Two weeks left of Training?

Our Washing Machine at Tyler's host family

Jessi's host sister and her daughter

Tyler's Host Family at Alim's 1st birthday

Jessi' Host Sister Marriam and son Issouf

Jessi's host brother Adama, Issouf, and one of the many village kids that hang out at her house

Jessi and her host sister who never leaves her side

It is impossible to believe, but two weeks from today we will be leaving our host families and leaving training. Two weeks and two days from now we will be sworn in as members of the Peace Corps at the US Embassy in Ouaga, and it is hard to believe that over two months have passed since we left the US. The prospect of leaving our rigid and rigorous training schedule, the “parenting” of the Peace Corps training program, and starting our home in Tougan is a welcomed one, but the idea of leaving our host families and friends that we’ve made here is not one that is easy to embrace either.

I’ve completed two weeks of teaching math in French at model school. Though it is only one class of one hour each day, it has been challenging. However, when I think about the fact that I spoke no French 3 months ago and now I’ve taught a bit of math to those 35 students in French, its downright amazing! (Note: model school classes are really small… typical class size in Burkina Faso is 70-140 students in one classroom) Model school has forced some improvement in my French because I have to answer questions off the cuff, and there is no one in the room to translate for me or otherwise help me if I don’t understand. We have two more weeks of model school left, and I’m hoping that my vocab will continue to increase with it.

We’ve both been under the weather a bit the past couple of weeks, and we don’t know what to attribute it to. Could be food, or a bug, or who knows what. Being sick here means lying down in an unventilated room that could double as an oven and sweating profusely until you can’t tolerate it any more.

Because of aforementioned scorching rooms, we’ve been talking about buying an oscillating fan for our site, and decided it is probably a good idea to get one while we’re at training since we’ll have somewhat of a better selection (well, that and because when we are forced to sleep inside here, even at night, it is a sweatfest). Today I decided to go out and browse around for fans. I was checking out a fan at a street vendor today and noted that the box (which was in English and Russian) promoted a two year warrantee that came with this fan. I chuckled to myself and asked the vendor if it was true. He smiled and said (not in English) “Ha! This is Africa. Things don’t work like that here.” In reality, if I took it home, plugged it in, and it quit after an hour I would have no retribution. I have no retribution with the vendor because he has no retribution with the manufacturer.

Though I held off on buying the fan, it really segued into one of the things I often struggle with here: a lack of guarantees. By guarantees I mean simple assumptions too, such as if I decide to buy 100cfa (25 cents) worth of Bissap and pay with a 500cfa coin, the likelihood of the person having change for me is really low, even at a restaurant. Similarly, when you go out to a restaurant that advertises various items on its menu, it is likely that 30% of the items won’t actually be available, though they may have been 10 minutes before. In my mind, I wonder why they couldn’t stock a little extra (there truly is a lot of potential business lost). However, there really is no guarantee for the vendors either, and if nobody buys their products it is simply food that you can’t afford to refrigerate, and thus money down the drain, something that no one can afford here. It is petty but its one of the little quirks here that has taken some adjusting, and I can’t believe how much I enjoyed that simple consistency and reliability back in the US. Both of those qualities are truly the mark of wealth I am now realizing.

So I know everyone thinks that Jessi and I are off living this incredibly exciting and adventurous life in Africa with the Peace Corps, and that may be true to some extent. However, I just want to mention again how much we enjoy hearing anything from home. It is seriously good for our mental health, even the simplest of notes. Thank you to everyone that has written, emailed, or called us.

Neighbors and Ouagadougou

During our Tougan visit we met up with Nick, a PCV who lives about 45k from us. He showed us a couple of cool places to visit in Tougan, where we can check our email and get good eats, and went around to meet people with us. He actually ended up being our first guest at our new home! He also had us come up to his home for an evening of food and drink and good conversation on that Friday night. He ordered a mutton (goat) for us and some of his friends from village for supper, as well as Cokes and Brakinas (the ‘national beer’). I know some of you have some aversion to eating goat, but let me tell you, this goat was amazing! It was seasoned with spices Nick brought, grilled with onions and peppers, and then slow cooked again over a fire. I think it could’ve converted some of you! Just being able to have a meal that wasn’t 90% carbs was amazing in itself!

We also spent the weekend in Ouagadougou, the capital city. For the most part, Ouaga is a very modern city, with many of the luxuries we experienced back in the states such as air conditioning, cold drinks on demand, readily available internet access, and a variety of foods. For supper one night we had pizza, and I mean it was actually pizza. The next night the trainees were invited to a PC staff member’s house to eat Mexican food (soft shell tacos with chips and salsa etc). Yes, I realize we get a big hung up on food here, but it really does have a big influence on our outlook. Processed food, like cheese, and foods that require refrigeration are difficult to find in Burkina, so it really is a treat when we encounter them!

Tomorrow model school starts for me, which means I’ll be teaching math in French every day. Its intimidating to say the least, especially the French part. A lot of the math terminology looks similar to the English but the pronounciation is quite a bit different and some of the concepts are approached entirely differently. It’s a challenge but one that I really look forward to.

With the rains in Burkina come the mosquitos, and they are actually starting to get thick. Yes, Northern Minnesota thick, except the world never seems to cool off here. Jessi and I are constantly dabbing anti itch cream am bug repellant on ourselves, but I think the mosquitoes here have learned that the scent of DEET = human blood to be drank, and thus are attracted by the stuff instead of repelled by it.

Rooster Story!

After what seemed like an epic battle with the cock in our courtyard for sleep over the past month the dust has finally settled, and sleep can once again be found. For the first month here, the cock in our courtyard woke up at 3:00 AM every day, and crowed until 7:00 AM. To put this into perspective, realize that windows and doors here do not have glass on them to keep noise out, and 4 out of 5 nights most of my family (self included) sleep outside in the courtyard to escape the heat of the house. Thus, if the cock goes off at 3:00 AM, there is no way to escape its decree. A couple of mornings I would wake up to my host father chasing the cock with pieces of hose and wacking it in an attempt to silence it. I also saw my brother put a bucket on top of the damn thing one morning in a similar attempt, but it continued to crow in an even more deranged manner since the sound was reverberating inside the bucket. One morning they even tied the cock’s foot to a chair behind the house so it was at least away from us. It seemed like this would continue indefinitely.

Well, two weeks ago I finally remembered that I brought earplugs, so when the cock started crowing at 3 AM, I put my earplugs in and enjoyed another three solid hours of silent sleep, outside, under my mosquito net in the cool 80 degree morning air. I woke up at 6 AM, earplugs still in, to my host brother leaning over the mosquito net, reaching for the cock which was sitting on top of my sagging mosquito net, 3 inches above my face, squawking and flapping its wings like mad. I was sure that I was going to start of my day with a face full of chicken poop! However, after my morning bucket bath, my host mom informed me that enough was enough, and that the cock had menaced everyone for too long. The following night we all slept soundly without the deranged crow of the cock, with bellies full of fried rooster. As twisted as it sounds, having won this battle by frying and eating my enemy was particularly satisfying.

After spending the past 12 days together, Jessi will return to her host family in village tomorrow night. I know it has been hard to be away from them for so long, but we have greatly enjoyed being able to spend so much time together.

Hope that all is well on the home front. Until next time!