A Christmas to Remember...

MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!!!

I hope that everyone had a wonderful Christmas! I probably had the most unique Christmas of my life. I'll start from the beginning...

My friend Christy had invited all us volunteers to her village, Kamona, for Christmas. Kamona is primarily a Christian village -- rare in Mali, since only 1 percent of the population is Christian. So 9 of us decided to meet up with Christy in the town of Bla and bike the 8 kilometers to her village. Although most people put their bikes on a bus and rode up to Bla from their various sites, Emily, Yuri and I thought it would be a great opportunity to go on a bike trip. So we decided to bike from Segou to Kamona via Emily's village, Samane.

We began the trip at 7 am on December 23rd. Our backpacks secured tightly to the backs of our bikes, we traveled across Segou and turned off the paved road. I was excited to finally get away from the city and spend some quality time "en brousse." The sun was rising fast, but it was cloudy, so the heat wasn't too bad (I actually began the trip wearing a long-sleeved shirt layered over my tshirt). Unfortunately, though, the Harmattan wind was blowing really strong, and directly into us. Mix this with biking through sand, and you feel like you're on a stationary bike! It was taking twice as long to get to Emily's site as it should have.

We had expected to bike the 45 kilometers to Emily's village in three hours. Instead, it took us five. We finally rolled into Emily's village around noon. We were covered in red dirt/sand and completely exhausted. After taking bucket baths, we all crashed on the floor for a much-needed nap. After we re-energized, Emily took us around her village to greet her friends. I LOVED her village. It was beautiful (surrounded by big trees), and everyone was super friendly. We ate dinner with her host family, and got her host dad laughing up a storm when we told him that Americans wish on shooting stars (Malians don't look at them...they are kinda afraid of them. He told us that a "shooting star" was a star breaking up and moving around, but later they find each other and go back into form).

We woke up around 7 am on day two, planning to meet up with everyone else (i.e., those who decided to take public transport) by noon for lunch. We biked about 7k to the Bani river (luckily, the road was rock, not sand), and then found a villager to take us accross it. It was a beautiful, peaceful way to start out the second day. I remember thinking, "I could do this all day, as long as the trails stay like this."

(before crossing the Bani river)

(in the boat)

Unfortunately, the trail didn't stay that nice. It quickly turned into a sandy road with gravel and deep sand patches. There was one big hill (probably the only hill in the Segou region -- otherwise, this area's completely flat), and there was absolutely no shade on the road as we made our way toward Bla. We passed only a couple villages. We realized that, although we were biking as fast as possible and using all our strength to keep going, we were only averaging about 12k per hour. We stopped to rest at a village around 10 am, and found out from the villagers that Bla was still about 35k away. Sadly, we decided to give up and jump on public transport to take us the rest of the way, because we knew we'd never make it there by noon to meet up with our friends.

When we asked the villagers about transport coming through, they told us that nothing would pass by until that evening! So we were stuck biking the rest of the way. We replenished our water supply and headed out of that village, hoping by some miracle we'd get to Bla by noon.

(The long road ahead)

After that village, the road got sandier and the sun got hotter (no clouds this time). I was mentally thanking the inventers of the CamelBak as I sipped on water to wash down the sand being blown in my mouth. Pretty soon, we began talking about the town of Bla like it was the Promise Land: "In Bla, we can get cold Fantas!" "In Bla, we can sit in a chair in the shade!" "In Bla, there are even a couple of paved roads!"

(Taking a break in the shade of a tree)

We pushed onward, and eventually we ran into a main gravel road! We could hardly contain our excitement. From there on, we almost doubled our speed and cruised our way into Bla. We showed up around 1:30 pm. We missed out on meeting everyone, but we had made it! We had a big lunch of rice and peanut sauce, cold water and cold Fantas. And we sat in chairs in the shade!

We finally biked the remaining eight sandy kilometers to Kamona, Christy's village. We met up with the rest of the group, and spent the night singing Christmas carols around a lantern and eating pork (her village killed a pig for us). It was wonderful! Christy's church also asked us to sing a few American Christmas songs in church the next morning, so we chose songs and practiced the night before.

Christmas morning, we woke up, cooked french toast, and then got dressed in our Malian finest and went to church. There was a lot of singing and a very enthusiastic minister preaching in French. A few different groups performed (some women, a group of kids, and a West African evangelical group visiting Kamona) before they asked us to come up and sing. All the African groups got up and clapped and danced around while singing. Then we got up, organized ourselves into two choir-like rows, and sang "O Come All Ye Faithful," "The First Noel," and "Joy to the World." The Malians just stared. It was definitely different than what they consider to be normal! But they applauded after Joy to the World, and I think they got a kick out of our performance.

(The group before going to church...clockwise from top: Emily, Louie, Meg, Kyle, Christy, Greg, Mary Virginia, Christy's host dad, Michelle, me, Yuri)

After church (which lasted three hours), we opened gifts. We did a "white elephant" exchange. It was really fun. I ended up with a Mali soccer jersey and matching sweatband/wristbands. That evening, we made a fire and roasted marshmallows (courtesy of Christy's care package from her parents). Some Malians joined us (as well as the evangelist group) and we sat around and drank tea and talked. I stayed up till 11 pm, and then was able to call my family back home to wish them all Merry Christmas.

(hanging out around the fire)

I'm glad I got to spend Christmas in a village, and now that it's over, I'm glad I biked from Segou to Kamona. Although we did take public transport on the way home!!

Life Updates

Wow! What a crazy couple months it's been. I'm sorry that I haven't updated my blog recently...I've been incredibly busy. Never thought I'd say that during Peace Corps, but it's true. In the past month, I've celebrated Thanksgiving and Tabaski, I've moved houses (across town...my new house is on the banks of the Niger river -- pretty sweet! I'll post pics once I can transfer my photos off my camera and make room for more), and I've FINISHED -- that's right, finished -- my applications for grad school!

It's quite a relief to be done with the process. Between traveling to Ghana to take the GMAT and calling my parents in Seattle to help me with getting transcripts, It's been a long and tedious process. But it went much smoother than I expected, so I'm grateful that it all came together with plenty of time left before the deadlines. And now I can relax for Christmas and New Years! Well, here's a photo recap of my past month:

(Thanksgiving at Steffen's house. It was pretty small this year, because it was right before Danielle was leaving to go back to Florida -- just Dana, Arnim, Steffen, Yuri, Danielle and me)

(Yuri, Danielle and Steffen on Danielle's last night in Segou. We went out to the Segou Night Club. I miss her already! I won't see her until her and Steffen's wedding next December.) (Steffen's dad came to visit from Germany, so we all went to Kalabougou, the potter village down river from Segou. As we were coming there, we passed some of the villagers taking their finished pots to Segou to sell at market.)

(The kids in Kalabougou LOVED Steffen. He's probably the strongest Toubab they've ever seen. After he lifted up every kid, he lifted ME off the ground in the same way. The kids were astounded!)

(Yesterday was the Feast of Tabaski -- the holiday where everyone sacrifices and then eats tons of sheep. Mme. Koumare and I were eating at her house...we'd just finished our second round of lamb and were washing all the meat down with some watermelon. Somehow, we both managed to coordinate our outfits without knowing beforehand. I think we're spending too much time together!)

Well, that's about it for now. I want to wish everyone a very MERRY CHRISTMAS and a Happy New Year. I can't believe I'll be celebrating Christmas next year back in Seattle. How exciting!