Just need a few of you to help out

In a couple of weeks the Bogolan Association will be going to Segou to participate in a week long training that Segou bogolan artist are gracously offering for free to help out their fellow Malians. Since my National Counterpart Koro who helped me intergrate into the community and has been a major help on all my projects here is a Bogolan artist my next few projects will be focused on helping the Bogolan Association of Koutiala.

Before we begin this next phase the bogolan artists are in great need of new equipment and supplies. Thier main work table top is roating, the other tables are ready to fall apart and if they repair any of thier stenciles one more time the quality of their work will not be exportable.

I would like to ask some of you to go to http://www.peacecorps.gov/ click on "Donate Now" in left menu and search for Mali. I am asking for $138 for supplies for the bogolan artists. It is not much but will mean so much to the people I work with.

Thank all of you who have helped get me to where I am today I could not do my service without all the support of my friends and family back home.

Ghana and Beyond

Months ago I suggested to Koro that we go to Abidjan, Cote d'Ivoire to visit her family and then I would go on to Accra, Ghana to meet Lani to travel around. This would have been the perfect way to go. Koro wanted to stay in Koutiala for the feast at the end of Ramadan so we left two days later which meant Koro came to Ghana with me and I couldn't meet Lani at the airport, this made me nervous.

As we approached the boarder of Burkina Faso I called another volunteer who was heading down to Ghana where we had made plans to meet at a hotel. She only agreed to meet Lani if things went
well when she arrived in Accra. At least she didn't say no right off.

Koro and I spent the night in a bus station in Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso. In the morning we took off for Ghana. When the Ghanaian boarder was within an hour the thought crossed my mind that Koro had never been in a country with different currency. You see many West African countries including Benin, Burkina Faso, Cote d'Ivoire, Togo, Senegal, Niger, Guinea-Bissau use the West African CFA Franc. This startled Koro's new experiences.

In Ghana the national language is English, I am not sure how many local languages there are. Not many people speak good English so the language even challenged me. For Koro this meant that she didn't have people to talk to and my French is not that good. Even finding food in Ghana that Koro would eat became a challenge. Malians are not an adventurous people when it comes to breaking out of routine. Malian routines are like their rituals that haven't changed in decades, in centuries particularly at the village level.

My friend did meet Lani at the airport. Koro and I arrived in Accra about 4 am sleeping on the bus until taxis started their day on the streets. Arriving at the hotel Emily and Lani had got acquainted and a good nights sleep. Lani, Emily and I decided to go out to eat and Koro stayed at the hotel to get some sleep. This hotel was too expensive so Koro, Lani and I moved to the Salavation Army and Emily stayed with a friend.

The next morning Lani and I took Koro to a bus station to get her on a bus for Cote d'Ivoire but the bus only leaves Monday, Wednesday and Friday at 4:30 am this was Saturday. We ran with the flow and headed to Cape Coast. Koro didn't seem very happy about all this and even got a little cranky she wanted to stay in Accra.

Cape Coast lies on the Ghana shoreline with a rich history during the time of slave trading. Walking around we found some bogolan in one of the artisan stands. I introduced Koro as a bogolan artist from Mali and asked the guy if he was interested in buying some. He said come back later in the day. We also found a fair trade retail store where all three of us bought some kind of a bag made from plastic water bags. The store even had some shea soap that I pointed out to Koro.

Later that day Lani went for a walk and Koro and I went to try and sell some Bogolan. When got there the guy said that he lent his money to a friend because the fish catch for the day was good so everyone in town bought fish. He said he would go and get his friend who might be interested in buying the bogolan. His friend showed with dreads and speaking both bambara and french, he is from Burkina Faso. Koro and I went over to his store. He makes musical instruments. We sat and visited in the usual Malian fashion.

Koro negotiated price and talked about home. The guy has lived in Mali, Burkina Faso, Cote d'Ivoire, Senegal and now Ghana.

After Cape Coast Koro went to Cote d'Voir and Lani and I continued on to Kumasi, Hohao, and up to my friend Rhoda's village in the Volta region of Ghana. This region is situated on the Togo boarder and during rainy season which is when we were there is green lush cool with water falls and hilly terrain. We hiked, Lani cooked us great meals and we visited with Rhoda and her site mate Leanne for a whole weekend.

