Reflection: A Day in the Life of a Peace Corps Volunteer

Though we complain frequently about the lack of structure to our jobs and the way that things move at a painfully slow pace here, we often forget how hard it is to imagine what goes on in our daily life for those of you in the States. We’ve procrastinated on writing a post like this because, due to the lack of structure of our job, our daily tasks can vary considerably. For example, Jim works in Duguba (15 k away) 3 days out of the week so his schedule is particularly dynamic. In Duguba, he’s busy attending meetings with local NGOs, the mayor, village associations, etc.  Twice a month, I accompany him to talk to the district education office.  Then Wednesday is Market Day here in Kongodugu so most of Wednesday is filled with once a week events like catching up with neighbors, doing laundry by hand, and buying everything we’ll need for the week. Friday is the holy day for Muslims and Sunday is our holy day, so even this misalignment can get in the way of getting work done efficiently. Therefore, its a bit difficult to sum it all up but I’ll do my best to cover the days when we stay in Kongodugu.

 

6AM in Hot Season/ 7AM in Cold Season: We wake up, make a quick western breakfast of peanut butter, bread, and tea or, if we’re lucky, some oatmeal we bought in town. During certain parts of the year we might even have scrambled chicken or guinea fowl eggs; however, since it hasn’t rained since September, we are currently in “egg problem time” as they say in Bambara because chickens or guinea fowl have stopped laying eggs and won’t start again for a few more months.

7/8AM the morning chores: We walk over to the pump, water our garden, carry back a few buckets of water to last us the rest of the day, and do our dishes from the night before by hand. We also take our first bucket bath of the day. For those unfamiliar with “bucket baths,” this simply means showering using a bucket of water and a small cup to pour water over your head. We then sweep our house. This is important because a.) the clay soil becomes a fine dust at this time of year and gets over everything b.) it keeps out the bugs and scorpions who might like to hide in corners.

9:30AM  After finishing our morning chores as quickly as possible, we are usually out and about greeting people in our village while it is still cool enough to keep a smile on your face for more than 20 minutes. Jim might head across town to get an update from the women’s association on their new garden or stop at the local carpenter’s house to see if he’s finished the bench we ordered. This is also a good time to work on maintaining the compost or garden. Joye might use this time to sit in on some classes at the school, to speak with members of the school board and discover why no one is showing up to meetings, or to meet with the village chief and get his approval for a training event she wants to hold in the next few months.

11AM It’s HOT! So this is the time of day when people stop working and find a nice shady spot to relax. We usually get out one of the hundreds of books Peace Corps gave us at this point and look through it for project ideas, vocabulary, directions about more technical aid.  We’ll write out lesson plans, meeting agendas, or simply brainstorm about how best to get people motivated to work with us.

12:30PM Lunchtime :) We now eat with the village chief's family 4 days out of the week, with Joye’s work partner's family 2 days/wk, and at market 1 day/week. There’s a whole other post about food so I won’t go into that here. Lunch is a big time for cultural exchange. We talk about American and Malian customs, explain that yes, peanuts and corn are found in America. But in America we cook our peanuts, and then eat them. No, people don’t know how to farm and don’t know where their peanuts come from. (That always inspires an “Eh Ala!")No, you can’t walk to America, you need to take a plane. Yes, its THAT far away. Why? Because there’s an ocean (In Bambara, a big salty water) in between us. Yes, planes can fly over water. No, I’m sorry, I can’t take your child with me to America when I go back. Etc. Etc.

1:30PM  Tea: Malians Love LOVE LOVE their tea. Every household has a tea set and makes tea a few times a day. We’ll elaborate on this in another post, but it suffices to say that tea is accompanied by more chatting and this is a huge part of Malian culture. They will be appalled if you want to get up and go work before 3PM. But to an extent, we can also use this time to observe people in their own homes and explain why we think its important for girls to attend school, or to wash your hands with soap after going to the bathroom, or to use a bathroom and not simply go in your field. 

3PM : Meetings are often held in the afternoon. Joye might meet with the school board or sit in on the literacy center class and provide feedback. This week, Jim led an afternoon training on how to improve your soil for gardening.  But to be honest, plans for meetings, etc, often fall through because people don’t show up on time or at all (not many even have watches) and we may end up simply reading a classic novel. Mali has certainly taught us to be flexible and patient because no matter how hard you try to plan out your day, something always arises which completely alters your plan. For example, today, when we planned on meeting with the radio director about our show and going to the bank. Then, we found out that it was Mohammed’s birthday, so everyone takes the day off!

5PM We once again water the garden, maybe harvest some fresh veggies, and fill our 20 liter containers at the pump. We take our second bucket bath of the day. After bleaching our veggies, we start making dinner (simultaneously shattering stereotypes of men who don’t cook!), often American style spaghetti, stir-fry, or homemade soup.

6:30PM Dinner! Since Jim and I often go our separate ways for a good portion of the day, we spend this time recounting the day’s events and often reminiscing over America and its glorious gastronomic delicacies, filling in the blank “If I could have any food in the world right now, I’d have a _____” For those who are curious, yesterday it was a toasted blueberry bagel and cream cheese from Tim Horton's. The day before it was a spicy chicken sandwich from Wendy’s.

8PM: After dinner, Jim gets out his computer (in the house of course since we don’t like showing it off to villagers). He is currently a Masters International student at Michigan State so sometimes he does work related to his thesis. He is also the head of the Food Security Task Force so he also works on tools to help future volunteers like a baseline survey and training materials. Joye has started a “study hall” once a week, providing a quiet well-lit area for children to come and study their lessons since they often can not do this in their own home. She also has a small group of children who come to our home for weekly evening English lessons. On off days, we’ll work together on radio scripts.

10pm: Bedtime! We tuck in our mosquito net, an impregnable fortress against all weird Malian creepy-crawlies who want to come toward our reading light. We read a chapter or two, and fall asleep. (If its too hot, we douse our clothes with water and that helps cool you down enough to fall asleep.)

All in a day’s work!  One last point I’d like to make is that every PCV’s job and experience is completely different. Some volunteers live in big cities while some in small towns. Some have a more structured 9-5 job and some volunteers’ work schedule is defined by village life. This blog post simply reflects our personal experience/assignment. Also, we’re still getting projects off the ground so the schedule will certainly change in the future.

Let us know if you have questions!

.~Joye (and Jim)