My life as a Peace Corps Volunteer...

My life as a Peace Corps Volunteer...

Friday, November 23, 2012

And So It Goes.

I left Mali very unexpectedly on April 6, 2012, and the week leading up to my departure was one of the most stressful weeks of my life. How do you wrap up two years of tears, struggles, triumphs, dance parties, and friendship in just a few hours? How do you express your gratitude and sincere thanks to a new family that showed you how to be a better person, despite the daily challenges that they didn’t realize they presented you with in the first place? And, then, how do you return to the place that you’ve always called home, only to have no one understand that you didn’t just spend the past two years in Africa, but in the very specific and wonderful-in-itself country of Mali? I have been struggling with these thoughts and many others for the past seven months, and that is why it has taken me so long to write “the final blog post.” There is so much pressure to eloquently express my thoughts and feelings while simultaneously “sugar coating” my unique experiences in Mali. All of my friends have written beautiful final posts that speak of a two year journey where they accomplished a plethora of projects, met villagers who positively changed their lives forever, and always felt supported by Peace Corps staff, their families at home, and their small villages full of new friends. Yes, I experienced a lot of positive times in Mali similar to theirs, but I also experienced an equal number of challenges and hardships that, at times, seemed to outweigh the good. To me, these challenges should not be overlooked - but, I have been so worried about being negative in such an important blog post that I have simply procrastinated on it all together. I have not called my village as much as I’ve wanted to. I have not kept in touch with Peace Corps staff, both in Mali and in the States, as much as I’ve wanted to. The most frustrating part is that I have been thinking about writing this post for months, yet I have not taken the time to put my feelings down on paper. I have been so angry at so many things ever since leaving my Malian family, and I think that writing this is the first step in really beginning to readjust to American life. So, my faithful readers, make sure you have twenty minutes (or 40…) to spare, and continue reading…

The week before leaving Mali... 
Around March 22nd, 2012, I was the happiest that I had ever been in Mali. I had great friends in Peace Corps, I had great friends in my village (Katele), I was secretly planning a Malian wedding to Roger to officially “unite” our villages (where I was going to ride into his village on a donkey and it would have been EPIC), and I FINALLY had a project that I was proud of. (I successfully taught my entire village, made up of mostly illiterate people, how to tax in order to generate money for projects. We created a completely sustainable alternative to any outside funding, and raised over $3,000 for village projects and income generating activities for women. Wouldn’t you be happy, too?!) I was going to facilitate a few training sessions and was even planning to have a meeting with Peace Corps staff about the importance of focusing on smaller, non-funded projects. Things were going well, and I was ready to celebrate my 26th birthday and the 24th birthday of one of my best friends. I arrived in my banking town early to celebrate with my closest friends (in Sikasso).

Then, in a matter of days, my happy world exploded. We learned of the military coup in Bamako, and realized how serious it was when Peace Corps consolidated us in our regional house for two weeks. (You can read about the coup on any reputable news site, and I recommend BBC News. If you haven’t heard about it by now, then I can only assume that you live in a mud hut somewhere, or the appropriate equivalent). We could not leave to get food. We kept hearing more and more about the “noise” in the North of the country. We heard that the President, ATT, was in hiding. We heard that all of the other foreigners in Mali were being pulled out by their respective governments. We saw tires burning in the streets. We learned that the airport temporarily closed, shortly followed by a temporary closure of the land borders. The power kept cutting out. Then, the water kept cutting out. For 40 unsure and frustrated volunteers in a confined space, this affected even the most stable ones. None of us knew what the immediate future would hold, and even though we all felt completely safe in the Sikasso region, we did not know what effect the fighting in the North would have on the functionality of Peace Corps Mali. We were stuck in this holding pattern for almost two weeks. The scariest part of all was that we hardly heard any new updates from Peace Corps, which meant that they were taking our safety and security into high account and did not want to say anything to make the situation worse. We were playing the waiting game, and we could not even go back to our villages to console ourselves with our families.

In the middle of it all, I received a call from my mom, and she told me the news that I had been fearing ever since I joined Peace Corps – her cancer was back, she was no longer in remission, and she did not know what the future would hold for her. Considering the state of uncertainty in Mali and the idea that the airport could close down at any time, I made the decision to leave Mali sooner rather than later. I told Peace Corps staff, and they were very supportive and worked very hard to get me home in a timely manner. But, as it turned out, I only came home a few days before everyone else because Peace Corps made the decision to evacuate us two days after I made the decision to go home to see my family.

