I am so fast on my one speed bike that on my way to send this to you I passed a camel on the main road in town. They are a lot bigger than the donkeys everyone else is using. Anyway...
I took a night bus yesterday to get into the office to do some work this morning ahead of my colleagues. Every time I’m on the road at night in Mali I’m pretty certain I’m going to die as the highway is too narrow with too many curves and drivers that think they are Canadian teenagers on a Saturday night. Every time our bus would pass a truck one of the vehicles would have to go onto the shoulder so there was enough room for both to go by. Of course half the ride amazing Malian blues music was blaring at a way to loud volume and the rest of the time it was Celine Dion making it tough to sleep. Yes, no matter where you go in the world you cannot escape her and I find big African macho men who will express their love for Celine Dion when they find out your are Canadian.

I was in a hurry to get back to Sevare to do a little work in the office. I’ve been in the field for almost a month doing an evaluation of the last phase of the project EWB is supporting. We are visiting all the multifunctional platforms in the country and meeting with the women’s groups that are running them. So far I’ve met with 87 different villages. I’ve been working 12-18 hours a day for the past few weeks which shows you that things aren’t always slow in Africa. I’m up at 5 or 5:30 and have a little bit of stale bread and some peanut butter I got from some friendly women who were grinding it when I arrived. The mornings are actually chilly and I can see my breath as I step out of the little room I am given every night by a different village chief.
After breakfast we drive on bumpy roads that make me think a hummer may not be the most useless vehicles around and make me realize that sending anything to market is very difficult. When we get to the first village of the day we check in with the chief and get as many women as possible to come to meet with us. We spend about an hour and half asking and answering questions. We are trying to figure out what worked and what didn’t over the last few years and solve any problems the women are having. If we’re unlucky we fall on a village that is having some troubles and we try to get everything settled. Usually the problems revolve around the fact that the MFP is for the community and everyone has to be happy with how it is being run. Imagine if your whole neighbourhood had to meet together to communally run a business and decide what to do with the profits, it’s tough to find consensus. Despite all the challenges about 75% of the platforms we visited are still running a few years after installation showing that community ownership by uneducated rural women is possible. At the end of the first meeting with give our formal thank yous and goodbye and hop back on the rocky road to our next stop.
If we are lucky somewhere during the day we’ll get some rice cooked for us. If not we are in orange and papaya season and we buy 80 oranges at a time for one dollar and keep getting papayas as gifts. There was a point in time where I was ridding in the back seat with 12 chickens that had been given to us. It is often true that the poorest are the most generous. Although the days we don’t find food my colleagues love to eat canned corned beef, and well I’m forced to chose between not eating and eating corned beef. I’m still convinced it is healthier to eat nothing but it’s pretty tough to leave a stomach empty.

Usually we meet with 4-5 villages a day, leaving us with 4-5 reports to write per day. Each meeting is a different challenge and shows us new things. With all the travel we are usually meeting, reporting and driving until 10 pm. Once it gets dark we agree to go to one more village to have a last meeting and sleep. We pull out lanterns or my head lamp so we can write as we chat in the dark under the stars. I’ve realized that a full moon and no clouds gives enough light for me to write without a lamp. Actually about nine pm is a great time to have a meeting because finally the women have no other work they are busy with!

All these meetings are done in bambara and I’ve become a lot better at understanding it really fast. I still can’t speak it very well but now I can follow what is going on. Most of the time I am working in French and don’t actually use my bambara but this month in the field has really shown me the importance of understanding it. You see very quickly the difference between the city and the country. In the city most people can get by in French, except older women who have never been to school. In the rural areas you can find whole villages where not one person has gone past grade six and no one speaks French.
Lots of women’s groups are being lead by one or two women who have been to school for a few years. They are often the only ones who know how to read or write and they always seem to be the most dynamic and forward thinking. I’m not sure if this is due to the fact they are natural leaders and thinkers or if the few years of school they took helped them so much. Although we often think of school as something you do to get a job or gain some skill I think it is more important just to open your mind and learn how to think. Seeing how important those educated women are to their community gives me hope for the future because more and more children in Mali are going to school. I think in ten years things will change a lot as the literacy rate of around 30% will shoot up. One challenge is that all the people who go to school don’t find jobs. This discourages everyone else from finishing school because why would you go if it doesn’t get you a job and money? People don’t see that education helps you in all aspects of life giving you the tools to solve problems and see the broader world. The trouble is good problem solving skills and a creative open mind don’t always put food on the table in Mali.

I meet pretty incredible people everyday. Madame Diallo is the President of the women’s group in Barila near the border with Guinee in the south of Mali where oranges and maize are plentiful and the men get some cash growing cotton. Her team is doing a great job of managing their MFP. They’ve added new services like a shea nut grinder so making shea butter is easier. Madame Diallo used to be the only woman who could write in her community but the project taught a few others and now she is teaching still more women so they can keep good accounting records. We hit it off great because since arriving I have been given the name Amadji Diallo which is what most people know me as here. That means that me and Madame Diallo are family. Our introduction lead to a frantic series of questions and laughter as she asked about my family with a giant wrinkly smile. After the greeting she sent some children to bring me some milk. Diallo’s are Fulani, or Peul, people and traditionally herders. I’ve met Fulani families who spend 8 months a year nomadic wandering with their herd of cattle and then come back to a home base in the north near the Niger river during the rainy season. They often subsist on milk and a little meat, often drinking water from open sloughs with their cattle. So of course another Diallo would offer me milk. But it didn’t stop at milk, after came bananas, then sugar and finally some tea. During the whole meeting she let the other women respond to the questions I asked. Usually one person tries to monopolize the discussion and I’m forced to facilitate things so that every speaks which is very difficult when the norm is to be quite and let your superior answer. She was warm with her friends and colleagues putting everyone at ease. She even took responsibility for a part of their bookkeeping that was poorly done rather than putting the blame on someone else. At the end of the meeting I told everyone I was very happy with how things were going but wanted to know why everything was working so well. Madame Diallo simply said “I make sure everyone gets along.” Simple as that, the wonders of cooperation.

I have seen lots of people creatively finding ways to cope with their challenges. Women who have taken over $1000 of debt to get an MFP because they knew the investment would pay off. Groups who accept cereals as a form of payment because some people have no cash and then they can keep the cereals and sell them at the time of year when they are more expensive. Despite what many people think the poor are capable and able to move themselves forward. I have truly seen how when given the tools they are able to build a better future. Like everyone they do not like to be told what to do but given the opportunity and the freedom to control their future. To me that is development.

Usually by the fifth village at 10 pm I’m pretty tired from working in bambara and being on the move since early morning. Not to mention I’ve gained five pounds from the red dust that is now covering my whole body. But this is the time when the work really starts. Me and my colleague sit down and start drawing out the lessons we’ve learned from the day. We take our observations and make them into recommendations for the next phase so we can do an even better job of helping and supporting the women. Usually this lasts for about an hour before our brains quit working and we are ready to go to bed. I always enjoy my bucket shower staring up at the sky. It is my moment to myself to think about the day and how lucky I am to be here. Then I’m recharged and ready to get up in five hours to do it all over again.