A Small Place...

I have returned to my hotel room after my first day at the Save Children Country Office here in Bamako, Mali. The sun is setting casting a warm glow across the large empty lot stretching behind the hotel. West Africa is certainly different than my only other experience on this continent. I spent a couple of weeks in Uganda for a mobile data collection assessment last summer, and attended a Save the Children education conference at Mombasa Kenya the prior year. The latter was at a beautiful, albeit synthetic, resort. The most stunning sight I saw there were guided camel rides across the sandy beaches for the hotel guests. Uganda, on the other hand, was a much more in-depth introduction to Africa. As in my other CO visits, we were able to spend time in the field, conducting PDA data collection field tests in the Luwero region, north of the capital city of Uganda. during my time there, I began to develop the sense of dire circumstances and struggle in that East African nation. There are so many people and so little opportunity.



Here in Mali, I am gaining a different sense of Africa, perhaps reflecting the great geographic and cultural diversity of this land mass. Once again, I am having the opportunity to shatter long held misperceptions of Africa. After my late afternoon arrival at my hotel room, I drew back the curtains and looked out to the empty lot. It is perhaps two to three acres in size, surrounded by buildings in various stages of construction. as I noted earlier, I have notice most uncompleted building are inhabited by families who are either squatting or function as caretakers. Within this perimeter are vegetable gardens. I believe that there is either a well or piped water near the center, since I see people going to and fro from this spot with buckets of water.

This afternoon, I saw at least a dozen persons working in these gardens, most all of which were women. They were busy watering, cultivating and harvesting - what product, I am not sure. I was struck by the women bent over at their waists in a open safety pin-like angle. It was amazing. I am such a soft person, both inside and out. My back would of screamed at me in just several minutes if I attempted the same posture, and that without working!

I read a small, non-fiction book a couple of years ago. This reading was at a time of my earlier trips to Central America on behalf of Save the Children. I was voraciously reading then, attempting to understand how to comprehend and rationalize my experiences. The book is called, A Small Place, by Jamaica Kincaid. The author describes living on a tiny island in the Caribbean. He describes, in amazement and at times derision, the collision that visitors from larger countries have upon arrival at his island. It is not simply the change from a fast paced lifestyle to one in the tropics. The author also understands that these are tourists and will likely never remain in his Small Place. I still do not feel that I completed an understanding of the thesis which the author proposes. I do continually feel like the tourist visiting a small place and being disconnected from the people about me. I first felt this in Haiti and attempted to articulate it in my first blog entry earlier this year. I am confident that I am just coming to face my own happen chance luck of being born in North America...

You may look at the hundreds of images that I have collected on my overseas trips, and of my personal life, at: http://disaak.phanfare.com