The Glass is Half Full

So now comes the time to test all the skills that we were supposed to be developing during our PST. Model school starts next week and this week we watched Burkinabe teach a class then PCVFs teach a class. Becky is teaching 6eme algebra, which is equivalent to 6 th grade math. She has a class of about 30. I am teaching intro to computers and have 14 in my class. Taking attendance is going to be a treat trying to pronounce the students names. Trying to come up with a lesson plan is also hard because I don't know where to start teaching kids how to use a computer. Some of the stories that the other teachers have are pretty funny. And I have to team teach an advanced course for people who already have some experience with computers. Advanced is a very general term though cause the test that we gave to check for basic knowledge would usually only take about 5 minutes for me to do took the better part of 45 for them if they were able to do all the tasks. The lab that we are using is a piece of junk. We went in on Saturday to try and get it running a little better but that didn't work at all. There are 12 computers of which 9 are functional if slow, 2 more take over a half hour to boot, and 1 that makes for a large paper weight. Next week though we are changing labs and the new one is supposed to be pretty nice with 20 machines.

Becky's chef de class is probably close to 16 and she had already seen a kid kicked out of class in just the second day for falling asleep in class. Speaking of sleep the Burkinabe can sleep anywhere. I saw a lady sleeping on the ground using a wooden foot stool as a pillow. When we go shopping it isn't unusual to find the vendors asleep in their stalls. Eating lunch the other day there were a couple of women sleeping on broken concrete and gravel under a hanger. I don't know how that could be comfortable, but it is to them.

REFLECTIONS AT MID-STAGE

Language—We both feel very strongly about French as a language. As of this moment, I can understand why the French have never succeeded in winning a war, everything sounds the same. I have asked my LCF (Language & Culture Facilitator) how people can understand what is being said when a conjugated verb is pronounced the same exact way. Not to mention the fact that he is pronounced the same way as they/them. The only answer I have gotten thus far is that you can tell by context. My feelings on this answer is a rather naughty response. We only hope in time that we will be able to tell the difference. On the flip-side, we both are in love with Mooré. This is one of the oddest sounding languages I have heard. The grammar is wonderful and easy. I will admit that the nasal vowels are extremely difficult to pronounce. Tim loves to make fun of me because I have to scrunch my nose to get a nasal sound.--Side note- Coming back to our families house one day this week, there was little girl probably 5ish standing outside of the courtyard gate. She pointed at us and said “Nasaare.” I decided to give my Mooré a try and so I greeted her with “Ne y zaabre.” The little girl stared me down for a few seconds and then proceeded to cry and run away. Tim and I have decided that if this is how all kids here react to us speaking Mooré we will greet them all the time in Mooré.

Food—The food in Burkina Faso is very palatable. However, there are only three choices: carbs, mystery meat with bone fragments, and mango or banana. So those of you who are on the Atkin's Diet, don't even think about stepping foot in Africa. Becky has lost over 22lbs, but now has a belly due to the excessive carbs. Tim has lost close 25lbs with no gain in belly jiggle ability. The food in Ouaga is excluded from the previous statement due to the fact that you can get anything in Ouaga as long as you are willing to pay the price.

Weather—Its hotter than Hades!!!!!!!!

People—They are very friendly here and always willing to help you, even if you don't want their help. I will say that the vendors do have a little bit of a pouting problem. Side note—The vendors here due not believe that white people should get to pay the actual retail price. Today Tim and I badgered a vendor into selling us a power strip for half his asking price and telling him we could buy the same one at another boutique for less when he wouldn't lower the price. The vendor was quite putout with us because he didn't make a huge profit. I also think we made his brain hurt with our poor skills. Then again we got exactly what we wanted at the price we wanted :)

Country—Its hot here! Otherwise the landscapes are gorgeous. So is the sky for that matter. I have never seen so many stars in my life. You would not believe how big Orion is here in the night sky. He is probably 2-3 times as big as he is in Illinois. We love to just sit outside and gaze at the stars. This country is very dusty. If you do not care for the color “African Red” then don't come here. Inevitably, everything you own and your feet with be some shade of this color no matter what you what you do.

P.S. Sorry for any confusion on the timing of this post. We wrote this post on Sunday, but due to the rain we had to delay putting it up on the blog.

So the first two days of model school are done :) Thank god too! I was so nervous about teaching in a language that I don't fully understand. I have gotten a lot of positive feedback though! Today, David, a PCVF told me that once I master French I'll be a kick-ass teacher. I am having a little trouble with one or two students not standing up when I enter the class so tomorrow, I am going to make them stand for the entire class if they do it again. I know mean teacher, but they have to learn to respect me even if I am a white woman teaching them.

Oh I am also feeling a million times better! Thanks for all the get wells.

Love
Becky and Tim

Loving Our Future Town

Hi everyone!

