Candy-Palooza

Cockadooooodledoooo! Greetings from Mali (where the roosters begin their day at 4:00AM)!

Currently my friends Kat, Mary, and I are in Bamako, Mali’s capital city where Peace Corps ‘ office is. We are going to do a little shopping in places where we can get things we can’t get in our villages, and check in at the office to exchange some books in the library, pick up packages, and resupply on medical items.

I am WAY excited to get the letters and packages some of you have sent. My mom and Dad sent a package with a Frisbee that I know my kids will get a kick out of. Speaking of my kids, I will try to upload some pictures on here but if they don’t load, check out my facebook page to see some of them. I tried to get them to smile for the pictures, since they are always smiling in real life and I want you all to see them looking happy, but a lot of Malians don’t smile for pictures, so most of them aren’t smiling. They LOVED seeing the pictures though on the camera screen when I took them and burst into laughter and smiles when I showed them their images. It was the first time I took photos of my family here but I have a feeling they are going to want to take a lot more when I get back since they enjoyed it so much.

Life at site has been going very well.  Every day I become more comfortable and my language improves. I even surprised myself with what I was able to squeak out when my host father was asking me questions the other night. Also the other day when I was running (on a BEAUTIFUL dirt road that goes to one of the market towns nearby) two dogs started barking at me and chasing me a little bit and my gut reaction was to yell at them to stop in Bambara… so I think that is a good sign of language learning. I also picked up a life skills book at the Peace Corps office with Bambara translations and I think that will be helpful in language acquisition as well.

Some of you have been asking about what work I am doing right now and what my job duties or projects are. Mostly right now for these first three months after being installed at our sites we are focusing on language acquisition, community integration. We are also supposed to complete three community needs assessments  education, food security, and gender analysis) during this time. I haven’t begun these needs assessments as I don’t feel like my language is at the level to be successful, and I think I will begin around the start of our second month at site. Pretty much what I do during a given day is wake up, greet the people in my compound, eat breakfast, go to my teacher’s house for an hour of Bambara class, do chores, play with my kids, sit around with the older girls while they braid hair, and sometimes go with my Grandma to other compounds to greet people.  When my family shells shea nuts or peanuts I help them do that, and sometimes I go to the fields to pick up the weeds that the women are removing with their “dabas”, or weeding hoes. Once a week I go to the market in one of two towns around where I am to stock up on food.

Here are a couple of things that happened this past week:

1.)    When I was cooking dinner, two goats tried to walk into my house. (Dave said that if I ate meat I would have had a free meal)

2.)    I killed another scorpion in my house this week and left it on the ground when I went to bed. When I woke up it was gone. I am assuming the army of crickets took it away to be eaten.

3.)    A chicken is roosting on the wall of my compound and has around 12 eggs there. I can’t wait for the chickies to hatch (CHICS!)

4.)    Mary and I unsuccessfully tried to resolve an issue with our tailor in Kati (who made really unflattering clothing for us, omitted the headscarves and one skirt that I had asked for, and decided not to refund me for those items for which I already paid). I am bad at handling these situations in the states and with the language barrier it was crazy! Luckily I’m only out around $2 USD.

5.)    Some of the little girls in my compound were really happy with me the other day because I helped them wash their dishes and do some chores. They took me around to little secret spots like where the boys play drums in the millet field, and to some gardens I hadn’t seen before. Then they wanted to take me to the place where they poop by a tree so they could poop… I told them I would meet them back at home.

There’s a little glimpse into my life here!

I miss you all at home a lot. Congratulations to my sister Marni who got married on Saturday. I am bummed I couldn’t be there for the wedding and I hear it was just beautiful.

Fast forward… my time in Bamako is over and I am now at Mary’s house in Kati. We had a salon night – I cut Mary’s hair and have henna setting in my hair as we speak (thanks to the package from Mom!) I will leave to go back to site tomorrow after we make one more trip to the fini kala yoro (tailoring place) to resolve some saggy crotch pants issues.  Women don’t really wear pants here so I guess I can’t blame him for making me men’s pants… but it’s not a cute look.

