being neighborly

I was lying down outside my house trying to “repose” when my 4 little neighbor kids came and sat down next to me, started yelling and banging on things and basically driving my crazy, as they often do, which gave me the idea to write about my neighbors and “quartier.”

For starters, kids run rampant. In the neighborhood, the 4 before mentioned kids range form age 3 to 5, I think, and I'm not sure if I've ever seen then with an adult. You know that saying “it takes a village to raise a kid” well that's definitely how it work in Bilanga. And, it's not at all an issue of neglect, I don't think anyone can say a child is neglected here, at least not in the way we consider the word in the States. But it's just you don't have the same worries because everyone knows your kids and will make sure they don't do anything too horrible, make sure they don't get hurt too badly, and that they get some water and what not. There's also a hierarchy of age here. Kids have an unusual respect for adults, or anyone older, so they generally listen. Unfortunately that doesn't always work in my case. Language is a huge part of it, and the fact that I sometimes play with the kids, basically has given certain kids the green light to drive me crazy and never listen.
Ca va aller.

Kids included or not, neighbors are very important here. People generally live in courtyards, usually with family, but not always. There are different houses grouped together, often surrounded by a wall. The people in your courtyard are essential and so are people in surrounding courtyards. You live in such close proximity that you can't help but have your lives intermingle. Neighbors here are people that you can generally go to for anything. You want to borrow a knife, my pot, my broom, no problem. The extras always go to neighbors too. If I have too many tomatoes or onions that are going to spoil I give them to one of the people in my courtyard, and vice versa.

Essentially you share everything. Literally when I step out of my door in the morning the first thing I do is say good morning to my neighbors. Then I cross the 15 ft between my house and my neighbor's to borrow her broom and sweep off my terrace. I don't think a single day passes without someone using something of mine or me using something of another person's. And while the privacy is lacking, I love the sense of community. Also, in some ways I am not as independent, but I also don't need to have as much for just myself, instead of stressing out about getting my own rope and wood to hang up laundry, I use my neighbor's line. And while admittedly, I still struggle with sharing some aspects of my possessions, or food, of life, I'm learning and have grown a lot in that area. I remember there were a couple times my neighbor boys/brothers asked me to do some cooking and things for them and clean up and I was rather annoyed, but then later that day then cooked for me and are continuously helping me in various ways. Everyone helps everyone and it all sorts itself out. It's quite beautiful actually, you don't worry about giving or getting, it just all falls into place, everyone takes care of each other, genuinely.

My courtyard family consists of some pretty great people:

Mariam is an incredible woman who is one of the strongest, independent women I've met in Burkina and is probably also one of the kindest as well. Everyone in village loves and respects her, including me, and while we often do our own thing, if I ever need anything, or just want to chat some, I know she is there. My stove broke a while back and I wasn't sure how I was going to get another one, or pay for another, and she went to another village asked her sister for her old one, brought it back, cleaned it up and gave it to me, sans problem. Unfortunately, it didn't work too well either, so now she takes my old one and goes to find her friend who ends up fixing it for me. It was a bit of work, but since I didn't really know what to do, she took care of everything for me. And in the mean time, she either let me borrow her stove or cooked for me.

David is a student at the CEG (jr high but older) and is responsible for the upkeep of the courtyard and is also my brother (which is kinda funny as my real brother's name is david as well). From day one, he's been helping me out with various things. He's the one that kills the chickens when we get them, or brought me all those fish, or takes me out of the village to go see the extended family. He also has an incredibly caring soul. There's been a few times where I've been really stressed out about something or worried and just ended up explaining my feelings to him and he listened and gave me some great advice.

Kassiom is another brother and one of my best friends. Kassiom is around my age and works for his brother buying and trading different produce, like peanuts or sesame. Also a cultivator and my running partner. I probably fight with Kassiom more than other people, which I believe is a good sign of our friendship, because I feel comfortable enough with him to really tell him what I think. Usually it's over stupid things like what time to get up in the morning to go running (he wants to finish before the sun even starts to come out, and I want to sleep/see the road). My 2 brothers have made a huge difference in my life here, we celebrate together, argue and laugh constantly.

