Well it has been quite a few days since I've posted, so I guess I have a lot of ground to make up.
Christmas was good. After going to bed late Christmas Eve, we had to wake up early Christmas morning. At the church there was a long Christmas service and then a potluck... which of course was delicious; and some of the food items were unidentifiable, but ya just have to close your eyes and eat it. Afterwords, we retreated back to our house and opened presents. I got a book about Mali, some bowls, and a prayer rug.
In the evening I worked on the network some more with Ernie.
Friday was a full day. In the morning we journeyed over to the campground. Basically, its a rustic retreat center. The pastor leads literacy camps and things of the like. I asked if they ever do youth camps (kinda my specialty) and they said that there used to be some a long time ago, but it would just take someone to run with it and motivate people, otherwise it wouldn't happen.
later in the morning, our friend Eddy came over and taught us some more Bambara. We learned the numbers associated with their money system. confusingly, they have a different number sequence when dealing with money than they do with counting other objects and such. everything in the money system is based off of the number five instead of 10 like ours. so, in order to say 25 you would pronounce it 5 5's.
In the afternoon I gave another lesson to Eddy on the guitar.
Saturday was kind of the calm before the storm. In the afternoon I gave another lesson to Eddy, his final lesson. He came along very well and I bet he'll make a great guitar player. The rest of the day was spent packing, saying goodbye to people, and going to the market.
Sunday, we got up very early (5:30), packed up the car, and headed off to Bamako (about a 7 hour drive). Along the way we stopped and looked at a nice waterfall.
Once we got to Bamako, we spent the rest of the evening getting settled in.
Monday we took a taxi (something I'm getting used to, but it's still weird to me) over to Jessica's warehouse (the street kids ministry) in the afternoon. For Monday, we were just going to check it out and look around. Jessica is this lovely nigerian woman who has given up her whole life to take care of these children. It's literally all she does. She doesn't have another job, she just takes care of the boys. She survives on some money that her sister sends her. She doesn't even speak their language. With all of this despair around her she still has hope and dreams. At the moment, these kids hang out and sleep in this warehouse (think of one of those rental storage garage's. its about 20x20 feet). There are anywhere between 30-50 boys that inhabit this place. Jessica took us over to a house that she hopes to rent out for the boys. I was shocked when we walked around in it. This house has at least 8-10 bedrooms, several bathrooms, and lots of living space. Jessica has plans of providing sleeping space for up to 200 boys in this house! Some of the kids would stay there all the time and be enrolled in her program where they will be tutored by teachers until they reach an appropriate grade level for their age. Unicef has said it would provide beds, school supplies, and teachers even, but not until they get the house (and they wont provide any money for the house). The landlord was touched by the ministry and is offering the house to Jessica and the boys for $800 a month... for a 10 bedroom house!! are you kidding me? what landlord in their right mind would ever consider letting 200 boys live in one of their houses, let alone lower the rent for such a cause. God is truly working here. Sadly, they have no one to provide for any of the rent.
Jessica is a trained nurse who could be making a nice amount of money, but instead she has given up everything for these boys.
I have finally seen a holy fool in person and in action; someone who takes Jesus seriously; someone who cares more about the cause of Jesus than her own well-being.
This forces me to ask myself, how can I be like this?
Tuesday we went to a missionaries house. She had a shop in her house that she stocks with Malian craft items. so we did a little Christmas shopping.
In the evening we took off for Jessica's warehouse again. This time we passed out the notebooks we had prepared and began teaching the boys how to read and write their numbers. There is something strange and rewarding about teaching 15 year old's and 8 year old's how to write the number 1.. and at the same time awfully depressing that a 15 year old has never written a 1 before.
Our taxi driver is pretty much the coolest guy. His name is Ousman. He waits for us while we work with the kids, and even comes in and helps us teach. He knows just a little bit of English (maybe as much as the spanish I knew by the end of highschool). So Ousman talks to the boys in their language (Bambara) and translates it to english and made up sign language for us.
Wednesday we went back to the warehouse in the afternoon and interviewed some of the boys so that we could better understand where they come from and why they are there. Ousman, our taxi driver, translated for us again. We also worked on some of their numbers.
