While things are still fresh in my head, I'll try to illustrate and
describe some of the things we saw and did today on our brief
excursion to Segou. We left early, about 6am so we could get to the
town about 9am, before it would get so beastly hot.
As you drive away from Bamako on the narrow but paved road
(one-lane traffic each direction), the scenery and environment
changes. Crowded traffic composed of 4WD's cars, mopeds, bicycles and
bachés give way to sparse traffic mostly composed of large transport
trucks some 4WD's and other overloaded vehicles. Alongside the road
you will see more donkey carts. People are walking, often carrying a
great deal. Women carefully balance the bowls of fruit or baskets of
laundry on their head and are usually also carrying a baby strapped
to their back with a cloth. Bicycles are piled high in the back with
chopped pieces of wood, grasses, or other items. The vegetation
changes, from an abundance of mango trees, acacia trees and bushes,
and gets sparser as you head towards Segou. Baobab trees become more
common, sprawling their root-like branches (often leaf-less) over a
great distance. Grasses are uncommon, making it difficult for the
thin cows, goats and sheep to find something to eat. Although it was
quite apparent by the neatly trimmed uniformed bottoms of the mango
trees that animals had found the leaves to be a treat. We even think
we saw a few baboons scurrying over to some mango trees. We also saw
black storks nesting, which is supposedly an indication that the
rainy season will start earlier - a much welcomed thing to me, since
there will be a little relief from the heat.
The housing of the people and the makeup of the villages also
changes. In Bamako, buildings are mostly made up of concrete cinder
blocks and are larger. Trees (including tropical trees and flowering
types) are planted around houses to shade the homes and keep grass
growing. Houses are multiple -roomed and have windows and doors that
close. Some homes (typically expats) are large and have swimming
pools in the walled yards. As you go outside Bamako, the Malian homes
transition from simple concrete houses with walled courtyards (which
are shared by extended families and a few goats or sheep) to very
simple small houses made out of mud brick. You will also find
granaries or other storage areas, looking much like the thatched roof
granaries found in Dogon area. Tiny mud-brick mosques also appear in
the villages. Occasionally you will find a long narrow one-roomed
concrete school, ventilated only by open windows. Today we saw
children in several of the schools. There probably was at least
75-100 children crammed into the one room, with others sitting on the
windowsills or leaning through the windows. Women or girls will be
inside the mud brick walled compound pounding millet with a large
heavy stick. Animals will be roaming the compound. Smoke waifs up,
from the meal that is being cooked outside on the fire. In some of
the villages, women will be seen pumping water from the single well
built by some aid organization. There is activity everywhere.
However, it seems like the women are the ones that are doing most of
the hard work.
Everywhere you have entrepreneurs, or at least someone eager to sell
something. Men hold up guinea hens by their necks alongside the road
waiting for an eager customer. Women present their newly picked
mangoes or vegetables (which are balanced on their heads) to
passengers in the local transportation vehicles (the bachés) and
whoever is willing to buy. Others sit in the shade with their produce
or fish, either freshly caught or smoked. Men stand behind counters
in crudely made wooden or metal booths, hoping that someone will buy
one of the huge hunks of meat (still on the bones) of cows dangling
from the ceiling of the booth. Children try to sell plastic bags of
water. Other items include lots of plastic ware, clothing (many of
which has Nike or other American logos on it), used tires, gas/diesel
fuel (in tiny crank pumps), prepared foods, and animals such as
sheep, goats and chickens. Once you enter Segou, you will also find
women from a nearby village selling pottery, Tuaregs and Bambara men
trying to sell (especially to white people, since they know we have
more money) hand-crafted items such as leather boxes, beaded
necklaces and other items. Others will ask you to "please come and
look at my shop," which is usually just a simple small room with
dusty wooden sculptures and masks piled on the floor or an occasional
table. You can also find mudcloth and indigo cloth here. Still other
young men ask if you would like to take a trip by pinasse (boat) to
the Bambara pottery village of Kalabougou. You are expected to
bargain when you are interested in buying something, which can
sometimes be a challenge in Segou, since many Bambara people do not
speak French. Although the Malians are very poor, they at least
aren't highly pushy with trying to make a sale and will usually
accept a polite "non, merci" as final.
I was pleased to see the amount of infrastructure improvements made
in and around Segou. It, like Bamako, is preparing for the 2002
Africa Cup soccer championships being held in Mali. A soccer stadium
is being built in Bamako, Segou and Kayes. In preparation, Segou has
been paving its roads, digging adequate ditches, adding new
turn-abouts in the roads, and covering up the open sewers with
concrete slabs - almost like a sidewalk. New hotels will also needed
to be built yet. New concrete block buildings being constructed to
provide space for businesses. Segou has even beat out Bamako, picking
up much of its trash lying around. If Mali does indeed make the
required improvements in time for the game; any investments it makes
should reap great benefits for this poor country and its residents.
When we first arrived in Segou, we walked past the market place area.
It was vacant, since market day is on Mondays. Continuing walking
along the Niger River bank, we reached the area where the women were
selling the pottery. Hand-built pit-fired pottery of varying sizes
and shapes could be found in this area. Two teachers purchased
several pots for flower plants (including some 2 1/2 feet tall) for
about $1 each. After carefully packing the fragile pottery in the
vehicle, we went to a local hotel for an early lunch. Already at
10:30, the heat was oppressive (110°) and we ached for a cold drink
(instead of the water that had become warm in our water bottles).
After eating a nice meal of capitane (a tasty fish) we drove to the
women's cooperative. Here they made rugs using the tying method.
After tying the wool yarn around each string in the row, the row was
tightened by weaving a strand across the entire length. The strand
was then packed more closely to the tied row using a type of pick.
The women then trimmed the tied yarn pieces down to a length even
with the rest of the rug. We also saw women there carding the wool,
spinning it (with just the needle) and others dying the yarn. After
this, three of us went wandering around the artisan shops. The heat
drained us of our energy even with drinking lots of water, so after
an hour or so we walked back to the hotel restaurant eagerly downing
an ice-cold coke.
We had a full day. Now we headed back to Bamako, once again passing
the tiny villages, carefully watching out for cattle crossings, goats
and sheep wandering about and crossing the roads, chickens, and of
course the vehicles and pedestrians. Full of color and quiet
happenings, a trip through Mali is never dull.
