On Monday, I was driving down the valley to go run some pre-trip errands in the "big city". My three girls were with me, indulging in one of their favorite recent pastimes: discussing all the tasty things they want to eat while they are visiting the USA this summer.

Top on the list is always Taco Bell. It may seem odd, but if you're a kid who only gets this stuff once every three years or so, I suppose you might really get to craving a fast food taco or two.

Then there are the breakfast cereals.
"Lucky Charms " Mallory announced. "Lucky Charms are the MOST delicious!"
"What about Froot Loops? We'll have Froot Loops, right?" Alexa chimed in, concerned that her favorite not be left out.
"That stuff tastes like mutant chemicals. " Tya sniffed from the front passenger seat.
"But it's goooood mutant chemicals!" Alexa insisted.
Mallory ignored the controversy.
"I like popsicles! We'll get popsicles? Right, mom?"
"Mmmmm." I answered, concentrating on the road, but giving it a vaguely positive intonation.
"And root beer?"

The other girls were quiet and let the master work. Mal was on a roll.

"And Cinnabon rolls? And Valentino's buffet? And Mountain Dew?"
"Mmmmmm!" I repeated, taking a particulary tricky curve. (People who have lived here for years have managed to drive off this road, tumble off the edge, down the to the valley floor and die in flames. I SO do not want to do that.)
"And those waffles? With that chocolate stuff?"
"Mmmmmm?" I inquired.
I hadn't heard this one before.
"You know! The frozen ones made by that strange white baking creature."
"Strange white...?" I said, baffled.
But then the light began to dawn.
"Yeah, mom!" Alexa chimed in "The little thing with the creepy staring black eyes!"
That clinched it.

Luckily, the hard part of my drive was over and I was able to safely laugh uproariously for a good long time at this very accurate description of the dreaded Pillsbury Poppin' Fresh Doughboy.

I am SO calling it "that strange white baking creature" from now on.

Back when we lived in Ouagadougou, we had a television, but never bothered to hook up the antenna. And there was no question of paying good money (or even bad money) for a satellite dish.
The tv was never turned on during the week.
At all.
On the weekends, our kids were allowed to watch just one video cassette per day (with the exception of special permission from their soft-hearted father).
One of the most often viewed and most treasured of these cassettes was « My Little Pony ». It was a French tape, so it was actually « Mon Petit Poney ». In this cartoon, small, chubby, pastel-colored talking horses went about their daily activities. And their daily activities included: being adorable, going on scavenger hunts, being even more cloyingly adorable, babysitting naughty (yet adorable!) toddler ponies, being adorable some more and rescuing a rock-star pony from the clutches of an evil manager. (Note: Rock Star Pony looked and sounded very much like The Artist Formerly Known as Prince and that particular episode was, as you may imagine, peculiarly fascinating)

One thing the ponies were never, ever obliged to do in an episode of the show was flee from people intent on killing them, butchering them and serving them up as Sunday lunch. This might well have been the plot of an installment if the show had been made in France, or Switzerland.

Most of you probably already knew that the French eat horse meat. What you may not have known is that the Swiss do it too.
They’re sneaky that way.
The Swiss may seem charming but you have to watch them closely. Otherwise, the minute you sit down to the table for a nice lunch, they are plonking down a huge roasting pan right in front of you and it’s chock-full of Mr. Ed basted in an herbed wine sauce.

And I know this is absolutely true because that’s exactly what happened to me last Sunday.