In the evening we relaxed a bit and enjoyed the sounds coming from the street. At midnight it sounded like someone was bombing us. apparently, the people here love fireworks :-)
------------
Thoughts:
Bamako has been really exciting so far, but at the same time I really miss Kadiolo. It was nice there because we got to know some locals really well and we saw them everyday. There was kind of a sense community... what I've been longing for... and then I left.
Wednesday, December 31, 2008
Thursday, December 25, 2008
Some pictures
Hello all! I am trying to post some pictures, so we'll see if it works.
the post after this one is from today too, so read that as well.
the post after this one is from today too, so read that as well.
Joyeux Noel!!
Greetings from Africa!
Sadly, the internet was out for the last days and a half. I am not too saddened when the internet goes out, since, after-all, it is Africa. The sad part of this story is that I wrote my whole blog post offline, and just as i had finished, the computer froze up.. and it's all gone. So now I am writing for you the second edition of my blog post.
Sunday (21st)
Sunday morning was my first African church service experience. It was organized quite like most of ours in America... you know... singing, then an offering, then the sermon. On the other hand, it was so different. There singing is so much different than ours. I like it a lot. They say that when Americans sing it sounds like we're crying. I have some video of their singing, so you can see it when I get back. often, it is just the voices and percussion. They go all out with the percussion though. They have djembe's, a goat skin box (for lack of a better name), marimbas, and shakers of various kinds. Also on sunday morning, we had the delight of listening to special music by a very famous West African singer. Jan told me that she often sings at weddings, but for each wedding she writes a new song... just for that wedding. It tells of the brides life story and then the grooms life story, and is often about 20 minutes long.
The sermon was in Bambara, with a French translation. Ernie translated it again for me in English. So the message had to go through 2 other people to get to me (kind of like the game telephone... except in this case sometimes things don't translate correctly no matter how good your translation skills are).
Since it was the sabbath, we just relaxed for the afternoon.
In the evening, I gave another guitar lesson to Eddy (he is the son of pastor Ibrahim). If you've never tried, I would encourage you to try and teach someone something when you don't understand each others language.. Its a riot.
Monday (22nd)
In the morning we worked on these notebooks that we will give to the kids in the street kids ministry in Bamako. Hopefully, we will be teaching them to read and write their numbers in Bambara, so we wrote them down in each of the notebooks.
In the afternoon we walked over to observe a literacy class that the pastor's wife teaches. Jan said that the women that come are not allowed to come to church on Sunday because of their Muslim family, so it is a great ministry.
In the evening I gave another lesson to Eddy. We told him that he could have the guitar in exchange for teaching us Bambara, which he was very excited about.
Tuesday (23rd)
One of the guys who works with the drama team came by to take us on an adventure. We walked across town and met an old lady who had just returned from her pilgrimage to Mecca. There were a lot of people there and a lot of children. Once we took our cameras out the children swarmed us trying to get their picture taken. Then we went across the street and met her son who had also gone to Mecca. Often, when they come back from Mecca, they will wear white for the rest of their lives, just to show that they have been there. We also visited another church across town and then went to the market.
In the afternoon I went over to the radio station and helped the news guy. I showed him a website that had news in french for West Africa, and I showed him how to use Google so that he could find more sites like it.
After this, we went to get our clothes from the tailor.
Tuesday evening I gave another lesson to Eddy.
Wednesday (24th)
I'm not sure what day it started, but I'm going to stick it in the Wednesday post. Rachel has these children stalkers and it's hilarious. They come over all the time and ask to speak to just her. Then today (Thursday) they wanted a picture with her and a picture of just her. okay, so... she doesn't think it's as funny as I do.
Wednesday evening was the big party at the church, and they really know how to celebrate. We were there from 8:30pm until midnight, but it kept going after we left. There was a lot of dancing and singing. I think that pictures would justify it better than me explaining it, so just wait and see.
______
It is interesting to experience the children here. some of them run away as if we are evil (we have been told that when the little kids are bad their parents tell them that the white people will come and take them away... hence the negative reaction to seeing one); Most, however, come running from all directions, hoping we will shake their hand or take their picture. It's a very strange thing. One of my favorite kids is Daniel, who was very shy at first, until I made him a paper airplane. It's the little things in life... so cool.
Prayer requests:
-I seem to have caught myself an African cold. I've had it since Sunday and it seems to be leaving, but I would appreciate your prayers for my health.
