Right now I am procrastinating. Instead of doing one of the many things on my to-do list prior to May 15! It has also been a while since a post for me, despite many promises otherwise. I don't have much to say about the current situation in Burkina Faso. There are many news articles out there. You can read them, but also do some research, too. The commentary around the actual fact is exactly that.

My romance with the simple life

So, people often make a big deal about how I lived without electricity and running water for over 3.5 years. I worried myself, considering I don't camp and do enjoy cushy modern conveniences. I even found an essay I wrote in middle school about how I wouldn't enjoy living without them at all. In reality, this much simpler lifestyle, while physically stressful, wasn't terrible at all. I enjoyed it, and still miss it (except maybe washing sheets and towels by hand). As I rediscover these modern conveniences slowly but surely, I realize more and more how much the dearth of said conveniences impedes the productivity of nations like Burkina Faso. At the same time, great strides have been made during my short time there.

Peace Corps, even in Burkina Faso, is not camping. I had walls and a roof over my head and owned furniture and multiple matresses. I had a deep pre-dug hole to use as a toilet. My camping gear: my giant backpack, a sleeping bag, and a screened tent (Bug Hut II). My giant backpack traveled around Burkina with Hamadé and me. My sleeping bag kept me warm during the cold season (anything <80° requires long-sleeves and <70° a blanket or many layers of clothing). My screened tent protected me from mosquitos. If I had to recommend one thing, it would be a screened tent to keep the mosquitos out, but let air in.

Water and Fire

I lived a few courtyards (read: lots/parcels of land) away from one of several pumps in my village. I woke up early each morning to beat the rush, and was usually the first one there... I often had to wake up the guy with the key to unlock it several times. I would pump the 40L of water that I might use over the course of the day and bring it back home (on my bicycle, I'm not that hard core). (I often used only about 20L, unless there was laundry, many dirty dishes, or I took a couple extra bucket baths that day due to the hot season). Pumping water each morning as the sun rose, was one of many physical activities that kept me fit.

I used this water for everything. The Peace Corps provided a filter to prevent the many diseases communicable by water. I took at least one bucket bath a day, as many as five during the hot season. My first bucket bath in Burkina Faso was at Yaneth's house in Komsilga during our Stage. We had biked out about five miles, and I bathed under the stars for the first time in my life. It was at this moment that I knew village life would be good for me. I heated the water for my bath during the cold season by leaving one of my giant jugs of water in the sun. Nothing compares to the stars in a country with virtually no light pollution.

It might surprise people to find out that our filtration/purification process did not incorporate boiling the water. Yes, this is a great option, if you have a good hot stove readily available. In Burkina Faso, the cost of propane has increased dramatically. In 2007, there were exorbitant rate hikes in food staples (e.g. rice, bread), fuel (e.g. gasoline, propane, wood coals, wood, etc.) as well. The majority uses wood or wood coals to cook. More inefficient in time and energy.

Electricity

Candles and kerosene lamps lit my home my first year, and my headlamp was my best friend for quick jaunts to the latrine. I paid twenty cents to have my phone charged at a little place down the way from me. It didn't matter much anyway. I had so little cell phone reception, that I had to hang my phone in a tree to send and receive text messages... most of which didn't go through. I kept it off mostly to conserve energy. At one point, my family called Peace Corps worried that they hadn't heard from me in several months. I guess my text messages had been lost, and back then it cost over two dollars per minute to call back home to America. Now, it's only thirty cents (half the cost of a domestic phone call in 2007)!

Afterwards, I bought a car battery to run a small flourescent light bulb (which they often called néons or reglettes). This increased my ability to work at night astronomically. As romantic as it is to read by candle/lamp light, the amount of light generated is actually very little compared to the amount of heat. My headlamp ran off of several AA/AAA batteries, which don't last long in heat. (This is due to science. I haven't charged my camera batteries since I left Burkina Faso, but they work without any problem. In Burkina, they would last a few weeks at best before draining.) My battery was not powerful enough to run a fan. Unfortunate, since the oppressive temperatures of the hot season leave you listless and on the verge of dehydration. The sweat dries so quickly that all that is found are traces of salt on your skin and clothes. At night the temperature drops siginificantly. While it is still hot (often >100°), the temperature is bearable and the power of light, increases productivity!

Charging my battery was an ordeal, and after two years, I succumbed and bought a solar panel. This actually allowed me to be much more productive my third year. I could even run a laptop off the battery if I wanted, and ended up charging many people's phones and batteries for free. Battery maintenance overall was necessary as well. The acid from the battery quickly evaporated. I had to regularly add filtered water into the system to maintain the acid levels, and on occasion, new battery acid. It's amazing how easy it is to buy a couple litres of H2SO4 in Burkina Faso.

Glass Windows

These conveniences, nonetheless, should not be the only consideration when one looks at "modern" cushiness. Windows are amazing. Especially, soundproofed and tripleglazed! Why are windows amazing? They keep out dust. I'm sure you've seen the pictures of our homes and seen the shuttered windows of the majority of BFPCV homes. They are not really shuttered windows, they are shuttered holes in the walls. There is no glass on the other side. Granted, Peace Corps regulations required screens to be installed over the shutters to prevent death by mosquito. However, there are no requirements for actual glass windows because of a combination of cost and also, the fact that it sets you apart from the rest of the community. The screens and shutters don't do much to keep out the dust.

Why is this a big deal? To maintain a spic and span home, one must sweep morning, noon and night and also mop daily. Dishes must be washed not only after use, but immediately before use as well to remove layers of dust. Clothes draped casually over a chair become dirty within a day. Sheets and mosquito nets and other linens become horribly disgusting as well. A casual shake of the sheets reveals more dust than critters. If you had windows, then your home would naturally have fewer of these critters anyway. Dust storms would be something to scoff at, instead of one of two other options: cover your face (optional) and go about your business OR hide under a sheet and hope the thread-count is high enough to keep out the majority of the dust.

You can read the Wikipedia article on windows to discover more about this fantastic modern convenience that saves people from many additional human hours of cleaning each day!

Conclusion

I wouldn't mind living without electricity and running water again, but only if I were guaranteed some glass windows and solid doors that kept dust and critters out of my home. Kudos to the Romans and all of Europe for their development of this modern convenience. I'm pretty sure that it is with this development that they soared ahead in development in the latter half of the second milennium, leaving Asia (where paper windows were popular) and Africa, quite literally in the dust.

OK, I am still overwhelmed, but on the road, so less frequent posting and more out of touch with the latest gossip/news/information. I just very strongly felt the need to post this in light of the events in Burkina Faso these past few days. Not making excuses for anyone. This is a completely editorial post with NO official factual basis. It is a COMICAL INTERPRETATION OF EVENTS to lighten my worries for the future of a wonderful country filled with amazing people. I know that at a certain level. These were not initially intended as malicious acts, but the flames of a bold call to arms can consume not only the bad, but the good as well.

Dear Guys with Guns,

Please note that bureaucracy is SLOW even in Nassaraland. You made a negotiation two FRIDAYs ago, and your paychecks came out this week.

The Big Cheese is super sorry that the money men didn't push the pay-more-cash button fast enough. They were busy pressing the print-paycheck button for the last two weeks since they wanted your regular monies to come out on time. It will probably take all month to click the single pay-more-cash button for each one of you.

Don't forget that your families look to you for your courage and wisdom, not just your monies.

Some say that if you build IT, IT will come. IT has already been built, and IT will come... maybe within two or three paychecks.

Sincerely,

Independent Misinformed Humble Observer

Dear Sitting Sipping Tea under Tree,

I appreciate the fact that your union is usually peaceful. I also understand your need for more monies when all the other sectors get paid way more than you... except for those who aren't on strike and actually work the entire week without a break and have more paperwork and get paid half as much.

I also understand that your normally captive audience was on strike last week. At some point though, shouldn't the good of your clients be considered more highly than some extra monies to spend on fun times?

Isn't it kind of cruel to tease those who work literally twice as hard as you for half as much as you?? Especially, when they are the ones who provide your client base.

Sincerely,

Independent Misinformed Humble Observer

Dear Marching Mayhem Masters,

Quench your thirst for justice

The only fire that burns cleanly

Is figuratively built of reasoning and truth

Literal fire destroys all things completely.

Sincerely,

Independent Misinformed Humble Observer

Dear Country of Upright Peoples,

Be wise.

Be strong.

Be careful.

Sincerely,

Independent Misinformed Humble Observer

I hope you laughed and took this all with a grain of salt.

I apologize for the hiatus. A life-defining decision is upon me. Since I've received this information, I have pretty much been incapable of doing much other than weigh the possibilities between a wonderful socially rewarding career AND the careers in the so many other things that I get excited about doing. I must decide by April 4th the course of essentially the next three years of my life or to go out on a limb and adventure. I noticed a lot of hits from my false post. I was half asleep and meant to hit save not publish! I know incoming PCTs are probably curious, too. So, without much further ado (because if I put off posting any longer this will turn into a book)... more speculation with some facts and plenty of editorializing!

In the news Monday from Burkina Faso... primary and secondary school students returned to schools across the nation, except in the Koudougou region. University students were supposed to return to school on Tuesday following talks between the government and union leaders, but they didn't, declaring another strike. In addition, over the past two weeks, the military has been acting up enough to warrant press in English news sources in both Ouagadougou and Fada N'Gourma. In small villages across Burkina, people find themselves crowded around radios trying to find out more about the developing situation across the country. Further military unrest has also occurred in Gaoua and other cities to support their fellow troops in Fada and Ouagadougou. School had started normally, and in more rural areas, it continues without a problem. Unfortunately, yesterday school ended early in Toma possibly due to some ridiculous rumors flying around, but Yaba was fine. The country is on curfew from 9PM to 6AM as of yesterday. The curfew does affect certain services that used to happen at night, and basically shuts down the entire capital.

The funny thing is, that the military and the students are essentially protesting about the same thing: corruption. In contrast to the students, the military are upset about the collapsing culture of impunity, protesting over the imprisonment and loss of military status for a rapist in Fada and a group that had a scuffle with a civilian... involved with the wife of one of those in the group. Maybe these individuals were actually innocent, but proven guilty under pressure to fight any corruption (even if it is imaginary). I don't know. However, the violent reaction of the military is maybe not as unexpected as one might think.

Once upon a time, people only had to take a test of physical fitness to join the military, no formal education was necessary. The minimum of a CEP diploma (primary school) is now required to join the private ranks. Of course, higher ranks require more education. Consider now that reasoning and logic are not innate skills, learned from educators (whether teachers or family) and best improved through experience (getting older and wiser?). The military has a right to protest. Especially, since many may have seen their superiors getting away with the same things or worse, without being punished for their actions. The culture of impunity is starting to crumble, but it's always the bottom of the pyramid that suffers first. This military "temper tantrum" is justified, after all, why do the superiors get to have all the power abuse, and not them? Or, vice versa, why do the superiors not get punished, like them? Either way, there are people upset in Burkina Faso and they have guns... lots of them.

Are their actions logical? Does freeing convicted rapists and agents who abused their powers to hound and beat people or destroying property and injuring people send the right message? Is there a flaw in the judicial system (which is on strike because of the military firing on their offices), were they under pressure to convict for fear of seeming to endorse corruption? Will a lot of whistle-blowing follow this?

Granted, their actions certainly garnered a lot of attention. After two weeks, Mr. President has publicly addressed the nation and intends to meet with key players in the military unrest. The students protested for over a month and didn't get that same treatment.

Is it comforting to know that youths across the world react similarly? While some are drawn to positions in the armed forces (police, military, etc.) out of the desire to serve and protect, many others are there for the power of the weapons and the uniform.

Is this related to the incident in Koudougou? Is this related to unrest elsewhere in Africa? Either way, this is not the first time the military has acted in an unbecoming manner... thinking back to late 2006. Though, the events in Koudougou may have led to a series of reactions and actions that caused all of this hubbub.

So, I have theories about lots of things, but I'll let your brains do some of the heavy lifting, too.

So, in a slightly lighter topic. I am revisiting wastefulness, particularly with food. For those of you who are out in the great unknown (e.g. not my Facebook friend), one of the most terrible shocks as a BFRPCV is the excessive waste of Americans. Originally, I started a post on discrimination, but then seeing as that is such a deep and personal topic and since I'm reading this very excellent book called American Wasteland, I thought I'd revisit the topic of waste.

Of course, as I write this, I could really not have the heat turned up so high or have as many lights on in my room. I am just as guilty... now that I've started to readjust just a little bit to being an American. However, the thing that still bothers me, now that I am officially starting my third month back in country (incidentally, the longest I've been in my family's home in the past decade) is the food waste that I can see.

Luckily, my family is okay for the most part at home. We eat leftovers, the next day, and repurpose food (e.g. leftover dishes and rice get mixed together to make fried rice). For the most part, very little food goes into the trash due to spoilage. Even if roots, onions, and garlic start to sprout or do some funky things, we just scrape off the bad parts and use the good. Our unintentional waste may only come from the couple of food scraps that don't all make it into the pot when chopping leafy vegetables like cabbage. And of course, my stove-popped popcorn doesn't get 100% return for all of the kernels. So a few shreds of cabbage and maybe a dozen kernels of popcorn for a week's worth of food waste (excluding peels, that dry wrinkly part of onions and garlic, etc.) doesn't seem too bad.

The problem is when you go outside. Though I've come back to America multiple times, I've hardly gone grocery shopping during those times. Since I was involved in the cooking and shopping for my first month back for my family, I started to pay attention. In all honesty, I was very surprised. Granted, produce in Burkina is seasonal, but for the most part, you can find produce the equivalent size of what you would buy in America... or at least what I remembered you could buy in America in 2007. Now, the reality is 2011 produce is apparently very different from what I can remember of 2007 produce. I could be wrong, but produce today seems much bigger, more symmetrical and cleaner than it used to be.

American Wasteland seems to support my cursory observation on the matter. Apparently, the "ugly" produce is culled multiple times before reaching the display bin. What happens to the majority of this culled food (fresh vegetables and fruit, dairy products, meat)? It's tossed into landfills, producing methane (one of those greenhouse gases) and much less often is donated to food recovery groups who then redistribute to soup kitchens and food pantries. Food may be replaced as often as every 3-4 hours with the undesirable stock being tossed into a dumpster.

After almost four years in Burkina, you can imagine my outrage at discovering this! For someone who had no refrigerator and had to figure out a way to preserve my fruits, vegetables, meat and dairy in 120+° F temperatures for at least five days at a time, the idea that food is being thrown out because it has been sitting out for a few hours seems incredulous. Granted, my food was farm fresh, and would naturally have a longer shelf-life if it were stored in a refrigerator compared to the run-of-the-mill food found in supermarkets which may be 1-2 weeks old by the time they are bought. I guess people don't realize how long food can actually be kept without refrigeration if proper care is taken to reduce exposure of the food to bacteria and fungi. I'm sure I was just as ignorant my first year. However, I figured it out through trial and error. Something that I lost through carelessness one day, would not be lost the next.

The problem, eloquently stated by Jonathan Bloom, is that many people have lost touch with their food. They have no idea what the original plant looks like, nor do they have any idea the amount of time and energy required to grow, harvest or process those plants are. Worse yet, is the fact that commercial farming rarely has >50% yields! Much of the produce that is harvested is tossed, because it is not pretty enough by commercial standards. The rest is not harvested because food pickers work quickly since they are often paid by the amount harvested (weight). Food is cheap compared to all of the work that went into it. Food, like many other things, is less appreciated when you don't have to work as hard for it.

In Burkina, I think people would keel over if they knew what happened in commercial food production in America! Of course there is food loss in the production process in Burkina. This is unavoidable since there are no perfect systems. However, in general, very little is wasted. Unwanted food is often given to the less fortunate (this is not exclusively beggars, a whole other topic that warrants its own post). Food scraps are fed to livestock. The entire animal is used in food preparation and if the skin is in good condition, it is can be used to create leather goods. I have eaten my share of soups and other dishes made from head, feet, organs, and other body parts (even before getting to Burkina!). In the fields, everything is harvested by hand. I know that people don't leave something behind just because it is too big or too small. They eat it all!

