Stumbling Upon Family You Never Knew You Had

This past weekend I went on a quest to find wedding attire for the marriage of a great friend taking place this weekend at the National Cathedral. DC shopping is abysmal, so I went to the only metro accessible place that had somewhat of an option in clothing: Pentagon f*^#ing City. On a Saturday. At 2pm. Imagine a Whole Foods the size of a mall on a Sunday afternoon. It still makes me kind of wince.

Earlier in the weekend, on Friday afternoon, a freight train carrying tons and tons of coal plunged into the Anacostia River--no one was hurt, but as the Yellow Line metro train made its way across the impossibly narrow subway bridge over the Potomac the next day carrying moi, I burrowed down into my coat and turned my ipod up, trying not to look out the window for fear of catching a glimpse of the fallen train. One of my favorite songs, "The Coast" by Paul Simon (but only the live version--not the studio one) was gliding through my ipod and I suddenly felt an intense wave of nostalgia for Mali--for one moment of my 27 months there.

We had been in country for about 2 weeks. All 56 of us in training, being carted through the streets of Bamako, to and from our training center, Tubaniso. The first few weeks were overwhelming and exhausting. It was hot, we were dirty, everything was new and hard. We were forced best friends but all still strangers event to each other. One afternoon, our massive white peace corps bus was taking us back to Tubaniso. It was close to dusk, we had been out all day for one reason or another. The training center was about 15km outside of the city--a trip that would take anyone in the U.S. 10 minutes to make, but from the Peace Corps bureau in the heart of Bamako generally took an hour or more for us. Crammed in, 5 to a row, we all kind of quietly rode thinking about anything other than where we were. Until the bus started sputtering and came to a halt on the side of the road--too far from either the bureau or the training center to walk back to one or on to the other.

Ah, Malian transportation. I don't know if there is anything less reliable on earth. We all piled out--grumpy. Our driver assured us it "would only be a minute, that it was a small small problem". It was early enough in our time in country that I think we actually believed him. As we looked around we realized that we had stopped next to a large courtyard where there was some sort of party going on. Upon seeing a group of 50 young, predominately white non-Malian people, the folks throwing the party coaxed us into the courtyard to join them in the festivities. Music was playing, everyone was dancing. We were shy--the kind of shy like small children at a party who don't want to let go of their mother's dress and shrink away from attention that is given to them. But one by one we all started to wander out, or get pulled out, into the circle of dancing, until we realized that every one of us was now in the middle. The sun set, the bus continued to be fixed, and we continued to dance.

I found myself opening my eyes at the stop for the Pentagon with a smile on my face and an ache of nostalgia in my heart. Eventually, our bus was fixed and we boarded it, somewhat changed--it was that first moment where you begin to absorb the country and the people who ended up absorbing us for the remainder of the time we all had left. The Coast ended as we pulled up to the Pentagon City stop and I quickly hit replay and joined the throngs of people in the corridors, my good mood quickly melting in the crowdedness of retail.

I walked into Nordstrom thinking it would be the best place to start the quest for the dresses for this weekend. I wandered through the racks, grabbing things left and right, arming myself with as many options as possible under the reasoning that if I had 20 things for the dressing room, there was a greater probability that something would work on the first try than if I had been choosier and grabbed only..5. A petite black woman with an accent came up to me and gathered the pile in my hands so she could go set up a dressing room for me while I continued to browse. When I finally made my way into my dressing room, this same young woman continuously checked in--was everything fitting? Did I need a tailor? Did I like the colors? Do I need shoes to try on with those dresses?

"Miss Emily", she kept saying, "you just let me know what you need". I whittled the original pile down to three dresses and a few other things, and went back out to make round number two of the racks, to make sure I did not miss anything. "Miss Emily!" "Ma'am, please, just call me Emily" "Emily--I will put this on hold for you, you just take your time" she said. So I went in and out of the rooms, with this woman always ready to stow away the keepers and dispose of those garments I did not want. After about 2 hours of this (yes, it seems egregious, but it takes a while to shop!) I found her in the racks and we went over to the pile that had become my "hold" pile. She and I went through as I decided on the true keepers (3 dresses, 2 pairs of pants and 3 shirts). One of the dresses I was buying to consider for the wedding and would return if one of the others was chosen instead, was missing a small piece of thread that held the sash in place. Knowing that Nordstrom had on-site tailors I asked my sales lady if I could purchase the clothes, but leave them at the counter while the garment was fixed and come back in an hour. She said of course, she would make sure it was less than an hour--I assured her that based on the sheer number of people in the mall I would most likely not be able to walk from one end and and back in LESS than an hour. She laughed while she wrote her name down on a card for me.

"Emily", she said, "My name is Binta. When you come back if you don't see me, just ask for me".

Binta. Huh. That's a familiar name.

"Binta--where are you from?"

"Guinea, West Africa", she replied. I looked down at the card she gave me: "Binta Diallo" was her full name.

In West Africa, and I assume other regions of the continent, you can tell what ethnic group someone is from based on their last name. Diallo is a Fulani name, I lived in a predominantly Fulani region of Mali, even though my village was Dogon. For the first three months in Mali, while in training, I had a Fulani last name--Cisse.

"Eh, Binta--are you Fulani?" I could hear myself get back into the West African speech patterns. She looked up at me like she had just won the lottery. "I lived in Mali, for 2.5 years", I explained. Immediately, she broke into French. "Emily, Emily, enchante, enchante", she kept saying. She gave me the West African combination between hand slap and hand shake and laughed and laughed. We chatted and little bit, and I told her I would be back in an hour.

I felt lighter--I felt good. I wandered through the mall quizzing myself on all the Fulani phrases I still remembered, almost three years TO THE DAY since I had arrived home. When I went back to the store, I saw Binta standing by a rack chatting with another sales lady.

"Giddo am--jam hiiri" I said. (My friend, I hope the afternoon has come peacefully--is the general translation and customary greeting for that time of day). As she turned around I thought she was going to burst into tears. We went through the extensive Fulani greetings and she continued to chatter away in the language. I finally had to say 'Binta, mido hali fulfulde seda seda tan" (Binta, I only speak a little Fulfulde).

"Emily, you are my family. You are my family". She said it over and over again. "W'ahhalai, allah, you are my family". She grabbed other women and pointed to me, in all my red haired and blue eyed glory, and declared, "This is my family, don't you understand--she's one of my people".

We chatted for a little while longer. It was getting late. I gathered my purchases and asked her if this was the department she always worked in. She said that it was and I assured her I would be back to see her soon. "Emily", she said, "you don't know what this means to me". I assured her I did--I thought back to that afternoon in Mali--surrounded by strangers, dancing as the sun set, feeling like a part of a group of people for the first time since arriving. Or arriving home to my village, my family, after being away and being greeted in the same manner that any family would greet each other.

I miss the family I had in Mali, and I look forward to going back next August. But until then, I'm thrilled to know that I have family in some of the most unlikely places, and it's so easy to feel like I'm right back at home at the most unlikely times.