The Burkina Visa, the "Conference" and Tamxarit

First, I have a ticket home! I'll be back in the States on July 23rd, 2 days before my birthday that I may or may not be awake for :)

Second, did you know that you can send me text messages? I don't know how much they cost but my guess is a quarter. All you have to do is put "011 221 457 7418" as my number and send! I can even reply for about 20 cents.

Well, hello from Kaolack, the city where I did my more rural internship. It's pretty much how I remember it but oh so strange! Seriously, I think this is where Senegal harbors its strange citizens. Also, I think it's the water and I'm not kidding. There really is something in it that make people's teeth turn brown. It's pretty gross. Most people in Senegal seem to have lovely white teeth, but not here! The teeth are brown and many are sticking out in all directions. I have some some strange tales to tell (I've only been here 2 days!) but those will be for later.

Now it is time to tell of Tamxarit, the Muslim New Year that took place last Wednesday (and the rest of the day).

I spent the morning and part of the afternoon getting my visa for Burkina Faso, which better be a nice country because the visa cost me 60 dollars! It was quite easy to get the visa after I found the embassy. The woman at Air Burkina had told me the wrong neighorhood (that's pretty much the only way you can find stuff here) and told me it was across from a building that it was actually connected to. My poor taxi driver was not very happy when I told him I actually didn't know where I was going. Then some nice man from the water service helped us figure it out by asking a bunch of people and then calling the embassy.

The next part of the day I spent downtown with some of the people from ASBEF at what I was told was a conference. It definitely wasn't a conference. It was more of a presentation about obstetrical fistules (sp?) and the launch of the campaign to address this problem. For those of you don't know what a fistule is and won't be grossed out by the definition, please continue reading. Otherwise, skip to the next paragraph :) A fistule a condition that can occur during child birth in which the tissue of the vagina and the bladder are damaged and join together (this can also happen with the rectum) and the woman can no longer control her urine (or bowel, or both) because of the damage. As you can imagine, this causes many problems and often results in the woman being abandoned by her family and husband. The baby often dies from complicated labor. This often happens when a baby is too large for the mother's body, especially in young women. There was a lot of talk about how the problem could be addressed by not giving young girls away for marriage at a young age.

Okay, gross description over. Anyway, it was interesting but long and sometimes very boring because they kept switching to Wolof. Also, the seats in the theater were WAY too close together and my legs were not comfortable.

When we finally left the conference, I did not go back to ASBEF because I didn't have anything to do there (as usual). I was trying to get a taxi to take me back to the Burkina embassy to get my visa when this guy came up and started talking to me (surprise, surprise). He invited me to his house for couscous, the food that everyone eats for Tamxarit. Yeah right. But then after unsuccessfully bargaining for a taxi, he decided to counsel me on ways to get to the embassy for less money. he presented several options involving different buses and modes of transportation but I really wanted a taxi. Then he decided to find me a "taxi clandestine", taxis that I think are illegal and take more than one person around for a fairly cheap price. Instead, I ended up in a taxi with 3 Senegalese women who were apparently going to same direction as me. So strange. So I did end up getting where I needed to go for about a third of the price!

Now to Tamxarit, the Muslim New Year. Senegalese couscous is the meal that EVERYONE eats for this holiday, although I don't really know why. It's couscous made from millet and it is much coarser than Moroccan couscous (what you are all probably used to eating). I like to say that it resembles sand and many Senegalese people will even agree with me on that one! It also doesn't have that much of a flavor. Yeah, so I don't really like it but it's the traditional food of the day so obviously I ate it. I went to Vieux's house for dinner and ended up paying an huge amount for a taxi there because it was a holiday and the traffic was super bad. Also probably because I am white.

Nothing too exciting about the dinner. Senegalese couscous with sauce and meat. There is a belief that if you don't eat enough on Tamxarit you will hungry for the rest of the year, so obviously I was forced to eat WAY more on the couscous than I wanted to. Luckily Vieux's wife works at a restaurant that her mom owns and is a very good cook.

The other interesting part of the holiday is what the childran do at night. They paint their faces white, the boys dress up like girls and the girls dress up like boys, and they walk around the streets banging pots and pans and asking people for money and treats. It's kind of like Halloween but I don't actually know the story behind it. It's a very funny sight to see though!

Sometimes I just have to laugh at my life here!