Month: November 2019

We left this hotel this morning with our few things and a gift box for an Elder in the Abidjan West Mission and we walked through the back roads of town to the Alliance compound which is near the new hospital.

Here are some typical sights from this town we love:

Arriving at the Ouelessebougou Alliance compound (they call it the Utah Alliance here).

We were greeted by our very dear friends, Anounou and Teningnini.  They are our Alliance staff in Ouelessebougou and we love them.  We’ve been coming here to work with them for years.

The Alliance is adding on!  This new wing in the compound is being built now.

There were 23 beds with nets set up for the doctors and the medical team.

The power in Ouelessebougou has been off, so Anounou has filled many buckets and barrels with water to get the team through the week if needed.  This is the bathroom:

The pavers are another change in the compound since last year!

After having a granola bar for breakfast, we headed to the hospital to join the team.  We only spent today here, returning on a public bus to Bamako late this afternoon.  The medical team is staying until Saturday.  What a gift they give each year to the people of this area!

We spent the night at the hotel in Ouelessebougou after visiting the Ouelessebougou Alliance compound with the team.  We had a nice freeze dried spaghetti meal with an appetizer of chips and salsa.  That sure tasted good!  There were beds and mosquito nets for 23 at the compound.  We and a few of the translators stayed at this lovely hotel.

There were just a few things we forgot to pack.  Sheets.  Pillowcases.  Towels.  Toilet paper.  Soap.  We did have a bed and a mosquito net, and complimentary flip flops for the shower that was over the toilet.

My tote bag is a reminder of our other life in another place.

The potty pot is what is used in place of toilet paper in traditional Malian bathrooms.  I found some tissues in the bottom of my tote.

One think we did think to pack for tonight:  Benadryl.  And we had a bottle of water.  We got a bit of sleep.

This evening we made a new friend, David Keddington from Dakar, Senegal.  He and his family live there.  He works for the state department doing lab/research work.  He attends the branch there where our friends, Elder and Sister Thompson are serving.  They told him to look us up when he had a week of work to do in Bamako.  We had a great visit and a great meal together.  The world is a small place in the church.  It’s easy to make friends when we start with so much in common.

Along every road or street is a ditch, usually made of cement, but not always.  This is where the waste water flows from the homes and shops and businesses.  These ditches are usually 2 to 3 feet across and 3 to 4 feet deep.

These ditches are often covered by removable cement slabs or anything available.  Since rented space is so dear, the vendors set up shops along just about every street, wherever they can find space.  Often the goods are left out at night, but covered.  People here are honest and don’t take what doesn’t belong to them.

With cemeteries on my mind, after Dad’s passing, I poked into this one today as we passed by.  There was a Muslim service going on and I didn’t want to disturb them, so I only took these 2 photos.  It’s a peaceful place, in spite of the heat and dust.

This day started like many others–we worked at the apartment, sorting and organizing and we had a fine lunch with food we left behind in Mali a year ago.  Stale crackers, good PB and some jam.

John went to work cleaning one of our Costco chairs that was sent over in the container.  The termites got to it and did some damage.  The whole chair seems to have inhaled the termite dirt, turning it a shade dingier than the companion chair.

We are sorting through the things that came over in the container in August 2018, trying to organize what needs to go where.

We’ve set up a bedroom for now in the smallest, coolest room we have.  We’ll move to the larger bedroom once the A/C in there works.

Our living room right now:

And our beautiful neighborhood view:

After a long day of work, we decided to go downstairs to the restaurant for dinner to celebrate getting so much done.  That’s where we were able to get onto WiFi for a few minutes and that’s where I learned that my Dear Dad died today.  I cried as I ate and was able to communicate a bit with my family.  He died early this morning, letting go of his tired broken body.

Dad is flying into the heavens tonight.  But I’m pretty sure he stopped by to wave at me when he flew over Bamako.  I went out onto our deck when I got home to see if I could see any stars twinkling at me.  There were none.  There’s too much smoke and haze in the air.  Then all of a sudden all the power in our sector went out!  It was pitch black for about 20 seconds, as if he was giving me a nod, not from an obscured twinkling star, but with a sign I’d be sure to see, a quiet darkness.  I smiled and wished him well.  I love my Dad so much.  A great soul has passed today.