give me my fada back!
i was in fada this week for the 11 decembre celebrations. its the burkinabe independance day and this is the first time that the official fete has been in a regional capital instead of in ouaga. fada is normally a very quiet, sleepy, chill town but it was crazy with all the fete goings-on. all of the volunteers who live in the east (though there aren't that many of us for security reasons - there are a lot of coupe de routes out here) are eager to see fada go back to normal.
there was a community expo where all the different nationalities and ethnic groups set up a stand. most people were selling things (arts and crafts or food) but we were giving away materials that the embassy had given us. a lot of the information had to do with the election. one of the more popular items was a copy of obamas victory speech translated into french. its pretty cool to think about his speech going out into all these african villages to school children to read. i just hope he follows through and doesn't make us look like idiots.
speaking of obama, we have renamed the states obamaland. we had a life sized cardboard cutout of obama that everyone wanted to take pictures of. we also bought obama t-shirts that someone was selling. mine is marigold (not the best color for either my or barack's complexion) with a picture of his face on it and it says "barack obama, yes we can." people will just randomly say his name or "yes, we can" to us all the time. its is pretty cool to think that for some of these people "yes, we can" is just about the only english they know.
we also marched in the parade (which involved standing in the sun for five hours so that we could maybe march for 20 minutes). we wore ridiculous looking outfits made from the official pagnes - our shirt was the color of a manilla envelope...not exactly the best color for whities. blaise, burkina's president, drove past to greet us and waved back to us during the parade.
burkinabe take parades very seriously. we had official parade marching practice where we were given lessons by the military. we tried to explain that in the states, parades involve waving and throwing candy and fire trucks and maybe some floats, but they were having none of it. people went nuts when we walked by - we got complimented on our marching skills, there were the requisite obama exclamations, some faux type-y guys yelled "i love you," etc. we were on television and there were official press photographers. we got texts from other volunteers saying they had seen us on television and random people stopped us in town to say that they had seen us.
the fete is now over and i am headed back to village tomorrow. hanging out in fada has been a lot of fun...maybe too much - it felt a little like i was back in college again. i am really looking forward to village but it feels like i've been gone for so long that i've forgotten how to be in village.
i'll be in village for a few weeks and then i am away again on a trip to mali just after christmas. cheers everyone and happy holidays!
there was a community expo where all the different nationalities and ethnic groups set up a stand. most people were selling things (arts and crafts or food) but we were giving away materials that the embassy had given us. a lot of the information had to do with the election. one of the more popular items was a copy of obamas victory speech translated into french. its pretty cool to think about his speech going out into all these african villages to school children to read. i just hope he follows through and doesn't make us look like idiots.
speaking of obama, we have renamed the states obamaland. we had a life sized cardboard cutout of obama that everyone wanted to take pictures of. we also bought obama t-shirts that someone was selling. mine is marigold (not the best color for either my or barack's complexion) with a picture of his face on it and it says "barack obama, yes we can." people will just randomly say his name or "yes, we can" to us all the time. its is pretty cool to think that for some of these people "yes, we can" is just about the only english they know.
we also marched in the parade (which involved standing in the sun for five hours so that we could maybe march for 20 minutes). we wore ridiculous looking outfits made from the official pagnes - our shirt was the color of a manilla envelope...not exactly the best color for whities. blaise, burkina's president, drove past to greet us and waved back to us during the parade.
burkinabe take parades very seriously. we had official parade marching practice where we were given lessons by the military. we tried to explain that in the states, parades involve waving and throwing candy and fire trucks and maybe some floats, but they were having none of it. people went nuts when we walked by - we got complimented on our marching skills, there were the requisite obama exclamations, some faux type-y guys yelled "i love you," etc. we were on television and there were official press photographers. we got texts from other volunteers saying they had seen us on television and random people stopped us in town to say that they had seen us.
the fete is now over and i am headed back to village tomorrow. hanging out in fada has been a lot of fun...maybe too much - it felt a little like i was back in college again. i am really looking forward to village but it feels like i've been gone for so long that i've forgotten how to be in village.
i'll be in village for a few weeks and then i am away again on a trip to mali just after christmas. cheers everyone and happy holidays!
posted by danielle at 3:57 PM
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