Luuta and Mifaliba are a young couple who live behind my house who are always fun to be around. Luuta is Burkinabe but grew up in the Ivory Coast and just moved to Bilanga a few years ago, so in some ways we can relate to each other really well. There are both around my age as well and whenever they decide to have babies they will probably be the most beautiful kids ever. Their french is more limited but it all works and we laugh a lot with my limited Gulmantche or when Luuta tries to teach me how to make To (the traditional food they eat with everything here).

There was a teacher living in the courtyard as well, with her baby and a girl, but she recently moved to be closer to the school. So, we will be gaining a new member to our random family sometime soon, which is exciting.
But living here has definitely given me a new sense of community, and has taught me a lot about sharing and giving. And while it's not always easy living so closely and intimately with others, I sure wouldn't ever choose to change my situation.

holidays in burkina

So, a little late but I thought it would be fun to write about how I spent my holidays here.

It definitely didn't quite seem like Christmas time when I looked around me and saw all the dust and felt the sun beating down, but it turned out to be a fantastic time.

While Burkina is a majority Muslim country, Bilanga has a majority Christian population and have basically been talking up Christmas for the couple months leading up.

The celebration started some the night before mostly with people hanging out even later than normal, kids singing at the church, a few going out for a drink.

Next morning, get up and everyone heads over to a church. So for big celebrations here, Christmas, marriages, March 8^th (women's day), independence day, you get matching pagnes (material) and make an outfit. For Christmas you get one through your church. Even if you don't get the pagne, you are going to get all decked out in your fanciest clothes. All the girls, from age 2 to 50, the week before get their hair done and then cover it up with a scarf until Christmas morning. Some friends were joking that you need to wait to pick a girl to marry until a few months after Christmas, because at Christmas, every girl is pretty.

Church was a blast. All the choirs were decked out and had been practicing for a while for the day. The kids choir, young adults, and 2 women choirs (it was combined service) all took their turns. The best of when the women started singing and others started dancing. People just seemed more alive and excited this particular morning. While I generally didn't understand what was going on (local language) I felt the energy all around.

Now that church is over, it is time to start cooking and eating and eating and eating. I spent most of the day with my “family” of 2 brothers (my neighbor boys), a friend of theirs, and one of my favorite girls Awa. Kassiom (one brother) brought me a chicken so I cooked the first round of food for us, and the others that were constantly stopping by.

I made a stop by a friend's house whose son got baptized, so it was an even bigger party, and enjoyed some more food and dancing and singing. Came back to find more people and more food that was brought over (you don't give gifts, you give food).

The going out and visiting or receiving friends continued for a while. Each time I left and went into village I was greeted by more people wishing me a “bonne fete” and smiles.

While eating spaghetti, macaroni and having a coke or beer might not seem like a big deal for us, for my brothers, it's something they never do, like never. Yet for Christmas my brothers and friend all put in some money went out a bought lots of pasta and sauce and all sorts of goodies. Kassiom went out and got the 5 of us drinks and then I realized how serious they all were about making the day special, making it a real celebration.

It all continued into the night and ended with me and Awa biking around trying to find dancing, didn't find any, but laughed the whole way around as I sat on the back of the bike rack and she pedaled us all over Bilanga under the moon light sky.

It wasn't quite Christmas like I expected, but it was a day full of friends and joy and I really enjoyed it.

I spent New Year's in Ouagadougou, the capital, with almost everyone from my training group. It including some good food, crazy fireworks that were exploding everywhere, and lots of dancing. Another successful holiday to say the least.

Came back to village the 2^nd and school started back up the 5^th. I've got a few programs up and running which are going fairly well, depends on the day, but so far so good.

Hope you all are well and have begun 2010 well.

