February 2014 Project Update

Our volunteers may have taken a few weeks off over the holidays, but things are still happening behind the scenes at the Dokotoro Project!

The dust has settled from our November fundraiser, and we’re delighted to announce that we raised nearly $11,000 by the end 2013. We extend a big, heart-felt thank you to everyone who donated or volunteered to make this such a big success. And we owe a special thanks to the anonymous donor who gave a $5,000 matching grant. Not only did we meet the match, we exceeded it by nearly $1,000.

Translation – We’re just past the half-way mark in translating Where There is No Doctor into Bambara. Our Bamako-based translation team is working on the First Aid chapter right now, which is one of the longest and most complicated chapters in the book, with nearly 80 pages of material. There is a lot of challenging material, with many new medicines, and lots of detailed figures and captions. The translators should finish a draft sometime in March, at which point we’ll pass it on to our editor/proofreader for correction. Continue reading

Friday Party – Tiécoro Sissoko

Tiécoro Sissoko is a griot from the Kayes region in western Mali, and a skilled storyteller, singer, and guitar player. He has played and recorded with some of Mali’s finest musicians, and until recently, he played a weekly gig with Toumani Diabaté at The Diplomat in Bamako. Tiécoro passed away in May 2012, before the California-based record company, KSK, would released his first album Keme Borama. Enjoy this great video.

Some new photos…

Have you noticed the photos that grace the “masthead” at the top of dokotoro.org? We’re using a WordPress feature where it posts a random photo each time you re-load the page. For a long time, we’ve had the same two photos–both of which I love–but I’ve been looking for new ones to add for a while.

Our friend and Dokotoro Project volunteer Lyle Hansen has graciously agreed to contribute a few photos for our site. Lyle recently returned from a month in Mali, where he took loads of photos, and visited several projects run by African Sky, our fiscal sponsor. His trip was funded by a successful Kickstarter campaign called Jarabi: C’est la joie de vivre.

Please join me in thanking Lyle! Better yet, go check out his website lylehansen.com for great pictures of everyday life in Mali.