First of all, I have to say that I had an absolutely amazing Thanksgiving. The Ambassador is extremely nice, and I was lucky enough to eat a lot of amazing food including: turkey (hard to find in this country, and certainly not cheap), mashed potatoes, green beans and corn, sweet potatoes, stuffing, and gravy. For dessert, I had pumpkin pie and coffee. Throughout the evening, I enjoyed the fine company of my fellow PCVs and some nice red wine (white wine was also available, but the red was so much better). That portion of the evening, I call decadent.
In other news, I'm around 44,000 words into my NaNoWriMo novel. I'm thinking/hoping to fully back on pace tomorrow/today (it's technically Friday, but really, it's still Thursday). The novel itself may or may not reach a conclusion by 50,000 words. We'll just have to see. What I can say, is that, just as I predicted earlier, the female character I added has taken a prominent role. She's just as important as the male, and I now alternate chapters between them--though their lives, for now, have gone separate ways.
Again, for those that are still well into the celebrating of Turkey Day in the US, I hope you're having a wonderful Thanksgiving. :)
Friday, November 28, 2008
Thursday, November 27, 2008
Happy Thanksgiving!
I would like to wish you all a happy and wonderful Thanksgiving. I hope you have the opportunity to spend the day with loved ones.
As for me, I'll be eating at the US Ambassador's house for Thanksgiving dinner tonight. Something tells me that I will probably need to be on my best behavior for said event.
The dry season has indeed begun, we haven't received a drop of water in nearly a month--nor will we for at least another 6 or 7 months. Currently, we're in a mini hot season before cold season sets in. The high temperature for the day is supposed to reach 99º. It's currently 95º.
As for when I'll begin at the university.. Tentatively, the next term is supposed to start December 22nd--so classes will likely start the beginning of January. Still don't know exactly which classes I'll be teaching, but it'll probably be first and second year students in American and/or British Studies, Conversation/Debate, and Writing. I probably won't teach all of those (seeing class sizes are upward to 150 students and lesson planning would be a bit difficult at best), but I will probably be teaching around 4 or 5 classes this semester.
I can't believe that I've already been in country for around 4 1/2 months. The time, so far, as actually gone by fairly quickly. I've been lucky enough to remain healthy lately. I exercise regularly at my house, and I have been working on another novel.
Again, the Malians that I've been fortunate enough to get to know are all wonderful people. I miss my host family that I had in Sanankoroba for training, and will need to visit them again in the near future. The people in my current neighborhood are all equally wonderful. We have interesting conversations while speaking "Frambara" (French & Bambara).
I've finally begun to get used to the cold showers I have to take here--now that it's getting colder at night, however, they're a little more difficult, and I feel I should consider myself lucky to even have a shower. Most of the other volunteers have to take bucket baths.
Since it's Thanksgiving, I thought I'd share a cultural phenomenon about Malians. It's called Joking Cousins, and it's very important to all Malians. In Mali, there are only so many last names--it dates back to when Mali used a caste system. Every family name has certain other family names that they joke with. The jokes would be considered mean or racist at times in the US, but it's the furthest thing from it here. For example, A Traore might see a Coulibaly and say "I bɛ siyɔ dun!" Which means that the Coulibaly is a bean eater--implying that he farts. They'll say this often. They'll also call people their slaves--again, this is not meant to actually upset anyone, they simply don't have the cultural sensitivity that we have to the term. Another common joke would go something like this: "You're a Coulibaly? My dog is a Coulibaly!" Thus calling the person an animal. This is met with much laughter and hand grabbing. Any joke is subject to being repeated countless times in a day, and no joke ever becomes old.
It's a very interesting thing, and it can be used to break even the biggest tension. Someone trying to rip you off in the market? Make fun of their family name and suddenly you're friends and you're receiving a good price on the product. That's simply the way it works. Malians, while living in the 3rd poorest nation in the world, have the richest of personal lives. They don't take anything too seriously, and they always try to enjoy themselves. I think we could all learn something from that.
Take care this Thanksgiving and remember to enjoy life.
As for me, I'll be eating at the US Ambassador's house for Thanksgiving dinner tonight. Something tells me that I will probably need to be on my best behavior for said event.
The dry season has indeed begun, we haven't received a drop of water in nearly a month--nor will we for at least another 6 or 7 months. Currently, we're in a mini hot season before cold season sets in. The high temperature for the day is supposed to reach 99º. It's currently 95º.
As for when I'll begin at the university.. Tentatively, the next term is supposed to start December 22nd--so classes will likely start the beginning of January. Still don't know exactly which classes I'll be teaching, but it'll probably be first and second year students in American and/or British Studies, Conversation/Debate, and Writing. I probably won't teach all of those (seeing class sizes are upward to 150 students and lesson planning would be a bit difficult at best), but I will probably be teaching around 4 or 5 classes this semester.
