Sprinkled throughout my blog entries will be some explanations of cultural differences between the United States and Burkina Faso. I hope you enjoy my thoroughness and you do not get too bored with my adventures!!
Peace Corps does not mess around. In our second week of staging we went out into the vast country of Burkina to be demystified with current Peace Corps Volunteers (PCVs). This entailed all of us new volunteers taking public transportation and in some cases traveling days to get to a site.
Now in Africa transportation is the number one cause of death to people working in developing countries, and this past summer 2 volunteers in Burkina were involved in a bus accident (All are fine and still serving). So you can imagine my apprehension with traveling and using the public transportation of Burkina. We left Wednesday October 29 early in the morning, some of us were going to have to travel over 12 hours to get to our demystification site and Peace Corps does not allow PCVs to travel at night, ever. I went with my language group, 4 girls and our Language Culture Facilitator (LCF), to Koudougou, one of the biggest cities in Burkina, west of Ouagua.
All of the roads that we traveled on were paved and our trip was rather short it only took six hours and we were eating lunch under the shade of trees in Koudougou before 1 pm. We visited a SED volunteer, Melissa, who has been serving for a year. She works with artisans and has an amazing house with electricity. She is about 5 km from Koudougou and we biked with our packs after lunch on Wednesday. It was an exhausting day since most of us had been up since 4:30 am.
Melissa’s had an entire house with 4 rooms and an outdoor patio. It was like a girls weekend and slumber party all rolled into one. Melissa’s mom sends her over care packages every month so she was stocked with tons of treats and American amenities i.e. boxed food items, magazines, and sweets. That first afternoon we sat on her lipico (a metal frame with nylon wrapped around tightly to create a bed) and reveled at the fan as it oscillated around us. Melissa regaled us with stories of her first year as a volunteer and the adventures and trips she and other PCVs have taken around West Africa. We devoured the American magazines and “shopped” for dress designs in her JCREW magazines. (I did say it was a girl’s weekend).
I was excited to get in the kitchen and make dinner for all of us. We went shopping at the market and picked up so much fruit: papaya, watermelon, banana, pineapples, and apples; to make a fruit salad. I picked up some tomatoes, onions and garlic to make a tomato sauce from scratch. Melissa provided tuna from the United States. (Great idea for Gwen's care packages). Voila: Tuna Pasta with tomato sauce and fruit salad.
Buying and Preparing of Food in Africa: When one goes to the market, fruits and vegetables are normally on display in front of sitting women. Fruits and veggies are bundled into piles and sold for arbitrary prices. Haggling is a regular occurrence in Burkina Faso and the women LOVE it when you haggle. Most of the time another vendor of veggies will come over and ask you to buy from her, saying she give you a better price. The women love the social aspect of market and they are tickled pink when one of the volunteers speaks Moore to them. When I was buying the tomatoes for my sauce I bought so many, i.e. 6, the lady proceeded to give me cadeaus, which are free offering of the product that I bought, tomatoes.
To prepare any fruit or vegetable we are instructed to make a bowl of bleach water and soak all fruit and veg for 15 min. The reason is that 1) the fruit and vegetables have been handled by people that never wash their hands 2) the produce lays outside all day long and bugs and flies land all over the fruit and vegetables, and 3) you are not sure if pesticides and fertilizers were used in gardening. Once the 15 minutes is over it is fine to go about preparing the meal, and what a delicious meal it was!!
After dinner we took bucket baths in an indoor shower room and that was fabulous to be inside and not outside and right next door to the latrine. Melissa said that shower room was one of the things she could not live without, she would even live without electricity. It was nearing 8pm and our bedtimes. I was super excited to sleep outside in a tent and look up at the stars with Addie.
Thursday I was up with the roosters (4:30 am) and wrapped a panya (huge piece of material with brightly colored designed, used for making dresses, skirts, and using as a rope/towel when taking a bucket bath) around myself and went for a walk by myself, camera in hand. It was beautiful in the still of the morning watching the children go off to school and the animals’ scuttle around finding food. That day we were heading out to visit another PCV in Reo, 15 km away. We would be getting to Reo by bush taxi, YIKES.
In Koudougou we found a “truck” that would take us to Reo around 10am. We all piled into the back of the truck, hunched over because they made a makeshift ceiling where they piled on tires and tarp while we sat hunched over in the back of the truck bed. Melissa haggled and yelled at the driver and could not believe the price they were charging us to go to Reo. Eventually she conceded and the driver left. It is not rare in Africa to fill up with gas after you leave, passengers en-tow, because most of the time they did not have enough money to fill up before they had passengers.
Now we did not believe our driver could drive and we rounded one corner in Koudougou and he was instructed to pull over by the police. What fun!! We sat hunched in the back of the truck for an hour and a half while the driver talked and sat and gesticulated with the police. He did not have some license and we were about to forget Reo when he finally came back and we got on the road to Reo at 11:30 am. Now the road from Koudougou to Reo is not paved and it is horrible with pot holes, unevenness and dirt, dirt dirt. We all had to cover our faces to breath. The rain ruins these roads and many times they become impassable because road maintenance is unheard of. A couple times during the 15 km ride we went off the road because it was “better” than the actual road. We made it safely to Reo in one piece and every expectation was met in my first bush taxi ride.