-Pastor Ibrahim is traveling to Bamako tonight, so pray for safety on the roads.
-We are traveling to Bamako on Sunday, so pray for safety on the roads for us. It's about a 7 hour drive.
Sadly, the internet was out for the last days and a half. I am not too saddened when the internet goes out, since, after-all, it is Africa. The sad part of this story is that I wrote my whole blog post offline, and just as i had finished, the computer froze up.. and it's all gone. So now I am writing for you the second edition of my blog post.
Sunday (21st)
Sunday morning was my first African church service experience. It was organized quite like most of ours in America... you know... singing, then an offering, then the sermon. On the other hand, it was so different. There singing is so much different than ours. I like it a lot. They say that when Americans sing it sounds like we're crying. I have some video of their singing, so you can see it when I get back. often, it is just the voices and percussion. They go all out with the percussion though. They have djembe's, a goat skin box (for lack of a better name), marimbas, and shakers of various kinds. Also on sunday morning, we had the delight of listening to special music by a very famous West African singer. Jan told me that she often sings at weddings, but for each wedding she writes a new song... just for that wedding. It tells of the brides life story and then the grooms life story, and is often about 20 minutes long.
The sermon was in Bambara, with a French translation. Ernie translated it again for me in English. So the message had to go through 2 other people to get to me (kind of like the game telephone... except in this case sometimes things don't translate correctly no matter how good your translation skills are).
Since it was the sabbath, we just relaxed for the afternoon.
In the evening, I gave another guitar lesson to Eddy (he is the son of pastor Ibrahim). If you've never tried, I would encourage you to try and teach someone something when you don't understand each others language.. Its a riot.
Monday (22nd)
In the morning we worked on these notebooks that we will give to the kids in the street kids ministry in Bamako. Hopefully, we will be teaching them to read and write their numbers in Bambara, so we wrote them down in each of the notebooks.
In the afternoon we walked over to observe a literacy class that the pastor's wife teaches. Jan said that the women that come are not allowed to come to church on Sunday because of their Muslim family, so it is a great ministry.
In the evening I gave another lesson to Eddy. We told him that he could have the guitar in exchange for teaching us Bambara, which he was very excited about.
Tuesday (23rd)
One of the guys who works with the drama team came by to take us on an adventure. We walked across town and met an old lady who had just returned from her pilgrimage to Mecca. There were a lot of people there and a lot of children. Once we took our cameras out the children swarmed us trying to get their picture taken. Then we went across the street and met her son who had also gone to Mecca. Often, when they come back from Mecca, they will wear white for the rest of their lives, just to show that they have been there. We also visited another church across town and then went to the market.
In the afternoon I went over to the radio station and helped the news guy. I showed him a website that had news in french for West Africa, and I showed him how to use Google so that he could find more sites like it.
After this, we went to get our clothes from the tailor.
Tuesday evening I gave another lesson to Eddy.
Wednesday (24th)
I'm not sure what day it started, but I'm going to stick it in the Wednesday post. Rachel has these children stalkers and it's hilarious. They come over all the time and ask to speak to just her. Then today (Thursday) they wanted a picture with her and a picture of just her. okay, so... she doesn't think it's as funny as I do.
Wednesday evening was the big party at the church, and they really know how to celebrate. We were there from 8:30pm until midnight, but it kept going after we left. There was a lot of dancing and singing. I think that pictures would justify it better than me explaining it, so just wait and see.
______
It is interesting to experience the children here. some of them run away as if we are evil (we have been told that when the little kids are bad their parents tell them that the white people will come and take them away... hence the negative reaction to seeing one); Most, however, come running from all directions, hoping we will shake their hand or take their picture. It's a very strange thing. One of my favorite kids is Daniel, who was very shy at first, until I made him a paper airplane. It's the little things in life... so cool.
Prayer requests:
-I seem to have caught myself an African cold. I've had it since Sunday and it seems to be leaving, but I would appreciate your prayers for my health.
-Pastor Ibrahim is traveling to Bamako tonight, so pray for safety on the roads.
-We are traveling to Bamako on Sunday, so pray for safety on the roads for us. It's about a 7 hour drive.
Saturday, December 20, 2008
Experience of a lifetime
I have been keeping an eye on the Michigan news sites and finding some entertainment in the current weather situation there. Here, it is the other extreme. Today was probably around 95 degrees.
