Demystification

Hey all...finally got some internet going- here are three blogs I've been meaning to publish. Enjoy!

What an amazing weekend. We left on Thursday for Takaladougou (in the southwest near Banfora) bright and early from the TDC. Our bikes (supposedly) already in Ouaga. I had been placed with the Mrs’ language group so we could travel together. I entertained a quiet concern about our LCF, a soft-spoken Burkinabé, younger than any of us and who we later learned had been employed by the Peace Corps for only two months. We were driven to the bus station with all of our things. My backpacking pack was too big to take on the bus (a lesson for next time). The bus itself was rather plush, though the pothole-pocked road, constantly blaring horn and terrible Burkinabé soap operas detracted a bit from the luxury. After about five hours, we arrived in Bobo-Dioulasso, the bustling, artsy, second-largest city in the country. My instinct about our LCF proved true when his vague leadership placed us all in a single taxi verte (including our bikes) which drove us in the wrong direction for awhile. We eventually made it to the grande route where we hailed a taxi-brusse.

Now the taxi-brusse is a true West African enigma. It is itself a gutted out van crammed with seats from front to back. Usually the goal is to fit as many people as possible in the thing, regardless of the number of seats, and the conducteurs seem to relish the challenge of strapping various cumbersome objects to the roof. I heard a story once that involved a cow, no joke. The taxi is always in motion, even when picking up passengers. One must be nimble, well-tempered to hot, close quareters, willing to swap sweat with whomever one ends up sandwhiched between, and be able to find peace with the ultimate condition of ones’ possessions at the end of the wild ride. And heaven help the rider with stomach issues (this includes all PCV’s).

After about an hour of this we arrived in Banfora, but not after having driven past our stop by a few hundred meters, again, under the direction of our LCF. We met Chad and Tana, a married couple living and working in Takaladougou with Business and Health, respectively. We were greeted with chairs, water (non-bleachy!) and mac and cheese. The amazingness didn’t stop there. During the course of the weekend we dined on French toast, breakfast burritos, spaghetti, polenta and mashed potatoes, real coffee, Milo, some delicious dried and fresh mangos, cashew bars and watermelon. The food, as great as it was, comprised only a fraction of what made demyst an amazing experience. We visited a local mango drying factory and met Chad’s counterpart who explained the process and answered our questions. We met a woman who makes shea butter which was extremely interesting and sparked an idea- shea brownies- which we won’t go into for proprietary reasons. The next day we visited the CSPS and met Tana’s counterpart after which we biked across the gorge on this awesome trail to another village to see the much larger-scale cashew processing plant. Also very interesting. Just seeing how all of this stuff actually works, what’s left after all the bullshit of training, the ambiguity, made demyst the most rewarding part of being here so far. It was real. I became extremely excited after seeing the possibilities, the work being done, the true relationships already in place after only nine months at site (with admittedly poor French). It was very encouraging and inspiring, and I feel more ready than ever to get thrown into it and get down to work. Bring it on.