Homecoming?

Entering Casablanca airport for the final leg of my flight back to Bamako feels like a strange déjà vu. I retrace my steps through the long terminal, and at the very end of the waiting lounge, I finally come upon my gate. Seeing the people waiting for my flight I feel myself slipping back into West African time. Under harsh stretches of florescent lights, colourful sleeping lumps cluster together over plastic rugs; the long robed men, skinny with skull caps and small Qurans in hand; the round women, their heads, shoulders, and shapeless bodies covered with brilliant, endless yards of fabric.

At the sight of this human quilt, my heart lightens. Over the course of preparing to come back, a rough hand had been constricting my chest, tightening my body in the worst type of fear: fear of my own weakness.. There had been so many moments of pure and utter bliss: grinning through face-shots of fresh powder while skiing with my brother; watching the sunset over the Brighton Pier with a pen in hand, a glass of wine, red flags reflected in the darkening window; losing myself in the soft warmth of a three year old cheeks as he gives me butterfly kisses; sunlight over the faces of my family and friends as they bid me good bye. There were moments that I felt so full, I was sure I would burst with happiness. Perhaps that bursting sensation led me closer to that precarious edge of fear and the tight grip as it knotted itself into my belly and crept up my ribcage. I kept asking myself: Do I need this snow, this wine, this type of beauty to survive? I was loving it all so much, a huge part of me was screaming YES!

Waiting for the boarding call, I watch the people around me. As different as they are, they are also familiar to me. Even though their language is still sludge on my tongue and I will never pull off the gorgeous bobo style of these women, I am loosening back into this world, and it is welcoming me. In the same way I received so much knowing, unconditional love from my friends, family, even strangers on this trip home, I begin to feel its effect on me as it begins to soak back out of me towards these strangers. This time, however, the soaking is filling me up at the same time. Perhaps I am coming home. At least for now, This feels right.

Homecoming Thoughts

1.12.07
Coming home. I think my eyes have been covered by a thin veil that makes every ice edged ivy leaf and dried blade of grass shimmer with beauty. I watch the hills and lake and wintry trees slide by on that familiar drive to town and imagine truthfully that I may have never seen such splendor. None of the oases and cliffs and busy street markets of Africa or the grand art museums and architecture of Europe touch me in quite the same way as this somber, overcast morning of frost and dry grass. This is my home and right now, home is more awe-inspiring than any distant corner of the world.

This desperate connection to the place I was born and raised extends far beyond the landscape. It is the people who make this space so unique. Again, my eyes may still be shrouded but I see in each rosy cheeked face the potential, and especially the desire to achieve wholeness. I sit in the coffee shop surrounded by strangers, sipping tea and absorbing the gentle voices around me. An old man with one crossed eye is teaching his grandson how to play chess; a large man in Carharts studies a fish and game manual over his latte; two women share intimacies and wild hair, cupping mugs of steaming coffee. I suck it all in.

This leisure is like a drug to me: it lures me into comfort and appreciation, giving me the illusion that I can’t live outside of such a fulfilling space. I try to absorb it so that I can understand how to bring back to Africa this concept of easy living, this engagement with one another, and do it without the props of easy Saturday afternoons or hot coffee shops.

11.12.07
The season is folding into itself in sheaths of cold air. I pull my scarf closer around my neck and experience the shift with joy in my cheeks and a knot in my stomach. I open a new journal today with decidedly less hope than my last, but with a vision perhaps more open to the realities I am facing. Coming home has been both an enormous gift and a challenging shift in perspective. My spirit soars into this cool space but I find with every homecoming that elements of this American life become harder and harder to accept. I’ve dreamt of this: crosswalks and snow, coffee shops and bookstores; but the abundance of the season, the excess of it sometimes sickens me- especially because I am a part of it.

I just received an email from Yann who fears that famine will strike his country in the next year due to poor rainfall. I contemplate while sipping my latte and try to avoid reaction by thinking about the fresh tracks I’d like to carve the next day. But my mind drifts back and I remember images from a photobook at Powells. Emaciated children, men, women from the Sahel; they could have been my neighbors; they could be his family. What kind of person am I that I want so badly to turn my head, to believe that this doesn’t exist? That I succeed in doing so?