Thursday was market day, and also the first full day we were in Kadiolo. We went to the market in the morning to buy some food. We also bought some cool fabric and took it to the tailor to have it made especially for us. They should be ready on Tuesday. For the fabric plus the tailor expense it will come to $16 (US) for a shirt and pants. Then in the afternoon we went back to the market to buy each other Christmas presents.
Also on Thursday, we got a tour of the ministries in this village. There is a Christian radio station in town, which is also in the same building as the church. The radio station is very important as it reaches 3 countries. It has won several excellence awards in categories not specific to Christian radio. Another ministry, which is closely related to the radio station, is the drama team. The drama team writes and records radio dramas that are very entertaining and Bible based. This country is 90% Muslim, but people all over gather around radios to hear these stories. The impact that this ministry is having is immeasurable. We couldn't meet most of the drama team because they were selected by the region (region is like a state) to represent them in the national arts competition and that is where they are now. This is by no means a Christian oriented competition, and it is very exciting that the team is getting national recognition.
Some of the languages around here are very tonal languages. So Jan was telling me that some of the early missionaries had tried to translate some of our hymns, but they didn't work because the meanings of words are based on pitch. This is the case so much so that sometimes when a musical instrument is being played it is actually saying words. The instrument is actually talking! When they had translated the Jesus film into one of these languages, they made intro music for the video that was just for that culture. When they were playing it on the marimba, loads of people started walking down the street towards them. Jan asked why and the lady there said that the music was saying "come, come and hear the story of Jesus". That is pretty cool.
Friday morning I did some work on the computer network system with Ernie. They really have quite the setup here. Ironically, my parents can't get internet at their house near Ludington, but we have broadband out here in the bush.
In the afternoon we went into town to buy some notebooks for the packets of stuff we will be giving the kids at the street kids ministry in Bamako. Then later we got a lesson in Bambara, one of the local languages. We had to learn the numbers because we will be teaching the kids at the street kids ministry how to read and write the numbers in Bambara.
In the evening, I gave a guitar lesson to a boy from the church.
Saturday was a very exciting day. We got up at 5 in the morning so that we could leave by 6am and drive 2.5 hours to another village. Here we attended a New Testament Bible dedication. since 1949 these people have been working on translating the New Testament into this language called supyire. It is finally done and the first books have been printed. There were hundreds of people there including the mayor and other figure heads of the local and regional government. To see the joy that these people had now that they had a Bible in their own language made me so much more appreciative of my own Bible. The entire ceremony was in French and Supyire, but I was able to understand what was happening. Few people get to have the experience that I had today, I really can't express how grateful I am for having it. Ernie said that in all his time spent over in this part of the world, he also had never experienced a Bible dedication. There are now 4 out of 40 Malian languages with at least a New Testament. That means that 90% of the languages here in Mali do not have a Bible. That makes me want to read mine a little more often.
The whole ceremony was about 4 hours long.
Thursday was market day, and also the first full day we were in Kadiolo. We went to the market in the morning to buy some food. We also bought some cool fabric and took it to the tailor to have it made especially for us. They should be ready on Tuesday. For the fabric plus the tailor expense it will come to $16 (US) for a shirt and pants. Then in the afternoon we went back to the market to buy each other Christmas presents.
Also on Thursday, we got a tour of the ministries in this village. There is a Christian radio station in town, which is also in the same building as the church. The radio station is very important as it reaches 3 countries. It has won several excellence awards in categories not specific to Christian radio. Another ministry, which is closely related to the radio station, is the drama team. The drama team writes and records radio dramas that are very entertaining and Bible based. This country is 90% Muslim, but people all over gather around radios to hear these stories. The impact that this ministry is having is immeasurable. We couldn't meet most of the drama team because they were selected by the region (region is like a state) to represent them in the national arts competition and that is where they are now. This is by no means a Christian oriented competition, and it is very exciting that the team is getting national recognition.
Some of the languages around here are very tonal languages. So Jan was telling me that some of the early missionaries had tried to translate some of our hymns, but they didn't work because the meanings of words are based on pitch. This is the case so much so that sometimes when a musical instrument is being played it is actually saying words. The instrument is actually talking! When they had translated the Jesus film into one of these languages, they made intro music for the video that was just for that culture. When they were playing it on the marimba, loads of people started walking down the street towards them. Jan asked why and the lady there said that the music was saying "come, come and hear the story of Jesus". That is pretty cool.
