the Grand Excursion

I have been very negligent, due to being away from Bamako for ten days, followed by diving headfirst into research. But now, I hope to catch you up on my travels.

My travels followed the Niger River through the safe parts of Mali, so Timbuktu was excluded. Nevertheless, I was able to see a whole different side of the country and many historically important sites. Our normal travel pattern was a day of driving and a little sightseeing, followed by a day just in one location, and our mode of transportation was two large vans. We started by going to Ségou, where we had an excellent hotel (that would be nice by US standards- I had my first shower with hot water in Mali!) and the opportunity to wander along the river through the old city, which was heavily influenced by french colonisation. The highlight of Ségou was having random conversations with the people we met along the river, even if they ended with getting proposed to or getting told to buy something. The market in Ségou was a lot less intimidating than in Bamako, so I could really work on my bartering skills (which are surprisingly good).While in Ségou, we also visited a few women's coops and the ancient village where the founder of Ségou was buried. In Markala, not far from Ségou, we walked across a huge bridge and dam that was built by the french and created an irrigation system for l'Office du Niger, now one of the most profitable farming areas.

Our next stop was Djenné, home of the world's largest mud-brick building, the Grande Mosquée. We couldn't actually go in, as non-Muslims, but we saw the very impressive exterior. We also walked around the city as a group and took a pirogue (large canoe shaped boat) ride to an ancient archeological site, which unfortunately is not worth much, since the remains mostly consist of small pottery shards, which littered the ground and only a couple of foundations are intact. It rained most of the time in Djenné so i saw more of my hut than the city (that is, i saw my hut until the electricity stopped working for my last 16 hours there).

I left Djenné in the rain and bought some souvenirs for a "good price" that was actually good for once. We were stalked by vendors walking around with their wares the entire trip, since a large group of white tourists like us is a giant dollar sign to them. Usually they were annoying, but sometimes they were cute. For example, that day, when the bus stopped, vendors mobbed the bus and started dangling things through the window like normal. One boy in particular caught my attention. "This one is box. This one is orange. This one is marron." But when i showed no interest in the box, he brought out carved wooden animal key chains. "This one is popotam. This one is noceraus. This one is leon. This one is femme (woman). This one is homme (man). This one is en train de dormir dans l'eau (in the middle of sleeping in the water)," and he set it down on the windowsill. At this point, we could not contain ourselves since this was all said very seriously and we all burst out laughing. He stared at us for a moment, then let out an indescribable laugh, even though he obviously had no clue what was so funny. I ended up buying a popotam, more for the entertainment than for its value...can you guess what it actually is?

Eventually we made it to our next destination: Sangha, in the Dogon country. Getting there required two hours of driving on really rough one lane roads- luckily I don't get too carsick so I could enjoy the beautiful country we passed through, scattered with low stone walls, goats, and patches of onions. The Dogon country is seriously a country of its own, with much less western influence. It is famous for villages built into the cliffs centuries ago, that seem impossible to access, but were built without modern technology. We took a five hour hike from our village to the edge of the cliffs, hiked down and across the plains of millet fields, then climbed back up at a different point...I took way too many pictures there, if you'd like a play by play. As if that day couldn't get any better, we had an excellent lunch at the hotel, then saw a traditional dogon mask dance, shopped for the local indigo fabric, and slept on the roof of the hotel, under the stars. I actually got cold that night (a very rare occurrence), then woke up before dawn and walked back to the edge of the cliffs to see the sunrise. amazing.

The final big destination was Mopti, another town on the Niger that uses the river heavily for fishing and shipping to Timbuktu. We took a luxurious pirogue ride and also had a tour of the city, like usual. Watching pirogues being made was interesting- the men were hand making nails in front of us, just using a little charcoal marmite to get the metal red hot and hammering them into shape. The tour ended in a tourist trap of a market, but i bartered things down to less than half of the original price, so I didn't feel too bad. My friend and I took advantage of the free time by just walking down to the river and finding a quiet shady spot away from pesky salespeople and closer to normal Malian life. After Mopti, the trip ended all too soon, with just one more night in Ségou.

