I am back home. It feels really good. It took me about two days to get over my jet lag.

I end the mission with one thought. When God sends you He goes with you. He supports you. And He brings you home.

Good Bye.

Au R'Voir

Mbah

The little engine pulled the train over the mountain!!

Next week I will have returned home to Norman OK. We finished school on Thursday and my flight home is scheduled for next Thursday. I am surprised that I have been able to keep this blog going. Some weeks were pretty thin but we did it!! Please keep me in prayer next Thur and Fri as I travel.

I was walking with Dan who is one of the Bible translators here in Bamako. I saw a young lady ahead of us with a baby tied to her back and another under her arm. I made a comment to Dan about it and said that I wondered how twins were handled here in Mali. Dan came back with an unexpected answer. He said, “ Jack. You have to remember that you are in Mali now. I Mali a man can have more than one wife. Therefore babies of about the same age in a home may not be twins. If there are two wives, then one might do the cooking one day while the other cares for the children. The next day they might reverse roles.” Dan was right. I have not adjusted my thinking to this culture. One time it could be “buyer beware” or they will try to get as much from you as they can and give as little as possible. Another time they would go hungry to make sure that you are fed properly. If you know the culture it all makes sense but to me …??? Well I like the people and they have all gone out of their way to be good hosts to this old man who does not even learn their language.

The picture showing the big hotel in Bamako is there to try one more time to show you the presidential white house. It is centered in the picture. It is located on a high bluff on the north side of Bamako. The picture of the traffic is at the six way intersection that I have mentioned before. You can see only a couple of the roads from the camera angle and traffic was light when I took it. The third picture is close to that intersection. I see no reason why OSHA would complain about the scaffolding. After all I don't know how many years it has been since the scaffolding was last used. It reminds me of pictures of buildings in Hong Kong except they used bamboo scaffolding.

I Went Walking

My thanks (or maybe SORRY!) to Bill Martin Jr. since I kind of copied his "I Went Walking" book.

(My daughter said it sounded more like "Brown Bear Brown Bear" to her .) I read his books to pre-k through first grade and they are easy reading because he puts a lot of rhythm in them. Anyway please don’t sue me for plagiarism or defamation of character Bill.

I went walking. What did I see?

I saw the gate guard waiting for me.

The night had cooled down to the low 70's so it had been good sleeping for me. The guard is sitting in a chair with a ski mask over his head. An extra shirt on and his brazier lit to keep his hands warm. He got up to unlatch the gate for me.

I went walking. What did I see?

I saw an old man walking unsteadily with his cane down the street toward me. His son was by his side to take care of him. I think they walk every morning. He is friendly and always waves his cane at us when we drive past on the way to school. When he waved this morning, I crossed the street to shake his hand and to say "bon jour" and "savah" (maybe ce vous?). We would have had a longer conversation but that's all the French I know and he speaks French and Bambara or maybe Bozo.

I went walking. What did I see?

I saw a lady sweeping the trash out of the sand in front of her dwelling and smoothing out the sand. She uses a small whisk broom so she has to be bent over to do this. If she were washing dishes, washing clothes, or cutting up fish to fry for supper she would use the same posture. Just think of your kitchen counter being located on the floor.

I went walking. What did I see?

I saw a lady picking through the trash pile in front of a tailor shop. She was looking for remnants of cloth that she could use. Recycling is serious business in Mali. I haven't heard the city government in Bamako having to find a place for a city dump. Back to the lady. She was bent over in the normal position but one thing was a notable difference. Her right hand was laid on her back. Evidently the task that she was involved in was not clean so she was doing it with her left hand while keeping her right hand clean.

I went walking. What did I see?

The donkey drawn trash cart coming toward me. Actually I saw two of them. One was toward the end of my walk. They do have a big tractor drawn trash cart to pick up the big stuff, but the donkeys are more fun.

I went walking. What did I see?

I saw a man with crutches try to move a couple of benches so I stopped to help him. Of course it took twice as long as for him to do it himself because I don't speak French but we finally got them where he wanted them. I think he was putting them in the shade so he could sit and talk to his friends.

I went walking. What did I see?

Lots of other stuff like the river and flowers and other people but I can't remember all of it. Oh. Well.

May 29

We have completed school for the month of May. We have school all of the first week of June and then have finals on tuesday and Wednesday of the following week. I did not realize that I would have to give my kids finals so I will start putting those tests together this weekend and finish them up next week. I have about finished the curriculums for the classes I was teaching. I hope they are reasonably close to what is needed.