Friday morning I did some work on the computer network system with Ernie. They really have quite the setup here. Ironically, my parents can't get internet at their house near Ludington, but we have broadband out here in the bush.
In the afternoon we went into town to buy some notebooks for the packets of stuff we will be giving the kids at the street kids ministry in Bamako. Then later we got a lesson in Bambara, one of the local languages. We had to learn the numbers because we will be teaching the kids at the street kids ministry how to read and write the numbers in Bambara.
In the evening, I gave a guitar lesson to a boy from the church.
Saturday was a very exciting day. We got up at 5 in the morning so that we could leave by 6am and drive 2.5 hours to another village. Here we attended a New Testament Bible dedication. since 1949 these people have been working on translating the New Testament into this language called supyire. It is finally done and the first books have been printed. There were hundreds of people there including the mayor and other figure heads of the local and regional government. To see the joy that these people had now that they had a Bible in their own language made me so much more appreciative of my own Bible. The entire ceremony was in French and Supyire, but I was able to understand what was happening. Few people get to have the experience that I had today, I really can't express how grateful I am for having it. Ernie said that in all his time spent over in this part of the world, he also had never experienced a Bible dedication. There are now 4 out of 40 Malian languages with at least a New Testament. That means that 90% of the languages here in Mali do not have a Bible. That makes me want to read mine a little more often.
The whole ceremony was about 4 hours long.
Wednesday, December 17, 2008
returning to the internet
This evening we arrived in the village of Kadiolo. This is where we will be staying until the 28th of December. The village and surrounding area is roughly 30,000 people. What I mean by surrounding area would be like a county in the US. It has been 3 days since my last post, so I will start from the beginning of that period.
Monday (the 15th)-
In the morning Ernie and I took a walk down the street to the pump and generator store. We were researching how much it would cost for a pump that would pump out the mud from someone's well. Then on the way back we stopped at the insurance office because Ernie needed to see how much the vehicle insurance was going to cost. Once we did that, we returned back to the guest house we were staying at to get the amount of money that we were going to need (carrying a lot of extra money around isn't the best idea). Let me pause my story to explain a little of what its like to walk down the street in Bamako. Most streets are paved there. there may be large buildings in the middle of the blocks, but lining the streets are little shops and vendors. There are pedestrians everywhere, and lots of guys pushing little pushpush's (like 2 wheeled wheel-barrels) with various stuff in them. There are lots of cars and even more motorcycles on the roads and they are traveling very fast. as a pedestrian you basically have to walk on the road, there isn't much of a sidewalk due to the shops (you'll see what i mean in some pictures i may post). So ya have to watch out for the crazy drivers while you are walking.
back to the story of my day. We went back and bought the insurance and then the pump. This is a very "hurry up and wait" culture, so this simple process that i explained took from 8am to noon.
After lunch, Ernie and I took a taxi to the other side of town (my first time in a taxi... and he was a crazy driver) to have some phones worked on. There is cell phone service here and all you have to do is bring used phones over from the US and they will unlock them here (so they can be used on any network instead of just verizon or the like). Once their unlocked then you can buy an Orange phone card (orange is the phone company) and they will work until you run out of minutes. So anyway, we had these phones from the states and we needed to get them unlocked so we went to the place across town that did it. Again with the hurry up and wait thing, this process took about 4 hours. The whole side of the street we were on was lined with these shacks that worked on cell phones. I've never seen so many cell phones in one place in my life. It's truly bizarre.
In the evening we just packed and generally got really to leave the next day.