My reaction to these clashing realities is inertia and a sense of only being halfway in my experiences, whether I am in the States or in Africa. I get lost, my head and heart swinging in an endless pendulum between what I want and what I know. I tip and sway out of balance because I can’t seem to find the reconciliation between myself, my hopes and the situation of this world.
23.12.07
As always, I find peace in the small moments, joys that bring me back to the unconditional knowledge of who I am regardless of the relentless questions and challenges I put myself through. My grin spreads across my face as I arc my first turns in two seasons. Knowing that my body remembers the movements and adjusts so easily to steep terrain as I slalom through fir tree tips reminds me of that woman who is strong and sure and always knows where her next move will be. Watching the fire on a cold winter night while neighbors, friends and family share stories, laughter, and music reminds me of how easy it feels to belong to a community, and of how simple our joys can be. Sledding through the trees by the light of the full moon, tumbling from the sled as dark silhouettes spin above my head shows me again the laughing child who sees potential for celebration and discovery around every bend. Hearing from you, the people that read this blog, makes me realize the worth of the journey I have chosen. I am truly blessed.

9.30.2007 Belief

Ramadan. The month of fasting is upon us, everyone around me is burning the sins out of life by ingesting nothing from sun up to sun down and praying five times a day. Mali seems to take this moon cycle with the same half hearted enthusiasm it takes towards work and love and friendship. Custom says you should act in a certain way, so you act accordingly.

I have never in my life been so confronted with my own belief systems and my expression of these belief systems as I am here. Surrounded by fasting Muslims and a Christian boyfriend, I begin to imagine that there are holes in the fabric of my own belief, one that I have constructed in much the same manner as a quilt, pulling one thread of what I call truth through a variety of fabrics to create something that I find comforting though perhaps not beautiful. With no set religion, no name to idolize or figure to pray to, I stumble through the halls of divinity, keeping myself upright by my own personal ideas of right and wrong, celebration of humanity, and inexplicable faith in a certain order that exists in the world we inhabit.

Last night, feeling particularly lost I went for a run. Night was creeping along the dirt avenues as I came upon the Islamic Relief Community Center. In shorts and a tee-shirt I felt significantly out of place and I picked up my pace as I ran past the young boys in long robes and the one woman dressed all in black, showing nothing but a thin slit of skin around her eyes. As I passed I heard the prayers I have heard at least twice a day since arriving in Mali, sifting in and out of my consciousness. A young boy must have been learning the chants, because a fresh, soft voice was emerging from the speaker that usually only emits the scratchy cracking intonations of old Imams. I was drawn by this voice, a clear, timid, learning voice that fell over the dirt soccer field and the haphazard gardens and semi constructed buildings and smoky cook fires. My steps slowed and despite myself I turned around to listen. The older Imam was instructing the young boy, and his voice came across encouraging in a guttural, lilting Arabic. The words meant nothing to me, but the sounds filtered into the evening and soothed me. I slowed to a walk and then stopped, watching the quick feet of the soccer players, noticing the gentle violet flowers on the weeds about my feet, remarking the slowing of my breath by the rise and fall of my chest.

I stood there, quietly realizing as I do every so often that this is my divinity. This unbelievably fleeting yet constant moment when nature collides with humanity and I am caught in the middle, lifted into awareness by my own physicality, the effort of my body in motion. These moments when I watch a young person realize his or her own potential, when the color of the sunset catches on bat wings, when a bead of sweat drips down the hollow of my back while making love, when the rains come hard and fast, when my hibiscus flower blooms, when someone I care for does something they can be proud of, when my own hard work pays off. These waves of appreciation, wonder and joy become my own forms of prayer.

I can not say that I am any closer to accessing the level of faith or devotion that many people around me these days seem to possess but in these rare moments, I feel alive and purposeful, and aware in a way that I cannot explain, nor will try to. I am happy to be constantly on the lookout for new ways to celebrate this life, grateful for the freedom I have to choose my beliefs, and respectful of the paths that others choose.

8.25.2007 Writers Block

In the hours that lean towards morning, I write. Into the darkness my words tumble and lose themselves piece by piece, turning and spinning in and out of one another like taffy, stretched between the vendors hands while the sand grits salty between your toes at the boardwalk. Colorful bits without cohesion or sense. Nonetheless I write. The night provokes me and I chase after my words with greedy fingers, stabbing at ideas and bringing them gently to my mouth to taste, roll around my tongue then spit onto a page. If only I could follow one of these ideas to its end, I say. If only I had time to write, to read, to sing. In this dark morning, I push excuse out onto the street and sit for a moment, just me and my words. The more we sit together, the more I become afraid of them. I try to listen, to let them flow but the longer I listen, the less adequate I feel with them. Rather than sit with them, I feel as if I am sitting in front of them, on a pedestal, being asked to perform, being marked for each misspelling and fragmented sentence and… my personal challenge: the unfinished thought. The words I cant drift so smoothly in, but soon begin to infiltrate. These two words change the music, and my words saunter off, hand in hand with my doubt, winking over their shoulder at me, my hands stuck in taffy. Maybe tomorrow night will be better.

