This past Thursday, after much speculation about what the actual date was going to be, the mudding of the mosque in Djenne finally happened! Hot season is also construction season in Mali, since people aren’t working in the fields or gardening, and they want to repair/build things before the rain starts. Being the largest mud structure in the world, the mudding has a big tradition in Djenne. Lots of people from the town all get together to help, especially the kids. They started the afternoon before the official day bringing mud up from the riverbanks to the front of the mosque. I was told that each quartier in Djenne is its own “team” and so I think those were the groups I saw that afternoon running with Malian flags, chanting as they went back and forth for mud. Supposedly each quartier team has its own section of the mosque to work on and they kind of have a race to see who will finish their part first. I’m not sure who one this year, but I think they had to switch things up a little since an NGO doing repairs to the inside of the mosque had already done some parts.
The morning of the actual mudding, they started at around 6am (to beat the heat that is pretty intense even by 10am). Boys were in charge of transporting mud, hauling it up and down the sides of the mosque, and mixing it by jumping up and down in it. Girls carried water on their heads to and from wells or the river to mix the mud. Of course, all the children participated in the throwing of mud at each other, which at first seemed mostly to be boys versus girls, but quickly escalated into hit anyone you can (and probably bonus points for getting a toubab, but I’m just guessing). Needless to say, but about 10am everyone was splattered with mud and people were starting to get a little wild, so my friends and I made our escape. I don’t think this blog entry really does the whole day justice; it really was amazing to watch people scaling the walls of the mosque barefoot and throwing baskets of mud up and down to each other. Thus, some pictures hopefully to follow so you can get a better idea of what it was like!
Monday, June 8, 2009
The Cat Came Back
I almost lost a member of my Djenne family this week, but thankfully she narrowly escaped death (but not a traumatizing bath afterwards!). Sally and Jack (mom and one kitten that are left at my house) have been spending more and more time outside when I’m not at the house so they can catch lizards and run around. Usually, they come in when I get home in the early afternoon or evening, since their food and water bowls are on my porch. A few days ago, however, only Jack was waiting by more door when I got in. I figured his mom had probably come while I was still gone, given up, and found somewhere else to hang out. By 10pm though, there was still no sign of her, so I asked the Aminata (woman who lives across from me) if she had seen her. She told me to check the roof, and I knew there was a little room up there where the cats sometimes go, so I headed up. Turns out, she was not in the room or on the roof, but had fallen down the nyegen that’s upstairs! (Note: the nyegen is basically the latrine, and in Djenne most of them are on the second floor. Luckily, this nyegen is not the one that everyone uses, so it was basically just a whole with a dirt floor). I could look down and see her in there, and she didn’t look hurt or even like she really wanted to come out. I went back down, and told Aminata, who seemed to think Sally went down there often and could get out on her own. I figured maybe this was why they didn’t use that nyegen, since there was a hole to the outside or something, so I waited until morning to see if she could escape without help. When Kate and I ventured up the next day though, she was still in there! She wasn’t really crying, but you could tell she was getting hungry and thirsty because she wasn’t moving to fast. We tried everything we could think of to get her out; everything from lowering baskets of fish down to tying a hole in a rope and attempting to loop it over her. After over an hour and one sacrificed basket, we had to give up. It was really hard to do, but we just couldn’t think of anything else. My host family still kept saying she would get out, but we didn’t know how. The next day I spent the day in another village painting a mural, and when I got back everyone was asking about the cat. I was kind of wishing they would stop talking about it because they kept saying how she was probably still alive (which made me think of her starving down there). My host mom told me I could call someone to get her, but I don’t know anyone in Djenne who rescues cats, so they said they would get someone. I really thought there was no way, since Kate and I had tried for so long, but I figured it couldn’t hurt to try. And lo and behold, after only 5 minutes with a rope and some sort of special knot, Sally was free! She was definitely starving, and still didn’t smell good, but other than that no worse off than before! In fact, I’m pretty sure the bath I gave her (with antibacterial soap!) was more traumatizing than falling down the nyegen. Jack was very happy to have his mom back, and my host family is going to cover the hole so she can’t fall down there again. Always something to keep it exciting here in Djenne!
Wedding Weekend
I know it’s been a while since I’ve updated, but I had typed these entries as they happened so I’ll just post them all!
