Tuesday, June 28, 2011

Initial Impressions

My fledgling experience at homestay has already opened my eyes to the many cultural and societal differences between Mali and the United States. The gender roles within Malian society have been the most noticable to me thus far. From the time the women wake up till the time they go to bed, they are continually doing domestic work and taking care of the family. Without running water or electricity, working around the home is arduous and time consuming. This on top of the large family sizes which average 12 people, requires the help of all the young girls of the family. In my family of 10, my 13 year old sister has a long list of daily chores. Her tasks include fetching water and fire wood, hand washing clothes, preparing meals, going to the market and child care. As a result of this demanding role, young girls education in Mali has been hindered. On top of going to school for the day, the young girls are expected to come home and fulfill their daily duties. This leaves very little time for studying or doing homework. For this reason, many girls fall behind and drop out of school after 6th grade. Also, as it is common for girls to get married around age 14-15, this greatly increases the drop out rate.
One of my favorite quotes is, "Educate a man and you educate one person. Educate a woman, and you educate a nation." The education of young girls is so crucial to the overall development of a third world country such as Mali. As an education volunteer, I hope to be able to promote girls education as part of my 2 years of service. It is an initiative that I have become more passionate about in my short time here. While the overall education and literacy of Mali is in major need of help and improvement, it can only happen dooni dooni (slowly). I believe that reaching the youth of the nation is the best place to begin. Wish me luck!

Monday, June 27, 2011

This Just Got Real!

I am finally back at Tubaniso training site after almost three weeks at homestay! This is apparently the longest period of time any stage has spent at homestay. We're breaking records!
My homestay family is great! My father is a tailor, teaches the original Malinke language and is on the radio twice a week. Luckily, he can speak French, so we are able to communicate and have very interesting converstations about life in America. I have explained everything from cancer to cuisine so far. My family also includes two wives who collectively have seven children whose ages range from 23 years to 10 months old. This is the first time this family has hosted a Peace Corps Trainee, but so far everything has been going great! I have adopted a Malian name and now go by Sira Camara. I was named after my host fathers paternal grandmother.
In my concession, in lieu of electricity and running water, we have a donkey and chickens roaming around, 4 huge mango trees, and a well from which I get my water to bathe with everyday. I have my own room which I call an oven because the tin roof heats it during the day and makes it a hot box. Speaking of weather, I think that I am acclimatizing pretty nicely. It is the hottest around 1-3 pm, but lately there have been some pretty wicked thunderstorms that roll through and cool everything down. The first storm I experienced happened during lunch time and was terrifying. First, the dust, sand and wind blew through, and I was sent to seek refuge in my room. Then came the buckets of rain and wind. The storm was so powerful that all the mangoes were falling off of the trees and pounding my tin roof. I thought it was the end of me! These storms are becoming more frequent and have even caused some of my language classes to be cancelled.
My day consists of waking up anywhere from 5:30-6:30 am due to either the crow of a rooster or the early morning pounding of millet. After I take a bucket bath and get ready, I greet my host father and the rest of my family and then eat breakfast with my 13 year old sister. I share all of my meals with her communal style (out of the same bowl eating with my right hand). After breakfast, I go to school from 8-12 to learn to speak Malinke. I return home to eat lunch and then am back at school from 2:30-5. After class, me and the other trainees who stay in B Camp usually either go for a bike ride, go rock climbing, or play BananaGrams until dark when we all return to our homes. I usually bucket bath again, because if I don't my family thinks I am dirty (which most of the time I am from sweating and trekking through the muddy streets of B-Camp) and will insist until I give in. After that, I hang out with my family, play with the kids a little, eat dinner and then usually go to bed around 9pm. Some days, instead of language classes, all three homestay sites congregate for technical trainings. Those days are such a treat, because after only a week and a half we all got really close and being separated is a bummer. However, I am loving my B-Camp group. We have all gotten exponentially closer and have become somewhat of an exclusive group haha!
Being in B Camp is not as bad as the Volunteer trainers warned us it would be. We at B-Camp actually prefer it to the other homestay villages we have seen. Yes, there are trash piles everywhere. Yes, there is negen water running in the streets. Yes, there are donkeys, chickens, and goats roaming the dirt roads. Yes, there are children yelling Toubabou (white person) and Y togo?(what's your name?) wherever you go. However, B Camp, in my opinion, has a certain charm to it, and I can't imagine being anywhere else! After being there for only 3 weeks, I know a lot of the community, and they know me. Wherever, we go I will almost always here someone call out "Sira Camara!" Just yesterday, before leaving to come to Tso, I went to the sugu (market) with my sister to set up our stall and sell tika dege (peanut butter) and macaroni (self-explanatory). I was such an awesome and fun experience. Everyone came up to us and greeted me and were really friendly!
I feel really lucky to feel this positive and happy about my experience so far. Others have not had it as good, and we even had someone from our group E.T (early terminate). We miss him dearly, and I hope that we don't lose anyone else.
Peace and Love to all!

