Sssss

I cracked another peanut between my index finger and thumb as I watched the status bar creep slowly across the screen. Peanuts are probably my favorite snack food in Burkina – they are (somewhat) healthy and are really easy to find. Plus cracking peanuts is a way to pass the time as I wait for the latest instillation to finish. And I have a lot of installing to do. After an unfortunate hard-drive malady incident, I found myself having to reinstall everything on all of my twenty computers. Good times.

The process had dragged on for the last couple weeks due to an abnormally high amount of power cuts. Watching an install that took several hours die at 90% as the power blinks out is a bit discouraging. Watching it happen several times in one day is extremely frustrating. But at least I was making progress; with about half of the computers done I was starting to see the light at the end of the tunnel.

I stepped out through the door into what was becoming a bright sunny day, not unlike the day before and probably much like the next day. I had amassed quite the peanut shell collection just outside my door and I dutifully added another handful. As they were racing down toward the ground I heard a loud “HIIISSSSSSSSSSSSSS” down next to my sandal-clad right foot. I jumped back about a foot and half and looked down to see a coiled cobra – hood and all – staring at me. I ran.

Once I was what I considered to be a safe ten yards or so away I peered back. It was about a foot and a half long – certainly not among the biggest snakes I’ve seen – but what set this apart from every other snake I’d seen was the its hood. It sat coiled exactly as I’d expect, looking at me and waiting, moving slowly back and forth. As I peeked through the slits between my fingers (what if it was a spitting cobra?) I felt an urge to go in and get a better look – this creature was absolutely fascinating. However after a few moments hesitation and a glance down at the bare skin of my foot that could have been so easily pierced by two poison laden fangs, I decided that I didn’t want to risk getting bitten by a cobra in a small remote town in Burkina Faso. It was time to go get some reinforcements.

Burkinabe hate snakes with a passion. The mere mention of ‘serpent’ gets the attention of the whole room and they will kill any snake they can find. I’d never actually seen this process, but I figured this was my time to find out. I ran over to the nearest classroom and grabbed a few of the biggest students and ran back to my lab. When we arrived I started to pick up some of the pieces of an old desk, thinking that it would be an alright weapon, or at least a way to stop from being bitten. The students exchanged confused looks.

After quickly explaining the situation the group dynamics immediately changed. “A snake!” “Where is it?” “How big is it?” “When did you see it?” An uninterrupted string of questions assaulted me as each student threw down the piece of wood I had given them and started picking up rocks. As we cautiously made our way to the place I had last seen my soon-to-be-deceased friend, I felt a pang of regret. The snake had done nothing to me – in fact he probably has helped me out by killing a lot of the mice in and around my lab. But what if I had stepped one foot to the right and he had bitten my foot? I shuddered.

“THERE IT IS!” shouted one of the boys and a barrage of rocks sailed through the air. I was amazed that so few students could through so many rocks! Someone got a headshot in early and flattened the snake’s head into a pancake. They moved in to closer range then, hitting the snake’s dead body with sticks and rocks. I told them to stop. He was most certainly dead at this point.

We did a brief clean-up of the area, putting back the rocks and moving the pieces of the snake off into the bushes. Then I escorted the students back to class, thanking them for their help. On my way back to the lab I saw another snake slither off into the bushes. Good work, stay afraid of me and we’ll get along just fine.

The Road

I wake up to my alarm and the scamping of little feet. My alarm (which, quiet fittingly is set to the song of time from Oceania of Time, I programmed it in myself) has scared Tyler and Jessi's two new kittens, Gingembre and Noname (which I've tenaciously been calling Meatkat for the past couple days, despite dirty looks from Jessi and Tyler - they want to name him another kind of spice) and they go darting for cover in their favorite hiding/sleeping spot – in the shelves on top of the pasta packages. They are both so cute and it has been a lot of fun playing with them the last couple days. Chris, Andrea and I snuck up to their house under instructions from Jessi to surprise Tyler for his birthday. He awoke to find a full breakfast spread (including bacon!) laid out with three of us and Jessi awaiting him. And he had no idea that any of it was coming. Good work Jessi!