In America, you will rarely see a child be excited to eat a carrot. In Burkina, children are just as excited to eat any vegetable as they are to eat a piece of candy! The food is financially inexpensive (of course, this depends on your socio-economic status, but if you can't afford to buy it, then you are more often than not a subsistence farmer), but physically expensive. Growing seasons are short and water is limited for dry season farming. Food is a valuable commodity and a lot of care is taken not to waste it (of course, occasionally food falls on the floor, but if it can't be salvaged, there is always a dog, cat, chicken or other animal ready to eat!).

Most of those who live more modern lifestyles in Burkina have not forgotten their roots and are very ashamed when food does go to waste. In a country where you are culturally expected to invite someone to join you when they see you eating, how could you justify throwing any food away?

Ashamed. That's how I feel now every time I see a buffet area or leftover restaurant food going back to the kitchen. By American health codes, those are the foods that can't be donated. Everything else can be donated. There are even laws that protect a donor from liability for donated food as long as the person doesn't knowingly donate something that is spoiled. Unfortunately the majority of that food is going to landfills instead of being donated, but that's a different battle.

Family, friends, and other readers, I encourage you to:

• Finish your food.

• Pack up the leftovers (if you don't want them, give them to someone who does).

• Well, I don't really have a solution for buffets, but I don't really think they're worth as much as a single well cooked meal. (Though I have yet to revisit one in Las Vegas.)

In brief, the normally complacent country of Burkina Faso is now three weeks into its own social crisis. While there have been brief mentions in US newspapers like the New York Times about universities being shut down. Most of the anglophone coverage is brief, not exceeding two paragraphs. You can read more in English here about the situation as it develops (since I am no longer there).

Now, let us wander into hypothesis land where I may or may not sound like I make sense, but this is how I interpret the situation, how it's developed, and how it may or may not progress. Please note, that I might be grossly off base, but this is what I have put together with the things I do know from the dark recesses of my mind and some speculation. Please don't take any of the following as absolute fact.

---< speculation >---

The student named Justin Zongo passed away in late February, police claim the cause of death to be meningitis. Witnesses, family, friends and his peers suspect foul play, corruption and a cover up. Chaos ensues.

Oversimplification and exaggeration of series of events: Girl and Guy 1 don't generally get along (for unknown reasons, but I suspect unrequited love).

Girl says something to annoy Teacher.

Guy 1, class president, says to Girl that that was inappropriate.

Girl says something that annoys Guy 1.

Guy 1 slaps Girl.

Girl complains to Guy 2, her boyfriend, and a formal complaint is filed with the police.

Guy 2 happens to be a police officer and uses his police officer powers to incarcerate Guy 1, keeping him away from girl and also paying him back for the slap.

Guy 1 is fined 10000 CFA which he has no money to pay, each time he goes to the police station to ask for more time, he pays off his interest by being slapped around and being arrested.

Guy 2 accidentally kills Guy 1 in his rage.

Guy 2 claims that Guy 1 died of meningitis.

Country calls BS. Guy 2's bosses say it's true, deh! Country calls double BS.

Country implodes in protest.

Guy 2 and other people are fired/thrown into jail.

Girl is mortified by how stupid guys are.

This is not the first time someone has died in police custody in recent years. Last June, another youth died in police custody. This youth was a gold miner who was reputed for selling confiscated drugs on behalf of the police. Unlike the incident in Koudougou with Justin Zongo, this incident in Gaoua with Arnaud Somé only resulted in localized protests. Both cases involve police corruption and violence leading to death. However, the difference is social function (miner vs. student), timing (summer vacation vs. middle of school year) and also reason for arrest (drug possession vs. student fight). Also, Justin's last name is Zongo, which reminds many people of the journalist Norbert Zongo, an influential investigative journalist whose suspicious death (many believe assassination) occurred while researching the presidential family's ties to a murder).

Protests for the Gaoua incident were localized and pertained to the community. However, the Koudougou incident touched the country as a whole regarding student rights. A disciplinary issue that should have been dealt with by the school was blown out of proportion due to the girl's connections. Nationwide rioting by students led to destruction of government buildings, especially police stations. This combined with the overall frustration with government corruption and the potential for future government corruption by the same people has led many of the unions to support the protesting and to protest themselves this week.

To really understand where this is coming from, one has to go back to the rise of the current president Blaise Compaoré and take a look at his government. Prior to being president, he was a close friend of his predecessor Thomas Sankara who he helped become president in a bloodless coup d'état in 1983. Many Burkinabè revere Sankara's philosophy (making the country self-reliant as opposed to relying on foreign aid for things that Burkinabè could resolve on their own through austerity); however, some of his policies were controversial (stripping traditional privileges from tribal leaders, tribunal courts, etc.) and led to his assassination in 1987. Compaoré placed himself in power after this coup and reversed the majority of the policies that Sankara had in place (most notably, limiting government employee salaries and benefits and inviting foreign aid back into the country).

Compaoré ruled the country under a military regime until its first election in many years in 1991. In Burkinabé fashion, the election was boycotted by the majority of the people who opposed the bloody coup that Compaoré used to seize power. Thus, he won his first and second elections in 1991 and 1998. In 2000, the constitution was amended to reduce the terms to 5 years. Note that the term limits set in 1991 was two terms, and the term limits set in 2000 was two terms. The judiciary system decided that the amendment could not retroactively count Compaoré's terms despite the fact that under prior to and following the amendment, he should not be eligible to run (if one follows normal logic and reasoning, though the argument on Compaoré's behalf was that he had never served two five-year terms). Bizarrely grandfathered in as an incumbent, Compaoré was deemed eligible to run in the 2005 and 2010 elections, both of which he won. Compaoré thought of himself instead of his country by choosing to run for office in 2005 and 2010 and by not allowing investigations into family corruption (possibly for fear of allegations of corruption in that particular affair or others leading back to him).

Everyone knows that there exists corruption within the government, especially embezzlement, bribery and abuse of political status and privileges. Not everyone is corrupt, but many are. At the very top of this corruption pyramid is the president. Whether or not he is corrupt has yet to be proven in a court of law. However, one could argue that by turning a blind eye, he is not proving himself to be a responsible leader, and thus is just as culpable of corruption.

Everyone also knows that there is a high likelihood of Compaoré pushing through an amendment to abolish term limits or changing the term limits to two N-year terms (where the natural number N ∈ (1,4] ∪ [6] ∪ [8,∞), or more simply, N ≠ {5,7}).

Back to the current situation... These protests are no longer about one student's death and its subsequent cover-up. These protests are about the corruption that is prevalent in the government of Burkina Faso. These protests are a not-so-subtle warning to the president of what will happen if he tries to change the constitution in order to run for office again. Recognizing this, schools have been shut down at all levels, not just the university level as some U.S. news sources might have you believe. That means students will spend less than three days in March in the classroom... if and only if the protesting ends.

Either way, it's the students that lose and the future of the entire nation is at risk.

---< /speculation >---

No morals of the story today, just thoughts:

• Justin Zongo hit someone. Regardless of the situation, he should not have hit someone.

• If you have been following me, then you know that in December, all students had the opportunity to receive free meningitis vaccinations. If he did receive this vaccination, which I suppose would be easy to verify with eye witnesses, then something clearly doesn't add up.

• Three lefts might make a right, but many wrongs don't make things right.

• I wonder when (if ever) the Ibrahim Prize will be awarded to a Burkinabè leader.

Burkina News:

A lot of Burkina is still in a lot of outrage over death of student in police custody due to police-claims of meningitis and the subsequent loss of life in initial riots following his death. Major cities still have striking and rioting, including burning down police buildings and allowing prisoners to escape. Some pro-CDP areas (supporters of the President) have had little public reaction and students have started going back to schools.

I'd rather not get into opinions about politics because it just ends up making me angry. So, let's talk about what sparked this whole problem: the alleged meningitis.

Some people join the Peace Corps because they believe they can save lives. I was more realistic upon arrival (I hope). I believed that I could maybe change some people's lives. I would love to claim that I saved lives in Peace Corps, but as a Secondary Education Volunteer, I don't think I saved any lives because my students learned some math. I might have saved some lives in the long term because my students learned to think a little bit more critically and creatively and also the importance and proper use of using condoms.

Upon reflection, though, I might have saved some lives from meningitis and other diseases by just being there... emphasis on might. The advantage to being the Nasara is that people want to see you and want to be taught by you. The disadvantage is of course you are basically a celebrity. Some people want to use and abuse you. Also, when you're not actually white but considered white it can lead to an identity crisis... more about that later I promise (as I have for the last couple of posts, I know).

Why is the Nasara effect important in the classroom? It brings people in to events (including school) and people pay attention to you. Once they get over the initial glamor of being near you (imagine yourself in the presence of your all-time favorite celebrity in the known universe), they still hang on to every word you say and hold it close their hearts to be repeated over and over again. Even the troublemakers who normally don't show up to other classes, will come just to be in your presence. If they cause trouble, as they are often bound to do, and are kicked out of class they do everything possible to stay in the classroom and be in the presence of the Nasara. As a good educator though, you must look beyond the promises of "I won't do it again" and be stern in the beginning. With time, the Nasara effect will fade, but if you have used it to your advantage, it will be replaced with awe-tinged respect (especially if you can kick any of the other teacher's behinds in logic).

You can use your powers as a Nasara to discuss health issues (including sex!), something that the majority of teachers are unwilling to do. (I was lucky and had multiple teachers that were unashamed of talking sex, discrimination and other sensitive subjects at my school. Some were actually bashful in the beginning but transformed as they realized the only way to solve a problem is to talk about the problem and possible solutions. I would love to claim credit for their awesome, but the reality is that they are just awesome open-minded individuals.)

Back to meningitis and neglected diseases... if you play your cards right you can twist the arms of these adoring children into coming to class on Vaccination Day. Sure all students love to hear talk about sex, but who really enjoys being stabbed by a needle? (Masochists and drug users aside.) These vaccines and also chemotherapy (read: medication) against neglected diseases save the lives of people every day. This is important because few people use the health clinics, especially in rural areas. The tendency towards self-treatment and suspicion of "modern" medicine (I really hate this term) is still prevalent with the majority of births happening at home. However, as the enrollment rates increase, the ability for organizations like the World Health Organization (Organisation Mondiale pour la Santé) to turn schools into key disease prevention sites has also increased. Campaigns going door-to-door are also effective (especially for Polio which is nearing eradication, but that's the hardest part), but time-consuming and difficult if there is not enough humanpower. The key role of the educator at this point is not to do the actual vaccinating or the medicating, but to help the students understand why they are being vaccinated, and why it's important. And also, to make sure that each and every student is vaccinated and swallows their medication.

The exciting thing about meningitis is that it used to be an extremely expensive vaccine, but now it isn't and was distributed freely in December! Schools were used as vaccination sites, with priority to students and personnel first, but then people in the general community also lined up to be vaccinated. You can read more about it here.

Now, if we could only get a malaria vaccine, people would expect to live beyond the age of 60. The median age of Burkinabè would be over the age of 17. People would have less kids and at a later age because they wouldn't fear the early deaths of themselves or their children.

In the mean time though, any incoming PCT should know that you will find yourself in the face of death, especially those who will be working in Health. Sometimes, the life of someone very close to you will be taken unexpectedly. There is nothing that can really prepare you for the death of anyone in your life, but you should know that it is very unlikely for a PCV to leave the country without knowing someone who died.

May they all rest in peace and continue to be our inspiration to live and to serve.

Morals of the story:

• Always use a condom.

• Get vaccinated.

• I saved lives by glaring.

• You can't save everyone.

• Create a malaria vaccine and you will be a hero.

This post asks @Google why only today is Pegwoman available? Sure they are doing lots of other great things and encouraging people to think about women and bridging the gap (quite literally).

I am thoroughly disappointed by the lack of coverage on International Women's Day by American news sources in the past 24 hours (yes, I did the search only about 320 hits for "women's day" + America in the last 24 hours, most of which aren't from America) as of this post very few of which were from American sources.

The key contributor is @The Huffington Post. While @Washington Post, @Village Voice, @Search Engine Roundtable, @Christian Science Monitor, @NPR, and @Forbes all have some commentary on it. I was excited to see an ABC hit, but then realized it was ABC Australia. Sure there will probably be more coverage as the day goes on, but really America.

I am very disappointed that this isn't even a blip for major financial newspapers like Wall Street Journal and other male-dominated industry papers. Fail since my parents actually subscribe to the WSJ and I looked thoroughly for the love.

A wonderful (and at times frustrating) aspect of Burkinabè culture are the holidays. Especially for religious holidays and also International Women's Day, the whole country shuts down. People spend the day(s around the event) preparing, cooking, eating, visiting, and wishing the best to everyone. I was lucky, and my colleagues in my village potluck for every holiday! In most other villages, people will go around to everybody else's homes to wish them a happy holiday and also eat food and drink beverages. People celebrate within their income. The wealthy often go all out, grilling lots of meat and providing high-end drinks. However, it doesn't actually matter what you serve, but who comes and that you have something for them (something as simple as popcorn works). The more people who come to visit, the more you are loved by the community! For bigger holidays, some people wish happy holidays preemptively or after the fact, saving the closest friends for the actual holiday.

Tomorrow (technically today in some parts of the world already) is International Women's Day. Each village has their own way of celebrating Women's Day, or as it is affectionately known in Burkina, Le Huit (pronounced "le wee"). Often there are bike riding competitions, soccer matches, and people give speeches about women's rights, etc. Some people are skeptical, others are gung-ho about the holiday. What's important to know, though is that Burkinabè love a reason to celebrate. Everyone is decked out their best usually in matching pagnes (same pattern on a light-weight cotton fabric, but with variations of color theme) with this year's Women's Day logo. Some scoff and say that it has become commercialized. In part, it is. However, some women's groups do use the sale of these (and other) pagnes as an income-generating activity to fund other projects throughout the year.

What frustrates me as that it is not a recognized holiday in America. In fact, some states celebrate International Men's Day on November 19, but none officially recognize International Women's Day (according to Wikipedia). This is very disappointing and is a reflection of the lack of equality that still persists in American society. Granted has never been the best role model in many sectors pertaining to equality. I'm still looking for the country that is metaphorically blind to color, race, age, gender, sex, religion, etc. If someone finds it or founds it, please let me know, I will be more than happy to join you.

I miss my Women's Day outfit from last year... a lot. Unfortunately, I don't have any pictures of this outfit, but rest-assured it has been described as simple, conservative, yet sexy. Liz may have to pick it up for me while she is in Burkina.

Aside from emergency services, the official holidays recognized by government officials (meaning non-emergency services are non-functional) and by many people even in the smallest of small villages are:

DateHolidayPopular NameFrench GreetingJanuary 1New Year's DayLe PremierBonne AnnéeJanuary 3People's UprisingSoulèvement PopulaireNAMarch 8Women's DayLe Huit ("le wee")Bonne Fête (to women)SpringEaster Sunday/Monday(Lundi de)PacquesBonne Fête (to Christians)May 1Labor DayFête du TravailBonne Fête (to fonctionnaires)August 5Independence Dayle 5 aoûtBonne Fête d'IndependenceAugust 15AssumptionAssomptionBonne Fête (to Catholics)November 1All Saints' Day

Veteran's DayToussaintBonne Fête (to Christians)December 11Proclamation of the Repulicle Onze

la Fête NationaleBonne FêteDecember 25ChristmasNoëlJoyeux Noël (to Christians)variableEid Al-FitrFin de RamadanBonne Fête (to Muslims)~2 months after Eid Al-FitrEid Al-AdhaTabaskiBonne Fête (to Muslims)variableBirth of MohammedMouloudBonne Fête (to Muslims)

Note: If the holiday falls on a Sunday, then it is observed on the following Monday. If a holiday falls on a Saturday, it is NOT observed on a different day.

