On my last day in Korea we visited another shopping area and went to NSeoul Tower.

In an effort to not allow my fear of heights to stand in the way of life, I decided to go to the top of NSeoul Tower. It was a little scary, but the view was really beautiful.

Here's the group of us at the observation deck at NSeoul Tower. The sailor next to me is in the U.S. Navy stationed in Seoul. We met him out the night before this. He is wonderful and meshed right into the group during my last day in Korea. Next to him is John, another English teacher in Seoul and a friend of Marius. He's from New Jersey and just might be the funniest man I've ever met in person. Kneeling is another friend of Marius, Maryanne. She's also an English teacher in Seoul, but she teaches PROPER English since she's from the U.K. These guys made my time in Korea so great!

I think it goes without saying that small children from all cultures are sooooo cute. Korea is not an exception. The little ones are freaking adorable. Here is a little Korean girl in traditional clothes. This weekend was Korean Thanksgiving and lots of little kids were dressed up like this.

I can't blog about Korea without including a section on the use of GPS systems. EVERYONE in Korea uses these to get EVERYWHERE. The girls driving on our rafting trip used it to get us to the rapids. No maps, just GPS. Every taxi uses these all the time. I promise no one really knows where anything is. They just type it in and follow the red arrow. I swear if someone blew up the GPS system Korea would go into full chaos.

Day 3 consisted of shopping, Soju and karaoke. Marius lives at the center of Seoul and is full of wonderful knowledge about the city. So he took us shopping and dining during the day.

Me with Minh at a street market in Seoul. Koreans LOVE to shop. And Seouls has about 12 billion shops.

Marius, me and Minh in a taxi at the beginning of a night to remember...or forget;)Karaoke is a very big part of Asian culture. They have these places that have a bunch of rooms equipped with video screens, microphones and a bunch of music. Everybody gets to be a rock star. Here are me, Marius and an English student (he's Korean learning English) singing karaoke.

Marius and Minh feeling good and sounding great! They are REALLY good singers!

After karaoke we hit up Itaewon, aka "the land of foreigners," for some hip-hop music and dancing. Here are me and Marius dancing with some Soju. This is magical juice. It's like Vodka light. It doesn't taste bad, can be drank alone or mixed with just about anything, and only costs $1.50 a bottle! Magic!!

We started Sunday with the plans to hit up a spa/massage parlor. On the subway we were reading the Korea Lonely Planet guide and found a tour of the grand palace downtown that was only offered at 11:30, 1:30 and 3:30 and it was already 2pm. So we decided to detour and check out the palace and then go to the spa place.This is Changdeokgung Palace, well, one of the many buildings on this huge landscape in the middle of Seoul. This was the main building where all the ceremonies took place. The king's throne is inside. It was built in 1405.

Here is me and Minh at the Secret Garden. The gardens are so beautiful! The grounds are so vast. The name of this pond is Aeryeonji, which means "loving the lotus."

So we spent a couple of hours at the temple then took the subway to Itaewon (pronounced ee-tay-wahn). This is basically the G.I. zone. The U.S. military base is 2 blocks from this area so it was covered with Americans. We arrived at the salon only to find out it was closed. What a deflated feeling. I had talked myself up to a mud scrub by little on Korean women, followed by massage, pedicures, relaxation, etc. Not happening. So we headed back to Minh's area of the city and decided to get the next best thing...pedicures.

Here's a pic of Minh's very first pedicure!! I can honestly say that I have started an addiction in her that will probably last forever. These ladies were really good!

We ended the day with a trip to sushi heaven.

This is my new best friend here. He is the sushi chef at a sushi place around the corner from Minh's house. He hooked up the goods. I know I didn't have to go to Seoul to see this, but he makes sushi and puts it on these conveyer belts that go by in front of everyone sitting around at the bar and you just choose whatever you want! Oh my gosh it was awesome. He uses this paddle to hand specially-made dishes to people. He hooked me up with some tune and Minh got an avocado roll. Yuuuuuum.

That ends Day 2 in Korea. Monday we are back with Marius for a tour of downtown Seoul, shopping, and drunken karaoke. Come on, you know I can't leave this place without singing like the rock star I am!! Stay tuned...

Ok, so I figured I would use this blog to continue the chronicles of my international travels...since those are the only ones worth reading about;) I am in Seoul, South Korea with a girl I was in Peace Corps-Burkina Faso with. She is here teaching English at a school. Also here is another guy we were in Peace Corps with, Marius - who is also teaching English, but at a different school.

So the interesting part of the story starts on the plane about halfway from Chicago to Tokyo. The flight attendants came around for our mid-flight snack, and it was nothing other than a bowl of ramen noodles!! How funny. They gave us the bowls, then came by with pots of hot water and poured them in and told us to let them simmer for 4 minutes then enjoy! I was cracking up!

