The Times They're Not A-Changing.

Monday and Tuesday morning of this week I went to the CSPS, as I normally do, except both mornings there was a different young girl there with Palu (malaria). The first day, I found her passed out on a path near the CSPS--the infirmary nurse and I carried her into the clinic. Palu. The next day, I walked into the infirmary the next morning to find another young girl, looking weak and tired with an IV drip. Palu.

Wednesday, I cross the gorge with Tene (my neighbor and closest friend in village) to Beregedougou to buy produce in their grand marche. While we're there, Tene and some other women from my village stop by a quartier to pick up mangoes. Not just 4 or 5. They each fill 30-40 liter metallic basins FULL of mangoes--I would say that's about 40 or 50 mangoes. But what was even more incredible is that these women carry these mango-filled basins on their heads (two additional women were needed to just lift the basin up on to each woman's head). And what is even MORE incredible is that these women walked down and up a gorge (which I would say is more like a hike since its steep and very uneven) back to village to sell these mangoes on the side of the road. They sell these mangoes for 25 CFA each--that means four mangoes cost about 25 US cents. So if each woman sells all the mangoes in her basin that day, she makes about 1000 CFA, or $2 US dollars. That's less than what she spent on produce for her and her family in Beregadougou.

Thursday, Tene falls ill. Instead of working all day, cooking, cleaning, and selling mangoes until 8, 9, 10 o'clock at night, she sleeps, too weak to move. I ask her, "Will you go with me to the CSPS?" and after agreeing with me each time she would make an excuse "Tomorrow, we'll go together." Friday, and today (before I left to come to Bobo) she went back to work ask if everything was fine, but I can tell she's not herself. It could be a lot of things--I'd imagine it's Palu based on what's been happening in village, but I'm no doctor. But she works too hard, she doesn't get enough nutrition in her diet, she carries ginormous mango-filled basins on her head up and down gorges. It could be a lot of things and it could only get worse if untended to.

So here's the issue: When you've lived all your life one way (and that way is to struggle just to make ends-meet), when you work all day, getting water to cook, clean, drink, wash yourself, wash your kids, wash your close, selling fruit on the side of the road to have money for the next day, cooking meals for your family--how can you have the time or the effort to even the intuition to make a change in your life? If Tene skips half a day of work to go to the CSPS, she loses money--for the cost of medication and for the loss of income for that day selling. So, people like Tene make excuses and wait, until its too late. So as a volunteer, I see that something needs to change. But the way of life here is so ingrained in people here, that I wonder sometimes how something so new and different (like taking preventative measures when it comes to health) could be receptive to my village. When your life is one big struggle to make ends-meet (though you could never tell by the smiling faces and optimistic attitudes of the wonderful Burkinabe) do you have room to try something different? Can you afford it? I'm keeping my fingers crossed that you can.

Friday I traveled around my village with my Coges Treasurer and the maternity nurse, giving Polio vaccinations to every child under 5. This is because many babies are NOT taken to the CSPS when they're born (many aren't even born in the maternity, they're born at home) and are NOT brought in to receive vaccinations (the CSPS is far, its hot as hell, there's so much work to be done at home, one doesn't think to go in for something preventitive) . Later that day, I gave a presentation to 3 classes in the school, the desks were table-style, meant for 2 people per desk. There were 4-5 children at each desk. And when there's no money and home is a kilometer or two away, they don't eat lunch. And they're water pump is broken, so they have no water unless they want to travel far to get it.

Money is needed, but the hard part is getting it, because there is nothing. And once there is money, the harder part is creating something new that is sustainable in a village that has lived the same lifestyle for decades without time to think of how to make the future better because the present is just too immediate. So lets see if I can change that.

Chez Moi

Now that my bat problem has been resolved, thought I'd take you on a little walking tour of my house. It lacks a lot--paint, more furniture (I got the furniture made when I got there), some personal touches, but, little by little, it will feel like home. Definitely want to share some insights on my village, but I'll wait till next week for that.

Part of the main room to my house

The "dinning area," if you will.



The hallway that leads to 4 rooms and an indoor bathing room (straight down the hall).


The first room to the right, my bedroom! (Ignore the personal items...)


Study/Dressing room, the second door on the right.

Kitchen (the two giant basins are my "dishwasher").

Annnnnd we can't forget the giant bats that live in the tree outside my house!

Hell is Spelled B.A.T.S.

After finding a dead bat hanging on the underside of my cot (which I swore I felt something perch below my neck the week before and convinced myself it was nothing...), I began to wonder if a had a problem. Then, after hearing bats flying through my house each night as I lay in bed, nestled securely under my mosquito net, flashlight at hand, I began to suspect that yes, yes it is quite possible that I have a problem. And finally, after my neighbors pointed out the tree in front of my house that's home to a swarm of giant bats, which make the loud, beeping noise each night I assumed to be some sort of electronic device (silly me...), I knew for sure this was a problem. Every night this week, once the sun sets, I become weary, uncomfortable, and completely paranoid. I hold 2-3 flashlights at a time, examining the walls of every room before I enter.

