The Very Last and Final Episode of
My Extremely Long Story About How We Visted a Winyé Earth Priest, Sacrificed Chickens, Saw Lots of Bats and Gave Away Some Cookies.

Within a few minutes, the ceremony at the Shrine of the Elephant Hunt was complete. The girls and I got out of there with what might well be described as relief.

It was over! We made it! I had the girls stand in front of the door to the hut and took a photo. (It’s the pic I posted yesterday. Now you know why Mal doesn’t look like her usual cheerful self in it. )

So, there I was standing by the door, putting the camera away and wondering why the guys weren’t coming outside. And JP says “Come back in! We had to give the gifts now at the Earth Shrine.”

There was NO WAY I was making the girls go back in, but I figured I could manage a final effort. I sent the girls to go sit in the shade and I walked back into the hut. Not surprisingly, I was confronted AGAIN by a mass of bats, this time moving out of the Earth Shrine and back to their usual home in the Shrine of the Elephant Hunt.

I waited for the traffic to die down and then made my way to the back room. There ceremony was very simple and quickly done.

Now, all we had to do was make a few social visits around the village, eat lunch and then leave. It was only about one o’clock and it was very possible that this day could actually stay on schedule!

We needed to go greet various friends/informants of JP. Not like we needed the company. There was plenty to be had in the compound of the Earth Priest, believe me. When we had arrived, it had been a quiet place, but soon after we had arrived various folks began dropping by to say “Naa Fo”. And there were the kids. Very quickly, there were about 20 of them, all staring fixedly at the twins and A. It was a bit sad, as there were many school-aged children. They all had parents that either could not afford or did not want to send them to school. And because they didn’t go to school none of them spoke French- and the girls with us spoke no Mooré. So, communication was very difficult.

After a bit, Mallory got the big bag of cookies out of the truck. I’d brought them from Ouagadougou as a sort of “ice-breaker”. And they were certainly a big hit. The girls handed out treats to each child and there was lots of smiling both sides.

After that, JP announced that we could start our round of visits. The village is quite scattered and the whole area mostly devoid of any shade or ground cover. So, it was very, very hot and very, very dusty as we crossed the village. And we were not passing through unremarked. As we walked, we collected a train of village children.

By the time arrived at our destination, we had over 80 kids in our retinue. The adults sat and drank the inevitable gourds of millet beer and the girls distributed the rest of the cookies. (See picture posted above. We can see that Mallory likes sharing cookies far more than visiting mystical bat chambers. Can’t blame her, really)

We visited a bit and then trekked back towards the Earth Priest’s compound. On the way, we stopped and visited the compound of the Griots. They are the traditional musician/praise singer caste. If I have to be reincarnated as a Burkinabé village woman (seems unlikely, but stick with me here) I fervently hope that it is as a Griot lady. They are the only village women in Burkina that seem to really have any fun. The minute we came into their compound, the women poured out of the interior of a nearby hut, laughing and joking. And soon the singing began, with impromptu and apparently very funny lyrics describing our visit. In a manner rarely seen in Burkina, the men were definitely in the background and it was a group of jolly, loud, fun women center stage, welcoming the guests.

Soon, we were back at the Earth Priest’s compound. It was 2 pm now and I was getting worried again about the deadline. If we weren’t in the truck and heading back by 3 pm, we’d have to stay overnight in Boromo. And that would NOT have been a good thing. But there was no imaginable way to leave before the meal was served an eaten.

But within a few minutes, we were ushered into a small hut to the right. You have to eat, but you don’t eat together. The Winyé are not big on communal meals. Guests don’t eat with hosts. Even in daily life, men don’t eat with the women and children, but are served first in a hut reserved for them alone.

So, Isseuf, JP, the girls and I were in our little hut, sitting on tiny wooden benches. Burkianbé benches are typically very, very low- intended to keep your rear end out of the dirt, but not by much of a margin. But as they don’t have tables, it makes sense. The communal bowls are placed on the floor and everyone digs in. We had a huge serving platter of millet tô (sticky dumplings) and a pan full of chicken parts and sauce. We ate with our fingers, in keeping with good Burkinabé non-table manners. Our twin daughters and A are quite good at this style of eating, as they all grew up eating local foods sitting on the kitchen floor with household helpers. For the less habituated, it’s hard to do without dripping sauce down your arm or onto the floor.

Soon, the meal was over. We thanked our host and hostess many times and slowly began the process of “asking for the road”.