What a great visit with Rhoda. It was hard to leave and head back to the big city of Accra where we had business to attend to and arrange the bus transportation to Cote d'Ivoir. We have figured out public transport in Accra so taking taxis is at a minimum. The bus for Abidjan leaves at 4 am, we report to the station at 3:30 am. As usual the bus left at 5 am. The ticket price was 1.000 cfa for the bus and 8.000 cfa for the boarder crossing bribes and as we found out there is a person at the boarder that does nothing but gets us trough the board. This frontier was the most guarded so far. The way we breezed through in three hours I would say the bribing worked.

In Abidjan we did nothing but visit with Koro's family. They are the greatest people. We were fed good, they took us around to artisan places, and when we left we got a ride in a truck and several of the women Lani's age took a taxi to the bus station to see us off. This was a great
brake from the heat and hardships of Mali.

The elders of the family. Lani and I estimated that about thirty family members lived in the household and there was a serious of three household where we were and more accross the street. Koro's family just goes on and on. We even went to Yamoussoukro to visit Koro's sister for a night.

Dancing at Weddings

Many have asked what some of my favorite things here in Mali are. Here is my doing my favorite thing Dancing with women at weddings.

Celebrating the Literacy Formation

The participants showed their enthusiasm by coming to class regularly and on time and did good work. And let me tell you for a Malian to come on time is a big deal.

So when they wanted to send out invitations for the closing celebration to the Prefet (county executive) and the Mayor as well as many other community leaders I did not hesitate to use some of the left over money to help make the closing celebration a big one.

For me this meant that I had to participate more then I have in the past. This last year at all public events I have been asked to say a couple of words. I usually answer “Non Merci.” Language has been my biggest struggle in my Peace Corps Service. But since I knew all the officials in Koutiala were coming my language tutor Sadio helped prepare and practice a speech. Here is what I said.

Monsieur le Préfet de Koutiala,

Monsieur le Maire de Koutiala,

Mesdames et Messiers. Bonjour

C’etait un grand plaisir pour moi d’être parmis les organisateurs de

Cette formation.

L’alphabéisation ouvre de nouvelles opportunités.

Je voudrais remercier l’Union, la chamber des métiers et le

RAC pour tout leur travail. Merci.

Not much but saying a couple of words made everyone there so happy it was well worth it and will be easier next time.

The celebration gave back to me so much of what I have given in the last year. There are little things on a daily basis but this with so people that had been touched overwhelmed me. I held back the tears, Malians don’t cry in public and they sure would not understand tears of joy.

The participants in the literacy class would not be considered the poor in Mali, many have moto’s most have cell phones but they could not read, write or do math and they sure didn’t know French. Making money in Mali obviously does not depend solely on knowing how to read and write. This made me think of the times this last year when someone in the market didn’t give me the right change. At the time I thought I misunderstood the price that we had negotiated but after this class I am not sure that merchants in the market know who to give change out.

As we say in Mali things happen dunnie dunnie.

The Diary of a Sewing Machine

From the first day of seeing the peddled sewing machines here in Mali I wanted to get my hands on one and sew away. At home sewing is relaxing, an escape, a way to create. In Mali with the fabrics there seemed like so much potential to create. Then there were the irons that heated up with charcoal the vision that came to mind wuth the possibility of using one of these was medieval times, a time with different sources for the creative energy. Yes I am a dreamer.

Every volunteer here in Mali tells a story of a tailor botching a sewing job. Its not that their bad tailors it just that volunteers try new and foreign designs out on them and it really isn’t something they have been trained for. Another volunteer bought a sewing machine; it cost 30,000 about $60. That’s a lot of money for a volunteer. I did my blotched tailor jobs over with hand stitching.

Going to America gave me the opportunity to bring back some purse patterns. One of my objectives for the Bogolan Association has been to help with product development. The day I arrived in Koutiala I showed Koro the patterns and told her I wanted a sewing machine to make purses out of Bogolan. She said she would see what she could do.

