THANKSGIVING IN SIKASSO!

If you were all wondering what people do to celebrate holidays when they are far away from their families then I have the answer for you. My parents always end up with a hodge podge of people at their dining room table for Thanksgiving and my Thanksgiving in Mali was no different. I decided to go to Sikasso where, every year, there is always a big event. The first night the focus was to get a head start on desserts. The Sikasso folks appointed people to be in charge of different parts of the dinner. Each leader was given the money to buy all of the ingredients. So the pie committee was getting things together. I decided to take on the stuffing. I figured I’d seen my mom do it a few times and I could probably handle it, then they said they had a Joy of Cooking book, so that made it plenty easy. The mashed potatoes group bought 30 kilos of potatoes. For the folks back home…that’s about 66 pounds of potatoes.

I bought 15 loaves of bread and lots of peppers, carrots, onions, celery and butter. Lots of butter. I had some people to help me out and while we broiled the bread to dry it out, we made the stuffing ji (ji = water or liquid in bambara) and then poured it over the bread and veggies. While drinking beers. I’ve never had beer at Thanksgiving, but that’s really all we have here, plus it’s hot and the wine isn’t as refreshing. I think the turkey committee bought 8 turkeys (this was for 50 or so hungry PCVs and some family visiting from the states). Both the turkey and potato committees out-sourced the cooking. However, we mashed the peeled and boiled potatoes ourselves. Please see photos. I will say that I would rather have been in freezing whether struggling through the Turkey Trot back home, but I hardly had time to think about it. I will also say that the stuffing was a hit namely because it tasted like stuffing! Mom, don’t count on me doing it ever again. :)

The night we all ate until we couldn’t stand then headed back to crash to sleep, I don’t think I’ve ever been so tired.

Mashing the Potatoes!

All the Turkeys!

The finished product!

DESSERTS!

The next day was just hanging around until Mexican night at Katie’s house. Mexican food here consists of guacamole (because they have avocadoes in Sikasso), pico de gallo, tortillas, BEANS (with cumin or taco seasoning), ground beef (with cumin or taco seasoning), lettuce, and melted cheese sauce (melted Laughing Cow cheese with hot pepper)…in Kayes we also have rice. When it was all ready there was a very long line and lots of smiling faces. The food was incredible and again the beer very refreshing. The ladies of Sikasso planned a FABULOUS weekend.

The next day we headed out to the Woroni Waterfalls. Woroni is just the name of the village near the falls. The falls are a ten minute walk into the bush from the village. Everything was planned by the people from that region: transport, food and clean water. They brought all the food, lunch, dinner and breakfast, a water filter and kept us all pretty happy. The falls were beautiful and incredibly relaxing. It was cooler by the falls because of the breeze the falling water created so when I finally went to sleep I got to wear a hat, fleece jacket and cuddle into my sleeping bag.

The next day we headed back to Sikasso and then I went with Susie back to her village. Sean (who lives up north and speaks Sonrai) and Rachel were headed in our direction so we hopped a bus together. The bus happened to be FULL of Sonrai people, so Sean became famous. The bus was so full that we all barely found seats and our bags had to sit in the aisle. I was in the back of the bus while Susie, Sean and Rachel were in the first row. When anyone not in the very front had to get out they had to climb across the seats to the door.
Usually when people bring small children with them the kids have to sit on mom’s lap, but the woman next to me had an infant and two daughters under 5 years old, so one ended up sitting on my backpack in the aisle. About halfway through the trip she came and sat on my lap. At one point I called up the aisle for Susie. After yelling her name a few times three of four women chimed in to help “Sus, Sus, Shi Shi, Sushi!” Whenever I needed her attention after that I just asked the women to call her. Susie and I got off before Sean and Rachel in her village, Kimparana. We greeted her host dad then settled in. I set up my mosquito net tent and Susie opted to sleep in it…when she was unzipping it, she said to me, “Emily, no offense…but your tent smells like pee.” I’m not sure why she thought I would take offense to this, but we quickly surmised that the little girl who was sleeping on my pack on the bus must have peed on the top of my bag, where my tent was packed, during the trip. Great. So we put it outside to deal with it later. Luckily the mosquitoes weren’t bad. We passed the time greeting folks and chatting, and also planning our lives post Peace Corps. Only 8 ish months left, which feels like nothing! I’ll find out in May the exact dates of my departure in August or September!
We headed in to San on Tuesday to check email and find out bus schedules for me to get to Bamako on Thursday. When we arrived we found some very horrible news. An RPCV from Mali who had stayed in Mali to work had been fatally injured in an accident in a village in Mopti. I did not know this volunteer well but many of my friends did and my condolences and heart go out to them and her family. On my way back to Bamako on what should have been an 8 hour bus ride, there was an accident where a bus filled with people had hit a semi-truck. The bus was tipped over across the road so no one could pass. I was 40 km from Bamako so I called Peace Corps after the drive of my bus said it would be another 3 to 4 hours. It was 8 pm when I called and I was worried about being there too late. I arrived in Bamako in time to go out with some friends. I went out to the club, No Stress, after lots of dancing and free drinks from the owner I didn’t get home until 6 am.