Life, Burkina, and back!

After a whirlwind trip from Burkina Faso, I am back in Benin. However, since last writing, I have done more than travel.  I had my site visit from my APCD (Assistant Peace Corps Director), have continued to enjoy life and discover my town, did several weeks of “surveying” (proctoring exams), and of course visit Burkina Faso.

So I was extremely nervous anticipating the visit and observation from my APCD. We recieve two visits throughout our time here, right now, and then into our second year of teaching. Thankfully, my site visit went really well. My director observed one of my 6ieme classes, and thankfully, they were very well behaved. The timing of the visit was awkward – I had just given the last of my ”interrogations” (quizzes) for the semester the week before, and had to prepare my kids for the “devoirs” the following week”. So my lesson consisted of going over the interro, and reviewing for the devoir. However I think I managed to present the lesson creatively – using a collaberative group review activity by dividing questions up for each group and then having each group find the answers and present them to the class - using awesome neon colored flashcards provided by freinds from home (thanks Daniel!).  Both my APCD Maria and another teacher observed me – the head of the English department. Maria then talked briefly to the class and asked why they liked or did not like English and said some things about my position as a volunteer. Later, she met me at my house to provide feedback. Good things she noticed according to her: I use little to no French in class, I am confident in my presence in the classroom, I present my lessons creatively, she was impressed by the high level of English they seem to know, and was pleased I knew all my kids names. Things I need to work on: correcting their puncuation and capitalization,  need to provide less corrections without them finding answers,  need to clarify any “French directions” I give, and that I need to show a little more patience with my administration. All things  I understand and will definetly be improving on. The patience point is one that I am learning and understanding more and more. Patience is key here! Things work themselves out with time, time, time!

In line with other school related items, before vacation hit, and after the site visit, there were several weeks of “devoirs” (exams) I was “surveying” (proctoring), so there was a small respite from teaching. This is the second set of devoirs for the semester, so things are wrapping up and getting ready for the second half. However, before “surveying” I attempted to do many extra tutoring sessions for those who had lots of trouble on the last “interro”. Although I told all those students with a certain low grade to come, it turns out only a handful of my best students end up showing up! Somewhat frusturating and I am trying to figure out other ways to reach out to these struggling students, as they do not come in to get extra help when it is offered. I realize this probably has a lot to do with commitments at home during those hours potentially. Any ideas from current teachers would be helpful!

Anyways,   although I find “surveying” (proctoring) to be utterly boring and somewhat frusturating, it comes with teaching. It is boring because we are obviously just staring at students for 2-3 hours making sure they do not cheat and answering questions, and frusturating because I find it difficult to develop the respect I have in class from my own students. Especially the older students – so many of them are bigger than me! And it is very difficult to pinpoint cheating, because it is totally accepted here to borrow pens, pencils, rulers, etc, so there is much turning around and small whispering. So I have learned to attempt to be calm, stern, and a bit authoritarian in my surveying techniques in order to not overeact but maintain control.

During the surveying weeks, I was correcting “devoirs” and finishing calculating all my students “moyennes” (semester grade averages). Although I completed this task before vacation, tomorrow when school starts up again I need to calculate it again in front of the students for complete transparency.

On other notes about life here, I continue to discover new parts of Azove, or especially my area of Azove (Holohoue), as I explore, and have begun running (and my neighbor Krystal has even joined me once – so fun!). If one goes away from the town center, where I had usually focused my attention, besides biking for miles to other towns, a less condensed population is visible, and it opens up into more village life. There is a small soccer field, a Beninoise red cross, many other women and men selling the basic items, great pineapple, many freindly and interesting people,  and an awesome path leading to fields away from the town center. It has been fun taking just different alternate routes and walks to continue to discover this area.

I am also getting to know some women in town better. This includes a women who sells “bouie glace” (essentially a cold thick drink/food kind of like cream of wheat but not exactly), and our main “marche mama”. It is important for me with time to really try to connect with individual people in town besides my awesome neighbors, so I think things are progressing. A few weeks ago I also went to the “grand marche” (market on marche day) with my young neighbor Krystal and her freind, which is definetly different in some ways than going with my postmate or alone. Although I went to my usual stops for fried plantains (bananas), and felt great “salueing”(greeting) my freinds in the marche, I also discovered where to buy this amazing fruit here called “azongoguey” which is like this combination between an orange and a kiwi, and felt that people treated me a little bit differently. One funny incident that occured with them was a guy selling shoes who continued to ask me to marry him over and over and over and coming up with every excuse possible. It was pretty funny because he was so adament, and I was so adament against it that it was like a comedy routine - it was great because some of my  other girl students were there and they were soo excited at my continual “no, no, no” and excuses of being young, not finished with my studies, independent, etc. It was really inspiring to seem them totally on my side and somewhat empowered, and joining in on explaining why marriage to this unknown person would probably not be the best idea.