Some other notable holidays/dates (though not officially national holidays) include:

• Lent & Ascension

• le 1 avril - April Fool's Day

• le 1 septembre - massive rainstorm in 2009 that led to infrastructure failure and flooding, leaving many homeless or dead throughout the country

• le 13 decembre - assassination/death of Norbert Zongo a popular journalist in 1998, school is usually shut down during this time due to student/teacher protests (some peaceful)

Political unrest common in surrounding countries (e.g. Côte d'Ivoire, Niger and Mali lately) does occasionally find its way to Burkina Faso. However, it is not as frequent. It is necessary to apply common sense. Paying attention to news and staying away from politically charged areas during those times are essential. Don't take pictures of riots and people using weapons out of context (actually don't even take pictures of people without their permission, that's just impolite IMHO). If you see people rioting or using weapons for non-animal hunting/butchering purposes, don't go towards them. If you can't get away from the area stealthily, remain calm and don't provoke the people with weapons. Not talking about local politics is a good general practice (besides the fact that it is against Peace Corps policy) for your own safety.

The more stressful situations that I went through were actually dealt with the very capable and quick-thinking staff of the Peace Corps. Training regarding security situations is covered by Peace Corps and is wonderful. Please take it seriously as some new PCTs don't, and it can be frustrating for PCVs who have been through stressful situations.

The country is generally safe, mind you and I never felt threatened by any of the political situations because most of my time was spent in my community, where I had built friendships and working relationships. I usually heard about strikes before they occurred. Also, blending in helped, wearing traditional clothing and headscarfs, having my hair braided, etc. I have been told by PCTs and PCVs they didn't even register me as a foreigner or thought I was a guest speaker because of my dress (combined with tan, making me look like a light-skinned Burkinabè... sort of).

Unrest incidents from the last five years in Burkina Faso:

• 2006 - Police and army fight each other in Ouagadougou over misunderstanding and quick tempers

• 2008 - Rising costs of living led to rioting, most notably in Bobo-Dioulasso

• 2010 - Threat from AQIM to kidnap foreigners in Ouahigouya (determined to be bogus a few months later)

• 2010 - Death of a criminal led to localized riots in Gaoua

• 2011 - Death of a student in police custody leads to localized riots and more deaths in Koudougou resulting in nation-wide shutdown of schools

Only one of these events directly affected my Service and it was because I was participating in Volunteer activities outside of my village.

Morals of the story:

• Training rocks, pay attention and don't be rude!

• Holidays rock, visit everyone and invite people over, too!

• Staying in your site (village) is good for a lot of reasons!

• Stay calm, panicking in public won't get you anywhere.

• HAPPY INTERNATIONAL WOMEN'S DAY!

One of the first things that Burkinabe will ask you about in the daily 10-minute greeting routine (this is well documented in many other blogs, I don't feel the need to cover it) is your health (laafi in Moore). The philosophy is simple: if you have your health, then what you perceive to be problems will eventually work themselves out (ça va aller or ça ira).

In Americaland, what would you pay to have total coverage, i.e. doctor on-call "24 on 24" (the French equivalent of 24 hours a day/7 days a week/365 days a year)? If you watch Royal Pains at all, apparently you would pay a lot for the services of your concierge doctor for each call. If you are a Peace Corps Volunteer, you pay nothing. That's right nothing. PCVs only get a monthly allowance that is adjusted based upon the standard of living, and after two years of service a readjustment allowance of less than USD$10000, but we get total health coverage. It was quite wonderful if you ask me.

Granted, our PCMOs (doctors) are not there to be abused. We are given basic survival health training, and encouraged to call during business hours for non-emergencies. Nonetheless, all of my medical tests (blood work, stool and urine samples), medication, dental and even vision were completely covered. In the event that I had to buy my own medication, I could apply for reimbursement. During my service, I had a couple of dental emergencies that were resolved within a week, regardless of where I found myself in the world.

PoopIn the beginning, almost all new PCT/Vs have to readjust their definition of emergency. The most constant problem for most of us are gastrointestinal issues. Many new PCT/Vs are disappointed that explosive diarrhea once is not just cause to freak out. When it's repeated and frequent, then there is a bigger issue at hand. Some people get parasites, bacteria, viruses or amoebas through the water, food, or poor personal hygiene of the food preparer/server/self. Others have issues just because of stress or change in diet. My frequent enemy was Giardia (aka Beaver Fever which can lead to Vitamin B deficiency and Anemia and lactose intolerance and destruction of the body's ability to absorb nutrients). Luckily, there are drugs that destroy it and also to help your body absorb nutrients.

Food

(the source of Poop)Many PCTs find that the food in Burkina is much more oily, salty and starchy than what they are used to in America. However, when one considers the lack of preservatives, fillers and other things that go into American engineered food. Food in Burkina is actually healthier... provided it is prepared correctly and that you make an effort to balance your diet. A lot of food in Burkina can be overcooked, and bouillon cubes (MSG + other things that make me want to pass out) and non-iodized salt are often used.

Balancing your diet can be tricky in Burkina, but that is mainly because most new PCVs don't learn Burkina's agricultural cycle during PST. Certain fruits and vegetables are only available at certain points of the year (with the exception of the major cities). This combined with local traditions in small villages (e.g. my village cancels the market day for a month every year) can lead to malnutrition problems such as anemia. My second and third years, I was prepared for this magical month of no fruits and vegetables (recognized by Americans), and avoided the drastic weight loss I suffered my first year. If you are open-minded, and try the local foods (like various tree leaves, and dried versions of fruits and vegetables), then you will be able to provide your body with all of the necessary vitamins and minerals.

Traditionally, female PCVs gain weight and male PCVs lose weight. However, I've found this is directly related to the activity level and the diet of each individual (as can be expected and appears to be an international conclusion). So, in theory, if I maintain my preference for a bland diet (since most engineered foods here make me feel miserable) and start exercising again now that I'm in Americaland (after a six month hiatus... riding a motorcycle is so much more fun than a non-existent (read: returned to Peace Corps) bicycle), I should be down to fashion model size in about a year.

Wild SpeculationSo, there is still hope for me to become America's Next Next Top Model (I might be watching too much terrible TV)... except I'm too old and blind. At least, being healthy will more than make up for it (maybe).

Of course, certain bridezillas may disagree and want me to be all plump for their October wedding.

Morals of the story: There is a 99% (made up statistic, but close enough) chance that a PCV in Burkina Faso will have debilitating gastrointestinal issues. A balanced diet is possible and exercise is good for you.

Note: This is a mostly ridiculous appreciation of American fashion and facial expression. The summary of this entry is to implore you for your phone number.

For the first time in a decade, I will be spending more than a month at my family home. This is wonderful and terrible all at once. I have ever so slowly been rediscovering who I used to be (through my ridiculously huge wardrobe, piles of books and papers dating back to the 80s). I know that most of it has to go, but the terribleness lies in the choice of what stays and what goes. In the process, I have to figure out who I am all over again. BurkinAK can't completely exist in America, but not all of her will disappear either.

Americans have been confusing for BurkinAK. Life is definitely more fast paced in America, and as a result, few people smile. Furthermore, due to the chilly temperatures, everyone is dressed in dark, somber sad colors. I understand that practical clothes are often in practical colors, but an outfit can easily be livened up with a bright scarf, hat or gloves. Of course, I should really be the last person to criticize. As I sorted through my wardrobe, I was very depressed by the overwhelming amount of practicality in my wardrobe. Too much black. Not enough color! I'm afraid of AmericAK v3.0 eventually being assimilated back into a dreary wardrobe by the time she evolves into AmericAK v3.9.

Luckily, my taste in shoes has not changed since AmericAK v2.9. I am delighted in my ridiculously too tall heels, fun colors and other assorted wonderfulness. Though, I am missing a pair of every day heeled sandals and a comfortable pair of running shoes. Despite the higher rate of American frowning, I find it odd that they are all wearing comfortable shoes. I find that the amount of frowning should be much less since the majority of people are wearing practical shoes. Perhaps, practical and comfortable don't actually make people happy. I traipsed around NYC in 3" purple booties this weekend and was happy!

However, despite the overwhelming amount of frowning and serious faces, I find that people can still be considerate. A wonderful couple stopped me to give me back a dropped glove (even though they were clearly in a hurry). A passerby told a couple of girls that it looked like their train tickets had fallen on the ground (I didn't notice because I was sitting next to them). Even though a lot of people will look at you blankly as you walk by, I am glad that decent people are still out there in the city.

However, the hardest things about coming back to Americaland is getting out of the house and actually interacting with people one-on-one! I do really want to catch up with the lives of my friends and family, but its hard when they have whole and busy American lives that have moved in a different direction from my own Burkina lifestyle. The worst part is... I don't have a lot of people's phone numbers, and even worse I don't know where they are in the world.

Dear friends and people who unfortunately may consider me only an acquaintance now,

I would really like to get back in touch with you! Please send me your phone number and a good time to call. If we are in the same area and you want to take a break and catch up on life, let me know that, too.

Sincerely,

AK

This is a fun (primarily for (R)PCVs) video that encompasses the two extremes of Peace Corps Training and Service. Each Volunteer's experience is different because of many factors; however, the most important of which are the PCV's coping mechanisms and open-mindness as well as the preparation of the community by Peace Corps Staff and Volunteers prior to the new PCV's arrival. The first step into integrating of course is being able to speak (a little bit of) the language.

*Just a warning that this particular blog entry will be boring for most people and is really intended for future PCVs so they know what they are getting themselves into.*

I've already stated in my blog previously that it takes about 18 months to begin to understand in your community. Stage is a 8-12 week experience that only touches upon the surface of life in Burkina Faso. Each community is unique and while Stage tries to cover the basics, it takes a full 18 months to begin to understand your community (hence, my argument that everyone should commit themselves to a minimum of 3 years of service). The core component of Stage is language training. There is no avoiding language training. Upon arrival stagiaires are evaluated for their oral expression (and incidentally, comprehension) in French. Throughout training, they are evaluated several more times until they pass the minimum language level in order to "Swear-In" as a full-fledged Volunteer. Those who have the minimum French level begin local language training earlier. The majority of non-Secondary Education (SE) Volunteers use more local language than French.

The learning process during PST is experiential, including language. This can be frustrating for those who have never experienced full-immersion language learning. Now, PCTs (except for SE where the focus is on French first) begin learning the local language of their community from the start with a smattering of survival Moore (the language of the dominant Mossi ethnicity in the PST area). Since there are over 65 local ethnicities, there are an equal number of local languages. The PCTs who will eventually in serve in the same ethnic regions oftentimes find themselves spending almost all of their time together. Even within local languages, different regions may have different vocabulary (e.g. English in Texas vs. English in England, different pronunciation and expressions/idioms, but overall the same language). Since I was an SE PCV, I primarily learned French, but was also exposed to Moore, Dioula (Bambara), and Southern San (the language of the primary ethnicity in my village) during and after my training.

One of my regrets from service is not learning a local language well. I can fumble my way through greetings, buy things, tell children to go put on their shoes and even understand the gist of most gossip. However, I can't have conversations. The trade off, though, is that my French oral expression improved greatly. Part of the reason it is harder for some Volunteers than others to learn a local language is too many local languages at once. My village bordered villages of different ethnicities. As a result, many people in the village may not be multilingual, but they can understand the basics in another language. A typical conversation in the morning may involve four people speaking entirely different languages (French, San, Moore, Dioula) to each other, but they still understand what is going on. Each group of people I socialized with had their own language and during each day I was exposed to at least four languages: French with my students/teachers, San with my neighbors, Moore with my colleagues/other civil servants after school, Dioula with the wives and children of civil servants. So, at the end of my service, I could follow a conversation and understand the main ideas in a couple of local languages, but I couldn't contribute much to the conversation in local language.

No matter what your local language level, locals are often surprised and delighted that you can speak a little bit of the local language. If you are a replacement PCV, you will often be compared to previous PCVs. In comparison, even native French speakers in West Africa are criticized for their French because their accent is different from the more guttural Burkinabe French. Many rural Burkinabe who are not exposed to a French accent (via radio, or otherwise) have a difficult time understanding a French accent.

Now that I have been back for just over three weeks, I find myself thinking (and accidentally) speaking less in French, but I don't think my Frenchisms will be disappearing completely from my English/Mandarin anytime soon.

When you fly to Burkina Faso for the very first time from Europe, America, Asia, and some parts of Africa, the first thing you will notice as you step out of the plane and walk down the stair cart (there are no jet bridges or airstairs) is the wave of heat that welcomes you regardless of the time of year. Burkina Faso is a landlocked tropical country, while technically classified as savanna, the northern part of the country is suffering from desertification. The temperatures range from 5 to 45+ Celsius (about 40 to 110+ Fahrenheit) in the Sahel (northern desert region), with a milder temperature range in the tropical south.

Technically, Burkina is considered to have two seasons: rainy and dry. However, the dry season is often divided into two or three sub-seasons. The south of Burkina receives more rain than the north, with light rains starting as early as February and running through December. However, the majority of the heavy rains fall between May and September. In comparison, the north typically has a shorter season from June through August (with a few light rains in April or May). The rain is essential for the subsistence farmers of Burkina Faso. However, like all things, one wants neither too much or too little. No rain = No grains = No food. Excess rain = Drowned-dead plants = No food. With the advent of global warming, the rainy season has gradually been shortening and shifting and the rains have changed from almost daily light rainfall during the rainy season (l'hivernage ou la saison pluvieuse) to extended rain-free periods broken up by torrential downpours.

At the beginning of l'hivernage, the temperatures are still high since it's the tail-end of the dry season. Even without a meteorologist though, the arrival of rain can be anticipated. The humidity combined with the heat makes the temperatures nearly unbearable (especially for a first timer living without air conditioning). It appears to settle down upon you oppressively and gives you wonderful things like prickly heat (heat rash) and leaves you changing your clothes, especially underwear for women, a few times a day. Then from a distance, you can feel a cool breeze and see the forming of dark, ominous clouds (the best kind). In a country with few modern buildings (mostly one-story houses made of mud bricks), these clouds are actually very far away. Anywhere between one to six hours later, the winds pick up, bring dust and rattling your tin roof (if you're lucky; if you're not, thatched and/or mud depending upon the ethnicity in your region), and the smell of rain is in the air. Finally, the much anticipated rain arrives. The next day, greenery may carpet the countryside, and you think to yourself Burkina is like a Chia pet! This rain can be or it can last for over 24 hours! Though, as I said, neither too little nor too much is appreciated. In addition to drowning plants and flooding fields, heavy winds and rains can tear off roofs and collapse buildings. As the season progresses, the overall heat diminishes and the temperatures are milder, with the rains happening frequently (daily in some areas). If you are a Trainee, you begin to think to yourself it only rains on Sundays (your only full day off from formal sessions during Training).

Before you know it, the season tapers off in about September or October. This is the beginning of the dry season, and what I find to be one of its three sub-seasons: the mini-hot season. The first dry winds start circulating, and within a few weeks, what you thought were ponds or lakes in your village disappear completely, leaving behind dried out shallow depressions covered in hoofprints. The air is hot once more, but no longer humid. The plants begin to ripen and the HCNs prepare to harvest (recolte) from October to as late as December. Quickly, the greenery of Burkina disappears, and if it is your first time in a desert, it can appear barren, dusty and dreary. Though the savanna vistas become lovely and quite fantastic in retrospect and as your service progresses. One can almost imagine and wish that Dr. Seuss had been inspired by the West African scenery.