Finally, amazingly, our visit to the village of Nanou was at an end. By three o’clock we were getting back into the truck.

With Isseuf translating for her, the Earth Priest’s wife jokingly asked if she could come along with me, as we gotten to be friendly, despite the language barrier.

I put my arm across her shoulders and asked Isseuf to say that she was coming with me to Ouaga for a nice rest and that the Earth Priest would have to do his own cooking and laundry for a while. We all had a laugh ( though actually I was more than half serious and if she shows up at my house, she’s than welcome. )

The trip back was uneventful, except for Mallory making me swear that I would never take her there again. Ever. I guess she’s not going to grow up to be an anthropologist like her dad.

Anyway, that’s it.

Really.

No more about our trip to Nanou. On to other things, which there are plenty of, believe me. Burkina is bracing for some more demonstrations against the rising cost of living here (or “la vie chere” as they call it) The US Embassy just sent out a warning that action is expected today in the town of Koudougou, not far from Ouaga. CRS Riot police are being sent out from the capitol to control any unruly mobs that arise.

Less serious, but more annoying: yesterday the electricity was cut almost all day. As the weather is getting hotter, it was not that fun trying to manage with not even a fan. Plus, I was worried about the food in the refrigerator. I was envisioning my kilos and kilos of strawberries half-unthawed and ruined.
The power finally came on again about midnight. Hope today goes better!

Enter the Bat Shrine of Doom. Yeah. Real high on my “To Do” list.

But there was Isseuf, chortling gleefully and giving me a “You white girls are such sissies” kind of look. And I WAS pretty curious, I have to admit.
And the bats DID all seem to have relocated, at least for the moment.

I told A to go wait outside. No telling what would go on in this next, more mysterious shrine and I figured that NOT bringing the 10 year old child of missionaries into might be a good plan.

But, amazingly, A. wanted to come along and Alexa, too, was ok with it.
Mallory, unfortunately, was at the end of her patience with all the weirdness and was already outside. And I wasn’t going to make her. I’d let her brilliant anthropologist father figure that one out.

I gathered the other two girls right up behind me, figuring that I could block any stray bats that might have missed the initial bulletin that strangers were invading their home.

As my eyes adjusted to the dark, I could make out that this room was about the same size as the Earth Shrine, but far more roomy. Instead of an elaborate altar at the far end, there was a very simple one, mostly made up of a big, black pottery jar. I don’t know what was in the jar. I was never even tempted to look. I was just relieved to see that there was a bench for us to sit on along one wall and that the floor was quite clean. Maybe the Earth Priest gets his wife to sweep it out regularly. At any rate, it was not the nightmare of bat droppings that I had been expecting.

I sat down with the two girls on each side of me and Isseuf was crouched near the Earth Priest. He translated the Earth Priests words to me:

“This is the Shrine of the Elephant Hunt. Now, of course, laws prevent us from hunting as we used to in the past, but we still keep our shrine. Even though we can’(t hunt elephants, we can ask here for help with other problems. Our troubles and obstacles can be lifted. We can ask for protection and prosperity. That is what I am going to do for your daughters. They will be protected when you leave our lands and go back to France.”

It was all very wonderful - but our last eight years in Africa have probably been far more risky than our eventual future in Europe will be. No malaria or meningitis in France! But going to live there no doubt sounded like a pretty perilous undertaking to an elderly Earth Priest who has never even been to Ouagadougou

And his previous demands for better health for Alexa seem to have worked wonders. So, why not?

I contemplated all this as I listened to JP trying to persuade a very reluctant Mallory to enter the Shrine of the Elephant Hunt. He had her in the doorway, but she wouldn’t come in. We all assured her it was fine (very clean, bat-free and far less scary than the Earth Shrine) but to no avail.

JP finally half-carried her in and sat down with her on the far end of the bench.

No sacrifices were even required here. We just sat respectfully while the Earth Priest chanted.

Tomorrow I hope to get to the end of this VERY long story...

A certain Ms. Smarty-Pants (aka babzee) just sent me an e-mail:
You have been posting so much it's almost hard to keep it all straight! You went to an orphanage in order to collect sacrifices to the crocodile gods and thereby divert their attention from your pet goat. Adorable chickens wore hats in honor of the twins and your husband took notes and refused to pass judgment.