Well we just got back from our exciting trip to Boulsa. We are both extremely happy with our site. Boulsa is a pretty big town by Burkinabe standards. Roughly 25,000 people live in Boulsa. The city actually houses a technical school, a municipal lycèe, a provincial lycèe and several primary schools. Tim and I will be teaching at the provincial lycèe. This is the largest of all the schools in Boulsa. The school itself is rather modern. The school has several regular classrooms. This lycèe is very lucky to be equipped with two laboratories: one for Psychics and Chemistry and one for Natural Science. By the way, there happens to be a regular toilet located in the building for the two laboratories :) The school also has a pretty sweet building for the computers. Tim's lab has 25 virtual computers running off of a large server. This computer lab is also equipped with TWO air conditioners! Guess where I am going to be hanging out and grading papers. Our school also has a pretty nice teachers lounge. It even has a frig! The school also has a running track and two volleyball courts; although they are essentially just dirt fields.

As for our house, well to some it up in one word—sweet. I will admit that when I first saw the house, I just wanted to cry and say no way in the world I can live here for two years, but after some time and reflection I realized how silly I was being. Now I am extremely excited about our house. We have two bedrooms in our house; although one is being used as a kitchen. We also have a huge salon with two windows on opposite sides of the room, and two doors from the outside! We were also lucky enough to have an indoor showering area. I must admit that the house definitely needs quite a bit of TLC, but I am really looking forward to it. I think that once we slap a coat of fresh paint on the walls everything will look a million times better. As for our private courtyard, I am in heaven. There are quite a few trees growing within our courtyard. I am really looking forward to possibly buying some gravel and doing some major landscaping in one section of the courtyard. I think that I could really make part of the courtyard into a beautiful oasis. We will be posting pictures soon so that you can see our house and courtyard.

After visiting Boulsa, we got to spend two more nights in Ouagadougou. This city is a break from reality. In Ouaga you can buy anything! We ate pizza, hamburgers, twice baked potatoes, BBQ beef sandwiches, breaded chicken sandwiches, onion rings and milkshakes! OH YEAH!!! Talk about being in heaven. Hey Mom guess what I actually like Hawaiian Pizza now, even with the ham on it :) While in Ouagadougou we also got to go over to the Assistant Country Directors house for dinner, Mexican themed. We also got to tour the Peace Corps' bureau, which was pretty cool.

Some not so fun news to let people know about. Traveling is a bit hard on Tim as his sinuses act up quite a bit. He chewed on quite a bit of sinus meds these past five days. I can't blame him for getting sick though, because there is a ton of dust here. As for me, well, I am officially the first one of the two of us to go and pray to the porcelain god. I woke up Monday morning and had to make a mad dash down the hall of the transit house to get to the bathroom. After my unwanted intimate time with the Hasselhoff, I curled up with Tim and popped a few Pepto. Side note all of the bathrooms at the transit house are named after deities and the bunks are names after infections. I woke up and thought that I was all better. Ha that was not quite true. So Monday we took public transport back to Ouahigouya which was not fun at all. The bus was overcrowded and extremely hot. This is about the time that my body decides to take vengeance on me. During our four hour bus ride back to Ouahigouya, I was unaware that I had spiked a fever. I just thought that I was hot and miserable due to the heat in the bus. So I began to now something wasn't quite right in the bus station in Ouahigouya. Tim and I had to leave our bike behind in Ouagadougou because there was not enough room on the bus. I wasn't feeling good at all by this time and having to hike 4k back to our house was not going to happen. We got a ride back to ECLA from the PC. That's about the time when Tim told me I looked like shit and a shade of yellow. Thank god for my hubby, he got the PC to drive us to our house and drop us off. I actually started to feel a little better on the ride home as the air conditioner was blowing right on me. I took a bucket bath and felt even better. I took my temperature afterward and it was 101. I munched on some acetaminophen and went to bed. I felt a lot better in the morning but still had a low grade fever :( Oh well, that just meant I munched on some more acetaminophen. Now my temperature goes up and then back down, so I can say fun times ahead for me. If the fever doesn't break by morning I will finally get to call Jean Luc and say, “Jean Luc, I'm dying!” LOL although, I might have to race Tim for the phone.

Well that is about everything that has happened. We love you all and miss you bunches and bunches! Don't worry too much about us. Aside from the stress, we are having some fun here.

Love
Becky and Tim

PS We appreciate all the comments that you guys are leaving it helps to boost our spirits when we see them. :p

Where In The World Are Becky and Tim

Drum roll please....................................................................................................................................
You have won an exciting two year vacation to the wonderful city of Boulsa!

