Mission Catholique Bamako

... to this blog.<br>After Guinea's second president died in December 2008 there was a coup (I believe I have another blog entry about that). Moussa Dadis Camara, a captain in the army, took the presidency to resounding approval by the Guinea people. He was young, spoke decisively against corruption and had a plan. But the international community immediately put pressure on him to hold legitimate elections asap. He swore he would and would step down to civilian rule. The months ...

... the US, I believe he was in New Mexico and California. He is very sought after now since his father's passing since he is carrying on the musical tradition of his family.<br><br>Magically, the day we were leaving Vieux reactivated his phone and was in town, in Bamako. Not only that, but he wanted us to come over to visit him. we were very excited, Mali was on our list because of music.<br><br>anyway, the long and ...

... direction of the dorm, so it was ok.<br><br>There's only one other person in the dorm at the moment, a Dutch girl who's been in the North of the country for 3 months. She says it's 'quite cool' here. It's not. It's absolutey BOILING. Bamako is dirty and (EXTREMELY) dusty and smelly and hot and far too busy.. and I love it! I have to admit though that I think I was suffering a little bit of 'culture shock' yesterday ...

... country. So when we found a bar that was open in Mali it made some good money from us. It was midday and still 40 degrees (as normal) so the 2 litres of beer in an hour made an impact on my ability to talk with any kind of sense. Yes, I am a cheap drunk. The locals were friendly and cheery as we were exchanging stories. Before long it was time to make the long drive to the Mali capital of Bamako. We were advised that it ...

... day, she can only keep a few full time. She is trying to give them a bett** life and teach them reading and writing. Although it looks like they have nothing at all, it is so bett** than the alt**native. The reason we w**e th**e is that Anko had put in a solar system for pow** and since he was in Bamako, he is going to work in the next few days. He does so much for so many people. Aft** the Orphanage visit, we did head to the market in ...

... out of the taxi and onto the back of one of the bikes. He was quickly ush**ed back to the taxi by the driv**s friend. In between all the driving and sw**ving the taxi driv** also managed to somehow stoke my hair putting his hand between the small prison cell type gap between the front and back seats. Most bizarre but it continued for pretty much the whole trip despite my best efforts to lean forward, the oth**s of course found this hilarious. Somehow we ...

... in the midst of which women sold shrivelled up vegetables, fresh bread rolls were heaped by the dozen, men hacked away at cuts of meat, frying up intestines, ribs and goodness knows what else... all the while being buzzed around by flies galore. We opted for veg lasagne. Bought 50 bread rolls.... good idea until we realised they didn't come in a bag. Got some paper and wrapped them up only for it to last a few metres down the ...

I recently realized that almost half the team I'm going with are repeat goers. The time spent and conversations shared with some of them has painted a clear picture of how different our trip is really going to be. Originally, the plan was to spend the entire two weeks in Bamako. We would return to the school that Global Assistance Partners (GAP) supports and be ...

... impressionnante des légèretés, il m'a appris au fur et à mesure de notre conversation, du décès de son père, du nombre pas possible de personnes qui contaient sur lui pour le solde mensuel qu'il devait repartir de ses propres et maigres gains et de la mort dans le proche avenir de sa mère, récemment annoncée par les médecins, fruit d'un cancer du estomac qu'on lui a découvert à la suite d'une intervention chirurgical pour un autre problème de résolution beaucoup plus simple ...

... arriving in Bamako at midnight, if not a little later. As the day went on, the stops continued. We began to feel sure that the stops served no purpose other than to help the local village economies. No one was getting on or off the train, but plenty of money was being exchanged through the windows for food, water and fans! By the 3pm in the afternoon, we had reached Kayes in Mali. The "official" timetable allowed 12 hours between Kayes and Bamako...so we gave up ...