a 2ND video blog!?!

Well, the Peace Corps Burkina Faso 50th Anniversary Fair is over and done.  It was this last week in Ouaga, and, as you will see in the video, it was a chance for volunteers to showcase their work.  There are some really awesome organizations making and doing amazing things.  It was the first time I was able to see a lot of the work that I'd heard about from friends and it was just so cool to see everyone in their element.  And the Burkinabe Prime Minister and First Lady stopped by to check it out!

So yeah, we're kind of a big deal.

1,2,3,4

This last weekend Peace Corps Burkina Faso held a 50th anniversary fair held here in Ouagadougou.  The fair was an opportunity for volunteers to share what work they've been doing with their communities and to help explain exactly what Peace Corps does.  The fair included performances by different groups and activities to try and involve fair-goers in what we were working on.  I helped out for a day at the performance booth and was able to get some video of a volunteer teaching a song about hand washing.  It is sung to the tune of Feist's 1,2,3,4 and was written by volunteer Halley B.  Sorry that you can hear me singing in some parts... :P

FRENCH

un, deux, trois, quatre : je me repose sur la natte

cinq, six, sept, huit : je me lave avant la nuit

et cette soiree, ma mere a preparé

tô avec bonne sauce, mais avant de manger,

ooooh, je lave les mains,

ooooh, je lave les mains

un, deux, trois, quatre : brosse les dents avec la pâte

cinq, six, sept, huit : je fait bouillir mon eau de puits

et mon ami, kando jacqueline,

elle fait quelque chose après la latrine

ooooh, elle lave les mains

ooooh, elle lave les mains

on lave les mains, c'est pour eviter

les maux de ventre et la diarrhee

ooooh, nous lavons les mains

ooooh, nous lavons les mains

ENGLISH

1,2,3,4 I lay on the mat

5,6,7,8 I shower before bed

and this evening, my mom made

tô with good sauce, but before eating

ooooh, i wash my hands

ooooh, i wash my hands

1,2,3,4 Brush your teeth with toothpaste

5.6.7.8 I boil my well water

and my friend, Jacqueline,

she does something after using the bathroom

ooooh, she washes her hands

ooooh, she washes her hands

we wash our hands to avoid

stomach aches and diarrhea

ooooh, we wash our hands

ooooh, we wash our hands

The problem with water...

One of the most common complaints I hear from my friends in Yaho is the problem with water.  Yaho doesn't have running water, but did have a water filter and pump system put in by WaterAid.  There were about 5-7 places around the village where you could go and get treated water from a spigot/tap/etc for 10FCFA ($0.02) for 25 liters of water.  Not a bad system.  Of course functionaires (teachers, nurses, etc) will whine that they don't have running water in their houses, but we work with what we have, right?  There is a spigot within walking distance for almost everyone and certainly within biking distance for everyone.  The water was treated; so less people got sick and they didn't have to haul water out of a well themselves.

Well, about 3 months ago, the filter system broke. And it's going to cost lots of money to fix it... I think that the money collected from every fill-up is supposed to be set aside and then used in case of emergencies such as this, but the problem is bigger than they anticipated.  And because no one can come get water, they have no way of making any more money.  Needless to say, it's a problem.  Women now use open-well water for their cooking, cleaning, drinking or they have to walk/bike a much further distance to get clean water.  Open wells are almost everywhere, so they're convenient and most women choose to use them.  Unfortunately, because they're open, there are problems with sanitation.  Anything can (and does) run into the wells, making the water unsafe to drink.  There are two direct-source pumps in the village, one near the center of town and the other over 1km away at the school where I teach.  But if you don't have a bike, do you really want to carry 25L of water on your head?

During this last school year, I would just bring my water containers to school and students would bring them home for me.  On weekends I would use the WaterAid water.  This summer I was already not looking forward to having to get my own water, and once the WaterAid pumps broke, that job became even more of a challenge.  There were many (many) days were I would seriously consider if a shower or washing dishes was really necessary if it meant I would have to go get water (for the record, shower is usually worth it, dishes are not).  This summer I was also in and out of village a lot, so getting into a routine was difficult.  The last time I was in Yaho I did finally seem to get a routine down and thought i would share with you all my typical day's excursion to the pump!

