There Must be an Amusement Park in Burkina, Because I’m on a Rollercoaster.

During stage, PC staff showed us a graph of PCVs emotional well-being during their two years. For the first three months, there was never a plateau or standstill on that graph—it looked like a sound wave with an ear-drum bursting frequency. And I can only confirm this emotional roller coaster that this graph portrays.

I think its best to paint a picture of the situation, because it’s the situation, not necessarily the string of events, that cause such emotional reactions. So imagine having three months in a completely foreign country. Its certainly shocking to be placed from one of the richest countries in the world to one of the poorest, but those first three months were very, very structured and very much so secured in an American bubble. Now fast forward to after training: I'm placed in a village of 2500 people, yet in many ways completely alone: the only one of my ethnicity, language, culture, personal beliefs, perspective, the list can go on. Not only am I completely alone, but I’ve gone from a jam-packed schedule to no schedule at all. And I've been given many more responsibilities than I had before: cooking, cleaning, furnishing your house, etc. I was, in a way, completely dependent on my host family, staff, and peers during stage, and I was ready for independence. But the struggle now is that there IS independence sort of but because I have no sense of direction, no idea of who is who, no idea what is where, and no real idea of what to do, I still have to rely on many people—so the independence was at first very much an illusion. And while I had no routine at all in my first week or so in village (and thus the supposed freedom to do as I please), I also did not have much control over my routine because I was at a complete loss of how to occupy my day. So all these dichotomies pulled me (and continue to pull me) in different directions.

Add on to that my role as a woman: I’m a third gender as an American woman. I can relax and drink with the men, but I identify with the women (I also cook and clean like the women). When the days go well, I feel as if I’m bonding with both genders. When days suck, I feel even more alone than I did before.

So during this incredibly fragile moment in my transition into my village, I am extremely reactionary to every change in my environment: if one too many kids yell Tubabu at me and demand a cadeaux (gift), I get angry. If I get nothing accomplished during the day because everyone is gone or out in the field, I get angry. If someone makes the tiniest comment about the low status of women, I get REALLY angry. But someones I don't get angry, I just get sad and isolate myself in my house. It really depends on the day. Every hour of every day is a different set of emotions, and it can be even more upsetting when I realize I have no control over it.

So take all these things: the physical and emotional isolation, the complete lack of structure that had been so comforting before, the opportunity of independence but the inability to attain it, the house not quite feeling like a home, the inability to communicate with people, and just plain being the “black sheep” in a small, tight knit community. Not only that, but add the fact that, since this is a village, my every action is pivotal to my acceptance and integration into the community.
All the said, I’ve found it incredibly difficult to reign in my emotions (which, unfortunately, makes me even more emotional). So when one little thing does go wrong, the factors of my environment are unable to comfort me and a start to lose it. Sometimes I’ll lose my temper, other times I’ll refuse to leave my house. And sometimes, I’ll be a little too sassy with people (typically men, since I’m probably the only woman who can stand up to them without being smacked in the face).

That being said, I had a REALLY good week, which made writing this entry fairly difficult. I found out there will be running water in my village in about three months, and I have found ample opportunities for small enterprise development--while not my "job" per say--would really help my village.