The Virtues of the Covered Porch

The incessant buzz of the cicadas in the midday heat, like oil frying in the pan, reminds us to jump out of the ‘fire’ to the cover of the porch. (Did you know that they buzz at 85 decibels? That is as intense as the sound of traffic in midtown Manhattan!)

It is one thing to escape entirely into the comfort of an air-conditioned home, but it is another to do as people have done for centuries: enjoy (tolerate?) the heat in the shade. We have a lovely back porch which provides shade at all times of the day. This I enjoy in a great many ways:

The sound of the bamboo wind chimes as the warm wind blows

Chalk alphabet by Zachary, some letters still backwards, but not skipping one

Creating landscapes full of thatched roof homes, bright flowers, and snakes

Cocktails with Mark

Dinner in the warmth of the evening

Reading while, legs only, are tanning in the sun

Listening to the amazing range of birdsongs, watching them flit through the trees

Playing in the new sand box

Zachary ‘being’ the “bread guy” delivering to all who will play along

A cardboard house weathered to distortion but nonetheless entertaining

Watching folks walk slowly past, muscles drained by the heat, skin shining

The rain pounding all around but not on us

Laughing, tickling

Mark the DJ keeping us in melody

Dancing along

I love our covered porch

I will miss it terribly but I will have (perhaps even build) another someday.

CSN

Life Goes On

May 7, 2007

Nothing much has changed here. It’s the same old place with the same old faces. I always come back with high expectations, but they never seem to measure up to the truth.

The truth is that there is nothing to talk about here. Everyone does the same thing every day; they get up, go to work, come home, go to the club, and go to bed. Occasionally folks will head out to the river or Kayes or somewhere similar, but in the end there is still not a lot to talk about. It’s only idle chatter and small talk. That gets really old after a while.

We did go to a great party on Saturday night, though. Ellen organized a hobo party at the club. We dressed in wife beaters covered with mud and I carried a bindle. Carrie wore a tiny little skirt and carried a basket of junk. We ended up winning second prize; a bucket full of soap, toothpaste, and laundry detergent. At the end of the evening we all jumped into the swimming pool.

That’s it for excitement here. There really isn’t a lot to do. This is especially so now that our car is in the shop. We dropped it off there before we left at the end of March and it’s still there. Apparently there is an issue with parts. I hope they get it running soon as it is the only way we have of getting out of our village at all.

So we sit and count the days. In exactly sixty-three days we will be on a plane bound for Bamako; that beautiful cesspool of poverty. Hopefully we will get some vacation time before heading back to the states to pack our stuff and move to Venezuela.

Right now we are having issues with our paper work. It seems that we didn’t follow the proper steps to get the visas necessary to work in Venezuela. The consulate sent back all fourteen documents and their translations because they don’t recognize the County Clerk’s notary as legal. In the meantime, our new school is breathing down our necks to get it done. It is very difficult to convince them that we cannot do anything from here. We don’t have access to a fax machine, a notary public, or Spanish translators. It sounds like the worst case scenario is that they will get us a tourist visa until the paper work goes through and then they will have to send us to Aruba for the final pickup (wah).

Nothing to do but sit and sweat, or sleep and sweat, or walk around and sweat, any way you look at it, the outcome is the same; sixty-three sweaty days until we leave here for good…
MJR

Remember the Alamo

April 30, 2007

Back in Bamako, it’s both a relief and a bummer.

We spent the entirety of last week with my brother and his family in Texas. We had a really good time. He lives in Austin, but we also spent some time in San Antonio. We arrived in Austin late Thursday night and headed out for San Antonio the next afternoon.

We went primarily to watch my nieces compete in a dance competition. That was awesome. Although the eldest has done this sort of thing for several years, I have never been fortunate enough to bear witness to it. It was amazing! She danced in many different categories, taking home gold after gold. I was quite impressed.

In between acts we wandered out to the city, enjoying the Alamo and the river walk. I came to remember that San Antonio is really a beautiful place. It’s well planned and well kept. Although many of the sidewalks are in poor shape, the overall condition of the place is excellent. We had a blast.
Back in Austin we were invited to come speak to my niece’s high school geography class. That was fun. We put together about 150 pictures of Mali and showed them to three different classes, discussing different aspects of Malian life. It was really good for me to do as it gave me an idea about pictures I still need to take. The kids seemed genuinely interested and asked some excellent questions.

Other than that, our time in Austin was spent lounging, eating Bar-B-Q, and shopping. We packed our stuff, stealing one case from my brother, and flew out last Thursday morning.

It took four hours to get to New York where we had a six hour lay over. We had one last morsel of fast food (at airport prices) and rode the air train around in circles a few times before boarding our plane. Once on board, we sat for two hours before actually taking off. We landed in Casablanca the following morning, staring at a fourteen hour layover.

Fortunately, Carrie is a practiced eavesdropper. She overheard a fellow passenger mention that he was continuing on to Bamako and that he was looking forward to the hotel the airline put us up in. We asked around and sure enough, Royal Air Maroc put us in a hotel for the day and gave us meal vouchers for our time there. We got some much needed rest, spent some time at the market in downtown Casablanca, and had a nice shower before heading off on the final leg of our journey.

So here we are; back in Bamako. I am struck by the poverty and the stench of open sewers. I listen to the teachers here tell me of the opulence of the embassies. I remind myself that I am heading back to an environmental disaster in the midst of some hard core racism and I thank the Powers That Be that we are moving away from here soon.

Downtown Bamako

That's the sewer in that hole!

MJR