Hey friends and fam!

Happy THANKSGIVING!!! I’m here in Gao where the internet is finally working so I’m able to respond to emails and “fingers crossed” post some pictures. I should have internet regularly from now on as I’ve made some new friends who have wireless, but I may also be jinxing myself right now.

We’re celebrating tomorrow with Turkey and all the fixings including pies and mashed potatoes. Almost all the volunteers in the region have come to town and we’re also having a bunch of ex-pats over as well to celebrate with us. Bess and I are going to try to make a pumpkin pie( fingers crossed) and scalloped potatoes and stuffing are already in the process of being made. Its amazing what you can find and make here if you put your mind to it. We’ve had Mexican, Indian, Mac and cheese all in Gao and in village we’ve figured out how to make cakes and cookies in our solar cookers and have also had some delicious meals of tortillas, cucumbers, onions and meat! I usually eat lunch and dinner with my family, which is usually rice or to with a sauce and a little bit of meat. Malians do not get close to enough fruit and veggies and meat but when you’re cooking and buying for twelve, you have to stay in budget and rice is cheap. I’ve been trying to buy my family what’s missing from their diet when I can and they’ve graciously chowing down. Can you tell I have food on the mind??

Site is good and I’m really coming to love it here. My language is actually improving and I’m understanding around 20-30 percent of what is said to me (to be fair this is a high estimate). Either way I’m feeling better about it and im thinking that I may actually be able to communicate with people in two years in tammsheq. However, I am so grateful to have my French because I think its kept me sane .

Work is also going well and I’ll definitely write more about it next time. I’m learning a lot about all the different associations and projects that are already up and running in town and the possibilities of expansion or new projects. The elephants are just getting to the mare now, so hopefully I’ll have pictures of them as well as some other spots in town for next time.

Promise you won’t tell my village—but I’m actually not married. The marriage proposal thing was really starting to irk me so I made up a husband in America. His name is alternately Michael or John, depending on what comes to me, and i tell everyone that he will be really upset if I had a husband in Mali. To which the response usually is," oh he won’t know, you must have a husband here in Mali." I’ve been trying to explain how there’s laws against this but its just not getting across. A lot of other volunteers, both male and female, have been facing the same problems and they’ve advised me to try the “you can’t afford me” response, which refers to the large dowry that my family would obviously demand. I’m not sure if I’m going to take that route as I don’t want to come off as perpetuating any sense of superiority so I’ll just have to get more creative.

So im sorry this is a short post, but I’ve got more emails to tackle! I miss you all very much and thank you for the bday wishes! I wish you all a very happy thanksgiving and hope you’re with the ones you love.

Here’s a post I wrote two weeks ago…..

So internet up here isn’t really… per se…reliable. Its been out for the past month and as I’m writing this on my laptop, I don’t know when I’ll be able to post it. If you want to reach me, or really love me a lot, you might have more success in sending me a letter or oreo cookies.

I’m enjoying life here with new surprises around the corner every day, whether it be a new word in Tammasheq or the climax of a four hour long Union meeting, where the two eldest gentlemen erupted in insults at each other, which seemed like it came out of nowhere, but I may have missed something, as I don’t really speak the language. I now have a cat, named “Ma Moos a wa”, which translates to “what is this” in Tammasheq and Bess and Jared have a dog, which they gave the more traditional name of “Chewy”. My family is awesome. My dad is named Aguissa (prounounced Reesa), mom Tuckamanit (spelled phonetically), oldest sister Asahara 23, followed by, in order by age, El-Mehdi20 or 19, Abubacrin(abu) 16/15, Suleyman14/13, Ousman13/12, Moussa10/9, Zeinaba (6 or 7 girl, also my bff) Oumar 3/4 and baby Xadijatu who is about 8 or 9 months. Two of my cousins also live with us, Alxamis (says he’s 23 but not a day over 20) and Abdoulay(14), so that they can go to school in Gossi. Their families are living out in the bush with their animals and there isn’t any yellow school bus to pick up the nomadic kids Harunna my eldest sister’s son also lives with us—he’s 5 but acts like he’s a 75 year old man. Its in his walk and attitude. I guess you have to see it. . My family is without a doubt the best they could possibly be. My dad LOVES his kids so much, especially his baby girl and my mom doesn’t take crap from anybody—how could you with 12 kids? She also loves to laugh and has learned to say “hey Raisha, whatsh up” after we taught this, the most important of all American phrases, to Zeinaba, Harunna and Oumar. Everyone has chores to do which include feeding the goats, milking the goats, washing tons of dishes, cooking (often done by Abu, who prefers to stay at home and cook rather than going to school and he’s realllly good at it!), fixing dad’s moto, working in one of four gardens, getting Raisha’s water….etc. When the kids aren’t doing chores, they’re usually off running around town or hanging out in our concession and most of them are very good students as well, practicing their lessons on the giant chalkboard we keep around. Oumar Harunna and Zeinaba have taken a particular liking to hanging outside my house, under my hangar, watching whatever I’m doing, talking to me or to each other about whatever I’m doing, and occasionally helping me with whatever I’m doing if they’re not climbing on me. Recently when we were having one of our hang out sessions, Oumar and Harunna started a really interesting conversation prompted by my question about what the word for stick was again. They talked for five minutes about what all the different words for wood were of which I believe there were about 8 or 9. It was so funny to watch a 3 and 4 year old discuss the different words for the different lengths and sizes of wood, as if they were having a frank political conversation. The discussion was frequently punctuated with exclamations of “BAHU-NES” which roughly translates to “FALSE” or maybe even a “NO WAY”.