Some of the people that are at the school or in missions here in Bamako have put together the musical "Joseph and His Coat of Many Colors" and will be presenting it Saturday (May 30). It should be pretty good. We have a lot of musical talent around. I volunteered to man the refreshment booth at intermission. I hope everyone has the correct change.

We have had some clouds this week and some wind but not much moisture. A good rain would cool us down some. They say that the Sahara continues to spread so I don't know whether I will see any wet season or not.

May 22

We have a four day week, a five day week and a three day week left. Yes. I am counting the days carefully now. It is not that I am in a hurry for them to pass. I need to plan my material left to the time left. Monday is Africa Day here and Memorial day in the States. At least we matched up on the holiday date this time.

The picture has an unfinished hotel on the North shore of the Niger. I have been living here almost six months now and that big crane on to has not been used in that length of time. I put the picture in to emphasize another difference I have observed in Mali. All over Bamako I have seen unfinished buildings. Usually part or all of the ground floor has been finished at least enough that it can be used. If someone is working on the building ; it will be one man or a small crew. Bricks or sand may be available even if no one is working.

This is how the reasoning goes I am told. If you have money and a relative has a need they will come to you to borrow the money you have. Of course it is never returned unless the situation is reversed. So if I buy bricks then I do not have money to loan. I have deposited the money in a bank that my relatives can not borrow from. They do not need bricks or buildings. They need cash. You have no cash so you do not have to loan them anything. So now you know the story of the unfinished buildings. This is sort of like Jesus chewing out some people for declaring their possessions "corban" dedicated to the Lord so they did not have to take care of their parents with those possessions.

The rains are still holding off. We have had one good rain this year. They tell me that the rains will cool down the temperatures. The rain we got gave us four days of cooler temperatures.

16 May

The tree in the center of the picture is a flamboyant tree. I was quite disappointed with them here in Mali. In Zambia, you would see a solid red top with no green from the leaves showing. They look really flamboyant. These look pretty but hardly something that you would go out of your way to see. The other flowers I have seen in Mali have been about the same. They are pretty but not anywhere near as lush as the ones in Zambia. I don't know if they are just not as nice this year because of the lack of rain or if this is normal.

We had teacher appreciation this week and the parents of the students really spoiled us with snacks each morning and a full meal on Friday noon. We have also been invited to a meal today (Saturday) and next Saturday the school board sponsors us to a nice meal with small gifts or mementos. Our God even favored us with rain and four days of cooler weather this week. The nights have been perfect for sleeping and I have gotten in some nice walks.

With four weeks left of school the students have already started their summer vacations and that is becoming a challenge for teaching. We will try our best to meet that challenge.

9 May

I went out for my walk early this morning. It was already getting uncomfortable. I am not carrying my camera with me so no pictures. We did take an all school picture and if I get a copy I will include it next week.

I have mentioned before that the people of Mali are friendly and happy. They like to joke with each other. There are disparaging jokes (all in fun) about each of the family groups in Mali. If you are not from Mali they will give you a Malian name. They did give me one but I never was sure what they said. This all leads into the one thing that they can get very combative about.
Politics and weddings may get noisy but if there is a soccor game you need to stay out of the streets. They really go wild with their soccor games. There was evidently one on tv this past week and when it was over we had an hour of screaming, hollering, horn honking, and firecrackers. I talked about that with one of the long term missionaries and he said that it was probably not even a Malian soccor match. He said that there was one game between Bamako and another town in Mali. The other town won. The man who owns the restaurant on the corner by my apartment was from the other town. He had to run to keep from being beat up and they trashed his restaurant. I don't understand how they could do that. If you look at past blogs you can see it in some of the pictures. It consists of a roof and part of a south wall of corrugated metal and a table. They bring their pots, pans, and dishes in each morning to set up for the day.

May 1 May Day

In Mali the first of May is Labor Day and of course no one can labor on Labor Day so we have no school today. We started to get back to normal at school this week. I felt much better about classes. Most of my classes will have more material than I can cover so I will need to do some picking and choosing. One class may not have enough to last out the year. That one really worries me.

We had a pretty good rain for about half an hour on Wednesday. It was enough to let some water run off. The Malian kids were having a good time in the rain. They peeled and were streaking down the street in the rain. Well I noticed that one still had his sandals on. Then they started damming up the water streams so they would have puddles to play in. They were not very successful though. A half hour after the rain the dirt was dry. The air was a lot more humid. Other than that you could not tell that it had rained.

