A trip home to a faraway place

I am now two days back from visiting my village that I will call home for the next two years. Visiting my village has changed everything. I now have a concrete place and actual people to which I can attach worries and aspirations about the coming years. I was able to see me house. I know the names of my neighbors. And experienced for the first time humbling respect that I will received from my future students. I should note that it was only by this respect was I able to discern students from adults as many of my students are only a few years younger than I. Let me start from the beginning.

The week prior to our actual site visit was the site announcement. For obvious reasons, all of the trainees were excited to find out the location of our new homes. Peace Corps delivered this information in a fun and creative way. On a cement basketball court was painted a giant map of Burkina Faso. On the map was labeled the cities/villages to which a trainee was going to be sent. We surrounded the map and followed orders to blindfold ourselves. We were then lead to stand on the city that would become our new home at the end of summer. After a countdown, we took off our blindfolds to see where in the country we were standing. Not only were we able to see the name of our new home, but we could also see who would be our nearest neighbors. I was happy with both.

Fast forward a week to the days leading up to the actual site visits. A counterpart from each village is matched with every trainee. These counterparts are fellow teachers, principles, or members of the Burkinabe equivalent of the PTA. They are directly responsible for easing our integration by being our first point of contact to handle concerns in village.

Roumba Abu Bakar is my counterpart. He is 23 years old and looks much younger. The fact that he is a teacher at 23 is an impressive accomplishment considering most of my middle school students (I am guessing) are between the ages 15 and 18. This indicates two things. The first is that Roumba’s parents valued his education and started him in school at a young age. The second is that he worked very hard as a child to avoid “redoubling” grades which is very common in the Burkinabe school system. Working for the government in Burkina Faso is an esteemed position as it is the only way to guarantee a steady income. Most people aspire to become government employees (i.e. teachers, policemen, etc). The opposite is true in America where the real money is in the private sector. Government employees are often haggled about being civil servants as they would often get paid much more to do the same job in the private sector. Good money in the Burkinabe private sector is few and far between. Therefore, I would compare Roumba’s accomplishment of becoming a teacher at 23 to a college graduate in America immediately making six figures.

All of the matched counterparts made the journey to Ouagadougou for a two week workshop introducing them to the incoming volunteers as well as the basics of Peace Corps. Roumba and I got along very well as we spent these two days together. I treated him to dinner the first night and he returned the favor a few nights later. He was eager to talk about our village and the school at which we will be working together. Similar to how PC volunteers are placed at a site, public school teachers also do not choose their assignments. I asked him about his initial reaction when he first received the news that he would be heading to “bush.” He admitted that he had apprehensions about the lack of electricity and restaurants. These apprehensions, by the way, are the same ones that I have now. The lack of electricity worries me much less than me cooking for myself for the next two years. I can do Ramen, mac N’ cheese, and frozen pizzas. But to make raw products straight from the ground into tasty meals is not something I would say I am experienced with. I foresee myself making veggie omelet sandwiches daily. I shared my concerns with Roumba and assured me that if he could adapt then I would be fine as well.
I suppose I can try and describe my house. Getting out of the Peace Corps land cruiser that Fermin conveniently arranged to take me from Bobo to my village, I was not expected to be suddenly stricken with fear. But fear was my first emotion when I first saw my house, and my dog to be standing guard. To make a long story short, I didn’t even attempt to touch Jack, my dog, one time during my 3 day stay. He was always chained up and I had to wake Jenny, soon to be introduced, in the middle of the night to restrain the dog so I could use the restroom. To say the least, it will be an adventure my first day at sight when I need to get into my house and Jack is there standing guard in front of the door, most likely unchained.

The intensity of the fear of my dog was easily offset by the warm welcome of the volunteer whom I will be trying to replace. Filling the shoes of Jenny will be a difficult task. I don’t even like using the word replace. I prefer to say that I will try to continue her work and not completely drop the ball that she worked so hard to get rolling. [I think I could be more cliché if tried]. Anyways, I was so thankful to have her there to explain the ins and outs of the village. The things she told me will make my transition so much easier come next month. This isn’t even to mention that I don’t have to worry about furnishing an empty house as I will be the third volunteer in my house.

My three day stay was full of introductions. I met the mayor, the chief of the village, the police, the village doctr, the president of the PTA, my neighbors, fellow teachers, and my future boss. I won’t go into detail now describing each of these people primarily because I don’t think I could say much about any one person. All of the people that I met have since blurred together into more or less on vague personality. Anything I may have tried to say would most likely have been more inaccurate that truthful. The time will come to describe the people of the village, but for now just know that I spent nearly three full days in introductory conversations.

