Update: Busy Bees Need A Break

This past week has been exhausting. It feels as if we accomplished as much work as we had in the past six months, which means our productivity increased at more than an exponential rate. Together, we recorded another six half-hour radio shows, bringing the total up to fourteen, in which we talked about clean water, malaria, girls education, mud stoves, mango drying, and tree planting, all in Bambara. We also kept working with local leaders to develop a project proposal for fixing the broken water pumps in our village.

Additionally, Joye collected firewood with a bunch of women from our local church (notice in the picture above the woman is cutting down trees with a baby on her back!), and co-wrote a proposal for a “Take-Your-Daughter-To-Work” Day project for all volunteers in our sub-region. Also, she helped the 6^th grade to write letters to American penpals, delivered 150 literacy books to village literacy centers, planted nutritious moringa trees with a community school, and still managed to cook delicious dinners every night.

    

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

James, for his part, led a formation on dry-season tree planting in nearby village, mediated a discussion between rival jatropha biofuel producers, encouraged a women’s group to experiment with food drying in Duguba, and trained local enumerators to conduct a survey in our village for his Master’s thesis.

And on top of all that, we had to prepare for the reason we were so rushed in the first place: we are going on a much anticipated vacation. This trip and the awesomeness that is mangoes were the only things that kept us sane. And now, for the next three weeks, we will be in Morocco and France, eating fresh fruit, catching cooler temperatures, and enjoying travel by train, not bus. We’ll be sure to update you on our adventures when we return. Until then…

~James and Joye

Update: Work Away From Village

Hello everyone. We thought we’d write a quick update before returning back to site today, after we’ve been away from site for twelve days. However, these twelve days have not been spent travelling or relaxing, but rather keeping busy with Peace Corps work in Sikasso (our regional capital) and Bamako (Mali’s capital).

The first six days or so we spent getting to and working in Sikasso for a regional in-service training. Peace Corps provided lodging, food, and transportation for our counter-parts and ourselves to participate in a series of workshops on food security, community needs assessments (see “PACA & Community Priorities”), and home-made income-generating activities (ie. soap, improved porridge, & mosquito repellant). We also heard from a number of 2nd year Peace Corps volunteers about what they were able to accomplish, and how they went about doing it. This was probably the most valuable for us as we are beginning to do some funded work as well.

Afterward, the last six days were spent in Bamako, where James was set to give a presentation on the Food Security Community Needs Assessment (FS-CAT, see “Promoting Food Security”). Even though we had to wait a few days for the timeslot to arrive, we kept busy. Joye worked on a funding proposal for the pump repair project to take place in our village and also laid some ground-work for a “Take your daughter to work” day event. James translated his Master’s thesis survey into Bambara and prepared for his presentation. Then, a day before, we travelled to Peace Corps summer camp (Tubaniso) to meet the new volunteers and talk with the married couples about their experiences thus far. When the presentation finally came, it went over very well, and right afterward, we left for site.

The reason we are so anxious to return to site is because we will be leaving it again in a week, but this time not for work in Bamako, but rather for vacation. Another reason we went to Bamako was to make some final preparations for our 2.5 week trip to Morocco and France, which is set to begin in about 10 days. So, look forward to hearing about that on a later post!

Hope all is well State-side. Thanks for reading.

-James (& Joye)