They don't play hockey in Burkina Faso

I think I know how to end this blog.

2011-12-14T18:49:00.000-08:00

I was recently asked a pretty mundane question that actually got me thinking: “What is the thing you’re most proud of in life?”

It didn’t take me any time at all to answer, despite the fact that I hadn’t tried to answer that question even once since I got home. The answer was strange to say. I guess I expected that when I got home, I would break up my experience into little successes and failures, that I would be able to say how proud I was to build a library, or to have taught in French… But it's not.

The fact is, we judge what we're proud of doing based on what other people think. That sounds seedy, but what is pride if not satisfaction derived from what everyone else deems worthy? It IS one of the seven deadly sins.

When I tell people I was in the Peace Corps, that's enough for them to say "wow! Where were you?" and I tell them where, and if they ask what I did I say I was a science teacher. And after that they say "Holy crap, that's really cool. That's incredible." And it's not because I taught science. People aren't very much impressed by a science teacher (though, they should be). It's because I up and joined the f***ing Peace Corps. Cut and dry.

So, what am I most proud of? Simply joining the Peace Corps, and following through. For me, there were a lot of meaningful experiences, a lot of failures, a few successes...but no one but another Peace Corps volunteer has the context to evaluate them. And we're not a judgmental bunch anyways (we know how much of both our failures and our successes were out of our control). The details will fade into memory. Think about it this way: have you ever wondered how successful a veteran was in the field? I'm guessing no. You just respect what they did, because you can't possibly fathom what it was...

I'm thinking about my current work with the Red Cross. I'm glad to be writing, proud of the moments when readers have complemented me on it, but let's be serious--I think it's way cooler that I’ve eaten dog, that I can convert CFA to dollars with effortless ease, that someone once tried to sell me a monkey, and so do they. The Peace Corps will probably overshadow everything I'll ever do for the rest of my life. (And that kind of makes me tear up...only because it's over.)

I think that's a good note to end the blog on. Thanks to everyone who followed along for the past two and a half years. It's been pretty wild.

-Jon

One way to sum it up...

2011-11-18T18:05:00.000-08:00

I've been thinking quite a bit, for the last several months, about how I might sum up my experience; talk about what I learned. And, as with most things you sit on for this long, it's usually so obvious you don't acknowledge it's presence.

I acknowledged it when I read the story of another volunteer. Now, I don't know if this story will ring true with those who were never in the Peace Corps. Perhaps it's like humor: "You had to be there...", where a joke isn't funny when it's explained to you. Maybe it wont make any sense to you. But here it is nonetheless:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/maya-lau/what-the-peace-corp-taugh_b_1099202.html

That's a wrap.

2011-08-10T09:28:00.000-07:00

I've been asked by a few friends and family members whether or not I'm going to write a final post. You know, something to wrap up my experience. I'm hesitant to do so--I fear I'd be putting it in a box, in a time capsule. I'd make it into something with a distinct start and finish, and I'd move onto the next thing, unfazed, unaffected by it.

The truth is, it's more complicated than that. While I am not physically in Burkina Faso anymore, my mind seems to have a hard time believing what's around it. I was a groomsman in a childhood friend's wedding last weekend, and all sorts of other things are different from when I left here to join the Peace Corps, but I'm floating through it all in a dream-like state. Not interacting so much with my surroundings as trying to absorb them, make sense of them. It's a strange feeling.

I had an actual dream early this morning, before finally pulling myself out of bed. I dreamed I was back in Thyou, with my sister. We drove our crappy little white Ford Focus there. In my dream logic, I though I should return to village one last time before shipping out for good.

My sister drops me off in my village, at the big boutique. I buy something and I start biking back to my house (don't ask where the bike came from), and then I think, "Oh, no! I don't have my keys! And I've already packed up and moved all my stuff! Though...I suppose there's enough stuff in there that I left for the next volunteer to survive for a few days. However, food-wise, I'll have to eat at a neighbor's. So, I'll just have to go to the Principal's house to get my key from him."

I continue biking, but then I get lost. How did I get lost in my own village!? Well, the thing is, it was all totally different--semi-developed... There was this big cement arc-shaped entrance-way, and a big flashing screen like the ones we have at the front of banks that tell you the temperature and time. My village looked like a weird mix between a high-tech colony on Mars and...well, my village. The village of my memory.

Of course, I'm lost, so I start to worry. Then my sister pulls around the corner in the car (the cavalry to save the day!). I get in (she's somehow picked up two white girls--friends of hers?--who are sitting in the back seats, but they're irrelevant to the outcome of this dream). Then we're driving and the car is beeping because it's dangerously low on gas. So I say to go over to the gas station (my village DID have one). We come up on a stop light. (Yep.) And then there's this girl who's sort of...biking with a cart rigged up to her bike, with a water drum in it. And she can't stop fast enough, so the water drum goes flying into the gutter on the side of the road, and she soon follows.

And then I wake up.

I'm trying to figure out if this dream means anything to me. Possibly, I'll never get back to Thyou again. That I know. And if I do, it will be too far in the future to be the same as I remember it. And it will develop, however slow. But I'm in a different world now, obviously. With cars and check-engine lights and flashing signs on banks that tell you the weather. And I guess my brain is trying to wrap itself around that. Though, smartphones did not make an appearance in my dream. I still can't believe those things exist.

Yes, my service in Burkina is over. But I haven't quite gotten over it. Perhaps I never will. Certainly, the experience has become an unshakable part of me. So, maybe there are a few blog posts yet to come as I get comfortable with the new world around me.

The Library is Open!

2011-05-14T02:43:00.000-07:00

It took a little longer than expected, of course, but my school and I were finally able to buy, catalogue, and organize all the books we bought, and open the resource center at my school. With sporadic school closures and striking across the country in the months of February, March and April, things took a lot longer to get started than expected. (For more info on the situation, check out: http://topics.nytimes.com/top/news/international/countriesandterritories/burkinafaso/index.html )

The first day that the library opened, I went around to each of the classes in the school with my school’s principal. We showed them some examples of the types of books and resources available—everything from comic books to novels to dictionaries and exercise practice books. We explained to them how the library would function, and how the books should be treated—don’t sleep on them, don’t sit on them, don’t write on the pages! Students are allowed to check out the books for one week at a time. We have also chosen among the school two students to act as librarians. They’re at the tops of their class—very capable, dynamic kids, quick learners, and passionate about the functionality of the library. Next year, students will pay a small resource fee (less than the price of the cheapest book!) so that the school will be able to purchase more books and provide even more for the hungry minds of our students.

In the days after the library opened, I taught class as normal. I’d be writing a math problem on the board, then turn around only to see kids with their noses in the books! I didn’t quite know what to do. “Faites attention!” I’d say. (Though, secretly, I was overjoyed that they were so eager to read that they didn’t even want to stop for class.)

A thousand thanks are not enough to all my friends and family who donated to this project. My school’s staff and students recognize your generosity, and assure me that the resource room will continue to grow and to benefit students for years to come.

A Day in the Life

2011-03-23T13:31:00.000-07:00

So, for the last few weeks, schools have been closed due to student striking. As a result, I’ve been in a bit of purgatory—I don’t quite know when school will start again, but I can’t go too far from home, because we could start up again any day now. Serendipitously, there was a nation-wide polio vaccination campaign going on at the time, so as soon as I found out, I stopped by the village hospital to ask how I could help. Psyched to have me, they sent me out with a vaccination team to go door to door, giving the oral vaccine to kids under five.

Vaccinating, I thought, is serious business. The goal was to vaccinate all kids under five in Thyou and its surrounding villages—about one thousand of them. We headed out on the first day on bikes with a cooler full of vaccine, sweet “Kick Polio OUT of Burkina!” apparel, and some forms to document the vaccination. The vaccination team I joined comprised one of my closer friends in village, a woman who makes millet beer and sells it at market. “It’s a shame it’s Friday,” she said, referring to the Muslim day of rest. “Otherwise we could quench our thirst.” The meaning of her statement didn’t quite register with me—it was hot, and I was thirsty too. Luckily, I’d brought water. We were very productive, able to vaccinate almost all the kids in our assigned area.

Well, the next day, Saturday, was market day. Market day is always huge. People come in from all over, they visit friends and cruise around the village on mopeds and bikes. All the while, we were trying our best to vaccinate.

7:00am: I arrive at the village hospital. As always, I’m the first person there. Even when I try to show up late (more than fashionably), I look the fool, and wait a half hour for others to start trickling in.

8:00am: Everyone’s finally in, we’re given our assignments and we head out to cover the ground we missed the day before.

8:15am: My team and I hop on our bikes and head out.