Before I ramble on too long, I am even more excited for my two years after my site visit. I realize the importance of the next month or so of training, but at the same time I am biting at the bit longing to make a new home.

A sudden goodbye

I thought it prudent to wait a while before posting this. Know that everything worked out fine and we are back to training as usual in a different city.

However…

Thursday afternoon, July 1st, after a full day of French class, the last thing on the schedule was a community meeting. All of the volunteers from the different sectors (Secondary Education, Girls Education and Encouragement, Small Enterprise Development, and Health), all get together for casual announcements. The meeting is led by trainees and it is a place where each sector can give a little tid bit of news from their training. The topic of last week’s meeting was to take care of details in planning for our 4th of July party that was, at that point in time, three days away.
In the middle of taking food and drink orders, our Safety and Security, Congo, walks in and says to everyone that he has a really important announcement. He started by saying that the embassy here in Burkina Faso issued a warden message warning of potential Al-queda activity in North. Ouiagouyia, the city in which we were training, was specifically targeted for the kidnapping of westerners. In response to this, Congo informed us that we would be evacuating the city the next day.

Let me describe how I was interpreting this information. Warden messages like this are not rare. They happen all the time. The embassy in Cairo issued several similar warden messages during my semester in Egypt. Sometimes we changed our plans accordingly, sometimes we did not. During my internship in New York City with the Department of State, I had access and time to read, or at least glance at, warden messages issued from embassies around the world. There were always more messages that I was willing or able to read. Basically, the embassy is obligated to report any and all credible information it may receive regarding threats to Americans. In this context, I was not scared or anxious that my personal safety was in immediate danger. However, knowing that the Peace Corps is responsible for 80 volunteers, each living with a separate host family, biking to and from training often at night, in a city that was specifically targeted for kidnapping, I knew that drastic change was in the offing.

That change came in the form of immediate consolidation into a local hotel. We were not able to contact our host families or pack our bags. This was frustrating for me as my house was three minute bike ride from the training center. All 80 volunteers spent Friday night in that hotel with nothing other than what we brought to class that day. I was lucky to split a three-bed room with four other volunteers. I lost the coin toss and had to share the bed. Others slept on mattresses on the floor in the conference room, so I consider myself lucky.

The logistics to set up our training in Ouyiagouya were staggering. Organizing the host families alone must have been an incredible task. Peace Corps needed to find 80 suitable families, train them how to treat the food for sickly Americans, and make sure their house met safety and sanitation standards. There was one amazing man, Siaka, who had spent several months prior to our arrival solely dedicated to this task. Our French classes also required an incredible amount of man-power. Eighty volunteers have French class nearly four times a day in classes of only 3 or 4. That means Peace Corps had to find well over twenty qualified French teachers that could work full-time teaching each class four hours a day. All of these things and more were up and running masterfully before the warden message. After the warden message, they all came to a screeching halt.
Everyone was anxious that night, not about our safety but about our future as volunteers. It was common sense that we would most likely not resume our training in Ouyiagouya (I think I spell that different every time), Knowing this, the next logical question was where and how are they going to be able to train us so that we can be ready to swear-in as volunteers at the end of summer. Organizing host families on such short notice is a nightmare. Finding facilities to hold classes is equally as daunting. So this is where we stand- in limbo.

I am writing this on the 4th of July. Last night was my second night in an air conditioned room with heavy blankets, and a normal bathroom. Actually our A/C was broken the first night but we quickly had the corrected the following afternoon. We have been told that we will be here for at least two weeks. Classes will resume tomorrow at an international school nearby. At this point, they do not know if we will stay in Ouagadougou all summer or find an alternate city to complete our training. We have been told that it is highly unlikely that we will be going back to Ouiyagouia. This means I will most likely never see my host family again. No one was able to say goodbye and I am still unsure if the families fully understand what happened. This is the saddest part about the whole situation. I have talked to my family a few times over the phone. I think it would be much harder emotionally if my French was better, but most of my energy is focuses on accurately communicating to them what happened as opposed to expressing my disappointment for having to leave my new family.

A quick word about the luggage- remembers I said that we were unable to pack our things. We were never able to do so. An unfortunate few had the incredible task of going to 80 different homes, packing up rooms that have been lived in for weeks, loading the bags onto buses, and transporting them to a different city two hours away. It would have taken me at least an hour and much creativity to pack my own things back into my original two backs. I can’t imagine having to do it with someone else’s stuff- eighty times over. They were able to do it and we had our luggage the following day. I can’t express how impressed I was at this accomplishment.