Another traffic story. They are easy to come up with. Kim Nelson and I stopped for some groceries. Then we made a left turn across a lane of cars to head home. The cars let us through but then we had to stop in the street for a herd of cattle on our side of the road. After they had gone by we went on home. Last night coming from school I saw another amazing sight. A car signaled for a left turn. Then he turned left!

April 24

We have completed the standardized tests and I look forward to a normal four days of school next week. Giving the tests went fairly smooth for me. All the schedule changes and other problems of that type during the week was difficult for me. I like the status quo and I think the kids are happier when they have a set schedule.

There have evidently been some sandstorms in the Sahara Desert lately. The very fine sand gets drawn up high in the air and then the air flow from east to west brings it over us and out into the Atlantic. We have had dusty skies all of this past week. That also means that I have dusty floors, tables, counters, etc. in my apartment. My eyes are sore and tired from the dust too. I even made up an [Old Bamako Saying] for you. If you don't go to Timbuctu then Timbuctu will come to you! Since I chose not to go to Timbuctu I thought that was an appropriate saying.

Back to work

This was our first week back from spring break. We are into our last nine week period of school. Next week we have the Stanford Achievement tests. That kind of messes up the schedule. They are also something new for me to do. Pray that I won't mess up the kids to bad.

I have no new pictures for you this week. The traffic still amazes me. I don't see how they keep from having a mess of accidents. My drivers just tell me you always expect the other vehicles to do something idiotic and you are not disappointed. If you see someone signalling expect them to do something different. Motorbikes will always turn right in front of your car. I saw one motorbike that had rear view mirrors but they were folded down. I assume that it was to hard to squeeze between cars with those mirrors out.

I finally figured out why some of the dirt roads have all the big rocks on them. By putting one of those rocks in front of their dwelling the people effectively enlarge their front yard. Since vehicles can't drive over the rocks the people can use that space for play or washing clothes or something along that line. When you think of it that way it makes more sense.

Each week from now on you can insert the comment. It is getting hotter. You pour water in your mouth and it pours out of your skin.

branch conference

The past two weeks have been spent in branch conference for SIL and spring break for Bamako Christian Academy. Since spring break was rather dull I will try to let you peak into the branch conference a little bit. First imagine people from 6-10 language groups getting together to socialize and to plan. The first week involved local workers and cooperating pastors who mostly speak in their tribal language or in French. All meetings the first week were in French with some interpretation. Singing is definitely a talent that God did not think I needed. Singing in French was way out of my capabilities. The second week was mostly in English with other languages thrown in when the person needed to express something that they did not have the English words to express.

I got to meet the workers from other parts of Mali and from Ivory Coast (Cote D'Voire). Even with the language barrier I have enjoyed getting to know them.

spring break

The first picture is a tent church of the Assembly of God. It is about a block away from the SIL where I am staying. Since it is spring break I can walk in the morning when it is cool. I took my camera with me and walked out on to the new bridge. The donkey cart was on the way home. The last four pictures are the ones that I wanted to put in this blog. Three are pictures of gardens along the Niger river. These are irrigated one bucket at a time although I have seen some where they pump the water out of the river to their gardens. They get several crops each year. During the wet season they get to rest while the river floods their gardens. The fourth picture contains some mango trees. They have thick dark green foliage and most of the trees that I see are loaded with fruit.

I am also making some progress with my curriculum writing. I hope that I am doing them correctly.

The first picture was taken as we crossed the old River Bridge on our way to shop at the Artisinat. On the top of the hill directly in front of us is the Mali White House. It is white and it is the residence of the President of Mali. I can see it from the balcony by my apartment but I hoped that this would show up better as we were about four kilometers closer. The "Green Machine" in front of us is one of many buses that you see and dodge as you drive on Bamako streets. On either side of the bridge there is a lane for two wheeled and pedestrian traffic.

The second picture shows the traffic near the Artisinat when we decided that we did not really want to shop there. The parking lot was full and as you can easily see the streets were also full

21 March 2009

This is one of the weeks that I expected when nothing out of the ordinary happened. I was up early one morning and looked down at the street. A grandfather was carrying to buckets to the river for water. His grandson was running from behind to catch him and carry one of the buckets. Then they continued on. A donkey cart came down the street very quietly behind them. Early morning is about the only time that you can experience peace and quiet around here. People spend most of their day outside where it is cooler and their conversations are generally much louder than you would hear in the States.

