Running Mali

No, comedy TV fans, this is not the running version of longest-running (pun unintended) TV show in the country Wow Mali. Nor am I about to correct your running form, with ‘mali’ meaning ‘wrong’ in local parlance. It just happens that I am in Mali, one of the landlocked countries below the Sahara desert in West Africa. With its capital Bamako, Mali is also home to the mysterious and legendary city of Timbuktu or that 'far away place', which was the intellectual center for the rise and spread of Islam in Africa during the 16th century. Legend has it that many European explorers, lured by the promise of gold and silver, left for this rich cultural center of Timbuktu, only never to return.

So can one run in Mali, or specifically in Bamako, now one of the fastest growing cities in the world? Tough at this time of the year! One has to be stubborn enough to run with or against the Harmattan - the dry and dusty wind that blows along the northwest coast of Africa, from land to sea, during the winter months up to April. The Harmattan is notorious for, as even famous scientist Charles Darwin noted, raising clouds of dust high into the atmosphere and sending tiny dust particles to as far-away across the Atlantic to North America. With a fog-like effect, the Harmattan dust can block the sun for days on end. Worse, it has been noted to cause irritability and rage in both man and beast.

Which made me think that maybe running in Mali during the Harmattan could be more dangerous than driving through heavy traffic in road rage-friendly Manila!

But run Bamako during the Harmattan I did! Since the city lies on the banks of the Niger River, the third longest river in Africa after the Nile and the Congo, looking for running paths along the riverbank appeared to be the most logical running option. Braving the pollution and dust and armed with a few mots français in this French-speaking country, I ran along the banks of both sides of the Niger, crossing the river twice using the city’s two main bridges – the The King Fahd Bridge and The Martyrs Bridge – that connects old Bamako with newer suburbs.

One loop of this route took about an hour to complete based on an easy pace of 6.5 minutes per kilometer. As I was supposed to do a 2-hour LSD (long, slow, distance) run as part of the training regimen for The Bull Runner Dream Marathon in May, I found myself running 18.5 kilometers in two hours in Bamako, which in the local language means "crocodile river". Qu'une grande experience! More importantly, unlike those early day explorers, I will return from Mali!

CJC3U2TWSX44