So after a 12 1/2 hour flight from Chicago I had a layover of 2 hours in Tokyo. Perfect amount of time to enjoy quite literally the best sushi I have ever eaten in my life! Wow! Then it was off to Seoul. I arrived without incident and my bags even made it with me!! Minh was waiting for me outside of the custom area. It was so exciting to see her after 9 months! I got in at 9pm and we took the bus to her house. She has this cute little "studio" apartment in a really nice area of town. She has internet, her own bathroom with shower and flushing toilet, and her own washing machine. This is not Africa my friends. It's so cute. Marius came over that night and we all stayed up talking until 2am, which on any other night would have been no problem. But we had to be up and ready to go on our white water rafting trip by 6am. Hello? I was in wonderful condition. I know, you're probably thinking, who goes to South Korea to go white water rafting? I do, that's who. We went with 2 of Minh's Korean co-workers and 2 American co-workers. So 7 in all in a mini-van. Talk about comfortable. And of course one of the Korean girls was driving, and I swear every time I looked out the front window we were on the left side of the road (they drive on the right here). That's when I started praying that I just make it through the day alive. We arrived 3 hours early (yes, 3 hours - apparently Koreans are not so great at timing) so we decided to go visit a Buddhist Temple that was only an hour away. This was really cool. It was located along a river and it was really serene, especially compared to the chaos of Seoul (a city of 24 million including the burbs).

Ok, here is me, Minh and Marius on the bridge to the Buddhist temple. The mountains are really beautiful and green. The river (or bubbling creek in the background) was really serene and comforting. I can see how Buddhist monks chose this place to try to reach the enlightened level. Puhlease do not talk trash about my chosen attire. We were supposed to be going white water rafting!! I had on shorts and a tank top and had to throw on my scrubs and sweater. I was not making a fashion statement;)

Me and Minh in front of the main temple. It was really ornate. You can see a monk praying right behind me.

A closer look at the monk praying. Noice the gold Buddha. The guy on the left is just some guy praying.

This is a humongous bell (on the right) and a drum (left) that was (or maybe still is) used at the Buddhist temple. I can only speculate what they are used for...maybe dinner? That's a heck of a dinner bell. Maybe it's used to call people to prayer. ;)

Later in my blogging I will have a list of observations I have made here. One is the fact that people here, when describing pretty much anything, really abuse the word "famous."

For example, all on Saturday one of the Korean girls showed us a famous restaurant in Korea, a famous temple in Korea, an area famous for when the leaves change colors, etc. Well, she described the man portrayed here in statue form as a "very famous" poet. So I took a picture. He actually was instrumental in leading Korea to independence back in the 1940's, and was also a poet. This statue is on one side of the temple.

So after a while at the temple we got hungry...enter my first Korean meal of my life. YUMMY. We had baked fish and kimchi (the cucumber kind and the cabbage kind) and eggplant and seaweed and rice and soup.

This is a pic of a typical meal here. The little dishes are all different and they keep refilling them whenever you finish. The big plate is baked fish that we shared. Please take notice of the scissors on that plate. They use scissors to cut meat. I'm just giving the facts here people.

Then it was off to the white waters. One note I should make is the fact that the temperature outside never really got above, I don't know...68F, and it was overcast and rainy all day. I'm pretty sure I could see my breath at various points throughout the day...maybe it was an illusion, but I was COLD. And it was funny because I was the only person raising concern about the fact that we were all probably going to get pneumonia. So when we arrived at the place, of course we were the only people rafting that day. What the heck? Who goes rafting on a day like that? We do, that's who. Oh yes, many wise decisions were made this day. No filling out any waivers or forms or anything, I don't even know the name of the company (not that I could pronounce it anyway). Just jump on the rapids and go. I don't know if you have been rafting before, but in order to make it through alive you generally need a good guide and some people in the boat that aren't completely without sense. Well, we had a good guide. And we made it out alive, even though Minh busted her ass on some rocks we went climbing around about mid-way through the trip down the river. I know, why were we climbing around on rocks when we were supposed to be rafting down the river. It's Korea my friends. So we finished and changed into dry clothes. We were all pretty tired and the trip was only halfway over. The Korean girls then decided to drive the rest of the way across the country to the coast to have seafood. South Korea is only the size of Indiana, but the middle of the country is mountains. So it took a really long time (another 2 1/2 hours in the minivan filled with 7 of us) to get to the coast. Please remember that the girl driving favors the wrong side of the road, and now we are driving through the mountains. Wow. Still praying to make it through the day alive. I know this blog sounds cynical, but at the end of the day I saw a lot of South Korea and it is really really beautiful. Really. And I got to be with Minh and Marius and learn about their time here. So we made it to the coast almost at sunset and it was really beautiful. The thing about the beaches here is that they are lined with barbed wire fences, to keep the North Koreans out. That was a sight I haven't seen before. So we stopped for dinner...another awesome 5-course meal including raw fish and tons of vegetables and seaweed and kelp, etc. 5 of us shared this meal that could have easily fed 10, and they say 2-3 Koreans usually eat it. How are all these people not walking around obese? Because the meals consist of the good stuff, not McDonald's. Point taken. After dinner we jumped in the van and headed back to our side of the country. In total we drove 9 hours yesterday. Coming off of 22 hours of traveling across the world by plane, I am happy the we went on this trip, but oh so happy that we are back.