8:17am: First stop of the day. We walk into a big family’s courtyard. There’s a lot of kids running around, so I set down the cooler and set about checking to see if they’re vaccinated (we mark a fingernail with a permanent marker to avoid double-vaccinating). I soon realize that all these kids were vaccinated the day before. I ask my friend, “Oh, yes,” she says. “We got them all already. Here, have a seat.” She immediately passes me a calabash full of millet beer, and I realize the purpose of our visit. After a few good gulps, we move along. Onto vaccinating children.

8:45am: “Hold on, Monsieur, let’s stop here for a second and have a drink.” There’s a woman with a big blue barrel full of millet beer on a stool under a tree, a few early customers lounging about. And who am I to refuse? This is not my culture, and I can neither pass judgment nor change their plan. We have some more. We move along.

8:50-something am: We’re following through now. It’s getting hot. I can feel some sweat dripping down my back. I haven’t touched the water bottle in my backpack. We manage to find a few kids who weren’t at home yesterday. We give them vaccines; move around to a few other families. No worries.

9:30-something: “Monsieur, we should go to market now and see if we can’t find some children at market who’ve been skipped over.” Seems logical to me.

10-ish: “Hold on, let’s stop in the shade here and rest while we fill out the documentation.” We stop in the shade, go back through the numbers, cool down a little bit. Down the path, we see a woman and an older girl approaching, donkey in tow. In a cart strapped to the donkey, there’s another big blue barrel. She’s got the goods. “Hey!” the other woman on my team calls out. Says something in Moore. She pulls a calabash out of the cart and dips it in the barrel. Brings it over to us, balancing carefully—it’s filled to the brim.

10-ish, later: “Let’s get going.” I stand up and steady myself. The two women suppress a chuckle. I’m not used to this like they are. But I’m a coordinated young man. I hop on my bike and start following. Further down the road, we cross paths with a young man in vaccination apparel. They converse in Moore. I catch “going to market” something about “Monsieur”. The young man turns to me, “Will you go back out with me, Monsieur?” No objections. He’s going alone and could use the help.

Almost 11:00: “Are you thirsty?” he asks, stopping next to the second woman I saw today. “I am, will you join me?” Well, I don’t want to be culturally inappropriate… A few gulps, and we’re on our way. We hit a family courtyard that was having a funeral the day before, where it was inappropriate to come by vaccinating. A bunch of kids here. We shake hands with the older family members, give a few condolences. Vaccinate, mark their hands. Say thanks, God bless, God bring you health, God will help us, God will repair us. Amen, Amen, Amen. “Shall we continue, monsieur?”

Sometime before noon: I see we are approaching another tree with two millet beer vendors sitting underneath. Obviously, we can’t be biased towards one, so we taste it from both. A tipsy old lady challenges the white man to a foot race. He counts down in Moore (laughter), fakes injury (laughter). “Is your foot okay!?” “Oui, oui. I was faking.” (laughter).

Is it Saturday?: “Shall we continue to market, Monsieur” Well, I suppose so. We continue. We grab a few kids to check if they’ve received vaccines. “HEY!” we hear, cruising by. Something is said in Moore. “She’s offering us a drink, Monsieur”. It’s one of the vendors from before. When it’s offered, you don’t pay. Well, we’re not the types to turn down a free drink.

Sometime in March, some place in Africa: We’re walking through market. The young man I’m with calling out to every woman-with-child nearby. “Did your kid get medicine?” “Did your kid get medicine?” We stop in one of the dens. The young man offers me more. I’m trying to count how many times I’ve stopped to drink millet beer today—I’m totally lost on volume. “I’ve had a lot,” I say. “Well, I haven’t!” says the young man. He buys a calabash. The vendor doesn’t have change. He takes change in the form of another calabash.

Quelle heure es-(wait...how do you conjugate that?): “Let’s get back to the hospital, Monsieur. It’s about time to eat.” We start on the way back. He sees a large group of children. Turns out, they’re not vaccinated. But we’re out of medicine! We get the kids to follow us back to the hospital—about 20 of them in tow behind our bikes. We show up. The nurses are filling out paperwork. They find some extra vaccine for these kids. “Thanks Monsieur, you can head home. We’ll see you tomorrow.”

Lunch time: This will be the first time I eat today. I need a nap.

So, you say you want a revolution?

2010-12-23T08:44:00.000-08:00

I hope the holidays are treating you well. I'm here in Ouagadougou, awaiting the much delayed (four days!) arrival of a friend from home.Even transportation here doesn't get delayed that long. Hundreds of flights into and out of Paris have been cancelled due to the wrath of the snow gods--if only Burkina could be so lucky.

We'll probably do the x-mas thing here. Eat things and drink drinks. Then run around the country a bit. See if we can't catch sight of a few elephants or feed a chicken to a crocodile before he flies back out after the new year.

As many of you know, I've been working for the larger part of my service here on starting a library at my school, to provide my students with some of the basic educational resources that my school lacks--workbooks, novels, maps, and textbooks. Lucky for us, our school already has a well-outfitted room for the occasion: Sturdy metal bookcases that close and lock are installed in the walls, where we can store the books, and allow students access to them during the day.

In light of this, I've been searching for resources to fill in some of this room's empty space. Without novels, for example, the students get little exposure to the french language--they lack, in large part, that most basic of educational needs: literacy. At the end of middle school and high school, these students have to take a national exam that will qualify them for higher paying jobs and allow them to continue their education. This test is given yearly, and since my school opened in 2000, less than 15 out of 150 or more students in the highest class have obained a passing note. Meaning that each year, less than 10% of the students eligible to take this exam actually pass, and earn the right to pursue higher education and better jobs.

Unfortunately, statistics like this are commonplace in Burkina Faso, and it's my job to try--in whatever way I can--to improve them. With books and access to study tools, my students will be better prepared for these exams. They can, with motivation, attain a better grasp on the french language and improve their capacity to learn.

So, alongside the school's faculty and teachers, I've researched the prices for a set of books and materials that will be a good foundation to start the library at my school. I hope that before the end of this school year, we can obtain these resources and put them to use. I plan to use my knowledge and experience to start this project off on the right path, so that it will be sustainable, so that it will grow, and so that it will continue to provide for my students' hungry minds even after I am gone.

In total, the resources we need will cost a little over two thousand dollars. Peace Corps has set up a website for me where I can receive donations for the project quickly and easily. When the amount is obtained, the funds will be released, and the library will begin. If you'd like to make a donation, however small, please visit the site below. There is a button on the right side of the screen which will allow you to do so:

https://www.peacecorps.gov/index.cfm?shell=donate.contribute.projDetail&projdesc=686-137

The resources obtained through this project are, of course, a minimum. We would be overjoyed to recieve more resources to stuff the shelves of our library--french novels, workbooks, reference books. Even comic books or magazines. Things that kids are excited to look at and read about that set their curiosities alight. If you'd like to aid the project in this way, please contact me directly via email. We can certainly arrange it. Also, please feel free to forward this information to others. Though, please assure yourself that they have not already recieved it. I know I hate spam as much as anyone. (Though, fried up with a few onions and tomatoes and thrown on top of spaghetti, it can be rather tasty.)

Happy Holidays and Happy New Year to all. See you soon.

Trimester Summary 2.1

2010-12-18T09:16:00.000-08:00

WARNING: The content of the following post contains no humor, no tearjerking, and nothing at all out of the ordinary. Consider it a nod to how life on the third rock from the sun can be pretty much the same anywhere. Consider yourself warned.

The end of another trimester. The beginning of the school year is fun. Kids are excited to be back, interested in learning something new, but three months go by, and that all becomes mundane. Teachers and students lose motivation, lose interest. Need change. Students start to cause trouble, sleep in class, ignore their lessons…the break is coming up and it occupies their thoughts. Teachers want to get through material, but get fed up grading tests, writing lessons, teaching uninterested students.

Teaching, I realize, requires much more than having your material down. You’ve got to be able to explain it in simple words, convey complex ideas, and illustrate their importance. Make sure kids CARE about what they’re learning.

Often, I’ll try to play a game to revive zoning-out minds. Or I’ll switch to speaking English to see if anyone’s paying attention. Snap them to it. But what happens when students start expecting these games? Start asking for them in lieu of class? The tactful teacher uses these tools in moderation, keeping student minds sprite and ready, but it’s a subtle art. And I find, as the trimester moves along, that I become less capable, less forgiving, more short-fused. And I start looking for diversion to take my mind off of this monotony, to not take my frustration with uninterested students back out on them. To not create a vicious cycle.

I found myself having a drink and eating a whole chicken with a staff member of my school yesterday evening. Two faculty members from the primary school inspection in town came by and sat down with us. “The end of the trimester is great,” one said. “It makes me feel reborn, renewed.” We all chuckled for the truth in it.

