Swear-in and so-on

A few days ago we had our swear-in ceremony at the American embassy in Mali. The ceremony was relatively painless and after a speech from director of Peace Corps Mali and a word from the ambassador we were off to the American Club to act like a bunch of toubabs for a while. The spread was phenomenal as the buffet had everything from beats to cheeseburgers. Although we were offered a fair share of American food, I stuck with my favorite Malian dish: Zamen Zamen is sort of like fried rice and it is usually served with fish, cabbage, Malian eggplant and other veggies. After stuffing our faces, swimming and drinking some jack, we hopped on the bus to head on for the rest of the day’s activities.

During a bus ride that day I found myself stumbling upon all of my highlights in Mali and I thought I’d share some of them today. So the best that Mali has seen of Katharine and Katharine of Mali: midnight cocktails at the top of a mango tree, yoga underneath the electracutable stars of the Malian sky, donkey rides around my well (guided by my host brother/ the Samakes donkey master), light-frisbee with the Malians in Banankoro (it goes without saying that they had never seen a light up flying saucer let alone a flying saucer), listening to the Dead in a bamboo forest by a creek that wouldn’t shut up, playing cards with my host siblings and neighbor (whose name is ‘cetigi’ which means ‘master of men’- needless to say he’s a gem and an excellent trickster), discovering hidden hammocks in the middle of the night, picnic (egg, avocado, and cheese – yes CHEESE – sandwiches) at the waterfalls of Sikasso, hotel rooftops chats about heaven and the Stranger (by Albert Camus), a bike ride that consisted of a few ditch dumps and a downpour, makeshift grilled cheese sandwiches at the med unit with a swollen foot...

Swear-in night was filled with dancing like jellyfish and drinking like toads (they do drink a lot, don’t they?). After a joyride around Bamako with a stranger, the night ended with me being locked out of a hotel room with a swollen foot and an angry bellman.

Here are a few pictures of swear-in (the education sector and then a picture of our entire stage at the embassy), some pictures of my new home and yard in Farakala (Sikasso), also above is a picture of me and some PC friends with our hula hoops (yes, we did manage to find the stuff to make hula hoops even here in Mali):

The Woman on the Moon

While back in the states we hear talk about “the man on the moon”, here in Mali, there’s talk of “the woman on the moon”. One full-moon night in Banankoro (where I stayed with a Malian family for most of my Peace Corps training), my host sister pointed out this female figure carved out of moon craters. At first, I explained to my sister that what I saw was the tilted face of a laughing jolly man. I told her that he had a dimple, one eye that was darker than the other, and that if we could see his body he probably had his hand placed upon his big round belly. She laughed at me imitating the jolly man and then told me that I was wrong. She explained very matter-of-factly that it was the side-angle, full body length view of a woman, with a baby tied to her back, shopping in the market.

The role of Malian women is traditional in that they are expected to do all of the cooking and cleaning and taking care of the children. But what makes it even more difficult is that they are often working in the fields or selling at the market on top of all of their daily tasks around the house. My personal observation is that this is often going on while the man sits at home on his over-turned bucket slurping down tea and hawking loogies. Ok maybe a bit of a generalization... Not to suggest that Malian men don’t work, just to point out that the women seem to have it a bit harder. Needless to say, you’ll never hear a Malian woman complain about her duties.

The way that Malian women are regarded is confusing for lack of a better word. Many Americans that I’ve spoken with would say that they’re repressed especially given the family law that is currently in debate in the country. Many Malian men that I’ve spoken with, however, attribute some sort of invisible and intangible power to the women given their “special” role and their unique bond with the children that the men do not experience. Either way, to me, the Malian women are truly fascinating. These women can multi-task like you’ve never seen before. For example, it wouldn’t be all that uncommon to see a woman walking down the road while unraveling a small child from her back to breast-feed while brushing her teeth all while carrying a five-foot tall bundle on top of her head. Picture it. No joke. They’re like graceful and beautiful robots (if that’s at all possible) wrapped like a birthday present in their colorful Malian fabrics and head wraps.

Above is a pic of me with some of the Samake (my host family) women...

Praying with the Samakes

Since its Ramadan right now in Mali, the members of my host family (the Samakes) pray many times throughout the day. They close the day with a long prayer in which they touch their head to the ground 17 times. Near the end of my homestay experience, I began praying with them on a nightly basis. I’ve come to enjoy doing it now and although I don’t do it for the same reasons as they do, I find it a nice chance to turn off my thoughts for a while. My host brother Sadio stands in the front and leads the prayer and the line of men and boys behind him and finally the row of women in the back. The women are also accompanied by all of the children so the woman’s row is usually where most of the action is going on. When I looked around I often saw my host sisters bending down to pat or situate their babies on the mat while continuing their prayer. Throughout the prayer I hear Adaman, my 2-year-old host brother calling out to his 19-year-old mother. He continually shouts ‘ba’ until she acknowledges him. I look over at this young mother, Badialo, and rediscover for the millionth time my fascination with Malian women. Badialo continues her prayer and pats her child and calms another young child sitting next to her all mid-prayer. She bows and Adaman bows with her, pretending to know what’s going on. I look to my right and one of my other host sisters, Oulimatu, has a child on her back during prayer and one crying on the mat in front of her. Not a word of complaint is heard from these mothers. Never have I heard a Malian woman complain.

Above is a picture of me and some of my Samake siblings. In this host family I have 12 host sisters and 9 host brothers.