OK-maybe my posting lately IS a bit chaotic. If any readers are new to this blog, my best advice is to go back about two weeks and start from there.
As for the rest of you, my ever so loyal family and pals all over the world that have put up with so much lately- Today we get to the "good"stuff:


The Winyé Earth Shrine Ceremony at Nanou
All too soon, yet not soon enough somehow, we were called into the inner sanctum. Everyone but the girls had to bend to get through the doorway of the ancient mud brick hut. We entered a big room holding several of the huge clay pots used for making millet beer. At the far back, on the left side, there was an even smaller door. This was the portal to the Earth Shrine.


We all left our shoes in the outer room and squeezed into the smaller chamber. It only measured about 6 feet wide and 8 feet long. And, as in all old, traditional huts, there were no windows- just a couple of smoke-holes in the ceiling. These are covered by overturned jars on the roof during the rains.

So, it was very dim in there and very, very crowded. Mallory and A. were in the far back corner crouched on a tiny wooden bench. Alexa squeezed in between JP and I on a slightly bigger bench in front of them.
The rest of the chamber was filled up by Isseuf, the Earth Priest, the Earth Priest’s son/apprentice and the altar itself, which took up about one third of the whole chamber. It’s was a mass of hanging bundles, dried plants, wooden figures, piles of dried mud, old blood and animal skins. ( It was hard to get an image with no flash, but I did my best. You can see it in the posted picture. The other picture is the girls in front of the outer doorway to the Earth Shrine.)
I could hear Mallory and A. whispering furiously behind me as the Earth Priest began chanting. Alexa pressed against me and I reassured her “You can close your eyes when they kill the chickens. And remember, it’s their lunch! People kill chickens everyday and it’s no worse than this.”
She’s a pretty good sport, so when the apprentice brought in chicken number one, she gamely grabbed its legs and handed it over to the Earth Priest.


Then it hit me. We were doing a sacrifice at the Winyé Earth Shrine. The chickens would die, blood would be splattered and much chanting to the spirits of the bush would be done. And I had brought along the daughter of Protestant missionaries.


Oops.


I could see it all: A. would go home traumatised and weeping. She’d report to her parents how Mal and Al’s folks had brought her along to a horrible heathen ritual of animal sacrifice.
I would be forever disbarred from the missionary community in Burkina and possibly all of West Africa.
This kind of thing can get you a rep.


Well, it was too late to get her out without making a fuss and ruining the ceremony. Luckily, she was stuck in the back, with JP’s back obstructing her view of the shrine. Maybe it wouldn’t be so bad…

The Earth Priest cut the neck of Alexa’s chicken. He poured the blood onto several of the small piles of dried earth at the front of the shrine.
The chicken shuddered, flapped and pretty much refused to die. It wasn’t pretty.
Alexa buried her head in my lap. I told the other two behind me NOT to look.
“Don’t worry” Mal whispered “We don’t wanna look!”

The Earth Priest threw the not-very-dead chicken into the outer chamber, near our shoes.
Then it was time for chicken number two. Mallory had to climb over us and come forward to present her half of the sacrifice. She hesitated at the sight of a beautiful civet cat fur spread out on the floor in front of the shrine. I could tell that her animal-loving heart had had about as much as it could take, but she bravely handed over her chicken and then quickly retreated back to her place.


There was much chanting and waving of objects. The spirits were thanked for their attention to Alexa’s case and their efforts to improve her health.
Then millet beer was served. Nothing important in the village is done without dolo.

We left the shrine chamber and retrieved our shoes from their place near the small heap of still-twitching chickens.

I was thinking furiously. “Spin!” I told myself. “It’s all about damage control! As soon as we’re out of here, I can make a few well-chosen comments about how:
1). Traditional religion is NOT evil.
2. People in the Old Testament had to sacrifice animals all the time, because God liked it then. So, it’s not that strange that some folks still do it.
And, most importantly:
3). We are glad that Jesus saved us from having to kill animals for sacrifices. Lucky, lucky us.
It could work!”

I was planning all this and was just about out the door and into the sunshine again, when Isseuf told me “The Earth Priest says you can’t go yet. You have to go in there.” He indicated a very small, dark doorway just to the right of the exit. It was so low and dark that I hadn’t noticed it when we entered.
I thought he was kidding.

The Earth Priest ducked down and went through the small door.
Bats came POURING out. They were small bats, but there were many, many, many of them, sweeping past me just inches away, heading en masse for the Earth Shrine room at the back.