So this ends the story for now. We are temporarily staying in an air conditioned hotel in the New York City of Burkina Faso. I had a good hamburger for dinner last night. Today we are going to an athletic club to celebrate the birthday of our great country. Classes resume tomorrow as usual with no more than a two-day hiccup. I forgot to mention, all of the language teachers, for the time being, are also staying in Ouagadougou- another impressive logistical success. Let’s just say I am thankful that I am not the one making decisions. I am in good hands sitting under an air conditioner as I type this. I can’t complain.

Crisp morning in Africa

I wrote this a while ago but never got around to posting it. I travel across Burkina Faso tomorrow to visit my permanent site. It is a small village very close to the border with the Ivory Coast. I officially will have no electricity.

Here is what I wrote a few weeks ago...

My watch in my room, resting in front of the fan, read a chilly 92 degrees at 6 AM this morning. There were a few brown outs last night, and during those times, I can’t comprehend how others are able to get by without a fan. The coolest moments are when the electricity kicks back on as the moving air cooled the pools of sweat on my body that were able to accumulate in the stagnant air. These super cool moments last about 5 minutes. I’m trying to decide if these extra cool moments are worth the incredibly hot stretches of still air. I’ll let you know if I ever make up my mind.

Let me tell you about the laundry. Sunday is laundry and cleaning day. To start, I still have scabs on the tops of my fingers below my finger nails from all of the scrubbing I did last Sunday. Two weeks’ worth of I laundry were build up last Sunday, so desormais, it should not be as bad. Here is how the story. I told my younger sister to show me how to do the laundry. She said first I need to go buy soap. She took me across the street to these two kids who were selling nothing but soap. A small bag of powdered detergent and a big bar of soap cost 350 CFA. (Pronounced SAYFUH). 500 CFA is one dollar, so the in total the two things of soap cost 70 cents. An avocado sandwich costs 300 CFA, a bowl of rice with sauce and a bowl of spaghetti both cost 500 CFA, a coke costs 450, and a beer costs 600. We are given 1500 per day during training. I am well under budget if I don’t get a drink and only eat the sandwich avocat.

However, a few times a week I go get a beer or two after class, buy 1000 CFA calling cards (which literally last less than 5 minutes if I call the states), go to the internet café which is 400 CFA per hour, and buy my host family treats. My 105 degree water just wasn’t doing the trick yesterday after class. I asked my sister and brother if they wanted a cold drink. Of course they agreed. The yaccompanied me to the Alimentation – the Burkina version of a 7-eleven. I bought two bags of water (deux sache d’eau) and three cans of coke, two for my siblings and one for my host mom. They didn’t know how to open the cans, so, at the very least, cold crisp coke is a rare treat for them. The bags of water are the cheapest way to get a cold drink. They are square bags that fit in your hand similar in size to a full sandwich sized plastic back. They are uniformly sealed on all sides so biting a corner is the ticket to a mouthful of cold water.

The wood chopping man

A worn wood chopping man came by a few days back. I was sitting on our porch one day after school when a leathery old man walked through the gate into the court yard. Slung over his shoulder was the biggest axe I have ever seen. The blade itself was well over a foot long and looked more like the grim reapers … I forget the name of the grim reaper’s tool of choice but I think you know the one I’m talking about…anyways…the blade was huge. Opposite the cutting edge, the blade narrowed and was secured by piercing the thick end of the “handle.” I put “handle” in quotation marks because the handle must have been the femur of a horse – I suppose I’m in Africa so it very well could have been the femur of an elephant or giraffe. This think was at least one and half times longer than any other axe handle that I have ever seen. After I was able to take my eyes of the axe, I gazed upon a man who looked like he has seen a ton of life. If a black person could be tan, this guy was California beach bum bronzed. I doubt he weighed more than 140 pounds but I guarantee I wouldn’t stand a chance. He wasn’t muscular, just efficient. Every inch of his body was chiseled and defined, his biceps as much as his rib cage. I looked to my little sister and gave her a look that said, “who is this old guy with the huge axe!”

My little sister giggled and told me to greet this guy in Moore. “Ya zaabri yaa laafi” I said in what seemed an extremely boyish voice compared to the tiny burly man that stood before me. He responded with a raspy voice, a three-toothed smile, and beat-red squinted eyes from a lifetime of African sun and heat. After exchanging the usual greetings, my sister led him around the corner of the house, and my first thought was that I was going to see dinner killed right then and there. I had a mini panic as I was not in the mood to see this man go to town with an axe on some chickens or a goat. Fortunately, my sister pointed him to a pile of wood and it became clear to me that this man was here to chop wood. I immediately told my sister that I thought I could do it. She immediately responded with a smile and a finger shake that indicated she had little faith in my wood chopping ability. She was more in touch with reality than I was.

