Banankoro

Jul. 27, 2009

Dear friends and family,

I am staying in a town here called Banankoro, which is about a 30
minute drive from Bamako, the capital. I will be in this town for my
training until September 11, when I am sworn in as a Peace Corps
Volunteer and will move to my permanent site for two years. In
Banankoro, I learn language and culture so that I will be able to work
effectively as an education volunteer at my site. Every two weeks
during training, I spend three days with all the other volunteers (67
people) at the Peace Corps training camp, Tubaniso, where we do group
trainings and information sessions. This is where I am now, which is
why I have access to a computer and the internet.

Banankoro is a town of maybe 1,000-2,000 people and is very poor.
There is no electricity or running water. The main road through the
town is the road that goes from Bamako to Guinea. Along the side of
this road are butikis (small general stores) and people sitting by the
roadside selling cucumbers, sandals, tiny bags of macaroni, and other
goods. Children wander around the town playing and doing chores for
their parents. There is garbage everywhere : people simply put their
trash on the ground and there is no system of sanitation. There are
also animals everywhere : oxen, goats, chickens, dogs, and the very
talkative donkeys.

It is very hot and the few trees in the town serve as serious relief
from the sun. Since it is the rainy season, it is supposed to rain
every day, but there is currently a drought (I believe this has
happened for the past couple of years and is a result of
desertification) so it has only rained a few times since I’ve been
here. Before the rain, it becomes very windy, dusty, and hot, then the
rain comes very intensely and lasts for about half an hour.
Afterwards, it is delightfully cool.

The family I am staying with is truly wonderful. The sotigi or head of
the household is Karim Coulibaly, who cultivates mangoes and does
other agricultural work including keeping bees. He has four wives,
three of whom live in the family compound I am living in. The two
people who do the most to look out for me are two of my host mothers,
both named Sali. Interestingly, the family has also chosen to name me
Sali, Sali Coulibaly. The older Sali is Karim’s first wife and is a
bit more reserved but firm in her doings and easy to smile. She has
eight children. The younger Sali is gregarious and pudgy (considered
attractive here since a sign of wealth). She has two children. Both
are very smart and seem to want to learn to read. When I start doing
my homework, they often come over and try to read the words with me.
There are about ten children always playing and working in the
compound. The children here find white people very exciting and
mysterious. The family compound is about 15 separate rooms constructed
out of cement with tin roofs in the shape of a square with an opening
to the street. In the middle of the compound is a room that serves as
the kitchen as well as stacks of firewood, pots boiling over fires, a
well, and donkeys. As far as I can tell the inhabitants of the
compound include Karim, his three wives, their children, two of
Karim's sons and their wives, two of Karim's brothers and their wives
and children, and Karim's mother. As age is respected here, when
greeting the family I greet Karim's mother first, then Karim, then his
wives.

We have our language classes in Banankoro's primary school, which
consists in a cement wall enclosing a courtyard, two tin roofs, a
small building used for storage, and a latrine. When it rains, we
crowd under the part of the roof where the least rain is blowing in
and cannot hear each other because of the noise. Our Bambara classes
are conducted by two Language and Culture Facilitators, Umu and
Nouhoum. Both of their families are in Bamako but Umu and Nouhoum live
in Banankoro during our training period, except for Sundays, which is
our only day off. Umu is also in Banankoro with her baby and niece,
who takes care of the baby and does the housework for Umu and Nouhoum.
Doing housework here is extremely laborious. Not only do people here
not have a washing machine, they've never even heard of one. The women
here spend all day long pounding millet, pulling water from the well,
preparing food, chopping firewood, washing clothes, and other chores
(not to mention having and taking care of children).

What do people eat here? Mostly millet, either in a porridge or in
something like polenta called to. They will have that with an okra
sauce or an oily tomato sauce. Rich people can have rice and small
pieces of meat or fish. As you can see, people are not eating a very
balanced diet. Fruit and vegetables are not a major part of the diet.
There are children in the town who have bloated bellies from
malnutrition.

Greeting is a very important part of daily life here. When I walk to
and from school every day, I greet almost everyone I pass. This
consists in more than a simple hello: you go through a series of
questions asking how they are, how their father is, how their mother
is, how their children are, and how they spent their night, then they
ask you this series of questions. It takes quite a while to walk
anywhere. In greeting, people will also often ask you your last name,
which is of significance here. There are only a few different last
names and people of certain last names have joking relatinoships with
others based on historical caste divisions. I am a Coulibaly, which is
historically a noble class, so pretty much everyone jokes with me. The
typical joke is to call someone a bean-eater. They love calling people
bean-eaters; it never gets old for them! 'Joking cousins' as the
relationships are called were apparently a way of historically
difusing social tensions between different castes.

Well, there is much more to say but this is just a taste of what it is
like here. I hope you are all well and I'd love to hear from you all.

Love,
Lauren