Working For Peanuts/Praying For Gold

I know I have been slacking on blog posts lately, but in actuality not much is happening currently. My village is still nowhere to be found, with most people off in the fields harvesting their millet, corn, peanuts, and beans. As no one is around, it is near impossible to plan anything of real significance. But I do have a few activities I am hoping to do once my village repopulates including health funtivities with my primary school and hopefully a malnutrition program as well. This past Tuesday and Wednesday, I went out with one of the nurses on our monthly vaccination campaigns in our satellite villages. In one of our villages, someone gave us a small plot of land for peanuts, so after we finished up, we checked on our crop and did a little harvesting. I had never really known how peanuts were harvested , but it is fairly simple. You just pull them out of the ground, comme ça:

People have given me so many peanuts lately, I don't know what to do with them all. Maybe I should give Planters a call. Anyways, after we checked on our field, we took a hike to see the gold mine nearby. They have discovered a lot of gold throughout our region, which has prompted many people to head to the mines in hopes of getting rich. Unfortunately, the mines are not the safest place to be. Falling into the mines, cave-ins, and mercury poisoning are all plausible dangers while working, and rape and STDs including AIDS are also elevated at these sites as well. Most of the work is done at nighttime when you can more easily see the gold glitter from the lanterns' light, but there were a couple people working when we showed up around 11am. We found this boy from my village sluicing for gold dust that may have been overlooked.

He told us he hadn't found any gold yet.

Our Assistant Nurse, Madame Zongo, is stricken with gold fever.

I feel like the rest of the year is going to be much busier, which will definitely be a nice change. In November I will be going on a mini-vacation to Mali for 4 days, hiking around what is known as Dogon Country (be on the lookout for more pictures). Then just before Thanksgiving, we have a Mid-Service Conference to discuss successes/failures and strategies for the coming year, as well as a medical and dental checkup. I have between then and mid-December to try to realize my 12-day malnutitrion program before leaving on Christmas vacation to America! That's right - I will be home from December 16th through January 6th to see family, friends, and eat some really awesome food. It looks like a busy two months ahead. Until then enjoy these random photos from village:

Isn't there something heavenly about light breaking through the clouds? C'mon, you know there is.

At 6am, while waiting for our nurse to head out for vaccination campaign, I caught these vultures chillin on my major's roof.

One of the last storms of the season

Panorama of the countryside near my village, what we call the brousse (the bush)