Life has filled in; all the small moments filter together and there is never a day that I dont have ups and downs. Words escape me in the afternoons and evenings... so here are some photos. I took a trip to Burkina Faso mid july, to refresh my brain and heart from my first CFH training. here are some photos of the kids I met in the village and a sunset that took my breath away. More words/thoughts/poems/dreams to come.

4th of July in Bamako

It is hot like any other fourth of July however this year there is nothing to make me jump up, scurry to the downtown boulevard, throw my blanket or chair between the masses, and shout hurray America, while watching the parade flap by. This time I wake up, do my sit ups, eat some cereal, enjoy the fresh milk, and step outside to admire the explosion of white and red flowers that push up against the street. A brief three minutes of quiet before I hop on my bike and pick my way through the puddle strewn street to my office.

It seems strange that today is the first day I notice the sticker on our guardians motorcycle: a smiling Bin Laden with his fist in the air. Underneath it, there is something written in Arabic and another sticker that seems to imply something about uniting Muslims. Though I respect his choice of religion, I recognize a certain ruffling of my patriotic feathers looking at this sticker. I think today I understand a bit better why Mustaphes’ greetings to me have been so short and why he rarely looks me in the eye.

Today, the day speeds past and I do my best to ignore the fatigue that pushes against my eyes, I try to gracefully hear my officemates comments about Bush and Libby and all the other crazy fucks who come from my country. Today is the first fourth I have ever experienced with an urge of my life to wave a flag.
Instead, I say quietly ‘ you know, today is my countries birthday’. My comment is immediately answered by ‘of course I know, its all over Yahoo, I never see July !7th marked all over the web…’ Bashfully I ask if July 17th might just happen to be Belgiums’ independence day. ‘Yes, but do you think Yahoo is going to post that all over? I mean there are so many countries, why do the states get… I tune out, try to focus on my spreadsheet.

The day rolls on and I look forward to the end with anticipation. My boyfriend has just arrived from Ouaga and I have decided to grill up some fish and drink some beer in celebration of his arrival. The more I think about it, the more I realize how much I also want to celebrate the fact that I am American. With the deepening of my experience here, and the progressive acceptance of the not so positive world reputation, I feel increasingly more and more American. Today more than ever I am more inclined to want to celebrate this day, one that I have only enjoyed as a party in the past. Since I was old enough to understand my nations role in the world I have turned my nose up to the flag waving and audaciousness of this day.

After work, I ride home, joyous after having sweat and happy to see my boyfriend. We take cold beers up to the roof and joke, popping peanuts into our mouths ( I like the way the dry brown skin slips off between my fingers) and admiring the green spreading over the hills to the north. With the help of my roommate and his girlfriend, the fish gets grilled, (Yann is ecstatic to get the head, while we are all happy to avoid it). When we finally sit down at the table, and lift our glasses in a toast, to good food, arrival of friends, celebration together, I again quietly say it is my countries birthday. I am here and I am for some strange reason, proud to be an American.

My name is...

One comment I often hear in the emails and notes that you send me is that people have a hard time imagining exactly where I am… there is no concrete way to give you a taste of my life here, besides my words, so here is a little montage of who I am here and what I am surrounded by. I hope it fuels your imaginations and sparks your interest.

My name here is Amie. Ahhhhh like a long, sighing, breath: opening, inviting, warm. Meee pulling your mouth into a smiling finish. Two nights after I arrived in Bamako, as I picked my way in and about my neighborhood semi lost, I was helped to find this name by some neighbors who soon became friends. A name; a friend; a breath; a smile; an inevitable entry into this world. When I walk down the street it rings after me like a song. The children who chant it, the friends who call, sometimes it sounds sharp and hard in their mouths, in a way that makes you realize they have been saying this name for centuries, and makes you wonder if it really fits you. Other times it sounds like a laugh, especially when Djelika says it- A sweet sound that makes you feel as if we have been sharing a joke, though the only things we can say to each other are hello, how are you, there was peace in the night.


