I have officially seen it all...two men on a moto, sandwiching between them a hog-tied sheep. A live sheep! Are you kidding me?
For a full week now, we have not had water in the taps during the hours between 7 am and 11pm. It makes for an exhausting, hot, sticky, smelly, and frustrating day. Sometimes there is water available in the downstairs spout, the one in the garage. So we fill up bottles and tote them upstairs and use them for all sorts of needs. Today there was water all day long. I am keeping my fingers crossed that it stays that way for the duration of our time here.
Recently I have heard Malians complaining about their diet. Rice, rice, rice, they say. Every day rice! (I thought I was the only one longed for more variety.) Granted there are potatoes and beans, as well, but even then... I have definitely gained an appreciation for being able to eat foods when they are out of season.
When I was sick and Constance brought me tea several nights ago she also brought a plate of food that I couldn't even think about eating at that moment. I thanked her and put it in the fridge. The next day I went to eat the plate of food and it was nowhere to be found. You guessed it! Andrew ate it.
When I confronted him he said he thought it was left over from the night before. I said it was, but it wasn't yours. He said he thought I had cooked and left the plate for him. I said Andrew I was in bed sick all day, I haven't been cooking. Furthermore when have you ever seen anyone cook meatballs or any meat in this house? He said he didn't know. I said well when you don't know you ask someone. There is plenty of community food that you could have eaten but you went straight for something that you weren't sure about and devoured it. He brusquely offered to pay me back the value of the food and I accepted.
Rodney said he liked how Andrew ate food that was clearly not his and then only apologized and went to his room without offering to somehow make amends somehow whether it be a replacement dinner or a refund. Glad I was persistent and tapped on his door so we could come to a real resolution. Rodney and I figured it was probably because the water was out in the taps and he was being lazy and didn't want to have to heat up other food and then go downstairs to get water to wash out the pots.
Friday we had a meeting with the head of Africare in Mali. On our way back Rodney and I stopped at Constance's boutique and chatted with her. Just as we were going to leave and go home to heat up some food she insisted we stay and eat there. And she uncovered a platter of a Senegalese rice and fish, with eggplant, yam, carrot, cabbage and a hint of tamarind and lemon. I asked Constance to eat with us and she said that we should eat. I asked what she was going to eat and she said not to worry about her, that she was at home. We scraped every last bit of food out of that platter. Not only was it delicious but it was nice to eat something that we didn't have to toil over. So then Rodney and I simultaneously got the same idea.
An hour later we were back at the boutique with a meal for Constance. Now it's not a meal I would write home about (well technically I guess I am) but we fried plantains, made grits and served over the grits the "boot" sauce we made on Sunday with everything but our boots in it. Seriously, it's a tomato sauce with tomatoes, lentils, potatoes, onions, garlic, eggplant, peppers, carrots, and lots of spice. Well Constance loved it so much that she called Maxime to come from their house to come taste it. Another of her friends tasted it and said he wanted the recipe. Are you kidding? And they had never thought of eating grits in that way. They boil them with milk and sugar and eat it as a dessert. I guess though we eat the same things a slight difference in how you cook it can make it interesting to someone else.
I hung out with Fa yesterday. She is so spirited and fun that I always enjoy myself. She and her sister Aisha turned the music up and we danced. Fa asked me to translate Celine Dion's "Goodbye" for her and though I did on the first go round she made me listen to it many more times. The pics above are her but she took her braids out in case you can't recognize her. Somehow we got to talking about the US and she and her sister told me in school they learned that we had 52 states. No we only have 50 I said, that's why there are 50 stars on the flag. They said really? And then honestly I started to doubt myself. What could possibly be confused for the other 2 states? Puerto Rico sure but the other??? Rodney said maybe it was the US Virgin Islands. Not sure but interesting...
Fa told me that Ouima, the 15 year old with whom I can talk very little with, is engaged to be married to a cousin who asked for her long ago. He is a 32 year old doctor so at least she will be living well, but my god the marriage takes place in a month. A 15 year old getting married? She's in 8th grade for crying out loud. (There is a picture of her above as well in a green top.) The funny thing is when I first met her I asked if she was married and she said no I'm only 15. I'm still a child. So when I found out I said Ouima, I heard you were getting married and you didn't tell me. I upset with you. She said it wasn't true. For a second she had me, but then when I asked about the details I had been told, she alternated between denying it, giggling behind her hand, and asking who had told me. So I said congratulations and best wishes for her marriage (what else is there to say) and she said thank you.
This morning Rodney and I got up early, took some food on a hike and ate it on a hillside overlooking Bamako. Nice view, very relaxing. Then he showed me around the dock area where small wooden boats are made and pitched with tar; trucks come in to get wet sand for construction purposes; and everything is bustling.
As we walked near the water some men offered us a boat ride. We declined because of a language barrier and we thought they were looking to be paid. Then as we continued to walk along the banks we saw them out on the water and waved to them. They pointed to an area where they could dock and indicated that we could still come out with them. So we took them up on the offer and joined them and a small toddler out on the boat.
Everything is beautiful when you're on the river. We saw people using large flat rocks to wash their clothes and lay them out to dry, children swimming. Even one of the men in our boat jumped in to swim and came back with two fish that someone had given him. One woman was singing and washing her clothes with a friend. This sounds so cliche, but her voice was beautiful and I could have listened to it all day. We docked and they told us they were going to wash so we scrambled up the hillside to give them some privacy.
In the distance there was a gorgeous house overlooking the river with a wraparound porch. My God that would have to be a lovely view night after night. When one of our friends joined us later he said the land we were on is owned by Salif Keita, a famous griot who recently did a remix of his 1989 song "Nou Pas Bouger (We Won't Move)" with popular urban Malian group L'Skadrille. The song is in protest of the French government's repressive policy toward immigrants, specifically those of African origin and 17 years later it is still relevant enough to have been remixed and re-released. It is very popular here.
Since I have been in Mali my mom has ordered some African films through Netflix and enjoyed seeing some of the relationships and issues I have described. The following movies are set in places as far apart and varied as Mali, Senegal, South Africa, and Chad but they come with mom's recommendation. Yesterday is about a Zulu woman struggling to raise her daughter in rural South Africa, who is further troubled when she learns that she has gotten HIV from her husband who is away working in the city. (I saw this one and it is excellent!) Moolaadé depicts a Senegalese village as it tackles the issue of female circumcision. Life on Earth: 2000 Seen By... is about life in rural Mali and a man who weathers a world disaster in a bucolic village. A young man in Mali travels to find his uncle in hopes that he might be able to help him solve his problems in Yeelen. Mandabi is about a Senegalese man who hits one bureaucratic roadblock after another as he tries to convert a money order from a wealthy relative to cash. Abouna is about two boys in Chad who set out to find the father who has abandoned their family; and, Xala is a Senegalese comedy about the trials and tribulations of a man with three wives.
Also a new book recommendation The Marabi Dance by Modikwe Dikobe. It tells the story of youth in South Africa caught in the gap between the old world and its ways and the new world post-colonization.
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