The next day Koro talked to the President of the UAAK and told him what I wanted to do. He seemed to think it would be no problem but Koro still had follow Malian protocol. She talked to the President of the Chamber des Metiers too. Then she talked to the president of the Sewing Association Ami.

Ami (on the right) has been around since my first day and we are joking cousins. Joking cousins is a cultural way of getting to know someone and sharing your heritage. You can also call on joking cousins to resolve a dispute. Always good to have some around, they will usually help you in any way possible.

The Women’s Association came next in the change of protocol. Luckily Ami and her best friend Jenibob are actively in leadership with the association so no problem there.

Last but not least we attended a Sewing Association meeting. The meeting was the first association meeting I even knew about, for a year I have been wanting to attend more meetings. Not that I understand everything that is going on but they would give me a feel for the organizational structure. I guess going through the protocol to get this sewing machine has given me an idea of the organizational structure which just goes to show the sewing machine idea will full many objectives some have yet to be revealed.

Right after the meeting Koro, me and a member of the Sewing Association hired a push cart and went and got the sewing machine.

Mali protest against women's law

Fresh off the press from BBC News

Tens of thousands of people in Mali's capital, Bamako, have been protesting against a new law which gives women equal rights in marriage.

The law, passed earlier this month, also strengthens inheritance rights for women and children born out of wedlock.

The head of a Muslim women's association says only a minority of Malian women - "the intellectuals" as she put it - supports the law.

Several other protests have taken place in other parts of the country.

The law was adopted by the Malian parliament at the beginning of August, and has yet to be signed into force by the president.

One of the most contentious issues in the new legislation is that women are no longer required to obey their husbands.

Hadja Sapiato Dembele of the National Union of Muslim Women's Associations said the law goes against Islamic principles.

"We have to stick to the Koran," Ms Dembele told the BBC's Focus on Africa programme. "A man must protect his wife, a wife must obey her husband."

"It's a tiny minority of women here that wants this new law - the intellectuals. The poor and illiterate women of this country - the real Muslims - are against it," she added.

Literacy in Mali, Or Not.......

My dream is that someday everyone can at least write their name and do simple math.
Most of the artisans here in Koutiala can’t write their own name. When the Union of Associations of Artisans of Koutiala (UAAK) has a meeting and the sign up sheet goes around some one who can write follows it around to write the names of the people who can’t.

The Peace Corps initiated the Shea Butter formation I organized last April because USAID offered a free trainer. USAID selects several initiatives, Sea being one of them. The Peace Corps in partnership with USAID trains the Small Enterprise Development and Environment sectors in processing Shea.

Even though the Sha training was a huge success I didn’t feel that it was a priority of the people I work with. The literacy formation however was a grassroots idea. The UAAK wrote the proposal including the budget. They even had a trainer who was available and well qualified. Koro (if you don’t know by now is my homologue and best friend here in Mali) and I agree that doing a literacy formation annually would be a great idea.

Figuring out what to do has not always easy. The first three months I fretted over how, what and who should I focus on in my service. When Macki my APCD came to site he helped by saying that I didn’t need to work with everyone and could focus on the Bogolan Association if that is what I wanted to do. During all this time weighing what I think “They” need and what they think they need was a challenge. With this literacy training I feel like I have reached out to all the people I came here to help.

In the literacy classes they are learning to read and write in Bamabara the local language as well as doing basic math. Two thirds of the class are women.

West Africa has a huge illiteracy population. It is even a bigger problem among women. In Burkina Faso, Mali and Niger still fewer than three in ten young women aged 15 to 24 can read and write. Not one of the nine countries here in West Africa with literacy rates below 50% in 2000-
2006 is expected to reach 50% literacy by 2015.

Mali the stats for total literacy rate among adults ages 15-49 is 23%; Male literacy rate 31%; Female literacy rate 16%;

Peace Corps Mali has stepped up their Education sector this year with 15 new volunteers. In my stage there were only six. When all us volunteers no matter what our sector do something about illiteracy here in Mali my dream may come true.