Picking up steam toward the end of Ramadan

Apparently it has been like a week since I last updated. I totally meant to do that.

The past week has been fairly uneventful. Living in Bobo is the same as it was. The water goes out randomly. The power goes out randomly. My workflow somewhat depends what I can do (what I can plug in or if my laptop is fully charged) any given morning. As they say here: Ça va aller. I forgot how easy it is to slip into resignation when you are at the mercy of others.

I started going to the gym with Zaky again. I don't remember it getting this hot here before when working out. It was also slightly muggy inside the gym. By slightly muggy, I mean that I am pretty sure everything was soggy. Salvador Dali would have been inspired. I can't recall if I actually worked out or not; the heat may have affected my memory. I am fairly certain that I did not actually lift any weights intentionally. They just sort of stuck to me as I crawled around among the gym equipment. Forget Dali, I am pretty sure Jackson Pollock is the correct reference. I don't know if I have made myself clear yet... it was sticky and dripping in there. It felt like what I imagine a dinosaur's panties would be like.

The past week Bakary and I have worked mostly on text stuff. We moved much further in an interview text that we didn't get to finish before I left last time. In doing so, I did manage to figure out a chunk of the 20+ verb suffixes I have in my data. Don't laugh at me, but many were actually just object anaphoric reference but it wasn't clear to me because 1) the noun suffixes are still a mystery (sort of) and 2) it is also possible to just not use them apparently, so the inconsistency was challenging. Transitivity might be a difficult monster in this language.

Yesterday we (Bakary and I) celebrated the end of Ramadan with Zaky's family. I am fairly certain I drank more than I needed to, but I survived. I got hang out with Cecilia again although she does not remember me from last year and is still shy around me. She did warm up a bit though, after I gave her a coin. Hmmmm.

Speaking of coins, I know a new phrase that I expect will bankrupt me at some point. In Jula it is samen samen. It seems to mean "give me money, because Ramadan." It is generally used by children at adults and adults give them coins. I am told that if I were in KV, everyone would say it. I weep for my wallet next trip as I plan to be there for two Ramadans.

I met with the missionaries (I haven't asked their permission to use their names) again to chat about variation in Viemõ and their work mapping Vigue territory. It is a little early to be able to talk about variation or Vigue perceptions of variation, but that will be coming. Someday. Before I write my dissertation. Hopefully. As a side note, I had wanted to do Preston style perceptual dialectology this trip, but I did not even consider whether or not people know how to read or have ever seen maps. Yay western privilege. So, I doubt that idea will happen.