Friday, July 29, 2011

Exploring Tougan!

**July 22-24: Exploring Tougan – My Regional Capital!

After getting on my bus safe and sound and plopping down next to my fellow Peace Corps friend, Vida, I was on my way to Tougan, the regional capital (aka “big city”) for my area of Burkina Faso.  Tougan isn’t too far from my village – 47 km away, which is about a 45 minute bus ride.  Although, if I really wanted to, I could bike that distance rather than take the bus.  It’d probably take me a few hours to bike it, and I’d be really tired and sweaty.  But, on the other hand, it’d also be good exercise and I could always spend the night in Tougan at a hotel (with electricity, showers, and air conditioning!) or with either Eric or Sudakshina, current Peace Corps trainees in my group who will be doing their 2 years of service in Tougan.  As of now, I plan on visiting Tougan about once a month to get food/supplies not found in my village, check my mailbox, visit friends, and relax at one of the Internet cafes while taking care of email and any other computer-related business.

The bus ride from Lanfiera was to Tougan was short and sweet, and before I knew it, I was in Tougan and being greeted by Eric, Sudakshina, and Jessi & Tyler (the current PCV’s stationed in Tougan).  Jessi and Tyler are a cute, young, married couple who will soon be returning to America, and ironically, will actually be living in Minneapolis!  Yay Minnesota!  It seems like I’m constantly bumping into Peace Corp people that have Minnesota connections!  We first went to a restaurant for breakfast, where I ate some of the best yogurt I have ever had -- plus, it was cold! Almost to the point that it was frozen-ish! And breakfast we went to our hotel to drop of our bags.  I was excited to see that our hotel had running water (showers) and toilets in each room, and though there was air conditioning, it cost twice as much so we all opted to do without and just use the ceiling fan that was provided.

Our 2 days with Jessi and Tyler were a lot of fun and they were wonderful hosts, making us yummy food and giving us lots of advice.  We made chocolate cookies using a gas burner and a frying pan, had a “picnic” with fried chicken and cole slaw, ate some of their M&M’s in their chocolate stash, and were treated to homemade pancakes with powdered sugar, butter, syrup, and peanut butter!  Mhmm, it was so nice to have something other than dry bread for breakfast.  Plus the powdered sugar, syrup, and peanut butter (Skippy brand) were all sent from America, since you really can’t find them here, and so for Jessi and Tyler to share them with us was SO nice of them!   It was also great to see how they’ve decorated their house and turned it into a home.  They moved into a new site 2 years ago, and so their house was bare and there were no plants or trees in their yard.  Now, their house is painted and has curtains, and their yard is gorgeous!  It seriously looks like somewhere you would go to have tropical vacation, with all the trees, flowers, and garden plots that now fill their yard.  It was nice to know that they did all of this within 2 years and got to enjoy some of the benefits/beauty of their landscaping before they return home to America.  Plus, all future volunteers who live in their site (which in our case, will be Eric), will have an absolutely beautiful house and yard.  Some future volunteers will eventually get to enjoy mangoes, cashews, and papaya, right from their own yard!  Although those trees will take a few more years yet before they start to produce any fruit…

While in Tougan, we were invited to supper by some of Jessi and Tyler’s friends and counterparts….and my computer battery is about to die…so the rest of my Tougan story will have to wait until next time!

Thursday, July 28, 2011

Visit to My Village!


**July 20-22: Visit to My Village!

It took about 7 hours to get to Lanfiera, with brief stops in several cities/villages along the way.  At each stop, little kids and women would shove various snacks and cold beverages in our face or up to your bus window, in hopes that you’d purchase something from them.  Additionally, a few people would get off at each stop, but twice as many would get on.  Tickets for busses aren’t sold “by the seat.”  Thus, everyone who wants a ticket will get one, and – somehow – they WILL get on the bus.  They might not have a seat, but they will fit on the bus…somewhere.  My bus experience wasn’t too bad, despite my row of 3 seats containing 2 women, a young girl, a baby, and myself… annddddd our bags.  Good thing the windows were open, cuz there was no air conditioning.  But too bad that half our route was on gravel roads.  So, it was pretty dusty.  Such fun.  I arrived in my village late in the afternoon, and immediately had tons of kids run up to me and try to help carry my bags and my bike.  And then there were the random kids who just wanted to touch me.  Poke/jab me is more like it, though.  Much to their surprise, yes, I am in fact, a real person.  I may look different, but I’m not an alien, nor am I a figment of their imagination.  While I’m not the first volunteer in my village, the last “foreigner” left about a year ago (rumor has it his name is Nick and he loved his service in Lanfiera so much that he’s currently serving a third year with the Peace Corps in Mali), so it’s been awhile since some of these village folks have seen a “white” person.  

My homologue immediately took me to my house so I could drop off my bags and wash up after that dusty bus ride.  But when I arrived, I saw that my house wasn’t quite ready for me yet -- a man was working on attaching the door to my house and there currently is no latrine for me to do my business.  BUT, there was a huge hole in the ground, where I assume a latrine is going to be built for me sometime in the near future.  My house will be nice, but definitely needs some work.  It has a lot of room for potential, and also was a lot bigger than I expected.  There’s 3 rooms, along with an indoor “shower” area (basically a little closet with a drain in the floor for when I take my bucket baths).  I don’t have electricity, but many of my neighbors do, so either it should be very easy for my house to also be equipped with a power source, or else I can just go over to my neighbor’s.  But if I can get electricity, that’d be nice.  Then I could have some lights, power my computer, and maybe even invest in a fan to help keep me cool.  My walls are currently a dirt/cement-like substance, so hopefully I can get them plastered.  This will prevent random clumps of dirt from just falling off the wall, which will keep my floor and shelves and anything else I own much cleaner, and then I would also be able to paint the plaster.  White or blue or yellow or, really, any color at all, is so much more “homey” and appealing than gray dirt walls.  My courtyard is currently pretty bare, besides for the big shade tree in the center of the yard and the other house on the left side (my house is on the right side).  The “other house” is currently inhabited by 5 young Burkinabe men/boys.  I think.  I’m not really sure what’s going on with that.  I don’t know how old they are (16? 22? 30?), if they actually live there or if it’s just temporary, or even if they’re really all brothers and their parents were gone...  I don’t know.  I really don’t know.  We’ll see what happens.  But if I do in fact share my courtyard with these young men, oh well.  Future husband, perhaps?   and/or 5 “brothers” to adopt me as their new sister and help me do work around my house.  I have a lot of landscaping plans I’d like to implement (tree planting, a garden, a patio, an overhang for shade…etc.) and I certainly wouldn’t mind making them food in return for their physical labor…although, I’m not sure they’d like my cooking… I have zero intentions of making traditional Burkinabe meals (like tot, rice, or beans) when I cook, and from what I hear, not being able to prepare good tot is a deal-breaker for most men here. 

