I finally found a place where I can get away and read a book, listen to music or just sit in blessed solitude. It's right behind a school, it has mango trees, yellow butterflies no snakes, overlooks a tiny canyon which has a tinyer waterfall and I'm claiming it as my sanctuary. I wish that it was on my biking path, a little further from town, but, I'm just happy that I found it!
In America, I grew up having "my own." My own room, my own toys, my own books, my own clothes, my own food, Americans love ownership. However, in Mali, everything is shared. There's no private space and the only time people stay inside is when they're sleeping, but even then, people prefer to sleep outside because it's so hot. The fact that I like and need to be alone sometimes is way over their heads.
On that note, today I walked home from school with one of my sisters and she asked me about what I do alone in my room. From an earlier conversation with my site buddy, she told me that Malians have a great fear of being alone. One day, she asked some of her students to write down some of their greatest fears, and all of them had written, solitude! What kind of place am I in?! I looooooove my alone time. I spend most of my alone time reading books or playing guitar. I've been reading a lot of Vince Flynn lately, but soon I'll be starting "The Alchemist" and "The Curious Incident of The Dog In The Night-Time." I asked her if she reads any books. She said that she reads her math and science books. I then specified and asked if she reads any books for fun and I totally lost her. She had no idea what I was talking about.
Later, I asked my 15 year old brother, Jakari, who's in the 10th grade, if he likes to read. He said yes and I asked if he had any books that he reads for fun. He said that he does and I asked him how many and he said, one. I asked him if I could see it and he went to his room to get it. What he came back with was a something like a mix between a comic book and Time Magazine for Kids. It had a story about caving, some information about caves, a game section and a comic strip. He handed it to me and I almost felt like crying. It's terribly saddening to not see any books around. There are no books to help expand these minds. By the time I was in 10th grade, I had read hundreds of books! And I think about all the reading programs I had back in grade school, where I would read as many books as I could and then I was tested on the books by my teachers and I'd get a prize. Reading was rewarding! Apparently, my town has a literacy center, but I think it needs to be revamped, so we can get these kids (and adults) reading!
Announcement: If anyone has any children's and/or adult books in French or know of anyone who might have some, please contact me by phone: (223)70007675 or email: jway1986@gmail.com or just send them to: Jade Way PCV, Peace Corps Mali, B.P. 85 Bamako, Mali, West Africa.
Friday, October 29, 2010
Friday, October 22, 2010
More Drama/I hate living with so many women!
I swear, every time I do my laundry something always goes down! THIS time, I did my laundry completely by myself and I was actually sort of enjoying it, because there were no commentators around to judge my performance. So, I had everything set up, things were going fine, I was almost finished and then, my sassy sister came back from the market and told me that my rinsing water was getting dirty. Well of course it was because I was doing two loads, but I didn't want to draw more well water. I was tired, so I said "Je m'en fiche." I only had two more items to wash and they were my clothes, so I just wanted to finish with what I had. But, she kept saying my water was dirty and this was bad and I just said that I didn't mind. However, I soon found out that "Je m'en fiche," were fighting words! She was really upset that I said that I didn't care, so I went over and I explained that I didn't mean to upset her, but in English, "Je m'en fiche," is not a serious offense. Luckily, my site buddy came to visit and I could escape the fire and go out for cold sodas, wosso and vent heavily in English.
Music
The music in Mali is pretty homogeneous, and for those who know me, I like a little bit of everything. I'm finding that all of the music has the same sound. The same instruments are used, the chords that are used are all pretty similar and the singing can be pretty awful. There's just not a lot of variety. There are no slow songs, no sad songs, maybe this ties back to "showing too many emotions is a bad thing". However, there are so many different ethnic groups in Mali, that I question the lack of diversity. There are the Bambaras, Fulanis, Dogons, Malinkes, Tamashecks, Toureqs and I can't think of any more at the moment, but there are a lot. Maybe, once I'm allowed to travel, I'll find some different sounds.
The other day, I brought my speakers outside and shared some of the music I listen to. I have a pretty eclectic collection from various decades, with every sound, every genre and every mood in many different languages, but not Bambara. My family was quick to say that they didn't like some of the songs, but I caught them nodding their heads and trying to hum along with some of the tunes. Although they liked some of the music, they asked me if I had any Malian songs. I said no, and they wondered why, because they have American songs. I told them that they are no Malian songs played on the radio in America, and their faces looked kind of hurt.