I live on a growing street. It is young, though somehow far from fresh. Despite the fact that not six years ago, there was a forest standing where my house now asserts its’ cinder block splendor, Mali has quickly moved into this street and adapted itself to the needs of it’s inhabitants. My concrete fortress is beginning to soften with the growth of bouganvilla, oleander, trumpet vine and hibiscus flowers I have planted out front; I keep trying to bring back the forest with my greens, the quiet and peace of my familiar Oregon woods but by seven in the morning, the street begins to shift and move, shuffling feet along the dirt road in front of me; the workers arriving with their shovels slung over their shoulders, the banging of pots and pans as the family down the street begins another day filled with selling morning fateyers (small fried patties made with bean flour), couscous, sauce. From my roof I sit facing north towards the street and the hills beyond the houses. There is a light, scattered frosting of green over the white and orange shadowed cliffs. In the evening, Venus rises above these cliffs and glows bright in the sky. Together they are like a beacon of the peace I keep trying to attain… visible, constant, just a touch out of reach.

The people around me are alternately wonderfully new, happy, and warm, and suffocating, challengingly different. I find a tender balance of wanting to share all with these people and needing to take time, space to myself. The gangs of little girls run around barefoot in their underwear: Baini, Fatu, Maimouna, LaVeille. skinny, with little faces, beautiful eyes, and high voices. Baini has an extraordinary beauty, an loves to dress up in whatever fancy dress she can find, though clothing is really an optional luxury here as 9 times out of 10, and entire arm and chest will be bare, or they will be wearing nothing but underwear. These girls all seem to be about 3-5 years old, according to my eyes, though it is possible that they are actually 6-7, all of them very alert, talkative and smart. Most girls don’t go to school. The boys play soccer and do Karate, a grinning mischievous bunch.

Up the street is my friend Natogoma. Her father seems to have produced an uncommon number of girls with his 2(I think) wives, and has managed to put them all to work cooking for the entire neighborhood. I have counted at least 17 children living in that house; all have the same soft nose and piercing eyes. One goes to school. Though I’ve only seen him once, I don’t like her father much. In the mornings one of Natogomas mothers sits on a wooden bench on a small piece of elevated ground, serving her couscous and sauce from a tin table with an air of regal boredom. The fingers of her right hand, greasy and covered in small yellow meal are also the ones that handle the money. Aside and below, Natogoma serves her frou-frou with spunk and sass, shouting at the men, her quick voice sharp and laughing. twenty men crowd around with their plastic plates and tin spoons. This circus lasts all day long: rice at midday, mangoes with oil, salt, and chile, in the evenings, chopping onions, . When it finally gets dark, sometimes Natogoma and I go for a yahlah yahlah arm in arm through the neighborhood; somehow on these promenades, I don’t feel so strange, even though we can hardly communicate with each other. The truth is though, that I am much closer with the men on the street. I spend evenings sitting in the dark on a rough wooden bench, listening to the endless greetings and jokes of my friends Madou, Souleymann, Adama, and others. It is nice to spend time, especially since the conversation has long passed the “are you married” stage…. or maybe I like being with them because they never got to the “are you married?” questions. In any case through these guys, I learn the reality of unemployment in Bamako. My neighbor, Mohammed comes over for regular Sunday evening cook offs, and shares his poetry with me.

As much as I would like to say that I feel fully integrated here, my relationships with these people are like waves. They come and go, as I seem to run in and out of my commitment to them. Sometimes I feel as if they are still perriferel to my life. I believe one of the main reasons for this is that since I have arrived, I am more deeply concentrated on work than I believe I ever have been in my life. Another reason for the distance is simply cultural and economic differences. I can’t take them all out dancing with me; I can’t communicate entirely openly with them, and so my relationships with locals only take me so far. Sitting and drinking shot glasses of sugar and tea doesn’t fulfill me socially. I also have a pretty good core of ex-pat friends, mostly from my ONG. I spend my days in the office bouncing jokes, frustrations, limericks, movie bits and recipes with my Belgian friend, Kristien who is working on child protection. We join Maria, the wonderfully down to earth, practical Irish lesbian friend and newly arrived, energetic film maker, Fid for gin and tonics and dancing. I have a fantastic new housemate from Paris named Nico. He is typically French in all the right ways ( appreciation for good wine, food, conversation) and typically not in all the right ways too ( very open, fun, and no zeeeece eeese sooo enyuant French accent.)
He makes the token guy in our group for now, and I am surprised he puts up with us as he does.


So, there you are, take a bite: a tiny morcell of my experience; roll it around on your tongue and taste it; see if it brings your closer to me. I hope it does!