Mali Water Pump Project

Today we woke up and got ready for church...and waited. And waited. And waited. Our ride to church was 2.5 hours late. Patience is definitely a virtue in west Africa!

When we finally arrived at the church, Jean-Pierre introduced us to his congregation, and they all welcomed us. Jean-Pierre gave a spirited homily, and then the service was over. After that service, we all piled into our van with Jean-Pierre and his children and nieces and nephews. (Overall, there were 23 of us in the van.) We went to Jean-Pierre's school, where there was another service going on. At the second service, the congregation played a special song for us on a real xylophone and several drums.

We went to Jean-Pierre's house and watched Monk in French on TV while the pastor changed his clothes. Jean-Pierre lives in the "VIP" area of Bamako, as he proudly proclaimed to us today. We went back to Amandine for lunch and then the van dropped us off at the mission house.

There is a family staying at the house with us, and they have four sons. We played with them all afternoon outside in the courtyard. (Jason especially!) There is also a little boy named Jacque (from Timbuktu) staying at the house, and the girls are all enamored with him. He never had a lollipop before today, but Asha fed him 15 of them, so he is now a lollipop addict.

Tonight, we went to a new restaurant called Steak House for dinner. It was very similar to an American restaurant, and they had excellent after-dinner espresso! Natalie, Asha, and Sam also enjoyed the restaurant's background music, which consisted of teenybopper music circa 1999. After dinner, we went back to the mission house.