Tuesday 16th-
In the morning we got up at 5:30 so that we could eat, pack the car, and leave by about 6am. We started driving and soon we were out of the big city and in the desert. There are trees here and there and a lot of bushes, but its a lot of open land and very flat. Everything is very dry here, it is often around 10% humidity. It was about a 3 hour drive to our next stop. we passed lots and lots of small villages along the way and there were always children waving at us as we drove by. The villages (again, you should soon see pictures) have shack shops along the street and the people live in mud huts with thatch roofing. Just about every village we passed had an elementary school, but if you wanted a highschool you would have to move to a bigger town. Finally we got to saguo, which is a city east of Bamako. We stopped for gas and to use the restroom at a hotel. Then, we continued on to Kotiala, which is about 2 hours south of saguo. At about 1 or 2 o clock we arrived in Kotiala, which is where we spent the night. There is a guest house there where missionaries can stay for 5000 francs a night per person ($10). Rachel, Kaitlyn, and I went on a walk to find bread for dinner and any veggies we could find for a salad. We found the bread shop and bought some bread (its all french bread and better than french bread in the states.. and it's roughly 25 US cents per loaf), then we spotted a girl carrying tomatoes on her head across the street (the women carry everything on there heads, just like you see in pictures), so we crossed the street to buy some. Rachel used her limited french to try and purchase a few but then we realized we only had large bills and we didn't know how to ask her if she had change... so we crossed the street again and went back to the bread shop, bought another loaf using a bill and got change, went back across the street and bought the tomatoes, only to discover that she did in fact have change, haha. Then Kaitlyn dropped all of the tomatoes on the ground and some locals laughed at us. all in all, it was a good time.
In the evening we just relaxed a bit.
Today (wednesday the 17th)-
We ate breakfast at 8 and then Ernie and I had an appointment with someone at 9. One of the missionaries in Kotiala works with computer networks and solar panals (since Ernie also works with networks, we had some things to talk about), so we met at 9 and they discussed a lot of network things and I just soaked up all of the information. They have one signal coming in from the internet provider (Orange, the same as the phones) and they transmit the signal wirelessly to many people around town. their wireless transmitter can go up to 4 or 5 miles even. This is all basically what Ernie is doing in Kadiolo, so they were sharing ideas. There is an optic cable that runs from the capital, so there is broadband all the way out here in the middle of nowhere. Anyway, I learned quite a bit about how the network works. Then we drove over to the bible school in kotiala (where they train pastors) to look at the solar panal set up he has built/is building. The entire school is run off of solar energy because the power company charges too much. The whole set up cost around 40,000 dollars, but would pay for itself in 7-8 years; but after that the panals will last another 30 years at least. So, I learned a lot about that too.
After lunch we got back on the road. If we had stayed any longer we would have had to stay the night again because you are not allowed to drive on the road after dark unless you have a military escort. I slept for awhile in the car and then after i had been awake for a bit we got a flat tire.. in the middle of the desert of course. We switched it out with the spare tire and headed on our way. The next village we went through we stopped to fix the flat tire (in case the spare went flat). The whole process of fixing the tire cost 500 francs (or $1). I bought a bottle of coke at a gas station (similar in size to a 20oz) for roughly 70 cents. Then we were off again, next stop, Kadiolo. The last 10 kilometers or so of the road was not paved and quite bumpy. We arrived here in Kadiolo just as the sun was setting.
Some thoughts:
What I have noticed so far is similar to what I expected: that there is hardly anything that is the same in the US as it is here.
The people are very nice, and very understanding of my inability to speak their language. I am slowly learning a little french. I can introduce myself, say Hi, say how are you (and it's response), I can ask how much something is (but I don't know my numbers so I can't understand their reply), and I can ask "do you have..." followed by an item or something. That's about the extent of it so far.
About 90% of the population is Muslim. they have a ritual where they pray every 4 hours or so. so at those intervals in the day you can here the call to prayer being broadcast out on a speaker or something.
Now that we are finally in the town where the missionaries live, we can see what sort of ministries are happening here. I am excited to see how God is moving in this very different culture. I hope that I will see things that I am not accustomed to, as I have in every other aspect of this trip so far.
oh, and there are termite hills over 20 feet tall! cool.
Monday (the 15th)-
In the morning Ernie and I took a walk down the street to the pump and generator store. We were researching how much it would cost for a pump that would pump out the mud from someone's well. Then on the way back we stopped at the insurance office because Ernie needed to see how much the vehicle insurance was going to cost. Once we did that, we returned back to the guest house we were staying at to get the amount of money that we were going to need (carrying a lot of extra money around isn't the best idea). Let me pause my story to explain a little of what its like to walk down the street in Bamako. Most streets are paved there. there may be large buildings in the middle of the blocks, but lining the streets are little shops and vendors. There are pedestrians everywhere, and lots of guys pushing little pushpush's (like 2 wheeled wheel-barrels) with various stuff in them. There are lots of cars and even more motorcycles on the roads and they are traveling very fast. as a pedestrian you basically have to walk on the road, there isn't much of a sidewalk due to the shops (you'll see what i mean in some pictures i may post). So ya have to watch out for the crazy drivers while you are walking.
back to the story of my day. We went back and bought the insurance and then the pump. This is a very "hurry up and wait" culture, so this simple process that i explained took from 8am to noon.