Then, my sister randomly told me that she learned about America in her geography class. I didn't even know where Mali was until 4 months ago, and it only rung a bell when I found out that it used to be named, Sudan. But, even after realizing that, I did not have bounds of information on the country. Malians don't know that the rest of the world doesn't know them. As stupid as this sounds, sometimes, I look up as an airplane crosses the sky and I wonder if they know that they're over Mali.
The other day, I brought my speakers outside and shared some of the music I listen to. I have a pretty eclectic collection from various decades, with every sound, every genre and every mood in many different languages, but not Bambara. My family was quick to say that they didn't like some of the songs, but I caught them nodding their heads and trying to hum along with some of the tunes. Although they liked some of the music, they asked me if I had any Malian songs. I said no, and they wondered why, because they have American songs. I told them that they are no Malian songs played on the radio in America, and their faces looked kind of hurt.
Then, my sister randomly told me that she learned about America in her geography class. I didn't even know where Mali was until 4 months ago, and it only rung a bell when I found out that it used to be named, Sudan. But, even after realizing that, I did not have bounds of information on the country. Malians don't know that the rest of the world doesn't know them. As stupid as this sounds, sometimes, I look up as an airplane crosses the sky and I wonder if they know that they're over Mali.
Malian-Birthday
Today's my birthday and the first birthday that I will celebrate in Mali! Malian's don't celebrate birthdays, so I wasn't expecting much in village. I also came down with a head cold, but my friend, Dani, came to spend the day with me! We made the most of my Malian-birthday and we headed to the city, where we bargained for jewelry at the Artisan's Market, ate fried chicken and ice cream for lunch and then we headed to the bureau to pick up my packages! However, when we arrived at the bureau, there were no new deliveries! On the ledger, it stated that the last date packages were delivered were on September 30th. I was devastated but, then I asked around and found out that packages were being delivered today, on my birthday of course! Later, we headed back to my village where we watched the most recent episodes of Glee. I'm so glad that I didn't have to spend my birthday alone in village!
The Week of October 10th
So much has happened over this paast week. After a week of language training, I came back to village refreshed, a little more confident and I finally had official work to do! Unfortunately, I missed the first week of school, but it looked like I didn't miss much. I visited a private school for grades 1-9, and three-schools-in-one, which is composed of one elementary school and two middle schools. The school structure is very confusing to me and there are three other schools I have yet to visit, so I'll probably get more confused. I'm going to try to explain what I've observed so far:
The Private School: There are two directors (principals) and one vice prinicpal, 23 teachers, 16 other staff members, 856 students, 18 classrooms (6 classes for middle school, 12 classes for elementary), sports field, extra-curricular building, cafeteria, girls and boys bathrooms. It was built in 1997 by an NGO and they pay the teacher's salaries.
-Structure/Layout: The school is placed off the main road. There are no homes built next to it. The school is an open-structure and classrooms are made of concrete with a teacher's desk, student desks, a chalkboard, a cupboard with supplies and four windows. There are 6 buildings where classes are held and the buildings are spaced so that there's not a lot of noise carried between classrooms.
-Random Observations: The students are very respectful of the teachers/staff. The students are eager to participate and they are surprisingly quiet for average class sizes of 60+. I sat in on a 7th grade math lesson, where the students were learning number placement. I was learning geometry and trigonometry in the 7th grade. All classes were taught in French. Teachers are allowed to refer to Allah in their lessons. The vice-principal walks the grounds and makes sure students don't wander the grounds.
-Problems: Malians don't seem to know that cell phones can be put on silent, so of course the teacher's phones interrupted the class when it rang. There are no substitute teachers. There are not enough text books. Not enough classrooms. Not enough teachers. The Physical Sciences need money to buy matierals to show physical examples. There's a library, but there are no pleasure-reading books. Homework???
The Public School: There are four directors; three for the middle school and one for the elementary school. There are no extra staff memebers. At least 800 students. No cafeteria. There was a library, but it is now used as a classroom. No sports field. No extra-curricular activities.
-Structure/Layout: The school is located right on the main road, houses are located right next door, classrooms are very close to each other, sound carries very easily through the hollow concrete rooms.
