The Malian Blues: Big Round #1

I am really depressed. It's more frustrating because I can't pinpoint exactly why. 


I see other volunteers playing games, being happy and smiling and I'm sad that I don't feel that way. I feel really sad inside. I want it to go away!! 


I can't really describe this depression. It's like a sorrowful slump...I don't want to go out and talk to Malians. I guess I just want to sit here and do nothing. I really want it to go away. I think I have only ever felt this sad maybe a handful of times. 


When I was leaving for Mali, my best friend, Al, who's in Peace Corps Ukraine now, told me that PC is the hardest thing she's ever done in her life. 


I thought, yeah, it will probably one of the hardest things I've ever done...but there is one thing above the PC that takes the cake for being the hardest. 


But now, the Malian blues are turning out to be the hardest thing. It's slowly creeping up there as the lowest point ever. Just go away!


The thought of tackling my second integration again makes me want to curl up in a ball and sleep in a dark corner until it all goes away. What I'm trying to say is, I am uncharacteristically dreading the shit out of not-really-that-hard-work. 


But the thing is, I don't want to be in America. I don't even really know if I like America anymore. I feel bitter toward America after an experience like Mali. I feel like the laziness, gluttony and utter disregard for people in other parts of the world is just disgusting. Jeez, right!?? Mali is making me bitter! 


I'm being hard on myself because I'm not motivated, because I'm annoyed with life here, because I feel lonely but am surrounded by people, because I don't know how to cope, because I thought I had the answers to find out they're all wrong, because I am so sad and I don't want to leave the house. I am really hard on myself about not tackling integration #2 with the same gusto as integration #1. I am finding it impossible to be patient with myself. 


This is one of those cases where your worst enemy is yourself. And I know it, so that's half of the battle. I'm at least aware of it. 


Why can't I be accepting of the fact that this will change? That this is totes temporary? That this is strengthening me in ways I don't know? Why can't I just get up and do something?? 


Also, my sister says when stuff like this happens, to just feel it. Human emotion like this is really beautiful. And I have to go through my own process. Why not see the beauty in that process and roll with it? Pain and suffering are beautiful...because we grow tremendously from them. If we don't let it wreck us. 


My friend, Jessica Luo, an utter and complete badass, asked me today if I was okay. She said she thinks I am comparing myself too much with what I was able to do at my old site. And this site is just too different to do that. And before, I didn't have any frame of reference as to what "integration" would be like. Now that I do, I am comparing myself unfairly. 


I told her I just have high expectations for myself...but really...I'm being super cruel to myself. Damnit! I just realized that a Tarot reading I got right before I came to Mali warned me of cruelty...to myself. I guess that kind of puts it into perspective for me. I'm making myself my worst enemy. 


Man, Mali is really messing with my head. 


This place is way more than the emotional roller coaster everyone described it as. There are so many ups and downs. Not only within long periods of time, but within one day, or even, especially lately, within an hour or several minutes. 


The other thing I'm learning here is that, one day you can have a huge problem and the next day the complete solution to your problem appears out of thin air, and alas, things are drastically different. Day to day. Hour to hour this happens. 


I need to stop being so hard on myself, enjoy what's happening to me...I'm growing...and realize the beauty and opportunity right in front of my eyes. I'll never be in this place again...every minute of it is an adventure. Every minute of it should be cherished. 


I'm actually starting to feel a little better. But, seriously, that could change drastically in the next minute. 


Writing is therapeutic for me. That's how I get perspective on things and get it off my chest. It's something that's going to become a lot more than a hobby for me after the PC. I really want to travel to the most unknown, obscure places and write about them. Tell those stories. Tell the stories of people who no one cares about, no one knows about, shed some light on them and why they deserve it. But, we'll see what happens. 


Bob Marley, Eric Clapton, Lady Gaga, Rhianna, Rolling Stones, Led Zeppelin...have all been great sources of support here in Mali. A pen and a paper too. My bike also. Dancing used to...but it gotten kind of old after dancing that much for two months straight. But a nice, healthy way to relieve stress. 


Listened to some Bob Marley today that I could relate to Mali: "Them Belly Full (But We're Hungry)"


Forget your troubles and dance!
Forget your sorrows and dance!
Forget your sickness and dance!
Forget your weakness and dance!

Cost of livin' gets so high,
Rich and poor they start to cry:
Now the weak must get strong;
They say, "Oh, what a tribulation!"
Them belly full, but we hungry;
A hungry mob is a angry mob.
A rain is fall, but the dirt it tough;
A pot is cook, but the food no 'nough.

We're gonna chuck to Jah music - we're chuckin';
We're chuckin' to Jah music - we're chuckin'.

Man, I love Bob Marley. I like these lyrics because that really is the kind of solution we have available here in Mali. It's not like in America, where you can just get up and go do about anything you want to help you cope with something. Here, resources are extremely limited. People dance and play "drums" with old trash bins and sticks. They do what they can.

If Malians can, I can too. "Forget your troubles and dance." I probably won't dance, because I'm sick of Malian dancing, but I understand the concept. It's quite beautiful.