10/07/11
As the car begins the subtle incline into the rocky Falaise, you can look out the window from my cramped little corner seat in the back and see flat plains stretching off into the horizon. The sun is starting to set, and the high cliffs cast a dark shadow across the land below fading further in the distance. The sky’s hazy, just enough to keep out the stars, but the moon is already out, creating a tranquil twilight of the fading sun and luminescent moon. Twenty minutes or so have passed since leaving the gare in Bankass, heading for Bandiagara; a short, routine trip that never seems to yield to prediction. You can’t predict in Africa.
It took two hours of waiting for a bus to roll in from Koro. Usually there are buses in by 4, but I showed up early and left late. It pulled up next to the only ‘restaurant’ in town, conveniently located at the bus stop, and everyone piled out to eat. Kind of an early dinner, or late lunch, but they still had a ways to go before getting to Djenne, and I would be sharing their company for a short leg of the trek. The arrival of the next two vehicles shortly after attracted the girls selling cakes and boissons, as well as the garibu, begging for anything. Tubab, ca va? I stand and wait, having a brief conversation with one of the passengers headed for Djenne, a teacher traveling back for the start of school. Soon everyone piles in and we head out.
I’m not sure how many people are crammed into this delivery truck turned pedestrian, but the makeshift wooden benches are packed with people, along with any available floor space. Factor in those topside and there are easily 30 people with their luggage loading down a vehicle slightly larger than a mini- van. There are three hanging onto the ladder on the back door, a man, a boy, and a woman. They are laughing with each other as we move along and climb their way up top. The man winks at me and points to the women and laughs, following her up the ladder. The rest of the riders are a typical mix of Malian public transportation users, mainly Malians. Old men, little babies and everything in between. Conversations in several languages are occurring at once. It’s not easy to understand Malians when they’re talking to each other. I can only pick out key words and then guess the topic. As we leave Bankass, I put in my headphones and gaze out over Africa.
As our vehicle slowly climbs its way towards the top of the cliff, you look and see the vastness of the world reaching up to the darkening sky. It isn’t a breathtaking landscape portrait, but looks more instead like the vast stretches of land down a Texas highway. Suddenly I’m not so sure it isn’t. The road curves and from the corner of the window a man appears, walking along in the same direction uphill. His clothes are dirty and he’s wearing a locally made beanie with some obscure year sewed large print into the cloth and a crudely made hoe is draped over his shoulder. Not too far ahead his dog is leading the way. It’s at first glance surprising to see someone walking along the road so far from anything, but soon a herd of goats guided by their Fulani herdsman is passed, and then a donkey cart driven by two Dogon boys wearing their funny looking hats. They’re all heading the same direction towards to setting sun at the top of the plateau. That puts an end to the daydream and I wake up again in Africa.
There’s not too much traffic, except for a few motos passing by in the opposite direction. Down below, a pair of headlights appears to be taking a winding path along the darkness of the plains and into the foothills. A short while goes by without much occurrence as the glow from the lights behind grows larger. The other truck pulls up and you can see that it’s completely full. There’s a kid riding on top of the luggage, and as they approach to pass he sits up on his knees and spreads his arms out wide. They are caught up with soon enough, and the car comes to a stop behind the other along the side of the road. An be jigin ka seli. It’s 18:15, and time for prayer. Everyone bails out with their mats and I take a seat. Others use the opportunity to visit the bushes. An ka taa. Ten minutes later we’re off again. The sun disappears and it becomes another night in Africa.
After about 15 minutes I look up and see an orange glow in the direction we’re heading. It’s obviously a fire, most likely burning trash. But the light grows, and you can see the fire is a lot farther off than it appears and a lot bigger. We stop short of Bandiagara, behind a line of cars and motos which have pulled up to the end of the bridge crossing into town. The fire’s on the road, and there’s a large group of people gathered who’ve abandoned their cars to watch. A kera chogodi? I cross over the bridge on foot, and ask what’s going on, but it’s plainly seen that a gas truck ignited. I can’t take the road into town, but I cross the bridge and make my way down the steep embankment on the other side. I slip and bite it hard. There’s a back way to the house, and I stumble my way there. The power is out, but it makes it easier to watch the fire over the treetops from the roof. I can hear the dull roar of a crowd coming from the direction of the fire. Mixed in are the usual sounds of braying donkeys and crying goats. It sounds like Africa.