But now all that is over - it's 6:30 am I have to get my butt in gear and get down to the road to catch the bus back to Toma. After saying goodbye to Jessi and Tyler I hop on my bike and get down to the road. Just in time to... wait for thirty minutes or so while the bus driver decides that he has enough passengers (or has finished his rousing round of morning banter) to leave. My wait is broken only by the occasional passing of bikes or motos on the road. Almost everyone says hello.

After about 10 minutes pass by a see a girl coming up the road with a chair on her head. As I'm wondering why in the world a young girl like her would be headed out of town with a chair on her head she stops in front of me, puts down there chair and says that her mom told her to bring this to you. I look down the road and sure enough her mother is about a hundred yards down the road, smiling and wave to me. I wave back and yell thank you in French and local language. She just waves back.

After a few more minutes the bus shows up, laden with its usual cargo of people, bags, boxes and animals. I wave the bus down, and tell them I'm headed to Toma. About a minute later my bike has been hoisted up to the roof and firmly tied down and we're on our way!

The road is bumpy, but not at its worst and at least by the light of day the driver can avoid or slow down for the bumps. And in case you get car sick there are very frequent stops to load on more passengers and cargo. At each of these stops the workers on the bus wait until the bus starts moving to hop on, partly because you're never really sure when the bus is actually going to move and partly because they want to look cool. I've always wondered if they ever got left behind on accident doing that.

Today the most exciting part of the trip is when one of the Guinea fowl got out of it's cage on top of the bus and made a break for it, flying off into the bush. Immediately a gang of maybe ten men and boys go running after it, yelling insults at the guy who put them in their cage as they run. They're back in less than five minutes, bird in hand and before everyone has a chance to calm down from all the excitement we're off again! But this time instead of his normal slow start the driver just steps on it and the gang of last minute bus jumpers is getting left behind! I start laughing as they thump the side of the bus, signaling the driver to stop. He eventually does stop and they clamber back on, looking only slightly abashed.

Before too long the 45 km to Toma is passed and I'm back home. Time for a shower and a nap!

Home again

The bus pulls into Toma late, around 10pm. I'm greeted perhaps the only streetlight in town, lighting up the intersection where I'm to jump off. 'Jumping off' is a highly technical maneuver that requires grabbing ones baggage, yelling at the driver to stop and clambering over people, bags, and animals toward the exit at the same time. Failure to do one of any of these three holds up the process significantly, much to the consternation of the other passengers.

I get off next to one of three 'bars' in town that I frequent and there are a few people that watch me awkwardly grab all my bags and boxes and start the walk up the hill to CAFT. During the day there would be much yelling of “Nasaarha!” by kids playing in the street but apparently they've gone to sleep or are otherwise occupied. My counter part, Frere Prosper, meets me about half way with his moto and relieves me of some of the heavier luggage. I'm forbidden from riding a moto by Peace Corps so I have to continue the last few minutes on foot, happy that I'm carrying less!

I walk into CAFT and am overwhelmed by the absolute mass of foliage outlined by the moonlight. There seems to be plants everywhere! Tall grasses spring out from the road around me as leaves blot out the light overhead. For a minute my home of the past year seems foreign to me, until I round the corner into our compound. And there it is! I'm taken back to the first time I pulled up to my house, almost exactly a year ago. I'm glad to be home.

I dump my backs on the veranda and start searching for my keys. I know they are in here somewhere... emerging triumphantly from my backpack I dust away the cobwebs over my door and turn the key. The door opens and I flick on the light. I'm not sure what to expect. After being gone for 2 months would there be inches of dust everywhere? Insects?

After preparing myself for the worst I look around and am pleasantly surprised. There is a fine layer of dirt, grime, dust and lizard poop everywhere, but besides that the place seems relatively clean! I grab the broom and get to work, I want to get the worst of it out of here and then go to sleep. I can deal with the rest in the morning.