6 months in

Hey friends and family,

So it's been a while, thought I'd send out a liitle update along with a request. I hope you are all doing well and finding some time to relax and enjoy yourself amongst the craziness of the holiday season. While it definitely doesn't seem like Christmas and New Year's are around the corner, I am greatly looking forward to celebrating with my new community here and taking some time to just relax. I just spent the last week in Ouagadougou (the capital) for In-Service Training (IST). It was the first time my group had been together since swearing in on August 25th, so it was an exciting reunion full of stories. The first three months at site were designated for learning, adaptation and needs assessment, then we come together for a short training and after wards (really after the holidays) we are supposed to start some projects.

So it's been 6 months in Burkina and I'm starting to feel like it's home, at least home for the next couple years. My community, Bilanga, is fantastic and full of incredible people and while I still struggle sometimes, I wouldn't choose to be any where else in the world right now. The past 3+ months have been a great learning experience and I've enjoyed getting to know my community, and also myself in the process and I'm looking forward to the next 21 months here.

I do have a favor to ask all of you who are interested. I'm trying to work on a project with some of the schools here to provide some more resources for learning, but I need your help. It was inspired by a class I sat in at the CEG (jr high) where the teacher was trying to explain a glacier. Schools here do not really have books yet students are expected to understand and use information given to them about things in which they have never been exposed, and often times the teacher has never been exposed to as well. In this particular class, the students needed to learn formations in nature for a test they will take in order to pass the class. In the example of the glacier, this can be very difficult. None of the students have seen an ocean, or a mountain and many of them have never even seen ice. Now they need to imagine a mountain of ice that floats on the ocean! Not easy. So I thought that it would be cool if I could get pictures of all sorts of things that they might learn about that we can hang in classrooms or make books with or lots of other things. The pictures can be almost anything, because the same problem exists in the primary schools as they are trying to learn basic french words about regular house hold items. However, gaining these images is not easy here. I had a couple other ideas but they aren't going to work out. But then someone gave me the idea of calendars.
So my request is that your send me your old calendars.
Maybe you can even ask a few of your friends for their calendars. I figure they are fairly light weight and easy to send, and often have fantastic pictures. Now, maybe you don't have any or don't really care to send them, and that is totally fine, no worries, but if you have some old ones lying around, or know someone who does, and feel like making a trip to the post (and maybe spending a dollar or two) I would sure appreciate it. It will also be a great way to reuse/recycle for all you environmentalists out there :) This will be a longer on-going project so even if it doesn't happen right away, I would still appreciate it a few months down the road. Thanks so much!

My address has remained the same:

Kimberly Hover, PCV
S/c Corps de la Paix
01 B.P. 6031
Ouagadougou 01, Burkina Faso

I would also like to wish you all Happy Holidays and I genuinely hope you all enjoy the time and are well. I appreciate all teh support so many of you have given me and while it may be more difficult, please let me know if there is anything I can ever do for you.

peace,
kim

the noises of bilanga

The noises of Bilanga

Whoever thinks that because I live in a village that things are quiet and calm, is wrong. Well, it's true village life is much more peaceful than the city. But, it does not come without its own set of noises, and I'd like to tell you about some of them.

• music. quite honestly I wish I heard more of it, yet a day doesn't go by without hearing music throughout Bilanga. Whether it is from a radio that is constantly being played by my neighbor, or a cassette at the kisoque (place where you can get food), or on some nights when the moon is clear and the youth get together to play drums. and always if you catch some ivory coast music, it is guaranteed to hear “tout le monde, tout le monde”

• roosters (get ready there will be lots of animal ones). whoever said that roosters only crow when the sun comes up, didn't realize that roosters crow all the time. I probably don't go 10 minutes without hearing a rooster, it happens so often that I don't ever notice it anymore. well, except when I'm trying to sleep or relax and it's outside my window...