So you might be wondering…what is tot?  Good question.  I’m wondering too.  Actually, I do know what it is…kinda…I’ve eaten it a few times now.  Tot (pronounced “toe” as in the 10 toes on your feet) is a substance best described as being similar to America’s mashed potatoes, except a little more blah-tasting.  It can be made from a variety of grains, such as sorghum, millet, or corn, and thus can appear in many different colors, but typically it’s white-ish and served with a sauce of some kind, like tomato or fish or “gumbo” (which is this nasty green stuff made of who knows what).  Tot is a standard food here, especially for “poor” people, and it’s eaten with the right hand -- never the left hand, which is the so-called “poop hand” …you don’t have to be a genius to figure out what that means…  It’s rather messy to take a piece of “mashed-potatoes,” dip it into the liquid sauce, and then scoop it all into your mouth without dropping any or dripping on your shirt, using only your hand (silverware is a luxury here), although the Burkinabe people have no problem doing this without making a mess, since they’ve been doing it since they were born.  I’ll admit I’m starting to like tot, as long as it’s served with an edible sauce.  My homologue’s wife made an amazing meal of tot and fish sauce for me when I visited my village, and it was by far the best tot I’ve ever had.  And I even ate it like a true Burkinabe – with my hands.  I mean hand.  Just the right one, of course.  But before my plate was dished up, my homologue asked me (in French), “Do you prefer to eat tot with your hand or with the spoon?”  And naturally I said, “With a spoon, please.”  He then laughed and proceeded to say, “No, today you are going to use your hand.”  He got a kick out of watching me make a huge mess as I attempted to use my hand to eat the tot and fish sauce, and he was very proud of me when I was somewhat successfully able to clean my plate, sauce and all.
                                                                                                                                                                     
So what else did I all do in my village?  I met a lot of people, that’s what.  The “tree doctor” (aka the head gardener who owns a greenhouse/nursery for trees), the “famille royale” (the royal family – they had HUGE solar panels in their courtyard for electricity!), other teachers, my neighbors, the police officers, owners of restaurants/bars/boutiques/shops, etc.  I rarely understood what anyone said to me, because they spoke Jula or Moore or some other random language, but I smiled and nodded, and they were happy with that.  For the most part, the majority of my 2 days in Lanfiera was spent walking around talking to people, with my counterpart right alongside me, doing most the talking.  And the whole time, everyone kept trying to feed me and/or offer me alcohol or “welcome water” (which of course I can’t drink because it’s not clean/filtered and I’d probably get sick and die… so I have to pretend to take a sip, then spit it out when they’re not looking).  Kids would run up to me and hand me weda, a fruit that’s best described as tasting like a Warhead candy, since it’s a combination of sweet and sour, and you have to suck on each segment of weda individually due to there being a large pit inside each segment.  And everywhere we stopped, someone offered to buy me a drink, and before I could say anything, there’d be a huge liter bottle of Brakina (the creative name for a brand of Burkina-made beer) in front of me and I’d have to be polite and drink it.  I had made the mistake of telling my counterpart on the very first day that, yes, I do drink alcohol.  I should’ve lied and said that I was Muslim or something and that it was against my religion to drink (this is a common and legitimate excuse in Burkina, since so many people are Muslim), so that I wouldn’t have had to drink all that beer.  Pretty sure I was drunk by 10am every day, with all the beer I drank.  As you can probably imagine, walking around the village wasn’t a very easy (or comfortable) task with several liters of beef in my system… and to top it all off I had to also find room in my stomach for all the food they kept offering me.  For example, on my first full day in Lanfiera, I had bananas and weda all morning, and then at 10am we stopped at a restaurant for what I thought was an early lunch. I had THEE best smoked/grilled fresh fish I have ever had and I can’t wait to go back and eat some more of it!!! It was SO good and HUGE…the fish was at least a foot long!  It was served with a tomato/cucumber/onion salad glazed with vinaigrette and was amazing.  And of course, I was given a liter of beer to wash down my fish.  We continued to wander around town, stopping for coffee at a little boutique around noon.  Then we went to my homologue’s house where I ate the tasty tot prepared by his wife, even though I was already completely stuffed from my early lunch of fish and beer.  After my tot, I was served a mango, and then my homologue brought me a large calabash (kind of like a bowl made from the bottom half of a dried gourd) of dolo, which is traditional home-made alcohol that has a taste reminiscent of fermented apple cider.  It’s not too bad.  Unless you have to drink multiple calabashes of it…like I did.  Anyways, after my dolo, it was about 2pm, and I was finally “allowed” to return to my (future) house and take a nap.  Thank God.  My stomach wanted to explode.  I pretty much passed out immediately upon lying down, and when I woke up 2 hours later, my neighbors brought me weda.  And then my homologue showed up with fresh, still warm Samsoa, which are little deep-fried balls of batter/dough made from beans, similar to little donuts, just not sweet – usually samsoa is eaten with a spicy seasoning or dipped in pepper.  I really don’t like the samsoa I’ve tried so far (though it depends what kind of oil it’s deep-fried in; some oils have weird aftertastes), but the stuff in Lanfiera was alright.  I figured with everything we’d eaten that day, the samsoa was my supper.  But no.  We went out to a restaurant for fish soup and bread…and more beer, of course…and after that I was taken to a bar and served some kind of toxic mixed drink that probably had just as much alcohol as sugar in it.  Don’t be surprised if I develop Diabetes while I’m in Africa…    By this time, it was about 8pm and time for me to go to bed.  As we walk back to my house, my homologue stops and says, “You lead, I’ll follow you.  I want to see if you know how to get to your house.”  What!?  Really?  In the dark?  I’m tired, probably intoxicated, there are no lights anywhere besides the moon, so I can’t see anything except for what my cell phone lights up within 2 feet of me, there are no logical paths/sidewalks for me to follow (I’m literally walking across fields, under trees, and through bushes), and even if it were daytime, I wouldn’t have a clue how to find my way.  Me lead?  Yeah right.  I started laughing and he just kept repeating, “No. You must try,” and he refused to take another step or even give me a hint as to what direction to go.  I don’t know how, but by some good luck, I managed to get within the general vicinity of my house, and so finally he pointed me in the right direction and I arrived safely at my door.  Time for bed.  But not until I first ate more food.  My neighbors had prepared me a huge pot of spaghetti and liver and left it sitting by my bed.  And yes, my homologue sat down next to me and made sure I actually ate it.  After all that, all of the enormous amounts of food and alcohol I had consumed within a 12-hour time span, I would’ve been happy if I never had to eat again.  But I still had another day to spend in Lanfiera…at least I now know that I won’t go hungry during my 2 years in my village!

To top of my exciting visit to Lanfiera, on my last night when my homologue dropped me off at my house, he also gave me a surprise.  Or rather, a scare.  He told me goodbye and that it was nice to meet me and how he looked forward to seeing me again in September, etc.   I found this conversation to be a little odd, considering I would see him the next morning when he took me to the bus stop.  And that’s when he dropped the bomb on me with his final words: “Make sure you leave early enough to get to the bus stop on time tomorrow, call me if you have problems…see you in September!”  Wait a minute.  He wasn’t going with me in the morning?  I had to get from my house to the bus station (aka a designated “spot” on the side of the main road) by myself?  And buy a ticket…by myself?  And speak French…by myself?  Great.  The next morning, I packed everything up bright and early and then sat outside my house in a chair, in hopes that my homologue would show up.  But he didn’t.  At 7:30am, I left for the bus stop, and fortunately didn’t have any trouble getting to it – it’s about a 5 minute walk from my house.  I saw a few other people with bags also waiting, reassuring me that I was indeed in the right spot and that I hadn’t missed the bus.  A bunch of kids ran to greet me and carry my bags and steer my bike for me, and some adults who I had met but didn’t remember their names greeted me and got brought me a chair to sit it.  After about 30 minutes, I saw the bus!  It was going really fast (typical for all vehicles in Africa, no matter how full they are or what the road conditions are), and as it approached, I noticed it wasn’t slowing down.  It drove right by me and I stood up and kind of freaked out a bit.  How am I supposed to get on a bus if the busses don’t even slow down enough to see me?!?!?  One of the adults who was waiting next to me and keeping me company, even though he wasn’t going on the bus, tried to explain in French something along the lines of that the bus would come back in a few minutes, but first it was going to a nearby village and then it would turn around to get me.  So I relaxed a bit.  I have a feeling my homologue had talked to this man the day before and had asked him to watch out for me.  Which is fine.  I’m glad he did.   Sure enough, the bus came back and I saw my friend Vida, who’s in a village that’s a 20 minute bus ride away from me, sticking her head out the window and waving.  Once I got my bags and bike loaded, I climbed onto the bus and plopped myself down right next to Vida.  She immediately told me how she saw me “freak out” when the bus drove by, and that she also freaked out a little bit and almost yelled, “Stop the bus!  That’s my friend!  She needs to get on!”  Good to know that there’s others looking out for me here, whether it’s Peace Corps friends or natives!