We’d gone to the Swiss city of Lausanne to visit some good friends there. We’ve known M and D for many years and were looking forward to a nice meal with them and then a group visit to an old hotel that was auctioning off all it’s furnishings (note: this hotel will figure very prominently in my next post for reasons which will surprise you. )

Anyway, there we were, all sitting around the table. There was JP, the twins, Sev, and our friends’ two lovely teen-aged sons. M was in the kitchen finishing up , while D approached the table with a big cast-iron dutch oven.
He put it down right in front of me and lifted off the lid with a decided flourish.
The large chunk of meat inside had a definite gray tinge to it. I figured that it was the sauce that had given it a funny color.
D want back to the kitchen to get a better knife and those of us left at the table speculated as to what it was.
Beef was the general consensus.
By this time, D was back at the table, hacking away at it with a large knife.
I asked him what the meat was.
« C’est un rôti de petit poulain. » he happily informed me.
« Poulain » is « foal » in English.
We were being served « roast of small foal ».
« You’re kidding, right? » I asked him.
D just looked at me quizzically and went back to putting slices on Sev’s plate.
I turned to JP. « He’s kidding, right? »
JP peered down at the lumps of gray on his own plate.
« No. I don’t think he’s kidding »
« Seriously . What is it? » I insisted, a vaguely worried feeling creeping into my mind.
« Poulain. » he said again, quite surprised I’d asked twice.
« Really? What? Really?........As in « My Little Pony ?» I asked, a bit desperately.
During all this, M had been coming down the long hallway to the dining room. She could see me clearly the whole time and she swears that throughout this exchange my face went from draining paper white to flushing bright red. (Note to self: Don’t plan to earn millions as a professional poker player)

D didn’t quite get what my problem was. In fact, he’d gone specially to the horse-butcher’s shop to buy us this nice treat.
I said that it was just like serving a roasted kitten.
In other words, not so good.

The twins, of course, refused to touch it.
The men of our family, on the other hand, chowed down. Sev even had seconds and thirds. With sauce. Horse blood sauce.
Gah!!

I’m not even that keen on eating cows. I serve beef to our family maybe once a week, max. It’s always organic, relatively happy beef and usually small quantities- little chunks in a sauce over pasta or rice, rather than steaks.

The foal roast was so very, very creepy.

Luckily, M and D are good pals and we all managed to have a good laugh about it in the end
Everyone but the foal, anyway…

The lack of dozens of photos showing our new room being built this week means -yes, you guessed it- the new room was NOT built this week.
At all.
Which is sad, but not at all unexpected. The French building contractor is a rare, shy creature and you really can't expect one to show up according to any kind of predetermined schedule. Wild and free as the wind itself, and all that.
It's a bit tiresome, but that's how it is.

So, this week, instead of watching the addition to the house go up, I kept busy with other stuff. "Other stuff" included taking Severin on a shopping trip to buy badly-needed winter boots. His old ones were worn to shreds and about a month ago started getting actual holes in them, which is not really what a person looks for in winter footwear. But Severin hates shopping so much that he'd rather have snow melting all over his socks all day long than set foot in a store. In fact, he'd probably rather have his entrails torn out by rabid hyenas- but I didn't give him that option (so messy and painful, don't you think?) Cleverly bribing him with promises of a lunch at McDonald's, I managed to get him into a sporting goods shop. We found him a pair of Columbia boots that he liked and, at 40% off, they were a complete win.