My return to Bamako was less than peaceful. I was happy to see my family, but very stressed out since my research topic was up in the air for the first few days. Now I am completely in research mode and my final topic is meningitis, and the possibility of its eradication in Mali. My research has led me to the different levels of health care in Mali, as well as research centers and the government, so I am in my element (except for the fact that most doctors don't speak English). Mali is excellent, in the vast networking of people, that makes networking in the US look like nothing, and the open nature of most people. The easiness of bypassing bureaucracy and the lack of complete confidentiality in the medical world also makes my life quite a bit easier.

This might be one of my last posts...my time here is running out, and I really should start devoting my computer time to writing my ISP, since it will be lengthy and I don't want to procrastinate (though blog writing is the perfect excuse). I would like to share some of what I've found out about the medical system, as well as talk about the second biggest fête of the year, Tabaski, that is coming up on Saturday. I'm quite lucky to be here for the two biggest holidays of the year!

sorry

I'm sorry I haven't posted in awhile. I got back from a ten day trip around Mali on Friday, and since then have been planning my independent study project that I'll be working on for the next month. Things should settle down in the next few days so I can actually write a novel of a post about what I've been up to.

P.S. If you happen to have any information on yellow fever, measles, meningitis, or cholera, let me know, since they are the focus of my research.

Music in Mali

Music is one of the only avenues in which Mali has gained international attention (it is hard to be noticed as a peaceful african country). Therefore, I have made it one of my main goals to seek out as much music as possible. It does take searching to find it. At my house, the only music I normally hear is American and French pop on Trace, a french music video channel. Black Eyed Peas and Akon are favorites that i have heard way more hear than i ever had in the US. Going out with my sister isn't even a way of finding live music...most of my Malian peers only like going to boîtes, where they also only listen to american club music. That is one of the saddest aspects of culture I have observed...an idealization of America perpetuated through american music and tv that makes the young people disregard what Mali has to offer.

Anyways, I have found real Malian music, and participated in it, much to my delight. A few of my friends and I have researched the best venues for live music and sample them whenever we can get out of going to the boîtes. Occasionally there is dancing, but usually it is an older, more sophisticated crowd, in their late twenties and thirties, I'd guess. Traditional Malian music characterized by a djeli (griot) singing praises of people or histories or other things that I have no chance of understanding. The instruments are really what makes the music. There is usually a distorted, psychedelic sounding guitar player, who can play with an almost classical or jazz technique (not just chords). Then there are a variety of drums, many that are specific to Mali. The balafon is usually present too...it is similar to a xylophone, but has gourds resonationg beneath the keys that gives it a softer tone. And last, but definitely not least, there is the kora. It is a large gourd at the bottom, with a long neck extending from it with about 20 strings tuned in a C major scale. It almost sounds like a harp, and is very difficult to master. After a wild goose chase around Bamako, I had the good fortune of finding a kora teacher with one of my friends. We had an hour long lesson to learn the basics, and I actually was getting the feel of it in my hands by the end of the lesson...I wish I could've taken one home to practice, but there is no way I could buy one. They are too expensive, plus too large to easily bring home on a plane.

I got to play the kora again today, when my teacher and his group came to my school this morning for a performance in honor of our last day of school before finals. They put on a great performance, with a djeli singing to each of the students in turn and dancing at the end. I played a little repetitive bit that I learned at my lesson and the rest of the band fit in around me and the djeli sang. It was surreal...it felt so good to be playing an instrument again, and even better to be a part of the great music they were making. My kora teacher took over after a little bit, so I could watch his mad skills; I'm guessing he is one of the best since he teaches, performs, and makes koras for a living. Even though I won't be able to bring a kora home with me, I think I'll take another lesson, just for fun.

If you are interested in hearing some Malian music, some of the most famous performers are Ali Farka Touré, Toumani Diabeté, Amadou & Mariam, Oumou Sangaré, and Habib Koite. I think you can find them on itunes or youtube...they are all internationally known.

Bamanankan

One of the major difficulties I have an encountered in Mali is language. I switch between french, english, and bambara all day, everyday, so my english is getting worse, bambara is becoming recognizable, and my french is getting more conversational, but still gramatically not great.