In between stopping at the med unit in Bamako and heading to Segou for a training session with an NGO, I spent the weekend with another volunteer in her site (rather than come all the way back up to Djenne for just a few days, and also it’s always fun to see everyone else’s villages!). I couldn’t have picked a better time, because it turned out to be wedding weekend! In her village, all the weddings take place on the same weekend. We think this is to prevent each family from having to give money to every griot, because if the weddings are all happening at the same time, they have to split up and can’t all be at the same one. Usually you are born into a griot family here, and they generally attend weddings, naming ceremonies, and other events and give people blessings. They sing songs about the people and how they are going to find money or peace in the future, and then whoever the song was about gives the griot money. In a bigger village, if your wedding was the only one happening, you might have to pay a lot of griots for coming (even though you didn’t invite them!). Anyway, it was really great to be in her village that weekend since a member of her host family was getting married and we got the inside scoop as to weddings in Mali (or at least in her village). Marriages here seem to just be about totally different things than what I was used to in the States. For example, it’s possible that the woman has never met the man she is going to marry, and normally the marriages are arranged by family members. Also, in the case of the man we knew, he was marrying his second wife, who was probably not more than 16 years old. The saddest part for me was that these women are basically leaving their families forever and going to live with someone they maybe don’t know at all. Obviously, that’s pretty upsetting to think about, and the women cry during a lot of the wedding events. I’ve been told that this is what they are supposed to do, because they aren’t supposed to seem excited, but I also think they are probably genuinely sad to be leaving their families and friends. One girl’s husband had even come from a different country just to marry her, and then they were returning, so she may never see her family again.
I don’t want this to sound like weddings are all bad here, but there are definitely some sad parts. There’s tons of eating of good food, dancing, and visiting, and family members travel from far away if they can to be there for the wedding of a relative. The bride also gets to stay inside for at least three days, which might sound boring (and probably is a little) but I think it’s probably also nice for the women to have all their meals cooked, and not have to work so hard for a little while. They also get really dressed up to go to the mayor’s office, and everyone comes and gives blessings and greets the new couple.
All in all, it was definitely interesting to see, and something that I probably wouldn’t have gotten to experience unless someone I knew well in Djenne was getting married (and pretty much everyone I know already is married!).
In between stopping at the med unit in Bamako and heading to Segou for a training session with an NGO, I spent the weekend with another volunteer in her site (rather than come all the way back up to Djenne for just a few days, and also it’s always fun to see everyone else’s villages!). I couldn’t have picked a better time, because it turned out to be wedding weekend! In her village, all the weddings take place on the same weekend. We think this is to prevent each family from having to give money to every griot, because if the weddings are all happening at the same time, they have to split up and can’t all be at the same one. Usually you are born into a griot family here, and they generally attend weddings, naming ceremonies, and other events and give people blessings. They sing songs about the people and how they are going to find money or peace in the future, and then whoever the song was about gives the griot money. In a bigger village, if your wedding was the only one happening, you might have to pay a lot of griots for coming (even though you didn’t invite them!). Anyway, it was really great to be in her village that weekend since a member of her host family was getting married and we got the inside scoop as to weddings in Mali (or at least in her village). Marriages here seem to just be about totally different things than what I was used to in the States. For example, it’s possible that the woman has never met the man she is going to marry, and normally the marriages are arranged by family members. Also, in the case of the man we knew, he was marrying his second wife, who was probably not more than 16 years old. The saddest part for me was that these women are basically leaving their families forever and going to live with someone they maybe don’t know at all. Obviously, that’s pretty upsetting to think about, and the women cry during a lot of the wedding events. I’ve been told that this is what they are supposed to do, because they aren’t supposed to seem excited, but I also think they are probably genuinely sad to be leaving their families and friends. One girl’s husband had even come from a different country just to marry her, and then they were returning, so she may never see her family again.
I don’t want this to sound like weddings are all bad here, but there are definitely some sad parts. There’s tons of eating of good food, dancing, and visiting, and family members travel from far away if they can to be there for the wedding of a relative. The bride also gets to stay inside for at least three days, which might sound boring (and probably is a little) but I think it’s probably also nice for the women to have all their meals cooked, and not have to work so hard for a little while. They also get really dressed up to go to the mayor’s office, and everyone comes and gives blessings and greets the new couple.
All in all, it was definitely interesting to see, and something that I probably wouldn’t have gotten to experience unless someone I knew well in Djenne was getting married (and pretty much everyone I know already is married!).
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