Tuesday, April 28, 2009

So I hear there's a heat wave

Friends and family in the US have been speaking of this "heat wave." My brother was IMing me the other day saying - jaimie i am soo hot. How hot is it? I replied. He knew he was being set up. To offer some comparable indicators, it's currently a cool 88 and I am outside typing on my porch; my air-conditioner is set to 80 degrees. Drissa came home to faux-summer in the US (78) yesterday and went inside to get a jacket.

I am now flying solo. This is of course horrible for my personal life - no husband, but has a mixed effect on my work. Drissa is a total facilitator - since he is from Mali - sometimes I look to him for mediation, etc. This is natural, but it makes me a bit dependent. Minus Drissa, I need to figure it all out myself - there is no hesitation I just go into automatic pilot and satisfice. I am starting to set up some systems (and make use of my refrigerator so not as much running around - hence last night: purchased an entire roast chicken, will eat remaining half for lunch).

It's not always easy to be here with your Malian spouse. Sure, I get way enhanced street cred for being married, but in Mali is that there is no concept of "couple's private time." The self-inflicted isolation of movie nights, cooking together, or any other types of coupley behavior that exist in the US are absent here. Now, I tend to think of Drissa and I as a little bit Malian - we like living with people and since we have been married have always had a roommate. But here, the stream of calls and visitations make me see the American side of myself. As Drissa fields calls at 11, 12, 1 in the morning asking him to do stuff - I find myself uttering "Don't they know you are married." Aghast - I can't believe I am saying stuff like that - resorting to some kind of weird 1950s rhetoric. I guess the scariest/most jarring aspect is realizing what weird latent parts of your culture you carry with you, no matter how much adapt, immerse, etc. This all makes me respect Drissa that much more - to be able to balance and finesse the transition between these two very different worlds with such ease and grace.

So I am forging my path alone "solo." Luckily, I have two families (Drissa's and my own host family) as well as my RAs, my basketball team, friends, and now domestic staff (my house cleaner and driver - more on domestic help in another post) so I am far from alone here. Last night I was out doing surveys until 7, then taught English until 9:30 and ate dinner at 10:30. Despite my entourage and crazy schedule, when I did hear about Drissa's arrival in the US, drinks and dinner with my mom, brother, dad, and dog on the deck in NJ, I got a little bit home sick.

Thursday, April 23, 2009

Making Breakfast in Bamako


Sometimes you wake up yearning for some hash browns, fried eggs, french toast, pork roll. You wish there was a IHOP around the corner, even a waffle house, hell I'd take a huddle house at this point. But things like that don't exist here. Apart from the ubiquitous fried egg stand (eggs fried in a lot of oil served on bread), these types of breakfast spots just aren't available. So you are left with your gas stove, the corner store, and your cooking savvy to try to recreate an American favorite.

A note on corner stores: Bamako has the African equivalent of Bodegas - they are everywhere and they all sell the same things. They are usually dingy, one room operations with tin roofs and for the longest time I was like how do any of them sell anything (since they all sell them same stuff) and what are they actually selling anyway? This is before I started living and cooking here. I realized that you can get almost anything there: butter, sugar, oil, eggs, cold cokes, cookies, tape, bleach, the list goes on and on.

Here is my fabulous morning creation:

Ingredients:
Drissa goes to corner store to purchase - eggs, butter, french bread, and milk. I had some stuff in my fancy refrigerator!: halal beef sausage cut into thin slices, Malian honey, nescafe, sweet and condensed milk, water, ice.

Directions:
Mix honey (lots) with 2 tablespoons of butter (pre cut and measured by corner store) and put in a cup. Place the plastic cup somewhere with full sun exposure - on a ledge, in a tree, etc. Wait for honey and butter to melt together.

Pull gas stove from the back mini-courtyard to front courtyard. Turn on gas and light stove. Put beef slices onto skillet with salt and pepper. Heat until a little bit burned. Remove from skillet and put on a plate; cover with another plate so the flies don't attack it. Take skillet to outdoor faucet and wash by hand using soap and a piece of a rice sack.

Crack 5 eggs into bowl. Pour in plastic sachet of milk. Cut french bread into small thin slices. Submerge approx 6 in egg/milk mixture. Turn on gas stove and heat skillet. Move slices from bowl to skillet - heat until brownish. Take off skillet put on a plate and cover from flies. Repeat procedure with new slices.