I can't believe that I've already been in country for around 4 1/2 months. The time, so far, as actually gone by fairly quickly. I've been lucky enough to remain healthy lately. I exercise regularly at my house, and I have been working on another novel.
Again, the Malians that I've been fortunate enough to get to know are all wonderful people. I miss my host family that I had in Sanankoroba for training, and will need to visit them again in the near future. The people in my current neighborhood are all equally wonderful. We have interesting conversations while speaking "Frambara" (French & Bambara).
I've finally begun to get used to the cold showers I have to take here--now that it's getting colder at night, however, they're a little more difficult, and I feel I should consider myself lucky to even have a shower. Most of the other volunteers have to take bucket baths.
Since it's Thanksgiving, I thought I'd share a cultural phenomenon about Malians. It's called Joking Cousins, and it's very important to all Malians. In Mali, there are only so many last names--it dates back to when Mali used a caste system. Every family name has certain other family names that they joke with. The jokes would be considered mean or racist at times in the US, but it's the furthest thing from it here. For example, A Traore might see a Coulibaly and say "I bɛ siyɔ dun!" Which means that the Coulibaly is a bean eater--implying that he farts. They'll say this often. They'll also call people their slaves--again, this is not meant to actually upset anyone, they simply don't have the cultural sensitivity that we have to the term. Another common joke would go something like this: "You're a Coulibaly? My dog is a Coulibaly!" Thus calling the person an animal. This is met with much laughter and hand grabbing. Any joke is subject to being repeated countless times in a day, and no joke ever becomes old.
It's a very interesting thing, and it can be used to break even the biggest tension. Someone trying to rip you off in the market? Make fun of their family name and suddenly you're friends and you're receiving a good price on the product. That's simply the way it works. Malians, while living in the 3rd poorest nation in the world, have the richest of personal lives. They don't take anything too seriously, and they always try to enjoy themselves. I think we could all learn something from that.
Take care this Thanksgiving and remember to enjoy life.
Saturday, November 15, 2008
Chocolate is truly amazing
Seriously. I was never a big chocolate fan in the US. To be honest, I wasn't much of a sugary snack person in general. I loved and preferred the spicier, salty and more bitter alternatives. That's changed a bit here. Perhaps it has something to do with the difficulties I find in having a regularly balanced diet, or the constant and unforgiving heat that affects me here every day (as I write this, it is currently 95º with a high expected to be around 98º). By the way, we are in the beginning of the Cold Season. So, to summarize. Chocolate, especially Milk Chocolate, is absolutely amazing. I'm blessed enough to have a refrigerator (not the norm), which means I can also freeze my chocolate to make it even more heavenly.
I mention chocolate so much here because I recently received a care package from a friend, which included Hershey's chocolate bars (the mini kind).
So, I'm still writing away with NaNoWriMo, and as is like to happen, my story has taken a very different turn from what I originally intended. I think I mentioned a few things about the story when I first started. How Mike (that's the protagonist's name) was going to be a Peace Corps Volunteer and so on. Well, Mike decided to become a Marine instead. He had a rough time prior to joining the military, so I can understand his decision. It was the right one for him. But now, he's gone and got himself taken hostage (he was deployed in Iraq--as a side note, doing research on military bases and tactics while living in a 3rd world country made me significantly more worried about my own well being than what it would have had I done the same research, or even more exhausting research, in the US). This doesn't bode so well for our hero, and I have no idea where it's going to go (yay for the rush of NaNoWriMo). Luckily, if all else fails, the story is written in 3rd person and I've recently introduced a new character, Captain April Davees, a Marine pilot who's more than intriguing enough to carry on the story. Anywho, no matter what happens to Lieutenant Michael Randall, the Captain will be having an increasingly larger part of the story as it goes on. Currently, I'm a little less than 1 day behind on NaNoWriMo (a spot I've stayed consistently at for about the last week). I haven't started my writing for today, so my current word count is 22,561.
I know I haven't written a lot lately, but if it helps, I've thought about writing a lot.
I lost a day when the elections happened (that's when I got behind on my word count), because I was at an expat's house (have I mentioned this stuff already?). There were probably 20-30 people there. All of us drinking wine, beer, soda, whatever and eating pork (oh my God, the pork was so amazingly good--it's also something that most Malians won't eat because of religious reasons, which makes it hard to come by). The house would easily have been a multi-million dollar house here in the US. It was pretty amazing. Anywho, we stayed up all night and watched Obama's speech on a big screen projector outside. Which didn't happen until something like 4 or 5am my time. Like I said, it was late. I was tired. And I didn't exist the next day. Not even a little. BUT, we all had an amazing time watching the election. There were lots of tears and calls home to the US and Malians cheering. It was very interesting to see the excitement from the Malians as they watched the election. The cheers and even the nervousness along the way. If you ever doubt that we live in a global community, just watch a US election from a 3rd world nation. You will see very clearly that we are, in fact, intrinsically linked to the rest of the world. And Obama, whether you like him or not, most certainly represents hope to other countries. His election inspired a world of people over here, and I don't mean US expats. It was something special to watch, and it actually made me proud to be a US citizen.
