My home stay village of Missalabougou is somewhere between 200-300 people. It's about 5 kilometers off the main road, with the ride into town being quite treacherous on a bike, and is often washed out in the rain. My family there is amazing. I have a host father and only one mother, which is rare in a Muslim village. They have 12 (I think) living children, of which 7 still live in the village. They are extremely friendly and caring, cooking all my meals and helping me with language. I have one particularly nice brother, Ladji who is approximately 12. He's extremely smart and helps me learn Bambara every night after school. There are 3 other Peace Corps Trainees (PCTs) in my village, all of whom are enthusiastic, dynamic and supportive people. My teacher at the school got his degree in English in Bamako, and is an amazing help in communicating, teaching and cross-cultural adaptation. I'm getting ready to head back to Missalabougou in a few days for the last 3.5 weeks of training. I'm super excited to get out of the rigid life of training but sad to leave my host family at the same time.
I just got back from a 4 day visit to my site, and it goes a little like this: The village is approximately 75 kilometers south of Sikasso city. It's amazingly lush in the Sikasso region and rumor has it you can get pretty much any fresh food you want most times of year. This is good news for those of us in the land of To. I have a few mango trees visible from my house and am super excited for mango season, which unfortunately just ended. Other trees we have growing in the immediate vicinity of my house include papaya and banana, along with other unidentifiable fruits with interesting Bambara names, to be identified at a later date. My house is a fantastic 2 room home made of mud bricks with a tin roof. I have a separate cooking house across the yard also made of mud with a tin roof. I have an outdoor bathroom area with two rooms, one for showering, and the other for natural and sometimes not-so-natural human practices, called a nyagen. My yard is fenced in with a nice gate to keep the animals out. My village has 254 people according to a survey just completed by my language tutor. My counterpart, language tutor, and jatigi are extremely nice people and were very helpful during my visit.
The village has requested my presence to deal with a perceived water quality issue. Almost every family concession has it's own well, some covered, some uncovered. They are hoping that I can help them to install a pump. Peace Corps encourages us to integrate into the community for the first three months, and just get a feel for the way things work, so updates on my projects may not come for awhile.
As you can see things are absolutely wonderful here. I'm learning so much, and making so many friends. Technical training just started, which will continue throughout service. It includes things such as how to design and build a soak pit and well, how to make mud bricks and cement and grout mixtures. There is more to come which I'll keep you posted on!
