Fun times in Mopti region

Despite being in constant internet access, I have been dropping the ball on updating PW. But as my departure to Douentza looms close at hand, I will give you all an update on my week.

On Tuesday morning, 10 of us set out across the fields from the Peace Corps office to the bus station. There, we all crammed into an old school station wagon: 4 in the back, 4 in the middle, 2 in the front and the driver. Dave had his little speakers, so we were playing some music, cruising along the Bandiagara road as the toobob clown car. At times, I would forget where I was, then I would look outside and see Dogon women carrying baskets on their heads or herder boys watching the car go by. Strange juxtaposition.

We got dropped off in front of the PC house in Bandiagara, a nice little apartment with flowering trees in the courtyard. There I met another 4 or 5 volunteers with whom I would share my St. Patrick’s Day festivities. After everyone greeted and got settled, half of us set off on an expedition to the swimming pool at a hotel across town.

The hotel (Cheval Blanc?) has a very unique and charming feel, with little stone igloos for rooms and a stone bottom pool that feels really natural. The French guy at the reception assured me it was “hyper propre”—hyper clean. We all could have laughed out loud, it felt so good to be in the water. Dan and I ordered some gazpacho for lunch, and we all got a beer. The rest of the crew showed up eventually, and we all stayed in the pool for probably a good 4 hours.

After we finally wrenched ourselves away, some of us went to get street food for dinner. I stuffed myself on 300 CFA worth of food—beans, rice and plantains. I was so full and tired when we went to the next hotel that I went back with another volunteer, Ryan, to take a nap at the house. We came back fresh and ready and stayed up until probably 2 in the morning. The last stop, the Auberge, was nice. We were able to put our own music on the speakers and dance and hang out until one by one, we went upstairs to sleep on the roof.

We all got fried egg sandwiches for breakfast the next morning (Wednesday), then the same clown car taxi came and picked us up to take us back to the bureau in Sevare. We hung out there for the day, then Rabayah and Susan and I went out to dinner with one of the PC bosses that evening. She and Susan had business to talk about, but Rabayah and I were just bumming a ride to Mopti off of the PC car.

We went to a well-known place called Mac’s Refuge. Mac is American, but was born to missionaries in Mali and grew up here most of his life. He opened this guest house/restaurant ten years ago that serves family style meals of various sorts every day, and he is always present for them. He’s a nice guy, but a little overbearing at times. His food was delicious, though. $10 bought a 3 course meal: first soup, then roast beef, sweet potato fries, steamed bread rolls, and salad, and finally homemade ice cream and chocolate syrup for dinner. Plus he was on his way back to the States in a couple days and was celebrating with sangria on the house. It was altogether a very pleasant meal (where I ate way more than I should have), but it dragged on a bit long.

We finally got to Mopti (where Susan and Rabayah live) around 10PM. I checked into my hotel just fine, but found that my original fan room I had requested didn’t connect to the wireless. So, darn, I had to upgrade to an AC room. I mean, I had to pay for it, but it was worth the luxury. Unfortunately, they shut off the internet a little after midnight, but I went to sleep and started my internet time again in the morning.

I spent most of Thursday lounging around on the internet, Skype-ing, e-mailing, working on my grammar, etc., until Susan came and met me at the hotel so we could go to Rabayah’s house together to make dinner.

Rabayah has a very pleasant apartment in a gardened courtyard. It’s really nice. We made spicy beans and corned beef for dinner, with this millet and peanut porridge Mac had given me for desert. Again, we all probably ate too much, but when something tastes good, you just want to keep eating it. After dinner, they escorted me back to the hotel, and I stayed on the internet again until bedtime.

I woke up during the night to the power coming and going. It was storming and raining (again?), and my AC and fan got caught up in the mix. I stayed until about noon the next day, at which point I checked out to find Susan and Rabayah.

Rabayah’s work, with women suffering from fistula, is right near my hotel, so I walked over there to find her. Unfortunately, when I got there, she wasn’t there and her phone had fallen into the toilet hole in Bandiagara. Also, none of the women spoke French and I speak no Bambara, so we were out of luck. Fortunately (or perhaps unfortunately), there were a couple guides there hitting on me and being generally sketchy, but they helped me figure out that someone was going to take me to Rabayah’s house after she ate breakfast.

The sketchy guys left, and I was left sitting under a little shelter, shivering from the cold misty wind. The woman I was waiting for was taking forever, and I was afraid Rabayah’s was going to leave to go to lunch at her host family’s house. At one point, I tried to get up and leave and just catch a taxi to Susan’s work, but the woman I was sitting with stopped me and tried to explain to me that we would go. I wanted to tell her I was afraid Rabayah would leave, but alas.

Finally, the other woman came over, and the three of us stumbled through the mud and rain until we got to Rabayah’s house. Luckily, she was still there. She hadn’t gone to work because she was feeling a bit under the weather and it was raining (a good enough excuse not to go to work here). It turned out fine in the end, but it was sort of an ordeal at the time.

After making some more porridge, we took a taxi to her host family’s house. The taxi system is really nice in Mopti. It works rather like a bus system. The taxis run up and down the road along the river, and every fare is 150 CFA, so you don’t have to worry about getting ripped off. The road was so muddy on her host family’s street, and we were both afraid of completely wiping out in it. I slipped at one point, but only got my knee muddy.

We got to her host family’s house and sat with one young woman, Fantasila, for a while. She brought us lunch and we hung out until we decided to meet up at Susan’s place. We carefully picked our way back down the mud trap road to find another taxi, and made it there relatively uneventfully.

Susan also has a nice apartment, a spacious one on the second floor. We opened up a couple cans of Indian food she’d had sent to her and made that for dinner. Once again, we probably ate way more than we should have. We were all tired and went to sleep early, then in the morning made French toast with bissap (hibiscus) syrup. I can’t complain about how I’ve been eating.

Today, Susan and I shoved ourselves into a communal taxi-truck and went to the bank in Sevare. We didn’t even have to wait that long. Afterwards, we hit up the little grocery store that has delicious soft serve ice cream and used that to power us through the long, hot, and now muggy walk back to the Peace Corps bureau.

I got more e-mail here, including one telling me my flight itinerary was pushed up one day! Now I will be leaving on May 19th! I’m pretty excited about that. I mean, it’s only one day and I’m actually fairly happy here, but it’s still awesome, since I’ll just be chilling in Bamako then anyway.

After this, I’m going to meet Seydou and we’re going to do some research on solar panels. This thing is really happening. But I am still open to donations (the more I can raise, the better the panels will be or the more equipment I can add on!), so contact me if you would like to donate. Or find my paypal button a few posts back… then it’s back to Douentza this evening. Ashley, the new volunteer, moved in last night, so it’ll be great to have a girl up there!

All in all, it has been a very fun and eventful week. But now it’s time to go home. Apparently Oumar lost the keys to my house (just the main room, not my room), with my cats locked inside, but he sprung the lock. Now it’s time to get that changed. Always something to do in D-town.