I clutched at A and Alexa, trying to shield them with my body. I didn’t say anything, but inside I was screaming “RABIES!” and mourning the fact that NO amount of damage control was going to get me past this one. A. might forget to give her parents the full details on the chicken sacrifice, but coupled with a massive bat attack?
It all spelled “scarred for life” with capital S and capital L.

I scurried into the doorway leading out as the bat flood lessened and the way cleared.
But Isseuf said “You have to go into the other shrine. Really! The Earth Priest has a special ceremony to do for you. And the bats are a good omen, you know? They are special Shrine Bats. If one of them clings to you as it passes, it’s a bad sign. It means that problems are hanging on you. But if they go past, it means you are ok!”

Yes it WAS a good sign that none of the millions of bats had “clung” to me, because I would have freaking LOST my mind and had to be committed to a special, very restful hospital somewhere in Switzerland for the rest of my life.


The Earth Priest called out something.
Isseuf translated: “He says the bats are all over at the Earth Shrine now, so you may as well go on in.”

The orphanage visit went well. There's much to tell, but will leave it for another day, as I have this entry all ready to go and I really need to finish the story of our trip to Nanou.


At left, you see JP, his field assistant and the Earth Priest. They are all sitting and waiting, something we do LOTS of here, especially when visiting the village.
That Sunday morning in Nanou, we sat...And then we sat some more. Mallory passed the time admiring the fluffy, curled feathers of the ‘Neré’ chickens wandering around the compound. They looked like little cotton balls. You hardly ever see the breed in Ouaga and it is even rare to find them out in the villages. The Earth Priest had a few special animals he was raising because they are highly prized as birds for sacrifice to the spirits.

After about an hour, some other, non-fluffy, full grown birds were brought to the Earth Priest for inspection. I figured that they weren’t for our lunch, because our midday meal would not require the approval of a divine authority. It could only mean one thing: a sacrifice was going to be held!

I leaned over to JP, whispering urgently “What are those birds for? Please tell me we are NOT doing a sacrifice. Please.” Visions of our last ceremony of sacrifice in Nanou filled my head- first the killing of the two chickens, then the two guinea fowls, then the beer and honey libation. The comings and goings and sheer amount of time it all took had been astounding. We’d have to sleep in Boromo. I knew it. And I had stubbornly not packed our toothbrushes or any other overnight gear.

JP gave me that cute, innocent, ‘I’m just a humble ethnographer, trapped by circumstances beyond my control’ look that he is so good at.

“But I didn’t know either! Nobody mentioned it! Really!” he said earnestly- but I could tell he was secretly having a Fiesta of Happiness deep in his heart. Some new and complicated ceremony he could film and ask endless questions about! What bliss. For him, anyway.

I was less than happy about the extra time it would probably take, but was really quite touched that they were going to so much trouble. And I’ll admit that my next thought was: “This is all going to make one HECK of a blog post!”

What was really bad was the fact that the twins would have to cooperate, and they wouldn’t like it. The subject would have to be broached delicately. They had been pretty horrified at the ceremony two years ago, when they’d had to hand over the four avian victims for sacrifice. It would only be two unfortunates this time around, but I knew the girls would not be overjoyed at the prospect.

I told the girls that we’d have to go into the Earth Shrine for a small sacrifice. Tiny, really. At least it’s not sheep, or (gods forfend) a couple of goats! Right?

How bad could it be?

The weekend involved much activity, not much of it associated with blogging. Mostly, I was helping my kids with their homework. Besides their assigned work from school, I try to give them extra help in French, because unlike most other languages, French was actually invented by sadistic insect-like aliens from a distant galaxy. Not many people know that.

We have to spend lots of time doing "dictées", which are like spelling tests, only more hellish. I read out a long text in French and the kids have to write it down, perfectly. Maybe it doesn't sound hard to you non-French speakers out there, but consider this: the verb "aller" (to go) is pronounced 'al-ày'. That's the infinitive. But there is also "allait", "allaient", "allé", "allée" "allés" and "allées" and they are all pronounced exactly the same!!! (See?! This system could only have been invented by extraterrestrial fiends.) You can only tell which spelling to use by looking at the context of the sentence. It's true of many, many French words and it's sick! And even a single, tiny missing accent mark makes the teacher count the whole word as incorrectly spelled.
As we worked, Alexa wished fervently that she went to "English" school, rather than French school, but I assured her that English would be just as hard. You just have to memorize a few things! I told her. But the fact is, I lied! It's evil and difficult. Cool. But evil and difficult.
Anyway, not much blogging went on, so here it is today: yet another installment of the Gourcy saga. It's still not done!