• donkeys. I'm pretty sure if you're 2 miles away you can still hear the cries of burkina donkeys. they use their entire body and let out this enormous yell, and normally for no apparent reason. and there are A LOT of donkeys in bilanga.

• dog fights. burkina dogs are definitely not like US dogs. they are mean and are used for protection, and they run everywhere. and one dog gets a whif of another on its property, there is at least a growl or two coming. every so often though you will catch a real dog fight, everyone jumps out of the way, sometimes people throw rocks to try to get them to stop, but usually you just step back and after a minute or two a winner is decided and life continues.

• motos. if you have any money here, you buy a moto. basically a motorcycle but more like a scooter most of the time, is the transport of choice. in bilanga cars are limited to 2 people but there are a few more with motos. but the vroom of a moto becomes a regular background noise, but it never goes unnoticed either. when you hear a moto coming, everyone turns and looks to see who is coming. the sound of a moto usually means the arrival of someone with a definite role within the community.

• greetings. if you recall my first entry where I talked about the importance of greetings, it might be even more important in Bilanga. so you will always hear people shouting at each other “fa fa ma” or “tusima” or “a cha le” and don't forget all the “o” sounds in gulmanchema. you respond with “lompo” or “n po” or “n to.” haha, lots of “o”s constantly jumping across the spaces of bilanga.

• definitely cannot forget the pigs. every morning around 5 or 6 you will hear the noise of pigs eating. for the first month I was convinced I was hearing pigs being slaughtered. I don't understand it, but when pigs feed they squeal, and they squeal like they are dying, it's actually quite terrible. for a while I was sleeping outside due to the heat, and I was greeted each morning with the high pitch squeal of pigs, not exactly the most pleasant way to wake up.

• laughter. burkinabe have a fantastic sense of humor, it's quite refreshing. so throughout the village you will always hear someone laughing.

• the moulin. the mill. everyone in bilanga eats To. To is something made from millet or corn crushed up and prepared with boiling water to make a porridge type material that you eat with different types of sauce. But in order to get make To you first need to bring you millet or corn to the moulin, a small machine that grinds up the grain into a fine powder. so often you will hear the constant turning of the moulin in various spots of the village.

• tin roofs. about half the houses here have tin roofs. they are cheap and easy to install but not the most conducive to sleep or simply not being startled. Often a bird or lizard or who knows what animal scatters across the roof of my house, and sometimes it scares me into a jump. Anything noise that touches the roof is amplified by 10 into the house. When it sprinkles, you think it is pouring. Rainy season is over now, and one more reason they don't have school during rainy season, is that you can't even hear yourself think when it rains and you are under a tin roof.

• kids. kids are everywhere and makes all sorts of noises. whether it be crying or screams or laughter or the general noise of kids playing and running about, the children make constant entertainment foron lookers, particularly myself.

well, that's a good start anyways of some of the noises of Bilanga. While overall Bilanga is a calm place, it is definitely not a quiet one.

things are continuing to go well. the more time I spend in village the more comfortable I feel and more friendships I form and the more it feels like home.

I hope you all are well, miss you and I send lots of love from west africa.

keeping busy?

Hey friends and family. I've now been at site for 2 months and still enjoying it. Things related to work are slow and frustrating, but village life and making friends is going really well. There is so much happening and so many great people there. However, I stayed a little long and am quite glad to have a couple days break and see some other volunteers a bit in the capital. Start the journey back tomorrow though. The following was written originally in my journal but has been edited for your viewing pleasure :)

September 24, 2009

It's 8am and all I've done today is bucket shower, fed my cat, ate breakfast, washed dishes, doctored my semi-infected mosquito bites, cleaned bloody fish, cooked and served said fish; pas des problems. I feel like I could stop for the day and be accomplished, but I've still got to go get water, clean a lot more dishes, clean my house, try and study 2 languages I need to learn, go talk with about 10 different people, cook again, try to do something/learn something related to Girls Education in Bilanga, all while checking in on my cat who thinks he's starving every couple hours. Pas des problems, as long as I don't have to repeat yesterday.

