PACKAGES!!!!!!!

So first, allow me to apologize to all of you who have asked me on more than one occasion if I have received your package and I said no...mainly Jessica.  And also sorry to Burkina for always blaming the fact that I have not gotten my packages on your slow mail system.  (Although, I do not speak without reason that things do at times move at a snails pace.)  In fact, I have received packages, I even got a surprise package from my church...I just didn't know it.  Let me explain.

When I was a peace corps volunteer the first time I just had all of my mail come straight to the closest post office to my site.  The Peace Corps office was like 8 hours away from me and I rarely went to the capital to do things so I wanted to make sure I always got my mail and not just every 3 months or so after it piled up for a while.  This time around since my stay is shorter and I did not originally have someone to split the costs of opening a mailbox with, plus the capital is no longer 8 hours away, I decided to just have mail go to the volunteer mailboxes.  Well, every time I checked my little cubby hole, it didn't have any notes saying I had a package, nor were their packages in the cubby...so how was I supposed to know that they were there?!  Apparently there is some nifty organized list system and the packages are kept locked in a room.  When you check the list, you may then go into the locked area and retrieve your packages.  To say the least, I am now rolling in packages because I got them all at the same time...YAY!  And also found out that it looks like the mail time for packages averages about 3-4 weeks.  So it is not too bad.

I must say I am stoked!  I have hair conditioner, kool aid, books, granola, really good seasoning, and a potato peeler, just to name a few of the things.  Thanks everyone!!!

Happy International Volunteer Day!

Black Eyed Peas said, “Turn up radio, blast your stereo riiiight now…”  Then he said a whole bunch of other stuff that has absolutely nothing to do with this blog or if it does, I wouldn’t know because I generally stink at knowing song lyrics (I had to look that up and also totally thought it was Andre 3000…lol).  But I think I just did the trick, because you are still reading and probably wondering, “what the heck is wrong with Aisha?”  Haha!  Today is December 5, 2011, International Volunteer Day!  All over the world volunteer efforts are occurring and I take my hat off to all persons who are willing to support someone else by giving of their time, love, and even money to support the development of humankind.   

You: “Aisha, what does this have to do with the radio?”

Glad you asked!  In support of International Volunteer Day a few local volunteers invited another Peace Corps volunteer and I to do a radio broadcast promoting volunteerism and sharing our experiences as volunteers.  The local volunteers are like our AmeriCorps, which means they go to a town far from home and devote their time and energy to education, healthcare, food security and more.  It was an honor to do the broadcast with them and also to listen to and share in their stories and hopes for the future of Burkina Faso.  We prerecorded the broadcast the other day and it will air locally today. 

Happy International Volunteer Day to all!  I challenge you all to volunteer in some way today and also say thank you to those who are stepping outside of their comfort zones in order to make your town, state, country, or this world a better place!  Thank you to all volunteers worldwide for your efforts!  It may seem hard at times, but remember the reward is not only for your communities, but also very personal J.  Keep up the good work!

Interested in international volunteerism through the peace corps: www.peacecorps.gov
Interested in local volunteerism: contact local schools, churches, hospitals, other civic organizations, or simply pick up litter with some neighbors. Also you can check this website: http://richmondgoodlife.com/volunteer/index.htm 

"The Ambassador Came to Visit Me!!"

Who gets to say that often?  Well, probably the ambassador’s colleagues, and friends, and family, but I mean outside of those people?  I am not sure if I will say it often or not, but, at least I will say it this time.  I am excited!

 It was a pretty quick visit that didn't last more than an hour, but it was nonetheless encouraging and supportive.  He shared a story with me and the Directrice of the boarding house about a young Burkinabe girl who was from a small village and last year I believe Michelle Obama had some sort of ceremony to encourage young girls and 2 Burkinabe girls were invited.  This was their first time out of their small villages, first time to go to the capital of their own country, and obviously their first time outside of their country!  One of the girls had a very difficult personal story, but despite the challenges of 11 out of 13 siblings passing away and also her father passing away, she was the first in her 5^th grade class.  She had aspirations of becoming a doctor so she could help heal other people so that death would not riddle their families as it had hers.  Being touched by the story, many people who were at the ceremony were ready to continue to fund the young girl’s education to ensure that her dreams were fulfilled.  What has explained to the American audience listening was that it was not a question of funding (although it is important), but more so a question of access.  So often young children in this country who work so hard to succeed in their studies are unable to continue on to middle or high school, simply because there is no secondary school in their towns.  Often at the middle school or high school cut off, the numbers for girls and boy change drastically because parents feel more comfortable sending their young boys far away to study.  Girls are at time targets and are more vulnerable.  Thankfully for the young girl, people pooled their money so that she could go to secondary school in a boarding school similar to the place where I work.