I hope you are all doing well and staying healthy in the states. I am officially over my cold and can now taste things again, just in time to devour some of the delicious candy in the packages from Mom & Dad and Allison. You guys are the best!

As you all enter the fall season please drink lots of pumpkin flavored coffee drinks and eat Einstein’s pumpkin shmear for me! And when the leaves change color for my friends in the north, take pictures and send them to me in an email, or throw some leaves in an envelope with a little update on your life and send it my way! I’ll probably get it two months later… seeing as that’s how the trend goes. For those who have sent me letters, I’ve only gotten one from Stef, so hopefully yours will find its way to Bamako somehow after floating around the planet for a while. I’ll be crossing my fingers.

Take care, stay safe, and thanks again for all of your support.

Jamie (Assetou Diarra)

Ameriki Kaw Ka Kene?

Hello Friends!
Greetings from Africa! I hope this finds you well and healthy in the states!
I am well and healthy here in Mali. Currently I am at my friend Mary’s house enjoying a little break from village life to do some banking and shopping in a bigger town and enjoy the amenities with which Mary has been provided by the NGO she works with.
Today marks 3 months since my stagemates and I stepped on the plane to begin our Peace Corps journey. It seems like that time has flown by, and at the same time some days have felt like they crawled slowly. After swearing in as volunteers on August 5th, we went off to our sites. I arrived at my site on August 10th, so next week Saturday (MARNI’S WEDDING DAY!!!) will mark one month at site. The first month is supposed to be pretty hard at site for everyone, and I proved to be no exception. The first two weeks were difficult to adjust to this new way of living without the comfort and support of the other people I had grown so close to during training. There were some rough days, but this past week I feel as though I reached a milestone in my comfort level and community integration.  My language level is improving slightly, and I feel less awkward in social interactions of day to day living.
The people of my village are all super friendly and welcoming, but part of the difficulties of the first two weeks came inadvertently from comparisons to the previous volunteer whom they adored, and their expectations from me. I don’t speak a lot of Bambara yet, but I do understand more than I can speak, and hearing “Oh, she doesn’t understand Bambara… She doesn’t understand French either? Oh, well the previous volunteer could speak French” started to grate at my confidence. I told myself and was reminded by friends and family that you just have to take it a day at a time and that the language and cultural knowledge will come bit by bit. It has, and every day is better than the day before. Now people say “Oh she can understand a little bit of Bambara, oh she’ll learn  little by little”, and even a few people have said “You’ve arrived” when I’ve made a funny joke in Bambara or understood a lot. That boosts my confidence a lot.
This past week has been really great in village. The end of Ramadan fasting was celebrated on Tuesday with what is called Selifitini, or a big feast and celebration. My villagers normally never eat meat except for holidays because it is too expensive, so they had meat with their meals and ate pasta and rice instead of the usual toh (mushy millet dish), which was a treat for all. The kids all got a new outfit, and the women and girls all put new braids in their hair and put on their best tailored complets. There was music, dancing, chatting and a lot of tea drinking. The kids went around giving blessings in response to which adults gave them small change and the kids bought little candies and gum from my host father who owns a small butiki out of one of the rooms of his house. In the morning, my host grandmother took me out to the field where many men and older women placed their prayer mats toward Mecca and prayed together for the holiday. They allowed me to pray with them which I was thankful to have the opportunity to do. They allowed some younger boys to pray with them too but they were making too much noise so the women would throw little pebbles at them while they prayed to keep them quiet.
The day before Selifitini was supposed to be a market day in a town 5k away. I was going to attend with my host mothers and host grandmother, but there was a death in one of the groups of houses near us, so we went over to give blessings instead of going to the market. Apparently there was a death of a child in a concession near ours the morning of Selifitini that my language tutor told me about, but I didn’t hear about it from anyone else and I am hesitant to bring it up for fear of not being able to communicate about such a sensitive matter in a language that I am not completely comfortable speaking.
In general things are great here and getting better all the time. I LOVE my kids in my village and all of the wives in my compound are really great. Malian women are so incredibly hard-working it impresses me every day. The men in my compound are great too and very helpful with any problems I have like helping to try and fix my bike, or patching my roof.
I have fallen in love with a baby goat whose mother died shortly after it was born. The kids know I love this goat so they bring it to me and they make sure I know when they feed it (they have to hold down a lactating female goat while the orphaned baby goat drinks its milk). I know that eventually this baby goat will grow up and become a part of some celebratory meal, but I can’t help but get attached to it. We call it Badenni (baby goat).
I am returning to my site tomorrow morning after banking with Mary, but I will have access to internet again the following week when I go into Bamako with some friends. Hopefully the letters and packages that have been sent will be waiting for me in Bamako too. Thank you so much for all of your support and love. I appreciate every bit! If you have time, shoot an email my way with what’s been going on in your life!
Take care!
Jamie (Assetou)

