June 27, 2006
Mali - Les Premiers Jours
I finally arrived in Mali to start my internship with the Global Alliance to Immunize against AIDS (GAIA) on Saturday at 4 am after a very long flight. Anyone who is ever planning on flying to Africa, should fly Royal Air Maroc... it is wonderful! For instance, rather than spend my eighteen-hour layover in the airport in Casablanca, a Royal Air Maroc rep tracked me down, and put me on a bus to a hotel in Casablanca where I spent eighteen hours eating free food and walking on the beach. Definitely the way to go.
When I got to Bamako, one of the doctors I am working with this summer, Malick Kone, took me to Dr. DeGroot's (the professor I am working with at Brown) house in Sikoro. Sikoro is actually a suburb within Bamako, which is the capital of Mali, and is a city of about 100,000 people. Right now, there are THIRTEEN people living in the house, but it's pretty big so it really doesn't feel very crowded at all. We actually have a pool and a doorguard... much better than the living conditions I had been expecting.
Mali is a gorgeous country. The only drawbacks are that it is incredibly hot (it's been up to 100 degrees since I've been here) and there are mosquitoes EVERYWHERE... even though I sleep under a bednet, I have tons of bites! I have gone hiking every morning since I've been here and the countryside is beautiful. There is also an amazing mosque right by my house that we want to go visit at some point - the only deal is that you have to go on a Friday and girls have to cover themselves up completely - veil and all. However, despite the beauty of the countryside, the city is INCREDIBLY poor. Our house is by far the nicest in our neighborhood. A lot of the houses are dilapidated and the roads are unpaved in our neighboorhood (the nearest paved road is a couple of blocks away). Standing out so much has also been a little difficult to get used to - whenever any of us go out, little kids call out to us, "Bonjour blancs!" (literally, "Hello whites!") Everyone has been incredibly friendly though - it takes forever to walk anywhere because people are constantly stopping to start conversations with you, but it's been great because I already know a lot of my neighbors.
Although I speak French, it's still been a little difficult to communicate when I go to the market because many people who haven't had formal education only speak Bambera - I am trying to learn a little while I'm here but it's a pretty difficult language. Malians really appreciate it when you try to speak it though. My neighbor Nina, a Malian medical student, has given all of us names in Bambera - mine is "Penda Keita" (pronounced PEN-da KAY-ta). Nina is the sister of Dr. Dao - another doctor who works with Dr. DeGroot and Dr. Kone in SIkoro.
I have had some great experiences in the past two days - Dr. DeGroot and Dr. Kone took me to the lab at Bamako Medical School where much of the work on the GAIA vaccine is being done (GAIA's mission is to find an HIV vaccine - check out www.gaiavaccine.org). Today, all of the GAIA volunteers and I went to the chief's house to present our projects to him. My project is an HIV peer education program for women titled "Le Main de l'Espoir" or "Here Bolo" (Bambera) or "Hand of Hope." I will explain the project in more detail later, but basically, Dr. DeGroot and I designed a curriculum that uses a mnemonic that uses each finger to remember an aspect about HIV prevention/treatment. This summer, I will be working with the President of HIV Education at Point G Hospital in Bamako to implement the program with a group of ten-fifteen women in Sikoro. At the end of the program, all of the women will become peer educators, and work with Dr. Kone throughout the year to continue teaching other women in Bamako and Sikoro. We are also planning on piloting a parallel men's group as well, which another student from BU, Jared, will run.
That's all for now...
Posted by Madeline DiLorenzo at June 27, 2006 07:10 PM
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