Happy holidays to everyone.

Thanksgiving Number 2

2010-11-28T03:38:00.000-08:00

Another holiday down. Last year, we got together and substituted chickens for turkey, thinking it wouldn't be possible to find "dendon". Then, on the next day, walking out to the bus home, we passed two fat, flirting, flightless turkeys and cursed them for having escaped our eyes.

Well, this year we made it happen. One volunteer found a live one in his town, named him Brian, tied his legs together and packed him onto a public bus (normal practice), to bring up to the feast. We spent that evening hanging out with him in the courtyard. Next morning, found a butcher in town and paid him in the organs we didn't want to eat. Lit up some charcoal, stacked a massive pot on top and threw Brian's meaty corpse in there to roast for a few hours. Meanwhile, various side dishes were made--onions, green beans, apple pie. Opened a can of cranberry sauce sent from America with a kitchen knife (can opener was not to be found). Yours truly carved Mr. Brian up after the cook sliced open his thumb. It even got a little chilly, and we put windbreakers on. Football was the only thing missing. Woke up at 7am after the night's food coma. Ate apple pie and mashed potatoes for breakfast before hopping on a bus back home. Back to sweat dripping down my back in front of 80 clueless students.

Song Requests: Part I

2010-10-16T07:38:00.000-07:00

I'll start with little sis's questions, because they're here and accessible, and I have internet access. I got a few more very good writing suggestions, which I'm going to work on when I get a chance in village.

She asks:
1. Do you want to come back next year or are you dreading it more than youre looking forward to it?
Yes. I look forward to coming back. It's been two years already since I've seen snow. It'll be three by the time I see it next. And of course there's American cuisine--tube steaks and meat patties, hormone-pumped chickens with breasts so big, meaty and boneless as to make Playmate jealous. And I dearly miss my Rock'n'Roll. I feel so unable to express myself without amplification. I often think of my stereo, sitting in a corner, gathering dust.

Still, things happen to me daily that I fear the loss of. I just recently started taking my study of Moore seriously--and if I don't learn a lot quickly, I never will. And who cares if it's not useful back home? It's just kind of cool... Will I ever learn to make dolo? What will happen in my students lives? What great things will they grow up to accomplish?

A great number of my volunteer friends from my last year of service have finished their service. Will I ever see them again? How quickly it goes...

But I'll be glad to go back. To be on track towards somewhere. To work hard and be able to rely on co-workers with a professionalism and attitude towards work that, unfortunately, is rare here. And the simple access to resources. My work here moves so slowly not only because of the culture, but because of the sparsity of infrastructure.

Still, that's a year from now. I'm only half done, and it's not until now that I feel truly capable in what I do here--work and otherwise. So it's far too soon to start dreaming of ice cream cones and microphones.

2. How is the dry season coming along?
Not quite dry yet. It still rains about weekly. But before I know it, i'll be waking up in the middle of the night to dig dry black rocks out of my nostrils.

3. How is school going? I hear you are teaching Physics and Math this year. Do the kids get it? What types of labs are you doing with them?
Good. Yes. Two math classes and one physics/chemistry. Math is fun. I can do exercises and ask applicable questions to the kids. In the lowest level, some of the kids--especially at the beginning of the year like this--have a very feeble grasp of french. It's frustrating to ask a four word question and get a blank stare in response. But the'll get a hold on it soon enough. No labs to teach. No labs to teach in! I do experiments in front of the class, reminiscent of the Late Show's "Does it float?" and my own pyrotechnic experiments in the back yard as a kid.

4. AFRICA HAS SNAILS?!??!?!
Yes. In Moore, they are called garweongo ("gar-ah-way-own-go"). Seems excessive in syllables. Guy was BIG, though!
I also saw the biggest snake on the african continent on a hike the other day. I was about to jump off a rock I had been climbing with my new volunteer neighbor, when she pointed out to me the strange, scaly, diamond-shaped texture of the ground deep down, between the weeds. I pulled up a nearby plant and started poking it down below. Suddenly, the earth shook. The weeds around the beast shuffled like a hurricane was passing. The clouds parted and lightning struck. I felt myself floating up above the ground, in the presence of a mythical god--the African Rock Python. It's a boa constrictor. It eats goats, my village friends say. We don't think it's ever caught a kid.
Moore: snake=waafo, african rock python=waa-kenfo. Best leave him be...

5. How DO magnets work?
Perhaps it was thoughtless of me to propose this question. I think it has to do with the ionization of the metal inside the magnet. It creates circular fields which grow more neutral towards the middle of the magnet, and align anything with a charge along it's axis, which is in fact perpendicular to the axis of an electric field. I forget why this matters. Perhaps it doesn't. Perhaps nothing does.

6. Do you want Chili's chips and dip?
Shut up. Of course.
Nowadays I crave wierd things like rice with vegetable sauce and fried dough balls. Barbequed corn. Fresh bread. The things that are, if not immediately accesible, at least within my near future. I didn't convince myself of it. It just happened. I miss cheese.

7. What are you going to be for Halloween?
A scary white dude with glasses and a beard.

8. How many girlfriends does Mirza have these days?
I don't inquire about his goings about, and he leaves me to my own. He's like any good roommate.

9. What's the bat situation at school like?
My school had a bit of a bat problem, especially over the summer when nobody was using the classrooms. They were hanging, ubiquitous and stalagtitic, from the rafters of one classroom. The ground was carpeted black in their waste. It smelled unpleasant.
We had somewhat of a specialist come in to lay down a chemical that would make them leave. It worked for the most part. Though every once in a while I hear a strangely mammalian chirp in response to a question posed in class. Could be a choked up student...

Hope that clears a few things up.

Blogity Blah Block

2010-09-16T10:52:00.000-07:00

I'm having what I will choose to refer to as "Blogger's Block".

I want to write something that is interesting to you, dear reader. I want to write something that makes you think, "wow!" Of course, only wanting to write something interesting is a sure-fire route to monotonous boredom. I've said it before: I'm way past the point where this experience is fresh as muffins and exhilarating as free-falling. I'm at home here. I really can't see myself doing anything else, being anywhere else, at this moment. So, what new experiences are there to write about!? None that seem worth blogging (see: writing home) about. I ran (and biked) around a lot this summer. A lot of the time feeling bad for not being at home, with my puppy, in my house. I was, more or less, working. There were few dull moments. I'm a little nervous--how will I cope with the drawn-out, hazy, humid days of village life again?

And I've got more work to do even before school starts in the first week of October. I had imagined that summer would stretch on forever. That I'd wake up on my creaky cot, sweating at eleven o'clock, and ask "wait...when's market day? I need something to do." As it turns out, there was a short vacation (it seems so long ago!) and a whole lot of work that needed doing. A fat block of business in between the static school year. This time, I can't wait for school to start. I get to stay put.

In another way, maybe all the work I've been doing has kept me up to pace. I'm not ready to slow down, and it wont be hard, now, to jump into it. I'm getting things started on my library project. I've decided to man up and do the leg work of researching book prices. (Until recently, I was too nervous about the inadequacies of my french to do so solo.) But running around today, for the first time, the formerly-daunting Ouagadougou felt like my proverbial oyster. No heckler on the streetside could irk me. No falter of language could slow me down. Only the magnifying sun provoked curses from under my breath. But, that's expected. I feel capable, on top of things, excited. Happy.

It was in this moment that I realized I've been living for the last year in subconscious fear! I'd been nervous about what people wanted from me. I'd become unfriendly to people I didn't know. As soon as I admitted that I AM capable of getting things done here, I quickly shirked my inhibitions. I'm not fearful anymore. I can do anything here--as well, if not better than I could in the so-distant home. I have more at my disposal.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

So, speaking of writer's block, I have a new idea: send me questions! Comment them here or email me. On anything. Burkina's culture. The weather. My thoughts on the french language. What color was the slop I ate for breakfast? Magnets! how the heck do they work? I think this exercise will inject some freshness into this here webpage. I look forward to pontificating.

J

Here are some pictures:

Kids with a snail we found while cleaning my yard.

Landscape engineers.

Girl selling peanuts.

At a bus station.

Some kid somewhere.

Hey, why not BIKE around Burkina?

2010-09-09T10:43:00.000-07:00

One time, two years ago, I took a couple days to bike down to Champaign from home. I went with a close friend. We loaded tents, sleeping pads, two pairs of underwear, and a shitload of granola bars on our bike racks and in our backpacks for the ride down. It was a memorable trip. In desperate need of bathing, we jumped the fence of a public pool that had closed for the season only a day before. Well, no complaints…entry was free! We ate whole pizzas and chatted with the locals (who were vastly different from those I interact with these days). The day after the trip was over, I had to crawl to the fridge just for a cold beer.

