I was reading The Economist in my village and everyone was really interested in this ad because there are actually chameleons in Mali. I told people I had never seen one before besides in pictures, and my counterpart promised that if he came across one he would catch it and show it to me.
Here is what arrived a few days later. We tied the other end of the string to the tree for a few hours. The chameleon didn't change colors like I thought it would, but it did develop some darker brown stripes that weren't there before. I pointed it out to kids passing by, and they consistently responded with "Don't worry. I will find a rock and kill it."
This girl comes by occasionally to chat, and one day while she was looking through my photos she asked if she could have one. I told her she could choose one, and out of all the photos, which included village favorites like family parties, winter scenes, and pictures of me, she chose this one of my brother, circa 2008, when he was learning to drive. Why? Because, in her words, "He is better looking than you." This was a slow day in my village. I want to stress that the music was playing at the time, and was not added later.
