Alaska!

So I found myself unexpectedly back from Peace Corps: unemployed and living at home.  A situation I never wanted to be in.  So I applied for stuff like crazy, back in Africa and all over America.  I finally found a position though the SCA with the Juneau Forestry Sciences Lab.  This stuff is a lot more like what I was doing in Ohio than for Peace Corps.  I love working with forests and doing research in them.  I also love working internationally, in other languages and with other cultures.  Someday I hope to combine those two loves and work with forests and communities on a global scale in the fight against climate change.

Anyway, I'm in Alaska now!  Probably till Christmas but maybe longer.  Most of the work I'm doing is inside, analyzing and organizing data.  I do get some exciting field time, though. Here are some pictures. (The last four are thanks to my friend Andrea!)


Here are some shots of the Mendenhall Glacier, literally down the street from my house:

"Bergy Bits" - little icebergs that have broken off the glacier

A photo from on the glacier, which is actually really dirty 

These are from a 8-day data collecting trip I took down to Prince of Wales Island

 The float plane that I took to get down there!

 Some of the crew and our leader, "El Jefe" at snack thirty.

 A visual sample of the slash we had to deal with.  Slash is all the crap (branches and logs) left behind after logging.  It is unstable, rotten, and often several feet deep.  Probably the most challenging terrain to get through anywhere ever.

Our camp!

And finally:

The northern lights!  Felt so blessed that I got to see them.  It was such a miracle that the sky was clear at the same time as Auroral activity this far south, it really felt like it was meant to be!

Mali ends

So my time in Mali was cut short.  What an unexpected disappointment.  I had put so much work and personal investment into Mali: committing my time, learning the language and culture, making amazing friends in my village, getting close to other PCVs...

It took months, the better part of a year, to adjust to my life in Mali.  But I saw it as an investment: work hard to live in such a strange and uncomfortable setting, so I could get to know people from a totally different way of life as my own.  I wanted to get to know them on a level that could only be achieved through two years of total immersion.  I wanted to make lifelong friends, and even, possibly help them improve their lives.  

I was really looking forward to that second year.  It was all set up to be one of the best of my life.  I was just beginning to have an amazing time, and getting the ball rolling on some big projects.  I guess I didn't get as big a return on my investment in Mali as I was expecting.  But I still got a lot.  I met some amazing people, learned Bambara, and fell in love with West Africa.  And even if I didn't get the full Peace Corps experience, I got enough to be certain that I'll be back.

And as disappointing as it was for me to leave early, my troubles are nothing compared to what the people of Mali have had to endure: an ethnic revolt, islamofascists, civil war, a coup d'état, an embargo for a landlocked country, destruction of ancient religious shrines, a drought, withdrawal of much of the Western aid Mali has become dependent on.  And no clear resolution in sight...

Ala k'a nogoya

Seasons in Africa

Last October I took a walk around Kissa and brought my camera with me.  It was at the very end of the rainy season and the land was at its lushest and wettest.  I took some pictures of Kissa's giant Baobab tree, the pond, cornfields, paths and lanes, houses and even a well that was filled to the brim.

Then, a few days ago, I went around re-creating all those same pictures.  Except now Kissa is at the end of the dry season.  The grasses are all dead and burned away.  The pond and wells are dry.  Trees have lost their leaves.... So here are the pictures:

The Baobab Tree:

A Cornfield

The Pond

Mango Trees

Oil Palms

Houses

More Mango Trees

The Well

Bambara!

So one of the most fun things about my time here in Mali has been learning the local language, Bambara.  In many of my Anthropology classes, I had always been told that "language is a window into culture," and that "language is an essential part of a culture."  I had always sort of believed those things, but still felt that language was somehow also arbitrary, just a set of noises that could be easily exchanged with another set of noises.  However, I've realized just how much knowing Bambara has shaped my experience of Malian culture, how I have learned things that I never could have if I only spoke French.  I also realize how different two unrelated languages can be, and how there is much more to translation than simply replacing each word with its counterpart in another language.

Fun Words:
The words for sun and day are the same (Tile), as are the words for month and moon (Kalo), and year and rain (San).  So, if you say, "two years and three months ago," it is really the same things as saying "two rains and three moons ago."