Fun in Ouaga!


July 25, 2011

After a week of “vacationing” in several different locations, including Burkina’s capital of Ouaga, our future village site, and our future regional capital, we’re back in our training village of Sapone, slowly readjusting ourselves back into a schedule that’s packed full of language classes and technical training sessions.  Our week away from Sapone was much needed and thoroughly enjoyed by everyone.  Here’s what went down:

**July 17-20: Fun in Ouagadougou!
**July 20-22: Visit to My Village!
**July 22-24: Exploring Tougan – My Regional Capital!

Because each topic is extremely broad and each took place in an entirely different city/village in Burkina Faso, and also because there were so many unique things that happened to me each day, I’ve decided to write about each topic in a separate post.  I’ll start with my time in Ouaga...

**July 17-20: Fun in Ouagadougou!
We education volunteers ventured away from our DABA friends for the week, leaving Sunday morning for Ouaga.  I got up early that Sunday morning, since I still had to pack, desperately needed to take a thorough bucket bath that included washing my hair, and also had to take down my laundry that was still hanging on the line from the day before.  Turns out that at 6am, my laundry was more wet/damp than it was before I went bed.  Dang.  So much for packing “clean” clothes.  I threw a couple of damp skirts, wet shirts, and my saturated jeans into a plastic bag, shoved it into my backpack, and hoped that I would remember to take the wet clothes out and hang them up to finish drying immediately upon arriving at our hotel in Ouaga.  And of course, it was while I scurried around, attempting to pack for the week, that my host family decided that they wanted to take a picture of me.  My host dad pulled out his cell phone and proceeded to demand that I pose for a picture, so he could send it to his family and they could all see what “his American” looked like.  Lovely.  There I was, with messy bed-head hair, wearing my glasses and pajamas (athletic shorts and a t-shirt), sweating profusely because it’s hot, even though it’s barely past 6am, and my family wants a picture.  Really?  Now?  Why not in an hour, when I actually have clothes on? (Here in Burkina, women are rarely seen in pants, and they certainly don’t wear shorts, especially shorts that go above their knees…and my shorts definitely exposed my knees…and then some.)  But I couldn’t convince them to wait.  I forced a smile, posed awkwardly in front of the latrine that I happened to be coming from when this chaos occurred, and let them snap their picture.  “Jolie!  Tres jolie!”  they exclaimed, and then showed me my photo on the cell phone screen.  Liars.  I was not pretty.  Not pretty at all.  And I most certainly was not dressed in “culturally appropriate” attire.  It was a hideous picture, and I’m embarrassed their family, friends, and who knows who else saw me in this ugly state.  Way to represent America, Beth!   

Once I got away from my family’s picture taking, finished packing, and went through the never-ending series of goodbye’s with each family member, I strapped my huge hiking backpack to my back and attempted to get on my bike…which turned out to be more awkward than I expected, due to the heavy bag on my back throwing off my balance…  By this time, I was of course running late, and so I pedaled as fast as I could to the FDC (our training center).  I arrived just in time to load up.  Eight people crammed into the back of a truck and the rest of us piled into the Peace Corps minivan bus vehicle contraption of a thing that somehow manages to hold 28 people and a driver...and all of our bikes (strapped to the top of the van)….and all of our overstuffed bags (as long as they’re piled on our laps).  Consequently, the hour ride to Ouaga wasn’t the most comfortable, although the vehicles were equipped with air conditioning, so that helped a little bit.

But it was all worth it once we arrived in Ouaga.  We had a first class hotel -- well okay, by American standards the hotel would’ve mayyyybe been given 3 out of 5 stars -- and all of us appreciated having the many luxuries offered by the hotel:
*air-conditioned rooms AND ceiling fans (We turned both on to full blast…just because we could.)
*real toilets….rather than just a hole in the ground (As I recall, upon arriving at the hotel, one my friends said, “I’m gonna go sit on the toilet for a while. Not because I have to go, but just because I want to relax and enjoy sitting on a porcelain throne.  I’ll probably stay there for 10 or 15 minutes.  Maybe more.”)
*mirrors to gaze into and look at our pretty (or so not pretty) faces… for many of us, it was the first time we had actually seen ourselves in weeks….and most of us decided it’d probably be best to never look into a mirror again, at least while in Africa…
*running water, sinks, hot showers (Many of us showered and thoroughly washed our hair several times a day…just because we could – yes, we probably wasted a bunch of water, but it felt so good to be clean!  However, through this process, we also realized how dirty we really were…it turns out our skin didn’t have a good tan after all…it was just covered in multiple layers of dust…)
*delicious food: good, non-stale bread for breakfast, along with real butter and jelly to put on it!  Sugar-coated peanuts and chocolate filled croissants for our mid-morning “pause café.” And large chunks of seasoned meat (almost the equivalent of an American steak!) that could be consumed without biting into bones or fat. Mhmm.  The nearby restaurants also were a treat to dine at, and we indulged in ordering French fries, cheeseburgers, ice cream, and more.
*Wi-Fi!!!!  It wasn’t unusual to see at least a dozen Americans sprawled throughout the hotel lobby, busy on their computers and smart phones into the wee hours of the night (or morning), surfing the Internet, checking emails, uploading pictures, posting blogs, Skyping with family and friends, etc.  I enjoyed some great Skype conversations with family and friends, and found it amusing that my dad thought he could sit in front of the webcam without a shirt on…thus anyone and everyone who looked at my computer screen could see a large, hairy man with a severe farmer’s tan… which probably doesn’t give the African locals a very good impression of what “Americans” look like… so I made him go put a shirt on before I would talk to him, haha. 