Cold beer is certainly no easier to obtain here. That’s why this time, we drank “dolo”—it’s the local beverage that could be most accurately described as “hard sorghum cider”. I’m looking back on my past posts and realizing…holy crap! I don’t think I’ve talked about dolo! Lacking refrigeration, it’s consumed as cool as possible. Perhaps like a fine red wine. One of my goals for the summer was to learn how to make it. Unfortunately, I was working my butt off on real work all summer, except for the short trip home. I’m scared: will I ever get summer off again!?

So, I went on another extended bike ride. We started down near Ghana, and the tour continues in a circle around the country, counterclockwise. Think clock-face: I rode from 6 o’clock to 3 o’clock. It was great! Except one volunteer’s village, I’d never seen this part of the country before. The tour is still well in progress, and you can follow along and see pictures at: http://www.burkinabiketour.blogspot.com/

You can read about the group there. I had a great time. The first day was all on paved road—without much traffic—and it went so quickly that another volunteer and I missed the turn at 75 km, chatting leisurely, and went an extra six kilometers. Whoops. Thank heaven for cell phones! Africa has changed drastically because of them. Without them, I’d probably be dead. It’s incredible how well this worked out. Immense thanks and congratulations are due to volunteers Marita, Julie, and Rachel who organized the tour. Spectacular thanks are due to those of you who donated (you still can on the aforementioned blog!).

I kept having flashbacks to the ride I took two years ago. Waking up early in the morning, shoving some carbs into my gut and moving along before the sun gets too high. There was even a moment—coming around a curve, where power lines hugged the road and sorghum plants (resembling corn) filled my periphery—when I could’ve sworn I was cruising down Route 47.

School starts October 1st. Time to warm up the cables on my resource room project and refresh on lesson plans. Already?

Back to Thyou

2010-08-12T07:49:00.000-07:00

I came back to Thyou for a couple days. To check on the house, to make sure everything was intact. To see if it still felt like home—however temporary.

At first it was hectic. I woke up early, from my air-conditioned room in Ouaga. Barely caught a bus. Had to get off in Sabou, and since I left my bike at home, I had to do the last leg by bush taxi. They knew who I was, though. “The white guy’s going to Thyou!” they said. Put me right on the next car out. I had to cram in, as always. A kid of about ten years took a place on my lap. Twenty minute’s ride to the school, I get off. They throw my bag down from the roof and speed off.

Walking towards my house, the car’s dust settling behind, I look around…

…Much greener than when I left… It’s been raining a lot, and often.

“…Is this home?” I say to no one. No one answers. “…For now,” I tell the presently-lush surrounding.

The stick that held shut my door has come out—by an active agent or its own accord, I don’t know. It’s the same courtyard that’s always been there. The big shady tree. Weeds crowd the ground, thick like the humid air, but it’s the same.

I float my head around. It’s just as I left it. Will it stay this way? One year down and only one left. It will become someone else’s, but a part of me will always live here—like walking into the house you grew up in.

All’s the same inside. It looks lived in. My things are everywhere. Nothing feels foreign like when I first opened the door a year ago. I will continue living this way for a long way to come. Different houses, apartments. Do different things. And I will leave pieces of myself in these places. It’s good, though. Because I take pieces from here and there to fill the parts of me left behind.

It’s amazing, really, how quickly you can feel at home in a place.

I suddenly feel more comfortable here, in my space, than I did in my old room back home just two weeks before. This is my space in the world. The little nook I cut out for myself—whether or not the surroundings feel like home.

I realize, talking to a group of children who tend their grazing cows outside, that I’ve arrived on a market day. I put on pants (as opposed to shorts…) and head for the market. The sights are familiar, too. Maybe like “home.” Maybe not. Is familiarity all that makes you feel at home?

But this is comfortable. It’s not the sense of wonder at something new that drove me before. It’s not foreign. At market, I see faces I know. Students call my last name. I don’t stop to ask directions because I know where I’m going: the veggie ladies. In back. They’re happy to see me. Others, who didn’t frequent the market last year, laugh and gasp in wonder, approval, at the white guy successfully talking prices, buying food, in Moore. I know less than they think I do.

School doesn’t start for two months, so there’s no one in town and nothing to do. I spend most of the next couple days between my house and courtyard, sleeping, reading, cooking, eating. Conducting business in my latrine. I realize at some point that this might seem lonely, unbearable, secluded. But I’ve done this for a year. I’m comfortable alone as long as someone calls and speaks English with me every few days. Everyone out there’s willing to chat if I need it. And I’m enjoying the book.

The nerves connecting my fingers to my brain are telling me it hurts to play guitar. It’s been a couple weeks, and my calluses wore away. I wonder briefly what else I’ve forgotten. In a month. In a year…

I stay up late playing, ignoring the dull aches. For a minute, I stop, stand up, fill a cup with water. And I hear a dull half-whimper, half-growl. I know that voice.

Mirza charges through the open door crack. If he were a bigger dog I’d have been tackled like an ill-placed receiver. He shoves his face in my hands. His butt oscillates with the torque of his tail. We catch up.

The next day, a few students stop by to say hi. They inform me there’s been a death. The elder guy living in the house closest to the school. Later, people are celebrating (no, not mourning. This is not a sad thing) outside. It begins to rain in sheets. There is lightning. Thunder. A group of young men take shelter in the house sharing a wall with mine. When the rains tops, I come over and say hi. I know all these faces. They know me. We do not understand each other, but we know of each others existence. Its merging in and out of our own.

They offer me a seat and continue their ongoing conversation. I understand so few words, but I’m surprised that I can follow. They’re talking about someone else. He has to go to Sabou and come back. He’ll sleep there the night. We’ll see him Wednesday.

I used to think it was rude to get up and leave at times like this. But I know, and they know, that I don’t understand and this is not all that exhilarating to me. They offer a drink, ask a sympathy question in French, allow me to be on my way.

I spent much of the last year worrying that I wasn’t making enough friends here. That I should feel this way or that. That I should speak more Moore and have a larger stake in this town. But I realize that I am comfortable, and I am confident, and I’m here to teach. And I’ve made as close of friends that I can with a select few here, given the barriers. And those friendships are only, at the most pessimistic, half over.

One of my friends in the group—probably the closest I have here save the dog—turned to me while I was sitting, listening. “So…one year left, huh?” He laughed but there was longing in his eyes. “After that, we’re going to miss each other.”

I love rainy season...

2010-07-26T09:27:00.000-07:00

There once was a song...

I'm imagining one of those Planet Earth style cameras that sits on a tripod somewhere for twenty years while a tree grows. Then, we sit on a couch in front of a plasma tv wider than the couch with the surround sound on in super-fast-high-def-down-low-uproar vision, and watch this sucker grow into a titan of living things. The forest blurs across the screen and we get to experience first hand what might be called aural sex...

I'm imagining this camera sitting where I am, at the door of a school building, sheltered, at the beginning of the day in a place exactly like but perhaps not Burkina Faso. We see the sun rise, blazing, above the sparse savannah. People trudge by, faces glistening with sweat. There's a vague haze obscuring everything.

Then the clouds flood in. On this camera, like an invading army, blocking out the sun. Dry from my spot in the doorway, my place on the couch, I feel the humidity of the air. I look for the haze, but can't find it. And it's pouring. I've been somehow, without moving a toe, displaced to the underside of a waterfall as the rain pours off the roof, into lake in front of me, non-existant only moments before.

The rain stops. Clouds still there. The sun sets behind them, and we watch through the night as wind tickles the leaves of trees in full bloom. In the morning, the clouds are gone. The sun comes up. People walk by, faces glistening, haze obscuring. All over again.

Except being here is nothing like watching it on a screen. Maybe Todo did a better job of capturing it.

24

2010-07-24T04:13:00.000-07:00

I wanted this post to be about America. About what shocked me upon re-entry, and about what culture shock looks like from the other end of the swimming pool. But, frankly, I talked about that enough when I was home, and I’ll go through it all over again in another year, where I can tell you all about it in person. And I still haven’t had time to process it all.

What’s on my mind now—and what was really on my mind the whole time I was home—isn’t so much about me as my…what would you call it? Generation? That is, all you buggers I grew up with (not, by any means, to say we’re all grown up).

I was class of ’08. That means two years have gone by since the end of undergrad. In the first year, a lot of us fumbled around and twiddled our thumbs, unsure of what to do next. Unemployed or regretfully employed. I played music and tutored a couple brats (and a few good students) on the side. I read books I’d always meant to read, but never had the time. I played more hockey than I had in years. I was arguably in the coveted “best shape of my life”. The day I flew out last year just about pinned that one year mark. Friends were working, living with their parents, finishing school, gettin’ schooled more. My baby sis was still passing her workdays in lecture halls. Nobody was engaged. Nobody owned a house. Nobody got knocked-up.