Speaking of girls here, I want to vent for a bit on my frusturation for girls here. I am just continually amazed by the lack of women in the classroom – I have been counting the number of girls in the older years at school, and how there really is such a lack of educated women role models (basically 2 or 3 women teachers besides me). Except at the same time, it seems that women honestly do the bulk of work here. It is 90% women that one sees selling at the marche, or hauling goods and water, or taking care of the kids. The women are such and absolute signifigant part of society on so many levels – my respect for them is incredible. Yet,  their general access to education, and literacy at the most basic level is incredibly limited. I know many people around the world know about this issue, but when you see it everyday, it is real. And just a part of life. And I have to remind myself of it’s reality. In addition, a few weeks ago I witnessed some treatment of young girls that really  bothered me.  One of my favorite former students (before her class was taken away) and a girl who plays football with my team was in my neighborhood selling “gateaus” (fried bean balls) – as most girls who go to school also play a signifigant role in earning money for their family. As I was buying, along with other people in the neighborhood, I observed the way the men who hang out in front of my concession were treating her. They were rude, and quick, and one of them kept flirtatiously  touching her face in an inappropriate manner. I see this type of treatment sometimes with men ten years their senior and it bothers me to no end. When I say something, they stop immedietly, but the girls never say something themselves, and it is obvious they do not like it. A sense of empowerement that that is NOT ok seems to be missing. Maybe with time and with building more trust with these girls, we can work on this empowerement issue…But where is my place? I am an outsider.

Anyways, my neighbors Mama Flo Flo and family have been dealing with their youngest son Mikey being in the hospital for several weeks. It is stranging not having Mikey or Mama around with someone to always talk to, and the three kids (Flo Flo, Maso, and Mikey) and all their energy. Mikey has some type of issue with his stomach or something that no one seems to totally clarify to me, but I guess it is bad enough for this second hospital stay and another surgery in Cotonou. I went with Papa, Flo Flo, Maso, and some other family members to visit him in the hospital in Lakossa. It was hard to see him so weak, but really touching to see the support and love from his family. I felt a more part of their family by going, and I think it meant a lot to them that I was there. I hope he is out of the hospital soon. I realize now more and more  we become really close to particular people while we are here for a full two years, and it will be hard to say goodbye.

Finally, many words on my trip to Burkina Faso. It was a great 10 days with some of my best freinds in the Peace Corps, finally doing some out of country traveling! I definetly noticed some marked differences between Burkina and Benin. For one, the attitude of the people seems to be a little different. Burkinabe (what people from Burkina Faso are called) are very laid back and freindly, and their favorite expression seemed to be “pas de problem” (no problem). Also, Burkina Faso is more heavily Muslim and with an encroaching Sahelian desert that is visibly noticeable during the dry season of the savanna landscape. Also, their seems to be more of a music and local art culture, especially with an awesome guitar like instrument alled the Kora that creates a beautiful harp like sound.   

Our visit started with a long bush taxi ride to Ouagadougou from Tangeuita (a Beninese town up North),. Our bush taxi broke down 6 or 7 times – many times we observed the donkeys moving at a faster pace than us as we sputtered along, the engine sputtering and sounding like we were continually being shot at. Eventually we changed taxi’s once the driver gave up, and finally made it to Ouagadougou for a few nights. Ouaga (as they call it here for short) is a really beautiful city, that is really well planned. No one rides zemijans here (the motercyle like things that we use to go everwhere in benin!), so we took bush taxis around everwhere. They even have strawberries in Ouaga! So during our time in Ouaga, we really just walked around a lot, ate good food, and planned to do more when we returned after visiting Bobo (but did not really end up happening due to circumstances that will be explained in a bit). 