After lunch, Ernie and I took a taxi to the other side of town (my first time in a taxi... and he was a crazy driver) to have some phones worked on. There is cell phone service here and all you have to do is bring used phones over from the US and they will unlock them here (so they can be used on any network instead of just verizon or the like). Once their unlocked then you can buy an Orange phone card (orange is the phone company) and they will work until you run out of minutes. So anyway, we had these phones from the states and we needed to get them unlocked so we went to the place across town that did it. Again with the hurry up and wait thing, this process took about 4 hours. The whole side of the street we were on was lined with these shacks that worked on cell phones. I've never seen so many cell phones in one place in my life. It's truly bizarre.
In the evening we just packed and generally got really to leave the next day.
Tuesday 16th-
In the morning we got up at 5:30 so that we could eat, pack the car, and leave by about 6am. We started driving and soon we were out of the big city and in the desert. There are trees here and there and a lot of bushes, but its a lot of open land and very flat. Everything is very dry here, it is often around 10% humidity. It was about a 3 hour drive to our next stop. we passed lots and lots of small villages along the way and there were always children waving at us as we drove by. The villages (again, you should soon see pictures) have shack shops along the street and the people live in mud huts with thatch roofing. Just about every village we passed had an elementary school, but if you wanted a highschool you would have to move to a bigger town. Finally we got to saguo, which is a city east of Bamako. We stopped for gas and to use the restroom at a hotel. Then, we continued on to Kotiala, which is about 2 hours south of saguo. At about 1 or 2 o clock we arrived in Kotiala, which is where we spent the night. There is a guest house there where missionaries can stay for 5000 francs a night per person ($10). Rachel, Kaitlyn, and I went on a walk to find bread for dinner and any veggies we could find for a salad. We found the bread shop and bought some bread (its all french bread and better than french bread in the states.. and it's roughly 25 US cents per loaf), then we spotted a girl carrying tomatoes on her head across the street (the women carry everything on there heads, just like you see in pictures), so we crossed the street to buy some. Rachel used her limited french to try and purchase a few but then we realized we only had large bills and we didn't know how to ask her if she had change... so we crossed the street again and went back to the bread shop, bought another loaf using a bill and got change, went back across the street and bought the tomatoes, only to discover that she did in fact have change, haha. Then Kaitlyn dropped all of the tomatoes on the ground and some locals laughed at us. all in all, it was a good time.
In the evening we just relaxed a bit.
Today (wednesday the 17th)-
We ate breakfast at 8 and then Ernie and I had an appointment with someone at 9. One of the missionaries in Kotiala works with computer networks and solar panals (since Ernie also works with networks, we had some things to talk about), so we met at 9 and they discussed a lot of network things and I just soaked up all of the information. They have one signal coming in from the internet provider (Orange, the same as the phones) and they transmit the signal wirelessly to many people around town. their wireless transmitter can go up to 4 or 5 miles even. This is all basically what Ernie is doing in Kadiolo, so they were sharing ideas. There is an optic cable that runs from the capital, so there is broadband all the way out here in the middle of nowhere. Anyway, I learned quite a bit about how the network works. Then we drove over to the bible school in kotiala (where they train pastors) to look at the solar panal set up he has built/is building. The entire school is run off of solar energy because the power company charges too much. The whole set up cost around 40,000 dollars, but would pay for itself in 7-8 years; but after that the panals will last another 30 years at least. So, I learned a lot about that too.
After lunch we got back on the road. If we had stayed any longer we would have had to stay the night again because you are not allowed to drive on the road after dark unless you have a military escort. I slept for awhile in the car and then after i had been awake for a bit we got a flat tire.. in the middle of the desert of course. We switched it out with the spare tire and headed on our way. The next village we went through we stopped to fix the flat tire (in case the spare went flat). The whole process of fixing the tire cost 500 francs (or $1). I bought a bottle of coke at a gas station (similar in size to a 20oz) for roughly 70 cents. Then we were off again, next stop, Kadiolo. The last 10 kilometers or so of the road was not paved and quite bumpy. We arrived here in Kadiolo just as the sun was setting.