Ok, nobody’s gotten knocked up yet. But you’ve all gotten up a notch. By the time I’m done here, I’ll have missed between four and six weddings. Perhaps all of you will have bought houses or condos or at least rent an apartment. I hope you’re all close enough for a weekend visit. Now, don’t mistake my discussion of this as a hearkening for the good old days. I’m not resistant to these changes. In fact, I’m quite the opposite.

With a little sister just out of college, and a year of whatever-the-hell-this-thing-is under my belt, I find myself increasingly excited about what’s going on, about what’s to come. Out of the bubbled, isolated college world, we’ve all got real things to worry about. We’re finally taking our part in reshaping the world—it’s what the old fogies (pardon my bluntness) have been telling us would be our responsibility since before the re-election of Bill Clinton. Lots of you work in energy. An undeniably real problem. Others in psychology and medicine. Others in peacekeeping and business and art. And while the engagements and moves took me somewhat for surprise, it’s just a sign that we’re mature enough to handle that responsibility.

I also know I’m not the only one gambling, every time I take a step, that an earthquake of Haitian proportions won’t crumble beneath my foot. I don’t know what the next few years will bring me. All I’ve got’s whims and wits. But the wits keep growing.
But that’s exactly what makes being twenty-four so exciting! We get to poke our toes in waters we couldn’t before. We get to try and fail, and we don’t have to worry that failure will injure some silly grade point average.

So, I suppose I ought to thank all of you—for getting on with your lives. It shows me I can do the same. Really, could you imagine the degree of messed-up I’d be if I left for two years and nothing changed? I’d have to abandon you at your dead ends just to straighten my own stumbling feet. I can say, honest, that it never once during this vacation felt like “old times”. It was fresh and crisp. I felt the same connection with you, but it was forward-looking, positive. Nothing’s being lost. I feel more assured and confident. I realize that changes will happen in this next year, and I’m excited to jump in and share mine with you.

And as for the fogies: I have nothing to offer but thanks. (I make 3 bucks an hour). Thanks for supporting me in my choice to do something a little off-track. Thanks for providing for me enough that I have the chance to sniff out new experiences. For your endless, reckless enthusiasm. Thanks for pushing me to seek that out. And thanks for the granola bars.

I once described myself as a cynic. And I can’t rightly say if my shirking that descriptor is a result of my experiences here, or if it’s from knowing and experiencing the positive movement of friends. Or if it’s just something natural, a scheduled, coded program of biochemistry. In any case, what’s the fun in moping?

j

One Year Down (really?)

2010-05-27T00:09:00.000-07:00

May 23, 2010

Well, it’s not quite June 10th—the day I left America last year to come to Burkina Faso and teach Science for the Peace Corps—but it’s close enough. By the time I get this posted on the blog, it might be past that date. My thoughts on an entire year of being in Burkina are unlikely to be drastically different three weeks from now. (Plus, given all the running around I’ll be doing, I doubt my mind will be in the right set for reflection.)

So, what I have I learned, living for a year in a foreign country? Why did I come in the first place? How have my reasons for coming been affected? And what’s going to keep me here for another year? It’s due time for some essay-guided reflection.

I wanted to join the Peace Corps for a few reasons. The professional reputation of the service is undeniable. Two years as a volunteer with so much “hardship” is seen as a measure of diligence, devotion, and determination in many arenas. Not to mention, the humanitarian implications of working so hard, and giving up so much to better the lives of a people so distant from us—a people so slightly affected by our daily-doings at home, whose daily lives so minutely affect those of ours in the West over sea, further North over land, and higher up in our skyscrapers. To be concerned for the well-being of such peoples is said to show a lot.

This is, in part, the professional perspective for me. Certainly, I care about these people. I worry for their health and their environment and their education, their self-betterment. But, it’s this very spirit that drives me towards my professional goals. The two are in many ways inseparable. So, yes. I joined Peace Corps to help people, but I joined it also to help myself.

Professional opportunities aside, there are many other reasons I joined. Curiosity factored in equally, if not more so. I’ve traveled in my life. I’ve checked the Louvre and the Outback off my list. I’ve seen fjords and beaches, skied down mountains and across water. I’ve stayed up all night in the place where the sun doesn’t set. I’ve done a lot to satiate my curiosity for new experience by travel. Yet, I was always frustrated at how quickly I had to leave. How I only got to see the surface of things. I only struggled with language long enough for an English speaker to walk in the door behind me. My curiosity drove me to seek new places in a different sense. I wanted to see a place, but get past its surface. I wanted to meet its people and learn about them. A place and it’s people are co-dependent, and it’s absurd—I thought—to just see a place and keep your feet moving. I wanted to understand the place. The place didn’t particularly matter, as long as it was new and shocking. So, I came to Africa. (Yet, I’ve realized that this word is that of a passer-by—someone who takes in all of “Africa” in one fell swoop, throwing it all together into one general category. I’ve realized that the peoples of Africa are so diverse themselves that I no longer feel comfortable saying “I came to Africa.” I came to Burkina Faso is more precise. And still, the ethnic groups here are diverse enough that even those terms seems insufficient.)

I also came for the adventure. There is no insurance in the 3rd world (well, hardly.) There are few hospitals. There are snakes and torrential rains and scorching heat, vicious sunrays, HUGE language barriers, strange foods, strange music, strange faces. And I wanted to be thrown in the middle of it all. I wanted the exhilarations and utter confusions of in-your-face foreignness.

I also came just because. And because it’s the best time to do so. No mortgage or debt or kids to raise. No job left behind. Plus, there were peripheral benefits: the opportunity to learn another language, to have a change in perspective, to maybe pick up some sweet souvenirs.

But I never thought very much about what this service would do to me. I thought, a year ago, that you can’t understand a place until you understand its people. And I still think this is true. But back then, I didn’t think about those people’s affect on me—or maybe even the effect I’d have on them. It was the disposition not of a worker or a volunteer, but of a traveler, still just passing through, albeit slow enough to taste it.

Well, a year being here, and I’ve found a few things out. I’m reassured in my conviction that you’ve got to live there to understand there. But understanding is not synonymous with embrace. There are many things I’ve come to understand about this place and its people, much of which I will never embrace myself. I’ve found that in a culture like this, so far removed from my own, there are things I’ll never reconcile—basic, believed truths that aren’t shared, nor capable of embrace by an outsider (at least, this one). Things like gender equality, work ethic, or even the role we play in our own future or demise.

There’s no doubt gender roles are different here. Women do an awful lot of work, and their education is often not a priority (despite a government agenda very much in favor of the latter). It’s hard to work in the heat sometimes. But I was raised to do my job anyways. To go to school despite a fever of 103, to brave the cold or the heat, to stay up all night studying if there’s still a lot left to understand. I’m not saying so much work is a positive thing. There IS such a thing as excess. But, the contrary is (I’d say) worse. Most people here take a mid-day nap. That’s an awful lot of wasted sunlight in a place without electricity. The heat is often an excuse to just sit and stare. If it’s not the rainy season, and therefore there’s no farming to do, many don’t work at all: not towards their own betterment (when they’d have the time!), nor to the betterment of their communities. And, finally, there’s a short-sightedness: people often do not (or…refuse to?) see the role they play in the world they live in. They see neither the positive effects they could cause, nor the negative effects they perpetuate. An old man with three wives who do all the work doesn’t stop and think that by doing nothing, the inequalities of gender perpetuate (if not progress). The same goes for a teacher who speaks to his or her students in local language outside of class (and not French, which is—perhaps unfortunately—the language of education and development.) Furthermore, that man doesn’t realize that he can be an active agent of change; that he can, for example, send his daughters to school, relieve them of housework so that they may study. Or, god forbid, even help them to study and understand their schoolwork. The same goes for a man cutting down trees in a region in danger of desertification. (This is happening behind my house as I write this.) It won’t dry up today or tomorrow. He doesn’t see 50 years down the line—his suffering grandchildren.

Being here this long, I realize that I am so very different in the way I’m raised. I can, in fact, connect with these people on many levels. And then, there are so many ways I can’t. This is a frustration, but also a consolation—it reassures me of where I belong, making me proud of where I’m from, makes me love my own people despite what faults they have. There are positives here that Americans lack—close family ties and friendly relationships between professionals (speak to my father about “lawyers nowadays…”). And, yet, I’m okay with what we lack. Perhaps as a result of this service, I’ll be more an advocate of the good things I learn here. And my people will embrace that it me.

