Site Visit AND Model School!

So things are moving pretty fast over here in OYGH. I just got back from a massive weak of counter part work shop and site visits. So to summerize, every volunteer is set up with a homolgue (basically a burkinabé person that is from your community and ideally has a similar job as you, in my case my bro is a physics, chem and math teacher- yeah we're a little understaffed in my neck of the woods) and mine bus'd it in from home to come into oahigouya for a little meet and greet. His name is Koné and he is a counter part to me in every sense of the word. Not only is he a great local rescource and a well conected amiable guy, but he is also a relaxed easygoing counterpoint to me the tightly wound overly passionate workaholic. We met on monday and had a few to many icebreakers and not enough content schedualed on the part of the peace corps for that day. However, that mild frustration paled in comparisson to the frustration of the tuesday which was an intire day devoted to VIH/SIDA sensibilation (hiv/aids ed). Don't get me wrong there is not a microbiologist in the world (not even a bacterio centric one such as myself) that would diminish the importance of HIV AIDS ed. HOWEVER, this day set out to enable the counterpart and the PCV to work together on eliminating HIV/AIDS in the community and did nothing but provide the victems with 9 hours of content-less lectures. Bah! The one shinning moment for me was when the asked the masses if they could name some oppertunistic infections which afflicted AIDS patients. My hand was up so. goddamn. fast. Anyways that aside the next day was an alright series of community meetings and orginzation for the site visit! Site visit was a chance for me to travel with my homologue to the the place I would be staying for the next two years. In addition to my counterpoint, I had the great babet (the gal who ran SVT-life science at my site before me) and Brigitte (a PCV whos site was too close to OYHG and thus wanted to go to a place that would require a little more negotiation of transport).

Anywho we Borded the OYHG bus and it was a site to say the least. In another life, this bus was perhaps a moroccan tourist liner but through several inheratances, the harsh mistress of time and the demands of burkinabé life it had warped into what can only be regarded as a burkinabé bus. It had about twice as many people as there were seats 12 happily breast-feading children and about 1 chicken for every two people. It was awesome. However, the full experience was somewhat diminsished when the announced that they would be sending two busses instead of one in our direction- our crew now had places to sit. It was still a magnificent experience watching the burkina country side fly by while the boldest of drivers flored it over dirt roads all to the soundtrack of cote d'ivoire hiphop at max volume. Our main stop was in my regional capitol (i will refer to it as T -for whatever reason Im not supposed to put my locations). T is a great place, It has probably the best youghurt in BF along with damn good bread and functional internets. Its a great place. Not to mention that babet introduced me to her entire crew including Ali who is probably the most "legit" (and I mean that in the strictly west coast gangster sense) guy in BF. He owns basically everything. In fact her whole crew there is hella awesome. We only lingered there for a couple hours before heading off to my site which I will refer to as L. Similarly my site is amazing. As we progressed towards it we noticed the greenery and diverse birds that signaled the temperate climate and the nerby bodies of water. It really is a different world in L, my counter part warns that it will all change once the dry season roles around but for now it is green, open and beautiful. Speaking of the openess, when I got to babet's house (soon to be my pad) I was struck by just how striking the environment is. Its kinda like my antonia prarrie- it has that romantic openess. My house is on the edge of my tiny tiny village (across from a family which has one man, 8 wives and 28 kids) and it has a view straigt west that spans across an open plain and into a far-off perimiter of trees. My first night there I watched a storm advance over this plain. It was truely picturesque- the setting sun, the dust spirals before the storm, the backdrop of lightning illuminated clouds- it defied discription. Im kinda running out of time at this cyber post so Ill try to hurry it up. My site was also wonderfull beside that though, and thanks to the nerby barage I enjoyed honest to god fresh grilled fish both nights I stayed there. I can't tell you how much agreeing with my site meant to me.

Anyway with that out of the way Ive got Model school this week which is sure to be a treat. I get a chance to enjoy burkinabé and PCVFs teach some classes. To finish this off Im including a nice picture of my life science crew. Till next time.