First, I would strap the container to my bike and head off to school. There I would stand and pump water for maybe 5 minutes before strapping it back on.  The container is 25L, so about 50lbs when full.

i should probably clean the container...

 Every now and then I will run into some kids at the pump who help me get water, but that's pretty rare these days because they're out in the fields.  After filling up the jug, lugging it up onto my bike, and strapping it down tight, I bike off.  The roads are also really bad right now because the rains wash them out.  If it rained that morning or the day before, I sometimes have to walk my bike so I don't get stuck in the mud.  I'm getting better at mud biking, but falling with one of those jugs strapped to your bike is less than fun. Not that I would know, of course :)

one of the girls i see everyday biking to school.  she offered to hold my bike for the picture and seemed disappointed that i only needed one jug so i wouldn't be back :)

this is where it can get muddy... less than fun.

After the bike back i unstrap the jug, lug it into the house and continue to convince myself that showering is worth the effort.  I only use about one of the containers a day (25L), which is roughly the same amount of water used in flushing a US toilet twice.  During hot season, the amount of water i drink a day and the amount I need to shower is almost the same (5-ish liters).

Luckily, school starts again in a week; meaning that the days of making my students do all sorts of manual labor can start once again :)

My time on the Bike Tour

BIKE!

So I just finished up my stint with the bike tour!  It was awesome and hard and fun and sweaty and tiring and great.

The first day we biked from Bobo to Bereba, which we thought would only be 106k.  Little did we know, it was really about 130k and we were not happy at 1:30 that afternoon when we still hadn't had any lunch.  But then we ate and all crankiness went away!  Once we got to Bereba, we were greeted by a soccer team who biked into town with us.  In town we were greeted by the Chef (chief) du Village, who had the coolest throne/seat ever.  It was made from an old car seat welded to metal legs, haha.

After greeted all the appropriate people, we went to the village library and played a BINGO-type reading game with some elementary aged students. We went out for a drink with the Chef, ate some great fried chicken and rice with peanut sauce, then I promptly passed out for the night.  Sleep well deserved.

My first morning! This was before we knew that we'd miscalculated the distance by 20k not in our favor :P

Our uniformed entourage.

 The next morning we headed to Dedougou, which means we passed the turn to my site!! (My site is about 30k directly north of Bereba, but to get there by roads you have to add about 50k)  That day was the toughest for me, mostly because I'd biked 130k the day before.  It was hilly again (my first day was also hilly) and after about 100k, my butt was officially kicked.  But we finally made it into town where our host had plates of rice and sauce just waiting for us.  It was perfect.
That evening we talked with some youth about HIV/AIDS, which was very interesting.  The group that came was a group of young men and women who are trained to go around the community and talk about safe sex.  I don't think any of them had done that yet, but they had obviously been trained.  The group also had condoms that they gave out as part of their campaign.  There is a stigma here that if you use condoms you must be infected, so a lot of people are ashamed to use condoms.  But through awareness programs like this people are becoming more educated on the topic!
Once again, after the talk and dinner (more chicken!), we all passed out for the night.

YAHOo!

The next day we headed to Tenado, and it was my first day of all dirt road. Luckily, it's dirt road that is about to be paved so it's packed down and pretty smooth, unlike the dirt road by me, which is a mud/gravel pit.  Halfway to Tenado we stopped in Tcheriba, a town known for it's pottery.  The volunteer there had a huge collection (a tea set, dishes, decorations) that she said ran her $10 total.  So i think i need to go back and buy some souvenirs!
In Tcheriba we met with the volunteers counterparts and other association leaders and talked about volunteerism.  One of the volunteers on the tour is actually working with the National Volunteer Association here in Burkina, so he was able to add quite a bit to the convo.  The NVA might be comparable to Americorps back home.
After lunch, we jumped back on the road to make it to Tenado for dinner.  Unfortunately, the road after Tcheriba was not as nice as the morning making the ride much more difficult.