But I’m here for another year. The sense of adventure has faded. I’ve learned enough about the people to satiate my curiosity. My french is pretty darn good, though I’m still not satisfied by my versatility in it. I’ve seen a lot of foreign things, but they’ve become daily for me. I often don’t recognize their strangeness unless I force myself to. But I’m staying. I’ll stay because (a) I have to: it’s a two-year deal and I ain’t a quitter; and (b) I still like the place, and don’t have such a hard time recognizing the strangeness, embracing it and interacting with it. My being here is equally strange to these people, and often, we don’t need much more than to look at each other, recognize our differences, and laugh about them. I have tons of fun in class (when it’s not a test week). My students continue to impress me with their curiosity and their devotion despite so little to work with.

And the adventure hasn’t totally worn off. There are days, yes, when it all seems old-news and jaded. Days I don’t want to go outside and struggle in another language. Days I just want to grab a cold one with chips and salsa from the fridge, park my ass on the couch and turn on Seinfeld. But there are also days I walk outside, excited to take it all in—realizing that my time here, while long, IS limited. Knowing that inevitably, no matter how much I do here, I’ll soon be looking back, wishing I’d done more.

I’m staying because now, after a year teaching, I’ll be so much more effective next year. Because I’m less a traveler than a teacher. I’ll connect so much more quickly with my students. I’ll open doors to them that their Burkinabe teachers never thought to, or never knew how to. And I’ll stay because my french will still get better, and I’ll pick up some very strange (to Westerners, at least) local language on the way. And I’ll stay because there’s still so much more to see.

Easter/Passover/Humidity Meter

2010-04-16T00:57:00.000-07:00

It's Easter Sunday. April's what everyone has been saying is the hottest month. It's 9AM here--the morning, the coolest part of the day--and I'm already drenched in sweat. I was going to go to church this morning--really! But, well, there's no way I'm going to sit under that jam-packed, thatched-roof awning over the pew (which itself is nothing put chopped-down logs we sit on), beads of sweat dripping from me, the service conducted in Moore--a degree away from jibberish to me.

I'm just going to lay in my hammock, move as little as possible, and dream of Easter brunch. Ice cold mimosas. Solid (unmelted!) chocolate. Maybe if I close my eyes and really try, I can convince myself I'm eating ice-cream-topped belgian waffles and sipping on iced coffee.

I'm trying to imagine where I was a year ago. Last Easter/ I had literally just recieved my assignment to Burkina Faso. I was pouring over the information in the packet, making lists of what I'd need. All optimism, excitement, adventure.

Does it seem like that long ago? Well, yes. It does. I've been here a while now. It's surprising to me, if I think about it, how "everyday" everything I do here has become. I've all but forgotten the hum of wheels on pavement, the crunch of snow under boots. Heck, I can't remember the last time I wore shoes. This is perpetual flip-flop weather. I'm impressed how much time has passed. How far from here I was last year. I dont' feel older, really. Only farther.

I'll spend even another Easter here. A year from now, I suppose I'll think back on what I was doing today. I'll wonder where the time went.

Easter here isn't terribly unlike it is in America. The Christians dress up, go to mass. Eat and drink. No chocolate. "Peeps" are an absurd notion. The only rabbits you might see will be in the sauce you eat at dinner. Though, likely, the animal slaughtered will be larger. A goat, pig, or sheep. People at church will be baptised. Villagers will visit each others' homes and wish each other well. Market will bustle. My dog wil sit, ass usual, right in front of my screen door, panting. Too lazy and hot to move a muscle and let me pass in and out of the house. He might stand up to eat something. The screen door is reflective: My actions mirror his.

The day after a holiday is usually a holiday, too. So I'll be back in the classroom Tuesday. I'm just praying my students will be alert enough to form sentences. The brain--as if chemically induced--isn't capable of much more than staring at walls in this weather. At home, April is a forgettable month--that middle-ground between Spring and Summer. Here, it's memorable only for its heat. Granted I don't melt, I'll see you in July!

City Life

2010-03-26T06:48:00.000-07:00

Done with my second trimester. Time is slipping on by. The break (decidedly not called “Spring Break” here after consultation with the thermometer) is two weeks long. I’m back in the classroom the first week of April, and the school year ends before the end of May. I’m working on getting together some books for my school using the recommendations from my colleagues. (If you feel like helping out, you’ll be able to contribute. Keep an eye out for updates.) This morning, I went to a library in Ouagadougou to meet my school’s headmaster and look up some prices. I biked into town.

I haven’t been in Ouaga on a regular workday very often. This morning was the first time I hopped on my bike at 7am and biked into town like all the other city folk. The myriad mopeds and motorcycles buzzed by me. By now, I can spot how fast the moto in front of me at a stop light can go by looking at it. On my fancy American bicycle, I passed a few. Others passed me. Cars whizzed by. (Don’t see those much in village.) I suddenly, for a moment, felt the novelty and excitement of being in a place so far from home once again.

In Ouagadougou, there are no lane markers. There are stoplights, but this morning, the power was out all over town. They weren’t working. The mopeds buzzed around me like angry bees. I pedaled hard to keep up. Moore and French were being screamed across the pavement. I dodged and ducked. The morning rush hour. This doesn’t happen outside of Ouaga. The rest of the country is not on a 40 hour work week. This is the picture of a place struggling to make it in the modern world: Buzzing, beeping, screaming chaos in the dead center of a country, surrounded by endless sand and savannah.

My baby sis is coming in June. I can’t wait to see this place new again, through her eyes. Then home for July. To see home, after being away so long, will be the most exciting.

Enjoy the weather.

Jon

Heat, Time Travel, and Foreign Language

2010-03-01T03:39:00.000-08:00

First off, appologies for the sporatic nature of this blog. It’ not so much that little is happening as it is that internet is such a rarity. In Sabou—the town 13km from me, on the paved road—there’s a cyber café, with computers, a copier, electricity, etc. They put up a new sign (in addition to the old one), advertising INTERNET, PHOTO COPIER, COMPUTERS, so I thought maybe they finally got things hooked up. I made it out there to ask: Nope. They bought the sign advertising internet before buying the actual internet. Africa.

Today, we’ll talk about time travel. Not in the Wellsian sense, over billions of years. More in the Vonnegut sense, time within one person’s life, and it’s effect on outcomes… We’ll start about 17 months ago, when I first began my application to Peace Corps. I remember back then, in the cold Champaign winter, thinking, “Two Years? Easy! What’s two measly years in the grand scheme of things?” The error in this line of thought is, of course, it’s Wellsian nature. Sure, in the entire course of human history and future, one man’s two-year absence is pretty much nil. But what about that man’s history?

The four years of college seemed to go by rather quickly. Of course, retrospect accelerates those perceptions. There were certainly days that seemed to never end, distant final tests and papers whose approach reflected personal doom. During those four years of college, a lot certainly did happen. Many things whose importance I hardly realize—after all, I was there to witness them. They weren’t such a big deal.

Of course, I was wrong. A LOT can happen in two years: It only takes a day, for example, to get married. Some of my closest friends and relatives—the same age as me—are engaged! Some have already scheduled dates that seem far off, but are dates I’ll still be here, with only my imagination to illustrate what I’m missing. Others are having landmark birthdays. People are graduating, switching jobs, moving to new cities. Our first black president will be 75% finished with his term when I make my return.

So, selfishly, two years ain’t much. For me, it’ll be a few days I killed sweating and reading books. But I’m realizing that the place I’ll return to qt the end of 2011 won’t be the same as it was last June, when I left. Some of you will be married or living elsewhere. My gravest fear is that some won’t be around at all. A short trip home will be enough to give me a taste of how things have changed, but not enough to be much of a witness to them. While, overall, I don’t think I’ll regret my time here, there are a few things I’ll never forgive myself for missing. My apologies to those of you who hoped I’d be there. Know that your progressions perhaps mean more to me than to you, now that I know I’m missing them.

Well, how about an update? Teaching is going without problem. I can speak words in French, satisfy needs, discuss prices, but there’s a big old iceberg-like quality to a whole new language’s use. Many things—turns of phrase, colloquialisms, proper grammar—I am not learning here. It’s a foreign language for people here, too, and as long as it works for basic communication, there’s no need to be picky about it. Save existential thought for your natural language. I can barely understand Radio France International. Chances are; when I’m done here, I’ll be no more an expert on French language than I am on internal combustion engines. (I get the idea, but that’s about it.)

