Christmas, IST, etc.

Wow, it’s been a long time since I last wrote but damn it’s hard to find a good connection around here. It’s the truth. Since time flies faster than we can find ourselves some decent internet, I’ll briefly touch on the best parts of November and then move right onto Christmas and IST (In-service training). For thanksgiving, we killed and roasted our own turkeys (around 5-6 of them), made mashed potatoes, stuffing, and the whole shebang. Me and Sikasso kaw (those who bank in the Sikasso region with me) threw a big party here in Sikasso and had around 50 other PCVs show up to our lovely thanksgiving dinner. After a couple nights of stuffing our bellies, we took a camping trip to the waterfalls where I discovered my head-balancing abilities and my friend Emily mastered the art of popping corn over the fire in a wok.

And then there was Christmas. I’ll admit that I didn’t get too big of a whiff of the Christmas spirit this holiday season as I was tubing down the Niger River under the hot Malian sun. Although it was quite a relaxing vacation, I sure did miss the bundling, sledding, wrapping, caroling, tree-thing this year. After a few hours of bathing in the sun and hanging out in the river on Christmas day, we decided to roast ourselves a pig, mash up some potatoes, and build a bursting bamboo fire. We did also spice up our not-so-white-Christmas with rainbow-frosted Christmas cookies and stockings. My friend Emily and I went and bought Malian socks from the market and filled them with random goodies we could find off the street in Manatali.

Christmas came after a long 2 weeks at the training center getting our final round of training in before we dive in to our projects at site. I arrived at the training center with a bang after running a half marathon from the Peace Corps bureau in downtown Bamako. As I rolled up on mile thirteen panting like a thirsty dog, I saw the gate to the beloved Tubaniso, where I first set foot in this crazy country. For the first week of training, we sat through countless hours of session with our fellow PCVs and for the second week, Peace Corps invited our counterparts (from our respective villages) so that we could spend some time preparing for the next two years. My homologue and I sat down and discussed the major needs of Farakala and decided that we’ll be focusing primarily on building and maintaining a literacy center that will open to the entire commune. I plan to raise funds to build the facility through Peace Corps Partnerships (PCPP) and with my counterpart, I will encourage people to attend and help acquire necessary material to have both a Bambara and a Senofou literacy program. The literacy program will be specifically to teach illiterate Malians who never got the chance to begin or continue their studies in school how to read, write, and do basic math. Although I expect this to be my primary work for the next two years, I also hope to be working on several smaller projects such as teaching English, raising funds for teacher salaries, and working with the women’s association in my village to market and sell their products (primarily shea butter and a spice called Sumbala).

Although it was nice to spend time with other Peace Corps Volunteers this month, I’m looking forward to getting back to site and diving into some of these projects. Next vacation for me to look forward to here is Mom and Dad visiting at the end of the month for a trip to the beaches of the Gambia! Happy 2010!