Michael and Jennifer in Mali - We're here!!
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We're here!! Hello everyone!
We have been in country for two nights and two days now and are adjusting pretty well so far. THe AIR FRANCE flights were sweet rides - free wine, cognac, french cheese, etc...but finding booked day rooms at 'de Gaulle' meant sleeping for 8 hours in Paris' airport. THe flight to Bamako was fun - you could definitely tell the Americans from the Malians. By the time we arrived we were jet lagged, had too much wine/cognac, and the "vivid dreams" from the malaria meds didn't help. We got in on Thursday night and it was definitely Africa at the airport...lots of surprised faces to see 75 Americans step off the plane. We are now at Zoubomago/Tubani So which is the training site and are excited about the posh treatment - electricity (lights and ceiling fan in huts), clean drinking water, and Americanized food. It's amazing that we were all worried about Jen's eating..but it turns out that her main staples are right under our noses - local peanut butter and local bananas every morning with breakfast. The mangoes uphold their reputation as being the best in the world- or at least what we've had for lunch the past two days. Training is going well so far. We had the "Mr. D" (diarrhea) talk today and made everyone really paranoid. Current Peace Corps volunteers that have been here awhile tell horror stories that are pretty funny. It comes with the territory I suppose. On Aug. 2nd, we and 5 others will be put into a nearby village to live with a host family. We will be speaking Bambara (the main local dialect) and are picking up on it so far. We had a cultural festival this afternoon with local food, music, dance, clothing, hair braiding (yes, Jen gots hers done), henna tatooing, etc... We have been trained in the local ways - bucket bath, using "the hole" (latrine=nyegan in Bambara) and constantly wiping sweat off your forehead. We are having a good time so far, Mike got a couple mosquito bites last night but oh well we are making lots of friends and learning lots about Mali. We met a guy from Brentwood, MO and one from St. Genevieve. Also, Sandy, we met a girl from Pella, IA that went to high school with Eric/Isaac. Small world...but as we've been told a lot, Mali is a big place with lots of different terrains, cultures, dialects and problems...so we've got some work cut out for us. Our email/posting ability is still somewhat unclear so we'll get back to you next time we stop by the training site (maybe in a week or two) or actually we'll try Tuesday night before we leave!
K'an ben, Here doron (Good bye, Peace only)
Mike and Jen
P.S. The internet works well here (because there are so many cell phones compared to land lines, any internet we find will probably be broadband instead of dial-up, Sweet! Go Africa!


Current Location: Tubani So, Mali, Africa
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| | | From: | (Anonymous) |
| Date: | July 30th, 2006 01:42 am (UTC) |
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| | From Karen | (Link) |
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Hi you two.
Loved the picture of "the hole". Reminded me of a time I was in desperate need of a facility in Paris. Becky and I had just come on foot from a jaunt around the Rodin museum. We both neglected to use the facilities while there, so we decided to sit and have coffee at a nearby sidewalk cafe in the hopes that they had a bathroom for use by the customers. I paid 2 francs to visit their bathroom, which turned out to be a French version of "the hole", e.g., it had handles to hold on to while squatting, toilet paper, and a flush mechanism for washing it all down the hole. Becky declined to use that facility--fastidious girl that she is. Anyway, hope you adjust quickly.
Here, we are busy busy busy and it is hot hot hot again. Mike, we planted waaaaayyyy too much corn. What were we thinking? We have adopted a new harvesting method, though--cutting down the plants and bundling with string in the field, then hauling the bundles in the pickup truck to the shade for removal and labeling (we're using bar codes!) of the leaf sheaths. That has made the job lots more bearable, temperature wise, and much much much easier on the backs of some of us oldsters. Two more weeks and we should be done with the harvesting. Can't wait.
i'll look forward to hearing from you again. Take care.
Best, KC | From: | (Anonymous) |
| Date: | July 30th, 2006 06:45 am (UTC) |
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| | | (Link) |
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Glad you guys are well!!! :)
~Mucha suerte (much luck!) Ashli Hilton |
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