I have had a couple formations and meetings in Ouagadougou in the beginning of February and March so my time at site has gone by so fast.
Hot season started EARLY this year, around February 13th, it get up to 105 degrees inside my house during the day. It has been quite hard to fall asleep at night and I find myself getting up in the middle of the night to splash water on my face. I do not sleep in my bedroom at all for the last month and have instead slept out in my salon. It has been so hot some nights that I get over my fear of having my door unlocked and open. I put my cot right up to the screen door to get some sort of breeze. What I have to get through my head is that it is not even technically hot season, the hottest it gets here is in April and May. Ohh something to look forward to, yippee.
In February I mainly worked with Lagou Da on his 2009 success stories we went out to the villages of Bapla and Navielgane to take photos of farmers. This month, March, I will help him write up his report in both French and English.
We have the ASUDEC's 2008 Macintosh that has never been used set up and just waiting for internet and a power strip. I will begin one on one technical trainings with the agents of ASUDEC hopefully starting the second week in March and construct a schedule of times during the week when I will help them with Microsoft excel and word.
Some WONDERFUL news for my counterpart Lagou Da, he and his wife Marie had a baby girl on February 23rd. This is thier first child.
I headed up to the north west of Burkina Faso on February 24th so I have yet to meet Lagou baby girl. I went up to see an international mask festival that only happens every two years here in Burkina. It was AMAZING!!! I had the best time and dealt with the heat because it was so cool to see all the amazing traditional dances and full on costumes. Pictures will be coming next month once I have time and a good internet connection.
After the mask festival I headed to Ouagadougou, which took me 11 hours and some sickness to get in on February 28th. This past week I and 3 other fellow PCVs have been spoiled by this amazing US based NGO called ASHOKA. We helped with a 4 day conference that they held here in Ouagadougou. My french was put to its limits and my brain was fried, I am not cut out for simultaneous translating in two languages, haha. We worked from 7am to 11pm practically all last week but it was worth it. I was able to meet the most fascinating West Africans from multiple countries (Nigeria, Senegal, Mali. . .) and come away with so many wonderful ideas on agriculture and social entrepreneurship. I have made some lasting contacts and friends. I hope to explain ASHOKA better in my next blog but if you are curious about their work in west africa check out www.ashoka.org
One of the biggest things that I am still working on is funding from the traveling village library. We have successfully set up PayPal for donations at the website www.mrsarmstrong.com and as of March 8th we were 72% to our goal of $3000 to buy books!!! That is WONDERFUL and I hope to have the full amount by the beginning of April so I can go out and buy books before the end of the school year: Summer Book Clubs!!! - maybe
I wanted to get this post out before I head back to site so none of you would worry about me after reading my last blog. I am doing GREAT!! January was just a blip on the radar of a wonderful service!!! I am so excited to get back into all the projects and activities I have planned for the hot season. I have 2 agricultural formations coming up in April which will be keeping me busy and I have been busy researching low cost drip irrigation techniques from around the world. I am also brushing up on semi-arid agriculture techniques, especially successful practices happening in Israel. I feel like I have become a little farmer while I am here in Burkina.
Take care and please check out www.mrsarmstrong.com !!!!!
1 comment:
Great to hear! Keep up the good work! Tootles!
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