The Ambassador was not only excited for the house where I work, but commended the efforts of the community and the persons who work there for bringing access to a group of the population that is often left out.  To encourage us even more, he brought with him 2 boxes of brand new books to fill our empty bookshelves!  The house is brand new, so we are pulling things together little by little, but it surely has potential.  Thanks Ambassador for your excitement and support!

Thanksgiving 2011- Burkina Faso

I am thankful for family, friends, new experiences, lessons learned, challenges overcome, inquisitive young ladies, the potential for growth, my strengths, the ability to be honest that I am flawed, most importantly life and love (both of which describes the nature of God)! 

The menu: grilled chicken, couscous, watermelon and popcorn.  

Drink menu: bissap (hibiscus juice), box wine, and water.

The guests: community house co-workers including the three catholic sisters, the two cooks, one of the guardians, and the chauffer; other colleagues from regional direction of education, my neighbors, the accountant for the mayor, and my landlord.

This thanksgiving was indeed one to remember.  Many volunteers organized thanksgiving dinners together in large towns putting together money to fatten up (weeks in advance) and kill a turkey for good old fashion thanksgiving dinner.  The country director even hosted a thanksgiving dinner at her house and invited those who had already planned to be in the capital to join in.  Considering that I am a Peace Corps Response Volunteer, I didn’t come in with a group of 35 other trainees awaiting the day of swear in.  I am actually the only response volunteer in country now.  So to say the least, I have nothing against the other volunteers, but I also do not have strong ties to most of them as we didn’t cry through diarrhea and training together.  I do have a select few close volunteer friends who I hang out with and who I vent to when I need a mental Burkina and French break, but I feel more tied to the people I work with and other friends I have in my community.  Thus I decided to make thanksgiving happen for the people here in my town.  And what a delight it was indeed.

Traditionally in my family the ways things go is that we cook starting on the Tuesday before Thanksgiving.  We make the staple Thanksgiving foods, go to relatives houses and eat!  We usually do some sort of explanation of what we are thankful for and then a prayer.  I tried to recreate the atmosphere here.  We didn’t have turkey, but really good grilled chicken stuff with couscous…kinda like turkey with cornbread stuffing no?  There was no cornbread stuffing, or corn pudding, but I had popCORN! No cranberry sauce, or pies/dessert, so the watermelon was the sweet stuff.  Haha.  It was great J.  I explaned to them what thanksgiving meant to me and then we all said a word of what we were thankful for.  Haha, the chauffer of the community house is really funny and he reminded me of all the teenagers in my family who have absolutely no interest in the thankful circle and prayer…they just want to eat.  He also designated himself my personal “Protocol”.  I guess the best way to describe that is a personal assistant, or planner.  It was quite comical.  So if people came late, he was looking at his watch to let them know.  If I needed anything for the dinner, he was Johnny on the spot.  It was quite surprising to see him come out of his shell. 

This is the first thanksgiving in Burkina that I actually celebrated with Burkinabe.  The first time I was here, I went to a big volunteer thanksgiving throw down, and then the following year, I didn’t go anywhere and didn’t even mention to my community that there was a holiday in America.  This one as worth having and I am happy I was able to share the experience with the people here J

Work Updates…

So the community house is coming together.  Interesting enough, I lived in Burkina Faso for 2 whole years before and never saw the first lady once.  I am back and within 2 weeks, I saw her twice.  On October 10^th we had a huge inauguration with the first lady present.  It was such a nice ceremony to get the ball rolling for the academic year.  All the girls, their parents, and other community members were present.  It was quite nice.  You can see a few pictures from the ceremony.  Unfortunately, I didn’t get a good shot of the first lady, but she was indeed there J.