Now a little recent history of Mali. In 1960 the Sudanese Republic gained it's independence from France. It joined with the Republic of Senegal to form the Mali Federation. Then Senegal seceded and Mali changed it's name to the Republic of Mali. The Army overthrew the government in 1968 and Mali was under military rule for 20 years. In 1991 dictator Moussa Faso was overthrown and Mali made a peaceful transition to democracy. There have been some rebellions along the northern border of Mali by some of the Tuareg tribes but most of Mali has been peaceful over the last 20 years. The economy has been steadily improving over that time. There is still a fairly large number of unemployed so I see more manual labor and less machine labor than I would see in the States.

I have commented on the traffic before and I may be repeating myself. Most of the vehicles on the road are motorbikes. They fit snugly in front , behind , and on both sides of any cars on the road. There are a few personal cars , a lot of taxis , and a lot of green machines (vans used as buses or for general hauling). Add to the above a fair number of bicycles , push carts , donkey carts and an odd horse or camel rider along with numerous pedestrians and you have an intriguing traffic problem. Anyone who drives must be expecting someone to do something unexpected at any time. Somehow it all works out.

We packed up our vehicles and headed out of Bamako. This was my first trip outside of Bamako since I flew in the first week of January. In the first picture we have the Africa Tower which is in a traffic circle near the airport. It has an outline of Africa at it's top. They tell me it has a pictoral tour of Africa that you can see as you climb up the interior of the tower. The next picture is from the village of Mana. The houses are built of mud bricks with thatched roofs.

I took two pictures of a mud wall that was put up around 300 years ago as a protection from slaver raiding parties. You can see that it has stood up well through the years. I have another picture of the village of Mana with some bushy trees in the foreground. These are Mango trees and they are covered with fruit. The big tree with the kids scattered in front of it? Well I don't know what kind it is so we will just call it Big Tree! The roots cover the ground all around it.

We stayed at a missionary compound at Mana where they teach pastors and their wives Bible stories and how to use them in witnessing. There is also a medical clinc at Mana which is sponsored by the church there.

Our retreat was sort of an extended field trip where the kids got to review their Mathematics, Biology and Earth Science materials and a spiritual retreat as we also had some Bible study. I came back pretty well tired out but I think that it was time well spent.

March7 Mali

These are pictures that someone else took in Mali and has shared with me. The young lady is cooking n'sema which I saw a lot of and ate a lot of in Malawi and in Zambia. I have not seen any here in Bamako. It may be more common in the villages. All the other pictures are of the area in and around Timbuctu. I would have liked to go there just to say that I had done it but It is about a thousand mile trek from Bamako. I could fly if I wasn't so cheap. Oh yes. Timbuctu is up closer to the Sahara so the climate is more arid. There used to be a river running through Timbuctu but it shifted so only the river sand remains. Timbuctu was an important center of learning and trade back in the 14th century. Morocco captured that territory in the late 16th century and held it until France took over in the early 1900's. Malian history fills in blank spaces for me when I have nothing new to report. Next week I will report on the retreat that we will have at Mana.

Orphanage

I am only including one picture in today's blog. If you click on it and enlarge it you will see the young lady in the center. She has been grinding grain and in the picture you can see her pouring it slowly from one basket to the other to allow the chaff to blow away.

Our school is trying to interest the students in some community projects. This week we took some of them to an orphanage in Bamako. There were about a dozen of us that went. Two teachers and about ten students. The orphanage has about 80 babies (birth to 2) and a few older children that are crippled. Most of the adoptions go to France.

I enjoyed holding the youngest babies (surprise). Even though I don't speak French I was able to make friends with the nurse in the room that I was in. They have about ten babies in each room. I sang a couple of my lullabies and then the nurse sang one of hers. She has a much livelier lullaby than I do. Then she told one of the babies a story with motions and facial expressions. It was a very nice story even though I did not understand a word of it. I think that it was about the little baby girl growing up and marrying a wise chief. I enjoyed myself thoroughly. Evidently the little boy that I picked up first enjoyed himself also. He certainly did not want to be put back down.

I did not change any diapers as they were using swaddling clothes and wrapped and tied them on. I still remember cloth diapers but we used to fold second base over home plate and pin them on.

A walk to the store.

