The approaching storm

[(Photo: I visit a friend who lives in this mud-brick 'house' every week to read the Bible. When you see clouds like this in the late afternoon you have two options; ride home quickly or spend the night. I rode home quickly (takes about 30 minutes), and beat the storm by a matter of seconds.]

If you appreciate a good storm, you’d love this time of year in West Africa.
We experience a downpour every second day which almost always knocks out our electricity for the duration of the storm (not that we mind since watching a storm in the dark is a great past-time).
Rolls of thunder last more than a minute at a time as lightning dances across the sky. The huge trees sway violently as the storm chooses its victims, such as one of our poor, paw paw trees which did its last jig a couple of rains ago.
Aside from the spectacle, the rainy season brings many positives including relief from drought and relief from the heat. Water is plentiful and the temperature drops from the uncomfortable 30s and 40s to the pleasant 20s during a downpour, before the mercury starts climbing again.
Unfortunately, there are some negatives; the mosquitoes come with the rains, which means most of the population experiences bouts of malaria, and the flimsy shelters of the beggars are usually no match for the fury of the storm.
Jon

The reason we are tired

There is a scrap metal yard opposite our house, owned by a Muslim family who live behind the ‘yard’. Most of the time, there are around 20 men working there during the day, banging pieces of metal which will be turned into large cooking cauldrons. The area is littered with old cars, old car parts and anything else that is made of metal and could be used again.

When we got home from our weekly prayer meeting last Wednesday, we noticed that the scrap metal had all been cleared away to one corner, and some marquees were being set up. There were some people sitting on the ground hacking into a meat carcass, which was covered in flies. We asked our guard what was going on, and he said that a wedding was taking place there the next day, with five couples getting married at the same time.

We went to bed to the sounds of earplug penetrating African techno music, which didn’t stop until around 4am. I made some enquiries with the neighbours about how long a Muslim wedding usually lasted. “One week,” I was told.

By 5pm the next day, the end of our street (an intersection, not a cul-de-sac) was completely blocked off as people crowded around the marquees for the entertainment. This consisted of a man ‘singing’ into a microphone, while two other guys chanted into the other mic. It sounded like the Muslim call to prayer, but much louder, and the guy didn’t take a break for seven hours. (Or if he did the changeover was so slick you couldn’t even tell.)

While the man in the middle of the circle did his song – he was exalting the five bridegrooms (we were told) – two guys sat on the ground drumming calabashes. The little girls we often see playing hopscotch outside our place were dancing in the circle, while the crowd clapped. The girls, and the rest of their family members, were all dressed in outfits made from the same fabric. At weddings here in Burkina, the family of the groom chooses a special ‘wedding cloth’ that everyone buys to get their outfit made for the special occasion.

I watched the proceedings for a while, with our young neighbour giving me a running commentary. The excitement of the crowd increased when some of the brides arrived. Their ‘bridal car’ was an old delivery van, preceded by several men speeding up and down the street on their motos, honking their horns and whooping. While everyone crowded around, two of the veiled brides got out of the car and were spirited off inside the compound – perhaps to meet with their grooms in private.

That night, I ended up sleeping at a friend’s place nearby, while Jon stayed at home because he didn’t want to leave the house when there were so many people hanging around. We do have a night guard, but we figured he would probably join in the celebrations instead of watching our house. Jon managed to get to sleep around 1am, only to be woken up by the motos racing around the streets honking their horns until the early hours of the morning.

Cathlin

HAVE YOU SEEN THIS WORKER?

Missing: This worker has big ears, large nostrils and a tuft of hair on his head. Many people think he is stupid and stubborn but he is in fact intelligent and focused. APPROACH WITH CAUTION. Witnesses say he is in the later stages of his 30-odd year life, because he was clearly 'graying'.

When this worker goes missing, fields are not plowed, rubbish starts piling up and building materials don't make it to half-finished huts or houses. In Burkina Faso, you often hear about such and such who is in trouble because they have lost their means of income: the donkey.

They are a target for thieves, but they also go AWOL on their own accord if they have a bad owner and an opportunity to escape presents itself (...not so stupid after all).

They are used extensively in the fields, as a cheaper source of labour than oxen and they have many attractive work qualities, such as tough hooves which don't require horse shoes. They also have a great poker face which makes them good with company secrets.

If you do see this missing worker, please contact us right away, as there are plenty of people here looking for their lost donkey.

Jon

Garbage women

It’s around 1pm and the rubbish ladies have just come to collect. Every week, 2 women arrive with their donkey and cart, knock politely on our front gate and then come into our yard with their worn straw mat. They speak no French, and I only a little Moré, so our conversations are short. But gestures transcend spoken language, and I know that on a hot humid day (pretty much every day in Ouaga) they’re asking for water. I bring out a large bottle of chilled water from our fridge, and they drink cup after cup until it’s almost all gone. They smile at me, and laugh kindly when I respond to them in Moré.

One lady appears much older than the other and some of her front teeth are missing. She wears a crucifix around her neck, and both are dressed in worn, dirty clothes. The smell from their open rubbish cart follows them as they take the path beside our house and empty the half-gallon drum that serves as our ‘wheely bin’.

The rubbish goes onto the straw mat, which they lug back down our path, one lady holding either end. The rubbish is dumped onto the pile in their cart, buzzing with flies, while the donkey waits patiently. I wave the ladies goodbye, say ‘barka’ (thank you) and lock the gate after them, wrinkling my nose at the horrible smell. And then I come inside where the air is nicer.

We’ve seen where some of the rubbish gets taken – an open air dump that we have to ride through to get to one of our English classes. At this dump, the ladies arrive and unload their donkey carts then sort through the rubbish to remove what can be re-used (empty cans, plastic bottles etc). We don’t know what happens to the unusable rubbish – it may get buried there on the site, which is right next to the canal where little kids play. I hate riding through this place, because of the smell. But I ride past and then it’s gone. The other people work there, while their kids play amongst the discarded plastic ware, plastic bags and other junk.

We pay the equivalent of $2.50 a month for this once-a-week rubbish collection service. A fairly well-dressed lady comes around at the end of the month, on her bicycle with her baby tied to her back, and collects the money. She is the ‘middle-man’. She collects for a man who runs the business. So we can only speculate how much of that $2.50 goes to the garbage ladies who do the dirty work, who have the stench of rubbish on them all day, and who walk around in the heat urging their donkey to keep going.

Cathlin