What was not so "win" was the moment, right after we left the shop, when I realised that my key card was NOT in my purse any longer.
I dumped everything out of my purse, but it wasn't there. We all (I actually had all four of the kids with me) went out to the mall parking garage, just to make sure I hadn't somehow left it in the car.
It wasn't there.
And to make things worse, I could see our housekey sitting on the armrest inside the car. This meant that if I couldn't find the key card and needed to go home and get the spare, I wouldn't even be able to get into my house. Unless I broke a window....
But no need to borrow trouble. I was sure (kind of) that I'd be able to find my key card somewhere in the mall. It had just fallen out of my purse somewhere.
Or had it?
(This is where you get a small insight into the workings of my tiny mind. And let me tell you, they are some strange workings indeed...)
Right then, I looked around the crowded parking garage and this thought flashed through my brain: "Maybe it was stolen! A clever car thief took my key card and is watching us right now! He's followed us in order to find which car is mine and the minute I take the kids and go search the mall, he'll click the door open, start her up and drive away. OMG!"
Yes, I am insane. Thank you for asking.
I told Sev (my six foot tall son) and Tya (5'9" and quite capable) "Guard the car". Mallory stayed with them and Alexa came with me to help search. Luckily, we hadn't gone to very many places that afternoon. There weren't too many places to cover.
First, we searched the McDonald's. My purse had fallen on the floor at one point as I'd fussed over my salad, so I had a strong hope that the black plastic card would be found on the floor under our table.
No such luck.
I talked to the manager, but nothing had been turned in. So, we walked to Go Sport, looking at the ground the whole way. The store manager there was super-helpful. "I lost my keys at McDo once. I'd put them on the tray and then got distracted by the kids. Threw them right in the garbage! " she told me. Her previous experience (which ended happily after she searched the trash bin) made her very sympatheitic and she helped us look through the whole store.
Nothing.
Disappointed, I left her my name and cell phone number and trudged back down to the fast food place. I was just lifting one of the tables so Alexa could look under it, when my phone rang. It was the Go Sport manager...someone had turned in my key card! It had been found wedged under the bottom edge of the front counter where the cash registers sit.
So, it turns out I was NOT the target of fiendishly clever car thieves.
Imagine that...

I was just putting the lasagne in the oven to bake when Mallory wandered into the kitchen, peering sadly into the small box of cat treats we'd bought just the day before.

"There's hardly any Dreamies left, mom! What happened to them?"

I set the timer and started to answer "I don't know, Mallory. I didn't ..."

I was interrupted in mid-phrase as JP joined us in the kitchen and announced in an injured voice:
" Those new snacks you bought really don't taste very good, you know!"


Mystery solved.

Yesterday morning, Tya's class got out of school early. After only one hour of French class, they were back on the streets. So, I drove down and picked up my daughter and her best guy pal(or possible bf- the jury is out on this one.)
I had some errands to run, so I took them with me to a nearby shopping center. And in the supermarket there, I spotted this:

Tya positively squealed with delight. And even I made sounds of great suprise and delight.

Her friend thought we'd lost our minds.

It's not that we are 'into' junk food. We're definitely more of a brown rice and veggie burger household.

BUT

We hadn't seen a Reeses Peanut Butter Cup or a Dr. Pepper since August 2007. So, it WAS very entertaining and surprising.

When I left France about 10 years ago for Africa, it was very difficult to find any American products at all in our area. I could occasionally find peanut butter or pancake syrup at outlandish prices. That was about it.

But now I can easily get items like: Old El Paso taco shells, Skippy peanut butter and
Campbells Cream of Mushroom soup (essential for the occasional US-style casserole). Even Pepperidge Farm cookies have caught on.

Crazy!

We bought nine packs of candy (@ 1 euro each. splurge.) and the last two cans of soda on the shelf. Guess some other Americans got there before us. I have NO clue who they were. I never see/hear fellow USA folk around. The only anglophones I ever run into are Brits. Odd.

I'm not sure I'll be a frequent buyer of this stuff. We've gotten along without it pretty well until now. But it was kind of fun. If only they'd get Crisco (which I need for my cake decorating) and Diet Dr Pepper)

And now for something completely different-

We've done some more work in the house!

Now when I look down from my office stairway, instead of plain white walls, brown lino

and grey plywood doors, I see this:

Check it OUT!!! Turquoise/aquamarine walls, a new light fixture, pale yellow cement floor, new doors for the closet and powder room,

PLUS floor to ceiling bookshelves nearly two stories high!!!!!

Before he left on Monday (for one month in Ouaga) , JP got some of our African artwork hung up on the walls.

I have been really busy these past few days, getting (very heavy!) boxes of books from the garage and attic and putting them on the shelves.
The books are, of course, arranged by genre and then by alphabetical order.
If I had more non-fiction I'd definitely Dewey Decimal it :) but I've only got about two shelves full and it hardly seems worth it.