-Problems: No text books, not enough supplies, it's difficult to hear the teacher, not enough classrooms, not enough teachers, no staff members to keep the grounds and classrooms clean, so students spend class time sweeping and moving furniture and interrupting other classrooms (however, a teacher explained that this only happens during the first couple weeks of school).
-Observations: students walk around, teachers walk around, women sell food on school grounds at all times, so students can go buy food and linger instead of staying in the classroom. There's a major lack of structure: school is supposed to start at 8:15, but today it started around 8:30 or tried to start, but there was so much racket going on outside because students were cleaning and moving furniture. While the students are cleaning, the teachers were standing around and chatting. I'm guessing that if I wasn't in my classroom, my teacher would've been chatting with the others. During the 15 minute break, my teacher sent one of his students to buy some phone credit. Break ended, but the teacher did not start his class because he was waiting for his phone. 42 minutes passed before he got his phone back. During that time, he walked around, I stopped a fight and I asked him some questions. I really wanted to ask him "Why he couldn't start his class without his phone?", but I kept my tongue and reminded myself that I was just observing.
Gosh, there's so much more, but I can't get into it all. I definitely have a lot to work with here. I just have to figure out which battles I want to take on and which schools I'll work with, because I can't work with all of them. I already know that one of the tasks I'll take on is behavioral change. It's so important to have an environment that's conducive to learning and right now, the public school is far from that.
The Private School: There are two directors (principals) and one vice prinicpal, 23 teachers, 16 other staff members, 856 students, 18 classrooms (6 classes for middle school, 12 classes for elementary), sports field, extra-curricular building, cafeteria, girls and boys bathrooms. It was built in 1997 by an NGO and they pay the teacher's salaries.
-Structure/Layout: The school is placed off the main road. There are no homes built next to it. The school is an open-structure and classrooms are made of concrete with a teacher's desk, student desks, a chalkboard, a cupboard with supplies and four windows. There are 6 buildings where classes are held and the buildings are spaced so that there's not a lot of noise carried between classrooms.
-Random Observations: The students are very respectful of the teachers/staff. The students are eager to participate and they are surprisingly quiet for average class sizes of 60+. I sat in on a 7th grade math lesson, where the students were learning number placement. I was learning geometry and trigonometry in the 7th grade. All classes were taught in French. Teachers are allowed to refer to Allah in their lessons. The vice-principal walks the grounds and makes sure students don't wander the grounds.
-Problems: Malians don't seem to know that cell phones can be put on silent, so of course the teacher's phones interrupted the class when it rang. There are no substitute teachers. There are not enough text books. Not enough classrooms. Not enough teachers. The Physical Sciences need money to buy matierals to show physical examples. There's a library, but there are no pleasure-reading books. Homework???
The Public School: There are four directors; three for the middle school and one for the elementary school. There are no extra staff memebers. At least 800 students. No cafeteria. There was a library, but it is now used as a classroom. No sports field. No extra-curricular activities.
-Structure/Layout: The school is located right on the main road, houses are located right next door, classrooms are very close to each other, sound carries very easily through the hollow concrete rooms.
-Problems: No text books, not enough supplies, it's difficult to hear the teacher, not enough classrooms, not enough teachers, no staff members to keep the grounds and classrooms clean, so students spend class time sweeping and moving furniture and interrupting other classrooms (however, a teacher explained that this only happens during the first couple weeks of school).
-Observations: students walk around, teachers walk around, women sell food on school grounds at all times, so students can go buy food and linger instead of staying in the classroom. There's a major lack of structure: school is supposed to start at 8:15, but today it started around 8:30 or tried to start, but there was so much racket going on outside because students were cleaning and moving furniture. While the students are cleaning, the teachers were standing around and chatting. I'm guessing that if I wasn't in my classroom, my teacher would've been chatting with the others. During the 15 minute break, my teacher sent one of his students to buy some phone credit. Break ended, but the teacher did not start his class because he was waiting for his phone. 42 minutes passed before he got his phone back. During that time, he walked around, I stopped a fight and I asked him some questions. I really wanted to ask him "Why he couldn't start his class without his phone?", but I kept my tongue and reminded myself that I was just observing.
Gosh, there's so much more, but I can't get into it all. I definitely have a lot to work with here. I just have to figure out which battles I want to take on and which schools I'll work with, because I can't work with all of them. I already know that one of the tasks I'll take on is behavioral change. It's so important to have an environment that's conducive to learning and right now, the public school is far from that.
Friday, October 8, 2010
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