The Search for Chinois

This evening, I spent my time looking for my friend Chinois (he is the one on the left). His is so named because as a kid he caused problems for his parents and his grandmother thought he was a vagabond... so she said Chinois. You can guess what Malians think of the Chinese and the products they send to Mali.

Anyway, Chinois has been absent from his usual post at his boutique since I have gotten here, so I decided I would go on the hunt. I found his wife in the early evening selling food on the side of the road and she told me he has been farming during the day and has been too tired to work at the boutiqu at night. She got a little kid named Oof Diarra to walk me back to Chinois' house.

The walk turned out to be longer than I thought, but it was all right because Oof might be the coolest kid I have met since I showed up in Mali. This kid couldn't have been more than 9 years old but you would have thought he was 25. As we walked he was greeting adults and young woman. He was talking with them and joking with them... it was impressive. My mobile phone has a flashlight on it and he asked if he could use it, so I handed it over to him. He then started asking about how you call the United States on the phone. I asked him if he wanted to speak English to an American and he said yes. I took the phone back and called Carolyn (who is in England, but that's neither here nor there). I quickly said hi and handed the phone over to Oof. I could hear Carolyn say hello so I told him what to say... he did brilliantly.

I don't think I'm doing Oof justice, because this kid was amazing. When we arrived at Chinois' house, Chinois told me this kid hangs out with adults and they all like hanging out with him... super cool.

Anyway, I finally found Chinois who was, in fact, dog tired after working in the fields all day. He has a dinkey cart that takes him out to the fields which is very far away and must be incredibly hot. We hung out for a good long while and then I wanted to let him get to sleep. He insisted on walking me back to Coulibaly's house. I tried to let him go but in true Malian fashion, he wanted to give me the road.

When we showed up at the Coulibaly's house, Vieux had stopped by and given me a chicken and a rooster from the tree association. Super nice.