I LOVE this SO much!

Can a stairway count as the favorite room of your house?

(NB: The very top shelves will be easily reachable by a special ladder we are having custom-built. )

This may be a blogging first: I am trying to write this post while simultaneously sewing! Impressive, non? (I have added a photo as proof, even)

I expect the Guiness Book of World Records to be calling me up any time now...

I'm serious. I've got the sewing machine set up right beside my computer and am alternating between the two. I'm telling you, it's BUSY around here and this is the only way I'lll get a post up this weekend!

Pathetic, really- but there you go.

So, it's not that I don't have lots of write about. It's definitely not that. Nearly every day I make myself a little post-it full of things I'd like to blog about...but the end of the day rolls around and somehow the post remains unwritten.

What was on my neglected post-its this week?

The first one says "marijuana-flavored soda pop" . I swear. I bet you had no idea I was the kind of degenerate that would offer small children such a thing. Alas, I am. But it was a mistake, I swear!! There is a local soft drink company here that makes lovely blueberry soda with cane sugar. It's in charming old-fashioned glass bottles and also comes in lemon, raspberry, cherry and pine flavors. They're all pretty nice, especially the pine tree flavor. Strange, but nice. Well, the last time I went to buy some, I noticed that they had "chanvre" flavor. It was a pale green color and I thought it must be made of the extract of some quaint mountain plant, such as the gentian. I brought it home and proudly showed it to JP.

"Look!" I said proudly "I have found a local drink made from charming local plant-life of the French Alps" (or something like that)

And he said "It's hemp."

And I said "???" (as I so often do)

He then carefully clarified so that even I could understand "Chanvre is hemp."

Hemp? I have only vague ideas about hemp. Isn't it just cheap marijuana?

Anyway, it was definitely not the kind of local charm I was looking for. I am SO sticking with the pine and blueberry. Marijuana soda is just Not Right somehow...

(Break for setting in the zipper. BRB)

Another of my post-its says "educational toast", in order to remind me of the clever scheme I dreamed up this week that is going to make my family wealthy beyond our wildest dreams. Or possibly not. Ok, probably not. But here's how it came about: I was sitting with my older kids as they ate breakfast one morning, when Sev held up his partially gnawed toast and asked me "What's this?"

"Umm...partially gnawed toast?" I guessed, as it was only 6:15 and I hadn't had enough coffee yet.

"No! It's a country! Guess which one!"

I looked at it again and decided the chewed edges had given it a decidedly hexagonal form.

"France?" I ventured, waking up a bit.

"Right! Try this one!" he said enthusiastically biting it into another shape.

It was actually kind of fun. We were really into it. What a great educational game! You could sell packaged bread, calling it something like "Geography Toast".

And the slogan? "Learn with your loaf!" (just an idea).

Anyway, I had a vision of this catching on- kids using breakfast time to brush up on their geography. This could be BIG!

I looked over at Valentine.

"Ooh! Look Sev! She's made India! Or maybe Texas! Are we doing states? Do states count?"

She said (and this is an exact quote, straight off the original post-it) "Leave me alone, you pathetic freaks. It's just toast, NOT Pakistan. I'm trying to eat here. Gawd." which may indicate that 15 year old girls might not be our target demographic...

I had better stop here. I seem to be doing far more blogging than sewing and this dress has GOT to be finished by tonight. In just over one hour, we are going to church and then a special dinner at the village community hall.

And tomorrow morning, we're heading off to a renaissance faire being held nearby. The girls all want to wear their costumes, so I'd better finish Tya's asap!

When I checked out my blog stats yesterday, I was pretty surprised to find that my month-long hiatus didn't cut off any traffic. In fact, there were just as many readers as ever, mostly reading really old posts. I guess I'll have to leave this blog up for a while, so people looking for in-depth info on what expat life in Burkina is really like will still have something to read.