The temperatures start to drop in November, and by December at the latest, the Harmattan winds are in full effect, bring on the cold season. Carrying dust throughout the area. The dust storms can be fantastic and arrive quickly, or they can creep in slowly and diminish visibility to less than 20 meters. The air cools off and at night, the wind can bring temperatures into single digit Celsius (40-50 Farenheit). In your first year as a Volunteer, you might find this as a wonderful relief. If you are not a member of Posh Corps, then during your second (and third) years, this becomes a terrible time of coldness and dust, where you find yourself dressed like the host country nationals in your site, wearing a sweater, sweatshirt and/or winter coat. The cold typically leaves in February, though this year, it started to heat up in late January. This usually results in a light drizzle in February or March somewhere in the country (no guarantee it will be where you live) and signifies the end of the cold season.

The hot season is quite frankly unbearable at times. The nighttime temperatures outdoors can be over 40 Celsius (110+ Fahrenheit)! Very few people sleep indoors during this time of year. Nighttime becomes a time of activity since it's actually cool enough (yes, 100+ weather is cool... cooler than 120+ weather) to move around. People often stay up until the wee hours of the morning chatting and hanging out, before catching a few hours of sleep. During the day, the noon to three pm siesta is a mandatory part of survival, and also, the pre and post siesta bucket baths. The average person rinses themselves off at least four times a day to keep themselves relatively cool and clean. Once you think you can't survive this heat anymore (luckily its dry), the humidity settles in and you know that the rains are about to start. Bringing us back to the rainy season!

So, I survived this for four years, and you can too! That is living without modern conveniences like plumbing and air-conditioning. The key to the hot season is to remember that evaporation is a cooling process, and even wet laundry air drying around you will cool off your surroundings a little bit. So now, I hope you understand why I find it ridiculously cold in all of America and will be wearing long-sleeved shirts and sweaters if it's under 80 degrees Fahrenheit.

The downside to all this extreme weather, is of course the different illnesses. The rainy season promotes malaria and schistosomiasis. The dry season promotes meningitis and tuberculosis. More in-depth information about health issues in Burkina Faso later...

In other news... I thought I was done with preparing stool samples. Darn you, schistosomiasis!

There are two parts of the Peace Corps experience spectrum:

Posh Corps = Peace Corps experience of Peace Corps Volunteers who have access to electricity and/or running water. Some people also install DSL lines or even have air-conditioning!

Hard Corps = Peace Corps experience of Peace Corps Volunteers with neither electricity nor running running water, and/or have to travel (long) distances by bicycle to catch transport or find (cold, if they're lucky) water.

Peace Corps/Burkina Faso is moving away from Hard Corps and towards Posh Corps (though it's not as posh as some other countries) because of security issues. More information about Burkina travel warnings and restrictions can be found at the Ouagadougou US Embassy website. While fewer Volunteers are being placed in sites without electricity/cell phone coverage/running water, the majority of Volunteers are found somewhere in the middle of this spectrum, with one of the three modern conveniences. I find this unfortunate because these convenience-lacking locations are often those suffering from the most need. The communities don't have the political sway to get these conveniences installed. This keeps governmental and non-governmental organizations from trying to stay in the areas as well. Either way, if you are an incoming Trainee, be mentally prepared to have nothing: no running water, no electricity, no cell phone coverage. These modern conveniences actually take you away from the majority of Burkina Faso's population living conditions and set you even further apart from them, making integration and exchange more difficult. While I struggled my first year, having to bike about ten miles to make a phone call, and standing in certain spots of my village on top of a chair just to send a text message, it gave me a chance to bond more closely with people in my village and learn more about the surrounding area as well. I missed out on having some great memories with my stagemates, but made some fantastic ones with people in my area. I know it helped with the success of many of my projects, as well as helped people better understand the United States (goal two).

Amazing in Americaland: beverages (except those with (high-fructose) corn syrup or added sugars), bacon, meat

Undesirable in USA: customer service, preservatives, healthcare system

Still Missing Faso: friends, warmth, sunrises, sunsets, stars, tailors

This is one of my favorite songs from Burkina. It basically is saying that Burkina is a great place and that their proud of their country and love it! It's one of the few songs that uses traditional rhythms in the music. Long before I understood this song, I loved it!

Dear America,

I know that sooner rather than later I will regain all of the weight I lost and turn into a size 10/12 again, but can you please let me enjoy being a size 6 for a little while longer?

Today I went shopping... granted with gift cards and at Marshall's, but still... it was shopping. I found some shoes for fifteen dollars. They're fun I think, but I don't really know what fashion is in America anymore. A couple of seemingly trendy tops and a pair of jeans. I also ended up with a swim dress that I think is fabulous especially during the winter time over a white shirt, but then again, I am most definitely fashion-challenged by America's standards. What I'm missing now is a comfortable sweater that's a little over-sized and comfortable. Something simple like this which I could wear with just about anything and warmify (I know it's not a word) myself when wearing a cute top. Quite frankly, winter can't be over soon enough!

The nicest thing about shopping was being able to buy white clothing without a second thought.

The worst thing about shopping was it has now re-opened the door to my horrible addiction of clothing, shoes and handbags.

For almost two decades I have been roughly the same height. I have accumulated twenty years of t-shirts and clothing that I have been reluctant to part with because it fits and it's not torn! Alas, no more! I'm going through my piles and piles of clothing right now and sending off the ones I don't want to people who could really use them... in Africa. In Burkina, they call second-hand clothing "fripperie" and they love it! Especially since some of the "new" stuff is low-quality stuff imported from China (the kind of quality that doesn't even make it to the USA). Our "Made in China" is better than theirs.

In other news, I find American food disappointing. It might be the terrible chain restaurants I've been to so far. I hope that tomorrow this disappointment will be corrected.

Still miss Burkina on so many levels, but I'm glad I can wear white now!

Dear America,

I officially (and quite literally) took my first steps outside into the cold hard world of consumerism. I tried very hard to buy things at Costco and also on the internet, but largely failed.

My biggest purchases at Costco may have been contact solution and brie. Aside from my delicious cheese (you can never go wrong with cheese that comes in a wheel), I found that Costco was too full of preservatives, sugars and engineered food oils. Once upon a time all of these things seemed so delicious, and of course candy still is. However, the baked goods were lackluster. So I bought the ingredients instead to make my own. I felt like I walked through the entire warehouse at least three times, but still gained wait from all the free samples (most of which I avoided). However, I will save ranting about food for a later post, but here is a preview: America you have grown too fat and lazy!The reason why Americans are overweight and malnourished (not undernourished) is a combination of food engineering and heating/air conditioning...My other two forays involve the internet. I, having spent the last three or so years in Africa, seldom access the majority of my accounts for this or that site on the internet. Now upon my return, I lock myself out of one of said accounts out of incompetency (typing on the US keyboard is hard!) and too many passwords in my head. Two hours of head banging later in an attempt to reach a human being on the automated customer service phone lines, I was finally able to reset the password to my account. The issue was not the confusing menus, but the fact that each time I was "being transferred" to a customer service representative after pressing the correct buttons the call dropped! I tried multiple customer service lines available for the company and same result. After much frustration and resorting to button mashing, I was finally transfered to a representative when the call dropped. So, after a final round of frustration and button mashing, I finally communicated with a human being and got my account issues resolved.

I don't understand why it is so difficult to communicate with an actual human being in this country! We expect excellent customer service from others, but don't provide it ourselves (actually, it seemed like the machines were programmed to frustrate clients, but this is true on a broader level). In addition, I remember now how much I disliked being an "overrepresented" minority in this great country. It seems as if no matter where I end up in the world, I will have to deal with being different from the rest of the majority. Even in Asia, I physically stand out. Ack, more on being a minority in America and in Peace Corps in a later retrospective post. But a small excerpt of my thoughts:

When will the world become color blind and finally see people for their actual intentions, skills, and character?Anyway, my final foray into consumerism was eBay. I attempted to buy things. I realize that purchasing Sims 3 may will ruin my productivity and impede my job hunt. Luckily, outbid. I realize that I don't need another pair of beautiful cute shoes... but I do really want them. Luckily, also outbid. What I don't understand is why there are no flat ankle boots with a pointed-toe out on the market. I had a pair in high school that I thought was fabulous. (More on high school later) Unfortunately, they disappeared sometime between high school and now. Heeled ankle boots are aesthetically pleasing for so many reasons, but oh so impractical, especially right now with ice and snow everywhere.

So, in conclusion. I am too overwhelmed to buy anything because the majority of products are full of fillers I don't need, or particularly want. The products I do want are extremely difficult to find (and not in fashion, which means they will be in next year, everyone be forewarned). So instead of exhausting myself by trying to be a consumer and interview for various opportunities (I've hardly slept these past few days, though it may be partially because of an extremely rich diet providing me with oodles of energy), I believe I will, focus myself on my future and not my present. (This goes back to my argument of Now vs. kNow).

Hmm... maybe I'll actually sleep tonight.

Busua Beach, Ghana, August 2010. They have trash cans there!

This may have been the first time I ever took a vacation just to relax and sit on the beach for multiple days where all I did was eat, drink and love...everything!

I have wasted so much water and electricity upon my return. However, nothing disgusts me more than the waste found here!

I love fashion and art. I understand how the pursuit of either of these can be wasteful more often than not. However, I have never found any art so offensive as this. Especially, in light of the millions of people all over the world who didn't have anything to eat today. I hope these artists are donating something significant to the World Food Programme or something equivalent. While there are definitely pieces of art I have disliked for aesthetic reasons, I have never been disgusted by art.

Today, I was disgusted by art. Tasteful fashion is disrespectful when the raw materials go to waste. Clothes made of food are art when they don't rot and become wasteful, but even with GMO food products, the best outfits won't last for very long.

Candied jewelery that we ate as kids is one thing (not to be confused with that worn by Kandi Kids); meat dresses are another, especially when they are left to rot!

So, the first step in your Peace Corps Service (presuming you went through the whole application process and got invited) is leaving the magical land of America (Americaland fbfpcvs). This process involves a "Staging" where you meet your training group (stagemates fbfpcvs), with whom you spend the next 2-3 months during Pre-Service Training (PST or Stage fbfpcvs).

After a few days of formalities, my stagemates and I found ourselves being shipped in the lap of luxury (AirFrance) to Burkina Faso by way of an extended layover in Paris. While other Stages have been more adventurous, we spent the entire layover in the airport, spending our walk-around money, nervous and excited for the training to come.

Peace Corps pays for your trip to your country of service and your return trip home. Many people opt to take the cash equivalent of the plane ticket home. If you extend for at least another 13 months, the Peace Corps provides a free 30-day trip home (plus 2 days considered travel days) with walk-around money. As far as I know, you can't take cash in lieu of the extension trip. All other personal trips out of the country of service are your responsibility. Some go home at the end of their first year. Others prefer to travel in the surrounding area.

To get to/from Burkina Faso on your own, there are many options. However, the cheapest (especially one-way) is Royal Air Maroc. While many have gripes with this airline, myself included at first, let us keep in mind that this is a self-advertised 3-star airline. This means that you shouldn't expect the best food, our customer service. You should definitely have sturdy bags and not put (electronic, etc.) valuables in them if possible. Though they try their best to provide what they think is quality customer service. I think they do more than some airlines as long as your flying from RAM to RAM. If you have an extended layover (more than three hours), you will be brought to the Transit Lounge, which has nice toilets (compared to the regular terminals), comfy couches, outlets and free food and water. Of course, if you don't know this, you will be confused, and will complain until you leave this safe place, like many a disgruntled American to go to the terminal shops where you won't buy anything that you couldn't buy when you are finally bused the 50 m to the other side of the building with the terminal. If you have a really long layover (like the 19-hour ones on the way back from America), they will bring you to a hotel room and you will also be fed. The staff has also improved its customer service and was really great with kids this last time through. Sure, people's bags disappears or get destroyed. Sure, the airport is confusing and they don't explain their reasoning behind their policies. Sure, some flights they don't assign seats and if you board towards the end you don't get to sit in the best seat (it's like a taxi brousse fbfpcvs, but at most there is one person per seat). However, you get what you pay for, and what you pay for is a lot less than what is provided.

Other options, of course, include traveling to Ghana and then flying out from Accra on one of many American carriers. Traveling by AirFrance, though expensive one-way, only costs slightly more than Royal Air Maroc and other alternatives for round-trip tickets. There are also other inexpensive airlines like AirBurkina and Ethiopia Airways, but they may be more unreliable than Royal Air Maroc. Flying to America, Europe and Africa are relatively easy. Asia and Australia are slightly more complicated on a budget; its much cheaper to avoid Europe and fly through Ethiopia or Qatar (Doha).

In other news... I thought I was done hand-washing my clothes (other than delicates and on occasional vacations). Alas! The washing machine broke... so I did laundry by hand in America. At least we have a bathtub!

fbfpcvs = for Burkina Faso Peace Corps Volunteers

Amazing in Americaland: 3-ply toilet paper, snow, internet accessibility, domestic appliancesUndesirable in USA: cold, amount of trash produced and water wasted, laundry by handBetter off without Burkina: dust, laundry by hand, litteringFancying for Faso: friends, warmth, sunrises, sunsets, stars

my second-to-last sunrise - on a moto ride to koudougou

As we descended through the fluffy ether, a fantastic and wonderful winter land presented itself. One could have imagined that she was at Santa's North Pole (neither magnetic nor true north). However, when we finally landed, the coldness became apparent beyond the physical level, which is significant since I was wearing 6 pounds of clothing and still feeling the chill. As much as I detest the dirt and dust, I miss the gritty warmth of Africa, particularly Burkina. New York City itself used to be able to claim some grit to it, but it's seemingly sterile. It might just be the excessive snow, though.

So, akia-blog was supposed to stand for AK In Africa. Luckily, this can be easily adjusted to AK In America. Apparently, I can live anywhere in the world except for Europe. Since I have ample time on my hands, I will be composing a multi-part blog post on my perspective (in retrospect) about the different aspects of being a PCV, particularly in Burkina Faso. I want to cover not only the general life cycle of a PCV (from PST to Swear-In to IST to MSC to COS to really COS'ing), but particularities about PCV life in Burkina Faso and travel in West Africa. I am self-absorbed enough to believe that this may be of particular interest to the recently invited Trainees leaving in May and June of 2011 and maybe my friends who want to know more about my service and other random tidbits about Burkina Faso and Africa.

Royal Air Maroc had a mildly long layover. They treated me well and all of my not-really-that-important worldly possessions apparently made it. More on overall travel to Africa in the first installment of my retrospective blog series, which may or may not include ranting, though not necessarily directed at RAM...

Anyway, you have been forewarned. I am currently exhausted from way too many good-byes, but once I catch on my sleep. Be ready for way too many blogs about things that may not interest you.

Freezing in America,

AK

The few things I did buy from SIAO. Its just so hard to decide and all the things I want to buy are large and require shipping. Some future SIAO.

Why did I do a third year?

This question has so many answers. I strongly believe now that all Volunteers should do a third year. In reality, the first year of service is on-the-job training since each site is different on so many levels (ethnicity, culture, size of town or village, local politics that PCVs cannot be involved in but need to navigate carefully in order to get any work done). I feel like I accomplished more in my third year than I did in my first two years combined. In addition, communities benefit from an experienced Volunteer instead of being replaced by a completely new Volunteer.

What have I been doing?

Since my last long post, I've been to Gaoua, Bobo/Banfora, Ghana, Sabou. I finally have seen many of the tourist sites that PCVs regularly visit during their service. It is so green everywhere that I went! The strange thing was the lack of mosquitoes in Ghana. Or maybe there were and I've forgotten.

Also, I planted peanuts, harvested them and washed them. Unfortunately no pictures of that.

I also finished my service on September 21st. Which means now I'm officially an RPCV (in theory).

I am waiting for my papayas to ripen. Also, I will be starting a garden soon. I don't expect to eat the fruits of my labor, but it keeps me busy and I can finally do it after three years of wanting a garden because I am no longer living with a lot of people (especially children) and chickens.