The school year is about 2/3rds finished. I’m really looking forward to the summer. I’ll get a chance to do a little traveling (let’s be honest; it’s the real reason I’m here), concentrate on language skills, and (maybe) work on some extra-curriculars. That little trip home will be awful nice, too. I hope you’ll be around! Thought, don’t peg me as a hypocrite: I’ll understand if you can’t be.Word is your winter’s extra long. Which really sucks because it’s looking like the hot season here will be uncharacteristically long: other volunteers say it’s never been this hot in February. Burkinabe say there wasn’t really much of a “cold” season this year… How unfair that my favorite season is extra long at home, snow still falling!

We’ll leave it there until next time. Gotta go chalk up my hands. (Sometimes, it does feel like gymnastics).

-Jon

New Year's!

2010-01-04T05:29:00.000-08:00

Happy New Year, tout le monde. I’ve just returned from vacationing in Mali with a few other volunteers in my training class. We counted down to twenty-ten overlooking the desert from the top of the plateau in “Dogon Country”. We hiked between the villages where we stayed at night. Some were cozily situated at the base of the plateau. Some teetered on its edge. The ancient villages are built right into the plateau itself. In all cases, we slept on rooftops, on rather uncomfortable slabs of foam. Believe it or not, it got unpleasantly cold up there. Winter in Africa…

Posting a few pictures of the trip below, if bandwidth permits.

It certainly is strange to be abroad for the holidays. Volunteers are good at assembling themselves, though. So there was plenty going on. We cooked breakfast and dinner on Christmas. One of the higher-ups in the Peace Corps bureau donated a bunch of turkey and other goodies to our cause. Expatriation is pretty cushy work. Mom sent along the annual family end-of-year letter along with a few too many Christmas packages. It’s from this letter that I learned my family went skiing in Telluride after Christmas (they’re keeping things from me…).

It’s almost seven months in. That means four months of volunteer service are nearly complete. With the first trimester finished, things are feeling more natural, more normal, and I’m learning the plausibilities and possibilities of the various work (and play) I hope to do here.

Thyou likes to have me, there’s no doubt. My colleagues at the school are somewhat dismissive of my presence—uncomfortable getting involved in my work, more wary of what counsel I might have to add—though I do think they will warm up to me in time. I’ll need to extravert myself a tad more.

I’m a little nervous about the summer. During the school year, there’s hardly time to do more than lesson plan and teach. Yet, when summer comes around, I’ll have an empty schedule—I’ll have to do SOMEthing to work. Perhaps that’ll be helping other volunteers with their projects, or working in training. Probably a selfish amount of traveling. Anyways, that’s for later. Now I’ve got to gear up for the next trimester. I’ve got the routine down, so perhaps it’ll get easier. Maybe an extra-curricular project will materialize.

Not much more exciting on this end. Thanks to mom and dad for sending a spanking new laptop battery. With this sucker, I should have a decent amount of battery life to write out in the bush.

I haven’t made any official new years resolutions. I’m still working on last year’s! Hope everyone has a spectacular year. I should be making it home in June or July. Roll out them carpets.

A la prochaine.

Jon

Pics:

From the base

The Dogon hunted monkeys for practice in battle. They display the skulls to scare off enemies.

View from the top.

6 Months?

2009-12-12T02:40:00.000-08:00

December 12th. I’ve been told it’s the second day of Channukah—somehow, it’s approach never even came to mind, given that even if it gets below 60 Fahrenheit in the morning, it’s still well over 85 by midday.

We made a makeshift menorah, using emptied beer and coke bottles. Christmas approaches, too. All the Christians in Thyou (that’s my village) are getting psyched up for it. My first trimester teaching here is almost over. Tests are done with, and I have to correct them, calculate grades (not so easy when lacking Excel), and continue teaching material to test on in January.

Planning a hiking trip in Mali for the break. You can count on pictures. It will be a nice vacation, and it’s the coolest time of year in the desert. Plus, it should all cost under 200 bucks: travel, lodging, food, etc. Not a bad deal. Other than this, there isn’t much that’s new. The exciting things in my life today involve all of YOU. Whether you’ve moved out of your parents’ house since I left, or you’re graduating soon, or you’re getting the kitchen cabinets redone, or you’ve recently gotten engaged… these are the things I’m thinking about on an average day after classes are out. There are a lot of changes happening on the home turf. Heck, a health care bill in the senate? Wow! I’ll tell you what health care is here:
“Don’t eat too many peanuts or you’ll get sick.”
“Don’t let a woman kill the chicken before you eat it or you’ll get sick.”
“Don’t take pictures during a storm because your camera attracts lighting. And if that doesn’t at least burn down your house and electrocute you, you could get sick.”

The other day, while rifling through my bookshelf for something or other, I happened upon the first little packet I received in the mail last April, inviting me to teach science in Burkina Faso. I highlighted the phrase “Your counterpart may help you hook a used car battery up to a fluorescent lamp to do work by at night,” because it sounded so foreign, so post-apocalyptic, so adventurous. Now, in retrospect, this little packet is more of a checklist: Hooked up the battery. I charge it with a solar panel every day. Taught photosynthesis to kids in French (at least a couple of them understood it). I wake up daily to the torturous sound of whining donkeys. There was a screaming goat under my seat on the three-hour bush taxi ride into the capital.

All these things are normal, though. Heck, expected. Unless it’s a particularly existential moment, I’m not stricken that my source of light is velcro-ed to a battery that runs it. The packet I got in the mail—the latter half of a year ago—didn’t lie, but everything in it is just normal happenstance now. What’ll be strangest is the things I have to reacclimatize to upon my return…

Well, my evenings are very free. It’d be sweet to get a call from you. If you don’t already have my number, talk to someone who does!

Alright, already

2009-11-26T09:25:00.000-08:00

I'm on the other side of the planet, sunburning in August, lacking electricity, turkey, and internet, and people are STILL managing to make me feel guilty about the amount of time the blog's been left hanging.

Well, it's my first encounter with the cyberbeast that is the world wide web in a month. I've got 14 minutes left on my timecard to give you an update. It's Thanksgiving today. I celebrated last weekend with a few other volunteers. We substituted chicken (that's Poulet in french) for turkey (though, oddly enough, upon leaving saw two wild turkeys chatting it up), threw together some stuffing which included Peppers and for some reason reminded us of Pizza, mashed Potatoes, and two types of Pie. Pumpkin and Pudding. That's a lot of alliteration.

This weekend is the Muslim holiday Tabasky. I'm not entirely sure what goes down, though I've heard a lot of talk of a goat roast. Mmm-mmm. I suppose every locale has it's favored, traditional act of carnivorism. Thank god for it, too.

Teaching turns out to make time go by pretty quickly. I've got a busy Monday thru Wednesay, a nice relaxing one class on Thursday, and nada for Friday. As it's cooled off, finally (by which I mean high 70's--it's tolerable to be under the sun), I've been doing a lot of biking. Two weekends ago I visited Sapouy (google it) with another volunteer. Today I'm in Koudougou, to head back tomorrow and see what I can catch of the party. Goat leftovers anyone?

I'm thinking of you all back home this holiday! Eat a bunch of dessert for me, and tolerate a little american football.

Best wishes,

Jon

It's a day job. I just don't get nights off.

2009-10-17T09:04:00.000-07:00

So I’ve come out to the capital again to do some work with our Burkina Peace Corps AIDS committee. We’re gearing up for World AIDS Day, and trying to encourage other volunteers to get motivated for side projects involving AIDS.

After our meetings, I solicited a fellow volunteer to cut my hair, as it’s been a few months since my shortest-ever buzz back in training. Today’s cut was a success, and it compliments nicely the beard I’m cultivating—possible only because it’s starting to cool off. We’ll see how long it lasts as it grows, and the hot season approaches.

Teaching is going well. A little bit of a rough start, but the students pay attention, seem to learn a thing or two, and can’t help but laugh at the non-verbal antics of their absurd, mad-scientist-looking Physics/Chemistry/Biology teacher. With lesson planning, I’m trying to think of new and creative ways to present the material to the students—not always effective with the heat, language issues, and jam-packed days.

But it feels just like your regular day job. I get up in the morning, make coffee, feed the dog, brush my teeth, grab the chalk and head for the classroom. I say hi to my boss (trying not to look like too much of a befuddled, wordless mute), shake hands with my colleagues, and think about what I’ll do for lunch. I look forward to the weekend, when I can sit in my hammock with a book, or perhaps visit another volunteer.

The trouble here is that all the while—waking up and going to work and writing lesson plans in my off hours—I need to be assessing the other needs in my community, trying to find ways that I can use my experience to improve things on a grass roots level. It’s sort of easy to just get up and go to work. It gets harder when I know I need to look for things out my door to improve upon, be creative about, take chances with. In any case, I feel like two years might go by pretty quickly. In a way that’s nice—I wont have to fight much boredom. On the other hand, non-education volunteers have more freedom when it comes to planning vacations, visits to other people, etc. But also more potential to really make a difference.

