for the Mayor of the village and my language tutor told the mayor I was going to ask him questions. This is true I did need to interview him, but I didn’t expect to do it on the microphone in front of the whole village! It went ok I guess, Lucky I’m not afraid of public speaking huh?
Last night a few of us went out to “Chinese” food. It was pretty good compared to what I am used to eating! It was so weird though! Never had I been in a situation with so many language/ culture clashes! Haha… I don’t speak French at all; the restaurant owners didn’t speak it well, they speak Chinese (go figure) which I definitely do not speak! They don’t speak English or Bambara. Haha! It was a good time trying to order!
*I started typing this two weeks ago when I was in town for my birthday and never made it back to a computer to finish the blog post! It is now October 14th and I am going to post it. I may post another of the happenings of the past two weeks today if I can or in a few more weeks?!*
Oh Also my site buddy Owen keeps a way better blog than I do, and he put pictures up some of which I am in! If you wanna check it out its Owenfitz.blogspot.com
I had a lot of fun (not) trying to get my furniture to my house… and I still haven’t been able to get a normal bed. But all in all things are coming together. If you know me you know that I am sort of anal about organization and what so it is imperative that I get more shelves to organize things in my mud hut! I don’t understand why people here don’t use tables and shelves. Why keep everything on the floor? Especially when they have animals running around wild! Imagine trying to eat and every two seconds you have to throw things and hit chickens so they get away from the bowl you are trying to eat from. All I can think is see… this is why we put food on friggin tables… well not the only reason, BUT had there been a table that would have been a non issue. I just don’t get it. Either way, I now have a table that my stove and food and dishes are on and shelves in my room for my books and clothes. Us Dioila cow said that we were going to have painting parties and paint each other’s huts! I haven’t really come up with a color scheme yet but I think I am going to go with blue and green. I found this mat at the market that I really liked its dark blue and teal with lime green and yellow. I know it sounds gross but its not to bad! Its Seahawks colors for sure so I may be going that route. I am going to the market maybe tomorrow to get fabric to make curtains and to cover things when I leave. The logistics of living in a hut made completely out of mud is pretty weird. It is always so dusty and chunks of my wall always fall off! There are also termites that crawl around the walls and dig tunnels EVERYWHERE, which then makes parts of the wall crumble and fall so I end up with piles of all over. Pretty gross huh? I guess they have this termite treatment that you can buy and sort of paint your walls with it and it helps… I don’t know how it works or if it’s even worth it, I might be able to use it as a primer for when I paint my walls. Hopefully by next time I get computer access I will have all of this figured out!
Ramadan has ended finally! People can eat again, and are more lively now. They had a big celebration they call fet which is the day after the full moon when they get to break their fast and everyone just stuffs their faces all day. I was interesting, we had to go around and visit people and they made us all eat. I am not used to eating very much anymore since the food here still disgusts me, so it was really hard for me. I didn’t want to be rude so I ate a little at each place but it was pretty rough. Then the following day September 22nd is the Malian Independence day. The part continued at the mayor’s office place. The whole town came and they set up big speakers and microphones. It was actually really cool because they had everyone from the community come up and talk about their issues. They had the town doctor and vaccinator talk about the health problems, they local teachers talking about school starting soon and all the issues the local schools have, and about cell phone connection for the village. All of which was in Bambara so I only understood a few words here and there but I got the gist of it. They of course re introduced me to everyone and again explained what I am doing there and had me talk in the microphone in my busted Bambara, which they all got a kick out of… I have also started working with my language tutor (who speaks English by the way!) to translate some of my baseline surveys have to do to assess my community. One of them is for the Mayor of the village and my language tutor told the mayor I was going to ask him questions. This is true I did need to interview him, but I didn’t expect to do it on the microphone in front of the whole village! It went ok I guess, Lucky I’m not afraid of public speaking huh?
Last night a few of us went out to “Chinese” food. It was pretty good compared to what I am used to eating! It was so weird though! Never had I been in a situation with so many language/ culture clashes! Haha… I don’t speak French at all; the restaurant owners didn’t speak it well, they speak Chinese (go figure) which I definitely do not speak! They don’t speak English or Bambara. Haha! It was a good time trying to order!
*I started typing this two weeks ago when I was in town for my birthday and never made it back to a computer to finish the blog post! It is now October 14th and I am going to post it. I may post another of the happenings of the past two weeks today if I can or in a few more weeks?!*
Oh Also my site buddy Owen keeps a way better blog than I do, and he put pictures up some of which I am in! If you wanna check it out its Owenfitz.blogspot.com
Love,
Gloria