The wood they use here looks more like tan, sun-beat drift wood than the logs one would normally think of in America. It is long, narrow, and spirally. The wood must be cut lengthwise with the logs sitting on their sides. One must straddle a log with the goal to make narrower pieces of the same length. It is very hard wood and when the axe man took his first swing I realized why he needed such a big axe. The first time he raised the axe above his head and made the first swing, I half-expected the log to explode. His motion reminded me of a perfect golf swing in slow motion that is a perfect combination of art, finesse, and explosive power. It’s as if his back swing and the first half of his downswing was in super slow motion but went double time right before the blade hit the wood. As I said before, I expected the wood to explode on his first swing, but blade bounced off barely leaving a dent. It seemed as if some law of physics had been violated. It did not look natural. He didn’t hesitate to take another swing but with this time made a sound when he exhaled during the down swing that again made me feel twelve years old. I swear the sound came straight from deep inside his lungs. This time, a small piece kindling flew off with a crack. After ten or so similar strokes, the first log split in two. To end the story before it gets too long, after thirty minutes watching this now sweaty man labor in the heat, I looked to by little brother and said in English so that he wouldn’t understand, “Damn, that is why you stay in school.”

A day in the life

I don’t think I will lose weight this summer because I am eating like a king. For breakfast, my mom serves me a fried egg baguette sandwich. I use coffee from your French press to wash it down. All of us go out to restaurants for our lunch break. So far I have tried rice with a tomato sauce, rice with a peanut sauce, spaghetti with the same tomato sauce, cuscus with the same peanut sauce, and an sandwich avocet. Of all people you should know that I am a happy man if I can fill my stomach for less than a dollar. My mom cooks me a good dinner, consisting of mostly the same dishes, but I get a sliced mango for dessert.

As I said before, the vast majority of food here is starches and oils. I take pride in my stomach strength, but even I feel the effects of the drastic change. It’s actually not the drastic if you consider I have been eating dc food and cheesy double beef burritos from taco bell the last four years of my life. To get off the subject of my bowel movements, it has been the topic of most of the conversations here since many people are having troubles in this area. For the time being, I am not.

So let me describe my room as if to put you here right beside me. I am sitting on the edge of my bed with my mosquito net brushing against my back. The fabric of the net is much closer to plastic than to cloth. I may look into buying a nicer one once I move to site. My computer is resting atop a chair over which is draped that blue and white thin cotton button up that I wore on my wengatzy days back at Taylor. I am stripped down to me skivvies with my fan cranked targeted at the center of my body. I am still sweating. My watch currently reads 96 degrees and its 9 pm at night. Today in the afternoon my watch read 105 degrees in the shade. There are several volunteers that are breaking out due to constantly sweating.

Also on the chair in front of me is draped a town that I use to do tidbits of P90 workouts on my motivated mornings. I didn’t do one this morning as I was already in a full sweat when I woke up. I am so thankful for my fan. Others do not have one, and I couldn’t imagine bearing this heat in dead still air. Behind the chair is my water filtration system that the Peace Corps divided. It is basically a two gallon bucket resting atop a five gallon bucket. A two part filter connects the two so I dump water into the top bucket and it filters into the bottom bucket. The whole contraption rests on a footstool so that my water bottles can easily fit under the bottom bucket. Resting next to my water filter is another bucket I use to fetch water from the main living room. Above me and to my right is a clothes line that stretches the length of the room (~10 ft) and is about a foot from the left wall (the left wall as you walk in from the door – I am facing the door now, the water filter would be immediately to your right if you were to walk in). Resting on the clothes line are the clothes I wore today. Do laundry in a bucket is a bitch, will talk about that later, so I let used clothes dry out so they can be used again. I even flip my underwear so I can use them two days in a row. The is one small window to my left covered with an orange and yellow flowery drape. To the left of the window hangs a board with hooks on it that I use to hang up all my shirts and pants. I am also very thankful for this as most of the other trainees will be living out of a suitcase for three months. In the corner in front of my and to my left is a small table. The table is too small to do work on so resting on it is my shampoo, toilette paper, a picture of my family, and a picture of Margee. Also there are two random sacks of peanuts as my brother gives them to me every other day even though I insist that I don’t really like them and can never finish them fast enough. Last thing, immediately to my right is a green metal chest in which is the stock pile of my supplies (My med kit, deodorant, q-tips, shampoo, lotion, etc). This probably goes without being said, but I sleep directly on my mattress. My pillow is rock hard and the bed is too short. I make it sound worse than it is as I have had no trouble sleeping. It’s all a mental game.