So, it turned out that the twins and their little friends did NOT perform their dance recital chanting "Thees my sheet" in front of hundreds of parents and children. When the twins told me on Friday night that the teacher had said they wouldn't be doing that song at the show, I thought 'What a relief!' They would only perform two dances and 'Hollaback Girl' would not be one of them! So, it was with a complete lack of trepidation that I enjoyed the first part of last night's show.


Severin's fencing team did a wonderful demonstration. Fencing is, like, HARD! Everything has funny names and you have to hold yourself just so. You don't get to swash and buckle however you please. It's very disciplined. And I have to add that Severin looked SO handsome! I have been humiliating him with my near-constant comments on how darn good-looking that boy is. But then, if your own mom doesn't think the sun rises and sets on you, what's the point of having one?


Next, we watched the gymnastics routines (3 different groups) , the circus acts, the hip-hop dances (3 too!!) , the ballet dance, and the Japanese stick fighting. The latter, an activity with only 3 children in it, seemed to go on forever. Considering the fact that there were only three sets of fond parents in the audience that had any interest at all in the proceedings, they would have done well to cut it to a more reasonable length. Folks are mostly kind, but they can only spend so long watching three kids they don't know wave sticks around in slow motion. After about 15 minutes, you've really seen all you need to. If I'd had my own stick, I might have taken a whack at the teacher. He was out of control and needed to be taken down- a boring, pedantic French guy that seems to have the mistaken idea that he is neither of these things.


The stick fighting ended, eventually. Then it was time for the first dance of the twins' modern dance group. The music started like this, and I quote:

Lift your leg up (so petite, so sexy)
Lift your leg up (come on sexy girl, feel me)
Lift your leg up (I want you to come show me, alright)
Lift your leg up, lift your leg up (sexy girl)
Lift your leg up
Yo, you're so sexy, you're so damn fine
Step in every place, you look so divine
Man you are magical, you're one of a kind
When you are ready, come have a good time

It made 'Hollaback Girl" look like a powerful, profound anthem of female empowerment.
It made me want to say: I'm sorry I was so finicky! Bring back Gwen!!


The girls were very cute, of course. They danced so well and the crowd cheered wildly because they were so darn glad not to be watching a fourth hip-hop group or, god forbid, more Japanese stick fighting.


(The song was "Zookey" by a DJ called Yves Larock. Maybe he had to give himself such a painfully obvious "cool" stage name because he's Swiss. It's got to be hard to have rock cred when you're Swiss. You've got centuries of watch-making and cow-milking cred working against you.)


There were a few more acts, then it was time for the final dance. It's a tradition that the modern dance group do the show finale. And I have to admit, I was a little nervous. What song would they be dancing to? 'Baby Got Back' seemed like a likely candidate.


But not to worry! It turned out to be a Russian dance club song- instrumental only! No lyrics!


And here they are at the end of the show.


A good time was had by all, especially us.

Hollaback Girlz

"Thees my sheet! Thees my sheet!"
There I was, sitting at the back of the small room where the twins' dance class rehearses. They've been working hard all year, preparing for the big show that is coming up this weekend. I'd mostly stayed away from the practises, figuring that it could be a surprise.
And boy, what a surprise it was.
Before me were twelve cute little 10/11 year old girls, almost all of them singing along with the song as they practised for the dance recital.

"Thees my sheet!"they chirped enthusiastically.

Well, I thought to myself, Perhaps this is a song about a woman with a Martha Stewart-like love of fine bedding. She has a nice 400 thread count Egyptian cotton duvet cover and has morbid fears about it being stolen. Hence her repetitive insistence that it is her very own personal sheet. Yes! I'm sure that's it!

But then I listened to the lyrics on the tape. And, as you may have guessed, the song was not about decorative texiles for the home.