Part V: The Magic Pumpkins of Death
Sunday morning found the seven us crammed into Antoine’s SUV. Pascal was at the wheel, Antoine riding shotgun. Frieda and JP sat with Nicodemus, Antoine’s son. I was in the third row with Yann, fiddling vainly with the rear air-con controls. It was nearing midday and it was getting pretty toasty outside.
Antoine was taking us on a tour of his village, where he grew up until he went away to school at age 12. He was full of nostalgic memories and waxed eloquent about what he clearly remembered as the “good old days”. “Good old days” is definitely case specific, as it involved old ladies threatening small children with immediate, hideous, pumpkin-induced death.
In the village, Antoine explained, the elderly women too old for any other work were charged with keeping the children out of trouble. This mainly involved keeping the kids out of the pumpkin patches. This normally didn’t entail a lot of strenuous effort, as the pumpkins are always grown right up against the huts. Grandma just had to sit under a nearby shady tree and yell occasionally. But the flaw in the system was that the kids love to play outside in the rain and elderly ladies don’t, for the most part, equally enjoy sitting outside in the rain. And the wide green leaves and bright orange balls of the pumpkin patch look even more tempting when all shiny and wet…So, Antoine’s old granny solved the problem by telling the kids that when it rains, each pumpkin opens up to take in water. It’s how they get so big and juicy. BUT, it is INSTANT DEATH to gaze upon the pumpkins while they undergo this mystical process. Yes, witnessing the pumpkin rain magic would mean an immediate, painful demise, even for small, cute children. Not surprisingly, the kids avoided the pumpkin patch like…well…death.
Antoine chuckled. “She sure had us believing! We were all convinced that we would die! Really! It took me years to realise it wasn’t true. Ha, Ha!”
(Cucurbitphobia = fear of pumpkins. I just looked it up online for Antoine, in case he ever needs to seek professional help.)
Antoine’s entertaining tale ended just as we pulled up in front of the village reservoir. He was very proud of it, as it was the first big project ever funded in Gourcy and has provided water to the town for over 20 years. We all duly admired it and Antoine pointed out the many crocodiles sunbathing on the shores. There were four, anyway, which seemed like a lot to me. But we were told that in the evenings at least 50 of the creatures could be found lolling in the mud, snapping up the occasional unwary dog. But not to worry. They don’t attack full-grown cattle or adult humans! Mostly. (You can see the reservoir in the pic I posted. It’s quite big. Plenty of room for hundreds of canine-starved crocs. As you can see, there are no reptiles in the photo- just Frieda, JP, Nicodemus, Antoine and Yann the Accordionist)

By now it was time to visit Antoine’s actual home village/neighbourhood. It looked just like a typical, fairly isolated Mossi village. There were many low, round mud huts thatched with straw. Near the central clearing, a woman pounded millet while a big group of men sat in the shade of some straw mats laid across a framework of sticks. Right in the center was a tiny tree with shreds of filthy cloth hanging off it. Other, more mysterious objects were laid in the branches and underneath it were several broken clay pots. As we got out of the car, Antoine told us this was the “fetish” of his village. It’s a huge deal, as the earth shrine is the ‘heart’ of the village- where sacrifices are done and ceremonies completed. I didn’t quite dare to ask to take a photo. I circled around it at a respectful (so I hoped!) distance and stumbled over a rock. It was a fairly big, red volcanic rock, sticking up in a very inconvenient way. As I looked around, I noticed that there were many, many of these rocks, each about the size of a soccer ball, scattered all over the central clearing of the village. Why the heck didn’t they just move them? Somebody was going to break a leg or a neck!
“Oh- that’s Grandpa” Antoine said to me. He called over his son. “Look, Nico! Your Grandpa is buried right there.” And he pointed right at the rock I was standing on.
I was standing on his Grandpa. First, I spit out his tô and then I go and stomp on the man’s ancestor. And yes, every single rock was the burial site of an important tribal elder...
I began to think it was time to go home….But wait! We hadn't visited the village gardens yet, or Antoine's family. Plus, he wanted to have lunch with him. I was pretty much ready for that one, as I had heard early morning mass chicken death happening in the kitchen at the hotel. (Fancy Burkinabé parties nearly always mean mourning in the chicken coop.) So, this day's adventures would not be ending anytime soon.

Coming soon: Part 6-The End (I think)