A lot of things!

Edit: I stole all these pictures from my friend Mary, whose sweet house I am in right now waiting to depart for my site.

Brooke, my fellow Baguineda Camp-er and me at a dance party under the straw roof (gwa)

wiping the sweat off my face after a three- legged race I forced everyone to participate in for my birthday.

The three legged race!

Sean and me in the garden the Baguineda Camp-ers created in Brooke's family's concession

Greetings friends!

I am writing from a very lonely Tubaniso training complex, as the majoirty of our stagemates left this morning to their various villages around Mali.
Normally the internet here is pretty slow, but with most everyone gone it is faster and I can take some time to write and update you on things going on here. This is a long post, so hang in there! There will be refreshments afterwards.

I am officially a Peace Corps volunteer now. Before we were trainees, but we swore in two days ago and took the oath to become volunteers. It feels good to be official! We swore in at the American Embassy (which is amazing) and spent the rest of the day at an American club in Bamako. I feel really spoiled whenever we go there. We sat by the pool, drank celebratory beers, and ate burgers, fries, and pizza. After the American club we were transported to our air conditioned hotel (with toilets and a shower!!!) in Bamako where we got ready, had a delicious dinner, and eventually went to a big outdoor bar where a bunch of excited current Peace Corps Volunteer were waiting for us. They gave us a round of applause upon entering and we all danced the night away and had a great time.
Our trainers also revealed to us our stage name (which is a really big deal and they had been keeping it a secret for a few weeks now). Our stage will be referred to as "Good fellas" after the gangster movie from the 90's. Our trainers decided on this name because they think we are all a close family and care for each other and others, and also because we like to have massive games of mafia where we fake kill each other off murder mystery style. I think we all are really happy with the stage name. It is going to stick with us for the next two years.
It was a truly surreal day in Mali. My life will be absolutely nothing like this in village where there is no electricity, so I was soaking it all in and enjoying every moment of air conditioning and real toilets.

There are 4 of us here now who belong in the Koulikoro region, the region our training complex and Bamako are in. We have some protocol meetings during the next two days in the town of Koulikoro and in Kati, the big city 27 k from my village, and soon I will be installed in my permanent town.

I was going to have to take public transport and then ride my bike 7k on some pretty muddy roads with some of my stuff to my village from the main road, but luckily since I was picked up last time I left my village I had left my bike in my room and now Peace Corps has to take me directly to my site by car. I am pretty excited about this as it is rainy season now and the dirt road is impassable by bike in some parts (you have to get off and walk through the mud)

Today the 4 of us went shopping in Bamako for items like buckets, brooms, mirrors, kitchen supplies, rice, shelving units, and some other things that will make our little mud huts a bit more homey. I have my camera and will try to take some shots of my village and house once I am all settled in. I am excited to go to village and see all of the people I had met a few weeks ago for site visit. I am worried that I will forget everyones names though. It is hard enough to remember 40 new people, but when their names are all Bambara names it makes it even more difficult. I will learn them dooni dooni (little by little) though. My family and friends at village like to quiz me a lot on people's names, so it will help to be forced to remember because I don't want to insult anyone by forgetting theirs.

I was able to talk to my parents on skype for a little bit tonight and it was nice to see their faces for a brief bit before the internet was too bad to have video. My mom is freaked out about me getting worms after she saw a scary tv show, but I think worms are pretty rare in volunteers here. I've remained pretty healthy, am maintaining my weight, and staying happy. These next three months are supposed to be the hardest part of the volunteer experience, so if I can make it through this next period, I will be golden.