What am I doing right now?

SIAO is in its last day. It is basically a large biannual trade show with art, textiles, jewelry, shoes, clothes, furniture, food products, and other products/services provided by vendors from all over Africa. While the majority of the booths were from West Africa, there were also representatives from Northern Africa, etc. I bought a necklace from Burkina (well the booth was Burkina and it was unique), a T-shirt for my special friend, and a few decorative pieces from Benin. It was a very tiring day since you can bargain, walk and eat and go back and forth between pavilions trying to decide what you want. They also had some traditional housing from different ethnic groups on display which was pretty cool. The last time SIAO happened in 2008, I missed it because I was teaching and I didn't want to miss school. It's kind of sad that at the end/after my service I finally doing the touristy things that a lot of PCVs do in their first year. Of course I took pictures!

I have been living between village, Koudougou and the surrounding area, visiting friends, mourning the loss of my boss, and just relaxing in my village. My daily life there is not much different than my former life, except different house and not teaching. So, I'm not very busy, but it gives me time to think and relax for the first time in a while. I'm working on my CV right now which will eventually be abbreviated into my resume. It is unfortunately very difficult to describe Peace Corps and all of the different responsibilities I've had and tasks/projects I've completed in just a few bullet points.

Right now I am waiting for my Mom to come to Burkina Faso. The trip has been canceled so many times in the past few years. It would be her first time in Africa. And while English isn't necessarily that great here... there are people in my village who speak English and, of course, in Ouagadougou as well. They just fixed the road to my village because of politicking for the upcoming elections. So, we can make the trip in approximately three hours. The car company also has "new" used buses which are fairly comfortable and not packed like sardines in a can. So, we might take public transportation either the whole way there or part way (and then get picked up by motorcycle!).

Unfortunately, my mother doesn't like to camp that much. Otherwise, we could go see giraffes and lions and hippopotamuses in the national forests and take lots of pictures! Outside of seeing my village, I want to take her to Koudougou and possibly Sabou which has sacred crocodiles which you can pet and feed chickens. Maybe even the hippopotamuses at Toma Island (not to be confused with Toma my provincial capital).

The trip to Banfora/Karfiguela Cascades and Sindou Peaks is very long. So, if she wants to go there, we will need to hire a private chauffeur. Public transportation to the area is good (air-conditioned and clean), but the drive is very long and the car doesn't stop often enough, long enough and in nice enough places to go to the bathroom/latrines (the important part of any trip). Also, there are no public transportation options to the tourist sites. So, the options are having a driver OR renting a motorcycle.

What will I be doing in the near/far future?

Right now, I am not sure because unfortunately, I cannot decide that somebody else will hire me even if I strongly believe I am the best candidate for the job in terms of skill set.

One of the many benefits of being an RPCV is the PC Fellows program which partially covers tuition at a wide-range of graduate schools in many different options that cover the scope of development work done by PCVs worldwide. The other benefit is our one year of Non-Competitive Eligibility status for US government jobs. Of course, with the current job market continuing to spiral downward, I won't complain if I find a job anywhere in the world that meets my interests (education/training and business/administration, amongst many other things).

So of course, I don't know what's going to happen next, but I will let you know.

Seb was my APCD on paper for three years, but in reality he was so much more. He was a mentor, a friend, a brother. I made the mistake thinking that there would be more time with him. So, I put off seeing him. I had already seen him during parts of his illness and it was just too hard to see him when he was unwell.... So, I went and visited other parts of the country because I thought there would always be more time. More time to laugh, more time for him to be at important events in my life, more time to make memories. I was wrong. I didn't want it to hurt, but either way it would hurt just as much.

So if you are looking to some cause to donate to, please donate to his family. He leaves behind his wife and two young children, but also all of his extended family as well.

Dear Readers,

So here I am, nearing the end of my service (again). This time I really promise to COS though. I am ready to move on with my life to the next phase. As usual, I don't know where that will take me, but I'm trying not to think of the big things too much otherwise I get overwhelmed.

The library was well received and the final step is to catalog the books and form a solid committee to oversee its growth. Thanks again to all the support from family and friends. Without you, it would not have been possible to get the project funded and done as quickly as it was done. I will be doing that over the summer during my few weeks left in village as I will be training the new PCTs again. I am excited about training, much to the bafflement of second year volunteers. I guess I just enjoy helping people become great volunteers... or I'm a masochist, or both.

In addition, I hope to finally travel to other parts of Burkina and also other countries in the region, like Ghana. Something that I've been meaning to do since December 2007. Unfortunately, those plans were cancelled due to personal issues. My friend and I will be making this trip together, hopefully with some other PCVs.

One of my fellow PCVs soon-to-be RPCV will also be getting married over the summer. I missed Bryan's wedding last year unfortunately, but I plan on making it to Jill's.

After I finally COS in September (if all goes well), I will be around for a little while longer to appreciate Burkina from the other side as an RPCV. I will probably be hanging up my malaria prophylaxis hat in mid-to-late October.

For those who have asked lots of questions about my friend. There are obstacles to all good things in life. And I believe what we have is a good thing. Hopefully, we will be able to overcome all of our obstacles. But, once more, we're just taking things one day at a time.

The Director of PC/BF came. Dancing of people ensued and were taken. Summer plans include full and thorough catalogue of all books in the library and a formal list of rules and regulations for its usage. Pictures to follow. In a big town for at least a week.

Bad pictures of my special friend and a picture showing to the whole world that my site has a functional cell tower and I can actually be reached 24 hours a day, 7 days a week with 5 full bars!! So, I am succumbing and getting the USB key. This will let me assist in managing our ICT committee's website. Officially launched in December of 2009. Please check it out. The Volunteer side is similar to GoogleDocs and a powerful tool for institutional memory and is powered by Alfresco. Check out our website at http://burkina.ath.cx!

More pictures are now available in the Picasa album for the library construction. I forgot to take pictures yesterday before leaving my village.

Dear Donors, Friends and My Wonderful Family,

Library

Thanks for your financial support. Our construction finally started on February 1, 2010 at 10:00 AM as you can see in the new photos posted on Picasa.

Part of the delay was due in part to a change in the administration of the PTA (APE). For the first time in approximately a decade, the PTA board has been replaced. Convincing everyone of the merits of the project was easy. The difficult part was the old PTA board transferring power officially to the new PTA board. This finally took place at the beginning of December. Right before Christmas, a general assembly was called to discuss how the PTA would fund their part of the project (local materials). Would they bring it in themselves, or would the children bring it in? Alternatively, would they hire someone to haul all of the materials to the work site. Finally, they decided on monetary contributions per student enrolled.

We waited for their money and the materials to show up during the month of January. Finally, all was ready and we had a groundbreaking ceremony. The vice principal (intendant) and I laid the first couple of bricks during the ceremony. Though they aren't in the spot where the library is actually being built. On February 2, the real work started. Will hopefully have more pictures soon.

Thanks again for all of your wonderful generosity! For those of you who are worried about the financial management. I am personally in charge of all of the funds that you have donated. At the end of the project, I do have to do a report with receipts for both the funds that you have donated and the funds or actual work that the local community did to complete the project.

Harsh Realities

So, recently one of the phone companies started offering a USB key that allows you to access wireless internet from your computer. The key is about $90. With the equivalent amount of money, I can feed 30 of my students for a month. That is not a typographical error, my readers. Yes, one (1) student can really eat for just three dollars ($3) a month at our school's "cafeteria" (cantine thanks to subsidies from the school and the government. Many of my students come by bicycle or on foot through the bush from as much as 15 km away (10 miles). They wake up as early as 4 AM to get ready for school and don't leave school until 5 PM, getting back as late as 7 PM. On top of all that, they don't usually have the financial or physical means to go home at lunch time, eat, and come back to school every day.

One of the hardest things in my day is seeing how determined my students are to come to school each day and work hard (162 out of 241 of my sixth graders are passing the trimester as of right now) despite their lack of means to eat more than once a day. I do try to encourage them as much as possible with small gifts that I've gotten from you and other local donors such as candy, pens, pencils, stickers, pictures and notebooks and lunch days for the best students. Unfortunately, physical goods have a limit. Of course, I try my best to teach them well, too. Negative numbers, fractions, exponents, order of operations, geometry, general information about the world at large, civic education, and general life skills like financial and family planning. It's the only thing I can give them that will last for the rest of their lives (as long as a I do a good job of teaching it that is and as long as they review from time to time).

Classroom management is tough when you have a minimum of 90 teen-aged students in a classroom. Life isn't easy being a Peace Corps Volunteer because you're not like everyone else. But, I wouldn't trade a single one of my frustrating days of service as a PCV for anything else right now in my life.

Then again, I might be a little bit masochistic. After all, I did get through Tech.

Tomorrow I am taking the GRE. I will be back near good internet in about 2 weeks.

http://bit.ly/2ftZ0B

Trying to build a library for my school. Please donate! Remember, all donations are tax deductible. Thanks.

Hi Everyone,

Long time no blog. I am in Tougan to check my email and work on more stuff regarding the new library we will be building this year. Details later. Was in OHG for a while training the newbies. They all made it and are now settling into their new sites. Luckily I got a few new neighbors out of the deal.

"The 263.3 mm that fell in less than 12 hours in Ouaga on Sept 1 is a record for Burkina and probably would be hard to match in any other capital city in the world." That's the big news. 150000 homeless in Ouagadougou and three dead. Plus it rained again for twelve hours in my village yesterday.

One of the small bridges near me that was washed out.

I will be in Ouaga for a week or so in mid-September, so I plan on really putting up lots of pictures and blogging (seriously).

My laptop is dying. The fan doesn't work. The power jack appears to be short circuiting all the power adapters that plug into it. I think the motherboard is short circuiting by the power jack. Help. Dell Latitude why are you failing me now?

Well, since I haven't officially made the announcement yet, I might as well...

I am doing a third year! I am staying at my current site, and continuing to teach mathematics, and hopefully other subjects next year. Secondary projects in the works are:Making an awesome website which will the tell the world more about Peace Corps Burkina Faso and also enhance the PCV experience by making collaborative resources available;Building a school library to better French literacy, and thus, French grades, and indirectly all other school subject grades.

The end of the school year wrapped up well. My sixième (sixth grade) students finally started to understand my teaching style, and did really well this trimester on tests including tough topics such as relative numbers (positive and negative numbers), plotting points on a graph, ratios and orthogonal symetry in a plane. So, I felt really accomplished! The only down side is everyone thought that I had lowered the level of my tests, even though I hadn't (in this class)!!! They didn't seem to understand that the students really stepped it up a notch.

The other math teacher and I also had an Olympiad for our top students in each class to see who the best of the best were. The Olympiad was really challenging, but some of the kids did okay. It's my latest FB profile pic.

I am doing some summer school work with interested students... which isn't a lot right now, but I'm hoping the word will spread, and that others will jump on the bandwagon. The kids who are interested are super bright and motivated, so I am inspired!!!! :D

So, I got selected to be a trainer for the incoming Stage, which is an exciting opportunity to meet new volunteers and also my future neighbors. I will be getting three within a 50 km radius of my village, if all goes well. Also, I get to work and do one of my favorite things: Teaching. Yes, as much as I get frustrated with my indisciplined students and correcting tests in bad lighting, I love teaching.

It's been just darned hot these past few months, but the good news is the rainy sseason started early (compared to the last two years). So things are already green and it's only the beginning of June.

Other exciting news... because you all know how much I love to use certain types of punctuation!!! I will be back in America in July. So, clear your calendar folks because trouble is coming to town.

Well, that's all I got for now... I will hammer out flight details soon, so you all can be ready. :)

Best and love,

AK

So, I spent/am spending this "Spring Break" in the hot hot heat of... Bagre, Beguedo and Ouaga. I am on the final leg of this trip. In visiting Liz and An, I got to see amazing things like delicious food, electrified villages bigger than the "cities" by me, rice paddies, fish farming, GliderPro on a Mac, gigantic pigs that were propre and Taiwanese people.

All in all, it's been REALLY HOT, but I've been eating well and relaxing and thus, able to perform important functions for my COS/extension tests. BF RPCVs you know what I am talking about.

Here's me and Liz hanging out in some rice fields. Ignore the date, my camera is on crack and refuses to register the AA batteries half the time and resets the date randomly. I will try to post more pics later as I will be in town for most of the rest of the week doing some work .

Hi, I am alive and typing in Tougan. What has been going on? Mostly teaching or scolding, I don't feel like there is a big difference between the two. I guess I have mentioned that I am teaching twice as much this year as opposed to last year. I am twice as tired and much less dynamic or friendly as is usual with me.

My service is winding down. I am considering applying for a third year, and despite my interest in doing so/desire of colleagues/needs of the village, I might not. We will see. There are certain factors weighing against a third year (people I love very much!)

PCBF just got a new IT committee going and I have the chance to contribute to it. Unfortunately, I'm technically not around for much longer (unless of course I apply and get accepted for that mystical third year) so I hope to push it far enough so that we can go live with a beta-version of a publicly-accessible website in August keeping all you interested parents, friends, prospective volunteers, and Burkinabè-loving people up-to-date on what we crazy volunteers are actually doing to try to help Burkina Faso develop on top of other fun stuff for us PCVs in BF.

So, in other crazy news, the weather! First week was cold (50s to 60s); second week was HOT (over 100); third week it was hot and humid which meant it RAINED!!! Twice in fact in the third week of February. This week it has just been hot is all. So, the month of February has gotten all four "seasons" that BF normally gets in a year:

hot season, March through May, over 100 daily

rainy season, June through August, rains often

mini-hot season, September through October, gets hot as everything dries out

cold season,November through February, dry, windy and cold (for Africa that is)

March is upon us! So happy birthday soon to my dad and all the other March birthdays! I will be heading back to village probably tomorrow morning with a nice cheery 65 km bike ride (short story but not a lot of time) or 15 km (if I get lucky).

Thanks to all the people who have written recently: TE and CS in particular.

I promise to be online in the second week of March, so be ready for more contact from Africa!

I should really be correcting tests that I have put off correcting all break. Instead, I thought I would share some thoughts... i.e. procrastinate some more.

This is my first Gregorian New Year away from family and friends since last year I was (un)fortunately with my family. But really, am I away from friends? I've been lucky to have formed a few good friendships with HCNs (with whom I celebrated) and non-HCNs alike.

Things have been tough, and as usual, I have been delinquent in updating. Though I've been trying to make up for it by posting lots (lots is a relative term considering the connection and my lack of picture-taking prowress) of pictures. I definitely had some emotionally tough times this past term. As my service starts to wind down, I have to ask myself... what have I really done? Who have I really inspired? I guess I suffer from the degradation of society's ability to be patient because I want to know if what am I doing is having a positive effect and I want to know now.

There's a sort of hazy lost generation between 1975 - 1984 that I would like to call the "TGIF generation". Yes, there are lots of other names out there for that time period, but let me justify. We were the generation that grew up watching TGIF and absorbed those familiy values and catchy theme songs and 90210 was less shock and more family-oriented. It was a time before cell phones in every middle school students backpack. It was a time when the Internet was still text only, graphic bullet points were all the rage, and page-loading took minutes... not fractions of seconds. It was a time when we needed time to find the answers, and part of the process of growing up was the search.

All of us kids falling under this lost generation watched technology grow by leaps and bounds, but the first technology that really educated us was the television. I would like to propose that our generation was well-educated on family values, service, patience, and trying to cooperate and get along with others despite race, religion, ethnicity, etc. (even though many of us wanted to hide it because it was "uncool"). It is why those of us who were just shy of voting against you-know-who the first time around were outraged (especially when that whole war talk started, despite the 9/11 business) and those of us who weren't were outraged even more so. It's why when I look at my group of friends I don't see color, I just see friends. It is why we worked so hard to get where we are today, and look around disgusted at the world today.

Why did we work so hard in the first place? What was the point?