Being in Ouaga, we also had the opportunity to explore some of the shops and stores available for our shopping pleasures, including Marina Market, which is basically a grocery store that caters towards Americans (or other foreigners).  We discovered that, for a hefty price, we can indeed buy otherwise impossible to find items in Burkina Faso, like chocolate candy bars, real deli cheese, Pringles chips, pickles, Hershey’s chocolate syrup, Diet Coke, air fresheners, non-stick frying pans, mini fridges, and toilet paper.  We haven’t been in Africa for that long, and yet, we were all in shock at how many things there were on the shelves and ended up spending the first 20 or 30 minutes just wandering around looking at everything.  The huge selection of products was overwhelming, and we were excited to be reminded of the many types of foods that –somehow – we forgot existed: “Look!  Ice cream!  And there’s a box of Lucky Charms! I used to love eating cereal with real milk… Man, how I used to love cold milk.  Powdered milk just doesn’t cut it.”   Everything is rather expensive (for example, a pint of ice cream cost 10,000 CFA or about $20 American), so most of us limited ourselves to a few select items, and took comfort in just knowing that these things existed and could be purchased if need be (like if we’re having a severe case of homesickness and just really need some ice cream to soothe ourselves)…provided we’re in Ouaga, of course.  So what did I splurge on?  Dark chocolate, strawberry yogurt, Gouda & Herb cheese from the deli, crackers, and a box of red wine.  Yes, a box.  It was cheaper, plus I didn’t have to deal with trying to find a bottle opener or corkscrew…   After cramming 14 people into two small taxis and bargaining for a decent price (200 CFA per person aka $0.50 American), we were transported back to our “ritzy” hotel and our “Wine and Cheese Party” commenced.  Needless to say, everyone was pretty happy that night.

Another very interesting (and unique) thing I experienced in Ouaga was having my banana stolen.  It was evening and I wasn’t very hungry since I had indulged in a yummy cheeseburger for lunch.  Actually, that’s a lie.  The restaurant we went to ran out of burgers -- too many Peace Corps trainees beat us to the restaurant and had already ordered/eaten all the burgers the restaurant had in its supply.  But it was okay: two of my friends and I split one cheeseburger so we could all have a little “taste” of America.   Anyways, I wasn’t super hungry and was only in the mood for fruit that evening, so I went with a friend to a nearby produce stand, where a lady was selling mangoes and bananas.  I bought my banana, being quite pleased with myself, having spoken clearly in French and actually understanding most everything that the fruit lady said to me.  But my friend, who was going to buy a sandwich from a vendor down the street, is a “Chatty Cathy” and likes to strike up conversations with anyone and everyone.  And since she has more French skills than me, she can actually do that with moderate success.  A man walked by, greeted us with a typical “Bonsoir! Ca va?” and before I knew it, we were having a conversation with this stranger.  No big deal.   We do that all the time.  Like every day, in fact.  Because everyone can tell we’re not locals of Burkina.  Hmm. I wonder how they know.  Could it be the fact that I have white skin?  And speak English?  Thus, they wonder who we are and what the heck we’re doing here, since there’s pretty much a 0% chance that we’re tourists.  (Most “foreigners” in Burkina are doing some kind of development work; there are few, if any, tourists here…because there really isn’t much to see or do…from a “tourist/vacation” perspective…)   So.  We go through the typical explanation of how we’re Peace Corps Volunteers and going to be here for 2 years, teaching Math or Chemistry or Nutrition, planting trees, developing community programs, bringing world peace, etc. etc., and usually, all is good and the locals are thrilled with us and say thank you and good luck and then proceed with their lives and leave us alone.  But unfortunately that’s not what happened this night at the fruit stand.  Our conversation with this man quickly went from typical to weird to creepy.   And before I even knew what happened, he somehow was holding the banana I had just purchased, asking me if I would give it to him.  No, I wouldn’t. Even though he said he was really hungry.  Too bad.  You give one person something and then you’ll have a hundred others following you around, asking for food or money.  Plus, I paid for my banana, and I wanted that specific banana.  It was perfectly yellow without any bruises, and I had picked it out specially.  Yes, I’m picky.  The creepy man then offered to buy me a different banana.  Which you might think sounds reasonable or at least like a quick and easy solution to resolve this awkward situation.  He took my banana, but was going to buy me another one in return, same price, same size.  Equal trade, right?  But no.  That’s not how things work in Burkina.  You see, me “accepting” his banana, could potentially mean a number of different things: that I would be his wife, that I would take him to America, that I agree to go out with him, etc.  So there was no way I was going to accept his offer to buy me a banana.  Or even, at this point, to take back my original banana.  It was best to just let him have it and walk away….as quickly as possible.  So we did.  Leaving me short 100 CFA…and without a banana.  Sad day.

However, our time in Ouaga was not purely for exploring, entertainment, and eating food.  It was actually to meet our homologues and attend 2 days of workshops together.  Our homologue is the person from our future village who we’ll work closely with, who will serve as a mentor figure and help us get integrated into our communities and understand the culture.  Our workshops were an opportunity to make sure that everyone was on the same page as to what Peace Corps is and what we, as volunteers, will (or will not) be doing during our 2 years of service.  My homologue is named Guel-Jean Kone (I think that’s how it’s spelled?) and he teaches math and science at the CEG (“middle school”) that I’ll be teaching at.  He’s about 30 years-old, has been teaching for 5 years, has a pretty wife, as well as a dog named “Welcome,” but no kids…yet.   After our 2 days of workshops in Ouaga, my homologue and I departed early in the morning to catch the bus to my village of Lanfiera, which is on the west side of Burkina and not too far from the country of Mali...

Tuesday, July 19, 2011

Attempts at Laundry, Playing Clarinet, & Doing Business with the Local Tailor

July 16, 2011

Today is Saturday, and so we only had class until noon.  Normally, Sunday is a complete free day for us, but not this week.  Tomorrow, we leave at 9am for Ouaga.  We will be spending 2 days in Burkina’s capital, where we will meet our homologue – a designated mentor from our site who is in charge of helping us integrate into our community – for the first time and attend workshops and training sessions together before departing for a 3-day visit to our site (i.e. the village we will be living and working in for the next 2 years).  After checking out our future home, we then go to our regional or provincial capital to meet up with other fellow volunteers and make the trip back to Ouaga, and then head back to our temporary home in Sapone with our host families for another 2 months of training.  All in all, we’ll be gone for a full 7 days.  I haven’t packed yet, but I figured I’d just do that in the morning.   What else do I have to do with my time from 6-9am besides take a bucket bath and then sit in my chair in my family’s courtyard? 

Exciting events within the past few days:
1. LPI Exam
2. Site Announcement
3. Tailor-made Dresses
4. Playing my clarinet for my host family
5. Doing laundry


LPI Exam:
The LPI is a language proficiency test conducted orally by conversing with one of the professors for about 20 minutes, in order to determine what language level we’re at.  We had one when we first arrived in Burkina, had our second LPI today after about 3 weeks of language classes, and will have several more throughout our Peace Corps experience.  Considering I was deemed “Novice-Low” to begin with and knew next to nothing coming in, there’s no way I can do anything but improve, and so I’m assuming I’ve moved up to Novice-Mid or even Novice-High.  Plus, I thought my exam (i.e. basically a casual conversation) went really well and I spoke with half-ways correct grammar most the time.  Technically, to become an official PC Volunteer and be allowed to swear-in at the end of our training, we need to have achieved a language level of at least Intermediate-High.  I’m still a long ways away from that level of proficiency, but give me a few more months, and hopefully I’ll be there.  It’d probably help if I studied a bit more on my own, too.  Or maybe read a page of the French dictionary each night to acquire some new words.  But after having class all day (and having been graduated from college for over a year now), I have zero motivation to do “homework.”