Prices of Goods and Services and Money in Burkina: If you are shopping in Burkina the vendor is ALWAYS right, and there is no such thing as a right customer. There are also no set prices for things. Therefore one day you can buy a good for one price and the next day buy the exact same good for a different price. For example, for the bush taxi service to Reo, Melissa road the exact same vehicle 2 days before we road to Reo and paid 500 CFA, we paid 650 CFA for the exact same ride. Most of the time vendors increase the prices of their goods for us because we are western and white. Walking through the marche it is not uncommon to here children and grown adults yell out Nessaro, Nessaro, Nessaro, which means white, wealthy, and western. It is yelled out like my name and has become apart of everyday life for me. Everyday, people yell and point and stare and it is something to get used to.
All of these little asides are to inform you all of the different cultural situations I am experiencing her in Burkina, and they are taxing and terrific all at the same time. Now getting change in Burkina is another interesting “task.” It is up to the customer to make change. Most of the time vendors never have enough money to give you change. Therefore, if you have 1,000 CFA and the good or service you want to purchase is 450 CFA, if the vendor does not have enough money to give you change i.e. 550 CFA, he/she only has 500 CFA then you as the customer have to take the loss. It is very frustrating and I have been turned away from buying things because they could not make change. Many times they do have change but do not want to give it to you. This is very sad because vendors are losing out on selling products and making money. It also reduces repeat business because customers will not want to go back to a vendor if they cannot make change. Even in my short time in Burkina, I have become a loyal patron of a couple boutiques because they always are able to give change and a smile, haha.
Back to Reo: PCV Kelly met us at the taxi stand and we went right to Market, Thursday was market day in Reo. We had been told they have piles of panyas for only 1,000 CFA (roughly $2). We went to town searching through all the panyas for our favorite designs. Our intention was to go visit Kelly’s counterpart and see the tailor that lived in Kelly’s courtyard. These panyas were so cheap because they were not waxed, or they were from the end of a roll of fabric, or had a hole or cut in the fabric. It was like shopping at Marshalls, and did we create a crowd of onlookers. Everyone was yelling Nessaro and crowding around to see what we were doing. As usual I was in and out in 5 minutes finding my panyas and buying only two. I then stood back to take photos and observe. I was pleased to see the “manager” of the stand sitting in the shade with a notebook. He was so pleased when the boys would bring over the money from the sale and he would record it in his notebook. This basic accounting pleased me to no end because it is rarely seen in Burkina Faso yet one of the most crucial skills a small business owner can learn.
Something very interesting happened, Abby, one of my fellow stagier, was trying to buy here piece of fabric but he was charging 3,000 CFA. Our LCF said that it was that expensive because it was 3 panyas all together. Abby said she could not pay. The vendor tried to haggle but Abby refused to pay. Her key move was to walk away. Walking away sealed the deal because the vendor came back and said he would divide the fabric and charge her 1,000 CFA. He would rather make 1,000 CFA than nothing at all. And because she was willing to walk away it singled to the vendor that he would lose the sell if he did not act. Many times in Burkina this is how the customer can get a lower price, by simply saying never mind and walking away. Vendors normally would rather sell you it for a lower price than not sell it at all.
Once we had our loot we walked about a mile to Kelly’s house. We spent the rest of the afternoon eating avocado sandwiches and sitting in the shade studying French. The best part of the afternoon was meeting Kelly’s counterpart. A counterpart in Peace Corps is a volunteer’s mentor in village. Sometimes the volunteer lives with the counterpart sometimes they do not. Kelly’s counterpart is a talented artisan and I just wanted to buy everything she makes. I found so many gifts for people back home in the States. I got so excited to be going home to the states with bags full of artisan creations from Burkina Faso. I bought myself a much-needed purse and promised to come back and purchase some more items when I was placed at my site. She was also preparing for SIAO that week and I did not want to deplete her inventory.
The most exciting part of our trip to Kelly was visiting the tailor, Eric, in her courtyard. We all had ripped out photos from Melissa’s magazines and brought them with the panya we had just bought at the Marche. We got measured and discussed the design in rough French and I only paid 3,500 CFA ($7) to get two dresses made. Incredible. All of our dresses will be done November 15th and Melissa will then bring them up to training so we can have them for swearing it. Most likely they will have to be altered slightly after that but that should not be a problem. We all got different designs and we are all so excited to see what happens. If the dresses turn out well then I might be making multiple trips back to Reo. Send me magazines now for more great dress idea, just kidding.
