Commercials stress me out

A bad picture of Marshall and Ian looking at the Sunday circulars

It took less than 24 hours for the commercialism that permeates this here country of ours to infect us to the bones.  After a visit to my nephew's house and dear friends that put us up in Eugene while we waited for our place to be ready, we had needs that had evaded us for months.  Their toy collections were intimidating and it didn't take long once we were settled for Ian to look at me one morning and say, "Marshall needs more stuff."  

"Stuff" was defined as riding toys, learning consoles and things with wheels.  No matter that this child's "toy" box in Mali was about the size of two shoe boxes at its biggest and mainly filled with cardboard tubes, old water bottles and other trash.   No matter they were reduced to fitting in my diaper bag on return.  He needed stuff.  Our parental egos were quickly beaten to a pulp and we subconsciously vowed to keep Target in business, whatever it took.

9 months later, TV commercials still stress me out.  They make me worry about my bills, drive me to think about high paying jobs and make me feel inadequate at every turn.  I can't go to Target without spending at least 20% more than I had intended.  And now, it will take at least half the moving truck to move Marshall alone.  The scariest thing to me is that we are totally conscious of it, yet unmoved by our realizations.

Sure, I could turn off the TV, move to a commune and leave it all behind.  I could throw out all the toys and focus on sticks in our garden and the excitement of what can be made with crayons and a piece of recycled mail.  But where's the fun in that?

The wandering salesman

So in downtown Bamako, you can purchase just about anything you need from the comfort of your porch.  Wedding gifts, shoes, food items of all kinds...its really quite convenient.

Why is it here that the only thing, from time to time, that works like this is the ice cream truck?  Can't you just imagine if the ice cream truck carried other things?  Some of my favorites would be:

Coffee

Convenience store items

Diapers

Pharmaceuticals

High protein snacks

Flip flops

Pressure!

So how, in the world, do I make life back here sound NEARLY as exciting as life in Mali.  How do I talk about daily life with out being just another mom/foodie blog.

Am I that good of a writer?

Am I that good of a mom?

So much pressure!

Anyway, here is life today, a normal day.  Above is Marshall zoning out to Sprout on TV while I finish my breakfast.  

The oversized sectional is used for nightly TV viewing of our favorite shows, sipping back on microbrews, catching up with friends and reading the paper.  We converse about odd Google news stories, what the neighbors are doing and "complex" parenting decisions, that, in my opinion, we wouldn't have given two thoughts about 9 months ago.

Is it good to be back?  Well, its been a while now and, frankly, that is quite a loaded question.

Stay tuned as I make the transitions to the blog to reflect our current location.

Leavin' on a jet plane...

In less than 36 hours we will be out of Mali.  Today is our last full day here.

Marshall, I promise soon to try to update this for you and all our other readers with all that has really been going on the last few months.  Pictures from your first birthday, trips to the museum, videos of walking on your own, stories of the great walks we take, mini adventures, shopping and the drama of saying goodbye.

Its so crazy, times like these.  Mali has been letting us know its time for us to go for a couple of months now.  Too many beggars, to many people trying to scam us, too many damn mosquitos, too much nasty raw sewage and flooded streets.  We are done with this experience for now and ready for the next step(sorta).  Ready for comforts, community and native language.  Ready to show our son the last days of an Oregon summer, have him meet his aunt and uncle and reconnect with all his other loved ones and dear friends who haven't seen him in so long.

But of course, such things are always bitter sweet and as our time gets closer, we are both taken off guard by how emotional this is.  This experience has been incredible for our family.  I don't regret doing this at all.  Not one thing like Peace Corps, but equally as challenging.  

I've totally fallen back in love with Ian again and again.  What that has to do with Mali and what that has to do with being new parents together is a bit indistinguishable as both provided opportunities to see new things in one another. But, I think being able to have it all happen, here, at the birthplace of our relationship provided a context that added depth and richness to this part of our story that I will be forever grateful for.  We have had to rely on each other for things we never had to before and Ian, for one, exceeded all my expectations.  I feel so lucky to have such a brilliant, gorgeous, confident, strong, mature, fun and committed partner.  I am so blessed to have such a strong marriage.

Luckily, I can take him and my darling amazing son with me.  Them along with this blog, thousands of pictures and a handful of souvenirs will act as reminders of this chapter of our lives.  But there is so much we have to leave behind, and for that, I am a bit sad.  I just thought I needed to take a minute to reflect on what I'll miss....