I have been continuing to work on the community analysis and trying to understand the needs of the community house.  The major concern is a water shortage.  Water pressure in the town is overall pretty low, but it became pretty serious for 3 weeks, nearly the entire month of November.  The community house and my house since it is in the same zone, and all of my neighbors had no running water.  It was nuts.  There are a few water pumps in town so we would buy water in town and fill up large containers with water to be able to continue with business as usual.  The water shortage put a fork into lots of things.  I was preparing to start a gardening project at the community house to help with 2 major needs, improving the value of the food served and also incoming generation.  Whatever we would not use at the house could be sold in the market to help make the house more self-sustaining.  Without a reliable source of water, a gardening project is out of the question.  Thankfully, water is coming back as it was before, with low pressure.  Apparently, there was a machine broken at the water plant and it took a little bit for them to be able to fix it.  In terms of ensuring that low water pressure and also water shortages will no longer be a problem, a water tower is going to be built in the month of January. So maybe the gardening project is still a possibility, but we will see in the next few months.

Work with the girls…

I work with the dorm supervisor creating life skills training, study skills training, and planning other activities for the girls.  On Thursday afternoons, when the girls are out of school, we have life chats.   We talk about hygiene, decision making, self-confidence, you know, overall life skills topics.  On Saturdays, I have an English club to help the girls prepare to pass their national tests.  While this is a francophone country, they take English and German as high school foreign language requirements.  Since I am here, they can profit from having a real English-speaker to practice with.  The other days of the week during the day I help plan activities with the dorm supervisor, create study groups, address concerns that pertain to the life of the girls, etc.  And in the evenings, I usual stick around to help the middle school girls with their math and English homework.  The high school girls I help only with English.  The way that math is notated in French, versus in English is weird and I don’t want to lead anyone into a lost hole…lol. 

My hope is to also get some life skills training or some sort of conference going for the high schools in the area.  I would like to work with both young ladies and gentlemen.  The reality is, even if you empower a girl with lots of tools to be able to navigate the world, it is important that both the girls and the boys at the same time are learning better decision making skills, and setting life goals and plans.  Heck, I have never seen a teen pregnancy with a girl doing this all on her own (let’s forget the possibility for artificial insemination for the sake of the reality here) so that means that young men need to be a part of the discussion as well.  As well as get a tree planting campaign going.  We will see how planning goes in the upcoming months.

 Overall, work is going well and I thoroughly enjoy working with teenagers.  Plus since I am a foreigner, they think I am pretty funny and interestingJ.  They are a delight to work with and I am glad I am here to share in a small portion of their lives and personal development.  Hopefully, I can leave some positive impression with them and also connect them with local women that they can look up to and learn from.  Realistically, it will be their stories that they will likely be able to connect with and be able to see themselves reaching in the future.  

Just call me Circuit City

So it has been quite some time since I have written a blog.  Mainly because I didn’t have a lot of time and also, I was going through…I guess they should be best called “lessons to learn.”  I didn’t really want to type any blogs because I feared writing about the challenges because it might be perceived as complaining.  The reality is my life here is not always perfect “rainy days”…  Where shall I begin?

My neighbors left.  There are new neighbors, a man and his teenage son, but it’s just not the same.  I did everything with my first neighbors!  We ate, laughed, watched TV, talked about life, went to the market, I reviewed homework with their kids…the list goes on and on.  They were not neighbors, they were like family!  Heck, on my dad’s birthday, October 17^th, we had a mini birthday party here for him.  We ate great food, I taught them how to say “happy birthday” in English and we even called my dad and passed the phone around so everyone could say happy birthday in their best English.  I can’t explain how nice it was to find myself in an unknown town and I was able to connect with such a warm and welcoming family.  Unfortunately for me, they left and moved pretty far away.  The Burkinabe system of public employment is similar to the French system in that when a person works for the public system, the government can move them to the area where there is a need.  So for example, teachers, post office workers, police, etc are placed at posts and can be deployed to another.  I guess like our military moves around.  The husband of the family is a police officer and his wife is a stay at home parent.  It was with her and her children that I connected with the most since she was always around when I got off of work. 

I think another thing that made my neighbor and I so close was that we were both foreigners in town.  She is in fact Burkinabe, but she comes from a different region in Burkina.  She is a different ethnicity from the people here and speaks a completely different local language.  Keep in mind, Burkina, while almost everyone here is African and more precisely Burkinabe born, this is a very diverse country with 60 different ethnicities all in a country the size of the state of Colorado…nuts, I know.  Considering both of our language barriers, market days together were quite interesting. We would go to the market and bargain shop and the two of us had the same level of local language.  The woman selling tomatoes would say the price in Moore and then we would look at each other and in French translate and verify that we heard her right.  It is quite funny because most often when a westerner does not understand the local language, people rely on the fact that they are hanging with a Burkinabe and assume that they can translate local language into French for them.  Nope!  Sometimes I think my Moore was better than hers…haha.