In the course of four years, TV went from TGIF to teenage dramedy. Now, with shock TV (and I don't mean Jerry Springer) as the basic diet of children growing up plus the Internet full of YouTube and other powerful share-all sites. Reality has blurred. Values are no longer valued. Friends are no longer your friends. Growing up is hard. Do we really need a world where the only safe people are maybe your parents, and even then, what teenager doesn't have that occasional power/growing-up struggle with their parents? A place where everything is Now?

Now is a dangerous place. It is no longer a future waiting to happen, and a past waiting for consequences. Now is Now. It's too late now for society, we can only cope with the immediateness of Now. People want everything now: money, information, service, friendship. At what cost? Credit only runs so deep. Truth is a matter of perception and corroboration of facts. Automation can only go so far. Trust can only ripen with time.

It's why things that take patience and time have become even less popular: science, research and development (from social skills to relationships to newer and better things and ideas). It's why we have pro athletes who skip college for the big leagues. It's why we have fast-track programs to high-paying careers and even fewer teachers in the public school systems.

Now is the time of forgive, but not really forget. But would there be something to forgive, if we had just used a little patience?

Don't you remember a time when you were young and you really wanted that cookie/toy/cartoon? And your parents told you, "Not now, honey." The victory was so much sweeter when you finally got what you wanted. Anticipation and patience, they made it all worthwhile. That doesn't happen Now.

Teaching and Peace Corps are the anti-thesis of Now. The developing world is catching up with the concept, but it hasn't infiltrated to the very core of it yet. After all, much of it is still unpowered, and hence, unconnected. However, as someone who started to feel the effects of the Now generation tainting my very existence when I left college and entered the working world, I can say that I suffer from wanting to know now if my work was worth it. Teachers who work so hard and see that their students don't have the ability to read and critically think like students of generations past. Why work hard? What is the point?

Dear friends, family and most importantly strangers who have suffered this long through my hypothesized TGIF and Now generations rambling. Thank you. I want to say that it is worth it, but I can't tell you the why right now. Even if you and I won't see the effects right away of the little things that we do because we really should (and not because someone else tells us we should). Don't let Now control you. Yes, I realize this takes critical thinking skills on your part to make the tough decisions and sacrifices.

If you all let the world fall to pieces while I'm outside of the Now, I'm going to be very disappointed. After all, what is the future of programs like the Peace Corps and the world in general if there are not enough people who are capable of waiting?

The president elect has a lot of work on his hands to transform a society of Now to a society of (k)Now. I hope the world realizes that if he moves at the speed of Now, the world might go to pieces even despite the best of intentions. Change can't happen fast. The world is a place that needs to be gently molded, otherwise it springs back into its original form, or worse yet, it collapses. Here's hoping for a speedy but not hasty transformation from Now to (k)Now - a generation that treats the information it has Now responsibly.

Happy new year everyone! Photos have been uploaded for my New Year's shindig in village. I spent both Christmas and New Year's in village, with a brief visit to my new neighbor Annette in between. She has a real nice set-up down the street... and 45 km is not a bad bike ride.

As we like to say around here... Bonne annee! Prosperite! Sante! Bonheur! Paix! Moins de problemes! Beaucoup d'argent!

In Ouaga for another day or so... and then disappearing back into village for a while...

Hugs!

Love, AK

I don't have much time because I will be running to my gare in a few minutes to catch my bus back to village (if there is such a bus this morning).

Monday afternoon after lunch while flossing out the wonderful bits of food stuck in my teeth, the floss broke. So, I tried again, second time around, one of my fillings popped out. No, Doctor Stender, it was not one of your fillings, it was one of my old, should-have-really-gotten-it-replaced-before-I-left-California fillings. In all cool-headedness, I popped it back in and sent a message to the PCMOs to ask them what to do.

Normally, I have Thursday mornings off, with English club in the afternoon. So, English club got cancelled and I planned to leave Wednesday night for a Thursday morning village and then back to village on Thursday afternoon... Yeah, so things did not pan out. I spent all afternoon watching as cars went away from the capital and not towards (except one camion, which passed really early but I truly believed the bus was coming that afternoon). Come 5 PM, after my friends across the street at the primary schools had watched me wait all afternoon, one of them calls the gare to find out what's up. They say they are not running at all this afternoon. If I had known that at 2 pm when I saw the camion, I would have jumped on and gotten off at the closest city with decent transport 70 km away. Fortunately, people in the Faso understand transport doesn't always work out. Got my dental appointment rescheduled and left yesterday morning (after being rejected by a couple of cars which were full of people who wanted to leave yesterday afternoon like me).

CLO helped me find the dentist; got some new shiny silver in my mouth; ate a good dinner on one side of my mouth (like I have been all week); saw Liz and caught up on life in general (who I have not seen in FOREVER).

So, how's village? It's going. The school year is almost over. In fact, I am rushing back to village to surveille the BEPC blanc. The BEPC is the middle/junior high school exit test. We are giving the examen blanc, a pre-test (think PSAT:SAT) over the next four school days (Sunday is excluded).

I might be online again soon (as I have not checked to see rumors have panned out). Internet may or may not be coming back near me at least for the next week, but hopefully permanently.

I have been extremely bad these past two trimesters about keeping in touch and I apologize. Things have been kind of hectic as the school year winds up. Don't worry, I will write lots of letters in June.

Much love from the Faso.

PS, I put a couple new photos up in the usual places (FB/Picasa). Sorry, not more specific, gotta run.

General Notes:

New photos posted on Google Picasa. Check them out (in the usual places).

Bats have been sited going in/out of my latrine as recent as this week.

I am incompetent at keeping in touch. Just been overwhelmed trying to catch up at school since I missed a week and the kids didn't understand negative numbers. So, I apologize for not writing letters/emailing/calling. Also, my network coverage has been terrible. My messages don't go through for some reason or I don't receive them. In fact, some of my fellow PCVs thought I had ETd and gone home because they weren't hearing from me.

I have officially finished my second trimester (and then some). This term because I was not pressed to leave for a training/funeral, I actually got to go to the conseil and eat chicken. As I may or may not have previously mentioned, I am the professor prinicipal of a class. It was 4e last term, but now that I no longer teach there thanks to schedule shuffling, I am pp in 5eB.

What does the pp do? All the work that a computer does in the developed world without a computer: calculating weighted GPAs, ranking students, laying the general smack down. All I know is I rock at it... must be the years of organizational skills I developed at my institute of higher learning... or something.

In other news, I finally finished a world map at my school (as opposed to in CLM's village) with her help (pictures in the photo gallery). It took two days and it is beautiful. General recommendations for those who are interested in doing world maps:

Less people is better, but more than one is strongly advised.

Having two "adult" figures is good. One for supervising any students that might be there, one for actually directing traffic.

Small brushes are essential for painting countries. Clean brushes often and also immediately after use.

Kerosene is essential for preserving paint and also removing it from your hands.

Don't let the kids draw the grid. For some reason, students are incapable of drawing a whole lot of perpendicular lines (math teachers too, but we got by a little better than the students did).

Old socks are great for wiping off dripping paint.

I got my hair done for Huit Mars (aka Inernational Women's Day) and a fancy schmancy outfit made, but unfortunately didn't get any pictures of the outfit, but I did get the hair. I putzed around all day and then played soccer with the women against the married men of the village. The women won 3-1. We kicked butt. My students came out to cheer me on (after all I am also their gym teacher and they love me anyway).

One of my other highlights since Chinese New Year was my friend B from high school came to visit me in village. That's right, all the way from America. He actually had a hard time getting in touch with me since my phone/coverage stinks, but somehow he actually made it to my village (though in a roundabout ridiculously long fashion). He took lots of pictures which I am hoping he will post soon of me, my students, my village, and friends. So, be ready for the awesomeness... when it arrives. He and his accomplice Brian stayed for the night. They got to chat up with some locals, experience real village life, sleep under the stars (sort of), and check out a funeral (they are a lot of fun around here). Seeing two Americans (with corn starch and old socks) really made my day! Their visit also coincided with our first "rain" of the rainy season. Really by "rain" it is more like mist, but still. Very exciting! Since then it has only sprinkled once.

So, really I just came in for a few days to get out of village, bask in a/c, and get some work done. I will be back next week on Saturday for the day, so be on the lookout for yet another post.

I am in Yako for the day. Came in with hopes of internet only to discover that the power was out until about 1 pm and the place doesn't open until 4 pm. Got them to open an hour early so I could get in some time before the bus leaves for village. My new strategy to deal with my students: pop quizzes. They are afeared. Put up new photos of kids (see link from last post). Forgot to take a picture of my actual students though; so, that will have to wait until next update. Things have been busy and getting hotter and dustier. When I get more time I will post photos of my wars against dust and flies. The bats are still there. Overall, life has not much improved. Recent rioting (rise in costs of living but no rise in pay rates - most necesseties have nearly doubled in price) has kept me in village as opposed to going to internet (was hoping to come last week).

Keeps your anxiety at bay!

So, Chinese New Year feasting was a success. The glowstick mood lighting was a big hit. I made oily rice, beef and broccoli with a black pepper sauce, cabbage and shrimp, and vegetarian chow mein. Also present were salty sticky rice cakes and sweet sticky rice cakes, two huge fish, dumplings, egg rolls, bbq pork, chicken, tea eggs, stewed pork, shrimp chips, pickled vegetables, hairy seaweed, strawbery sponge cake, and pineapple cakes, as well as red envelopes filled with candy. I am entering food coma or enterring myself, who knows which?

We ate, we answered trivia questions, and we ate some more. Which is good because I intend to exceed 70 kg for my return to village.

All in all a sweet Saturday soiree. I wore my new dress (in photos if I can ever convince this internet connection to let you have them).

The new pictures of my house are up by the way! You will find pictures of my lovely new hangar and also gate to my courtyard. Here are pictures of some of the kids I mentioned earlier. Here are some pictures from CNY shindig. Mostly I just don't believe in double-posting (despite my love of redundancy, technology is limiting me).

Happy Asian Lunar New Year!!

I am currently in THE Dougou (not to be confused with Kool Dougou or West Dougou) to celebrate Chinese New Year. We are having a shindig which involves me cooking. Hopefully, no lives will be lost except for tasty ones. We decorated, and me being the loser I left my lantern in village (see photos), BUT I made up for it with yellow glowsticks and red ribbon (thanks to my (always) awesome former co-workers!) and my amazing ability to provide tasty Asian candies and treats. I am actually going to run off in a little bit to start cooking and whatnot. I hope that I get back in sometime late tonight or at the butt crack of two hours before dawn.

Life has been hectic as I try to make up for lost time in school and also battle boughts of paresse and fatigue. Coming back from a wired country really made it tough to adjust to the lack of electricity and general convenience.

Here's the scoop:

• Negative numbers are every students bane and I am way behind on grading papers. I've only graded about 20 devoirs, but the best note (coming from one of my top students) is 10/20. I spent all week reviewing operations with relative numbers (positive/negative). I am going to give a pop quiz on Tuesday (but don't tell my students!)

• The cost of living here has gotten tres cher. The cost of a bottle of Dinor (palm oil) has gone from 800 F CFA to 1400 F CFA in village. That along with many other daily consumed items (that aren't veggies or millet) have gone through the roof.

• Internet by me is still out. The internet lady and I are going to hang out at my place next week, though.

• Things are starting to heat up. Day time temperatures have been exceeding 90 and rising.

• I biked over 90 km in under 24 hours unintentionally.

• I am currently weighing in at 70 kg. Trying to get it back up this weekend.

• I received an extremely large box with refried beans and Del Taco sauce packets... every girl's dream!

• I own a ridiculous number of bags and suitcases in the Faso now. All of which are at village (because I thought I had left one in THE Dougou, but alas, no!).

• Tailors here are awesome. I own awesome dresses.

• There are 14 French people building tables for my school. I stare at them as much as my students. They stare at me as much as the Burkinabe. All in all, we're a bunch of oddities to each other.

• My last act before getting on the bus to get out of village: Watched telecentre Hamidou gut a lightly smoked chicken while making conversation and kids played with the innards.

• I have bats in my latrine. Unfortunately, the plumbing in my latrine is shared (i.e. one latrine, two holes). They pop up during the day time and night time to eat bugs and just make it difficult for you to excrete waste peacefully.

• I run an unofficial day care center. The kids of my neighbors just show up to lie around and doodle in the shade. At least they are cute and sweet (most of the time), except for the faux type in the making. My favourite is Newton, not even a year old and crawling around and causing havoc. He's big, fat, and a mama's boy. Total cutie, too!

Plan to be back in Marchish for spring break and to get some medical work done, but will try to get in sometime tonight or tomorrow morning for a last bit of internet time.

[Casablanca, MORROCO @ 1731 GMT]

I am no stranger to nonsensical flight plans or long layovers. Once upon a time I actually flew from Indianapolis to Las Vegas to Los Angeles to Newark. There was a 20-or-so hour layover in Los Angeles. Not advised by the way.

So, here I find myself deliriously tired in Casablanca (as you all may have seen from my previous posts). After my time ran out, I managed to fight my way to the front of the transfer desks... twice. You see, in normal airports, there are things like signs, staff, lines. In Casablanca, such organization does not exist. [Heck, signs point all over the place to things and then when there is a crucial turn right before the stairs to the final destination, there is no sign. Maybe my exhaustion has blinded me and they don't usually see people who have been on three flights before arriving in Casablanca for yet another flight.] So, the frustrating thing about arriving to the front of the transfer desk is because once you are in front, that does not necessarily mean you will be helped. They really need a new supervisor or something in this airport to whip these guys into shape.

I can understand that my layover is ridiculously long and such, while others have a quick turnaround. The problem here is that there is a serious lack of organization. I noticed this the last time around, but miraculously made it through with about 15 minutes to spare before my next flight (I had a three hour layover). Heck, I got to the front of the line before people who were leaving in twenty minutes (twice) and I already had my boarding pass (thank you, HKI efficiency!!!)!!!! So, why was I at the transfer desk? Because I wanted to know what gate to go to... logical question right? Also, apparently if you have a transfer from Royal Air Maroc to Royal Air Maroc you can get a voucher for a restuarant in the airport (fat chance you'll find it though since it is not well labelled to get there). Unfortunately, since I was switching airlines. I did not qualify. Even though other staff members told me I was eligible for this and possibly some place to pass out that was not the floor or a cold uncomfortable airport chair (this is was one of another reasons I was at the transfer desk). I also wanted to make sure my luggage got checked okay. The guy didn't even look at my stubs and said it was fine even though there was a typo. I don't know what to say other than I hope my luggage gets there (not that you won't find out at the end of this post if I don't). All this was after wandering in and out of the "gates" area several times because I didn't know where to go (since I didn't know my gate number). The guards were ever so helpful (as in not at all). All of the staff kept pointing me back to the overcrowded transfer desk. Add all this to a mix of French, English and Arabic and shoving and shouting from many people (not me, I was too tired). So, just in general frustratingly tiring. And really, I am too tired to be frustrated, just vague shadows of frustration.

Worst 10 Things To Do During A 15-Hour Casablanca Layover

10. Sleep. Physically impossible, it is too shiny.

9. Try to use the mysterious Wifi advertised on every darned wall in the airport. (Have to pay for it and can't even get to the pay page anyway!!)

8. Try to understand the language people are speaking to you while you stare blankly at them.

7. Pay exorbitant money for nourishing substances.

6. Try to find an outlet in the airport for quickly decharging laptop.

5. Try to figure out how to get to the other side of the glassed off area where people are lounging semi-uncomfortably (as opposed to uncomfortably).

4. Pay exorbitant money for internet time.

3. Go to the restroom.

2. Drink tap water from the restroom. (NB: I didn't actually do this, but was strictly warned by one of my new acquaintances that I should not drink it... besides the fact that it smelled quite... unpotable.)