Friendships

Not having to look at the clock

The sense of confidence that comes with living in another country the way we have

The long walks that need no destination

People seeing my son as a joy and not a burden.  Seriously, just about everyone

Being able to trust strangers with my son.  To know that they mean him no harm and to know it at my core.

Seeing Marshall giggle at the animals on the streets, the sheep, chickens, donkeys....

Sharing the adventures of our days with Ian over dinner

The smells(sometimes) and sounds(every once in a while...)

The color

The fruit...the mangoes...

My stupid and annoying quest for a chicken.   Its made for a great story that will now come to an end.  I don't think it will be as hard in the states.

The fantasy that America has become.  We're realists.  We know its not as great as we keep thinking it is.  Sigh.  But it has become such a fantastic place in our heads, in some ways...

The kids(mostly 6 and under), although they can be SO annoying, for the most part, they are curious and sweet.  I've had fun with them, I must admit.

The freedom

So, this will most likely be the last post of Darwin in Africa, although I promise to come back with some catch up work.  I guess I'll soon change the title to Darwin out of Africa.  Stay tuned for looks back and stories of our adventures readjusting to life in the States.  From what I remember, its guaranteed to be as much of an adventure, for the first few months at least, as this one has been.

Signing off from Mali.

Happy Birthday, Marshall!

Dear, Sweet Marshall-do,

We just wanted to take a second to say a very heartfelt happy birthday to you, our amazing son.  And to recollect some of our favorite times of the past year with you...here are a few...

Holding you to sleep in the early days

All your fantastic noises(humming while eating, early grunts, important speeches of what we hear as jibberish)

Making you laugh has become one of our greatest acheivements to date.  Your laughter is so sweet and addictive.

Watching you learn to become mobile, pull yourself up, grab a toy, put food on a spoon, clap, splash the water, eat on your own, drink on your own, cruise, and, just yesterday, take your first real steps.  When you do these things, your face lights up with pure joy.

Seeing the happiness you bring to others, the walls you break down and the neverending friends you are able to make.

Growing ourselves as parents and seeing each other in new and wonderful lights full of unknown strengths, shedding insecurities and wanting to be the best we can be for you.

Marshall, we love you so much, it makes us so warm and fuzzy all inside and out every time we think about it.  We hope that we can fill all your years with us with joy, love, peace and richness and that this is merely the beginning of an incredible life for you. We know, for us, that you have already enriched ours more than you can ever know.

A very very happy birthday, sweet love bug,

Mom-mah and Dah-dee

One month shy of a year...

11 months old.  Wow we say around here.  New developments for Marshall are that he can let himself down off the bed by himself and he is really into communicating by pointing.  Oh, and I swear he's actually cuter if that is at all possible.

Sorry for my lack of posts as of late.  I've been on this nutrition research quest and have focused all of my time on line to that.  Emails are backing up too...its bad.  I'm in obsession mode...

None the less, I have thought about a lot of blog posts as of late, here are some of them:

1.  F#@king Coulibaly, or Abdolaye as you've known him, and his quest for greener pastures by overusing our phone and internet services that cost us money and bothering us with, well, just being him.

2.  Birth rituals, homebirths, etc.  I've been doing a lot of birth processing as of late.  No idea why, but think I'm finally over the insanity that was how Marshall entered this world.  So I haven't see it, but from what I understand it says a lot I would say in the post, go see "The Business of Being Born."  

3.  Getting ripped off.

4.  Made up sob stories.

5.  Eating local.  Yummy summer in Oregon.

6.  Last night's dinner(BBQ pork tenderloin with mango sweetened guacamole and pita chips.  mouth watering...).

7.  The strange things they sell outside the maternity hospital

8.  The maternity hospital and western birthing practices in Mali.

9.  Marshall's awesome new red shoes(thanks Graham!)

10.  Can our sidewalk weed cure breastcancer?

11.  Bad ass moms

12.  Long walk routes

13.  Dinner with the Fulbrighters

14.  US presence in Mali

There have been others, but thats what I can remember right now...A good smoothie recipe website summons.  Off to that.

Going home...

So by some fate of the gods, our previous flaky landlady amazingly stuck to her word and we found out we will be able to get our great place back in Eugene.  We can move in at the end of August and get back to whatever our lives are going to look like when we get back.

Kinda weird, really great.  Ian said we need to move things around a bunch so that it doesn't feel like we never left or none of this ever happened.  Oh silly boy, I don't think thats going to be a problem...

When the flowers fall from the flamboyants...

Is when the rain starts to come, according to Kara.  When we arrived at the fancy hotel for our getaway, I noticed some flowers on the ground from the flamboyants.  It was starting to cloud over.  The grey was setting in...

