Holidays

We recently marked two holidays, Thanksgiving and Tabaski. These are strikingly similar. Although one is religious and one is not, they both are marked by gluttonous consumption of meat. Thanksgiving has its turkeys to commemorate the survival of the Pilgrims thanks to the cooperation of the Native Americans. Tabaski has its rams to commemorate Abraham’s willingness to sacrifice his only son, Ismail, to prove himself to god. The bottom line is that an animal is killed and folks gorge themselves. These two separate cultural holidays happened to fall two days apart this year, which made for the tastiest week ever.

Since Tabaski was on the Saturday after Thanksgiving and it is the biggest holiday in Mali, the Peace Corps crew who live in Sikasso held their annual feast early, on the preceding Monday. This was perfect for us because it meant we got to go there and pig out on turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes and maybe a beer or two and still make it back to Bamako to go to the U.S. Ambassador’s residence on Thanksgiving itself for more of the same! This was our Mali version of Thanksgiving with the Hannons and then driving to New Hampshire for Thanksgiving with the Briggs. Score!
Tabaski is celebrated by virtually all Malians and that means that the same move could be pulled for this holiday too. We spent the morning with our family cutting up animals and cooking then we headed to our tutor’s place for a feast with his friends. After that, we came back
home only to eat even more with the family again before they returned to the mosque dressed in their finest. Normally, everyone gets new clothes made for the occasion but since we rarely wear Malian clothes in Bamako our “swear-in” outfits were new to them.

(Sam with our host family in Bamako)

We ended the evening in an untraditional fashion watching a France versus New Zealand rugby at the bar. Heck, we are even culturally exchanging with Kiwis!