Yesterday started with a nice but not so relaxing bike ride as I was really too tired. After that was the usual bucket bath, eat, try to read a little. Then I decided I really needed to do laundry, I leave for 5 minutes to get soap and come back to find my cat looking like he's going to die because some little kid hurt him. And while most of the time I don't really like the cat, he's still mine and my responsibility but I really hope when he gets bigger he's not so needy. So I finished my laundry which quite frankly is hard and I do not enjoy, but it has to be done.

All this is happening while this horrible smell is coming from my house of fish that my neighbor/brother gave me the night before but I didn't know what to do with. My other neighbor comes but I ask her and she tells me I need to do it asap or it will become "gater" or spoiled. But I seriously don't know what to do, the fish is still whole and I know some need to be gutted before cooked. As the day before I went with my friend to the dam and watched her buy and clean the fish to prepare them to fry and sell.

My neighbor tells me she'll come back in a little to help. My counterpart comes and tells me to throw it out but then my neighbor comes back and it is embarrassing, hilarious and fun cooking with her. It's tricky a bit because I don't have the same things as the people in my village do for cooking and I also have no experience with this. The two times I think I've prepared fish, it came frozen in a box and I all I had to do was stick it in the oven. Most people here have never heard of an oven.

Though eating here has made me realize how wasteful we are as Americans. For example, the meat we buy comes ready and simple, but how much meat was thrown out before you get the pieces you wan? Here, if possible, you eat it. People are starving here but you wouldn't realize it at first because there is always a lot of food around. But in reality, most people just eat a little at a time of the stuff they have to buy and all other time it is To, which only temporarily feeds the appetite, it doesn't really feed the body, nor does most of the food they have here. I find myself wanting to eat a lot more than necessary because my diet always seems to be lacking something, and I have more money than others to get whatever food I really want, that's available.

Anyways, background info. So we prepare the fish but my neighbor/brother comes and tastes it and says it's gone bad already. So he has to go throw out this big pot of fish and I feel like such a failure. He assures me it's fine but I know it is not, he worked hard to catch that fish and if he had sold it he could've made enough money to eat off of for a couple days, or eat the fish himself. It was the only food I've really seen go to waste since coming to Burkina.

But Burkinabe are patient and understanding. I feel like I've made 100 mistakes here but people keep helping me out, showing me the way. My brother went fishing again the next night and this morning we prepared the fish together and it turned out really good.

After the fish extravaganza, my 2 brothers retrieved 2 watermelons, or pas sec, which were a treat except for one of my brothers sliced his finger (really really badly, should have gone to doctor) and I tried to doctor him up. I played guitar with someone for a while, actually I watched him play. Then I visited several people before calling it a night and despite the unbearable heat I managed to crash quickly and deeply, of course, after feeding my ever hungry cat.

For someone who strongly believes in a common worldwide humanity, sometimes I am really taken aback by how different it is here. More than anything its just exposure, living in village definitely limits your perspective. I so badly sometimes just want to take people here for one day to shown them the US, to show them a grocery store, sky scrappers, boats, ovens, cities without farm animals everywhere, sidewalks, restaurants, the list can continue...
Not to say no one knows about these things, Ouaga has a lot and a lot of people have traveled, but definitely not the majority.

Then, I get asked a lot of questions. Some simple, like do you have corn in the US? yes lots, but not millet. Do you have sheep? yes, but they look different. And other questions that are quite difficult to answer, like, do you have lots of hungry skinny children in the US like here? Or other things like trying to explain the educational system in the US or why being 23 without a husband and kids is quite normal, or why it is hard for me to remember everyone's names, or to not use my left hand, ever, or why I don't know how to prepare To (what everyone eats) or prepare much for that matter.

But as frustrating as that all can seem to be, it is also the beauty of this experience, and a large goal of this experience, we learn from each other, everyday, and do so in an open and understanding manner.