I know most people stopped checking this long ago, but just in case, here are some pics. I never got the elephant pics from Audrie's mom... but here are some to leave you with.

Here we are crouching, looking for the elephants. You see here the guide that ended up leaving us high and dry;)

The view out my front door during a rain storm.

The baby of one of the women in my association.

My boys playing with the bubbles my dad sent.

More bubbles. They loved it!

I do miss them.

For a slew of reasons I have decided to end my service as a Peace Corps volunteer in Burkina Faso. I said tearful good-byes to my host family already. They will always hold a special place in my heart. I am finishing some end of service administrative stuff this weekend and I fly home Monday (getting me to Indy Tuesday).

So, last night I went out with some other volunteers here in Ouaga for a little good-bye celebration. As I was waiting (outside, with my back facing a waist-high wrought-iron fence) to use the restroom, I felt something grab the back of my leg, really hard. I thought it was one of the other volunteers just having fun, but when I turned around I came face to face with one of the biggest dogs I have seen in this country. He had stuck his head through the fence and bit me! OUCHY! I was wearing jeans and those teeth went right through and sunk into the back of my thigh. Not a ton of blood, but OUCHYYYYYYYY! So today I had to get a rabies shot. DOUBLE OUCHY! And I will have to have the follow-up shot Tuesday. TRIPLE OUCHY! Good Lord! Get me outta here! I'm kidding...but what the heck?

Anywho.

I will add a few more posts as I get my pictures uploaded (since that seems to be what people love the most:) A little more to share, so stay tuned. I am so happy to have had this opportunity to come here, see what I've seen, learned what I've learned, and share it all with you. If anyone has questions about my experience here please feel free to contact me at nanettemkelley@gmail.com. Thank you all for checking in to learn a little about my experiences here.

One thing I have time to do here is think. There are much fewer distractions from thinking here than there are in the U.S. I don't have TV or constant radio in the car (car? what car?), I don't spend an hour everyday "getting ready." I just have a lot more time to really think in silence; to ponder many things I have wondered about.

So I was sitting here frustrated to no end the other day and I started wondering why I was so grouchy. Life is hard here (and I have it easier than 99% of the people who live here) and I realized that there hasn’t been a whole day that I have lived in this country throughout which I was comfortable. I’m grouchy because I am constantly uncomfortable. But what gives me the right to expect to be comfortable? Because that’s all I’ve ever known. I have always had a temperature-regulated environment; I have always had access to cold beverages; I have always been able to eat what I want whenever I want; I have always been able to take a nap when I want, or go for a run, or visit my friends or family, or fly to Jamaica for vacation. All 30 years up until now have been comfortable and easy (and I know this is because I live in a country that allows me these freedoms, and I come from a family that has provided the means for me to do anything). My natural instinct is to seek comfort because that’s all I’ve ever known. I wonder what I would seek if I never knew comfort.

I have always all my life been able to get or do anything I want. I feel so fortunate to be a woman in this world and be able to do anything I want. If I want to move to a 3rd world country and live amongst the poorest of this world, I can. If I want to move to the U.S. and make $100,000 a year, I can do that too. If I want to watch a movie, get a massage, paint my toenails and go to the store in my bikini, I can. Imagine a life in which you couldn’t get or do what you want. Imagine being a Muslim woman in Saudi Arabia and not being allowed to walk to the store without being escorted by a man, just because you are a woman. Or imagine being born into a family here with no money and your only option is to work you family's fields in order to eat for the rest of your life. Or imagine a gazillion other scenerios you could be in. Having the luxuries of freedom and choices are the ones I treasure most. So many people in this world don’t have and will never know these.

How funny is this?? Meet Aaron, perhaps the funniest volunteer here in Burkina (except for me of course).

A view of the countryside on the way back to the waterfalls.

Rose, Veronica, me and Erica back at the falls. It's so wonderful there.

And you thought I wouldn't get the total international experience by coming here! These are our favorite non-Africans here in Bobo. Walid on left is Lebanese and owns the most beautiful nightclub here (Please notice the speakers, mirrors on the walls, air-conditioning in the background. It has tile floors and flushing toilets! We are talking NICE...considering most clubs here are outdoors in the dirt). And Rami on the right is Syrian and owns the supermarket where we get all our non-African goods (like Ben&Jerry's ice cream, cereal, milk, cheese, WINE!).

The roaches here are ridiculous! When I first moved to my house there were 40 of these crawling around my latrine at night. Can you imagine? I had to put a stop to that really quickly! I haven't seen any for a long time. Thank God!

Ok, ok gee-whiz! Technology these days has made people so demanding! The requests for pics is overwhelming, so here are some to pacify you...

I'm pretty sure this is who Jay-Z is rapping about when he talks about coming from "the school of the hard knocks!" No doubt. This is about as hard as it gets.

Have I posted this one before? Who knows, who cares. These are my boys Latif and Oseifa coloring on my front porch with the sidewalk chalk my dad sent. They are always running up to me saying "Nanette, dessiner SVP? dessiner?" (which means they want to draw please:). Genius idea dad!