Tuesday, June 7, 2011

Leaving for Homestay!

Today was our last day of training! This afternoon, I found out which homestay village I will join and which language I will learn. Since I can speak French, I was chosen, along with two other guys in my stage, to learn Malinke. It is a dialect spoken in the Kayes region of Mali. From what the current volunteer trainers have said, it only slightly differs from Bamabara in pronunciation and meaning. Therefore, I can deduce that my permanent site will be near Kita or Manatali which is in the western part of Mali, near Senegal. Our team of 23 is going to be split up into 3 homestay villages, but luckily we are all approx. 10 km from eachother, so we can visit eachother on Sundays.It is crazy how close we have all become in such a short time. This support system is going to be so crucial for all of our survival and sanity in Mali.
While I am a homestay, my days will consist of language classes from Mon-Sat, with Sundays off. I will be there for two and a half weeks and then return to Tso to regroup and have more technical training. So, this is going to be my last blog post for a while!! Tomorrow, I relinquish all forms of communication!! I will be going to a village where I don't speak the language and can't communicate! Charades anyone?! While this may seem daunting, I am not too nervous, just mainly excited to being this new chapter in my Peace Corps experience!

Sunday, June 5, 2011

The Arrival

We arrived in Mali to a very warm welcome. Not only was it hot, but we also were greeted my a handful of current volunteers. After waiting for our luggage (mine were obviously the last to arrive causing a slight panick attack), we took a short drive through the capital of Bamako to our training site at Tubaniso. We were shown to our living quarters, which were mud huts with thatched roofs which I am currently sharing with two other ED volunteers. We were then shown the latrines...yes I am going to the bathroom in a hole in the ground. Here in Mali, they are called negens (pronounced nyegen). Luckily at T-so, we have running pump water and electricity, so for now I am able to take a shower, use the internet, and even sleep cause we have a fan in the hut. I feel like I am staying at the Ritz!! So far the hottest part of the day is from 12-4pm, but after that it cools down and very unbearable. I even went for a run this morning with a couple other PCT's, and it is bearable!!
Our day is filled with information and orientation sessions. We have begun to learn Bambara, the most popular local Malian language, and it is so fun to learn!! It is so different from any other language that I have learnt. I will most likely dedicate an entire post to explaining the language, but here is a sneak peak:
Greetings are one of the most important aspects of the Malian culture. They are an elaborate converstation where one inquires all about the individual and their entire family (which usually contains multiple wives and therefore lots of kids), how their day has gone so far, how they slept the previous night, and then the exchange of blessings. For example, here is how a typical conversation might go:
a). I ni sogoma! (Good Morning)
b). Nse I ni sogoma. (Good Morning)
a). I ka kene? (How are you?)
b). Tooro te. (No problems)
a). Somogow be di? (How is your family?)
b). Tooro t'u la. (No problems)

And the conversation continues...

Normally, we have some down time in the evening. Some of the guys in my stage brought guitars and ukuleles, so last night we had a jam session to some hits from the 90's. Tonight, we are going to do some yoga to destress, and then hopefully get to bed early because nights have consisted of approx. 6 hrs of sleep.

Peace and Love to all

Thursday, June 2, 2011

The First 24

We are at the airport 5 hours early, so with all this time to kill and free wi-fi, a blog post is definitely warranted!
After a tearful goodbye to my parents yesterday, my journey with the Peace Corps officially began with orientation in D.C. I arrived to meet my wonderful and spunky roommate Ashton who hails from the great state of Kentucky and has the sweetest southern accent. She is a Water and Santitation Volunteer, so hopefully eventhough we are in different sectors, we can still hangout.
While we were told that the average group size is 40, my orientation group is 23 strong! So far, this size is great because I feel like I know everyone so well already. Almost everyone is in their early to mid-twenties, with our one "grandma" of the group as she called herself. It is great to be surrounded by people with similar goals, aspirations, and fears. We were all brought together by our shared dreams to fulfill the PC mission, and going through this experience together is going to bond us even futher.
After orientation, we all went out for dinner and drinks to celebrate our last night in the U.S. (and maybe to calm our nerves too). Today, we travelled to the clinic to get our yellow fever vaccinations and then arrived at Dulles which brings me to the present moment!
I have no idea when the next time I will be able to blog, so, until next time...
À bientôt