Now a lot of the physical challenges here I am proud to say I have adjusted to rather well: I don't mind taking bucket baths, squatting over latrines (which I have managed to adjust my "schedule" to avoid the cockroaches that infiltrate my latrine at night), sleeping on a cot, boiling and filtering all my water, biking and walking to most places...lack of air conditioning and electricity--its all been reasonably painless. But bats. Bats are different. Bats have wings. And disease. And they make creepy noises and defecate in my house. I'm not the only one with a bat problem here, a friend of mine has a problem far worse than mine. Not only was she bringing a stick in to her bathing area with her to fend off the bats as she bathed, but she also tried to convince herself that the 10 bats flying around her as she ate dinner was a sort of "natural ceiling fan."

I hope it doesn't seem like I'm complaining. Yes, it sucks. And it really sucked when Buddah started acting strange and I flipped out thinking he had rabies and would die (turns out he has worms, and that has been promptly resolved!) But I didn't want to write about how sucky it is--I simply wanted to tell you of a recent bump in the road I've encountered--a necessity in life. What makes it difficult is that, as a volunteer, my community and the board that manages the money for the health clinic (the Coges) are responsible for my living situations. So any problems I have that I need resolved comes out of the budget for the health clinic and sometimes out of the villagers pockets. That certainly makes it very difficult to demand repairs when one of the major problems in my community is lack of resources for medicine. And when my "necessities" like a bat free home are much higher than the necessities of the villageois.

In other, more exciting news, I have my first two presentations in French! Sure, my Coges members may have been 2 hours late to the meeting, and they may have demanded to leave when the clock read 12:08 (repo begins at 12:00 and lasts until 3:00), but I think they got the message, understand the participatory needs assessment activities I'd like to conduct with my village to get a broad, diverse idea of what the villagers think are some of the big health problems in the village, and I think (I hope!) they're excited to get started. This month should be busy--not with fending off bats (hopefully)--but with meeting with all different kinds of groups in my village to assess the problems in the community and potential, sustainable solutions to remedy these problems. I'd also really like to meet with groups that are interested in doing income generating activities and set up some groups of my own, start working with the school, etc. So unless a freakishly large, fearless, mutated breed of bat moves into my house, I doubt this month could go badly...It is beginning to get a bit toasty here (its 104 today and at night it only gets down to the 90s...) so sleeping will be difficult, with or without bats. So please feel grateful wearing your heavy coats and long underwear in your 0 degree weather!

In Case you Wondered How I look Atop a Camel...

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.

Oh yeah, my job

But first, let me entice you with my new puppy, Buddah:


Buddah is about 6 weeks old--I got him a week ago, only to feel like a single parent with postpartum since he arrived. When hes not peeing, pooping, eating and whining, hes sleeping--he hardly bares and calming quality I hoped him to have when I got him. But I know in time it will pay off--a gaurd dog, a garbage disposal, and a cuddle/playmate all in one!

So I realize I’ve spent a lot of time talking about the culture and lifestyle of my village and my slow (very slow…) integration into the community, but I’ve done very little talking about what my job entails. For the first three months (until mid-March) I am not to do anything that my “real” job entails. The first three months is the “Etude de Milleu,” in which I am to spend my time—not only integrating into my community, which is paramount for the success of my next two years—but to perform various studies with my community to determine its needs (particularly health needs) and effective strategies to fulfill those needs and ensure their sustainability—even after I’m gone. Being that this is a village without the technological advances many Western countries have made to enable continuous, regular and stable livelihood throughout the whole year, this is a village (like most in Burkina and other African countries) whose inhabitants’ lives are incredibly interconnected with the seasons, crop production, religious holidays, money--everything.

So, now that I’ve been here for a full three weeks (I can’t believe it!) what have I learned? Well, there is one CSPS in my village, and that CSPS is not only the rural health clinic for my village, but for 6 other satellite villages—the closest being 13K away and the farthest being 25-30K away. The CSPS is composed of an infirmary (a room with a few small beds) a maternity (one birthing table)and a couple offices for medicine and consultations. Most CSPS clinics have pharmacies as well—mine does not; so if someone needs medicine, it might be at the CSPS—otherwise they would have to go to another CSPS or to the district hospital. There is one Major, my counterpart, who is the doctor and head of the CSPS; there is one infirmary nurse, one birthing nurse, and one assistant. These four people are responsible for the 2500 people in my village and the other hundreds of people that inhabit the other 6 satellite villagers. The clinic is closed every Sunday. Everyone takes a 3 hour siesta (called a repose here) from noon to three. There is no electricity and no running water. There is a solar panel, but I’m not quite sure of its purpose, because the refrigerator that holds vaccines runs off of a propane tank.