The Goodbyes… 
After being consolidated in Sikasso, we finally received the go-ahead to return to our sites, but only if we could hypothetically get back to Sikasso within one day. (Keep in mind that Malian transport is not reliable, and sometimes, you might wait 5 hours for a bus to pass you by… and then might not see anything on the road for 3 more hours after that). So, Roger and I headed back to his site to say goodbye to his village. (At this point, we did not know Peace Corps was evacuating us, but I knew that I was going home). I visited his work partner and said goodbye, and he gave me many blessings. He stayed cheerful, as if he did not believe that I was actually leaving. I could not muster the actual words to say goodbye to Roger’s host mom (who was like my second mom in Mali), so he told her the news, we nodded, and we both walked away crying, knowing that we would probably never see each other again. After saying goodbye to a few more people, we hopped on our bikes and headed over to my village, as I mentally prepared myself for leaving the first family that really made me feel at home in Mali.

When I said goodbye to my villagers in Katele - my home - everything felt like, and still feels like, a blur of emotions. I can’t even remember the exact goodbyes. I do remember saying goodbye to so many people, and being surprised at their words about how much I meant to them, and how much I taught them. I do remember taking a final picture with my host mom, Jelia, and hearing her promise to take care of my dog and feed her three times a day. I do remember telling people that they should take whatever they want from my house, and hearing them refuse because they were my things and they did not want to impose during such a sad time for me. I do remember that everyone thanked me and did not get upset when I sobbed at the thought of leaving them, and how some people – MEN – even let me hug them to show my gratitude. I do remember that in the final picture I took of my village counterparts, they ALL smiled when I told them that my mom would be looking at their picture and framing it on the wall. And, I do remember that my village chief waited with me on the side of the road until my transport came, looked into my eyes, thanked me, and gave me a left-handed hand shake. The left-handed, or double handed shake is important in Mali because it means that you must come back to shake hands properly, with the right hand, one day – and, I told him that I would be back to correct that wrong (once Roger and I are married with our brood of honorary Malian children, of course).

I left for Tubaniso, the Peace Corps training facility, to say goodbye to all of my friends and PC counterparts, but it did not seem real until I was actually on a plane, surrounded by ALL of the fleeing Americans. They all seemed happy and relieved to be returning to American or European luxuries, but I felt strange and empty and scared. I called my first counterpart from my first village and told her I was leaving for good, and then hung up before I started crying. Before I knew it, one day had passed, I had eaten the amazing plane food provided by Air France, and it was Easter Sunday in America. I was back in America, in my parents’ house, facing the realities of cancer, and having allergic reactions to medications that almost put me in the hospital. America was not all that I had hoped for, and I felt very incomplete. It was a VERY long seven months, and I’ve lost and gained quite a few things along the way.

America… 
I’ve had a long journey since I’ve been back, just figuring out what is important to me and slowly uncovering more and more lessons that Mali has taught me. Every day is now easier and easier, and many thoughts and many people keep me going. I talk to my villages about once a month (thanks to the wonders of Skype and limited Facebooking), I live with my best friend/boyfriend (THANK YOU for being so super), I surround myself with positive and sassy friends (who know when a good margarita, dinner date, phone call, text, soup dumpling, or GH rager is in order), and I try to think of everything that I have gained over the last two years, rather than dwell on the many things and people that I have lost. So, I apologize if I haven’t made as many efforts to talk to you all as I should have, and I apologize for just dropping off the radar a few times. It has taken me a while to finally feel comfortable with my life and to find a positive way to handle the challenges, and my best friends know that it has NOT been easy for anyone. (PS - Friends, you really are AWESOME, and I am thankful for you all).

So, thank you for reading, for listening, and for caring, and please know that all of your comments, letters, packages, prayers, and positive vibes were, and continue to be, a very huge part of this journey. Thank you all, again, for reading, and for continuing to keep me in your thoughts.

N bora so, N nana so. I left my home. I came home. And now, I have two homes.

Thanks for following along!