I have enjoyed learning bambara (or bamanankan) since it is the language of the biggest ethnic group, and most people's first or only language. The other languages in Mali, and many others in West Africa, are related to Bambara so I supposedly could also understand them, but I don't really believe that. It does at least comfort me to know that this language could be spoken elsewhere.

Bambara has a lot of quirks that make learning it quite fun, and insightful into Malian culture. For example:

~there is no word for late (you're just 'not early')

~there aren't different verb conjugations for different subjects, making it a lot easier than english or french

~the words often are made by combining two others. 'den' (child) is a common addition to the ends of words so, for example, students are children of study (kalandenw), Malians are children of mali (malidenw), and fruits are children of the tree.

~you can often lake a french word malian by spelling it phonetically and adding i to the end. chair = chaise = sezi.

~they repeat words all the time for emphasis.

~there is no negative response to 'how are you?'

I walk to school each morning, and therefore exchange many greetings on teh way, since I say hi to everyone, like a vrai malian. Just for fun, here is a literal translation of a typical conversation:

me: you and the morning!

them: My power! Family members?

m: No problems with them.

t: You are healthy?

m: No problems.

t: Did you pass the night peacefully?

m: Peace.

It can go on longer, depending on the person, but I can now fire out that conversation like it's nothing since I practice it many times each morning. Since I walk the same route every morning, people now know my name and I'm trying to learn theirs, but there are a ton of them, and only two toubabous (white folk) who walk that way for them to remember, so I don't feel too bad if I forget. Little kids run after me chanting toubabou often...it seems to be a game that never gets old. I don't mind, it is better than when I am walking through the market and keep hearing hisses and 'La blanche' (the white). That gets annoying instantly.

I am slower at learning everything beyond greetings, but I can do basic bartering, ask for directions and tell a bus driver to stop, so I have the useful things down. I need to start studying for my bambara final coming up...it is the only one I am worried about. And yes, I am already starting to talk about finals, since they are just over a week away, and then I am done with classes for the semester. After finals, I go on the Grand Excursion to other parts of Mali and then am doing independent research while volunteering in a clinic for the last month. Time is flying!

Sanankoroba

I spent last week in a village about 30 km outside of Bamako, but I felt like I was in a different world. Sanakoroba is actually a large village, with about 7000 inhabitants, and a large presence of NGO's. Parts of it have electricity, but most homes do not. I spent the week with one other student, Brittany, and a family in their compound. The Traoré's were an adorable young family, who were extremely welcoming and, in general, happy people. We lived with the dad, mom, 5 kids, and 3 older women in one part of a large compound made up of extended family. Only the one of the older women and the dad could speak french, and he usually just agreed with everything we said, so I doubt that he really understood it. Therefore, the week provided me with a lot Bambara practice, and even more nonverbal communication. The language barrier didn't really matter with the kids. In my family, the oldest son was perhaps 8 years old, and was an exemplary older brother. He was followed by a 6 year old girl, and then two more boys between 2 and 4, and a 5 month old baby girl. In addition to those five, many other children from our compound and the neighborhood would hang out with Brittany and I, so it was not unusual for us to be entertaining 15 or 20 kids. They usually wanted to dance or do the awesome handshake we taught them. The Macarena was a favorite, but the chicken dance and Mini KC (a malian dance from Ministar that just about every kid with a tv knows) also made appearances. The life of children in a village is quite simple...the two little boys were quite easily amused by playing with a piece of rope, and the kids went crazy when we gave them glow sticks one night. The kids start school when they are 6 or 7, but come home in the middle of the day for a long lunch break, and often didn't return in the afternoon. The older ones helped with chores, and were delighted to carry chairs around the compound so Brittany and I would have to sit wherever we went.

The mother, Fatoumata, looked like she was only a few years older than me, but she already had 5 kids! I could not imagine being in her position, but she was always laughing and I never saw her get angry the entire time we were there. She was a supermom, if I ever saw one. Just as an example, one night she was bathing two of the kids while the baby was breastfeeding and she was watching dinner and stirring a pot with her spare hand. The baby was usually strapped to her back as she cooked, went to market, got water, swept, and did other household chores. She did usually take a break from her normal activities in the afternoon to rest, which I was glad to see.

