Thanksgiving fun

I’m in Sikasso but heading back to site today or tomorrow. I came in to celebrate thanksgiving with PCVs. There was a good deal of volunteers in town and we had a great time, the food was delicious and it was nice to see people I usually don’t see. I helped plan the thing so I was kinnda busy the day of and the day before but we ended up having one of the best meals ever. We actually had turkey (the first ones I’ve had since in Mali) 2 of which were deep fried. There were mashed potatoes, gravy, stuffing, green beans, squash, vegetables, and salad, all of which was homemade. Then we had fruit salad and pies for dessert. The next day we had another incredible meal at Katie Cannon’s house in Sikasso city- it was Mexican, and again everything was fresh and hand made except for the sour cream like yogurt we found at a larger shop in Sikasso, anyway it was great. I also went camping for the first time to Warani. It’s a place about 60km south of Sikasso with really cool waterfalls, that I had yet to visit, so I went along for the first time and we had a blast, I got a lot of pictures and I’ll try to put some up. It was one of the few times I found it hard to believe we were in Mali, it was so beautiful and green and clean, unlike much of Mali and there were no Malians to be found- Malians in general are afraid of the water and I guess they have to sacrifice chickens before they can go in and swim there so as to appease the water monsters, I didn’t see any though.
I did see a monkey the other day. I was waiting on the side of the road to go to Sikasso and low and behold there was a monkey stepping out of the bushes, I was really excited but also wanted to scare him away because if he keeps hanging out there he’d be dead in no time.
Did I mention I ate rat? It was a big field rat not the dirty sewer kind, it was actually pretty tasty. I also had a large wild cat; it was ok, I preferred the rat. Speaking of rats I’ve been having a hell of a rat problem, they’re these nasty smelling rats that are bigger than mice and make a loud squeaking sound and run around my house at night, and they bite so cats won’t touch em, so my homologue, Abli said he was going to set up a trap to catch it while I was gone, let’s hope it worked.
We should be starting our soak pit and wash area project soon in village. Otherwise I’ve just been teaching a health education class to the sixth graders and facilitating soccer with the sixth grade girls. I started weighing babies at the health center in the nearby town, I’m hoping we can start something similar in my village to improve child growth surveillance and nutrition in my village. Oh, I also started tutoring my homologue’s younger sister, Diarrah. She’s in fifth grade and can’t read or even do basic math. It has been the most frustrating experience in Peace Corps, because she is not some freak case, all the kids are in the same boat as her. It really makes me worry about the future of Mali. Even the older people recognize the poor quality of education nowadays as compared to their time. I can speak French to women who have had a sixth grade education in the seventies and they’ll understand me but the kids nowadays don’t understand squat, seventh graders can’t even greet me properly in French.
I’ll be heading to the magical land of Bamako next weekend to turn in two project proposals 1-build a maternity in my village and 2-train a woman from my village to become a matron. I haven’t been to Bamako forever and I hate going because I always spend a lot of money.