You can see some of the traffic on the street just beyond the 'short haul' men. In the States you can get two men and a truck. Here you can get one man and his cart. They haul some hefty loads on those little carts. We also got a picture of a donkey cart on the same trip. It isn't loaded though. The other pictures is of two ladies heading for the river to do their laundry.

I think that I mentioned the science project of a solar cooker. We didn't have to good luck with our test. The food wasn't cooked at 3:00 when school let out. It was completely dehydrated the next morning. The plastic cover had also ripped and the class did not seem to interested in continuing so we stopped the project with very limited success. You can't win them all. One of the boys took the cooker home with him and he might continue working on it.

We had clouds and even a few drops of rain this week. The rainy season is not supposed to start until April.

Happy Valentines Day

We don't have any pictures for you this week. I will try to get my camera out for pictures of some of the local color next week.

For those of you who are waiting with baited breath on the results of our 5-6th grade Solar Cooker science project. The construction was completed on Wednesday , however the Chinese president visited Mali on Thursday which resulted in some of the roads being closed so our school was closed also. On Friday we performed tests on the cooker. We warmed water up to to about 160 degrees Fahrenheit. Our rock (heat sink) was almost to 180 degrees. Since school lets out by 2:30PM we had some of the hottest part of the day left to go. Those temperatures would be enough to cook with. Next week we will try to cook rice in it.

I was asked by one reader what SIL stood for. I don't speak French and those letters stand for a French name. It is the name of the organization that does the Wycliffe Bible translation work in Mali and Ivory Coast. There are now a Bible in the Bambara language and New Testaments in Bomu , Khassonke ,Dogon , Tamasheq , Fulfulde ,and Minyanka. They also work with various Christian groups in generating Bible story sequences , Audios , and Videos.

I am being taught the Bambara greeting although I doubt that I will learn it in the short time that I have left here. I will try to go through that greeting now. This has to be done before any business is transacted.

eenee sogoma (hello)
eenee sogoma (hello right back at you)
somogo kawkenee (is the family well?)
toro tay (very well thank you)
eemoso kawkenee ( is your wife well)
toro tay
demee semu kawkenee (Are your children well)
toro tay
oobay kawkenee (how is everyone)
toro tay

This is then reversed and the second person asks the questions and the first one answers.

there can also be a blessing given which will contain "Allah" in it. If you hear that the response is "ameena".

kawumbay means goodbye or be seeing you.
Congratulations. You now know Bambara better than I do.
As you can see; social amenities mean a lot to the people of Mali. They joke a lot with each other which releases a lot of tension and seems to make them a relaxed and friendly people.

Since I let you see me at play last weekend I thought that I would balance everything out and show you my workplace. The first picture is our school lunchroom. Naturally we eat in the open air since the weather is always warm. The kindergarten teacher in the next picture doubles as one of my chauffeurs.
Next is our up to date science lab In which you can find anything you don't need and then our combination library and computer lab.
My room is next with chairs still on top of the desk so the room can be cleaned. Then two pictures of me pretending to teach a Geometry class. Actually they were taking a test which I am still in the process of grading.
A picture of the 6th - 12th graders in chapel and then we see a couple of pictures of kids and teacher with smiles on their faces since they have survived another week and this is Friday afternoon.

Our 5th-6th grade science class is in the process of building a solar oven (solar cooker). Our challenge is to build one that will cook a pot of rice. I hope that we succeed. We may not teach anyone anything but we are going to keep trying. Well that is my work in Mali. The kids are kids like anywhere else but I think they are pretty nice.

The Niger River

We begin our trip on the Niger about a block from my apartment. The group includes missionaries from the USA ,England, Netherlands, and Germany. We started around 3:30 and finished around 7:00 . The boat was a little larger than the fishermen's piroughs and had a top and cushions for us so we were fairly comfortable.
























































We landed on an island. I have pictures of trees including a Baobab tree. There are also a group of Baobab trees on an island that I took from the boat. You can recognize them because it looks like there roots are on the top of the tree.That is a termite hill that I am standing beside. The houses in the village are made with mud bricks. The garden (left and down 2) is set up in squares so they can irrigate by pouring river water in each square.












































The bottom picture on the left is bamboo. On the right are some kind of fruit palm. I tried to show how they use the river. There are pictures of them using it to do laundry, irrigate their crops, and fishing. I am sure that it is also used to move goods but I did not see any shipping on this boat trip.