I've also been watching Battlestar Galactica again (I love that show). I'm anxious for the final episodes to start, which I know won't be for a little while, but still. I'm anxious. Speaking TV, I've been mostly keeping up with a few shows. Four, to be exact: Heroes, Chuck, Smallville and Supernatural. Sometimes, it's hard to find the episodes because they don't last long on most video streaming websites (and living outside the US, I'm incapable of watching the official streams from the network sites--it's... frustrating). For example, I've not yet found this week's episode of Chuck. Hopefully, I'll find it this weekend. I actually tried writing NBC once several weeks ago, but their response only proved that they didn't even look at my question (it literally had nothing to do with what I asked). Anywho, of the shows I'm keeping up with, Smallville has been surprisingly good this season (probably the best season in a very long time) since they're finally having Clark start to assume the mantel of Superman (at least kind of).
Enough rambling, this is writing I could be doing for NaNoWriMo!!!
I mention chocolate so much here because I recently received a care package from a friend, which included Hershey's chocolate bars (the mini kind).
So, I'm still writing away with NaNoWriMo, and as is like to happen, my story has taken a very different turn from what I originally intended. I think I mentioned a few things about the story when I first started. How Mike (that's the protagonist's name) was going to be a Peace Corps Volunteer and so on. Well, Mike decided to become a Marine instead. He had a rough time prior to joining the military, so I can understand his decision. It was the right one for him. But now, he's gone and got himself taken hostage (he was deployed in Iraq--as a side note, doing research on military bases and tactics while living in a 3rd world country made me significantly more worried about my own well being than what it would have had I done the same research, or even more exhausting research, in the US). This doesn't bode so well for our hero, and I have no idea where it's going to go (yay for the rush of NaNoWriMo). Luckily, if all else fails, the story is written in 3rd person and I've recently introduced a new character, Captain April Davees, a Marine pilot who's more than intriguing enough to carry on the story. Anywho, no matter what happens to Lieutenant Michael Randall, the Captain will be having an increasingly larger part of the story as it goes on. Currently, I'm a little less than 1 day behind on NaNoWriMo (a spot I've stayed consistently at for about the last week). I haven't started my writing for today, so my current word count is 22,561.
I know I haven't written a lot lately, but if it helps, I've thought about writing a lot.
I lost a day when the elections happened (that's when I got behind on my word count), because I was at an expat's house (have I mentioned this stuff already?). There were probably 20-30 people there. All of us drinking wine, beer, soda, whatever and eating pork (oh my God, the pork was so amazingly good--it's also something that most Malians won't eat because of religious reasons, which makes it hard to come by). The house would easily have been a multi-million dollar house here in the US. It was pretty amazing. Anywho, we stayed up all night and watched Obama's speech on a big screen projector outside. Which didn't happen until something like 4 or 5am my time. Like I said, it was late. I was tired. And I didn't exist the next day. Not even a little. BUT, we all had an amazing time watching the election. There were lots of tears and calls home to the US and Malians cheering. It was very interesting to see the excitement from the Malians as they watched the election. The cheers and even the nervousness along the way. If you ever doubt that we live in a global community, just watch a US election from a 3rd world nation. You will see very clearly that we are, in fact, intrinsically linked to the rest of the world. And Obama, whether you like him or not, most certainly represents hope to other countries. His election inspired a world of people over here, and I don't mean US expats. It was something special to watch, and it actually made me proud to be a US citizen.
I've also been watching Battlestar Galactica again (I love that show). I'm anxious for the final episodes to start, which I know won't be for a little while, but still. I'm anxious. Speaking TV, I've been mostly keeping up with a few shows. Four, to be exact: Heroes, Chuck, Smallville and Supernatural. Sometimes, it's hard to find the episodes because they don't last long on most video streaming websites (and living outside the US, I'm incapable of watching the official streams from the network sites--it's... frustrating). For example, I've not yet found this week's episode of Chuck. Hopefully, I'll find it this weekend. I actually tried writing NBC once several weeks ago, but their response only proved that they didn't even look at my question (it literally had nothing to do with what I asked). Anywho, of the shows I'm keeping up with, Smallville has been surprisingly good this season (probably the best season in a very long time) since they're finally having Clark start to assume the mantel of Superman (at least kind of).
