Ashley and I are only a couple weeks away from swearing in as Peace Corp volunteers! To celebrate Peace Corps’ 40th year in Mali, the President of Mali has volunteered to host our swearing in ceremony at his presidential palace!

As we approach the end of our pre-service training and prepare to move to our permanent site in Kourounikoto, I request that any new mail be sent to our regional capital instead of the Peace Corps office in Bamako.

Our new address:

Daniel Brent Arnold, PCV
Corps de la Paix
B.P. 25 Kita
Mali, West Africa

If you are wanting to send a care package or letter, here is a list of requests:

Champagne yeast (and any other wine making stuff)
Cheese packets from Mac ‘n’ Cheese boxes
Spice/sauce packets
Beef jerkey
Gatorade mix
TV shows/movies on flash drives or DVDs
AA or AAA batteries
Photos and letters

After 12 hours of travel, we arrived at our site on Sunday. It took all of our efforts to stay awake until dinner was served at 8pm. The dinner was worth it. A whole chicken on top of a tub of spaghetti, delicious! We laid down shortly after. Despite waking up several times to dogs howling and the hee-haw of donkeys, we still managed a good night’s sleep.

The next morning we munched on fresh baguettes–with a taste reminiscent of country biscuits. Around 10am, we made a stop at the dugutiki’s (village chief) compound. We have two dugutikis in Kourouninkoto, they are twins. Traditionally, a dugutiki is chosen based on age and family line. Since they both came from the same family and are roughly the same age, they were both bestowed with the honor of serving the community as chief.

We were introduced to the elders and influential people in our community, and gave short speeches in Bambara on what we will be doing for the next two years.

Afterwards, we traveled to the CSCOM (under-five children’s clinic) for Ashley to meet her supervisors. The CSCOM is on the other side of town, and Kourouninkoto is not a small town. The rest of the morning was spent mapping out our future garden.

Our compound has a rock ground to “keep it less muddy during the rainy season”. While the logic may sound true, it neglects to consider the stubbing of toes and prevention of plant life. Before we can plant anything, we must first remove an inch or more of jagged stone. I foresee a labor-intensive weekend project. Our plans also call for the construction of a mud oven and painting our nyegen (latrine). Additionally, I plan on constructing two chicken coups.

Photos of our site are available at:

https://picasaweb.google.com/dbrentarnold.com/SiteVisit

Pictures of my host family: https://picasaweb.google.com/dbrentarnold.com/HostFamily

Pictures of a few of our African outfits: https://picasaweb.google.com/dbrentarnold.com/Outfits