Although this post will probably also be not long enough. Later this weekend I'll write to my heart's content. Okay, now I'll continue from where I left off...the bats in my house. Well, the bats went away after we covered the holes with banco, so I guess that's the end of that story. ;) But on to bigger and better things.
Village children 
The first couple weeks in village were really difficult in terms of getting any privacy, EVER. The kids hung out at my house almost all day every day, wondering what the white girl would do next. There's Safiatu, who presenter herself the very first day. She speaks french well enough for me to understand her. But I think we had a misunderstanding; she wanted me to come to her house, and I told her if it didn't rain that evening I would come see her house. For the next three days, every time it rained she would come to my house to tell me it was raining. But she stopped doing that, and now we understand each other just fine. I think.
Next is Issouf, the little naked boy. He looks like he's 3 years old, but I found out that he's apparently 5. I don't really believe that though. He never wears clothing and was deathly afraid of me at first. But he's warmed up to me a lot, and now he doesn't run when he sees me. :)
Aisha is another girl who likes to come hang out; she's older, probably 12 or so. I don't think she ever went to school, because she doesn't understand french at all. She lives next door to me, and is usually very quiet and reserved when she comes over. I like her, but I wish I could communicate with her more. I need to get better at Fulfulde!!
There are so many children who come visit me on a regular basis, it's hard to describe them all. But there's a little slice for you. :)
The trials and tribulations of house rennovation in Burkina Faso...or lack thereof 
Here is a list I made on 5 September of the things I want to do with my house:
- paint the walls yellow
- put shelves on walls
- get a bed frame made so I can store things under it
- hang a coat/other things hanger
- get a mud-brick wall built so I can have a courtyard and some privacy
- get a straw hangar built for shade
- get a cement porch made so I don't get dirty when walking from the shower to my house or when I want to hang out outside
- start a compost pile
- plant at least one tree
- eventually have a garden
- redo concrete in latrine and shower
- finish separate building for kitchen
The things in bold are the only things that are finished. I had sort of an epic fiasco with the paint, and am now waiting for someone to paint my house for me. Made the mistake of buying oil-based paint to paint my entire house. I should have known better, having worked with oil-based paint with my Dad and knowning how annoying it is to work with on small surfaces, let alone entire walls. But I bought it anyway, along with paint thinner. And the yellow color was too bright, so I also bought a smaller can of white paint to mix with it and hopefully make it less yellow. Looking back, I should have bought a big can of white and small can of yellow. Anyway, after mixing all the white in with the yellow, it was still waaaaay too bright. We're talking primary color yellow for my entire house. No thank you. I'd never be able to sleep! So I painted my windowsills with it, and vowed to find water-based paint. To keep from boring you, I'll just say that water-based paint does not exist in this country. You have to buy paint that's in a powder and add water to it. But this isn't just any powder; oh no. When you add water to it, the temperature gets so high it begins to boil; you have to wait 24 hours before it's cool enough to actually use! So the powder is sitting in my kitchen (i.e., currently my storage area) waiting for someone to paint for me. I don't want chemical burn! I already had it a bit when helping another volunteer paint her walls.
Anyway, this list is to show you how difficult it is to get things done. There is no competition, so it's not like I can go to someone else to get something done. I learned, however, that if I start doing something on my own people will stop me and start doing it themselves. I still pitch in a lot, but it's very nice. Especially when I have NO IDEA what I'm doing; I just know that someone walking by will help me. So the lack of competition is frustrating because no one cares that much about satisfying their customers, but if you just say you're going to do something right now, people will help.
2 September: the gold mine that made me think of my tiny village as urban
I had agreed to go with Adam (my closest PC neighbor, 5km from me) and this old guy from Bani (Adam's village) to see the old guy's fields, and also a gold mine that's "near" his fields. I met them at Adam's house at 8am the next day, and the guy took us the 5km or so to his fields en brousse (in the bush). His fields were much smaller than many of the others; either the soil there really sucked or he planted a lot later than everyone else. At any rate, it's cool that he wanted to show us.
After spending a bit of time there, we headed towards the gold mine. It took quite a while to get there; it was pretty far to begin with, but we also stopped a lot in the process to greet people. (It is very rude to not greet people here.) When we got there, however, it was totally worth it. We rode up to this little shack where a family was staying, and it looked like they were living in the middle of nowhere with no water or other necessities. We walked down the path a little ways, to where we found a 60-meter deep hole with a couple of grates on either side. There was a pulley system set up with a couple of gears, and one small stick tied to a very long rope. A man sits on the tiny stick and is lowered into the hole to collect rock to sift through for gold. We actually witnessed some guys being lowered, but that was on our way back from visiting the actual mining village.
