Trying new things in Mali Part 1 (PICS!)

From getting my hair braided to spending all day walking around a village, for the purpose of greeting, there are everyday things that I do here in Mali, that I might never get the opportunity or time to experience in America. 

The last two months have existed solely for me to get to know my community - to greet, to chat, to drink tea, to ask questions, to walk around and meet people, to dance, to be seen, to introduce myself, etc. That was considered "work" during the last two months here. 

So here are some pictures from my journeys during the last two months, for the sole purpose of getting to know people and building relationships with them...doing things I would probably never do in America...but my heart has grown much bigger for it...here goes.

Learn to make tea and drink tea at all times!! Here are some pictures from a day in which I learned to cook kous kous with my host sisters. We took an afternoon break and made and drank tea. Tea in Mali takes a long time to make, and they cook it over hot charcoal, then pour the tea into another pot. Then they add a shot glass full of sugar and pour into another pot. Then pour it into another pot, over and over again until the tea and sugar are mixed. Then they let the tea heat up a little more, taste it and serve. Here's some of the process. As you can see in the shot glass, the more foam you have, the better your tea is considered. They say the foam is "beautiful." Ha I haven't learned how to cultivate more than a millimeter of foam :)

They pour the tea from up high like this, to better produce tall and abundant foam. This is a good example of tea with a lot of foam.

Tea with a lot of foam after drinking. Nice and sugary.

Awesome foam!

Mixing the tea. They also ONLY use their right hand when making tea. NEVER, NEVER the left hand. And they tear apart the tea box and use it as an oven mit, or just use their fingers on the burning hot silver, when mixing the tea and pouring. Malians don't really use oven mits - a concept that doesn't exactly exist here - they use their hands and torn fabric they have, or pagnes, instead. So they can pick up really hot pans and tea kettles that would burn the hell out of our hands!

Two other volunteers for "Take our Daughters to Work Day" - The positive effects of the three day event were the girls learned about networking, they learned a skill while shadowing women in leadership positions, they bonded with other girls, met other American Peace Corps volunteers, learned goal making skills, presentation skills and we talked a lot about how gender roles are not set in stone. How women can be presidents, how women can hold positions of leadership. How women can be business owners. And it ended with the girls singing together about how they were going to be president one day. 

My host family (except my host moms and dad), slept on the hard concrete every night. Unlike anything I'd ever do in American on a daily basis, I took to sleeping outside in this tent (this pic is in my house), on the hard concrete too. I used an extremely thin mat to sleep on only. I really like sleeping outside and would usually spend my late nights reading Harry Potter by flash light. 

Women here juggle several jobs at once, all hard labor, while carrying their newborns on their backs like this. Keep in mind that babaies don't wear diapers here, so there are times when the babies just go to the bathroom while sitting tied up like this. This baby felt like he weighed at least 30 lbs and I walked across town during tile (hottest part of the day), when it was at least 110 degrees out. I was drenched in sweat when I arrived at my destination. The point is not me carrying this enormous baby, but the endless hard, I mean, HARD work that women in Mali do every day. One of my host moms carried her two-year-old around the village like this every day, with at least 20 lbs of mangoes balancing on her head, while she's eight months pregnant, wearing flip flops with no support and walking all across the village trying to sell mangoes in 110 degree heat...for the profit of about 10 cents average per mango. 

I got so much attention for carrying this "bellebelleba" (Fat) baby on my back. People were stopping me and laughing and asking if I had acquired a Malian baby. Personally I love this little guy, so I was like, "YES, I have!"

Here's the "bellebelleba" baby. Soooo cute. His little clothes were too small and his belly was protruding out of his shirt. So cute!

"Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful and committed people can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has." - Margaret Mead
"We can never have peace in the world, without mutual respect." - Martin Luther King Jr
"Be the change you want to see in the world." - Ghandi 

Got my hair braided!!! Half way through at this point...Malians kept asking me to get my "kunsigi dege" which means hair braided, So finally, I was like, "why not?" I'm in Mali, it's what Malian women do, might as well go for it. I'm supposed to become as Malian as possible, why not?

