this is an exterpt from an email update to the NMPCA who have supported many of my projects and even come to visit a time or two- I just copy and pasted but it is an update on how my village handled the coup and such...
The most pressing issue right now is the recent military coup. Since
Greg filled you in on the situation in Bamako, I won’t go into that
and I am honestly not too familiar with everything quite yet. I was
in my village until Monday evening without radio, internet, and
unusually bad cell phone reception, so I only had my village friends
to keep me updated. And boy did they keep me updated- there are
conspiracy theories running rampant through the Malian grape vine.
Stories about how ATT planned this or about how France sent the
weapons to the Touraegs so that they could have a reason to fight and
regain control of Mali.
The first response of my friends in village was excitement. On
Thursday morning, after I received a phone call from Greg telling me
that the night before the military had taken over the presidential
palace, I ran outside and asked my host dad what was going on. He was
very excited, and said that ATT wasn’t treating the military or their
families well in light of the situation up north. He said that the
rebels were winning and that ATT wasn’t doing enough. They didn’t
propose solutions to the problem; they only expressed their new found
dislike for ATT. It is strange because they used to love ATT and
respect him for his actions in the past promoting and upholding
democracy. The village changes their opinions so quickly based on
popular opinion from the radio.
Another example of this flip flop attitude is when NATO began bombing
Libya; suddenly it seemed that all of Mali had begun hating Obama
vehemently over night. Suddenly, even my most educated friends, were
telling me how terrible it was that ‘Obama killed Gaddafi with his own
two hands. What nerve!’ In one situation with close friends I
offered a counter argument to this statement only to feel the mood
going in the wrong direction and had to change the subject.
The whole situation is very sad though. There will soon be a severe
food shortage in my village. If rains aren’t sufficient this year,
the problem will become very serious. If all the aid pulls out, these
people will be left with no help to get them to the next year. The
education system was already suffering and I am sure that the military
government does not have education at the top of its list of
priorities, especially when funding runs low. Currently in Bamako,
everyone is pulling their money out of the bank near where I am right
now and the Air France and Air Brussels airline offices around the
corner are over flowing with Malians trying to get out. The already
struggling tourism industry will be finished. Projects in our Peace
Corps villages are on hold until we can hopefully go back. There are
Touraegs fleeing the north, 200,000 already in fear of ethnic
conflict. The homes of some Touraegs were burned in the city of Kati,
45 minutes north of Bamako. With the upcoming famine, things just
couldn’t be worse. The situation is unfortunate to say the least.
On a lighter note, a lot has been going on in village. Jon Markle
donated funds to do a child nutrition program in my village. With the
money, we created a program to put emphasis on vitamins and
preventative care as a complimentary program to the clinics core
function. Through vitamin enrichment and village baby weighing we
will improve the diet of women and children and educate them on the
importance of a complete and balanced diet. With this donation we
purchased mosquito nets, de worming medicine, prenatal vitamins, and
children’s vitamin supplements to work hand in hand with our
complimentary education program. We completed a ten day HEARTH
nutrition program with ten mothers and their 2 year old malnourished
children. My mom and her two friends came to visit to help and we had
a great time. The HEARTH program was first introduced to Peace Corps
health volunteers a few years ago in Guinea which has since gained
credibility and popularity. HEARTH is a community based program
designed for small groups of ten mothers and their malnourished child
to promote nutritional rehabilitation and behavior change. HEARTH
brings together a group of women to be lead in discussion by mothers
with healthy, successful habits including but not limited to birth
spacing, hand washing, and vaccinations despite the difficulties. The
objectives are to rehabilitate these ten malnourished children by
cooking ameliorated porridge daily, to educate mothers on basic health
issues, and to demonstrate through the ‘role model’ mother what is
possible even in village with limited means. We selected participants
during a regular baby weighing, and then had a meeting with all the
village leaders to formally invite the women into the program and make
sure that they understood the time commitment.
We also recently received a donation of over $90,000 worth of lightly
used medical equipment from the US Military, Department of Defense.
The doctor is so excited and had just begun outfitting our clinic with
the new goods when I left village on Monday. He also plans to build
another building next to the clinic to include a pharmacy, male
recovery room, and well lit operation room. He recently did a hernia
surgery with a flash light. The goods include new beds, mattresses,
surgical gowns, wound dressing, IV kits, exam tables, and desks. It
is truly a blessing and I owe many thanks to Greg and the US embassy
for securing this donation. I haven’t gotten to take pictures of the
goods yet but will first thing when (hopefully) I get back to village.
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