Site Announcement:
Since we’re meeting our homologues and visiting our sites this coming week, clearly, we must know what site we’ve been assigned to for the next 2 years.  On Thursday afternoon, an exciting session/class was held with all 50 of us gathered together to announce each of our individual sites.  It was more like a celebration or ceremony, though, than a class.  I was expecting them to hand us a piece of paper with the name of our village and some info about our site and then be done, but instead a HUGE map of Burkina was taped to the wall and we were called up to the front of the room, one by one.  Our village was announced, and we had to find it on the huge map, where we pinned a photo of ourselves on the location of our village.  Then some interesting facts about our site were read off.  Similar to our adoption ceremony with our host families, everyone’s reactions were priceless.  And I got a picture of everyone, displaying their reaction as they stood in front of the big map and learned about their future home.  Check them out on my photo page!  It'll give you an idea of "who" we Peace Corps Volunteers are, what we look like (well, at least what we look like in Africa), and where we're all going in the country.

Some amusing facts we learned about each other’s sites: one guy will be living with monks; one girl will be near Catholic sisters who make cheese (REAL cheese!! That’s, like, virtually impossible to find in Burkina!  We were all jealous!); some will be the first volunteer ever in their village; others will be the 3rd or 4th volunteer and inherit all the things previous volunteers left behind, which for one girl in our group includes a cat, a freezer, and bedroom walls painted with Care Bears and music notes; a couple people will have air conditioners and access to swimming pools while most of us will be without electricity; one girl will literally be in the middle of nowhere, but at least her village “comes equipped with 3 other current volunteers nearby: all males” – and apparently – “all good-looking, especially Hottie Scotty”  Or so that’s what the piece of paper she received said…seriously!

A little about my site, the village of Lanfiera.  Lanfiera is located in northwestern Burkina Faso, not too far from the border between Burkina and Mali.  It’s part of the Sourou Valley, where the Sourou River flows, and thus land is fertile and not nearly as dry or desert-like as most of northern Burkina.  Because I’ll be in the Sourou Valley, I’ll also be smack dab in the middle of a whole slew of Peace Corps Volunteers, namely, ALL of my DABA friends (the 12 members in our current group who are training to work with agriculture) plus a few other Education volunteers.  All 12 DABA volunteers will be spread throughout different villages in the Sourou Valley, and so I’ll have easy access to friends and be able to visit the majority of them by simply taking a bike ride anywhere from 5-50km.  We’ve decided to rename this heavily infested Peace Corp zone as “Party Valley” since so many of us will be so close in proximity and we will be “infusing” this region of Burkina Faso with Americans.  I’ll be the third volunteer in this village, and the school I’ll be working at has a good connection to a school in France that helps supply them with resources, like pencils and notebooks for the students.  That's about all I know right now, but I'll know more soon after my site visit there this week!

Tailor-made Dresses:
Since I’ve been in Africa, I’ve bought a few pretty pagnes at the local market.  Pagnes are essentially rectangles of fabric that are about 1.5x2 meters, and are used for many things: as a towel when showering, for a light blanket, as a curtain or room divider, wrapped around a women’s waist for a quick make-shift skirt that’s perfectly acceptable in public, or as a piece of fabric to have a shirt or bag or anything else you could want created at a local tailor’s shop.  Now that I actually have a bit of French to work with in my vocabulary base and have seen plenty of local women’s clothing fashions, I also have an idea of what I would like done with my pagnes.  So I sketched a couple of dress designs I thought would be easy to make and look good on me, and then explained to my host mom that I would like her to take me to a good tailor.  After class yesterday, my mom (along with Christi and baby Cecilia) met me at the market and then we walked to the nearby tailor.  I showed the tailor my design ideas and fabric, but to my dismay, the tailor said, “No, not possible…how about this instead?” and proceeded to show me photographs of African dresses that were pretty traditional looking and gorgeous…but definitely more like something a super model would strut down the runway in…and not what a young American lady in the Peace Corps would wear to teach in a school.  After 20 minutes or so – and a lot of frustration with my lack of ability to effectively communicate that I just wanted a simple dress – my host mom and tailor were able to agree on something they thought would look good on me and on a fair price for it.  What exactly I was having made, I haven’t the slightest idea…but the tailor pulled out her measuring tape and started writing down my measurements.  After paying a small down payment of 1000 CFA (about $2 American), we headed home.  Hopefully I’ll like whatever the tailor is sewing for me.  But I won’t know until I pick up the finished product (products?) in a few days or so. 

Playing my clarinet for my host family:
I finally took the liberty of playing my clarinet in front of my host family.  Instruments are certainly a rare luxury in Burkina Faso, and this is especially true in village.  I hadn’t played in quite a while, so I was pretty rusty, but my family still thought every sound that came out of my clarinet was amazing.  I attempted to play some of my repertoire that I brought with to Africa in my neatly organized binder, and was thoroughly disappointed with how awful I sounded, compared to what I used to sound like in college when I would play my clarinet 2 or 3 or even 5 hours a day with clarinet lessons, wind ensemble, orchestra rehearsal, woodwind quintet, private practice, etc.  Plus, playing an instrument takes work and energy – it’s a physical activity – and so within minutes I had sweat just dripping down my face, which also made it difficult to play well.  Amusingly, there were village kids from all around that started to gather and just stare at me. They intently watched me for over an hour while I played. Nonstop staring.  It was kinda awkward, but I pretended that I didn’t notice that there were a dozen little faces creepingly peering into my courtyard.  They probably had never seen or heard a clarinet before, so this was an epic experience for them.  I felt bad for my host family who had to listen to all my squeaks and practicing of scales and repetition of difficult measures over and over, rather than just being able to hear pretty and flawless music.  Furthermore, and also awkward, they thought they HAD to listen to and watch me the whole time, as if I was putting on a concert for them and it would be rude for them to continue with their daily life tasks, like washing the dishes, while I was playing my clarinet.  I tried to explain that I should practice more, possibly even every day after class…and they took that to mean that I would like to practice every day…which, in a way, of course I do....or at least should want to do!...but then again, not really, cuz I don’t particularly enjoy my practicing in this hot climate with my practice sessions turning into concerts for village children who think I sound amazing when I know I actually sound like crap.  It’s not good for their ears to be exposed to my horribleness …    Interestingly, this whole “should vs. would like to” misunderstanding led to an interesting conversation with my host dad, as I tried to explain to him that they don’t mean the same thing in English.  In French, the words for “should” and “would like to” are very similar and are often used interchangeably, and so explaining that I SHOULD do something (or ought to) does not mean that I WANT to do it.  I’m not sure if my dad ever fully understood, as I attempted to explain this speaking the languages of English and Francais and broken French…all of which combine to form what we Peace Corps volunteers have coined “Franglais” – similar to “Spanglish” (Spanish/English”). 