I'm not sure who brought in the mass shipment of fussball tables to Burkina, but you can find one on EVERY street corner in this country.

Here is a typical vegetable market. I'm really lucky, because most volunteers don't get this many options in village.Yes, this picture absolutely means you are never, never allowed to complain about your commute to work again. Period.

People who live here really love the rains because it cools everything off and it provides for a good harvest. I love the rain too. There is something peaceful about it. And when it's blue skies and scorching sun 99% of the time, a little rain is a nice change of pace. The only thing about rain here is that it comes without warning in a matter of minutes (no Dad, I can't just flip on the Weather Channel to check the radar...no TV. And even if i had one the Weather Channel wouldn't be an option. Only Burkina news and African dancing videos.), and when it rains it really does pour. So last weekend me and another volunteer were on the other side of town visiting friends and decided to head home around 9pm. We were a 20 minute bike ride from my house. About 5 minutes into the trip she got a flat tire. We asked around for a bike mechanic, but they were all closed. So we decided to walk our bikes. We noticed there was a lot of dust in the air, but figured it was because of all the cars driving past. Well 5 more minutes down the road and the winds kicked in. The winds are no joke! Dust was flying everywhere in hurricane-like winds, we couldn't even see. Then I felt a drop. Thank God for the kindness of people in this country. We were just walking past 2 girls and one of them yelled that we had to come into her house. Just like that! So we followed her and 5 seconds later the rains hit like Katrina. All the houses here (well, most of the houses here) have tin roofs, so when it rains it is defeaning. And this girl didn't have electricity, so we sat in the dark for a few minutes before she brought out a kerosene lamp. So there we were, sitting in this stranger's house, looking at each other by kerosene light, not able to speak because it was too loud, and I giggled as I thought to myself "I would never be in this situation back home." It rained for a long time and I must have dozed off because I woke up to this little old man with only one arm telling me in the local language that I could sleep on the mat that he had prepared for me on the floor. And if that wasn't ok, I could have the girl's bed. Never, never would this happen back home. I just smiled and thanked him profusely and told him it really wasn't necessary. I think it rained for like 45 minutes before we heard the rain calm enough to be able to continue walking. We thanked the girl and the old man for their hospitality and off we went. Many people offered us rides or just to push our bikes and walk with us. Gosh people are so helpful here. Sometimes on my rough days here I forget that. This was such a great reminder. We made it home eventually, grabbed a beer and stayed up laughing and talking about how funny the night turned out to be and how this was just another experience to add to the many we've had in Burkina. Never a dull moment.

I had another meeting with my girls club last week. Since malnutrition is a big problem here (there are lots children with big bellies and skinny arms and legs, and children with light-colored hair due to a lack of essential vitamins, and those are just the visible signs), I decided to do this session on nutrition. A couple of weeks ago I asked the girls to write down everything they ate and drank over a period of a week so I could get an idea of what they were eating. There was little to no fruits or proteins in their diets. So, for this session I basically listed the essential vitamins and nutrients an average person should get on a regular basis, listed what each of the vitamins and nutrients did for the body (Vitamin C good for the eyes, etc) then listed which foods available here contained each of them. Since not everyone is literate in French, I drew pictures of the foods in each groups. The girls thought it was pretty funny. I took about a half hour to explain everything to them, then we played 2 games to see how much they really got out of my explanation. They were pretty good. It was interesting to see how little they knew about (1) the nutrients essential for good health and (2) the foods readily available to them that contained these nutrients. At the end of the day I just told them they had to had to had to eat fruits and vegetables and protein whenever they could. They all were very happy with the session and promised to remember to get a variety of fruits and vegetables every week and make sure to eat more meat, eggs and milk. So far, so good.

Last week the mother of one of the other volunteers came to Burkina to visit and I decided to meet them at a town not far from Bobo that is famous for regular elephant sitings. We arrived on a Tuesday and just spent the day chatting and relaxing by the river. Since I live in Bobo I don't get the best view of the night sky because of all the "city lights." But out there in elephant land the sky was dazzling with millions of stars. And it was so peaceful as the three of us were the only ones at the site (even though nature is LOUD at night! goodness crickets and frogs and who knows what else, all harmonizing together). Our "guide" told us to meet him at 8 the next morning. Without any briefing, warning, etc. he came and got us and we set off on foot to find the elephants, our guide in front, then me, the other volunteer, her mom, and then another Burkinabe guy bringing up the rear hanging on to a 4 foot stick - like one he just broke off the tree. I wondered to myself what exactly he thought that stick might come in useful for, but I assumed he knew what he was doing. So off we (the white people) went chatting and laughing along the way until we noticed that our guide had started stepping a little more cautiously, then the talking stopped. After about 10 minutes of walking he started walking REALLY cautiously and stopping and squatting down to look under the trees. So of course we followed his lead, and looked so funny, all crouched down together peering around. The other volunteer gave our guide the new name of "African ninja." That's exactly what he reminded me of. THEN, he put his fingers to his lips (to tell us to be vewy qwiet) and he pointed straight ahead of us to where a whole line of elephants was walking by about 50 yds away. It was breathtaking! We were in awe. I started counting, one big, one baby, a teenager, another baby, another big, another medium...and then the first one turned towards where we were standing and her ears waved out really big. Then the other big one did too. Then they all turned and started coming our way! We gasped and when I turned to our guide to see what we were supposed to do he was gone! He had taken off running with the other guy with the stick! So me and the other girl and her mom high-tailed it out of there. My heart was in my throat. I kept thinking to myself, "as long as we don't feel the ground shaking, the elephants probably aren't running after us, so we should be ok." But of course images of us getting trampled by a whole herd of elephants were running through my mind. I thought "what will I do if they catch up to us? climb a tree? oh, why didn't I brush up on 'what to do if being chased by elephants' before I came?!!" It was exhilarating! We finally caught up to our guides, who were crouched down by the side of the river, and they said maybe we can go back to camp and wait for them there. Yeah, thanks African ninja! So we went back and got a beer and looked through the excellent pictures they took of the elephants. In total there were 13! Just walking in the wild! After 2 beers our African ninja came over to us and pointed at where 2 more were walking right by the camp. Soooo cool. I'll post the pics after I get them uploaded.

