General impressions

Most of my posts so far have been of things that I found interesting or special.  But I haven't talked a lot about my daily life in Bamako and given some overall impressions.  Overall, life is pleasant here -- more pleasant than I expected. 

The people are especially friendly and giving.  I've been offered scooter rides by strangers to run errands (twice -- I took one person up on the offer).  I've shared tea with workers on their break.  I spent an hour sitting and chatting with a shop keeper with whom I eventually exchanged phone numbers.  Walking down the street, it is common to greet people.  Being a little bit unusual looking (white, or "tubab" in Bambara) sometimes people call out to me, but it is always friendly and they usually just want to chat.  Children are especially interested and like to shake hands as I walk by.

We have two full time guards, a gardner, and a housekeeper.  All of them are very kind.  Our housekeeper, Cise ("see-say"), is a great chef and makes us traditional food for lunches.  As you can imagine all of this help makes living pretty easy.

Shopkeepers are almost all friendly in the face of my very broken French.  Sometimes they'll ask where I'm from or make other small talk.  My impression is that they charge fair prices (the same as they charge locals).  And our neighborhood market is a sight to behold.  It is almost a square block packed with produce and other items.  I'll post some pictures soon.

The weather is consistently warm and  pleasant: high 80's and humid during the day and mid 70's at night.  I understand it gets cooler in the Winter, but quite hot and dry in the Spring.  Before I came to Mali, I was a little afraid of lots of exotic critters.  But it turns out to be pretty similar to say Southern Florida.  In our house we get a few ants, but that's it -- no cockroaches or other bugs.  We do seem to have a salamander trapped somewhere in our house, but I like to think that's good luck.  I hope he eventually gets out.  The mosquitoes are not nearly as bad as Minnesota  In my almost two weeks here I've been bitten about five times.

The streets are alive with activity and just walking around Bamako is pretty fun.  Plus there's lots of commercial establishments I have yet to try -- there's a golf course, casino with poker, many many nightclubs and music venues, and many restaurants.  I start drumming class this week, there's weekly pickup basketball and softball among the ex-pats, and there's a fun sport called hashing  (description linked) I hope to try soon.  There's lots going on here, and I'm excited to get a car because besides the city, the surrounding countryside is beautiful (watch for an upcoming post about rock climbing).

Today I'm especially lucky because I was invited to a wedding!  I'm off.  More on that later.