Now for those of you who are sitting there asking yourself “Boulsa...Where is that?” My first response to you would be “Why in Burkina Faso silly!” Haha :) I just felt like being a little bit of a smart ass especially since that is how most of you remember me :) OK so putting all my lovely wittiness aside, Boulsa sounds like it is going to be a pretty cool place to live. The city is actually pretty big in size. The city is located in the East kinda between Ouaga and Fada. The city is located close to a paved road, so traveling to the capital won't be too terrible. We are going to be teaching at a big lycee. There is electricity in our city and in our house! I'm pretty pumped about that, so is Tim :) I personally think he is only excited about being able to sleep with a fan blowing on us all night long. Our house sounds amazing. Seb has told us that the house has two bedrooms! This is a pretty big deal here. That extra room is going to be amazing to have. We will be able to have friends come and stay anytime they want. Our house also has a big salon. This is the area that will have the living area and more than likely a small cooking area too. Our house is also equipped with an indoor shower area for our bucket baths :) No more getting to watch people in the courtyard over the low wall in the shower. Oh sweet, delicious privacy!

So some new developments that have arisen over on our interesting continent. I am no longer teaching SVT (natural science) or IT, I am now going to be teaching math! Apparently there were two math teachers at our school that just got affectated. Thus leaving the school in desperate need of at least one math teacher. So now I have to brush off the cobwebs and remember all the lovely lessons that Mr. Mac taught me so many years ago. Oh the endless memories of class in the little school surround by cornfields :)

This coming week is going to be very busy for both Tim and I. On Monday and Tuesday we have a day long counterpart workshop with our homologues from our school. For those of you who are wondering, a homologue is one of our most vital resources while in village. The homologue is there to help us not make asses out of ourselves. Basically our counterparts have been warned that we know nothing and that we are not trying offend anyone, so if it happens that we do offend them we didn't mean it. They are responsible for us when we visit our site this week too. We leave Ouahigouya on Wednesday and head for Boulsa. We get to take public transport for the first time too. Oh goodie! To be honest, I am terrified of public transport due to some of the stories that I have heard. People have told me that they have had babies pee and vomit on them!!! Anyway, its only about a 7 hour bus ride, so think happy thoughts. Once in Boulsa, we have a whole list of people we have to go and meet. First and foremost, we have to go and greet the Chef of the village. We then have to walk around with our homologue and of course meet our neighbors, the perfects of the village, high ranking functionars, and our coworkers. We are also going to meet the current PCV in our village that we are going to replace. We will be taking over his house and working in the school that he did. He is pretty excited to meet us and we are most certainly excited to meet him. We are hoping that he will be able to show us some useful spots around town.

Well I think that is about all that is new here. We are still trudging through our French lessons. I still am not too fond of them, but I am getting better at speaking the language. Tim is doing really good too! We still get our lovely wakeup call from the stupid rooster every morning around 3:30 :) We'll keep you all posted on any new developments. Hopefully our next post will also include some pictures of our future house.

And the heat is on ....

It's still hot here. We are starting to see some rain but it hasn't been enough to cool off yet. The farmers are starting to get their fields ready now. We heard rumor that it might be a short rainy season, which is really bad for the people here.

We are so tired right now. We have turned into some retirees going to bed at 8:30 at night. But who ever heard of a rooster crowing at 3:30 in the morning. I think that the only reason it does it is cause the mosque just down the road took over the job of getting us up at the crack of dawn. If those two don't work then our host family washing pots and pans at 5:30 will make sure that we're up.

Then it off to class for 9 hours then some homework. Maybe a little relaxing to end the day before heading back to our host family for a dinner of sauce with mystery meat and little pieces of bone to chew on. Becky has tried for two weeks now to explain that she is vegetarian, so far it has been mildly successful. Having to watch me eat a chicken liver one time made Becky a little sick, but it wasn't too bad.

We are trying to get our laundry done on Sundays now because it's the only day that we have off. Laundry is not like back home where you just throw it in a washer and come back when it is done. We have to first let it soak in Omo for 10 minutes, then we start to scrub on our clothes using another bar of soap. Then we rinse in another bucket and start with the scrubbing again. Then repeat once more and let hang dry. It takes hours to get it done. Our host family said that we should try to wash during the week but we never have time. Becky is also allergic to the Omo.

One of our fellow trainees has fallen ill with malaria. It's a bitch when the government misdoses you on antimalarials. Apparently we were supposed to have gotten our dose a week early to have full coverage. The only thing that the PCMO could come up with was that he was infected within the first two days of being here. Otherwise our stage is holding together OK. Just a few stress induced meltdowns, Becky included. French fucking sucks. No wonder they never won a war. We did do our first lesson in French and that was brutal.

This week we get to find out where we are going to be spending the next two years. Then the week after we get to visit our site. We had interviews with the director of education to describe what we would like in a site. I told him that I want beach front and if that's not possible a swimming pool. He said that he would see what he could do. That means we're probably going to end up in the Sahel. Çe la vive.