Enough rambling, this is writing I could be doing for NaNoWriMo!!!
Saturday, November 1, 2008
So...
I had apparently decided to play the role of one of the undead for Halloween. Seriously. I was so incredibly sick for a couple of days. It started on Thursday. I had felt it growing throughout the day, but it had been mostly minor. Then, as we were preparing to watch Halloween II, I had to make a pit stop in the bathroom where I proceeded to violently sick anything that was in my stomach then into the toilet. This consisted of water and yogurt, because it's all I had on Thursday (due to my ever-growing nausea throughout the day). This marks the first time I've vomited since being in country (I think). It was pretty vicious. I can, however, happily state that I still watched Halloween II that night (followed by immediately rushing back to the toilet).
After taking anti-nausea/anti-vomiting medication, I finally recovered well enough to not sleep through the night (too many aches and pains). The next day, while exhausted, saw no need to vomit. It also saw only the tiniest of sandwiches due to a lack of appetite. Today's been better. Still not 100%, but I wouldn't expect me to be. I am, however, mostly better, which is good. The one bummer is that this sickness prevented me from doing anything neat for Halloween. There was a Halloween thing at the American School that I could have worked, and there was a party at one of the 3rd year Volunteer's home that I could have gone to. Which brings me to another point. The last time I was sick, Eric (the 3rd year) invited us to his place for dinner. Apparently, I only get sick if I'm expected to go over to his place. Note to self, never go to Eric's.
Well, it's National Novel Writing Month time again people. If you haven't yet begun your 50,000 word novel yet, you still have time--seeing that today is the 1st. I highly recommend it. Though, originally, I wasn't going to participate (seeing that I wrote a novel in 3 weeks like... a month or two ago and I have two other novel projects that I'm wanting to finish), I've since changed my mind. Actually, it was yesterday. Last night, really. I was listening to Flogging Molly, and suddenly, an idea came to mind out of nowhere. It both excited me and frustrated me (because, dammit, now I have to write). It will blend fiction and non-fiction. It's another Peace Corps themed novel. Based on someone similar to me living right now, during the final days leading up to the election. The character's past, motivations, etc. are all different. The title is currently "Man With No Country." Named after the Flogging Molly song I was listening to that inspired me. It's a writing style that I think I like--a true blurring of fact and fiction that the reader is really uncertain about what's real and what isn't. Anywho, I'm currently at 3343 words. I want to get a little more into tonight, but still... I'm over a day ahead right now (this won't last). I also have absolutely no idea where this story is going to go, and I'm okay with that, too.
For those in the Halloween mood (or who simply like horror-themed stories), here's a link to a zombie story that I wrote (which will probably end up being a part of a novel about zombies that I have on the back burner): Evolved.
After taking anti-nausea/anti-vomiting medication, I finally recovered well enough to not sleep through the night (too many aches and pains). The next day, while exhausted, saw no need to vomit. It also saw only the tiniest of sandwiches due to a lack of appetite. Today's been better. Still not 100%, but I wouldn't expect me to be. I am, however, mostly better, which is good. The one bummer is that this sickness prevented me from doing anything neat for Halloween. There was a Halloween thing at the American School that I could have worked, and there was a party at one of the 3rd year Volunteer's home that I could have gone to. Which brings me to another point. The last time I was sick, Eric (the 3rd year) invited us to his place for dinner. Apparently, I only get sick if I'm expected to go over to his place. Note to self, never go to Eric's.
Well, it's National Novel Writing Month time again people. If you haven't yet begun your 50,000 word novel yet, you still have time--seeing that today is the 1st. I highly recommend it. Though, originally, I wasn't going to participate (seeing that I wrote a novel in 3 weeks like... a month or two ago and I have two other novel projects that I'm wanting to finish), I've since changed my mind. Actually, it was yesterday. Last night, really. I was listening to Flogging Molly, and suddenly, an idea came to mind out of nowhere. It both excited me and frustrated me (because, dammit, now I have to write). It will blend fiction and non-fiction. It's another Peace Corps themed novel. Based on someone similar to me living right now, during the final days leading up to the election. The character's past, motivations, etc. are all different. The title is currently "Man With No Country." Named after the Flogging Molly song I was listening to that inspired me. It's a writing style that I think I like--a true blurring of fact and fiction that the reader is really uncertain about what's real and what isn't. Anywho, I'm currently at 3343 words. I want to get a little more into tonight, but still... I'm over a day ahead right now (this won't last). I also have absolutely no idea where this story is going to go, and I'm okay with that, too.
For those in the Halloween mood (or who simply like horror-themed stories), here's a link to a zombie story that I wrote (which will probably end up being a part of a novel about zombies that I have on the back burner): Evolved.
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