Village Life (by Thom)

In my last couple of posts I described the two cities where I actually did the filming for my recent video project: Djenne and Macina. In those two cities the national church in Mali has sent Malians to serve as missionaries. My job was to film an interview describing their ministry: their challenges, joys, successes, visions, and persecutions. It was a good but difficult trip. Some of the most interesting times, though, came outside Djenne and Macina in the short stops we made along the way.
The first day I met my Malian colleague in the city of Bla. We spent a short time at his house and then went on the way. Our first stop was San. The national church has established their headquarters in San and so we stopped there for a short time. This is something about Mali that takes getting used to but is so very important. If word got out that we were through the town without stopping to great it would be a great insult. Thus we stopped, sat under a tree for 15 minutes greeting each other, talked about how things are going, and got back on the road. Our next stop was a couple of hours away. There was a church in a small village where my colleague had a friend. We repeated the greeting cycle and continued to Djenne. These stops are so indicative of the relational aspect of African culture. I doubt my friend Abel would even think of not stopping in San. That would be unheard of!
The next day, during the return trip from Djenne, we stopped at a very small village along the road. Abel's wife has family there and someone had recently passed away. We stopped here for a bit longer than the other places. We greeted, but since no one in this small village spoke French I was in the dark for the rest of the stay. What I saw was a lot of chatting and a lot of kids staring at me! Within minutes of arriving at the village there were dozens of kids following us around. I think I counted nearly 40 who were fascinated by me and my white skin. Abel told me that for most of the kids I was the first white person they had ever seen. I also saw a group of kids playing cards. After a moment I realized the game they were playing was basically UNO with a regular deck! That made me laugh!
We then continued on to Macina with one more stop - this time in Bla again at Abel's house. We stopped so he could greet his family and they were very generous. They shared their watermelon with me (watermelon is very expensive this time of year and costs almost a day's wages) and gave me some bath water.
Overall I was mostly left out, language-wise, during the stops but I got to see African culture in action. Greet others. Make sure they know they're important to you. Show interest in the lives of others. Stop and realize life isn't a race. These are some great ideals! I'm glad I got to take this trip.