The father was constantly smiling. He worked in the fields for a living, but he only went to the fields 3 times per week. I don't know how he can support a large family with on that, but he might be getting help from his brothers. He definitely played a large role in raising the children, and would go on errands for the family and even helped a little with cooking. In a culture where gender roles are strictly defined, I was impressed to see that in reality, the gender lines do blur.

Village life is simple, and mostly revolves around children and the next meal (or tea in the evenings). I was not able to the really understand the complexities of life since I could not speak enough Bambara to get into any deep discussions, and they could not speak enough French. In some ways, the life seemed idyllic because of the simplicity, peacefulness, and proximity of the family. But after a few days, it began to disturb me. I realized how ambitious my plans for my life are, and how a child there has no example to follow to come close to making plans like that, and probably wouldn't be able to fulfill any major plans because of the lack of resources and, for a girl, the expectation to get married young (often around 16). Living day by day, like they do, makes it nearly impossible for them to make any changes that could improve their life, but at the same time, they seemed to be okay with their life as it was. Perhaps if I could have talked to people my age, I would have gotten a different view of life in the village.

My stay in the village made me realize how western Bamako, and especially my family in Bamako, is I have three sisters in university, all over 18 and none married. They have plans for their careers and will pick their own husbands. They cannot imagine life without electricity, even though it exists not far from their comfortable life. I am happy for all of the opportunities that my sisters have, but a bit disturbed by their obsession with American culture (as I write this they are watching The Hills).

I guess my stay in the village made me remember yet again not to take any of my privileges for granted. As much as I could complain about the U.S., I cannot deny how lucky I am to have grown up there. Sustenance living does not provide much room for thinking about the future, much less grand plans like becoming a doctor. There always are the exceptions, when a child from that background can really succeed, but that is not the norm, especially for girls. Thinking of solutions for that opens the Pandora's box of development, which is much more complex than thinking that every country needs to end up like the U.S. Maybe I'll divulge more on that in another post, but I think I've shared enough for one night. I have many more blog posts floating around in my head than I have time or energy to type.

As a closing note, think of what your life would be without electricity...one pro is star gazing. I have not seen that many stars, or the complete milky way like that since I was in the Boundary Waters. I sat with my jaw dropped a few nights in a row while munching corn on the cob roasted on coals. mmmm. And a con: no internet=no blog=no connection with people halfway around the world.

I came here to shop Old Navy???

Yesterday, I found myself in a place I never would have thought of...make that many strange places. I had slept at a friend's house after Friday night's adventure and returned home, hoping to sleep so more, or at least shower. Then, my sister asked me if I wanted to come with her, like she does so often, without telling me where exactly we were going. I managed to get "the market" out of her, so at least I prepared for being out for a few hours. My sister, cousin, and I took a Sutrama (bus) to the grand marché, and then got on another Sutrama and got off at an unknown destination. My sister didn't seem to know exactly where she was going either...great. We finally found our destination, a tin roof shelter where men were selling clothes from big bundles.

Apparently, that is the place to shop. Two guys helped us- they held up one shirt at a time and my sister said yes or no until we had gone through their entire stock. The clothes were american thrift store castaways. Apparently it is common for places like Goodwill to send the clothes they can't sell to Africa, where they get sold at pret-a-porters (one step up from where i shopped with my sister, since you might be able to find multiple copies of the same style) or on the streets in "stores" like the one I was at. I also saw men cutting out seams and resewing some of the shirts they received before reselling them. The clothes that my sister was looking at included a lot of brand names that i recognized, and I ended up buying one shirt, Old Navy by way of Africa. One of my friends said that the style I got was just from earlier this summer, so the lag time in clothes getting there is not too long. The Malian girls are definitely stylin', especially my sisters, who ended up buying 15 or so shirts. After making sure there was nothing left that they wanted at that store, we got back on a Sutrama and headed back to the grande marché, where they got accessories and shoes. It is interesting to go to the market with them, and try to see it through their eyes. They focus on trying to look western, so they love stores full of imported shoes or cosmetics. When I go, I prefer looking at the Malian fabrics and go to the craftsmen's part of the market, where one can buy handmade leather shoes, instruments, jewelry, and other 'african' looking things.