Doing laundry:
Because I’ll be gone for a week visiting my site and other shenanigans, I needed to do my laundry.  I don’t have a whole lot of clothes here to begin with, and with all the sweating, dust, and rainstorms that result in massive amounts of mud, my clothes get dirty pretty easily and need to be washed quite often.  If I wanted to have clothes that were remotely clean for this upcoming week, I had to do laundry.  And of course I waited until this afternoon to do it, allowing myself only a few hours of daytime for my clothes to dry…or attempt to dry – they’re still pretty wet, hanging on the line, as a I write this at 11pm.  But unlike last time I “did” laundry, this time I actually was the one who did my laundry.  All by myself.  Well, kind of.  I bought my own soap and laundry detergent, filled my buckets of water, and started scrubbing my clothes which I thoughtfully had soaking in bleach water all morning to help kill germs and bad odors.  Everything was going well…until my neighbor came over.  We went through the typical greetings and hellos, and then I went back to work, scrubbing away.  After 5 minutes, my host dad got really concerned that I was “getting tired” and overworked, and made me sit in a chair.  I rested a few minutes to please my family, but when I tried to go back to my bucket of clothes, my neighbor got all concerned and then bluntly told me in French, “No.  You sit.  I’m doing your laundry.”  I tried to say something along the lines of “Thank you very much, but no, I need to do this, it’s important for me to learn” but she wouldn’t have any of it.  I wasn’t touching any more of my laundry, and that was final.  So I gave up and watched her wash a few of my shirts.  Then I went over to her, took a dirty skirt out of the bucket of water, and washed it alongside her.  And I guess that was fine…and that I got the point across that I was going to at least do some of my laundry, whether or not they liked it.  So there we were, washing laundry together, side by side.  Granted, she could wash 3 things in the same amount of time it took me to do one item, but still, at least I was doing some of my laundry.  Within no time, my laundry was washed, rinsed, washed with soap again, rinsed again, soaked briefly, and then rinsed another final time.  It’s probably a good thing my neighbor helped, otherwise I would have been scrubbing clothes for at least 3 or 4 hours, rather than just the hour it took us.  Plus, I’m sure my arms would be absolutely dead and my muscles sore, (aka more sore than they already are), cuz doing laundry by hand is hard work!  I don’t know how all these women (and even the young girls) do it, but they are tough.  They’re hands are like leather and they have the strength to overpower any American athlete.  As one of the guys in our training group put it, “My host mom is scary strong.  She’s half my size but could kick my butt any day. She carries 30 pound jugs of water in each hand AND balances a basket of fruit on her head, all while carrying a baby on her back, as if it’s no big deal, and just sticks her bare hand right into boiling pots of rice to check if it’s done or not.  I wouldn’t mess with my mom.”  The women of Burkina are amazing.  Enough said.

Monday, July 18, 2011

Educate Boys and Girls and You Develop a Nation...

July 14, 2011

Though most every day in Burkina seems to bring about some new adventure or a crazy story, today in particular was AWESOME.  Such a special day.  First of all, to start out the day bright and early at 6am, I did my laundry -- all by myself!  Using a bucket and soap, just like all the locals do, since there are no washing machines!  After 30 minutes, my hands were really tired from all the scrubbing…and I had only finished 3 shirts and a skirt…with a whole bag full of dirty clothes to go.  I thought I did a pretty decent job, for it only being my first time doing laundry in Africa (my host mom has done my laundry a couple times for me while I’m at class).  But apparently my laundry skills weren’t as decent as I thought.  Everything I “washed” was carefully examined by my host mom, and except for a few articles of clothing, my host mom rewashed everything before hanging it on the line to dry.  But at least they’re clean.  Hopefully next week’s attempt at doing laundry (by myself) will be more successful.  But if not, no worries.  Most of the current Peace Corps Volunteers we’ve met so far say that they never do their own laundry – they just pay one of their neighbors to do it and the clothes end up a lot cleaner this way, too, than if we’d try to wash our own clothes. 

By 7:30am, I finished my laundry and was on my way to class.  Except today, I wasn’t the student.  I was the teacher.  Well, for 15 minutes, anyways.  We had what is called “Model School.”  Essentially there was a bunch of local kids organized by age/class, and each Peace Corps Trainee taught a 15 minute lesson – in FRENCH!   Yes, I spoke French while teaching.  Good French?  Nope, not at all.  But despite my horrible pronunciation and lack of French vocabulary, I still was able to get my points across and it seemed like the kids had fun.  My lesson was for 5e Mathematics (i.e. the American equivalent of about 6th grade) and I had prepared a lesson on the topic of comparing the sizes of fractions (i.e 1/3 vs. 1/4).   There were 8 students in my class, and though they were very timid at first, after a few minutes I got them talking and participating.  My previous experience as a teacher definitely came in handy.  While other volunteers were nervous about having to speak in French AND stand in front of a group of kids, I only had to worry about my French skills.  Everyone said they really enjoyed watching me teach, because I “actually look and act like a real teacher.”  Good.  I should act like a real teacher…cuz I am…or at least spent over 4 years in college preparing/studying to be one.  While some of my friends stared awkwardly at the kids and did that all-too-common nervous laugh thing after asking a question and having no students immediately respond within 2-3 seconds, and so then they moved on to the next question, I just stared right back at the kids and let there be that awkward silence…until someone answered my question.  Or else I would actually point to a kid and make him give me an answer.  It worked.  The kids started answering questions and raising their hand when I asked for volunteers, and somehow – though I don’t know how – they always understood my French and did exactly what I asked them to do!  So overall, I felt successful.  It was nice to be back in front of a class again and this made me really excited to teach here in Burkina.

I’ve been learning a lot about Burkina’s education system, and it’s so different from the US that I had been feeling frustrated and almost as if my teacher skills were going to be useless here.  (The following may be interpreted as being a rant on the education system here, but it's nothing against Burkina -- I have many of the exact same sentiments about America's education system as well...)  I mean, how do you effectively teach a class when there are no textbooks, there’s over 100+ students shoved in a classroom that’s half the size of classrooms in America (so it’s difficult for the students to easily get out of the chair and go to the chalkboard, and nearly impossible for them to get into groups or move about the room), and there’s only a tiny “blackboard” (aka a piece of wood that’s painted black) with chalk so fragile it constantly breaks into pieces whenever you attempt to write with it?  But after today, I now know that my “American” style of teaching can still be implemented, though I will have to make a lot of adjustments to better fit Burkinabe culture.  There are tons of opportunities for me to share my teaching and pedagogy knowledge with Burkinabe teachers, in terms of helping them develop effective lesson plans that aren’t purely lecture-based and include critical thinking and other activities for students besides listening to the teacher lecture and copying down information from the blackboard.  But unfortunately, the math books that I’ll be making my curriculum off of are 20 years old and based more or less on meeting the French system’s education requirements, and so applying them to kids in Burkina and actually making the material relevant could be a challenge.  There’s also not much emphasis here on encouraging creativity or using different methods to solve problems.  In addition, the attitude of “Well, that information is taught in 5e, and if the student didn’t learn in then, too bad,” is quite common.  Students are expected to know (and memorize) everything that is presented to them within each class year and then use it in their subsequent education years, although that specific information from 5e or 6e (or whichever grade) will not be retaught or even briefly reviewed within the curriculum…unless the teacher takes the time to review information before presenting the related new material. So, to summarize, there’s a lot I can work with and attempt to improve within Burkina’s school systems.

Here’s a rundown of the basic school system set up in Burkina Faso, along with the coordinating American grade so you can have a better idea of what I’m talking about (although you’ll still probably be quite confused):

[Preschool/Early Childhood]
**Not common – only available in some bigger cities.  Nor are early childhood programs funded, so only “rich” parents can afford to have their kids go to preschool.