One interesting thing about Bambara is how much bigger words are made out of smaller words.  For example, the word for bicycle (Nɛgɛso) is made out of the words for Iron (Nɛgɛ) and Horse (So), so it is essentialy Iron-Horse.  Other fun compound words include the words like:
    -Hypocrite (Jijukɔrɔsa) or Snake-Down-in-the-Water
    -A mentally ill person (Dajibɔ) or Mouth-Water-Comes-Out, ie, drooler
    -Bee (Diden) or Honey-Child
    -Fruit (Yiriden) or Tree-Child
    -Condom (Fukulannafama) or Very-Important-Hat

Sometimes what would be a phrase in English is just one world.  So, "store that sells farming implements" becomes "Farming-thing-selling-place" (Senekɛfenfeereyɔrɔ).

Other Fun Facts:
-Bambara is tonal (2 tones - a low tone and normal speaking)
-There are no conjugations or genders
-There are 4 extra letters: ɛ, which is a more open e; ɔ, which is a more open o; ɲ, which is like ny, as in annual; and ŋ, which is like ng, as in angular.
-It also can be written in the Arabic alphabet or in N'Ko, an alphabet inventing just for the Mande languages of West Africa.  Nevertheless, the latin alphabet is by far the most common.

A Window into Culture
One way that languages can be used as a window into a culture is by examining words that care commonly used in one language but do not translate easily into another.

Some words in Bambara that are not in English:
-Jija, roughly "to try one's best"
-Soli, "to wake up early in the morning"
-Sebe, a personality trait, which means serious, hard working and brave.  Perhaps Malians would have a harder time conceiving of someone who could be both lazy and brave, or serious and cowardly.

Some words in English that are not in Bambara:
-Favorite.  Malians are not used to choosing their favorite of something.
-Impress.  Maybe they dont talk about showing off as much as we do.
-Late.  Could explain why Malians are never, never on time.
-Colors.  Traditionally there is just "dark," "light," and "colored" in Bambara.  If you want to say something more specific, like Green, you could say "Healthy Grass-y," but this is uncommon.
-Normal.
-"I wish."  You could not easily say "I wish it wasn't hot here."  If you wanted to, you would have to say something roundabout like "If it was not hot here right now, that would be pleasing to me." Malians are not as wistful as we are.

Reconstructing the Past
Because two major cultures/languages have influenced Malian culture/language, it is possible to "date" the time period that a word, and thus a concept was introduced to Malians.  So, for example, because the words for god, religion, law and date palm are all similar in Arabic and Bambara, we can infer that there was no concept of a monotheistic god, of different religions, or  law before the Arabs showed up and brought Islam to Mali, around 1300 AD.  This is also probably when date palms were introduced to Mali.  Other concepts and technologies, like car, potato, and Christianity are similar to the French word, suggesting that these things were not introduced to Mali until around 1800 AD, when the French started colonizing Mali.

You have to be careful, though: some words that have their origin in other languages are just replacing native Bambara words.  For example, because the days of the week in Bambara resemble the days of the week in Arabic, I always assumed there were no weeks or days in traditional Malian culture.  That was, however, until I learned that there is a traditional six-day week, with many implications: some days are unlucky or lucky, some days require a baby to have a specific name if he is born on that day.  This traditional six-day week is rarely spoken about or used anymore.

So that's Bambara!

Learning a new, exotic language has definitely been one of the most rewarding and challenging parts of my experience here.

Making a House!

It's now the dry season in Kissa, so there's no farming work to be done.  People do spend a lot more time chatting and relaxing, but they also take advantage of this lul in farm work to build and repair their houses.

So, to build a house, the first thing you do is go to the local mudhole:

There, you make mud bricks, which are left in the sun to dry out and harden.

The bricks are stacked into walls, which are then covered by a different type of mud, then smoothed out.  That is then painted using different dyes.

Here is a donkey cart bringing in some mud.  Everything in the construction of the house is made from different types of earth: the bricks, the mortar, the coating and even the different paints.  People have to pay attention to exactly what proportion of water, sand and clay they use in all of the different building materials, in order for the building to last.

The roof frames are made out of wood, traditionally covered with dried grasses.

Nowadays, though, some people have roofs from sheet metal.  If you look in the background, you can see that the roof behind them is made from thatch.

And thats how you make a hut!  It's usually something the whole community comes together to do.  I.e., you help 20 people build their houses, and then, when you want to build you house, you'll have 20 helpers.  They last around 10 - 20 years, although the thatch does need to be replaced more frequently.

What's your house made out of?

Back in Mali/Cotton

So I'm back in Mali after an amazing 5 weeks in America.  I got to see tons wonderful family and friends  (not to mention eat lots of Pizza).  I also found out how many of you back home are actively reading my blog, so I will try hard to keep the entertaining and informative entries coming.... Thanks for all the support!