Our way back to Koudougou was not as dramatic and we had another early night. Friday was October 31st, Halloween, and we spent it studying French by the pool. Yes, the pool. There is a pool at the Jackson hotel in Koudougou and it was a nice retreat. Other PCVs from around Koudougou biked in to meet and join us for Melissa’s Halloween party later that evening. That evening we danced to Michael Jackson’s thriller and I made mashed potatoes. All of the stagieres, me in my tent, zonked out by 8:30pm while the fete went on into the night with the other PCVs. The next morning we got up and biked back into Koudougou with our packs and got the 10 am bus to Ouagua for our Ouagua-weekend at the Peace Corps transit house.
Thoughts on the demystification: Melissa’s site is not the Peace Corps norm, but it suits her to a Tee. I explained it as a girl’s weekend; our other SED volunteers called it our spa and shopping weekend. It will not compare to any of our placements because most of us will not have electricity, nor an indoor shower room, or live in a major regional city. Every site is different, every PCV house is different and it really depends on the group, counterpart, or organization that sponsors the volunteer in their village. I am very thankful I was able to visit Kelly’s site because her living arrangement had only 2 small rooms and was farther away from a city, i.e. 15 km bike ride to Koudougou. We find out next Wednesday, November 12th , where our sites will be for the next two years. Since this is Melissa and Kelly’s first year none of us will be replacing them. So this demystification was a way to meet more Burkina PCVs and get clothes made!!!
Ouagua Weekend
Peace Corps had all of SED stay at the Peace Corps transit house in Ouagua this past weekend. It was tagged on the end of our demystification site visit. There were three different SED demystifications. One group when down south below Bobo-Dioulasso and the other group went up into the Sahel region of the country outside Djibo. Therefore, each SED group had completely different experiences on their site visit with current PCVs. The other groups definitely had a greater integration experience because their PCVs lived in small villages. A part of me was jealous for their demystification site and then again I think back to the artisans and dresses being made.
Most of the weekend was sitting around the transit house doing NOTHING. Getting us ready for our time at site. The transit house does have free wireless Internet throughout the house, which is a bonus, it is just sad, that none of us brought our computers this past weekend. It will definitely be the place where I will upload my photos from my computer.
We stayed at the transit house for 2 nights, Saturday and Sunday. A lot of time was spent going through the “library” i.e. 5 bookshelves of unorganized books left behind by volunteers over the years. There were some treasures I brought back with me to training and some more I look forward to borrowing in the coming years. It was nice to use a toilet and take a real shower. We all slept outside in the screened in porch, it is got rather cold at night. I layered panyas on top of the sheets for warmth. It was also interesting to meet and see current Burkina Faso volunteers go in and out of the transit house all day long. But the transit house is not only for Burkina Faso PCVs it is for any PCV visiting Burkina Faso that needs a place to crash. PCVs do have to pay. Therefore, if I visit another West African country that has Peace Corps I can reserve to stay in its transit house while I am passing through. Burkina Faso has two transit houses in Burkina; the one in Ouagua and the other down south in Bobo- Dioulasso.
On Sunday a few of us went SIAO (Salon International de l’Artisanat de Ouagadougou) an artisan festival that only happens every two years, on even years. For a new volunteer Ouaga is a very confusing city and most PCVs hail down green taxis to take them anywhere in the city. In these taxis you cram as many people as possible. On my way to SIAO we got 7 people into a compact car. Leaving SIAO we got 8 people, it is a hot sweaty mess.
SIAO was exactly like an arts festival in the states and there was so much wonderful things; batik, paintings, hand-made drums, bronzes, baskets, sculpture, furniture, textiles, shoes, pottery, jewellery, ceramics, leatherworks and clothing from all four corners of Africa. I was there to window shop; some stagieres found some great art and jewelry and haggled the steep price down to a reasonable selling price. I figure that SIAO will be back to Ouaga in 2 years, right before my close of service (COS), therefore my bags will be ready for some souvenirs to take back with me to the states. I really did not want to have to carry things around for the next two years and it was great seeing what was at SIAO so I know what to look for on my journeys through West Africa. Plus, once I am a volunteer I get a cubie hole at the transit house to store any purchase I would have in the big city of Ouaga.
3 hours was enough for my wandering eyes so a group of stagieres and I made our way back to the transit house. Everyone was excited for that evening’s dinner at our SED APCO’s house. He was having us all over for MEXICAN FOOD. Sadly some of my SED volunteers were sick sick sick, so they came for Mexican but then could only sit and watch as we call crammed our faces with chips, salsa, and soft tacos. I was even more thrilled to have sparkling water.
Throughout the evening we all had our final interview with the APCO about our site placement for the next two years. Answering questions about what part of the country we wanted to be located and what projects we aspired to work on in the next two years. I have a tentative idea where and what I will be doing but I will not divulge that until week 4 when site placements will be announced. As the evening went on and it got past my bedtime, I used the free phone in the house to call home to the United States to say hello to Tootles, Jen, and Dad. I also devoured the latest Economists that were lying about the house. I called it a night around 10pm and walked back to the transit house.
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