If you are interested in helping me keep some of my sanity, feel free to send an email my way updating me on your life so I can check it during the two times I will have internet in the next 3 months on my trips to Bamako. Even better, send me a letter or pictures in the mail! I will respond to any and all letters and keep them close to my heart. If you are super interested in helping a sister out, you can send me a package, but they are pretty expensive to send (usually more than $20). You can pretty much just fill it with candy, dry black beans, and goldfish and I would probably cry from happiness :)

These next three months will partly be spent trying to figure out some of my community's needs and wants through assessment tools that the Peace Corps provides. We have an education assessment tool and a food security assessment tool. The food securty one will be interesting since it is hungry season right now (the time of year where new crops are planted but not ready for harvest and when the crops from the season before are running out). I think my village is pretty good at having gardens and crops that they can use and sell, most of the land around our houses is full of crops or gardens. I am hoping to have a vegetable garden if I can procure a little plot of land. Peace Corps gives us some cool resources for veggie gardening and the food secirty program will even give us some seeds for a personal garden and a community garden. One thing we learned about which is pretty cool and kind of gross is urine fertilizer. Basically you collect your pee in a jibidon (big water jug) and mix it with water in a certain ratio, let it sit for a bit, and use it on your vegetable garden to enrich the nutrients available to the plants. Apparently it works wonders! I'll let you know how it goes :) One of our volunteer trainers said that her villagers are super impressed by how well it works in her garden but are too apprehensive about collecting their own urine to do it themsleves. We all find this funny because people pretty much just pee anywhere so you wouldn't think they would have a problem with it. We will see what my village thinks!

Here are some other small projects that I might be able to work on:

The "tippy tap" - which is a handwashing station created from big sticks, a small jibidon (water jug), and a string system that creates a floor pedal. This is a great and inexpensive project that in some villages catches on like wildfire, which is good because it could mean more people washing their hands and dishes.

Murals - I can create various murals around about hand washing, breast feeding, the importance of trees, proper nutrition, a world map, etc.

Girls club - I would like to start a girl's soccer club or some sort of weekly girls meeting. I know the volunteer before me was starting life skills classes with some of the girls, and that would be a really neat project to continue.



Some bigger projects that I have been thinking about planning if community members are interested:

Getting women together to have a workshop on proper shea butter production.

Neem cream production - a natural bug repellant made from the leaves of a certain tree (malaria is a big problem in Mali).

Moringa tree planting - hold a workshop on the moringa tree, its nutritional benefits, and other benefits of planting (google "moringa tree" to learn about it, I guess it is a wonder tree!).

Bambara literacy classes - I would like to work with one of my volunteer friends who works with an awesome literacy program to get some people in my village trained on their literacy program and get some books for the kids and adults to use
- Also, a nonformal education program has some Bambara literacy materials for that may be helpful to procure for these kind of classes.

Take our daughters to work day - Maybe once a year, volunteers from around the different regions meet in a central area in their region with chosen girls from their village to have a girls empowerment weekend where girls can see other women that are educated and have good jobs.

Career fair - one of the volunteers on an education volunteer panel organized a career day where professional people came in and talked about the importance of education in how they got to where they are. This was a big hit and it showed the kids some options that they may have never known about before.

English language classes - I think the volunteer before me tought English once a week. This would be nice to continue if the want is still there in the community.

Once I do a community analysis of what the community perceives to be their needs, I can figure out what other big projects I can do. Some projects that I may think the commuity could benefit from may not be the same as what they think they can benefit from, and if they aren't on board, I won't get much support or have any sustainability in those projects that they are uninterested in.

One of the nice things about being a volunteer in the Koulikoro region is that we have easier access to the resources at the Peace Corps bureau in Bamako. There we can get things like books on how to teach life skills classes, tips on teaching English as a foreign language, we can learn about different trees, income generating activities, and other resources that will be helpful at site.

I am excited to begin this journey, and I appreciate all of your support and love! I'll post pictures the next time I go into Bamako in around a month so you can better understand my little place in Africa.

Until next time!