As soon as we stepped into the village I felt like I was 600 miles from where I had been that morning; it was truly a nomadic mining village in the boo
nies of Burkina Faso. There were bloody goat heads and legs strewn about the earth at the first maquis (um, I guess "food stand" would be the best translation for that) we came across, many of the houses were of the nomadic type (i.e., constructed completely out of straw), and there was no green anywhere. During the rainy season. The old guy took us around the village, and we watched the different steps of extracting gold from the rocks. First, a man puts a chunk of rock in a piece of rice sack or something and pounds it into much smaller chunks. Then there are about 8 or 10 people pounding these smaller chunks into powder with really heavy metal pounders (I tried this...there's even video evidence that you will hopefully soon be able to watch), and others sift out the fine powder. Another man then takes the powder and mixes it with water in a bowl, which sifts out the gold because it's a different density. Then they sell the gold, measuring by the "matchstick," in a small container. 500cfa for one matchstick's worth. It was incredibly interesting, and incredibly weird. The people looked like they hadn't been out of their tiny mining village in, well, ever.
We walked around the village a bit, still feeling like we were in some weird form of Burkina Faso, then headed back to the hole to watch some men go down into the deep. We sat around for a half hour or so before they came, and Adam contemplated going down. But we talked him out of that. :) I felt pretty awkward for most of this time because I was the only woman there, and everyone thought I was Adam's wife. Anyway, when people were ready to enter the hole, there was a line of about 20 men holding the rope and steadily lowering each one in. They tied flashlights to their heads with bike straps, and most took their shoes off before going down. It was a very odd scene to be witnessing. It really felt like some secret military base in the middle of the desert, where no one could get in and no one could get out because it was so far away.
25 September: the gold mine that made me think of my tiny village as akin to the other gold mine
My second-closest neighbor is Patrice in Yalgo, who coincidentally lived in Portland for three years before coming to Burkina. Small freaking world. The first time I visited her, I took the bus down there one morning to hang out with her for the day. Then Josh, another volunteer, came over and we went to a soccer game in Patrice's village. Then around 7pm we were picked up in a Land Rover by a security guard of a Canadian-run gold mine in Taparko. We were driven, for free, in a Land Rover, the 12km south to the gold mine that looks like America. We drove through two security gates and were inspected by guards, then drove up to the catering building. That's right, the gold mine has a catering service. With American food. We ate macaroni salad, meatballs, potatoes with garlic, fruit salad, beer and soda. For free. There's no way I can express to you how weird this was for me. I get reverse culture shock 25km from my own village!
Common forms of Burkinabé village transport: the donkey cart
Back to Patrice's village...this time with my counterpart's wife (Pendo) in a donkey cart. Pendo grew up in Yalgo, and much of her family is still there, so she visits quite often. She wanted me to meet some of her family and show me the Yalgo market. It took fewer than 15 minutes to get to Yalgo by bus. On a donkey cart it's a slightly different story: we left Amsia around 8am and didn't get to Yalgo until well after 10am. Wheeee! But it was fun because Pendo and I got to talk a lot. She speaks French very well, but also we were practicing Fulfulde and English. She's my best friend in village; we do a lot together now. She's 22, and has a one-year-old daughter named Safura. But Pendo, myself, and many others call her by her nickname, Juma (which is Arabic for the day of prayer).
Ramadan: living proof that you can live in the desert for more than three days without water
Waking up to the rhythmic sounds of women pounding millett from all directions at 2am is a sure sign that the month of Karem (Ramadan) has begun in Amsia. As no one eats or drinks while the sun is up, it's necessary to get up that early to start preparing the morning meal so everyone can eat at 4am. Everyone is tired, many get sick from not eating or drinking enough, and the village is almost too serene. The 5th and last prayer of the day, at 8pm, lasts slightly less than an hour during Ramadan. All the men go to the mosque, but as the women aren't allowed inside they just stay at home and pray in their courtyards. I spend almost every evening in my counterpart's courtyard chatting with the women there, so during Ramadan I would sit there while they prayed. Everyone washes their hands, arms, face, ears, and feet with water and set their prayer mats out before praying. An older man stands at the mosque and sings the prayer very loudly so all the village can hear, and the whole village prays along with his voice. All the older children pray along with the women, but the youger ones have no idea what's going on. Some of them think it's a game and have the time of their lives, laughing up a storm while kneeling to the ground, touching their face to the earth, and standing back up along with the adults. It's so innocent and peaceful.
The first night of Ramadan, Hama (my counterpart) saunters into the courtyard after this prayer and the first thing that comes out of his mouth is: "Brandi! Comme tu es africaine maintenant, on va te donner un nom africain." Meaning now that I'm african, he's going to give me an african name. He knew about my name in Komsilga, Pendo. But Amsia wanted to give me their own name. So my new Burkinabé name is Hajiatou. It was so honoring to have him give me a name like that. It was like during the prayer at the mosque he had been talking about this with everyone, and he just couldn't hold it in. So Pendo is no more...except when Jenni calls me that and when I visit Komsilga. From now on it's Hajiatou, or Hajia for short.
I'm tired. It's time for bed. Hopefully this will satisfy you for a bit; this weekend I hope to write more about my actual job, but we'll see if I get that far. I have so much to write about.
HAPPY THANKSGIVING EVERYONE!!