Muddy roads

Biking into Tenado

Tenado to Koudougou was my shortest day yet, even though we did go the long way around to stop at another volunteer's site, Reo.  In Reo we met with a women's association where the volunteer led a Neem Cream making demonstration.  Neem Cream is a mosquito repellent lotion made from the leaves a local tree, Neem.  First you boil the leaves in water until they turn the water green,then take them out. Next, add shea butter (locally made here, very very cheap and easy to find) and a bar of soap (to help it thicken back up) and keep it on the fire until everything is melted.  After it's melted, just let it cool and you've got Neem Cream.  Very easy and now that i know the measurements, i hope to make it this fall with my neighbors!
After the demonstration we biked the 15k into Kdg, where we met the mayor before finally getting some lunch at about 5 that evening :P  My friend in Kdg had her parents visiting, so I joined them for dinner before once again going to bed early.
The next day was our day off, and let me say: it was much needed.  I slept in, walked around in search of my breakfast and simply enjoyed the ceiling fan in my room.  That afternoon we hosted a joint meeting of the local English clubs.  We watched a movie about American history, answered questions about that as well as questions about American culture in general.
That evening for dinner we were actually not overly exhausted and could even enjoy the meal, haha!

Sunrise coming out of Koudougou

My last full day on the tour was another 100k+ day, once again all dirt road.  We actually left that morning when we said we were going to, so we made it into Latodin by a normal lunch time. We ate lunch, met the volunteer's hospital staff and mayor, drank a free beer, then ate dinner and passed out, per usual.

The next morning was my last day, and I was hoping to catch a 7am bus in a village 25k away.  Needless to say, we left early that morning.  We did make it in time for the bus, and i did make it in time for a 10 mtg in the capital!  Success!

Overall, I had a great time!  I learned so much from each of the volunteers we stopped to visit and thoroughly enjoyed seeing how each of them lived within their communities.  I hope to bring some of the new ideas i learned back to my site.  The bike tour is still going on for another two-ish weeks, so check out their blog if you're interested in more updates!  And of course, you can still donate to the GAD fund :)

Map!

View Bike Tour! in a larger map

Here's a map of the route that I will be biking! Check out the previous post for more info!

Tour du Faso!

So what is the Burkina Bike Tour?

The Bike Tour was started last year as a fundraiser for our Gender and Development Committee (GAD). The riders in the tour ask their friends and family back home to make a donation to in support of them biking the tour. The money was then used to fund small grants for volunteers and their communities throughout this past year. All the projects that grant money was used for had to help promote the development of women and girls. (This really awesome project was done by my nearest neighbor, a Girls' Empowerment and Education volunteer who lives about 30km from my village! She used grant money to train some middle school girls to act as "health agents," teaching the community about a variety of topics.)

This year, in addition to using the tour as a fundraiser, the GAD committee wanted to use it as an opportunity to spread awareness about Peace Corps Burkina Faso and about individual projects volunteers are working on. I know this year's route was chosen so that they are passing through as many sites as possible. At some of the sites we pass through, through group will help lead a formation (session? sometimes i forget that words i use aren't really english words...) about hand washing, hygiene, malaria, family planning, or anything else that the volunteer wants to put together. In some villages, we will have a welcome festival and simply enjoying spending time spent eating and dancing.

The Bike Tour is going to cover a total of 1800km (about 1120 miles) over 22 days. I will biking 7 days for a total of 572km (355 miles) for an average of 96km/day! I'm super excited, and I tell myself that 100km is not actually that much; most cars can do it in an hour, so I figure I can do it in a day, right? The tour starts on the south-western corner of the country, and I'm starting at the third little dot. I'm ending at the most northern dot, and if you're curious, my village is just north of the 4th dot.

Yes, there are more dots than sites listed. We are just passing through some villages, and spending the night in others.

So now that you know all about the Bike Tour, consider donating to the GAD committee. I mean, what better way to spend some tax-deductible money than on the development of women in one of the poorest countries in the world. And you do get quite a bang for you buck, too. At the current exchange rate: $8 will buy all the needed supplies for a hand washing station (bucket, spigot, and soap); $10 is enough to buy notebooks and pens for girls' camp of 15 girls; and just $2.50 is enough to feed each of those girls breakfast, lunch, AND dinner for that same week long camp. So without starting to sound like one of those infomercials for sponsoring children, even a little bit goes a long way! If you do donate, make sure to mark GAD Gender and Development in the comments box. Here's the website, and the donation box is on the right hand side.

