Yesterday we took a walk up the hill from our base of operations here in Yirimadio. We were joined by friends here in Bamako who also enjoy a bit of a hike-- well, not quite rappelling, but more than a stroll. Up a series of rocky paths, s-T-
E P UP over rocks big enough to hide a small cow, hoist yourself down again on the other side, look for a steady place to out your foot...-- you get the picture!
We always have a tag-along group of children, and since Mimi seems to be the easiest of our names to say, we hear "Mimi", "Mimi, look", "Mimi, Photo"(I had the camera), "Mimi...". It was a beautiful day, not too hot, and relatively good humidity level, for a hike and photo taking session--(I did tell you I took my camera! I have been good and had left it at home on numerous excursions early on in our stay, so as not to be the Ugly American tourist. Now I have to play catch up.) We also are making an effort not to just be "whiteman" and have been asking them their names and telling them ours. Since we are about the only white people in this neighborhood they can recognize us at a distance--"Mimi" Yakou"...
jules always collects a following, and stops to talk to the little ones. She has realy picked up a lot of Bambara and has a better grasp of the sentence sructure than either Ray or I have at this point, but we are trying to keep up.
We headed back after an hour or so to a dinner of meatloaf, baked potatoes, green salad, and Julies coffee cake, with coffee and tea of course.,
We had purchased a meat grinder at a downtown Bamako store so that we could grind our own hamburger. My one attempt to purchase hamburger at the supermarket left me wondering what they had included in the mix (at best it was some liver, and I wasn't sure I wanted to know what else). I decided that I preferred to eat meat that I had seen in its solid form, hence the grinder purchase. We can get a good chunk of "round roast' from the butcher at the local open-air market, and if I go in the morning I can get my cut right off the hind quarter, before it has been left open to the air and whatever flies and other pests have open access.
Want to try your math again?? 1 kilo of meat(red meat only, no bones and other parts)is 2300cfa: 460cfa/$1.00 and 2.2 lbs/ kilo. So how much am I paying for a pound of "misi-sogo".... So, how much was that?
Or you can do what I do, round it off to 500cfa/$1, and round off the kilo to 2 lbs close enough!.... Oh, did I tell you? First you have to take the number they tell you in Bamabarakan and multiply by 5 to get price in franks. (They used to have a 5 frank coin, and their money system is really saying "so-many" 5-frank coins.) S-o-o-o-o-! "A be joli?"she asks the butcher. "Kemenaaninibiwooro" ?? "Keme naani, ni bi-woro?" Lets see! That's "hundreds-4, + tens-6"--(460), times 5cfa....Oh that's 2300cfa! [I'll figure out the dollars when I get home!!]
Count your many blessings and thank you for blessing us to be able to be here as your emissaries. Your support is much appreciated.
Mim in Mali
Yesterday we took a walk up the hill from our base of operations here in Yirimadio. We were joined by friends here in Bamako who also enjoy a bit of a hike-- well, not quite rappelling, but more than a stroll. Up a series of rocky paths, s-T-E P UP over rocks big enough to hide a small cow, hoist yourself down again on the other side, look for a steady place to out your foot...-- you get the picture!
We always have a tag-along group of children, and since Mimi seems to be the easiest of our names to say, we hear "Mimi", "Mimi, look", "Mimi, Photo"(I had the camera), "Mimi...". It was a beautiful day, not too hot, and relatively good humidity level, for a hike and photo taking session--(I did tell you I took my camera! I have been good and had left it at home on numerous excursions early on in our stay, so as not to be the Ugly American tourist. Now I have to play catch up.) We also are making an effort not to just be "whiteman" and have been asking them their names and telling them ours. Since we are about the only white people in this neighborhood they can recognize us at a distance--"Mimi" Yakou"...
jules always collects a following, and stops to talk to the little ones. She has realy picked up a lot of Bambara and has a better grasp of the sentence sructure than either Ray or I have at this point, but we are trying to keep up.
We headed back after an hour or so to a dinner of meatloaf, baked potatoes, green salad, and Julies coffee cake, with coffee and tea of course.,
We had purchased a meat grinder at a downtown Bamako store so that we could grind our own hamburger. My one attempt to purchase hamburger at the supermarket left me wondering what they had included in the mix (at best it was some liver, and I wasn't sure I wanted to know what else). I decided that I preferred to eat meat that I had seen in its solid form, hence the grinder purchase. We can get a good chunk of "round roast' from the butcher at the local open-air market, and if I go in the morning I can get my cut right off the hind quarter, before it has been left open to the air and whatever flies and other pests have open access.
Want to try your math again?? 1 kilo of meat(red meat only, no bones and other parts)is 2300cfa: 460cfa/$1.00 and 2.2 lbs/ kilo. So how much am I paying for a pound of "misi-sogo".... So, how much was that?
Or you can do what I do, round it off to 500cfa/$1, and round off the kilo to 2 lbs close enough!.... Oh, did I tell you? First you have to take the number they tell you in Bamabarakan and multiply by 5 to get price in franks. (They used to have a 5 frank coin, and their money system is really saying "so-many" 5-frank coins.) S-o-o-o-o-! "A be joli?"she asks the butcher. "Kemenaaninibiwooro" ?? "Keme naani, ni bi-woro?" Lets see! That's "hundreds-4, + tens-6"--(460), times 5cfa....Oh that's 2300cfa! [I'll figure out the dollars when I get home!!]
Count your many blessings and thank you for blessing us to be able to be here as your emissaries. Your support is much appreciated.
Mim in Mali
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