Elementary School = L’ecole (Primary School)
Kindergarten = CP1
Grade 1 = CP2
Grade 2 = CM1
Grade 3 = CM2
Grade 4 = CE1
Grade 5 = CE2
**Students take the CEP exam (must pass this test to advance to middle school)

Middle School = College (Secondary School: First Cycle)
Grade 6 = 6e
Grade 7 = 5e
Grade 8 = 4e
Grade 9 = 3e
**Students take the BEPC - Brevet d'études du premier cycle (must pass this test to advance to high school)

High School = Lycee (Secondary School: Second Cycle)
Grade 10 = 2e
Grade 11 = 1e
Grade 12 = Terminale
**Students take the BAC – Baccalaureate exam (must pass this test to advance to l’universitie)


The numerical levels in the French system (and therefore also the Burkinabè system) are in reverse order from the numerical order of grades in American schools. Secondary school starts with Sixième (6eme) then goes to 5eme, 4eme, and 3eme before the BEPC exam. The second cycle of secondary school starts with Seconde (2nde), either on the A-track (languages/history/etc.) or the C/D-track (mathematics/sciences), continuing on to Première (1ere) and Terminale levels before students attempt the BAC exam. Students who pass the BAC are at a somewhat higher academic level than the average American high school graduate.

The number of students advancing to each grade (especially in the middle/high schools) gets smaller and smaller, as students drop out of school.  But this doesn’t mean that these older classes have less students or smaller class sizes.  There are still 60-150 students per class, because of the shortage of teachers able to teach these higher levels, as well as a lack of school buildings.  Sometimes kids need to move to another “nearby” town just to attend a high school, and if this is the case, unless they have family to live with, they need to buy/rent housing, which is unaffordable for most families…and so they drop out of school because there is no school for them to go to…or afford to go to.  Dropping out of school is also due to a variety of other factors:
*not advancing into the next grade or passing the required exams
*illiteracy (French is what’s spoken at school, but at home, a local language is spoken.  So unless the parents are educated, there’s little to no French literacy at home, making it difficult for students to master the French language and effectively read textbooks or exams, as well as for students to get homework help from parents)
*early pregnancy or marriage
*being needed at home to work, cultivate fields or tend animals, or to take care of siblings
*and in general, a lack of importance placed on education coupled with the fact that there’s no jobs here to begin with…so there’s no point in getting a college degree, or even finishing high school, when the majority of jobs available revolve around farming or other trades (like being a tailor or carpenter) that mainly require skills not taught in formal schools.

Thus, a lot of our work within Peace Corps will focus on improving agricultural practices and small business activities, like encouraging the use of record-keeping practices to manage income and expenses. It’s hard to believe, but there are shop-keepers and vendors here who think they are making money just because they are selling things, but in all reality, they are actually losing money with each item they sell because they undercharge and don’t consider expenses.  For example, take the tailor who doesn’t account for the thread he buys to make each dress or the electricity used to run the sewing machine.  He might have tons of business, but without taking these expenses into consideration when charging customers a price, more often than not, he’s only breaking even…and sometimes, not even that.  Education (in school) is important and the key to implementing change in a nation, but almost more importantly, is educating those who aren’t in school – and likewise, preparing those students who are still in school to have good common sense life skills (like managing money and sanitary practices) since they probably won’t go to college, or even finish high school – in hopes that they can still live successfully in good health and pass on these habits and skills to their children, as they’ll probably have at least 3 or 4 or 8 kids.  And thennnnn (hopefully), their children will have the ability and opportunity to attend school regularly -- because they don’t have to sell mangoes on the side of road to get money, since their parents will know how to manage money effectively and not need to depend on child labor to help support the family.  Thus, these are the kids that will advance to college, assuming that by then there will be an abundance of jobs in Burkina for which a college degree will be useful, and thus desirable.

Students who fail a grade can repeat it once, and after that, they need to go to a different school.  It’s not uncommon for students to repeat a class, and this results in there being a huge discrepancy of ages within the same grade, particularly with the middle and high school classes.  For example, a class of 6e students (7th grade) would ideally be about 12-14 years old, at least in America.  But here, it’s not unusual for there to be 16-year-olds mixed in with 12-year-olds.  And by the time students get to Terminale (the final class before university), there are students ranging from 17 to 25 years old (or older).  Technically, after a certain age, students can’t go to school anymore (public schools), but they just lie about their age and/or change their birth certificates so they still meet the age limit.  Problem solved.

Where There's No Microwave...or Fridge


July 7, 2011

It’s another hot day here in Burkina…but fortunately my body has finally started to adjust to the heat.   Yes, there’s no doubt it’s still overly warm here, but unlike before (when I would break into a massive sweat by just sitting motionlessly in the shade), I no longer perspire like crazy unless I’m directly in the sun or doing some kind of physical activity, like biking to class.   In fact, last night I actually thought it was it was cool enough to sleep indoors rather than outside like I normally have been.  This decision was also influenced by my being lazy and not wanting to take the 4 minutes necessary to set up my tent, and by the ground being damp from all the recent rainfall… And so, for only like the third or fourth time since I arrived in Sapone to live with my host family, I slept in my room on a real bed, which is SO much more comfortable than laying on a thin mat on rocks (imagine that!).  Furthermore, because I even covered up with a light sheet sometime during the night, I figured the average daily temperature must have dropped a good 10-15 degrees since we first arrived in Burkina about a month ago – after all, it’s currently “cold season” here – and thus, the temperature MUST be down to about 75-80 degrees Fahrenheit at night, if I can now sleep rather comfortably in my room and cover up with a blanket.   So out of curiosity, I dug out my thermometer (which was still buried deep inside my suitcase) and checked out the current temperature.  The results:  at 6am, the coolest time of each day, it was already a good 87 degrees.  Yikes.  Which means by the middle of the afternoon, it’s probably a scorching 105+.  Ha, and to think I thought 87 degrees was “comfortable” and “cool” enough to use a light blanket.  Come this time next year, don’t be surprised if you see pictures of me bundled up in heavy sweaters and scarves, just like all the locals do during cold season, even though it will be over 80 degrees…cuz here in Burkina, 80 degrees is the equivalent of it being below freezing in Minnesota.

Today I got to meet a fellow Bennie (aka graduate of the College of St. Benedict/St. John’s University).  Lindsay (’09) has been volunteering here for about a year now, and so it was fun to connect with someone who not only is from Minnesota and shares the same Fargo-ish accent as me (as other volunteers like to point out), but also went to the same tiny Benedictine liberal arts college I did.  But wait. It gets better.  There’s also Sam, a fellow Johnnie (’09), who’s also been here about a year.  I haven’t met him yet, but should be meeting him in the near future.  What a small world!  Whoever would’ve thought that there’d be more than 1 or 2 people from Minnesota currently serving as a Peace Corps Volunteer in Burkina Faso, AND that they would all have graduated from the same college within the last 2 years?!?  It’s cool that we know many of the same people, professors, and, just in general, Minnesota cities, landmarks, events…  