Getting back to Gao two weeks ago was another interesting trip and I’ll spare you all the details—I’m sure you’re sick of hearing transportation story that gave me laughing in church syndrome for a good half hour of the trip. To set the scene—it was the second day of the “emeut” or end of Ramaddan holiday so there were no big regular buses coming up from Bamako towards Gao. Just as we were absorbing this news and wondering how we were going to get to Gao, a form of transportation arrived in the form of a small bachee van packed with 25 people (this van would hold ten people tops in the US). After hour and a half long customs difficulties (customs checkpoints are stationed across the country along the big highways, sort of like weigh stations in the US, except these are manned by customs officials and military guys who sometimes check ID’s) we finally pulled away from Gossi and the gentlemen seated next to me reached into his knapsack and pulled out a clicker counter, like the Amtrak or Metro North conductors use to count the number of people on the train. He starts clicking away vigorously every few seconds leading me to believe, ok gov’t official, counting houses or people or goats along the side of the road(there’s NOTHING else he could have been counting). Yet as we continue past Gossi, he keeps up this pace and there’s nothing left he could be counting other than trees or bushes, but they’re going by way too fast. This keeps up for a good half hour and then he stops, puts it back in his pack, rummages around, pulls out an apple, looks at it almost fondly and filled with satisfaction bites in. Now I wouldn’t have thought this was strange if the exact same actions hadn’t been repeated about three hours later and as he rummaged around this second time, I couldn’t help but think of that sex and the city episode where Carrie has jury duty and one of her fellow jurors has that briefcase from which each day he pulls out a different kind of tropical fruit. I honestly was hoping that this the second time around my fellow bache rider would pull out a pineapple or coconut. No such luck tho. Also on this strange ride---our “chauffeur” could have been Ben Twoomey’s African Twin (Jackie or jackie’s family if you’re reading this, feel free to pass this info onto Ben- if he ever wants to come to Mali, he has a twin and subsequently most likely a place to stay.

The end of Rammadan holiday was really very nice. You could feel it was a holiday, the feeling in the air was sort of like that of Thanksgiving or Fourth of July. For the whole month prior, Men and women, who weren’t sick or nursing had been fasting during the day, only eating before sunrise and after sunset. Rammadan represents the days that Muhammed spent in the cave outside Medina when he received his visions from Allah that would become the teachings of Islam. So the “emut” is a celebration of the end of an intense month of prayer and fasting. Everyone wears their nicest clothes and visits family and friends in the village or town. My family slaughtered a goat for the special occasion-I didn’t watch-and we had grilled meat and couscous for a special meal. My little sister, Zeinaba, my big sister, Asahara, and I went and visited the Mayor, my teacher and my homologue in our new duds, henna and our braids. Bess and I had spent the whole day before-at least 5 or 6 hours- at the Malian equivalent of “the spa” or sitting on a mat in a concession, having our hair braided and our feet and hands hennaed. We looked about as Malian as we could but it was tough sitting still all day and we were both anxious by the end to get the plastic bags off our hands and feet and to get to a mirror to see whether the compliments of “a wa ihooskat” were really true.

So to sum up I really miss you all and would love to hear about how everything is going over there.