But, in case you were wondering, I’m quite alive. The care packages have all been wonderful (thanks to all), though it’s hard to take such volume back to my site! There are plenty of fresh veggies to get in my market, and with all my new imports, I think I’ll be able to last a good year or so on my SPAM and other canned goodies:

Pictures!

2009-09-26T20:38:00.000-07:00

Pictures first, paragraphs later.

Caterpillar who fell from my tree (I found it, he ate it):

Some unwelcome roommates (he found them, I killed them):

The only welcome roommate:

A view of the courtyard:

Inside my house:

Tree (and hammock) in my courtyard:

Soccer field outside my house:

A class at model school (can you find me?):

With the host parents in Ouahigouya:

Life in Thyou, Burkina Faso, West Africa—you wonder—is like what? Well, it’s 3:45 in the morning. I’m in that country’s capital (Ouagadougou), at the volunteer house for my first visit as a tried-and-true volunteer. I’ve almost forgotten how to work this keyboard. I felt a vague, childish sense of discovery upon entering the bathroom and observing the strange, metal contraption from which water effortlessly falls to aid in my cleanliness. I saw my whole torso in the mirror (month-long beard and all), and said to the man inside, “You should probably change your underwear today.” It’s in the re-exposure to these conveniences that I notice the differences…

But, life ain’t bad in Thyou. For a month now, I’ve been doing essentially nothing but trying to meet some people, find some balance, stay positive, and pressure my school’s director into giving me something to prepare my courses with. I’ve taught the new dog a few tricks, had a few good conversations on the phone with those of you generous (and wealthy) enough to call, and figured out that if I don’t buy all my vegetables from the same lady at market, everybody competes for my business—donating extra onions, tomatoes, eggplants, or hot peppers to my cause.

There were certainly a few days of unrest. A few days of sickness. A day or two that I read, and re-read the symptoms and manifestations of malaria, thermometer in mouth. But with the first month over with, it’s feeling like this wont be so bad. I can live this way for a year or two. The occasional care package certainly helps. Last week, somebody from the Peace Corps was passing by my house in a jeep, so brought me SIX large boxes with my name on them, literally. After tearing into them, I was able to cook up a phenomenal tuna, tomato, onion and hot pepper pasta. Safe to say I’m eating just fine.

The problem now is, I’ve been on vacation—not that getting to know a place so removed from my own culture is an easy task, but I haven’t been given any due dates. School starts next week. That means I now have lessons to plan, more names to learn, technical french to understand. After a month, I finally feel calm, controlled, comfortable, and now it will change all over again. Much work to be done. And while a little work is a good thing, it doesn’t come without it stresses.

For now, I’m enjoying the few days in the capital, stuffing the gut on comfort foods, and taking a few cleansing showers—essentially gearing up to go back into hibernation. There is a town with an internet cafe and electricity 13 km from me. The man working there said the internet will be up and running in November. In Africa, a promise like this means close to nothing, but let’s hope he’s right! In the meantime, I’ll need to come out to the capital at least once more before November for professional reasons. So this just might work out…

Wish me luck in the coming school year. Miss you all very much. Thyou, while lovely, is a little lonely as an American. We’ll chat again soon.

-Jon

At site

2009-09-12T08:34:00.000-07:00

Today marks one week and two days at my site, though by the time I manage to get to an internet café—and by the time you read this post—it’s probably well past today’s date. Nonetheless, I’m writing today (on the remaining moments of my laptop’s miniscule battery life) because, for one I’m a little bored, and for two I hope to chronicle my initial reactions as I start getting settled.

So the first week has come and gone. Upon my arrival in the big, fancy, one-way-ticket Peace Corps jeep, a tribe of children showed up to watch me unload my things. One boy, who I met two months ago, when visiting my site, informed me that the next day was “market day”. There is a market in my town once every three days. So, after my first rather restless night, I woke up and headed down the dirt path running by my new (for me at least) house. I wasn’t sure exactly where the market was, but I followed the people walking by, assuming they were headed for the same place.

Upon arrival at the market, I was hugely overwhelmed. It was much, much larger than I was expecting, packed with people. And to make things worse, all eyes were on me—the obviously clueless sore thumb. I tried to keep a low profile (impossible), tried to navigate the pathways (senseless), and narrowed my priorities down to simply finding a few vegetables for my chili recipe and getting the heck out of there. Lucky for me, I ran into the boy from the day before, who showed me the way, and translated prices for me from Moore to French.

I of course realized the strangeness of what was going on at the time. Dropped in a small town in the middle of Western Africa, my only acquaintance this eager-to-know-me-for-reasons-I’m-unsure-of youth, I tried to take things in stride. I bought a few tomatoes, onions and hot peppers, and split. Thankfully, the volunteer I replaced has left me a gas stove and a few pots and pans, and I had bought a few canned goods when I was still in Ouagadougou (the capital). I cooked up what I considered a rather phenomenal meal and started feeling comfortable.

My house is pretty nice. There is a wall with a gate surrounding it, which leaves me with a nice big courtyard and a big old tree from which a hammock hangs (thanks to the previous volunteer), for those African-afternoon-heat naps. I took pictures. When I get this entry posted, I’ll try to post the pics as well (though as you can imagine, uploading times here are not optimal).

So, it’s been a week. A few days ago, I hopped on my bike early in the morning and visited another volunteer from my training group. The village this volunteer lives in is even smaller than mine. While there, I didn’t meet a soul who spoke French. We hung out, made french toast, and spoke lots and lots of much-needed English. It’s good to know we’re having some of the same adjustment issues.

Today was the first day since getting to my site that I woke up feeling legitimately homesick. I felt this feeling during training a little bit, but we were so busy that there was hardly time to think about it. Now, after waking up, brushing my teeth, and putting water on the stove for some instant coffee, I suddenly realize that I have to find something to do today. I’ve already finished two books in the week that I’ve been here, and at this rate, I’m going to run out of material pretty quick. All this time sitting around, of course, makes me face West and wonder what YOU are up to. (So send letters…)

Today, I also bought a car battery to power the fluorescent light I will use to write lesson plans and grade papers.

There are three minutes left on my laptop battery, and I hate being pressed for time when writing. I miss you all very much. I took up four pages in my journal just describing people I want to hang out with (you—dear reader—are one of them), things I want to do, and time I’d like to waste back home. See you all before you know it.

News from week 2: I got a dog to keep me company. Not much else going on. Pictures posted below...

Jon

My house:

My dog (he figured out pretty quickly how to get on my good side):

Let's Get Started

2009-08-10T12:30:00.000-07:00

The end of training is upon us, and we couldn’t feel it more heavily than now. Model school has been a huge stress (though arguably successful), and as we begin our final week of teaching, there isn’t a soul here who doesn’t wake up each morning thinking, Can I PLEASE just get to my site and get this whole two-year-commitment thing started? I’ve escaped a few things in my move to Africa, but senioritis isn’t one of them.

Just last week, we had a session on cooking. They gave us a Burkina-specific Peace Corps guide, with loads of delicious recipes, American and otherwise, which we should be able to throw together with ingredients from our local markets. Presenting us with this information towards the end of training was—as I now realize—a very good idea. We are now enlightened souls—so sick of rice and couscous that some of us (okay, mainly I) can’t get out of bed for two hours on Sunday mornings, with the knowledge that we will, in a matter of days, be able to cook ourselves some damn pancakes and drown them in loads of syrup.

Eleven days until we bid goodbye to our host families, and to the barren-though-homely city of Ouahigouya which we’ve learned to appreciate, in a hometown-pride kind of way. After a brief stint and Swearing-In as volunteers in Ouagadougou, we will be escorted to our sites by Peace Corps vehicles with all the junk we brought from America, and all the relics we’ve acquired here thus far. It seems that each of us has an unspoken plan, while in Ouaga, to put ourselves into a debt of General-Motors proportions, as it will be our last chance to acquire those amenities and creature comforts which will permit us to survive as foreigners in a land entirely alien to our own.

Hopefully the Wonderful Wizard of Ouaga possesses the power to grant us all our wishes. Among my priorities are a solar panel (brain), a french press (courage), and a can opener (heart, for the tin man). With the panel, I should be able to charge my phone, possibly my computer, and if nothing else, a tiny light to grade papers by. With the french press, I should be able to continue my self-serving addictions. And with a can opener, I’ll be able to open cans. Duh.

The volunteer transit house in Ouaga has free internet. I’ll try to get some pictures posted when I’m there. Sorry for the wait! Internet time is pricey, pictures take a while to load, and I tend to let other volunteers take party shots…

I’ve updated the Want List. It should be in the column on your left. Don’t feel obliged. I’m a big boy.

-J