I make my away around the room, making small piles of mess everywhere I go. I've got about half the room done when I round the corner of my bed and AH! LIZARD SATAN SPAWN FROM HELL!!! I almost jump out of my skin as I see what appears to be a giant lizard starting at me from the floor. I pull up the broom defensively, readying myself for a fight. The lizard doesn't seem to be moving at all though. In fact it doesn't seem to be alive. A couple seconds later I realize that this poor soul must have slipped into my room under the door, then died. The heat in my room had long since dehydrated him into a larger, crispier, bone-dry version of his former self. I shudder.

I put him, along with the other unwelcome guest (a scorpion, which I dispatch of with the broom) out onto the porch. The small jump I get out of Prosper when he seems them is worth it. Even after I poke it with the broom and explain to him that it's dead he eyes it somewhat wearily.

The next days are spent sweeping, dusting, mopping (by hand) and washing my room and (almost) everything in it. I feel really good when I'm done. Time to start year two!

An Evening in Ouahigouya

June 30th, 2009

I’m lying on a bench on the concrete porch outside my house on my back. The cool night air flows over me, giving me some respite from the heat of the day. The bench feels cool, especially in comparison to the dirty hot concrete floor I have just been standing on. I can see the moon above next to the concrete overhang - its full brilliance obscured by the clouds, dust and smoke that seem to permanently reside in the skies above.

Inside, Bernadette, the other boarder at this house, scolds Bulgeisa, the serving girl. Her usually soft and kind voice takes on a sharp tone as she scolds in Moore. I hear the sound of the tables being set. One table will be for Bernadette, Bulgeisa and my two host sisters, Gidoni, 7, and Dorine, 8. Their table is a proper kitchen table with six chairs. The other table is for me, my parents, Jacques and Felicete, and my brother, Faniel, 3. It’s not an arrangement that I hope to keep for the whole three months that I’m here, but at the moment I lack the necessary language skills to say anything else.

Geckoes crawl on the wall behind me, their small feet clinging to the wall so effortlessly, for a moment I feel as though I am hanging upside down, looking down at the floor upon which they crawl. Four of them appear from around the wall in a line, as if waiting for the leader to make sure that the coast is clear before venturing any further themselves. Their large black eyes shine the light of the florescent bulb which is their goal. Or more correctly, the insects and moths that fly haphazardly around the bulb.

Lizards here are very common, so far I’ve managed to identify and find names for three kinds: margouya, geckoes and salamanders. Margouya are by far the most common – when I’m outside they are a constant reminder to me that I am indeed in Africa. Not that I really need a reminder, the constant heat around me is reminder enough. Most of the time when I talk to people in the states it is hard to know where to begin. The heat is usually where I start. The first week here you can hardly stand it, sweating all day and all night. My skin, so used to the dry, clean Montana air, does surprisingly well the transition. Other trainees haven’t faired so well. Cases of heat rash, caused by the clogging of overworked pours, are fairly common, evident by red itchy bumps appearing on the skin. Spiny heat afflicts a few more. I’m told it feels like being stabbed by small needles every time pressure is put on the affected skin. It doesn’t sound fun.

Patience, our dog walks cautiously up to me. I hold out my hand to him, not expecting him to come much closer. To my surprise he does, and allows me to pet him. He is a good dog, but you can tell he has had a rough life. Scars cover his face from fights with neighborhoods dogs. He’s skinny, like everything else around here, despite the fact that he is fed every day. I think a lot of it is the need to have a large surface area to volume ratio to lose heat. He looks at me with his big brown eyes as I pet him, his tail slowly wagging. It took me a while for him to get used the idea of getting petted. Apparently dogs here aren’t petted. I asked Dorine why she liked Patience, she replied that he was a good dog and that he guarded the house. After a couple minutes of petting he has had enough, and curls up on the floor to sleep. I’m never sure if he comes to me for the attention, or the chance that I have food.

Part of the courtyard around me is visible in the all too familiar fluorescent light. This corner of the courtyard is home to the only tree, as well as the ominous hole which marks the opening to the well. The hole looks a little small for me, but seems a perfect fit for my three siblings. They seem weary of it, though the sisters do get water from it almost every day. The rope to the bucket is tied to the tree and looks strong enough to hold their weight. I’m fairly certain I could pull them up if need be.

Dinner is served and it is time for me to go inside.