Since then, the power’s come back, and I’ve been able to write this short story of the trip I took today. Four of my fellow volunteers are here for the weekend and they’ve filled me in on what happened. Apparently, hot coals lit by some tea drinkers ignited the fuel tanker as it was unloading at the service station. The driver saw it catch, jumped in the truck and took off away from the station, almost making it to the bridge before the whole thing went up. I’m told no one’s hurt. They had to call in a spill crew from Mopti over an hour away to come clean it up.
I’ve become used to the unpredictability of African life. The most mundane tasks, like shopping or a short trip into town can turn into an adventure. The only thing you have control of here is how you respond to the situation. Sometimes it can really test your strength of will. I’ll admit I do daydream of home at times, but despite my occasional feelings of homesickness I feel like there’s a lot more I can learn out here. Time’s going by fast and everything’s slowly changing. You can’t help but to see the world from the African perspective. Coming out here has given me a chance to step back and look at life from a different angle. Instead of everything coming right at me, I feel like I’m watching from the side as my life passes in front of me. Back home, I was only concerned with what needs to be done next, but it’s not the same here. Life’s much more indirect and disorderly. It just happens. Sometimes I wonder what I would be doing if I had stayed home. My life up to now had been designed for a specific outcome. After coming here I’ve realized all the limitless possibilities that exist. There’s so much more to life than what happens next.
Work at site is like that. I don’t exactly have a job, but I do little things around town when the opportunity arises. With the CSCOM I’ve been doing porridge demonstrations. There’s another NGO called Marie Stopes that is working there as well. The rep comes in on vaccination days and talks to the women about family planning and birth control. It’s a difficult topic in a Muslim country since the Koran prohibits contraceptives, but it is completely necessary when you can’t afford to feed your other 12 children. The only way to decrease the child mortality rate here is to decrease the birth rate. My morenga garden was attacked by sheep. They ate everything, but hopefully it will all grow back. The women at the CSCOM water them for me every morning. We spent a couple days pulling up all the weeds and grass that has grown up to keep the sheep out, but to no avail.
The funding for my well covering project finally came in after three months of waiting around. I’ve ordered the covers but they won’t be ready for a few weeks. The next step is to pull up all the wood from the two wells that we want to renovate. Then hire a mason to come construct them. No one’s in a rush to get things done quickly, which is nice because I can take my time with it. There’s no deadline.
Last weekend we had another polio vaccination campaign. I went out into the bush on Thursday morning after getting the wells measured for their covers. That day it rained. I remember because it’s the second time since I’ve been here that I’ve woken up to rain outside. It made the trek out to the villages easier. It’s scary riding on a moto through deep sand and is easy to wipe out. You have to go really fast to make it through. Wet sand is easier, but there is the occasional puddle to avoid. We spent the rest of the morning and early afternoon walking through two small villages vaccinating kids. It’s tiring work. We ate lunch in the first village and headed over to the second. All in all we probably saw around 350 kids in these two villages, but I wouldn’t doubt if there were less than 60 adults. These villages are completely different from Bankass. They’re only 10km away but life is so much harder. Village life is filthy. Kids are covered in dirt and other stuff that looks like dirt. When I got back home that evening I was sick and threw up, just from spending the day in village. It’s hard to believe that these people live the same exact way they did centuries ago. The only improvements to village life has been the introduction of cell phones, which don’t get signal, and motos, although most people still walk or take a donkey cart to market.
Bankass played a basketball game against Bandiagara last week as well. I’ve been playing the last couple months and am officially part of the unofficial team. We didn’t win but it was a really good game. The final score was 50- 46. Since then we’ve been trying to make our team the official Bankass club, but we keep getting turned down. It’s all a matter of money; the city doesn’t want to sponsor us, so they keep coming up with excuses for why we can’t be an official team. They claim we need a board of individuals to run the team, which we found, and then we needed a copy of statutes and regulations, which we’ve made. I don’t see how we can get turned down again. We have a lot of support from the people so I have a good feeling. Basketball is my daily exercise and helps me unwind at the end of the day. If we become official we’ll be able to travel all over the country playing.
That’s about the gist of it. I’ve got more things planned for the future that should be fun. Check back for more later.
Missing everyone!
Andrew