Because I was so close to my neighbor, we often talked about our families and how much we missed them.  It has been 3 almost 4 years since she has had the time and money to go see her family.  I demised a plan in my head on how I could help my friend go see her family and show her now 4 month old to her aging parents.  I figured if I told her that I was looking for someone to help me mop my floors once a week and asked if she knew where I could find someone like that, she would suggest herself.  The plan worked!  She checked with her husband to see if it was ok and came back to me a day later and told me that she would totally do it.  I asked her, her price and she ensured me that there was no price between us and that she would do it without worrying about the money.  If I wanted to give her a tip at the end of the month, she said that was fine, but don’t worry about it.  Well, I absolutely adored her and wanted to help her see her family.  Even though she came to my house once a week to mop my floors and then she also insisted on washing my clothes for me another day of the week, I paid her the same amount per month that someone gets paid when they do everything including cook all meals 7 days a week.  I totally overpaid her, but how could I not?!  We did everything together and I wanted her to be able to save up to see her parents.  She was quite shocked at the end of October when I gave her the money and also excited that I thought about her being able to save to see her family.  When I paid her the first time is when I revealed my plan.  A few days later her husband got word that he was being deployed to another town.  I was devastated!

“Ma Voisine”, which means my female neighbor in French, ironically that is what we called each other, was leaving me!  Here relationships with others mean a great deal.  Even when it comes to marriages, it is not just two people who come together here it is the two entire family networks that join.  If there is trouble between the couple, the two families come together to find solutions.  Might be why among other things the divorce rate is so low here, but that is going to have to be another blog.  So as you can imagine, by me being friends with them, whatever network that they had automatically became my network.  Sadly, it was after destroying the network that I truly learned that. 

Before leaving Ma Voisine asked me if her sister in-law could take her place in helping me around the house.  I trusted that it would be a good match as I trusted her judgment.  Her sister in-law was in a similar situation as her husband is a police officer and she too was from a different region.  They lived not far from me, about a half a mile up the street.  Her husband came with her to the formal introduction and work agreement.  I told her the expectations, and also asked her price and explained that Ma Voisine and I had not established a price because it was between friends.  She insisted that she was “la meme chose,” the same thing in French.  So I told her what I paid my neighbor and I would pay her the same thing. 

After about 2 weeks of eating alone, wishing my neighbors were back and going to her sister in-laws 2 or 3 times and trying to engage her the way I engaged my neighbor, I realized I was in over my head.  I was paying too much for a service that I could do on my own and thanksgiving was coming and I wanted to have a big dinner.  I couldn’t afford to think that I could pay her at the end of the month and also pay for the dinner.  So like any corporation that knows anything, I decided to downsize.  Heck, I can wash my own clothes and mop my own floor.  I did my own laundry by hand for two years the first time I was here…I can do it again for less than 10 months.  So I rationalized that I would pay her for the half month that she worked and thank her for her time, but I couldn’t afford it and plus I originally was doing it in order to help out a friend, hoping she would understand. 

OMG!  Talk about a poor decision making!  I was totally thinking in terms of being an American Corporation!  I took no time to consider her own personal thoughts, as she prepared in her mind to get paid for the next few months, nor did I consider the Burkinabe standard of solidarity.  Not only did I get an earful from her about how it was inappropriate for me to tell her that I no longer needed her services without first calling together everyone who was at the initial introduction, but also that she didn’t care about my money and actually refused to take the half month pay.  She insisted that she was “la meme chose,” the same thing, as my neighbor.  And I could do everything with her that I did with the other and that the friendship was carried on through her.  She told me that she actually had no idea that I was going to pay her when she first agreed to help me out.  Apparently, my neighbor went to her and asked her to kinda look out for me since I wasn’t from around here and maybe we would hit it off since she was in the same boat.  It wasn’t until I talked about pay when we had the formal introduction that it even entered her mind.  She was doing this out of her love for her sister in-law and for me to refuse her assistance made no sense.  She told me that what she was doing for me was nothing (which I agreed that the workload was pretty light considering what most people do here) and that I went about this all wrong.  She is absolutely right.  I did go about it all wrong.  And in the midst of it, messed up the line of network I did have through my friend.  Now, I almost always eat alone (except for thanksgiving) and the 2 or 3 times that I went to her house before have turned into 0.   She came by before from time to time to check on me, that too dried up.  What can I say, I learned my lesson.  I definitely have more money in my pocket, but one less line of friendship…