Retrieve honey/butter mixture from tree or sunning spot. If its over 100 - it will have melted; if less than 100 - you may have to mix together with a fork. Divide beef slices and french toast between two plates. Cover french toast with honey/butter mixture. Voila French toast and pseudo spam.

Pour ice into two glasses. Pour a teaspoon of nescafe into each glass. Put a teaspoon of sweet and condensed milk in each glass. Cover with water. Stir with a fork. Voila iced coffee.

(Warning: my french toast creation, while delicious - looked nowhere near as delicate and precious as the breakfast food featured in this post's picture).

Friday, April 17, 2009

a love letter to sotramas*


Sotramas are one of my favorite things about Bamako - not just because I fell in love in one or because they were on my wedding invitation or because as a chauffeur's girlfriend I used to get free rides in the front seat - sotramas epitomize Bamako for me. They are loud and bright and wild- but in their chaos, they are very reliable. They help citizens criss-cross quartiers in a way I have seen in few other cities. Imagine fleets of painted mini vans moving people around various Chicago neighborhoods! Sotramas are painted green and follow standard routes and charge a standard fare (between 20 and 30 cents a ride), but the drivers and their team of apprentices (aka apprendikes) have full creative freedom in their decoration. Often you see Che Guevera and Barak Obama flanking sides of the back door, or Madonna next to a veiled preying girl. The windows and ceiling's are often peppered with soccer stars from around the world. Up in the drivers cabin, where the lucky ones, usually hot girls, get to sit - there are fake flowers and tassles around the windows and sometimes snapshots of the sotrama team with various ladies.

You scrunch into the sotrama with 16 other people and the apprendeki. The latest arrivals angle their way into small spaces on the benches butt-first. Chickens and kids and produce share the floor/lap space. Flying through the city in a sotrama makes the whole sensory experience so much more intense - you watch the craziness wizzing by, but seeing all the diversity - the colors and people and clothes and produce in the sotrama - you realize you are part of all craziness too. You feel very alive.

When I am in a sotrama I often imagine myself playing I spy. Just today on my two-sotrama trip from the National Archives to basketball practice: I spy a pile of smoked sheep heads, I spy 30 different Bruce Lee DVDs, I spy sparkly, Chinese-imported slip-on shoes, I spy a near-accident, I spy another near-accident. That is when I stop playing I spy. If all the crazy moto and car drivers rode more sotramas, there would be less traffic and less pollution. I want to start a movement to make sotramas glamorous again. In Kenya, some matatus have flat screens and pimped out sound systems. As a friend suggested, maybe we should just start an "elite" line of sotramas with comfortable seats.... I am already a proud taxi owner, but it is my dream, one day, to own and decorate my own sotrama.


*I have sampled this blog title from one of my Chicago-twin (Khrist's) upcoming works.

Monday, April 13, 2009

Out on the town

Drissa went off to San (its the town right after Blah) for the weekend and left me home in Bamako. As such, I decided it would be an appropriate time to go out on the town. Friday I had meetings downtown, and then went to coach a basketball game. It's the first time my girls every played a real game and though we lost, they were fearless and I was proud of them. The other team hit about 60% from the 3 pt line, so that was pretty crazy. Meanwhile, we don't have any plays yet or any defensive systems - so it was a good first outing for us. So I tried to get back over the bridge(s) to take a shower and then go out to this US military party I had heard about. Unfortunately, traffic was so crazy - I barely made it over either bridge and decided to stop close by to meet fellow American (and Kiva Fellow) Jessica to get a beer cross back over the bridge. Hence, I was not in any kind of cute going out attire - some African print pants, dirty feet (which I tried unsuccesfully to wash in the bathroom), and a t shirt. Regardless, we headed back over the bridge to the soldier's house - which oddly is in the same neighborhood of former Malian dictator Moussa Traore's home. (In fact, that's how you tell the taxi where you are going: an be taa Moussa Traore ka so karafe). We got to the party and we not disappointed. Super hospitality, imported beef and bacon, and a full, free bar. You'll be happy to know our soldiers are living well in Africa - huge house with pool over-looking the Niger river. I was able to borrow a t-shirt and shorts to go swimming in this amazing pool. Eventually I made it back to my comfortable air-conditioned room!