So on Monday of our trip, we took a bus ride to Bobo-Dioulasso, the second largest city in Burkina and which is very close to the border of Mali. We stayed at a wonderful small hotel downtown, and visited and had a tour of the old district, the beautiful mosque, walked around the marche, and went to the museum.  The marche was outside, but enclosed in this covered market space, and music could be heard through speakers throughout. Definetly, a different, more “desert-like”  feel than the marche’s I had experienced in Benin. The Bobo museum was pretty interesting, where several of my freinds bought local contemporary art and we were able to meet the artists. It also seemed that there was apprenticing going on their, in “batik” cloth making, woodwork, music, and other artisan specialties. We also were able to explore an old Bobo home. 

We also went on a several hour long taxi ride to try to go to this supposed water hole outside of bobo proper. It was a hilarious experience, with our chain smoking “chauffeur” (driver) who took the total backroads, so we were essentially in the middle of nowhere and driving over bumps and uphills never meant for a car. It was all we could to convince him to keep going until we finally made it to a forest, where the water hole was unswimmable due to a water treatment facility. But it was an adventure!

Anyways, the next day, things rapidly changed our travel plans. We had been told the day before that the “commercants” (shopkeepers) would be  striking so the marche would be closed so we knew that things would be different. However, as our little hotel was downtown, we woke up to protesting and rioting right outside the hotel door. Turns out, the protesting was over the increased cost of living in Burkina Faso. To read a little bit more on this, go to this article: http://allafrica.com/stories/200802221172.html . It was definetly not violent at all, but tons of men were gathered, holding cardboard, making noice, and eventually burning tires at the corner. After breakfast, we walked around for a bit, even though absolutely no shops were open, and no taxis were leaving Bobo due to blockades of the street and police in riot gear.  Some of my freinds were on a desperate search for “pain chocolate” (bread with chocolate inside – french speciality), and actually got some only through a backdoor of the bakery – like World War II esque. So because we could not due our planned day trip due to no taxis working or leaving, we decided to go to a nearby hotel with a pool and just hang out and swim. While we were there, we met Cory, a Burkina Faso Peace Corps Volunteer with his parents. While there, he recieved a call from Peace Corps Burkina Faso that the country was on “standfast” due to the rioting both in Bobo and in other areas of Bobo. In addition, the Peace Corps office in Bobo had been attacked – basically things were thrown at it – kind of in the line of fire of the rioters. Basically, in Peace Corps lingo,  “standfast” means that you are not supposed to leave your post, or stay where you are. So, because we were Peace Corps volunteers in another country, we are immedietly put under the auspices of the country we were in. So we too were on “standfast”. Finally we recieved word that we had to get our stuff from the hotel, and all of us, with Cory and his parents, had to move to a hotel near the Peace Corps office as they feared more rioting I suspect. It was interesting, because by the afternoon things appeared to  have really calmed down, but I suspect they were being extra cautious, especially because things were happening in other areas of Burkina.

After a night at Casa Africa, all of us were told last minute to grab our stuff and that we were all going to Orodora, about and a half away from Bobo, going west. However, we were packed into the Peace Corps vehicle with BF volunteers who were at the office, so 16 of us were crowded in this car! We were essentially “consolidating” for safety reasons, as the Peace Corps suspected continuing protesting and they wanted to get us out of Bobo, one of the main areas of the country where it was occuring. So we spent one night at this new place in Orodora, and then the next day, we took a 9 hour car ride a really long way around the country (to avoid the main roads where they were nervous about driving) to drop off Burkina Faso volunteers at their sites, and to bring us back to Ouagadougou. We spent a night at their Peace Corps transit house in Ouagadougou where we met up with other Benin volunteers coming back from Senegal who had also been consolidated, and then were taken by the Peace Corps to the Burkina Faso- Benin border the next day, where our Security officer in Benin met up with us. So we were essentially evacuated from Burkina Faso! It was an interesting three days, witnessing how the Peace Corps really goes all out in these types of situations – it seemed like they were taking every single possible precaution to keep us safe – which seemed a little much at times, but I guess it is better to be safe than sorry. So we got to see less of Ouagadougou, but did get to see Burkina Faso volunteers posts, which was really interesting. So the adventures truly do continue!

Start teaching again tomorrow, and in a few weeks is International Women’s Day soccer match with Dogbo, and then another week of training for TEFL teachers. This week, there will be extra practices with the girls, and today, my postmate and I are getting some necessary shoes and uniforms for the team, as we recieved the Gender and Development funding we had applied for!

Currently reading Interpreter of Maladies, and continue to read The Fate of Africa, the 700 page book that seems to never end. So I will be keeping busy!

Hope all is well at home and abroad for all freinds and family! Miss you all!