Ha, it's done!! It didn't turn out anything like I told them I wanted...but I've learned I HAVE to go with the flow here! Things almost never turn out as planned. My braided hair was no exception!

I'm not going to lie - I thought it was hideous, but I pulled it up into a pony tail every day and wore extremely tall musoros (head wraps) every day! I had Malians tell me in beautiful French, "You have become Malian now." 

Even babies drink tea here! Here's the "bellebelleba" baby chugging tea!  Something I have learned here is how much I love kids. In an environment in which the tiniest thing can be super stressful, and emotions are constantly running high, I have used goofiness with children, dancing and writing and reading as stress relief. I never knew that being silly with little kids who giggle and giggle and run at you, laughing and smiling, would be a way to keep things light. 

Braids, musoro and big earrings. So Mali!

I like this picture because it illustrates how Malians will do anything to make you comfortable and happy. This is my host brother transporting my chair (on his head) for me to sit in a more comfortable spot for dinner. Malians give me tea first, give me their best chair, give me their best food, greet me especially, invite me into their homes and want to get to know me because it's their nature. 

My host family!! When in America, would I ever have a family of 20? I have never had little sisters. I have never lived in the same house as my siblings (for long periods of time). My parents divorced when I was little, and here I lived with a host dad, a host mom, a host grandma, my host dad's second wife, two sets of kids and literally 20 people. Their sisters' kids lived there too. One HUGE family!

I have a younger sister for the first time! This is my 16 year-old sister who participated in the "Take Our Daughters to Work" event. She was chosen because she is the best student in her class. My other sister, Kadia (pronounced Kaja), who is 11-years-old, is also the head of her class. My oldest host sister, but still my younger sister, who's 17-years-old, is one of the top students in her class and just finished her tests to help her get into college in Bamako. I made her promise me, that she would do whatever she can, to go to college. But normally, it's not as easy as "going to college." Anyway, for the first time in my life, I live with my siblings, I have younger siblings and a big family. 

This is my little sister, Howa, who is 2-years-old. I like this picture because we all made fun of her afterward that she was "crazy," because she looks crazy here! That's what I love about Mali - that I wish was part of American culture - they make fun of each other endlessly - joking cousins and joking are a significant part of Malian culture. I have heard people say that Mali is a peaceful nation amid other African countries that are disrupting, because of its joking culture. We tell each other they're thieves, our children, crazy, their head has left them, sick, they eat beans, they eat donkey meat, cat meat, dog meat...and they're all jokes. It's awesome because it happens all the time and it keeps things light. 

What I love about the Peace Corps - is you really learn to go with the flow. This is from the day in which I randomly went to an agricultural research facility next to my village, with people I had never met before, for reasons I didn't understand, all day, at the request of my women's association president. That's the thing about Peace Corps - there's so much I don't understand now - the language barrier makes it very difficult to get everything right - but there's a lot of trust and going with the flow. I trust my women's president - so I decided to go. I ended up learning a lot about what a research facility is like in Mali. In America, there would be doctors and physicists and chemists everywhere, in white coats, in million dollar buildings and labs - but not here. It was all men, out of at least 20-30 men, they told me two women work there. Showing that Americans and Malians could do a helluva lot better in encouraging women to pursue fields in science, technology, math, engineering, etc. I have a bunch of pics to post on the trip. But the point is, here, your biggest ally is trust and going with the flow. 

My three host brothers and my neighbor girls. I LOVE this picture because this is one of the days that I glued their fingers together with super glue!! They were begging me to do it, day after day, because one day I played a joke on some of my host family and glued their fingers together. I love this, because here, I have learned how simplicity is often much, much more valuable than valuables and things. These kids don't have toys to play with. They don't have jungle jims, stuffed animals galore, talking toys, nintendos. They have car tires and super glue. And their environment. They have mud and rain water when it rains. They have each other. And this picture illustrates the beautiful simplicity here. Kids don't need hundreds of dollars of new toys every year for Christmas. The best toy and entertainment they have here are their families and each other. 

This is my host bro, Bamusa, trying to pry his fingers apart!