----


okay, hope all is well with you. talk to you again in a month, and thanks everyone for all the support you've been sending my way, much appreciated!

just a few snaps

Here's just a few photos that's I've been holding on to. My camera isn't really working too well so I haven't been able to really take pictures of my house and village, but I managed to snag a couple of my cat!

His name is Umanli which means luck in Gulmanchema (my local language). My neighbors/brothers named him because he had a lot of luck that I found him. His mom got killed and his brothers all died and he was going to but I found him so he lived, thus the luck. I've had him a month now, so you can imagine how little he was then. He's quite honestly a pain but he keeps me company. He provides for a lot of fun interaction with my community members as well. I often get asked "A buga te?" or "How is your child?" and I respond "beeni" or "good" because now I have a "kid" and we laugh a lot.



The other photos I have are from the swearing in ceremony in Ouaga when I became an official volunteer. We all got traditional complets made for the event. My host sister helped me pick out the pagne (material) and the tailor.

Me ready to go


Jessi and Tyler in their matching pagnes.

Colette, Devin and Mikey all dressed up.

here is the lovely ladies of my language group with our 2 professors, some of my favorite people in burkina in this photo.

striking a pose. seriously love these girls!

about to write another blog with more updates.

beginings

Well folks, I survived my first 3 weeks! We had our swearing-in ceremony in the capital on the 25th and on the 27th I moved to my new home.

I arrived in Fada today, after a very very very dusty bush taxi ride, my regional capital, one of the larger towns in Burkina. It's a little overwhelming here after being in my village for a little while but nice as well.

I've been trying to think about what I could write about for my first blog after moving to site, and I haven't been really able to think of much. Which is actually kind of funny considering I have a lot of thoughts about these next 2 years after my first 3 weeks at site. But I can't manage to find myself yet, which means I can't find my thoughts to share with you all. Most of the time, things are fine, things seem normal as I go day to day trying to discover my village, but other times it hits me that I will be here for 2 years, have to create work, and don't really know anyone, and it gets quite overwhelming.

The people of Bilanga have been kind to me though. While in some ways I wish I was meeting more people, every time I interact with someone, they are incredibly helpful and friendly. When I finally get the courage to ask someone for help, I am overwhelmed with how willing everyone is to do anything for me. Including watching my baby kitten that I “rescued” recently (it's mom died and it's so little I have to hand feed it) while I take off for a couple days. Or taking me to their fields to show me around, then giving me a chicken to prepare! (And then killing it, handing me the body parts, including the head and unborn eggs, and telling me to enjoy. Which I might add I made a really fine dish out of and shared with my neighbors who also really enjoyed it.) Or simply going with me to buy things when I don't know where to go.

Most of my time has been just filled with me trying to figure out how to do simply daily tasks. Even though it's a village, finding a place to buy bread is an adventure. Doing household tasks take up a lot of my time, like fetching water, cleaning dishes, cooking. Chatting with people, or sitting with people, takes of the rest of my time. I frequent a few places everyday to chat with some people who have befriended me. I've also enjoyed taking some bike rides and getting out to see the area, it is actually quite beautiful. There are 2 dams here which are incredible and the fields are everywhere. The millet in some places reaches 15 feet tall and sets quite the scenery.

The first 3 months were given to us to “discover” our communities. So I'm not really expected to start any projects until December or January, which I am very grateful for. But I do have a list of about 80 questions I am supposed to answer about my village. There is so much going on in my community and it's been hard to figure much out so far. I really like that aspect of the Peace Corps; we need to know our communities and the people before really thinking about what can be done. Everything I do needs to come from the people, which will be hard sometimes, but so so necessary for success.

That's really all I got for now. Stay tuned, hopefully I'll make it to internet again in a month with a more detailed update. And I should have more time to write some of you as well.
One more thing, if you ever end up in a village in Burkina Faso, bring a deck of cards, instant friends, guaranteed!

peace, always,
Kim