Well, so far so good. When I got to the meeting at 3pm there were 23 girls waiting quietly and patiently for me - 3 of whom did not attend the previous meeting. 3 girls showed at 3:15 and 4 more at 3:30 - all got the boot (Ashauna you wouldn't have made the cuts;)

I gave them a survey to fill out and bring back on Monday - to guage what they know, what they don't, what they want to learn/discuss. Generaly speaking girls here are not outspoken (basically the opposite of me), so I gave them a questionnaire to think about and write in the answers. It prevents them from having to speak in front of everyone...obviously one skill we will be working on this summer. Before long there will be a bunch of mini-me's running around this place with all kinds of priceless knowledge speaking their minds, standing up for themselves, being assertive...respectfully of course. And I promise to watch my mouth this time - don't need a bunch of sailors running around;)

In other news:

It's been hot (the rains are few and far between).

I've been sick again.

Same stuff different day in chez moi.

I hope everyone has a lovely Memorial Day weekend. Love you all!

Before I came to Burkina it could have been said that I could have been known to let a cuss word slip here or there. I’m not gonna lie, I didn’t have the cleanest mouth in the world. Fast forward 8 months, add to that this crazy heat, the slew of stressors we deal with here, AND the fact that no one knows English (or if they do, they certainly don’t know slang or the cuss words) and you have the perfect recipe for yours truly walking around with (I hate to admit it) the mouth of a sailor. I’m not proud of it. And I’m not trying to make excuses. It’s a stress reliever for me. I don’t know why, but it relieves tension to say “What the f@*%!” sometimes…or daily. Well, it has caught up with me. Oh man, in the funniest way.

I teach English to this adorable 20-yr old soccer player named Issouf. He is originally from Burkina but grew up in Ivory Coast. His dad died before he was born and his mom died when he was 2. Safi sort of adopted him when she lived in Ivory Coast and brought him back here when she came here - she pays for his housing and food and basically plays the role of family in his life. Issouf speaks Moore (a local African language), French and Arabic, but is only literate in Arabic. I’ve been working with him since February. We meet every night at 8pm to review what I have already given him and then add a little more. He is so intelligent and he works really hard. Everyday he tells me how excited he is to speak the good English. So a few nights ago we’re going through some vocab words, and he is getting them right one after the other. It’s so exciting to watch someone learn what you teach them. I was giving him the French word and he was giving me the English word. It went like this:

Me: pomme

Issouf: apple

Me: marcher

Issouf: to walk

Me: good job! chapeau

Issouf: hat

Me: jeudi

Issouf: thursday

Me: very good! croire

Issouf: to believe

Me: vouloir

Issouf: (after thinking for a few seconds) f*ck

I literally fell out of my chair laughing. I couldn’t help myself. He said it with the straightest face. I was crying! And he had NO CLUE what I found so funny. He was so confused. So I composed myself and asked him again, and after thinking for a few seconds he said it again!! Oh my gosh! I almost didn’t recover after that one. We had to move on to the next word, and of course after that I had the giggles for the rest of the night. Oh man. I gotta watch my mouth…and try to undo the damage I’ve done! Freaking Nanette!

On to another topic…I had my first meeting for my girls’ club yesterday. I requested 10 and 26 showed up – aged 12-24. I’m thinking of making 2 clubs – one for the young ones and one for the older ones. The issues facing each age group are different enough to have 2 groups. And smaller groups are more manageable anyways. One aspect of West African culture that drives me crazy is the lack of importance placed upon doing anything “on time.” I’m not even sure that phrase exists in this place. It is common to have people showing up to a 3pm meeting at 4:30pm. It makes me wonder how anything gets accomplished. It is maddening to someone from a society that is driven by time. So I explained the importance of being “on time” to my club and told them that anyone who shows up a minute after 3pm won’t be allowed to stay in the club. We’ll see how this little trial works. It will probably blow up in my face and I’ll have no one in the club. I’ll let you know how it goes;)

When I leave this place I will be an expert in the art of asking the right questions. Before I came here I heard many, many stories from other volunteers who didn't find out very important information about their jobs or their community or their projects until the end of their service. It's common here (and apparently in other countries where Peace Corps exists) for people to not get the entire story or all the information (pertinent or otherwise). I don't want to say people are lying, just not giving all the information; not necessarily withholding, just not giving more than you ask for...which leads to the reason I will be an expert in asking the RIGHT questions.