Some thoughts:
What I have noticed so far is similar to what I expected: that there is hardly anything that is the same in the US as it is here.
The people are very nice, and very understanding of my inability to speak their language. I am slowly learning a little french. I can introduce myself, say Hi, say how are you (and it's response), I can ask how much something is (but I don't know my numbers so I can't understand their reply), and I can ask "do you have..." followed by an item or something. That's about the extent of it so far.
About 90% of the population is Muslim. they have a ritual where they pray every 4 hours or so. so at those intervals in the day you can here the call to prayer being broadcast out on a speaker or something.
Now that we are finally in the town where the missionaries live, we can see what sort of ministries are happening here. I am excited to see how God is moving in this very different culture. I hope that I will see things that I am not accustomed to, as I have in every other aspect of this trip so far.
oh, and there are termite hills over 20 feet tall! cool.
Sunday, December 14, 2008
Day 2
We are still in Bamako (the capital city), we will be leaving for Kadiolo on Tuesday most likely. Today we went to an English Sunday school in the morning. It was held at an international school (an english speaking school). Ernie said that the school is very expensive, about the equivilant of $20,000 per child per year. For lunch we went to a Chinese restaurant. what is strange about Bamako is that you can walk past several run down shacks and a few steps later walk into a nice restaurant. There is a very diverse mixture of social economics, as opposed to in America where you would find an upperclass area of town and a lower class one and they would be very separate.
Since it was Sunday, we didn't go out a whole lot today. For the afternoon we sat around and played some cards and just relaxed. This evening we went to an English church service. The church was composed of local missionaries, Bible translators, and some locals that moved here from English speaking countries.
That's pretty much all that happened today. Tomorrow should prove to be a little more exciting.
Since it was Sunday, we didn't go out a whole lot today. For the afternoon we sat around and played some cards and just relaxed. This evening we went to an English church service. The church was composed of local missionaries, Bible translators, and some locals that moved here from English speaking countries.
That's pretty much all that happened today. Tomorrow should prove to be a little more exciting.
Saturday, December 13, 2008
Day 1
So now I am a little more awake. I just slept for a wonderful 12 hours.
I am glad that we arrived here at night, because the air was very comfortable when we came off of the airplane. Right now it's around noon and it is very warm. Thankfully it is dry though, so it doesn't seem as bad.
The air has an interesting smell to it. Not a horrible smell, but different. It almost smells like something is being smoked.
I just got my $500 in spending money exchanged into 250,000 francs (I guess thats not really what they are, but thats what they call them).
I just have one story or you guys. While going through security in detroit they had to take my carry on backpack aside. Then the security guard pulls out a 4 inch knife from the bottom of my bag... whoops. The moral of the story is, don't use your hiking backpack for a carry on backpack. The guard was very understanding and I happily surrendured my knife over to him. I do remember thinking though, if I was Mike Johnson, I would be in jail right now... sorry Mike.
I am glad that we arrived here at night, because the air was very comfortable when we came off of the airplane. Right now it's around noon and it is very warm. Thankfully it is dry though, so it doesn't seem as bad.
The air has an interesting smell to it. Not a horrible smell, but different. It almost smells like something is being smoked.
I just got my $500 in spending money exchanged into 250,000 francs (I guess thats not really what they are, but thats what they call them).
I just have one story or you guys. While going through security in detroit they had to take my carry on backpack aside. Then the security guard pulls out a 4 inch knife from the bottom of my bag... whoops. The moral of the story is, don't use your hiking backpack for a carry on backpack. The guard was very understanding and I happily surrendured my knife over to him. I do remember thinking though, if I was Mike Johnson, I would be in jail right now... sorry Mike.
Friday, December 12, 2008
Arriving in Bamako
We have arrived safely in Bamako, Mali. The trip was mostly uneventful.
We didn't loose any luggage!
I guess I will post more when I have more to say.
God bless.
We didn't loose any luggage!
I guess I will post more when I have more to say.
God bless.
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