The sky then began to turn yellow. Besides in Mali, the only other place I've seen the sky so yellow is when the eye of Hurricane Alicia passed over Houston when I was 10. The color in these pictures is true...





We saw heat lightening as we ate dinner and awaited the downpour that never came, well, at least not while we were awake.

When we got back home, the humidity became more unbearable. We heard thundering one afternoon, lots of wind, and the sound of people running for shelter. A big storm was on its way. And then the sound of a giant faucet being turned on and the sky literally opened up. Our street became a river within minutes...

Ignore our silly family banter. I don't call Ian daddy, I promise. I was translating for Marshall who thought the splatter from the rain was the funniest thing he'd ever seen and was gesturing towards Ian as if to explain himself.

When I first opened the door to see the rain, three boys and one girl, all around 9 or 10 where hopping down the street and ran towards our open door as if they were looking for shelter. They asked me for mangos, which I thought was weird, because we don't have a mango tree and was sure that I must have misunderstood them. They were all in their undies and all freezing and confused wondering if they could seek shelter in our portico or not. They kept running in circles, kinda trying to come in, but stopping when they saw me. I stood there not quite sure what to do as they asked me for mangos and yelled to Ian in the most ridiculous way, "There are children coming inside and they are asking for mangos." The girl was shivering and I realized they would normally run inside an open door and was about to bring them in and give them all towels when Ian walked up. He smiled smugly and in a pull yourself up by your bootstraps kinda voice, he looked at the girl, specifically, and said, "You cold?"  I asked where her house was and it wasn't far, she could seek shelter there if she wanted to. The boys asked Ian for mangos and we realized they were referring to the mangos from our neighbor's tree that they thought was in our house. The girl looked at me pleadingly, Ian said something else smug and they left, the poor girl almost losing her flop along the way.  

Untitled

Apologies for the two week lag in posting!  

Life hasn't been particularly exciting or notable as of late.  I think as we cross that 6 month threshold of our time here, life begins to seem a bit normal and perhaps even a bit uninspired.  The excitement in our lives is having to turn to life back in the States and horribly tedious tasks such as plane tickets, housing, transportation, jobs...things that fill blogs with nothing but familiar ennui.

Marshall has reached a plateau in his walking, a good sign as with most stages of his, he gets to a point where we decide its never going to happen just to be surprised when it actually does.

Ian is a bit hot and burned out these days.  A true Karamogo now, he is having to work more than observe and the humidity really makes that more uncomfortable than usual.

As for me, I have to keep shifting my thoughts from what to do while here to what do do when back home.  I am keeping up with a wiggly and into everything child who makes it challenging to get the most basic tasks done and getting out of the house when I have so much that needs to be done here becomes near impossible some days.  But I love being a mom and I love this child, so I take it all in stride and do what I can when I can.

We've started a couple of new rituals around our house that albeit are a bit boring and mundane to some are things that make me all warm and fuzzy inside, all family love-ish.  We're listing to a weekly radio show together and we've started reading books to each other.  Its cozy, its cerebral and its entertaining.  I like that its something that Marshall is being exposed to.

As life has been feeling a bit mundane, Mother's Day and our stimulus check were good excuses for a bit of a get away.  We just returned yesterday from 3 days and 2 nights at the Hotel Amite, the super fancy hotel here in Bamako.  We had English TV, yummy French food room service and extra cold air conditioning.  I will try to post our spectacular view of the river sometime soon as it was one of my favorite things about the place.  Marshall had firsts of taking bubble baths in the big tub, eating dinner at a fancy restaurant(he made us proud), and going swimming.  It was a dreamy getaway and today, we are feeling a bit refreshed and ready to take on the next 3 months.

10 months...

As of today we can say 2 things significant about Marshall's life so far. First, he has now spent more of his life outside the womb than inside...that 3 extra weeks made it about a 10 month gestation. Also, as of today specifically, he's spent more time in Mali than he did in the states.

Marshall is more and more amazing everyday and we laugh more and more with him as he grows and discovers everything around him. As you can see, the walking is progressing nicely, we expect him to do it sans chair any day now...granted I think we've been saying that for about 2 months.

Lets be honest here...

We're Obama supporters in this household.  And, we're not liking what we're reading about Hilary Clinton these days.  In fact we've never been big fans.

From the moment talks of her being a presidential candidate started, I cringed.  Not because of Hilary herself, but she is a terribly polarizing figure in the states.  Talk to any Republican, event those unhappy with GW or McCain, she is not liked.  There are too many bad jokes still circulating from her husband's days in office, like it or not.  I want the Democratic party to have a chance in November, and in my opinion, she is not the way to do that.