Jamie (Assetou) Casterton (Diarra) ;)

Almost a Real Volunteer!

Hello Friends!

I am back at Tubaniso, our training center near Bamako, Mali with the rest of my stage mates for a bit before we swear in this week and become real volunteers. We've been trainees for the past two months and will take an oath to swear in as volunteers on August 5th, then we will spend the day at "The American Club", a nice little oasis with a pool to hang out and enjoy our last moments together as a stage before we ship our to our permanent sites on Sunday. I am getting sad to be leaving all of these people I have grown so close to in the past two months, but I am excited for all of their potential and looking forward to hearing about the work they will do in their villages.

We are not allowed to travel for the first three months at site except to go into our banking towns twice during that time. Ultimately this will be helpful in our integration process, but it is going to be a hard three months adjusting to a new way of life and being thrown in the deep end when it comes to language. We can coordinate with other people who share our banking towns to see each other, but we won't have a chance to see any other volunteers in other regions. This is going to be a big change after spending every day with at least 7 other Americans in Baguineda Camp, my homestay village, or with 22 other Americans when we are here at Tubaniso.

The previous volunteer at my site before me had a blog which my parents told me about and which I started reading yesterday. It is beneficial to get some inside scoop on the village and the volunteers previous projects, but I want to make sure not to compare my service to hers too much.

That is all I will say for now... I will have a lot more to say once I go into Bamako for banking after being at site for a while! I hope you are all doing well in America!

P.S. for now, my mailing address is the same as before except that now you can write "PCV" next to my name instead of "Trainee"!

Jamie Casterton - PCV

B.P. 85

Bamako, Mali

West Africa

Thank you for all of your support and love!

~Jamie (Assetou)

Oh hey!

Hello friends and family! Greetings from Africa!

Life is going well here. I am in Mali's capital at the Peace Corps office right now after a 3 day stay at my permanent site (check out my facebook for the name of the town where I will be placed, I don't think I am allowed to write it here).

My village was very welcoming and I felt at home already, despite the Grand Canyon of a languge divide that exists between the villagers and me. Dooni dooni (little little) my language will get better.

My new host family is very patient with me and they invite me to sit and chat. They say that if I sit and chat every night my Bamanankan will get better very quickly.

From what I gathered so far, my new host dad has at least 2 wifes, but might have more. One wife has 3 kids, and the other has 4. There are several family groups in my compound, and several other compounds in my village that are spread out. It was around 20 minute walk from my house to my dugutiki (village chief) 's house yesterday.

It is definitely a change from my homestay village. This new village is much smaller by population and more agriculture centered.

There was a volunteer there before me and I thank her little soul because it seems like she set some good boundaries. The kids don't go into my room like at my homestay, and the kids in the village don't call me "Toubabu" like the kids in the homestay village do.

My name changed again and now my permanent name is Assetou Diarra "Eye-sit-too Jar-ah".
Most of the men in my village have the last name Diarra, so I will fit in better and be able to joke more. I'm not sure if I mentioned it, but Malians have something in their culture called joking cousins where based on your last name you call people bean eaters, donkeys, or other slams when you meet them. Certain last names joke with each other and you can count on your joking cousins for anything. It is kind of complicated, but google it and learn more!

We go back to Tubaniso, our training center tomorrow and will be there until the 19th. I am excited to spend my birthday with my friends here. After that we will go back to our homestay villages for a few weeks, swear in as volunteers around August 5th and will go back to our permanent sites after that for our 2 year stay. Everything is happening very quickly and it is kind of overwhelming to think about, so I just take it a day at a time.

I hope you are all doing well in the states. I will know my permanent address soon and will post it on facebook. For now you can mail me letters or packages at the address I put in one of my facebook notes. I miss you all dearly. Thanks for your love and support. Please send me positive Bambara learning vibes so that I can communicate ;)

Happy birthday to my sister Wendy on July 19th!!!

Love, Jamie (Assetou)

Hey Friends!

Hello friends!

Sorry for the long delay between posts. We have been at our homestay villages for a few weeks and have not had access to internet. Things are going really well and I am enjoying myself fully.

