Double Life

So one thing that is not really touched upon in many Peace Corps blogs or other writings is the double life we lead as PCVs. There’s your village life, which is the one everybody talks about because it’s so profound and life-changing. And then there’s your expat life, when you spend time with other Americans/expats. Which isn’t very profound at all, but lets you blow off some steam and get your feet clean.

An easy way to distinguish between one’s village life and one’s expat life is a simple evaluation of wardrobe. In my village, I’ve got nobody to impress. So I wear my Macabi skirts or pagnes or my crappy, oversized ripped up dirty jeans (which as I have mentioned before elicits lots of “heeeeeeeeeey!”s from my village). On top, tank tops, stretched from the washboard, occasionally bleach-spotted or oil-stained. And occasionally, if I’ve got one on hand, a complet made of African fabric.

On the other side of my double life, I’ve got my expat clothes. My bedazzled, more fitting jeans (which I plan to de-dazzle tomorrow), cute tops, strapless bras, dresses. All of which I have left at Raven’s house in Bamako because I will never have occasion to wear them in my village so why haul them around?

Another telling sign: prevalence of hair on legs. I always shave my pits but NEVER my legs in my village. But once I’m in expat territory? I bust out the razor. Deodorant, too. I have taken to not wearing it in my village but can’t live without it otherwise. Hair conditioner. Even in those rare moments I wash my hair at site, there’s no way I’m going to use conditioner. Another item I have left at Raven’s.

Entertainment. Site: books, iPod, kids, animals. Expat world: laptops, televisions, internet, movies, iPod on speakers, dancing.

Food. Site: millet. Expat world: pizza and fried chicken burgers with bacon…and a strawberry milkshake.

In Guinea my experience in the expat world was extremely limited. I lived a two day hike away from Conakry (unless I happened to be able to catch the twice-weekly direct car which took 12 hours or so). In Conakry the only luxuries available were Chinese food, so-so ice cream, shawarma and beach bar pizza (accompanied by cold Guiluxe or Skol – well, sometimes cold). I never once went dancing. Nor did I ever go over to the Marine house. Half the time our VCR or DVD player in the house would be broken. But there WAS air conditioning. And hot showers.

Here in Mali, Bamako has a lot more to offer. Not only are there a slew of Chinese places, but there’s the Broadway Café which serves amazing strawberry milkshakes and pretty much whatever diner food your local mom-n-pop serves. There’s Appaloosa, a sub-par but better-than-nothing Tex-Mex restaurant. The Thai place (like heaven on a plate). Daguido’s Italian (quite good). Tons of real bars with beer on tap. Dance clubs. Internet cafes in spitting distance of wherever you’re standing. I’ve never been to the transit house but I bet there’s air conditioning and hot showers. I assume most of these things have sprung up and been successful here due to the sizable expat community. I mean, it’s no Dakar (Senegal), but it ain’t Conakry either.

I think the disparity between these two lives we lead is one reason some people end up ETing (early-terminating). In one sense, you do need it to blow off steam and get away from your village and be an American for a minute, but on the other hand I think some people get too caught up in it if they’re immersed in it too long and they are afraid to go back to their villages or they remember how fun and easy life was in America and just go back. Which is why Conakry was kind of the perfect balance. It had those elements of relaxation and indulgence you need every now and then but not so much that you wanted to stay there forever. When I came back after almost a month in Dakar on med hold, I was afraid to go back to my village, I remember. I was afraid I didn’t know how to live there anymore and that it would be like starting over and that all the tastes of Western delectability I’d been bubbling in for the last month had cooked me to a different consistency, but of course this turned out not to be true. I also thought this the other day as I was coming back from 3 weeks in Bamako. Which also turned out not to be true. You forget how easy it is to slip back and forth between these two lives.

So just remember that, future volunteers: just go back to your site. You won’t regret it.

On another note, Drissa told me today that the first project our chef du village wants us to work on is pisciculture, or fish farming. I was like awesome, that’s the one session I didn’t pay attention to because I was like yeah right. There’s no water. How are we gonna raise fish? Turns out there is some sort of river 5k away that in the rainy season has lots of fish that just pass us by and the dugutigi wants to harness this resource. So. When I get back from New Years and Tiken Jah, on va commencer.