And I'll admit, we've in some ways just blindly jumped on the "Hope Train" wanting some kind of change and currently seeing Obama as one of the only choices with promise of that.  We weren't this way from the beginning.  I was actually a bit excited by Chris Dodd's candidacy for a bit.  He is the first Returned Peace Corps Volunteer to run for president and has an impressive foreign policy record.

That brings up an important point that experience living abroad is a huge factor for us in this household.  I think foreign policy is the #1 issue in this campaign not only because of the war, China, Tibet, Darfur or any other trendy issue, but because we are increasingly interconnected to the rest of the world and our domestic issues often complicated by international sub issues, or distracted by trying to keep those that continue to dislike us at bay.

Can someone who spent a few years as a kid in Indonesia make all the difference?  Probably not single handedly, but I have more faith in him than someone who didn't.  As do others on the world stage as we see international media here being incredibly embracing of Obama and the ideas he carries with him.

But our love is not blind.  I think his health care plan is weak.  Like it or not, as well, he still has to play the DC game.  He is promise, but not the messiah. 

In addition, we find Hilary's campaign tactics unsettling, to say the least.  I also really feel strongly about 20 years of power being in the hands of but 2 families.  And I'm not sure how I feel about her stance on Israel.  I've even had moments where I think she's rigged the election.  The international stage makes it seem like she can't be nearly as popular as the votes are reflecting.  

And I'll shamefully admit it, we've had moments at particular dirty points in the campaign where we've said we'd vote for John McCain, antique, conservative and against many of our ideals and all, simply to not see her in office.  I've accused her supporters of being a bunch of thoughtless bandwagon women supporting her simply because she is a woman. 

But this morning, early this morning as Marshall decided to pull an all nighter for some reason, I read this great article on salon.com that put me in my place a bit.  As a woman, I have to admit, there is this little piece of me that feels a bit guilty for turning on a female candidate, but at the same time, I will not vote for a woman just because she is a woman.  Regardless, there is something a bit unsettling about how a female with ambition is still seen with such contempt.  I admit, I get caught up in it as well, using words I shouldn't use when she acts in a way I disapprove of and that I should be ashamed of using in front of my still innocent 10 month old son.  

I hope you take a look at the piece and think about what a female candidate really means and if she is really being given a fair shake, like her or not.  Perhaps this is a common discussion in the states, but its new to me here, and one of the first ones out of many thats actually made me pause and reflect on my stance and what I'll do in any instance.

Firsts these past 2 weeks

There seem to have been a lot of them, so thought I would share:

• Ice cream taste.  Didn't like it.  I'm not sure he's mine...
• Riding in the grocery cart child seat thing.  LOVED IT.  Frowned for about 2 seconds before we started moving around and then I think he thought he was in a parade waving and chatting with everyone.  I swear he's going to be a politician
• Sitting in a high chair.  Thank God.  And Mimi for sending the portable thing our way.  He loves it.
• Making himself laugh.  Great great skill.
• Tomato.  Was scared of it at first.  Cried when he saw it on his tray, but after expressing his discomfort with it for a while, he decided to give it a go.
• Standing on his own for a while being aware of it.
• Drinking out of a straw.

"Well, I am the Karamogo..."

We have this joke, well, perhaps its more mine, around our house, about how Ian is supposedly the only one somehow that can have insights about people or culture because, well, he "is the anthropologist." This is often said when we have differing insights about something regarding said people or cultures and is intended to remind me of his expert status.  Right...So to add to his supposed to "stop my comments in their tracks" book of phrases, he can now call himself a Karamogo as well.  Karamogo(which is Kara's full name by the way) is a master of some kind, in this instance, of the sands/divination/marrabaga.  It literally translates to teacher. 

So he's spent the past month being taught the sands and, of course our little over acheiver, mastered them in no time.  Kara had been hinting that Ian's initiation would be coming soon and earlier this week it did.  Think of it like graduating from medical school.  He still has a residency to go...Regardless, this is a big deal and we're all really proud of him.

Anyway, all sorts of things had to happen to finalize his position such as, sand readings, trips to the outskirts of town.  Here are Ian, Kara, and a goat on the final day of initiation

At the end of this day, Ian came home with 3 impressive fetishes, a marked up egg that he still needs to eat hard boiled and whole, a bag of sugar that represents "goodness" that we all have to taste from, and a hindquarter of the above goat.  

