Two days ago was the one month mark from leaving home (but who's counting!?) While most days have seemed to drag on as some of the longest days of my life, the month has flown by. I owe my salvation and sanity to the medical unit in Bamako. I had heard of this magical place with comfy mattresses and AC, but never allowed myself to think of it for long. Finally, after a four day escalated bout with amoebas, I checked myself in. What a good idea! Movies and ice cream and pizza! Oh My!



As it turns out, Africa's pretty dirty and it's hard to avoid getting poop in your food.



Four gatorade packs and an antiparasitic later, I was back with my homestay family. They insist I must have gotten sick from the clean bleached water at Tubaniso, but I just don't have the language (or the heart) to tell them otherwise...



I now realize that I have become a complete characature of myself. Everything involves a huge hand gesture or body movement that accompanies my broken Bambara. "Hello! How are you? how is your family? and your husband!? I am on my way to the place that I study! With my American friends! Then I will eat, and then I will dance! May God increase the blessings of this day!" Seriously, I've said all that... a lot.



Each morning I wake up to my host sister, Mama, saying my name about 8 times before I answer. I haven't thought of a clever enough way to tell her to stop bothering me a 6:30 am, so I just say, "No, mama! I am sleepy. I want to wash myself" And then I get up, carry my things for the shower outside, grab my bucket of water and head to the Nyegen. Bucket baths are my best alone time, so I cherish them. Balancing clothes and toiletries on the wall, delicately soaping up while trying not to drop the bar down the hole in the cement floor (I've lost one brand new lavender oatmeal soap and two razors... I have nightmares about dropping my toothbrush and sunglasses down there too). When I get back to my room accross the courtyard, Mama is there waiting for me. She has made my bed, swept my floor, and has tea and an assortment of "breakfast" items waiting for me.

"Drink tea Alima. Drink it, Drink it." she says. She's got the most attitude I've ever seen in a sixteen year old and I kinda like it.

"Ok mama! let me put my clothes on first."

I'm sweating by now, since I've been out of the shower for 8 seconds, and I'm trying to decide if I should put mosquito lotion on first or sunscreen, but it all just mixes with the sweat and runs off my skin by the time I leave for school. "Eat the bread, Alima. Eat it. Eat the Siri (rice porridge). Eat. Eat Alima." I try to curtail the lb of sugar and cup of powdered milk she puts in everything, but fail. Then I scarf, so as not to be rude, say I'm full about 4 times before she believes me, and head off to school in my diabetic coma.



Recently, I've discovered that my new BFF, "Muso Kura" (Amanda, who also went to CU Boulder and who's mother's name is Kathy Duncan. I'm not kidding, Mom! totally a "Parent Trap" moment.), gets the best food because her host mom is an amazing cook. This is where my life in the states has translated perfectly into my Malian lifestyle. I stop by her house around meal time every day and graze, then get my second supper of "to" and onion sauce with my family. It's great becuase it's rude not to eat when you pay a visit during meal time, and this way I don't offend my host mom who doesn't know how to cook anything but millet gluten yuckiness!

I had one of those strange moments a few days ago when I realized my eating situation was dire in comparison to Amandas. I went over to her house almost to tears after being served rancid four day old rice without much of an appetite due to the parasites. She was just getting ready to eat and said, "That's it, we're having beans and you're eating here from now on." Her mother brought her a table. A table! "WHAT???????" I said, "You eat off a table!?" Well, yeah Alima, what do you eat off of? "THE GROUND!" We laughed. She even had a table cloth. Needless to say her family is happy to serve me because I eat A LOT when i'm there.



Originally, when the children saw a group of us walking through town they'd yell, "Toubabu! Toubabu!" (white person! white person!) but now, because I have pretty much become the poster child for integration, the new word for "white person" is, "Alima Jan! Alima Jan!" The other volunteers tell me that the little children yell that to them, even when I'm not there. Well, atleast I'm integrating!