The End of Ramadan

Everyone was awaiting the end of Ramadan with much anticipation. Based on the lunar calendar, the celebrations would either begin on Tuesday or Wednesday, so most people had been preparing for two or three weeks before. My host family had been busy getting outfits made and buying shoes and food. On Saturday, I went with my sister to the Grand Marchet in Bamako, which was basically like going to the mall three days before Christmas, but worse. It was probably 95 degrees, and the market was absolutely packed. Getting anywhere was sort of like trying to shove your way to the front of a crowd at a concert. It was crazy.

Finally, early on Monday night, someone saw the moon, and shortly thereafter, gunshots rang out in the capital, signaling that the celebrations would start the next day. On Tuesday, my family got up early to start making food. As we sat in the courtyard, groups of children and men came up to our door and recited phrases in Bambara asking for forgiveness for the things they had done. We all responded, “Amiina,” (“Amen”) and then gave the children small amounts of money. The first picture below is of my host sister Jolie on the left and my cousin on the right. The second is my other host sister Aïda and my host mom. They're in the courtyard in front of our house preparing food.


The visitors throughout the day were very interesting, but the Ramadan outfits were definitely the highlight. My entire host family had outfits made for them of bazin, an expensive fabric reserved for special occasions, and my host sister Jolie had one made for me to match hers. Bazin is made of cotton, but it has a thick waxy coat that sort of makes it like wearing an outfit made out of that red and white picnic tablecloth fabric. Basically, it was freaking hot. In the afternoon, I put the bazin on along with the heels my sister bought for me at the market, and then we left to go visit her friends as well as some of my classmates’ families. I looked pretty silly, but all the Malians were very impressed with my legit African garb.

Now that Ramadan is over, it will be interesting to see how Mali changes. Because people could only eat after sunset and before sunrise, they were generally exhausted by about 4:30pm, and many places weren’t even open after the late afternoon because people went home to sleep. Music and dancing have generally been absent, too, because those things are also banned during the daytime. Hopefully, life will get a little more interesting as things return to normal. After being here for a month, it will be nice to finally see the real Mali.