Friends

Friends!
So far, my closest friend is most definitely Sita, my neighbor. She is her husband’s second wife and she is pregnant with her second child. Her son, Yacoba, is 4 years old and adorable. He’s a little scared of me, but I’m sure that will go away with time. Sita’s husband and first wife live the courtyard next door as well, the husband owns coffee kiosk, so I spend a lot of time there just hanging out (also my house doesn’t have chairs yet, so if I want to sit and read, I’ll usually do it at the kiosk). The other wife doesn’t speak French, meaning I definitely talk more to Sita, and I’m embarrassed to admit that I forget her name more often than not (like right now…) But she is also really nice, we just aren’t really able to communicate right now. She has 3 or 4 boys as well (there is one I’m not sure if he lives there or just comes to hang out.)
Sita is only 21 years old, and was born and raised here in village. She did not finish school, but has pretty good French in spite of that. She is very social and I think just about everyone in the village knows her. The family is Muslim (note, two wives) meaning they just celebrated the end of Ramadan, which finished last week, and we had a giant fete! For the fete, instead of having all the friends and family over to their house, the women make lots of food, then go around and deliver it to their friends and family. I’m not sure yet if this is how all celebrations are or if this is specific to Ramadan, so I’ll get back to you on that. I have to admit, I because I didn’t know that how things worked, I kept waiting all day for everyone to get there. I was invited to dinner at Sita’s parents house, and also was expected a lot of people to be there, but it was just the family members who lived in that courtyard. At the end of night though, I did get to go out dancing with Sita and some other women! The bar was certainly packed!! I ended up dancing with the moms, mostly because after a couple guys asked me to dance, I realized that I don’t really know who any of my students are yet, and that dancing with them at a club might not be the best way to meet them… I was also exhausted because it was most definitely past my 9pm bedtime, haha! But it was really fun to see so many people from the village together.
Most nights after I eat dinner, I go over to Sita’s and we sit and talk for an hour or so after the sun sets (meaning I can’t do anything in my house) but before I want to go to bed. Even though we don’t understand each other perfectly, it is really nice to have someone to answer all my questions about the village. As I said before, Sita is very social, so I think she enjoys having telling me about the culture and customs as well :)
The second closest friend I have here is another women named Nadine, who works at the CSPS (health center) as a nurse. There are always at least 3 employees at a CSPS, the major, who is the head nurse and in charge of all administrative task (Alexander), the maternity nurse (Nadine), and a third nurse in charge of all the rest (Eliane). Our CSPS also has a health agent (not exactly sure what his role is, but he often seems busy) a grounds keeper (Felix) and a dispensary person (in charge of the pharmacy, Solange). I often go over to the CSPS to chat, and Nadine’s sister Chantal was visiting for the month, so she would often have a little more free time than Nadine to chat with me. Nadine is also unmarried, which is rare for a woman her age, which I think has to be at least 26 if not a year or two older. To become a nurse in Burkina you only have to finish CEG (college d’enseignment generale), which is somewhere between middle school and high school. The next level up is lycee, which is like a mix of high school and jr. college.
Nadine also told me that there is a women’s functionaires group in my village. Functionaires are anyone who works for the government, including nurses and teachers. The group consists of the two nurses mentioned above as well some primary school teachers and all the wives of male functionaires. I have to admit that I have mixed feelings about the idea of me joining the group. On one side, I know that all of these women will be able to speak French, which is a little hard to come by here, but on the other, I don’t want to associate only with functionaires when that isn’t the point of my being here in the village. But maybe I can also use the group as a starting point for things I might want to accomplish in the village (even that would be more of a top-down approach, which might not work in all situations). Either way though, as a friend pointed out, I’m sure the get togethers will have great food!!
Well, other than the small groups of friends I’ve mentioned above, I have to admit that I have been somewhat hesitant to get to know people here. I think part of that is that during stage we hear all of the worst case scenarios that have happened to volunteers, so I am probably the most on-guard right now that I will ever be during my service. I think part of it is also that I’m just not an entirely outgoing person unless I first have a reason to be interacting with someone. I know that I need to work on that because if I only befriend people I have a built in reason to interact with, I’m only going to be friends with the 5-6 men who work at the school with me! And as I just get to know people in general I’ll figure out who are the faux-types (literally: false types) and who are actually nice :)