After that 6 hour excursion, I finally got to shower and rest from my previous night of fun. I had spent the night at a friend's house, and we went out with her Malian brother and sister, met up with a couple other students and then went to the Maison de Jeune in downtown Bamako. There, we met some Malian guys that one of my american friends knew and they took us on their motos to a restaurant with live music. The music was great- in the style of Ali Farka Touré with kora and blues guitar. We ended up dancing a lot with the random Malians, who ended up being pretty sketchy and made us pay for their drinks. I don't know what exactly happened, since they never were my friends and I spent most of my time taking to my friend's host brother, who also thought the other guys were bad. All in all, it was a fun night, but more expensive than i expected.

So, Friday night was tiring, but I could not pass up the chance to go out to a boite (nightclub) with my own host sisters on Saturday, especially since they are not allowed to go very often. My sister was kind enough to complete my outfit of my brand new old navy shirt with some of her white, sequined skinny jeans (i said no to a miniskirt) and her shoes so I was set to go. Bintou took at least two hours to finally decide what she as wearing; she was disappointed since she ended up repeating an outfit. Her boyfriend picked Bintou, Dadi, and I up, and we headed to No Stress in the Badalabougou neighborhood about 15 minutes from our house. Apparently, 11:30 was much to early, since we were the first people in the doors. Luckily, some of my friends were sitting at a restaurant next door to a club so i went and had a banana split with them instead of waiting inside the empty club. We danced from about 1:30 to 4 am, or rather, they danced and I did variations on a step touch. The music was all american or french and didn't impress me nearly as much as the live music the night before. Nevertheless, it was a Malian experience I needed to have and will probably repeat.

I'm all tired out today, and am having more trouble with the heat that has been building recently. Apparently October weather is not the best, since it is just about done raining but the cold season doesn't start until November. It will really hit hard tomorrow, when I go to Sanankoroba tomorrow with the group. It is our week long rural village stay without electricity, so I won't be updating again until next weekend, when I probably will have a lot more to write about. My family here in Bamako thinks it will terrible there, which I guess makes sense, since they spend 80% of their time watching tv in a house cooled by fans. I am excited since it will be a great time to practice Bambara (most adults there don't speak french), and we get to tie and dye!!! Luckily, there are two students placed with each family in the village so two can communicate better than one.

If you have any questions, ideas for posts, or just want to say hi, i think it is best if you email me at courtney.kerestes@gmail.com. My experience with the commenting option on blogspot isn't good, so email is easiest. Have a great week and enjoy the cool of Minnesota and the joys of electricity!

LE PALUDISME! (malaria)

It sounds much more dramatic in french, not that Malaria needs to be made more frightening. Since I last posted, I had a great fete (more later), got sick, traveled to Sikasso, a city in the south, near Burkina Faso and Cote d'Ivoire, was diagnosed, returned to Bamako, and recovered. Time flies here, even though Africans don't take time seriously.

My battle with Malaria was not too serious- don't worry- but it did cause a great deal of discomfort. My primary symptoms were vomiting, fevers, and alternating periods of sweats and chills, thanks to parasites bursting out of my red blood cells at specific intervals. Due to my interest in all things medical, and having learned about Malaria scientifically (in english) and practically (in french), I guessed my diagnosis on the second morning. Later that day, after visiting a doctor and having blood drawn, I was proved right. Having blood drawn on a porch, sitting in an office desk chair, while trying to chat with the lab assistant was interesting...especially since the needle used looked a lot like the ones I used in lab this summer, and the blood just dripped from the needle into a little vial (I think I prefer the Red Cross method). I started on a multi-drug treatment right away, and am now feeling mostly better, only 6 days after my initial sickness.

Malaria didn't completely ruin my weekend excursion to Sikasso with the rest of the students. Though 6 hours each way in a bus (van) on rough roads was uncomfortable, it was worth it to see that part of the country. The region of Sikasso is much cooler at this time of year, and there is a lot of agriculture. Saturday morning (before the clinic), I hiked up a mountain to get a panoramic view of the region. The climb involved ladders, chains, and boulders...I was quite glad I wasn't wearing flip flops since it was a bit intense. Mali has a lot more hills and small mountains than I had thought and it is very green, year round in the south. Later in the trip we'll travel further north, but never actually get to the Sahara since there is a small presence of Al Qaeda and the U.S. embassy doesn't think Timbuktu is safe.