I actually already knew of Lindsay (and likewise Sam) before meeting her in person, due to randomly (or perhaps not so randomly?) meeting her friend Rachel, also a current PC Volunteer, about 2 weeks ago while on a 4-day training visit deemed “Demystification,” which we just call “Demyst” for short.  The purpose of this training was to give us an idea about what a typical volunteer’s life is like: housing arrangements, the villages they live in, the work and specific projects they do in their communities, etc.  It was also to give us hands-on experience with traveling throughout Burkina Faso – buying a bus ticket, paying for a taxi, riding an overcrowded bush taxi (essentially a van that somehow always has room for one more person or bag or goat – it’s not uncommon for there to be over 18 people plus animals shoved into one of these vehicles!), and dealing with other cultures/languages/foods than what are found in our host city of Sapone or Ilpace.  We went in our language groups (so groups of 3-4 trainees in addition to our language instructor) and each group went to a different city or village somewhere in Burkina.  Some people only had an hour bus ride (like me) and others had to endure 6-7 hours of travel.  My language group, which consists of Jose, Maren, our teacher Saliou, and (obviously) me, went to the village of Niou, which is about an hour north of Ouaga.  ****Tangent: for those of you wondering what I mean by “language group” -- it’s the small group we learn/practice French in for several hours each day, and, if the trainees are really talented and already speak practically fluent French (which some of the 50 of us do!), they learn a different local language instead of French, like Moore or Jula.  Thus, the groups are determined by skill/proficiency level: Novice, Intermediate, Advanced, or Superior...and within each of those four categories, we’re split up further by being classified as Low, Medium, or High.  My group is made up of the “novice lows,” which basically means we know absolutely nothing when it comes to French.  There are a few other groups also deemed “novice lows,” and so Jose, Maren, and I didn’t feel quite so disappointed about being deemed stupid in French.  But then again, we know we’re pretty bad compared to everyone else.  Especially since none of us have ever studied French before (the three of us all studied Spanish), whereas most the other novice low’s had at least had a class or two in high school or college, and thus know more than us, despite also being classified as “novice low.”  Consequently, whenever anyone asks what level language we’re in, we say “Novice Low Low Low” to clarify that we’re the lowest of the lows, that we understand and know even less than the other novices, and that we probably should have had a separate category created below the current Novice Low classification to more accurately represent our French proficiency (or complete lack thereof).  But don’t worry, we are learning and we are undoubtedly getting significantly better by leaps and bounds every day!*****

Back to describing my Demyst.  We stayed with Rachel in the village of Niou, who is working in the sector of Girls’ Education and Empowerment, as well as with some health/hygiene projects.  She was very welcoming to us and made us some great food, including sweet potato French fries and an awesome tomato-cucumber-avocado salad.  We spent a lot of our time just hanging out at her house (which was equipped with electricity and Internet), playing cards, getting advice about being a volunteer and implementing projects, talking, and getting to know our small group better.  We also helped a bunch of her girls and boys make soap, which they sell at their local market to make money to cover school expenses.  I have some pictures of our soap-making extravaganza posted on my photo webpage – take a look!  Anyways, long story short, one afternoon Rachel got a phone call from her friend Lindsay.  Lindsay asked Rachel where the 3 of us stagiares (trainees) were from in the US, and as soon as Rachel said “one girl is from Minnesota,” Lindsay got really excited -- we could hear her shout “OMG! Another Minnesoooootan? No way! What city? Let me talk to her!” through the phone.  And so Rachel threw the phone at me and I had a quick conversation with my fellow Minnesotan that went something like this:
Me: Uh, hi….?  My name is Beth.
Lindsay: Hey!  I’m Lindsay!  I hear you’re from Minnesota!
Me: Yup!
Lindsay: Me too!  I’m from Duluth!  Where’d you go to school?
Me: St. Ben’s/St. John’s. 
L: What?!?!
Me: They’re Catholic liberal arts colleges by St. Clou-----
L: No, I know! OMG!!!! I’m a Bennie too!  This is awesome!  Did you know that there’s also a Johnnie in Burkina right now?  His name’s Sam!

Yes, this sure is a crazy, small and coincidental world we live in.  Lindsay has decided that we three CSB/SJU alums need to get together and take a picture of us doing something cool (Posing next to an elephant? Riding a camel? Climbing a banana tree?) while wearing one of our infamous Bennie/Johnnie shirts, in hopes of getting it posted on the CSB/SJU website for all to see!

Meeting a fellow Bennie was certainly a highlight of the day, but so were the classes and sessions we had in training.  Today’s classes were some of my favorite thus far.  We received a cookbook entitled “Where There’s No Microwave…or Fridge,” and it’s full of tried-and-true recipes from past Peace Corps Volunteers in Burkina that are feasible with the ingredients and resources available here.  From how to make some of the more popular local and traditional African cuisine to attempts at recreating favorite American treats like pizza and cookies in a homemade Dutch oven, this book has a bit of everything.  Even information on how to dry fruit (like mangoes and bananas, which are plentiful here) and how to make a decent ricotta cheese-like substitute using powdered milk and vinegar.  I’m excited to try all the recipes out and whip up a batch of brownies.  We also received tips on staying healthy and “well-fed” in Burkina.  Right now, along with it being “cool” season, it’s also “hunger” season, and so access to a variety of food (especially fresh produce) is limited and expensive, resulting in many people only eating rice or noodles for the next few weeks, and sometimes even cutting back to one meal a day if finances are really tight.  Because we live with host families, we don’t have much control over what we’re eating or how much, and some days this is really frustrating and our stomachs will rumble and grumble a lot.  Granted, none of us are going hungry – we are fed all the carbs we could possibly handle – we just don’t get much else besides empty nutrient-less carbs.  And because of this, a lot of us are losing weight. However, we’ve been told that guys do in fact tend to lose weight during training (due to a lack of protein and their solely-carb diet not tying them over) and that, unfortunately for most women, females might actually gain weight (since all the carbs go straight to our butts).  But thankfully today’s session informed us that it WILL get better: more fresh produce will be readily available in a month or so, and when we are done with training and living on our own at our site, we will have complete control over what we eat and how it’s prepared.  Plus, we are given more than enough money within our monthly living expense to be able to “splurge” on food items that are nutritious (like fresh produce, canned vegetables/fruit/meat, and powdered milk), whereas the majority of Burkinabe people can’t afford to purchase much more than cheap carbs and maybe an occasional tomato or chunk of meat (aka fat and/or bone) to mix in with the rice or noodles.  Furthermore, when we’re on our own, we can also plant a garden and grow lots of good stuff.  But for now, we’ll just have to be content eating the white rice slathered with oil so lovingly prepared for us by our host mothers…which really doesn’t taste too bad at all…if you’re hungry enough.


July 8, 2011

Yesterday was a big day, and there were a lot of topics I wanted to write about.  But sadly my computer battery died and so the rest of my stories had to wait until today to be written.  I’ll start with some of the sad news:  we’re down to 47 stagaires out of the original 50.  It seems we’re having an epidemic amongst our training group.  No, don’t worry, no one has died or been kidnapped by Al Qaida…but for medical and/or personal reasons, three of our group members have returned to America.  All three of them “left” us within a total time span of 5 days – it seemed like every 36 hours, there was yet another person announcing that they were leaving and going back home, leaving the rest of us totally shocked as we said our goodbyes.  We may not have known each other very long, but everyone has grown really close within our few weeks together so far, and each time someone left, it hurt and left the rest of the group in a state of confusion, and some people in tears.  Losing 3 people within 5 days is tough on everyone, and though most Peace Corps training groups do tend to have 1 or 2 volunteers who go home before their 2 years are up, us having 3 trainees leave so suddenly is extremely uncommon, not to mention alarming.  And so today, instead of getting a second dosage of vaccines like was scheduled, we had a nice heart-to-heart community meeting with some of our administration and country directors to discuss what was going on and how to deal with it, in addition to how to better help ourselves cope with all the changes of being in Burkina and avoid the drastic decision to go home.  By the end of the afternoon, we all felt much better.  It helped that they also fed us M&M’s during the community meeting.  Chocolate fixes any problem!