Risky Business Swears In...

So on Thursday morning, I officially swore in as a Peace Corps Volunteer, with all the other Risky Business stageres. I had been slightly ill the night before, so I missed the talent show and other fun times at Tubaniso to go hang out in Bamako at the med unit. It was hard for me to get back into the swing of celebrating after the ceremony, so I just vegged at the American club; watched some movies, ate way too much good food, and spaced out. We went to a hotel after that, to get ready for a night out on the town. I wasn't sure I was ready for any such thing, but I ended up rooming with Owen and Amanda, and we met up with Eric and Cat for dinner. We went to a place that made brick-oven pizzas and I had a vegetarian calzone. A few hits of whiskey from Eric's Nalgene sort of smoothed the edges of the kind of rough week I had. Much better than that was just sitting and chatting with those wonderful people. I suddenly felt loved and safe and cozy out of nowhere.

I had been feeling very lost and outside, as if everyone in the stage had made real friends in these two months except me. It's not true. I have made friends, real friends even. Those four I just mentioned certainly fall into that category, along with the other Soundougoubaians, especially Colleen. Koutiala kaw are still seeming awesome-sauce to me, although I don't know them as well just yet. The thing is... Now that I've bonded with these kids, I'm separated from almost all of them for the next three months. But we had a pretty awesome night together in Bamako, first. I barely drank any alcohol (well, you know me, that would be fun and I hate fun), and I was pretty exhausted because I hadn't been able to sleep very much the night before or nap, but I danced my pants off. Not literally... my pants stayed on, but the music was pumping at both clubs and everyone was feeling it. I retired before the end, but I thought 3am was late enough to be respectable. And then I got up and went back to Tubaniso and prepared to move to the middle of nowhere.

In order to achieve anything at all meaningful, I need to be trusted by my community and to be able to understand them. I mean really understand them, not just know what they're saying. Both of those goals, trust and understanding, can pretty much only be achieved slowly and with much much greeting and chatting. Greeting is so key in this culture. You might never have seen someone before in your life, but if you greet them, they're your friend and will help you out of a bind or offer you up the last meal they can afford for a week. So I'm going to study Bambara until I dream in it, and get basic greetings in Minankan. I'm going to greet and greet and greet. I'm going to learn the layout of my village, and I want to learn every last one of their names. All 1000 of them. Last names, at least, because acknowledging some one's last name is a form of greeting.

This should be easy, since I think that over half are the same as my new last name. And kids don't count. Everyone is above me in the hierarchy except kids and single women and poor young men, so their names will probably come last. Except that I'll probably want to be friends with the kids and single women first. The thing is that I don't have a real place in this society. A woman my age (23) should be married with several kids right now, and because I'm not, I'm less of a woman. In fact, I often get relegated to a whole third gender, allowed to eat and work with both but clearly not a part of either. But as of yet, I get more respect for that instead of less. They don't know how to treat me, so they treat me like an honored guest. I need to achieve a balance where they still respect me, without putting me on a pedestal of Crazy Toubabness.

And right now, I'm going to go buy cheese, because I'm in Koutiala and I can. Hopefully I'll have grilled cheese for lunch, and that will be glorious. Ana (my new Malian name) out. Peace!