Those of you who know me well (or just know me) know that I am direct (to put it nicely). I say exactly what I mean, no beating around the bush, no sugar-coating. Some people consider this a flaw, while others consider it an asset. Whatever the case, that's the way I like to be dealt with. As luck would have it, that's not the Burkinabe way...at all. It's actually the exact opposite. My organization is large and has A LOT going on. They are motivated and hard-working and aspire to be something big a great one day. Being the accountant I am (whether I fit the prototype or not) almost the first thing I requested from my organization was financial information for the organization in its entirety. 6 months later I am 200% sure that I do not know everything this organization does. I have studied all the words in french that I think might be able to convey exactly what it is I'm trying to get my hands on - all, everything, complete, entire, the whole lot, each and every one, altogether. I find out a little more each day. It is exhausting. It goes against my grain. Maybe a lesson in being indirect; definitely a lesson in patience.

I've been crazy busy with my organization since I got back. They have some big and exciting things going on and I'm doing my best to help them where they need me. I'm also starting a girls club for this summer in my neighborhood for girls aged 12-18 (the prime age range to drop out, get pregnant, make less than desireable choices for their futures) to address a lot of the issues facing girls in this country - career planning, financial management, sex ed, family planning and just provide a forum for them to discuss what's going on in their lives and answer questions they may have. I'm having a lot of successful women from Bobo come to speak with them to provide the girls with local role models who could potentially serve as mentors for them. It's going to be fun and hopefully will benefit the girls somehow.

That's what's happening with me. Sorry this wasn't funny - maybe next time.

So my journey back to site almost did me in;) As I mentioned in the previous blog, the weather was unusually cool for the first 2 days I was back, oh it was so nice it made me wonder what I was so worried about coming back here…that all came to an abrupt end the morning I woke up at 5am to make it to the bus station to try to get on the first bus back home (the logic being that if I take the first bus leaving at 7:30am it won’t get toooo hot until just as I am arriving in Bobo at 12:30). In addition, I paid a little more to get an air-conditioned bus. That morning started out at about 100F and just increased from there. Add that to the fact that the air-conditioning was broken on my bus (shocker – and no, they don’t give reimbursements for that, freakin’ Africa;), AND the guy sitting next to me may have been the largest man in this country, AND I had been in country just long enough to get my system irregular again (no, there are no toilets on the bus – toilet…what’s that?), and you have the perfect equation for the trip from hell. Of course when I got here I had to go through 4 taxi drivers before I found one that would only charge me 4 times the real rate (it had to be the suitcase!) and then once we got close to my house complained that I lived too far and that he would have to charge me more. He got that whole day’s worth of American curse words and a little French attitude to go with it. Needless to say, he did not get any more money out of me. Thank God Aissa was here and after 100 questions about America and China and my family and friends and how everyone was doing and how was the weather and on and on, helped me clean my house. Oh my gosh it was so dirty I had to wait until the next day to do the laundry. Before I left I think I wrote about the president of my association moving out of the courtyard down the street because she and her husband were disagreeing about some things. I thought that after being gone a month she would have moved back and everything would be A.O.K. That is definitely not the case. She still lives down the street, so after cleaning my house I went to talk with her. Here’s how the conversation went: Safi: Nanette! Welcome! How are you? Me: Hi! I’m great. Safi: How is your father? Me: He’s great. Safi: How is your mother? Me: She’s great. Safi: How is your sister? Me: She’s great. Safi: How is your brother? Me: He’s great. Safi: How are your friends? Me: They are great. Safi: How is America? Me: It’s great. Safi: How is China? Me: It’s great. Safi: Great. Why didn’t you call me from America? Me: Ok, what? Anyway, how are things here? Safi: Things are great! Me: Are there any problems? Safi: There are no problems. Me: But you still live here. What’s up with that? When are you coming back? Safi: Never. Me: Never? Safi: Yes, my husband is very mean, apparently he has another wife in another city and a total of 9 other kids besides mine. My father came to talk to him about many things, but he will not change. We are getting divorced. It will be final in 4 days. Me: Ummm, ok, I see you’ve been busy while I was away. So I will be living in the courtyard with your ex-husband? Safi: Oh yes! There is no problem with that! Me: Really. I guess we’ll chalk this one up to irreconcilable differences? What the heck??? Talk about freaking awkward! I didn’t even know people got divorced here. So his other wife, who also lives in the courtyard where I live (I love this woman), comes to me today and asks if I know about Safi. I told her I did and she asks me why Safi gets to leave and she doesn’t! Grrrrrrr. At times like these we focus on things we are thankful for: 1. That I’m not one of the wives of this freaking man trying to get the heck out of here. 2. That I didn’t end up needing the toilet that wasn’t there on my bus ride here. 3. That my latrine is only 32 steps from my front door (and not, say, 100 because there would have been some accidents my friends!) – guess I’m making up for lost time;) 4. That the taxi man didn’t understand English. 5. That my electricity is finally on today (after days of 100F+ with no fan – I don’t know how those volunteers in villages without electricity do it!!) 6. That it’s really cheap to get both bike tires fixed at the mechanic who lives just down the street. 7. That I was not a child soldier (I’m reading A Long Way Gone – Memoirs of a Boy Soldier by Ishmael Beah who was in Sierra Leone during their war…I highly recommend it!) 8. That my headphones still work even though I dropped them into the bucket I was washing my clothes in! It was an accident! Woohooo, now that’s quality merchandise! 9. That I brought back enough M&M’s to keep the neighborhood kids bouncing at least until the end of the week;) My thoughts and prayers go out to Debi Egan (and her kids) who completely unexpectedly lost her husband of 29 years last week. It’s been a long time since I’ve seen 2 people so in love, and after so many years of marriage! God works in mysterious ways. She’s such a special woman. May He give her strength to get through this difficult time and continue to brighten people’s lives everyday. I love you all, my family and friends!