Saturday - I slept in until the afternoon. This would be impossible without my airconditioner as the heat wakes you up by 8 usually. It was the first day of doing nothing - I basked in the cold after-glow of my airconditioning during the afternoon then went to an election meeting for my Aunt who is running for mayor. Election season is now in full effect - there are flyers everywhere, flat bed trucks with music and dancers, dance parties, and soccer games - all ringing in the upcoming local elections. This meeting was organized to hand out flyers - representatives from the 10 areas that make up our commune were given posters to put up. It's hilarious to be in a Malian meeting - everything is extremely democratic - everyone gets his or her turn to say his piece. Unfortunatley, in this atmosphere of tolerance and equality - some people like to hear their own voices - hence lots of repetition -to the point where I am like - come on guys - let's just do this!!! But Malians are more patient. Some verbal fighting and insults broke out, people faked like they were leaving the meeting, but it all ended in laughter in the end... gotta love Mali for that.

After the meeting met Jessica at my favorite bar - le Flamboyant and then headed to meet another new friend Abigail en route to a club called No Stress. The club was fun - we danced till 4 am with the owner (who I had met at Festival in the desert - my brother tommy aka Zander had performed in his tent). I retired again near morning time to my room and wallowed in the AC. I slept until Drissa returned from his trip and then slept some more! What a wonderful, indulgent lazy weekend - all facilitated by an airconditioner!!

Thursday, April 9, 2009

Can appliances buy happiness?


So from my last post, you might have noticed that hot season was getting to me. The air quality + non stop heat (110 degree) made for an unhappy researcher. Well - Drissa and I have decided to go all out and make the transition to Donna Reed levels of domesticity: we now own a refridgerator and air conditioning!!!! The last straw came yesterday when, after a couple of nights back on a Bamako rooftop, I came down with a serious stomachache and was vomiting 'cause the gross stuff in my lungs seeped down into my stomach (ok well there might have been a little food poisoning mixed in there too). Health before everything else right?!

Well one trip to the Samsung store and my spirits (and hopefully my health) restored. Both appliances have one year guarantees, which means they aren't going away and I can enjoy chilled mangoes for the rest of the year. This is a rare type of assurance in Mali - knowing something is working well and will continue that way for the rest of my stay. If I had a quality of life index - it would be making some major jumps.

I am so excited to sleep in my bed tonight - it's been almost 3 months outside on the roof! I can enjoy the fact that the bathroom is steps away, clean soot-free bedding, a little bit of privacy (instead of waking up seeing all your other neighbors getting up and scrambling to put on some decent clothes), no passing smells of burning garbage or charcoal fires, and maybe even getting up in the middle of the night and pulling a bottle of coke from the fridge.

Tonight I am making a celebratory dinner - Massaman curry. This investment was expensive (like $700 for both appliances), but for my own sanity and for the next 9 months here - I think it was worth it. After all, I only pay $150 a month in rent. As goes my graduate school moto: it's all about sustainability!

Sunday, April 5, 2009

Segou is the best "gou"

Today felt like that scene from the stranger - where the main character is walking on the beach and the sun is so hot that he decides to murder someone. I always thought - crazy existentialist literature - how could weather ever effect your emotions in such a radical way. That was before I experienced peak hot season. I had an itinerary today - but instead - i asked Drissa to take me home - so I could take 6 showers and sit under 2 fans.

What made this heat so awful is that I spent Friday and Sat in beautiful Segou. I was about at my breaking point with this heat, so I asked Drissa if we could escape to sleepy, breezy, tree lined, colonial Segou; he said yes. Coincidentally, the day before we planned to leave - I found out that I got some extra cash $$ for my research project. Thus, my escape became a full fledged vacation. We spent a day and a half eating well, drinking wine by a river, taking naps in air-conditioning, and breathing in the pollution-free air. I feel in love with Africa again.

We were joined by Art History Fulbrighter Paul and his wife Marie. It was great - everything was slow and indulgent and easy. We even went sight seeing at the Markala dam and bought some fresh fish right off the river.

Then was the sad 3 hour drive to Bamako. Upon entering city limits you could feel the heavy air starting to clog your lungs - like the Wump world after the pollutants come. I went from my air-conditioned, IKEA-adorned hotel in Segou to sleeping on my mat on the roof. I awoke with soot covering my bed and sheet. Welcome back to Bamako. With the peak temps of today (113)- we resolved to buy a refridgerator. Cold mangoes and cold water would make things much more bearable.