You would think this would cause complete chaos: if all the doctors in your community did this, there would be lines of people bleeding and crying and in labor and waiting for hours to see the doctor when he or she was available. That’s not so much the problem here, rather, it’s the exact opposite. Instead of a massive line pouring out the door to see the doctor (especially given the high rates of malaria, meningitis, upper respiratory infections, STIs, HIV and AIDS, and diarrhea), the four nurses here spend a lot of their time outside the CSPS, waiting for someone to show up. I go to the CSPS most mornings before the repo, and in the 3 to 4 hours I’m there I see no more than 4 people there at a time—maybe 7 or 8 people total during that time span. Perhaps its a bit more when its vaccination day. But none the less, when there are 2500 people in my village (so not even including satellite villages), and when the birth rate is much, much higher here than in the US, and when there is only 40 some babies recorded as having vaccinations for the year 2008, something is seriously wrong. I biked 13K and back to the closest satellite village for their vaccine day—maybe 15 mothers showed. If motivation is low to begin with, add an hour plus bike ride and no other real means of transport and you have a bunch of people who just aren’t willing to seek medical attention when they may really need it.

And what only complicates the problem is the livelihood of the villagers: they’re nearly all farmers, so they’re constantly planting, cultivating, harvesting, or selling their produce on the side of the road or in the marche. And if a rainy season doesn’t produce a healthy crop—that means less money, more work, and less time and money to spend on one’s health.

So what am I to do? Not only is it important for me to address specific health problems within the community (water, sanitation, STIs, diarrhea, infection, malnutrition, etc.), but I need to be able to get the message out to as many people as possible—probably the most important people being the ones who don’t go to the CSPS in the first place.

It most certainly seems like a very complex, complicated problem that an etude is necessary for. But just as my integration into the community is foundational to a successful two years, the community’s participation and active involvement in the etude is foundational to a successful future.

Tubabu is the New Nasara

Well what can I say about my first week at site? It honestly has felt like one very long Mefloquin dream (Mefloquin is the anti malaria medication I have to take, which can have a tendancy to give people very bizarre, intense dreams). After spending two days in Banfora buying necessities for my house, I rode in a Peace Corps van with all my belongings 15K away to my new home for the next two years. I pulled up to a massive welcoming party, with villagers, dancing, and bylophone playing galore. It was so touching, having so many people put such time and energy into my arrival without even knowing me. But I have certainly felt like a member of this community the minute I jumped in the dance circle.

No lies here: my house is ginormous: one large 10 x 20 living room that connects to a hall way with an indoor bathing room and four 8 x 10 rooms. This is a house meant for a large family, not me. And with the limited budget I had for furnishings, its looking pretty desolate. I've already commissioned some furniture to be made and I've spoken with some people to have my walls cleaned and painted, so it will feel like home in no time at all. I must say though, I'm feeling pretty cocky that my first house out of college is (comparatively) a mansion—just don't tell anyone there's no electricity or running water!

So what have I been up to for the first week? The timing has made for a very interesting first week, as there was a fete for the New Year as well as a marriage. So there has been lots of dolo drinking (dolo is locally brewed beer) by everyone (children included), lots of bylophone playing (there is a group here that has even toured through Europe!), and lots of dancing (everyone wants to see the awkward white woman dance, which has been unfortunate for me…). Because I'm living in the chief's compound, the chief's son—who may actually be the chief now since the chief is dead—has taken me EVERYWHERE. It has been incredibly helpful in many ways: meeting the important people in the village, knowing the ins and outs, learning how to greet everyone (half my day is spent greeting people), and just knowing my way around in general. I'd also say that, being associated with the chiefs son, I have a kind of immunity and protection here. However, because I spend nearly every waking moment with the chiefs son, I think by day 3 everyone was convinced that I am his new wife. I also feel as if I still have very little independence here, but I know that with time that will change.

So what else is there to say about my new village? Well, I've eaten papaya every day since I've been here. Everywhere I go I see massive mango trees. There is also pineapple, oranges and banana here. There is a village only 1 K away (I have to cross a massive gorge to get there, which is a beautiful site) that has electricity, which means I can have cold drinks and yogurt and charge my phone whenever I want! I am told I will be getting a puppy very soon, and I've decided to name him Marley (as alluring as Lieutenant Puppykins was, I don't think the people in my village could pronounce that). My name here is either Ama or Amada because "Amanda" is much too complicated. My name is also Tubabu to the children, which means foreigner. It is still beyond comprehension to me that the chiefs son has a Mercedes benz. I have spent more time in dolo bars than at the CSPS (on the chief's son's account), and I'm starting to wonder if I could conduct my sensibilizations at the bar in order to reach more people.

I can already tell that I'm going to miss the people here so much after my two years, and I can already tell how much I'm going to love it here. But I must continue to tell myself for these first several months that is a process. Its not easy now and its going to be challenging in many ways, but that is a necessary, crucial part of the process. This struggle is vital to my growth and my immersion into this community, and the most I can do right now is welcome the struggle and have the patience to endure.

Opening a present from Mom and Dad on Christmas :) thanks Mom and Dad!

[expect more photos, unfortunately this is all you can get at the moment because my connection is terribly slow!]