To say the least, my time home was pretty amazing. I have THE BEST support network ever. I had such a great time seeing my friends and family. I didn't get to see everyone and for that I apologize. Time went by so fast...all the way up until my last night home (which ended up being my first all-nighter since college - sorry about that dad, and thank goodness for 24-hr Wal-mart!). I am now back in Burkina readjusting to life here. God hooked up some UNUSUALLY cool days to help in my transition back here. It's really nice. I have slept under the stars for the past couple of nights and can't convey just how awesome that is. I will be posting again as often as possible. Thanks for keeping up with me!

I've been out of this for a while, so I'll get you up to speed. Let's back it up a little...Coming home was fantastic (see prior post). I spent my first week home remembering my old easy life - driving anywhere I wanted to go, taking showers though I'm not REALLY dirty (because I now know what REALLY dirts means), seeing and talking to my friends and fam at will, and eating all the good food this country has to offer. Here's one of me with my girls Amber and Ashauna out on my first weekend home. Such great times!

Then I went to Shanghai and life accelerated a little. Everything is fast in Shanghai - quite the opposite of Burkina. We went sightseeing, hit some good restaurants, caught a great concert.

Me with my brother at the Bund downtown Shanghai. It was freeeezing!

The view from my brother's balcony. Breath taking.

And the view from his bathroom. What 25 things in this picture indicate you're not in Burkina anymore?

And now I'm back for America in April - Phase II.

People keep asking me if I want to go back to Burkina now that I'm home and it wasn't until last night that I truly thought "I need to get back there." I got off the plane from China, took a shower to get ready to meet some friends out and started to worry about what I was going to wear. Reality check - who cares? 2 weeks in and I'm back to worrying about the stuff I hated worrying about before I left. Man, life in Burkina is not easy - it's freakin' hard! But that's why I went there in the first place. Yeah, I gotta get back to the simple life where it's harder to forget the important things in life.To all my fellow volunteers toughing it out in April in Burkina right now - keep up the good work! I know it's hot, but you're helping to make somebody's life a little better and that's what it's really all about.

I made it home safely and I must say it is gooooooood! I wasn't on U.S. soil for more than 20 minutes before I had a grande nonfat chai at Starbucks in the JFK airport. That's the way to start it off right!!! I have a new temporary cell number for those who want to get in touch while I'm here...(317) 796-0968. Things are fantastic so far! It's frrrreeeeeezing, but other than that everything is perfect! I had sushi tonight and am standing on carpet (these feet haven't touched carpet in 6 months and it feels so good - it's the little things I miss:) and I am in heaven.

To those in the U.S. - call me!

To those in Burkina - you should be sooooo jealous;) miss you guys!

I am officially on vaca. I get home Tuesday night, so get at me sometime while I'm home.

I have been looking forward to this trip for a long time - in part because I was sick for so long and it's just nicer to be in familiar territory when you're sick, and in part because I miss my fam and friends like crazy. But a couple of times as I was saying my goodbyes to everyone here I felt the early signs of maybe missing this place while I'm gone. I know! Call me crazy!

Things I may not miss:

1. 108F in my bedroom last week (I'm not exaggerating people, we are talking AFRICA hot!)

2. biking through town in the blazing sun (please consider #1 above when imagining how sweaty I get when biking) arriving at my destination covered head to toe in dirt (I'm relatively sure I have redefined "dirty" here)

3. drinking water that is the same temp as my house (please see #1 above)

4. being sick (please also consider #1 above)

But then there are the things I will miss...

Deep in contemplation...how can you not love him?

These are my little angels;)

Musicians and dancers - you couldn't pay to see it this good in the states. They are amazing!

It took 7 photo attempts (7!!!) to get them to smile. And even then I couldn't get the little girl in the middle (without a shirt) to crack. Isn't she the most adorable!!

Need I say more?