1. Go to the transfer/transit desk. Yes, I am pretty sure the frustration is not worth it. Don't go if you don't have to!

Top 10 Things To Do During A 15-Hour Casablanca Layover

10. Strike up a conversation with someone who had to run to the restroom while waiting in the crowd by the transfer desk. Alternatively, give bad directions in French. Alternatively, give away your plastic bottle collection (from all the other layovers).

9. Watch the cleaning people wash the windows and wonder why the airport is so clean every where except the restrooms.

8. Figure out exactly how you can spend the change you got in dirhams so that you don't have anymore and also that you are no longer hungry or thirsty.

7. Try to find anything in the airport (AKA window shopping/wandering around dazed). Whoever designed this airport must have been loonier than the guy who designed the South Houses. At least there, I can understand the old numbering scheme, not the new one though.

6. Watch the escalators as they mysteriously change speed from fast to slow to fast again. (I thought I was delusional, but really all of the escalators slow down and speed up again. I think it has something to do with solar power.)

5. Go through security. Multiple times. Explaining that you are American and not name-that-Asian-nationality.

4. Change socks and discover that the new socks are unmatched.

3. Consume nourishing substances, multiple times, preferably things you saved from previous flights. Warning: this causes the second worst thing to do during a 15-hour Casablanca layover!

2. Pay exorbitant money for internet time.

1. Watch a guy carrying the giant raw leg of cow that will be your next schawerma sandwich. Mmmm...

Well, here's hoping that the next 5 or so hours are as wonderful as the last 10 have been!

[Ouagadougou, BURKINA FASO]

Well, I intermittently slept uncomfortably. Where I really mean, I would fall asleep for about five minutes and then wake up hoping that I had slept longer when I really hadn't, darn that shininess!

Around 8 PM, all of the flights that showed up on the board were flashing that they were boarding. This was not the case, nor were gates announced on the board. Luckily, by this time through a combination of nagging and wandering I had found out that my gate was at gate 22. Chatted with a couple of Guineans in my butchered sleep-deprived French. Smiled at some kids. Felt exhausted.

Anyway, to top off my Casablanca experience, as everyone was preparing to board the plane, a nice neat line was automatically formed by the people who wanted to get on the plane without instruction. When they finally started boarding, airport staff actually told people about halfway down the line to move to the front. Most people thought they would open up both boarding machines and have two nice neat lines. What did they really want? They wanted us to crowd around the one open boarding machine and squeeze our way through regardless of who was there first. Completely and utterly inane. That and the fact that people were switching seats like crazy on the plane and some guy didn't have a seat for a short while. The staff was generally rude e.g. telling a guy with a small child that said small child did not have a seat when his small child in fact did have a paid-for seat. They made him get his ticket out and everything. Also, some other guy was being told by two staff people back and forth different information right in front of us about some misplaced items from his previous flight. Yeah, no applause for Royal Air Maroc.

I am still in love with Qatar Airways service and food. On top of it all, last time around I am pretty sure I was really in economy (since my seating and food type arrangements were the same), the boarding passes were on business class paper because the staff at Casablanca is again incompetent. Either way, Qatar Airways rocks. Royal Air Maroc not so much.

Amazingly, my luggage made it safely all the way from Taipei. Well, sort of, one of the locks was mysteriously opened but at least it didn't look like anything was missing. I mean who really wants to steal a 3-pound jar of peanut butter or spandex?

Conclusions:

1. Don't fly through Casablanca again unless absolutely necessary!

2. Get enough sleep and figure out what to do in Casablanca before getting to said city if yet another ridiculously long layover ensues. Alternatively, be rich enough for business class so that one can sit in the nice comfy lounges.

3. Try not to take four consecutive flights ever again.

4. Using a bathroom while carrying all of your carry-ons since there are no hooks and the floor is wet and you haven't made any nice friends in the airport yet is rather difficult, but doable.

5. Find another way to take Qatar Airways again that doesn't involve Casablanca.

On going back to life in the Faso... I have missed constant internet connection like nobody's business. That and cute shoes are probably two of my top picks for trivial things that I miss. At the same time though, I will be relieved to go back to my simple life of mangled French mathematics and Scrabble. Though I will be considerably more busy this term (already behind at school! though I did leave exercises for the first week. The poor suckers won't know what hit them if they didn't finish their exercises.), finish up the world maps at my school, and I am self-appointed PCV Asian Lunar New Year cook or something like that, so I hope to be back online again end of January/beginning of February. I also want to visit some cool people like my third nearest neighbor Babette and help her with her tree-planting project. 80 K bike ride sounds like fun! And, I want to check-out Koudougou possibly during spring break. Thoughts are out there, though plans are always bound to change. This time around, I really promise to try to take pictures though as I now have a normally functioning camera!

Me in the Doha airport. It is shiny, too. But not as offensively as CMN (which is actually quite pretty aside from the disorganization and restrooms, don't have any pictures though because I figured it would be weird for the strange 15-hour layover tired person to walk around taking pictures all over the airport).

And now back to your regularly scheduled programming.

If I were a braver and less confused soul, I would probably be wandering around in the city. Unfortunately, I am even downright confused about which terminal I am in and the ground staff isn't being terribly helpful. I decided to shell out some big bucks for internet that I found here hidden in some remote corner of this mystery terminal. And after my time is up I am going to try the transfer counter again because I am just tired and confused and want to sit relatively near where I will be boarding for the next 14 or so hours.

A week ago on Friday, we had the first of our last three ceremonies (which I have been able to attend). Traditionally, every seven days, there is a ceremony. Though, in modern times, this is occasionally abbreviated. Last Friday, was the seventh seven day ceremony. If you do the math, this means that the seven day periods were abbreviated.

Before that, though, there were many activities to be had. Each morning after paying our respects to my grandfather, my family was busy planning for both the small and big ceremonies. As I mentioned earlier, we bring offerings each morning such as fruit, my grandfather's favorite snacks, etc. This is not burned in offering, but large amounts of paper money and the paper lotuses are. Last Saturday, we had an additional ceremony to wish my grandfather good health in the afterlife, as well as to give him his home and seemingly a ton of sacrifical money. You can see a photo below of the house that we had constructed. Not included in the photo are representations of some of his favorite activities (mah-jongg and fishing). The model house was quite large and fully furnished. I say was because Saturday night we burned it in offering. Since it was large, and also the immense amount of sacrificial burned, we used the temple's incinerator as opposed to the traditional firepot.



On Monday, was the official ceremony for all of the people who aren't in the immediate family. Before it started, I took a bunch of pictures of the flowers and drinks that people sent. In return for attending a funeral, a towel is given to the attendee. I don't have any pictures of that.



This ceremony lasted quite a while and my brother and I were part of the procession even though we are "outside" grandchildren (i.e. we do not carry the name of our grandfather since he was our maternal grandfather - we were clothed in a manner to indicate this though I don't have any photos of that). One of the most difficult parts was seeing my grandfather lying in his coffin. After everyone paid their respects (which involved lots of incense, kneeling and bowing on lots of people's parts), we saw him again. However, everyone who wanted to see him one last time saw him with us and my grandmother. It was so strange because less than a year ago I saw him alive. There really are no words to describe how I feel about it. As poor as his health had been in recent years, my family was not ready or really expecting this to happen.

We escorted the coffin outside to the hearse. All of his "direct" family (except my grandmother and me) went to accompany his body to the funeral home that will house his ashes until my family is ready to transport them to the temple they have elected on the south side of the island. I went with my grandmother to help her with the offerings and prepare for their arrival. Afterwards, we paid our respects once again. We "washed" ourselves. The rest of my relatives went back to the temple, while my first aunt and I took care of burning the last of the sacrificial money for him. There was a lot left and we were burning out of our improvised offering cauldron - a rather large mixing bowl on the rooftop of my grandparents' apartment building. Being rather windy, and with a rather large stack of ceremonial cash to go through. This took us all the way through to dinner time since it was just my aunt and me.

After the services, most of my relatives left for home within the days following. My brother and I went to see my paternal grandmother yesterday after paying respects to our namesake my paternal grandfather at his temple on the south side of the island, and then visiting the technical school he founded and my dad's childhood home.

I think my grandma looks great for someone who is turning 97 this year. You can also see the quality of my camera with these photos. It stitches panoramas for me fairly well. It's got loads more megapixels, but I don't know if this is necessarily an advantage.

Well, back to your regularly scheduled programming starting Sunday.

Merry Christmas! Joyeux Noel! Sheng4Dan4Jie2Kuai4Le4!

If you search Google for information regarding Taiwanese funeral customs, you see a fair mix of information. Here is one site that I have found that accords with some of my family's practices. Practices and beliefs differ from group to group (even from family to family) within Taiwan due to the wide mix of people on the island (they may all look the same to you, but to me there are Taiwanese, Chinese, the indigenous peoples and others). I thought I would blog about my experience to share a little about my experience with Taiwanese culture and also to document it for my own sake.

General things you should know about my family and me. My parents immigrated from Taiwan before I was born. For the most part, my family (grandparents, uncles, aunts, cousins) lives in Taiwan. More so on my mother's side than my father's side. When together, my family speaks a mix of Taiwanese/Mandarin/English/Japanese (due to the Japanese influences on Taiwan). I am practically illiterate. I attended Chinese school for a few years as a child. I can write my name, numbers, and a handful of basic characters. I figure out pinyin/characters through a combination of the internet, phonetics, vague memories and the power of deduction.

My grandfather's funeral rites follow a mix of Buddhist and Taiwanese traditions. Since he passed away, my relatives have been going to the temple to pay respects to my grandfather. Each morning, they go to bai4bai4. This involves burning incense and giving thanks or offerings and general respect paying. According to Taiwanese beliefs, he is ascending to the afterlife but he has not taken anything with him. Each morning, after paying our respects by burning incense at his soul altar, we burn paper flowers (the steps for him to reach the afterlife) and sacrificial money (money for the afterlife). Basically, my grandmother's apartment is reminiscent of a paper/origami factory.

An auspicious day was chosen for my grandfather's funeral (07/01/08), unfortunately it is not so for my uncle's wife. A Buddhist ritual, two wooden-pieces are tossed to the floor. If they both land face-down, the answer is "No". One-up and one-down means "Yes". The internet (i.e. I don't know this person) tells me that having both face-up means that the spirit really approves. Though my family believes if they are both face up, the answer is also "No". Of all the days suggested to my grandfather (each one inauspicious for each of his children and his daughter-in-law), he selected the one that was inauspicious for my uncle's wife.

Yesterday, we went to select my grandfather's urn. Well, really my grandfather had already "selected" (same eight-ball method) his urn, but we went to inspect it for flaws. My grandmother and mother wanted a perfect one of course, but after much careful inspection, they realized that all of the urns had their own particular flaws (of course, you can't expect anything human-made to be perfect - that would imply that humans are capable of perfection). So, the family decided on the original urn.

Ancestor worship may be unfamiliar to some of you. The concept is even more difficult to explain in French to HCNs who for the most part think the three choices for religion are Christianity (Catholic or Protestant), Islam, or Animist. In fact there is a joke that the sum of the distribution of religion is 2 (and not 1) because everyone is animist. Really the closest in village I could come to describing it was animism.

Anyway, speaking of respecting my elders, it is getting late and I need to go to bed.

22 December 2007 - 1855 GMT

Doha, QATAR

Early this morning, I left Ouagadougou for Casablanca, one fantastically named city for another made famous by the movie of the same name. I have only ever seen the last scene. This is the first time in more than six months that I have left the country. I wish it were under better circumstances. As I mentioned previously, my grandfather passed away two weeks ago. The news came as a shock because after almost six months of serious health problems, it looked like he was finally on the upswing. I actually found out several days after he died due to poor network coverage. On holidays and weekends in Burkina Faso, text messages are hit or miss. And unfortunately, they missed me for several days in a row.

Originally, I was planning to holiday in Ghana. My entire stage (training group) is going, with the exception of the ETers, a couple people, and myself. Also, my neighbor and a few other PCVs are heading down there as well. I was planning to spend Christmas on the beach, hike and river raft, and traverse the renowned canopy walk (this list is neither exhaustive or ordered). Also, HB is headed to Ghana to visit his family at conveniently the same time I had planned to be there. As fun as it is to think of might-have-beens, I decided that I need to be with my family.

Looking on the plus side, my grandfather lived a very long and successful life despite his penchant for smoking, drinking, and a rich diet (all three of which he gave up as the years went on). I did have a chance to see him back in March before his health started to give him problems again. I also will be with my family for an extended period of time, and I am very grateful for that. My colleagues (PCVs and HCNs) as well as the PC staff have been very supportive during this time, and I want to thank them for that. I have been distracted, distraught, and pretty much just doing what I need to get myself to Taiwan. I know, however, without the wonders of modern technology, I could in all possibility be finding out about this news even later than now. Or, alternatively, I could be trapped in an airport trying to pay my way between countries. Really, without the support of everyone, I would be a lot more worse for wear than I currently am (mild case of bronchitis). Being sick on top of it all, hasn't helped, but at the same time I think the being sick is related to the stress that I have been feeling. (Stress weakens the immune system after all.)

The flight from Ouaga to Casablanca was mostly a half-asleep blur to me. It left at 0330 after all, and I was exhausted (n.b. I typically wake up somewhere between 0400 and 0600). I am not as young as I used to be, nor have I been in the best health or sleeping well lately. I was not at the airport long before taking off for Doha, Qatar. I have to say that Royal Air Maroc had surprisingly spacious legroom, but the food left something to be desired. Qatar Airways had very tasty food and personal tvs. The flight was not full at all, so I sat back and caught up on some movies before dozing off. I am hanging out in the airport right now waiting for my flight gate to be announced. The layover is approximately five hours. I hope that the flight to Hong Kong is equally awesome, but I don't have my hopes up.

(This part written in HK.)

Flight from Doha to Hong Kong was not bad. Though I slept a lot again. I will be with my family soon. Will probably be online until my battery runs out as I am hanging out in the HK airport until my next (and last flight). Thanks to everyone for their support.

PS, One of the down sides to traveling alone is the lack of people to watch your stuff while you run to the bathroom.

Fo Gou'ni Good morning everyone.

I am back online for the second time since... well, the last time I posted! Yesterday would be the first time but blogger was being persnickity.

These would be the only two pictures that my camera is willing to give up. The rest from Thanksgiving (food list to come) and pictures of my students refuse to be recognized by computers all around BF. I have some more photos of my house and pictures of a storm rolling in from September/October, but they are stored elsewhere so I will try to remember to bring them in tomorrow.

The first one would be one of two pies made for Thanksgiving holiday (that would be the apple pie) and the other is me after eating lots of tasty thanksgiving food. Even from the unflattering angle, it is apparent that my eating seven or more meals a day isn't helping. Yes, I do actually have first breakfast and second breakfast and sometimes if not often first and second lunch and don't forget the snacks, too! No, I am not a hobbit, but I do bike a minimum of 5k a day, if not more.

My schedule has been shuffled around a bit, and now I teach math and EPS (that would be PE/gym). I have Mondays off which works out well for me since Sunday is typically my big cleaning day. My villagers/fonctionnaires make fun of me because they don't see me all morning (and I get up before dawn) except to go to the water pump to get water. So, it gives me Monday to relax and run errands and whatnot. I am the professeur principal of 4e. That means I do the work of what computers do to calculate "GPA" or the "Moyenne". I did some programming on my dusty old TI-85 (literally it was quite dusty). Unfortunately, I remembered the limitations of that sucker in the process of programming. I remember back in high school how jealous I was with people with even TI-86's and let's not even talk about those TI-89's. I am sure technology has much advanced since then. What I would give to have Matlab and Mathematica running on something the size of a TI (and AAA or AA batteries)!!