I debated what to do with the leg o' goat and thought that I should just take it to our local smoker to cook it up for me, but after a little research online, decided to do it myself.  So, turns out, according to my foodie websites, that goat is making a comeback Stateside.  Its being sold for $10 a pound at farmers markets and is being touted as a low calorie, low fat meat.  I found all sorts of recipes from tasty jerked leg of goat, to Mexican goat stews, to even a Molto Mario recipe that involved mint and lemons that sounded pretty tasty.  

Unfortunately, most of these required a grill with a certain level of control I could not achieve (or didn't have the patience to) or a key ingredient that I couldn't get or properly replace.  So here is what I did with it and I think it turned out pretty tasty.  Marshall did to.  

Roasted BBQ goat leg

1 hindquarter of goat, bone in

2T minced garlic

1/2 c white vinegar

1/2 c bottled BBQ sauce (or homemade, I just used some Jack Daniel's Spicy Original Sauce that we got at the commisary)

Mix garlic, vinegar and BBQ sauce together and marinate goat in this mixture overnight.  Heat oven to 350 and roast lightly covered with foil for 1.5 hours.  Uncover for last 10 minutes of cooking.  I flipped it half way through as well.

It turned out good, albeit a bit overdone(I cooked for 2 hours thinking it needed it...), but really tender and flavorful, almost like something you'd find at a roadside BBQ place.  I highly recommend picking up some goat if you can find some.

As for our Karamogo, he's already dropped the phrase when being picked on for not doing something as if he was above it.  Jokingly, of course...right...?

Zoo

Last week we made a family outing we'd been trying to get to for a while.  We went to the zoo.  Yes, Bamako has a zoo.  It was a required field trip of ours when we were in the Peace Corps.  Although we remembered it as a depressing place, we couldn't pass up the opportunity to see Marshall respond to some crazy animals.  

It was a great time.  Marshall really liked seeing the animals, well, we all did, as depressing as it was...you can just tell the animals aren't getting enough to eat and some of them are in cages too small.  But at the same time, I give Mali credit for investing in it.  There were parents and children there learning and interacting, and isn't that what the zoo is really all about?

Not pictured here is a relatively new fish and reptile house we saw.  It was actually really nice by local standards.  We received a private tour by their keeper.  Ian showed off his knowledge.  They exchanged phone numbers and I'm sure will soon be besties.  Here are some highlights.  Apologies for there only being one family shot. 

A small antelope thing, perhaps a bush buck?  

So American zoos give these animals African names.  African zoos give them Western names.  This is Leo.

A Jackal looking frighteningly like our dog Flynt.

The lion enclosure.  The white specs you see are picked clean bones of thier last few meals.  Turns out the zoo is where Bamako's donkey's go to die.

A curious and endearing warthog

One of two monkeys tied to trees to interact more with the public.  Marshall had a ball with these guys.  He screamed at them, they screamed back.  He waved his arms with glee.

So, according to a plaque on the wall of the snack bar, the signs were all done by a high school graphic design class.  Here is the manatee that is no longer there...

Marshall's other favorite animal(besides the monkey) he saw.  He really responded to this porcupine.

The first animal Marshall saw at the zoo is one he sees everyday, a donkey.  They are used as filler, it seems, for enclosures since left empty by other animals.

Maribou stork.  Ugly bird.

The butt of a chimp that was posturing at us.  Marshall thought it was funny to be mooned.

Crocodiles or "Bama", the root of the name of Bamako because they are in the river that cuts through town.

So two funny things about the signage here...first, the sign on the left is asking that you please respect the fencing as all the animals are dangerous, including the domesticated goats it seems.  The one on the right is asking that you do not give the animals your cigarettes.

Creepy hyenas

Hot and cranky leopards

Yeah...so, no there are no dinosaurs still in Africa in case you were wondering...Mali's not Jurassic Park.  But here we are walking out of the zoo and down towards the museum to find a taxi to take us home.  Ian stops dead in his tracks and lets out a bad word and we see this...all alone and with out explanation....we walk up a little further to catch a glimpse inside the gates and find...

...this...which is all built into the natural surroundings.  a couple of teenage boys walking down the street come up behind us and Ian asks what this is.  One of them says that these are Sunjdata's people...right....so there were cave men and dinosaurs still in Mali in the 13th century?

As we get closer to the museum(which is redone as of 2003, BEAUTIFUL on the outside and the definite place of our next family outing), we finally see a sign on the front of a gate leading in.  Turns out it is the "Jardin de Prehistorie" or the Prehistoric Garden.  We're looking forward to checking it out.