1. This is the cutest little girl who was at a gardening project we were visiting. A Burkina organization fenced off (to keep the roaming animals out) a field and divided it into 10 gardens (for local families to grow food for their families to eat and to sell) and built a well that supplies all the water for the gardens. And then the family has to pay back the costs over time witht he profits from selling the produce. Very interesting project...but not half as interesting as the little girl with the cup as big as she is;)

2. Here she is walking up the path with her mom. All in a day's work.

3. Can you tell I love the kids here. They are so frickin' adorable!

4. Here's a lady who works at a chicken coup who was so sweet and happy. When we got the cameras out, she jumped right up and smiled. Love it.

5. A formation teaching us about micro-lending (lending small loans for small businesses - growing and selling vegies, sewing, grinding up flour, peanuts, etc for cooking)

1. Me with my yoga instructor. He is fantastic! (it took 3 shots to get him to smile)

2. Me with some other volunteers at Mexican night at our boss's house - we try to keep it diverse:) Yuuuum.

3. This is me and Audrie tonight - it's St. Patrick's day and a lot of people wrote "Kiss me I'm Irish on their bodies," but Audrie is not Irish so she wrote "I'm a mutt." Peace Corps makes people do strange things.

4. Me with Mark - our token Filipino (he's here in the bureau with me right now, so I felt obliged to add him:)

You know the old saying "buy a man a fish, feed him for a day; teach a man to fish, feed him for a lifetime." That basically sums up the first mission of the Peace Corps. We are here to build human capacity instead of handing out cash (like a lot of NGO's do, and many times it ends up wasted, stolen, etc) or building buildings (that sit empty cluttering the horizon because they couldn't be maintained) because somebody wanted to "make an impact" or have something that shows how they helped Africa. But here another concept has been identified that could be added to the saying...something like "teach a woman to fish, feed the next generation." The point being that while an educated man can go out and work and provide for his family, an educated woman will educate her children. I have never been a supporter of helping a category of people based on sex, race, religion. I don't believe in organizations/associations/whatever established to promote any one category of people - whether it be women, catholics, African Americans. As far as I'm concerned we are all human - and though we weren't all born equally, I think we should be treated equally. I don't think anyone needs handouts or special recognition nor do I think someone should get a job or a scholarship just because they happened to be born Latino or Jewish or whatever. In addition, I don't think Africa needs the rest of the world to hand them money because they are poor. The people here are perfectly capable of fixing their own problems and giving money only teaches people to be creative in ways to get more money rather than addressing the underlying problems. The only way I think a difference can be made is through education. So...since I do agree with the notion that an educated woman will most likely pass education on to her children AND since I was placed with a women's association here in Burkina, I am having less of a problem with focusing my efforts here on educating women.

Thanks for listening to me work this issue out via blogspot. I hope everyone is fantastic. I miss you all and will be home in 16 days...I can taste the Starbucks already;)

Leah - I still have all the teeth I came here with.

Brent - My thumbs are in the same condition as when I arrived back in Sept.

Fear not my friends! On the whole I am the same on the outside...it's the inside that's having the makeover. Toodles!

1. Me with my host mom - love her love her love her

2. This was me (and some other volunteers) in the back of a taxi setting records in this country tonight - we got 9 in this hatch-back taxi - not including the driver and not including anyone riding in the hatch-back. phenomenal!

My first week of training was fantastic! It has been wonderful to see all my co-volunteers with whom I came here from Philly and spent the first 2 months in Burkina. We started with 39, 1 girl left in October, 3 girls left in January, and 1 girl left in February (some were medically related and others just didn't want to stay here). That's not so bad considering the circumstances (i.e. Burkina Faso). And the rest of us seem to be getting along nicely at our sites. We all have our struggles, but on the whole people seem happy and motivated.

Of course it was so great to spend time with my host family too. They really are fantastic. This week we will spend in the capital city visiting various NGO's (non-governmental organizations) with which we could potentially collaborate on projects at our sites. Now that I'm back to 100% health I'll be ramping up the workouts this week and taking advantage of the pool (at the Embassy) and the great food here in Ouaga - life is all about timing my friends:)

When I read other people's blogs I notice that lists seem to be great way to present a decent amount of information while still providing maximum humor (kind of like David Letterman's top 10). So I started a list of things you can get here for 100CFA (the equivalent of 20 cents in America according to my last exchange rate check). So here goes...

1. 1 bike tire repaired (I should know)

2. 1 small bag of cashews

3. 1 pack of lotus (the small packs of kleenex that serve as our toilet paper)

4. 4 tomatoes

5. 1 thumb sewn back on at the local health clinic

6. 1 calabash (see the half-shell bowl looking things that I hung on my wall in my house - pictures are a few posts back) - these are often used for drinking dolo (the local made beer)

7. 3 carrots

8. 2 wicker baskets

9. 1 watermelon

10. 1 day of parking your bike at the internet cafe

11. 2 teeth pulled at the local health clinic

so this is my top 11 things that you can buy here for only 20 cents each! I would say that's a bargain!

The countdown is getting exciting!! Almost in the teens! 20 days and 20 nights! Wooohoooo!!Miss you all!!