First Night In Training... Wait...What's Going On?

      What have I gotten myself in to.

      This entry will be short, as the whole charging dynamic is a serious concern to me now. This morning we awoke in Ouagadougou at 6:00 AM, as has been the usual since we’ve arrived in Burkina. We had breakfast, and sat through some expectations of what to expect when we arrived in site today. We learned about some societal norms, and what is and is not acceptable in Burkinabe culture. It was a very helpful thing to learn before we set off into who knows where for the first time. We then worked on a little bit of Moore, one of the local languages that is supposed to be useful everywhere in the country. At 1:00, we departed Ouaga and headed south for Leo, a regional capital only 15 kilometers (the rest of the world uses the metric system remember… its 9-10 miles) away from the Ghanaian border.

     We learned earlier in the day which village we were going to. The drive was roughly three hours, but finally we arrived in the around surrounding Leo. One group of Health volunteers went to Kayoro, to one side of Leo, and the other two continued on through the city to Zoro (my village with the DABA volunteers) and Songa (other health group), about 5 kilometers away. When we arrived in Zoro, the entire village was waiting for us with chairs. The chief of the village said a speech, and with a handshake and a drink of ceremonious water, we were welcomed to the village. When I got into my family’s village, the language barrier was immediate and it was unbelievably awkward. They gave me a chair and I sat trying to speak but failing, which is ok because many of them do not speak French. I had a “shower”, which consists of a bucket and something to pour on your head with. I got out and was fed what looked like an enormous potato? Then I was given Spaghetti in my room, which I didn’t want to eat in since it is about 95 degrees in there. That was actually very good. I concluded the night by watching tv, that’s right, television. The TV was 14” but had pretty picture. Unfortunately, one show doesn’t do much when it’s a crazy Chinese movie. Side note: they all called the Asian guy Jackie Chan…. Whom was nowhere to be found in the film. I was falling asleep, so I came into my burning hot room, which is infested with ENORMOUS, venomous looking spiders. All in all, an interesting night, and hopefully the awkwardness and language barrier will begin to fade.