I will hopefully have at least one update on how the tour is going, but I'm not sure what our internet access is going to be like. If not, I will most definitely write all about it once I'm done :) Also, if you have any other questions about the donations or grants, let me know!

Ghana has the best French Toast!

Ironic if you think about the fact that Burkina is a French speaking country and Ghana isn't...

So back in June I traveled to Ghana with a few friends, Val, Shannon, Celenia and John. We visited Busua, Akwiida, Cape Coast and Kumasi, spending almost all of our time relaxing on the beach. It wasn’t really hot when we were there, but we actually really enjoyed the nice and cool weather after our weeks of 100+ temps in Burkina.

One of the first things we noticed after crossing the border into Ghana was the number of children wearing shoes. Even in a somewhat small village/city. Everyone had shoes, and they were nicer than cheap flip flops!! After a couple more days in country, we started noticing that very few people wore pagne (local fabric) clothes; most people were wearing western style clothing. In Burkina, it is not at all uncommon to see a woman wearing simply a piece of fabric wrapped around as a skirt. Even in the capital city, this is not an uncommon sight. But in Ghana, I think I only saw two women throughout the week who sported the simple pagne skirt.

One thing we often talk about amongst volunteers is how buff Burkinabe are, men and women! Every woman in my village has the most muscled arms you can imagine. And every boy over the age of 8 has a well defined six pack. In Ghana this was not the case: we saw almost no well-toned arms, and everyone seemed to be carrying a few more pounds around the waist. I am certain this difference is due to richer diet and a less physical labor required, but it really struck me how obviously healthier Ghanaians looked.

After living in Burkina for a year, my perceptions of what is “normal” most definitely have changed: What is normal body size, what is normal to expect in a grocery store, what is a normal level of cleanliness for children, etc. And Ghana once again shook up my ideas of all of these. The grocery stores had so much more to offer!! (it still is nowhere near an American store though). It’s funny, because just before leaving we were talking about the movie Green Zone and how everything in the war-torn city looked nicer than Ouaga :P

Because of the big differences we noticed in Ghana, I looked into the gap in income between the two countries. According to CIA World Factbook Ghana’s GDP per capita is $2500 and Burkina’s is $1200 (and the US’s is $47,200). Even more interesting: Ghana’s unemployment rate is 11%, while Burkina’s is 77%!! (US is 9.7%). So it’s one thing to be told I’m living in one of the poorest countries in the world, and it’s another thing all together to think that a country with a per capita GDP of $2500 has it made :P

In Burkina, the common mode of transportation is a small motorcycle (called a moto). In big cities there are enough of these to completely fill the streets and cars are rare. In Ghana there were cars everywhere!! Motos were rare and roads were better condition.

Anyway, back to vacation-y things. One of the days we were staying in Akwiida, three of us biked to the nearby Cape Three Points. The cape claims to be the closest landmass to the intersection of the equator and the prime meridian (0 degrees for both latitude and longitude), aka the center of the world! One look at a map argues that there are probably closer points, but it is certainly one of the closest on the continent! While the bike ride would have been much more fun on bikes that weren’t really crappy, it was still rather enjoyable (and kind of scary going down some of those hills!)

Our second to last day was when we headed to Cape Coast, and I really wish we would have spent another day there. Yes, it was a little more touristy, but it had a lot of cool things to offer that the smaller places we were staying didn’t have. We did get to see the castle in Cape Coast and we noticed that the part of the castle that you only see from the ocean hadn’t been white washed as recently as the street view side :)

Unfortunately, after our relaxing week, we had to spend over 24 hours in transport getting back in to Burkina. Transport was just as awful on the way there, but this time there wasn’t a beach at the end of it :/

Also, I probably gained about 5 lbs that week from eating, drinking, and relaxing to my heart’s content. And I’d do it again in a second :)