Upon returning to Bamako, my sole object has been recovering. At the same time, a load of homework is bearing down on me, since I only have 4 weeks until the classroom portion of the semester is finished (and next week is in rural village). I can't believe that I have been here for over a month now!

Ah yes, the fete! It turned out to not be quite as exciting as all of the buildup led me to think it would be. In the morning, we cooked a lot, but that is pretty typical. Everyone dressed up in the late afternoon and some people visited my house, but I stayed home with my sisters. In the evening, Bintou and I visited another friend who lives on the military base in downtown Bamako and the two of us ate dinner there (without the friend). Then we returned home, and went out to a couple restaurants with her boyfriend and another friend. I saw a lot of people out and about, but we didn't go to the boites (clubs) that apparently were crazy. The next day was declared a holiday since it happened to land between the end of Ramadan and their Independence Day. Bintou and I got tickets to a fancy event at the Radisson, since her friend works there, which turned out to be an awards ceremony interspersed with famous singers and dancers performing. It was celebrating the youth of Mali and sponsored by the Ministry of Youth and Sports. On the actual independence day, nothing special happened in my neighborhood.

So now I am up to date, minus the first few weeks here that I glossed over.

La fete et ma famille

Today is the festival you've all been waiting for. if you're Muslim. Today is the festival for the end of Ramadan- for the past month, most people in Mali have not been eating from sunrise to sunset, and today is the end of that so they are all excited, and Malians love to have fetes! I'll hopefully get to experience all the ins and outs of it with my family, for the next three days.


Since my program is about having the real Mali experience, I live with a real Malian family in the Garantigibougou neighborhood of Bamako, south of the Niger. My host sister gave me my Malian name, Kadidia Bouaré, when we first met, since apparently they can't say most American names. But other Malians are rather incredulous when I say I am from America and my name is Kadidia. I like it:)



I live with my mom, dad, and six sisters, in a beautiful little compound. Six sisters is a lot, to say the least, especially when most of them are younger than me, and I'm used to being the youngest child. The oldest is Dadi, who is 23 and almost done with medical school. Next, there is Bintou, who is my primary host and caretaker. She is 20, studying english at 2 universities, and has many random male friends from school that I have met, plus the boyfriend that she can't see until Ramadan is over. But she is a great sister and takes me all kinds of places, including on a rendezvous she snuck out for while her dad was sleeping. Next, there is Tabara, who I share a room with...she hasn't really opened up to me yet, but there is still time. Then, Aissata is 14 and sometimes a bully to her younger sisters and other times their best friend. Awa is next, and finally, the youngest is Nana. She has quite the attitude, being the youngest, but she is fun to talk to, or watch dance. All of my sisters are fluent in franbara (french and bambara spoken together at an alarmingly fast speed), but will speak to me just in french. Since my family obviously has more money than the average Malian, they are pretty well educated.



Right now, however, there is no school, so they hang around the house. When not doing chores, there favorite activity is watching tv...I have had a hard time reconciling myself with that, since I have already probably watched more tv in two and a half weeks with them than I do in a normal year, but I have started to do homework or read a book in the same room as them instead of just watching it. They have a wide variety, including hours of music videos, Spongebob, Maria de la Barrio (a bad soap), Survivor, Secret Story, african dancers, CSI, and Desperate Housewives. My favorite was grey's anatomy a couple nights ago.



My father is a biologist at the University of Bamako- the first molecular biologist in West Africa to learn to separate and recombine DNA (He studied at the NIH for 6 months in 1992). He is doing some interesting research with the genetic modification of mosquitoes and other vectors so they cannot carry infectious diseases, like malaria. My mother stays at home most of the time and cooks and makes sure her daughters and maid are in line. Having a maid living in the compound is pretty typical here, and and my family treats her really well.

I believe it is time to get dressed up for the day. I am borrowing one of my sister's old complets so I will fit right in...or not.

