Of Coulibaly and Third Wives

Madame Touré was given the wonderful task of picking me up this morning for work. She was in the front seat with the driver, and when I opened the door to the backseat there was an elderly woman already there. After getting through the initial shock of the thickness and roundness of Madame Touré's mother's glasses, we exchanged a few greetings in a mix of French and Bambara. When I introduced myself as Sali, as expected she asked me what was my "nom de famille." I explained, "Je n'ai pas encore un nom de famille Malien"/"I don't yet have a Mali last name,"and as is the Malian way, she offered me hers.

And like everyone else I've spoken to, she also warned me not to take the last name "Coulibaly"/COOL-E-BALL-E.

I explained via blog before that last names are important because they establish who you're able to make jokes with; every last name is connected to certain other last names that are considered your "joking cousins."

Well apparently, Coulibaly is joking cousins with everyone (I guess one particular Coulibaly got around back in the ancestral days). Your friend spills a drink, "ahh...t'es un Coulibaly." A donkey crossing the road gets in the way of your driving, "regardez cet Coulibaly!" So if I took the family name Coulibaly, I'd be setting myself up for some trouble.

As luck would have it, the horrible Malian referee that took back the U.S. goal vs. Slovenia was in fact a Coulibaly. He would've been called a Coulibaly out here even if he wasn't actually a Coulibaly...so it could not have worked out better.

During this typical car ride and throughout the first part of the day, I was already looking forward to lunch. Today was my co-worker Kankou's birthday. This birthday has been getting uber pumped up the past week because birthdays in the office mean: CAKE.

Now while things like Nutella-type products, sweet yogurts, and hard candies are readily available in the everyday market, there really is little to no actual chocolate. When there is chocolate, it is expensive, and this birthday cake was no exception: ringing in at a whopping $30 U.S. dollars, or 15,000 Fcfa.

After the fact, I can say that it was definitely worth it; if not for the actual taste, then for the singing that accompanied it.

Everyone in the office started weakly singing "Joyeaux Anniversaire," the French version of "Happy Birthday," once they had stuffed themselves with fried chicken and french fries that had been brought in for the occasion. But Kankou herself took the lead on the song and started belting it. She didn't stop there, any time I whipped out the camera for a picture she would start singing again, slipping in and out of the French and English versions of the song.

Couressy the program officer, Aicha the financier, Paul the chauffeur,

and Kankou the exec. secretary/birthday girl

In the cake's wake, on a chocolate high, we got onto the subject of marriage for some reason. Mali laws permit each man to have up to four wives. Kankou is the third wife to her husband, as her mother was the third wife to her father. She was one of eight children from her mom, and the other two wives had 4 and 6 children respectively, making Kankou one of eighteen children total! That's a lot of birthday phone calls and texts.

It makes you wonder, why are we doing family planning with women's groups, when we should be doing wife planning with men's groups!? One's enough!

Issa also pictured here, general physician/program officer

When everyone then asked if I were married, I said I was waiting for the laws to change in the U.S. to allow women to take four husbands.