Steamy and Sweaty

The last few weeks have been spent settling into my mud hut and learning the different roads that wind through my village. I introduce myself over and over again, despite my growing belief that people secretly already know my name, and only ask me to introduce myself as a way of forging conversation. Everyone wants to meet me, to talk with me, to have me visit. One woman came to my compound complaining that I hadn’t visited her: I had no idea what her name was or where she lived. Slowly, I’m beginning to remember faces, if not the countless names.

I spend my days trying to build some kind of routine out of days that could stretch out forever. These first couple months are mainly a time for me to try to get to know my village before I start any projects. This strategy makes a lot of sense – I can’t possibly know what’s needed until I’ve gotten to know what’s going on here. But it’s difficult not to have a schedule, so I’ve been trying to create a bit of structure for myself, even if all it entails is leaving my own compound to drink tea in the afternoons with my neighbors.

There were a couple parties in the last couple weeks. The first was the celebration of Mali’s Independence Day on September 22nd. There was a celebration at the Sous-Prefet’s office, where griots sang, and all the important officials spoke. I was also introduced a number of times, but, thank goodness, was not asked to speak. After the ceremony, we all trooped over to the mayor’s house for a big feast, but, it being Ramadan, no one could eat any of the huge platters of food, except me and the few Christians present.

The next party was a real celebration: the end of Ramadan. When I came back from my morning run in the fields one morning to find all the village awake, dressed in their finest clothes and buzzing everywhere, I realized that the moon must have shown itself after I had gone to bed the night before: Ramadan and a month of fasting was over. The party continued for three days, but the first day was the most fun. No one went to work (in the fields or at the health center or at the mayor’s office), and everyone spent the day eating and going around greeting friends and wishing them another good year. I went around with Banta, the old woman who shares my compound in the morning, and she seemed to delight in showing me around to all her friends. The greetings consisted primarily of about one million blessings, of which only about two of them I could understand. Maybe next year I’ll have mastered them.

After the end of Ramadan, things have been getting back to normal. Everyone is in a better mood and drinking tea again in the afternoons to pass the time. It’s a busy time in the fields though – rice is ready to be harvested, corn, millet, watermelon, and oh, the peanuts!! Fresh peanuts, boiled peanuts, roasted peanuts, I’m eating them all. I went over to my homologue, Aissata’s house one day to find piles and piles of peanut plants unearthed and spread over her compound. We spent the afternoon pulling the peanuts off of the plants.

I’m beginning to worry about the information I give out about America. I get so many questions about what life is like in America, and no matter how I try to explain about how big America is and how things can be very different depending on who you are, or where you are, I’m afraid that everything I say is taken as the absolute truth. And of course, there’s no one to either back up or contest what I say. Some of the questions are funny – as almost all the questions about winter in America are. Aissa, for example, told me that in school she’d learned that when an African gets off the plane in America or France in the winter, they immediately turn to ice! And so many people are shocked that in America men can only have one wife, or even that America and France are not the same place. But when the questions are about the fields and farming in America, I find myself struggling along – for what do I really know about agriculture in the U.S.?!

I’ve found a few people who I can talk politics with, including Bocar, the vaccinator at the health center. As you may remember, I was promised a bike by Peace Corps, but still haven’t received one, due to budget constraints or a hold up at customs, no one’s really sure. When Bocar asked where my bike was, I said, “Listen, Bocar, There’s an economic crisis in America.” And, oh, Bocar just started laughing hysterically. He listens to the radio a lot, and agrees with me that Obama had better win. Aissa, on the other hand, did not take the economic crisis so lightly. When I was explaining it to her, she immediately began to worry about what it would mean for developing nations, a serious concern for all of the developing world and certainly Mali, a country that relies heavily on foreign aid.

Its reliance on foreign aid is obvious: all of the community buildings (mayor’s office, schools) have been built by foreign NGOs; the mosquito nets and anti-malaria treatments given to pregnant women are provided by USAID. The aid is expected by the community, and the disappearance of it would be disastrous.

In other news, I may have contracted scabies, which is pretty gross. My body is covered in hundreds of bites, and the nights have been pretty miserable. But I just got my scabies lotion, so hopefully in no time at all my skin will once again be as good as gold.

I feel like I’m making friends. Like when I go to the market on Saturdays (when the village’s population swells by what feels like 500%), and people I’ve met call me over to see what I’ve bought. Or when I’m walking through the village and there are compounds where I know people’s names and feel comfortable walking in and sitting down for 10 minutes or three hours. Step by step.