Here is a post about cotton, based on some pictures I took last November, before coming home.

So this is a cotton field near Kissa:

Cotton is one of Mali's biggest cash crops, ie, one of their only ways to make money and develop.  Every spring, all the farmers in Kissa take out loans from CMDT, a Malian cotton company, in order to buy cotton seeds, fertilizer, and pesticides.  In addition to all of the crops they grow to eat, villagers will plant a few hectares of cotton.  Over the course of the rainy season, they will plow the field, lay the cotton seeds individually by hand, scrape at the weeds that grow around the emerging cotton plants, lay fertilizer with their bare hands, and spray pesticides.  Finally, in November, they go out into the fields to collect all the cotton.  It is collected in big piles and weighed.  They then sell the cotton back to the company, pay off their loans, and usually have a few dollars left over.

Here is a hut overflowing with cotton, with my bike as a reference for size:

A hectare of cotton can have a return of about $400 in US dollars, but that can vary a lot, depending on the world cotton prices, and how productive the hectare was.  It is with this money that my villagers buy motorcycles, cellphones, and solar panels, as well as medicine and clothes.  It is hard to estimate how much each individual can make from cotton, since everything is so communal among families.  You are never farming cotton on your fields, with just your money.  Land and labor are shared among siblings, extended families, and village associations.  If I were to give it a per-capita estimation, I would say the average Malian man can farm 3 hectares of cotton, so he makes about $1,200 a year.  With this he must provide for his wive(s), kids, and elderly relatives too old to work.

Transporting the cotton, by hand and by donkey-cart:

There are many issues and problems associated with cotton.  Because the land and labor that goes to growing cotton would otherwise go to growing food, some commentators have blamed the popularity of cotton for Mali's malnutrition problems.  Also, cotton requires a lot of chemical inputs, which can damage the villages soil and water, especially when villagers have no idea have to safely and efficiently used industrial fertilizers and pesticides.  Nevertheless, cotton is one of the major ways Mali can enter the global economy and become a modern, developed nation.

 Weighing the cotton:

Weighing the cotton is a very tense moment for the farmers.  Their yield and the world market price of cotton can vary drastically from year to year, so up until this moment, the farmers aren't really sure how much they will get.  This year was a decent one.

A semi getting filled with already weighed cotton:

The business of cotton can have positive effects for all Malians, beyond just the individual farmers.  For example, the terrible dirt road out of Kissa was repaired by CMDT, the Malian cotton company, so that they could get the cotton out of the countryside more easily and efficiently.

This cotton will go to Bamako, then to a port like Dakar or Abidjan.  From there, it will probably go to some factory somewhere in maybe China or Indonesia, where it will be made into clothes.  Those clothes will likely go to a developed nation like America or Germany, where people like you will buy them.  Someday, they may even return to Mali as second-hand goods!


So now I'm gonna get political real quick.  Let me just say the views I'm expressing here are my own, not those of the Peace Corps (duh).

I've mentioned already that how much Malian farmers earn for their cotton is determined by the price of cotton on the world market.  Well, because the US is also a cotton growing nation, our policies can drastically affect how much Malian farmers make, and how quickly their nation develops.  Currently, America subsidizes our cotton producers, lowering the price of cotton globally.  In 2009, America spent over $2 billion subsidizing our cotton farmers. Because of our subsidies and subsidies in other developed nations, West Africa loses an estimated $191 million each year.

You might respond that well, it is the responsibility of the American government to look out for American interests, and that is exactly what they are doing when they subsidize cotton.  Two responses:

1. Subsidies aren't helping poor American farmers.  Because only large, rich cotton companies can afford to lobby the american government, they're the only ones that receive subsidies.  In fact, 78% of the $2 billion in taxpayer money we spend on cotton goes to only 10% of American cotton farmers.

2.  What the US is doing is actually illegal.  In fact, Brazil, another cotton growing nation with a little more international muscle than Mali, brought the issue before the World Trade Organization.  Now, American taxpayers give $147 million a year to Brazil!

So, what can you do?  Well, at least agricultural subsidies aren't much of a partisan issue.  They are supported and opposed by both Democrats and Republicans.  America's agricultural bill is due to be updated in 2012 ro 2013, and the best thing you can do is support candidates who are anti-subsidies, and encourage your local representatives not to hand out billions of taxpayer money to large agri-corporations.

And finally: Happy Kids Jumping on Fluffy Cotton.

And, yes, I did join them in jumping on the squishy goodness.

Thanks for reading!