I did not leave my village for the entire month of October, not even day trips to go to the "big city" or to visit CLM's village. In November I was finally getting stir crazy and had to restock on some tasty treats at the "supermarket" so I got to the "big city". I also played basketball, got beat up by some kids in it (not really), but I tried to turn a corner and I am just not as fast as the boys here, so I got knocked down. Banged up my glasses, knees, elbows and my head pretty good, but I am fully healed now. The glasses could be in better shape, but I still wear them in village because its better than having to switch between normal glasses and sunglasses. I am lazy, it's true, but I also bike 15k to play basketball all day and then bike back 15k afterwards, so I make up for it sort of. Internet by me has been broken since I last used it. So, I haven't gone in to the "big city" that often except to buy food for Turkey day.

Thanksgiving was amazing. Here is the list of goods consumed: popcorn, peanut brittle, beef stew, green bean casserole, candied yams, mashed potatoes, gravy, turkey and stuffing, pintade, fajitas, fried rice, pumpkin pie, apple pie, brownies, sparkling cider, sparkling grape juice, soda (I have now grown to be a big fan of tonic), yaw (dolo/millet bair). I am sure there were other things, but that is all my addled brain can remember right now.

December was kind of hectic with schedule shuffling and then grading and then calculating all my grades by Friday night so that I could leave Saturday morning. It has been hard for me because I found out on Wednesday that my grandfather passed away a week ago due to a stroke. I was planning on going to Ghana for vacation, but instead, I am trying to get to Taiwan for the funeral.

I don't have much more to say right now, except that I am a little sick and a little out of it due to the combination of events and sickness.

So, for some reason the internet is painfully slow at the bureau. I am typing this in notepad while I wait it for it to pick back up again.

World map project is a popular project started a few years back by a PCV in another country. She got the idea to paint the world map in her community and it picked up from there. I am really happy that I helped CLM out on this project because I learned a lot. I think she might be happy that I was there, too (especially since I provided all the brushes that we used for doing detail work - i.e. almost all of the painting). I am really glad that I brought my paint brush set, but I think they are pretty much ruined for the acrylics that I want to use (since we used a latex-based paint). CLM was lucky because they had already painted the blue square in the 3e classroom and there were examples in all of the other classrooms. Even parts of Antarctica and South America were traced. We spent most of the first few days cleaning the wall, redrawing the grid lines and then (re)drawing the countries. After we realized that the brushes that CLM had were too big, I went home and came back a few days later to do the painting. We actually only took one day to do the painting thanks to a couple of students. We finished all the countries in the morning and then redid the ocean blue and touched up the countries in the afternoon. I think it looks pretty darn good, even though I free-handed the flag and the compass. CLM is going to go back and label the countries at some point.

I am hoping to do the same thing in my village and CLM is even going to hook me up with some of the paint that she has left over. The director and I have discussed a little bit about the positives and negatives of different locations in the village. While in the classrooms would be the easiest place to do this (and also the easiest location to maintain), it is probably the least accessible location to the community. I have some ideas of where else might be good, but the problem is if it is an outdoor mural, natural deterioration with time, and hence the need to maintain the mural.

I posted the pictures in my gallery: http://picasaweb.google.com/pictureandrea/WorldMapProject.

I can't figure out how to SSH into the new UGCS. Is the address still to.ugcs.caltech.edu? And if I am using a MindTerm facility (like the one at http://www.netspace.org/ssh/) will it work? I vaguely remember that there was a MindTerm applet on the UGCS website, but that no longer seems to be there. Help? I want to make some basic text changes, update the FAQ and links page, and also fix some links due to the UGCS migration (because obviously the quickie cgi scripts (especially for the art page) I have no longer work thanks to the change in folder names).

OK, here is the selfish part of my blog. I feel slightly guilty asking for it, but I am exercising my right (or addiction) to preservatives as an American. I can get Laughing Cow cheese and Starkist (in water) and corned beef and Oats in the big city (that's actually pretty darn good, even if I'm isolated I can get these things) amongst other canned goods. I still feel pretty solid muscle wise at least in the legs though. AKA, things I wish I could eat:

Slim Jims

Beef, pork or chicken(canned or dried, it's all good)

Seasoning/sauce packets for cooking stuff (e.g. Easy Mac, Knor Lipton PastaSides, gravy and other assorted items)

Summer sausage

Easy Cheese (yes, canned cheese is amazing) or parmesan cheese

Hot Sauce and condiments from fast food joints in general (I like Del Scorcho from Del Taco and of course Cholula)

Dried cuttlefish

Refried beans or at least a good refried beans and tortilla recipe

Nuts that are not peanuts

Kashi Tiny Little Chewies

Dried fruit

Chocolate (preferably individually wrapped or even M&Ms)

Instant mashed potatoes!!!

I hear bear creek soup is good

Maple syrup (though I probably shouldn't be rotting my teeth anymore

A shampoo bar or two (mom)

The recipe for monster cookies

Instructions on different stiches.

I am seeing the dentist tomorrow because my teeth have started looking like I am smoker (no, don't worry I have not picked up the habit). I bought a mirror on Saturday and saw myself for the first time in about a month. It was kind of scary. I am getting skinny as you can see in the pictures, but don't worry, I am still in the healthy BMI range.

So, this was my first day living in village (officially my third day in village if you count the two I spent there during site visit). No, that is not a giant bottle of liquor, it is kerosene for my kerosene lamps. Fortunately, the day I arrived was marche day, so I was able to get that giant basin and assorted buckets for bathing.

The following are some pictures of my house. When I first moved in, they hadn't yet completed my terrace or private courtyard.

I live in a celebratarium which is like a bachelor's pad (quite literally). The houses are connected sort of townhouse style. When I left village, they were in the process of finally cementing over the other latrines and showers and also some gaps in the outer courtyard walls (as you can see in the first picture).

You can also see my transition from living off of the floor to having furniture!!! :)

These buckets are what I use for bathing and also to get reseau (network coverage). In this manner, I can get five bars of coverage from my Telmob number and supposedly Celtel works in my house now (it just got there Saturday), but since I haven't had enough units, I haven't been able to test it. My alternate solutions for coverage are to go out to the telecentre (a cell phone carefully balanced that everyone in village without a cell phone makes calls from) or to bike the approximately 3-5 k to my school and stand halfway between the tree and the latrine and hope real hard, or to bike towards the big city (where internet and the cell towers are to be found).

Story Time:

When I bike more than 30k in a day, it rains. It is unexplainable, but it happens more often than not. My dear nearest neighbor CLM has suggested that it is just an effect of the rainy season, but I have managed to convince some of the kids in my village otherwise. On the second day in village, CLM and I biked to the city to scope it out. I ordered a bench and the fancy table you see covered in green tarp and heard rumors about internet and also found a decent supermarche (where I can buy tuna IN WATER (!!! extremely rare outside of the capital) amongst other things). The bike ride is about 15k and takes me anywhere between 30 minutes and an hour depending on how tired I am and the condition of the road, though they claim it is only 11k (but that's only if you go from signpost to signpost and there is a lot of farmland and brousse before you reach the ville). It is rather hilly and pretty, I don't have any pictures of it yet, but that will hopefully come later. Someone showed me a "shortcut" back to village. I don't really know if it is any shorter, I will have to time it next time to find out. Anyway, on that day, on the way back it started pouring, and the roads stop being roads and turn into rivers. Needless to say, I was about as pleased as a drenched cat. The first time I biked to CLMs village, I meant to come back the same day. I got about halfway back through a downpour before the road became completely washed out.

The door handle incident was hilarious. I closed my door at night because I wasn't used to the sounds in village yet, besides the fact that my neighbors haven't come back from vacay yet and its just awfully lonely in that huge courtyard that I can't lockdown. I didn't even lock the door when I realized something was wrong as I was closing the door. It turns out the catch had snapped off and was stuck in the door. After struggling with the door handle a bit, it fell off. Here I was, locked effectively in my house at about 8 PM. I started yelling and yelling and finally my neighbors heard me. Luckily for me, I had actually gone around and faired some voisinage (chatted up the neighbors) and introduced myself to people who live around me (very important culturally here to saluate and talk to people). They found my landlord who busted open a hole in the wall to push out the latch from the catch. He fixed the wall the next day, but I no longer have a handle catch, and I am fine with that.

I have biked with chairs, giant basins, giant bidons of water and other fun objects attached to my bike. I am getting pretty good at tying things on there and not having them fall off.

The basketball court is right by the internet cafe in the big city. For those who are curious, the service is provided by www.africaden.net. Unfortunately, upon closer inspection, I realized that the baskets were on the ground, but at the very least the court is there! :)

I happened to walk outside one day and catch this beautiful sight, a double rainbow going right over my house. I took a bunch of pictures and some day when I have enough patience I might photoshop it all together into a panoramic view.

On the night I got my table and wicker chairs, I also got a mouse. It took me a while to figure out that it was a mouse trying to get out and not some stranger trying to get in (like a toad two nights ago). I spent a good deal of time chasing it around the house until it finally left. I have also killed many crickets, flies and weird creepy crawlies in my house. I leave the lizards alone since at least they eat the creepy crawlies.

World Map Project and huge Wishlist of what I really miss eating (and can be feasibly sent to me)... lot to say about that, will blog about it tomorrow. If not, you can find it at CLM's blog soonish.

Sorry this post isn't more coherent or organized. Maybe tomorrow's will be slightly better. :)

Extremely short blog right now since I only paid for an hour of internet! Yes, there is internet within a 15 km bike ride from my village. It is of course on top of a giant gravel hill, with a greater than 45 degree incline. Anyway, I will blog more on Monday or Tuesday with all of my adventures. My network coverage is hit or miss right now for either number since I am biking in between my village and my nearest neighbor's (a short 30 km ride that takes about an hour and 15 minutes when the road isn't covered with mud from the rain) as we work on her secondary project. We just finished the drawing of the countries yesterday with the help of some lycee students. I am going back on Sunday to help with the painting (since I actually own brushes small enough to paint countries like Swaziland and Djibouti). I am learning a lot from helping her out and am hoping to do the same sort of project with students at my CEG and Ecole Primaire (there are no such murals at all), will post pictures later and also a link to her blog. Other fun tidbits that I will elaborate on later... it always rains in the place I just arrived at if it is greater than or equal to 25 km away or if it is the first time I am there ruining my plans to bike back on the same day (or my clothes); I got locked inside my house because the door handle broke and fell off; I have biked with lots of large objects tied to the back of my bicycle; there is a basketball court by the internet café; I saw a double rainbow over my house; I had an incident with a mouse in addition to your standard creepy crawlies; and some days I just enjoy reading by kerosene lamp light. Mom, I promise to be in network coverage on Monday/Tuesday, call me then.

I am actually getting to site tomorrow for the very second time. Yes, I am actually moving in, and no, I don't know what my new postal address will be, but as I said, the other one will work if you change the T to a V (and probably even if you don't). Once I know, I probably won't have internet access to tell you all, but I promise to write someone or bike 40+k to the nearest (unreliable?) internet source.

This past week has been really hectic, between moving out of my host parents house, and then the swear-in ceremony, and then the bus ride down to capital, and then shopping for all of the stuff for my house, and then... Yeah, basically I have been feeling overwhelmed.

I am excited to get to site though, and really get settled in. It will be good to make a home and to paint my house all sorts of pretty. Unfortunately, I hit a snafu when trying to buy a car battery today because the salesperson was concerned if I didn't buy the whole package deal with the (dry-cell) battery and the solar panel, I wouldn't be able to recharge my battery just any old place. Why dry-cell? Lower maintenance cost despite the higher price tag. Downside, I don't have the time or the understanding of electrical type things to know how much juice I need for my battery (obviously this affects the price). Also, I don't know if I can charge a dry-cell battery through normal means (i.e. not a solar panel). So, the nice thing was they didn't pressure me into buying anything, which I couldn't afford anyway. And then, I had a tasty dinner at the restaurant next door.

So, to all my readers out there:

If I have a 12V dry-cell battery, what kind of wattage/amperage/some sort of electrical termage do I need to charge a laptop (without running it)?

Do I absolutely need to charge from a solar panel or is it possible to do so from conventional battery recharging sources?

Should I just buy a cheaper standard car battery (higher maintenance and doesn't like to be drained completely) and hope it doesn't fall apart on me.

If the responses could be compiled into a nice and neat presentation that takes little time for my french-fuddled brain to comprehend, that would be great!

Other things? Since TH posed the question, I am sure other people may be wondering, too. What am I doing for the next month before school starts (yes, it is a trimester system sort of like Tech)?

The answer is integrate. Mathematically and socially, of course. *zing* (blame TH)

So, I know that there is another stage coming in soon after me. If any of you future PCTs are reading this, I highly recommend:

Packing an extra bag inside your other bags. What they don't tell you is that they give you lots and lots of books and other papers that are useful and also use up a lot of space that you had so carefully packed everything you thought you needed for two years. Also, you kind of acquire lots of stuff by accident.

Also, really do bring a good frying pan and spatula.

Tupperware and ziploc bags are awesome.

Peanut butter is everywhere, but it is just not the same.

You don't really need lots of clothes because you can have them made here (or shop in the marche aka the thrift store), but I do highly recommend at least one pair of jeans (I automatically feel 50x more American when I wear them).

They take Visa here, not Mastercard or American Express (if you are thinking of bringing a credit or atm card). And, you can't use that plastic card for much more than atm machines that exist only in really large cities.

Bring a camera and take lots of pictures (unlike me, I am now less camera-happy than during my yesteryears).

I get to read Newsweek when I actually get my mail. The truth is, though, I sort of miss trashy American celebrity gossip, but only really just a tiny bit. I miss not having information readily available at my fingertips more.

Tell your alumni association where you are going. Chances are they will actually send alumni newsletters and the like to you in BF. (Yes, Tech is really doing that!)

Bring a good sense of humor because joking is key in this culture.

Appreciate every last tasty morsel you eat before you get here because you will shed all those pounds you gain before Stage and more!

Okay, it is late by my time, and I am off to bed.

You all can still mail me at my current address, just change the PCT to PCV. If I get a post box within in an hour or so of me, then I will write and hopefully someone can email everyone my new mailing address.

Also, I am expecting lots of love on/for Thursday.

Also, if you recently moved, I may not have your new address.

As you can see, I got my hair braided. This was an extremely long and fairly painful process, but since swear-in is coming up on Friday (for those who are keeping track), I thought it would be nice to get a new 'do. I am not looking forward to taking all the little rubberbands out. This will probably be my primary activity during transport to site when I have nothing better to do. I think hairstyle is a form of art though.

I have also gotten some clothes made. On the left, you will see some awesome fabric that I picked out for pants. In fact, I would like to call them my molecule pants since they remind me of small molecules. It is a big hit with all the other science and math teachers. I also have had some other clothes made, but I don't have any pictures of me in them yet.

Last Thursday, we had our closing ceremony for model school. We presented prizes to the top students in each class (male and female) and the kids danced and lip-synched a bunch of songs. It was fun, almost all of the SE PCTs got up to dance and J--- gave a speech about the seeds of knowledge that we had planted... and something about a garden in French. I handed out a few prizes and even danced a little bit with the kids.

I have been having San lessons lately to prepare myself for going to site. Like Jula and Mooré, there aren't very many verb conjugations. Unfortunately, there is a distinction between past tense, present tense, the infinitive, and the future tense. And, on top of it all, it is a tonal and dialect language like Chinese. As in, different regions speak different dialects of San. It is not like Mooré and Jula where there may be small variations in pronunciation (e.g. Texas vs. UK). There are full out different dialects. So, I have my brain full of local language that I can't get to stick.

This will probably be one of my last few posts before I head off to site and go off-the-grid for a few months. So, I will leave you with a few pictures of people during one of several heavy rain storms that we have had.

BTW, Biking through heavy rain storms is not fun!

PS, I also posted a few other pictures in my photo gallery. And, for this blog, I am too tired to figure out how to rotate the pictures, so you all will just have to bear with it, or perhaps one of my blog editors can figure it out and rotate the photos accordingly.