Of course, the little group of French-speaking beauties obviously had NO idea what they were saying. And Alexandra, the teacher, while fluent in Russian and French, is not so great with English- as we see by looking at her choice for the song about to be played in front of hundreds of parents and children at the French Cultural Center on Saturday night.

The song in question is something called "Hollaback Girl". I don’t know what a hollaback girl is, but she wants to hurt you, bad.
And I quote:

“Oooh, this my Shit , this my Shit  [4x]

I heard that you were talking shit

And you didn't think that I would hear it

People hear you talking like that, getting everybody fired up

So I'm ready to attack, gonna lead the pack

Gonna get a touchdown, gonna take you out

That's right, put your pom-poms down, getting everybody fired up”

It is possible that Alexandra chose it because it's educational, though.
Later in the song, Gwen Stefani helpfully spells out the name of
a tasty and nutritious fruit: 

"This shit is bananas. B-A-N-A-N-A-S"
Perhaps she has plans for future songs where she shows children the joys of
spelling other useful words like "papaya" and "litchi nut"?

It's a very, very strange song.
The word shit is repeated many, many times.I wondered why the
twins hadn’t mentioned this little problem.    
But it turns out that Mal and Al didn’t  see any problem at all.
“Alexandra already picked the song and planned out the dance.
We didn’t want to hurt her feelings.”  Mallory explained afterwards in the car.

“Besides, the other girls don’t even know what the words mean,”
Alexa added.  “And Mallory and I just sing ‘This my chip!”
She illustrated this point by crunching an imaginary potato chip.

Works for me..

When I got home, I did a little internet research and came across this very funny analysis
of the song.
The fact-based Wikipedia take on it can be found here.
Neither of these sources mentions potato chips.

No electricity here yesterday from about 3 pm until midnight. And there won’t be any power again today. To be honest, we are all a teensy bit sick and tired of it.

Yesterday, as soon as the power shut down, I put the kids in the car and sought distraction. We had to drive even more cautiously than usual, though, as all the traffic lights were off, of course.

We wandered around Orca a bit. It’s a Lebanese owned store that is kind of like a Bed, Bath and Beyond, only 10 times smaller and 10 times more expensive. We bought a few extra candles there, though, as there was a 30% off sale on them.

The fact that something I actually needed was on sale tricked me into thinking it was my lucky day. It wasn’t. I didn’t find any D cell batteries at all in any of the shops we tried.

So, I finally gave up and we headed over to the Rec Center. I figured that the kids could swim while I worked out in the gym. But the power was off there, too. And no WAY do I work out in 105° F heat with no air-con. And I hate swimming. (I am secretly convinced that I died of drowning in a previous life. The fact that I don’t even believe in reincarnation is no obstacle)

We ended up over at the CCF (the French Cultural Center). Now, just because it’s called that, please do not imagine a place full of blindingly white French folks gathered together to sip fine vintage wines and congratulate themselves heartily on all the Great Culture that they have created (the Louvre, Moliére, Monet, Haute Couture, the metric system, big metal towers that attract hoardes of toursts and tiny cups of really strong coffee)

In fact, when we showed up, we were the only expats there. The outer courtyard was full of Burkinabé people enjoying an exhibit of the work of local cartoonists/ caricaturists. When we entered the library, it was full of Burkinabé children quietly reading. This is very typical. The CCF is used much more by locals than by expats, as it is intended as a sort of community outreach center. Yes, the French high school puts on their school musical there, but local dance companies and theatre groups are more often the performers on stage.

We stayed in the air-conditioned library, reading comic books and magazines, then went on over to the Verdoyant to eat a quick dinner of (yes, it’s true) ice cream.

When we got back home, we lit some candles and played board games until about midnight. Then the power came back on!

Today’s Ouaga Rumour Mill bulletin is that the Part we are all waiting for is coming from Germany. Of course, there is no direct Germany to Burkina flight, so it has to pass through Paris, anyway.

The Part did NOT arrive on last night’s plane, so it will come on Sunday night. We hope.