First Impressions

I arrived in Mali on August 28 after 3 long, stressful days of flying and sitting around airports. I stepped off the plane into the sweltering heat, walked inside, went through the fastest customs ever, watched several cycles of bags through the baggage claim, and did not find mine. Someone told me to go outside and around to find out about my bag, so i obeyed, about at my wit's end. I didn't have my bag, and worse, it looked as if there was not anyplace indoors for me to sit for the next 8 hours until the program director would arrive.

As I walked outside, I didn't notice the man holding a piece of computer with SIT written on it, until I was almost past him, and he approached me. When he introduced himself as Modibo Coulibaly, the academic director of my program, a wave of relief hit me. They helped me check with the office where I was directed to find out about my bag, and we found out that it wouldn't be there until Monday. I could go to the hotel right away, so I hardly cared that I didn't have my bag.

I hardly noticed anything else about the airport. I got in a van with another student who arrived shortly before me, and we rode to the hotel, staring out the window at the fields of corn and millet, which were quickly replaced by houses. I was struck by all of the women carrying huge buckets on their heads, with children tied around their waists. That is definitely not something you see every day in America.

From the moment I left the airport, everything keeps getting better. After a couple of days of orientation in Bamako, and staying in a hotel there, we went to Siby for three nights. Siby is a village about an hour and a half outside of Bamako, in a lush green area. We visited a women's cooperative that makes soaps and shea butter there, and spent a couple of hours in small groups in an actual village compound (a family here doesn't have a house, they have a compound, with different buildings aroudn the perimeter for cooking, sleeping, and washing). We knew just enough Bambara to introduce ourselves and greet people on the street. That is one of my favorite things about Mali so far: everyone greets everyone on the streets, especially in villages. The culture is so open and welcoming, which has made my transition to malian life very comfortable.
In the village, we stayed at a 'hotel', that was actually a series of huts. Living in a hut and listening to a thunderstorm through a thatched roof, but never getting wet was a great experience. While in Siby, we also went on a short hike that led to some places where some of the events of their legend of Sundiata took place. Look up Sundiata (or Sunjata)- it is the story that the Lion King was based off of!

After Siby, orientation was finished, I finally got my bag (on Wednesday since we were in Siby on Monday), and I moved in with my host family, and our normal class routine started. More about that later...

At long last...

I ni su! Good evening!

I was kind of slow getting onto the blog thing, but now I have one so I hope you enjoy! I will try to update the normal goings on of my life here, as well as what I am learning about in class and the cultural insight I am gaining. Luckily, my host family has a computer with internet (very rare) and it normally works (except when it rains or is really cloudy), so I can update regularily.

First, I assume some of you are wondering what I am doing here in Bamako, Mali. I am studying abroad through SIT (school for international training) in a program focusing on Gender, Health, and Development. The classes are not taught at a Malian university, or anything like that: they are seminar style with myself and 20 other students from universities around the U.S. in the same classroom together for all our classes, except french, which is split into four levels. The other classes are Bambara (the main language spoken here), a field study seminar, and a thematic seminar, covering history, culture, gender, health, development, and music. We have three main teachers and overall guides, who are Malians so they give us a real Malian experience, all the time. Also, lectures are often taught by guests from local universities or NGO's in their areas of speciality.
The program places much importance on field based learning, so we have assignments like interviewing a person, or making a photo essay. The most important source of direct contact with the culture comes in the home stay family (I'll write more about mine later, since I can say a lot on that topic). The culmination of our learning here is a month long independent study project (ISP). I haven't picked a topic yet, but I have many ideas and resources for a health based project.
I chose this program because it is in a francophone African country and has a focus on health...and frankly, I didn't have that many options. The field based nature of all of the SIT programs also drew me to it. I wanted a unique learning experience in a completely new culture, and a break from my normal hermitage in lab (not that i don't also enjoy that!) and thus far, my experience has been beyond fulfilling my expectations.

I will write more details about what I've been doing here soon, but right now, I am sick of the french keyboard with its misplaced a and w and nearly impossible period. Plus, I need to get back to my tea, dates, and millet porridge:)
k'an ben!