Right now our group is back at our training center for two days, and we will return to our homestay villages on Wednesday.

I love my homestay village, and host family. The people in my host family that live at home right now consists of my host dad, his two wives, a host brother and sister, and a niece. My Malian name is Assita Keita. (sounds like eye-see-tah kay-tah). Up until yesterday I thought my name was Assetou, but I was wrong. I am named after my host sister, who we call Pai. She is a little troublemaker but I love her.

There are 8 trainees in my village, 6 in one close by, and 7 in one a little further away. We get together every few days for common training sessions, but most days we study language in our villages and hang out with our families. I am studying a language called Bambara which is really fun to speak. I am getting better every day but it is still hard to communicate with my host family. Most of the time I just say "N m'a faamu, Haketo" (I don't understand, sorry) and laugh.

Yesterday I went to the sugu (market) with my host mom and she helped me get my sandal fixed, and I walked around with her while she bought spices, meats, vegetables, and mangoes.

I thought I was going to have to eat meat while in Mali but my host family is super accommodating and I haven't had to eat any yet with the exception of broths mostly.

I have been fortunate so far that I have not been really sick with diarrhea, but a lot of my friends have been sick a lot. I think part of the reason I have been lucky is because my family serves me food in my own bowl, and I don't share food out of the communal bowl with my siblings, who don't wash their hands normally.

My village is awesome even though some volunteers warned us going there that it was really dirty and the kids were mean.

It is true that is is dirty, but there is no trash collection system here or plumbing, so it is to be expected. The kids are really sweet for the most part. It is sometimes overwhelming to go outside because the kids all chant "toubabu" (white or foreign person) but they really are just want our attention and stop when we wave at them or tell them our Malian names. Now a lot of kids near my house know my name and will yell my name instead of "toubabu".

There are some amazing rock formations in our village, and there is a small village nearby that the trainees in my village and I go to to climb on and look a the farmland and canal. It is really peaceful and a nice escape from the constant attention we are paid in our own village.

All in all, I am having a wonderful time. The trainees in my village all have great attitudes and are a really valuable support system to me. Really everyone in my stage class is amazing. I feel really lucky to be serving with these people.

We aren't doing any work to improve village life or starting projects right now since this period is focused on language acquisition and cultural integration and familiarity. We have had a lot of good trainings on gender development, water and sanitation, and education among others.

In around 10 days we will find out where our permanent site is. I am excited to find out, and also a little sad that our training will be over and our stage class will part ways... but that is when we can really start our service and learn our new community's needs.

I will write more later about some of the issues specific to Malian education, which is the sector in which I will be working. I will not be teaching, but rather working to improve the access and quality of education in my village.

Thanks again for all of your support! I really appreciate the messages and comments on here and facebook. It is nice to know I have support back home even though I am so far away.

I would love to receive letters and will write you back!

Ok I am going to end now because the electricity went out and I thought I lost the post... thankfully it saved!

Love you all!

~Jamie (aka Assita)

Waaahooooo! Africa!

I ni Sogoma my friends!

Our group of 23 made it to Mali safely! We are staying in a beautiful compound, 3 people to a hut. The weather is hot, but not unbearable. We all slept well last night after long flights
I just took my language placement test in French and failed... don't tell Miss Haan! But it is okay because I will probably be learning Bambara and I am already better at that than French.

Our stage (The people who came with me, pronounced like in French) is really cool. I couldn't be happier with the people I will be spending the next two years with. There are even some cuties ;) Our group motto is "Things are about to get real" and "Things just got real". We have some funny kids in the group.

The negens (n like in onion) or bathrooms haven't been as bad as described, but I've also had experience doing business in the woods camping, so it's not much more difficult than that.
The food they have been feeding us is very good.

Last night there was not a veggie option, so I picked around the meat... I'm scared to take a real mouthfull, but I know it is inevitable.
I love you all so much and it makes me feel really loved that some of you have followed my blog. I am so grateful for your support.

Everything is better than I imagined, and I'm sure will continue to be great... until we all get diarrhea :)

Love, Jamie.

P.S. The keyboard here is really sticky from the dust, so Lily, you are def not allowed to judge my spelling now!