Not that France isn't exotic in it's own way. The natives are kind of odd and have strange ways. Here too is fertile turf for the anthropological researcher.

For example, my quest to blend in as a French housewife (participant-observer is a classic research technique) nearly came to a screeching halt a couple of weeks ago. My über-French mother-in-law had come for a visit six days after we arrived in France. I had invited her down, as I feel that she has spent the last nine years unfairly deprived of her charming grandchildren. She is very kind, in a brusque sort of way, and we get along really well, but she has definite ideas about how things should be done. I know that is in the nature of the creature that is the MIL, but still...

One afternoon, she asked me what I'd be making for dinner. I hadn't been to to the market lately, so it took a minute or two to come up with an idea.

"Cauliflower, I guess. And pasta..."

"Pasta?!" "With CAULIFLOWER?! exclaimed the French MIL in exactly the same tone of voice that she'd have used if I'd said that I was going to serve the cauliflower that night with a sidedish of poison, while wearing my underpants on my head.

Now, in my younger, newly-wedded days, I would have backed down in an instant, begging her to reveal the "real" way to serve cauliflower. But I am older now and less inclined to let people make me think I'm an idiot. I just looked at her.

"You would do that, you? Serve cauliflower and pasta??!!!!" She was looking sort of pale and panicky. This was obviously a big deal.

"What's the problem? What would you serve with it?" I asked, just because I didn't want her to have a heart attack right there in my kitchen.

"Well, I don't know. But not PASTA!!" She said "pasta" just like a non-French person would have said "snot". srsly.

Now, I'll admit that pasta would not have been my first choice. It would sort of make a very bland, monotone color scheme on our plates. But Yvette obviously found something far more sinister in the combination of foods proposed. It was just not "how things are done" or "comment il faut faire les choses" in France.

There's all kinds of moments like that here. There you are confidently cruising along in life, thinking you have it all figured out. Then suddenly you find someone staring at you, jaw dropped by your "shockingly bizarre" un-French behavior.

Despite my French passport, I still feel like a foreigner in many ways. And iIm guessing I'll never really "blend"- I'll always have a funny accent, be five inches taller than most other women here and have crazy ideas about what can and can't be eaten together...

The First Communion Saga Winds to a Close, Sort of...

Last Saturday’s festivities went perfectly. Bells were rung, water was splashed about, wafers were distributed and responses were sung. In less than two hours, the Mass was over and it was time to head over to the restaurant.

The twins were anxious to change from their simple white robes and into their party dresses that we bought last summer in USA. The girls looked lovely in their fancy white dresses and matching diamond crosses from their grandparents in America. They greeted the guests, accepted many gifts, envelopes and good wishes.

The meal was nice and lively, the guests a real mixture of nationalities: Burkinabé, Malian, American, French, Italian, Swiss, and Taiwanese.

At about 9:30 pm, there was a pause as the nuns sang Ave Maria. Afterwards, the twins and their friends danced around under the stars in the courtyard garden under the sleepy, sweet marble gaze of Saint Mary in the niche in the back wall.

The party ended too soon. We made our way home and went to our well deserved rest. And we’d need it- Sunday would also be a very busy day.

Sunday morning was relatively calm. I spent it cooking, getting ready for that night’s American Idol party. But by noon we had to be out the door and on our way to the First Communion meal of the daughter of some friends. Lots of families decided to have a Sunday lunch, rather than a more formal evening party.

These friends live in a chic, huge house out in the swankiest neighbourhood of the city- Ouaga 2000. But the party was very casual and Burkina-style. In some ways, this was very, very bad, as the day was very, very hot and the party was outdoors. There were big tents for shade, but it was quite hot under them. And there were almost no tables (only two that I saw) and not enough chairs for all the guests. There were about 150 guests and it was a bit of a crush. Especially when it came time to line up at the buffet. Everyone was anxious to get at the grilled wart hog and the tripe soup.

Oh yeah.

As you may have guessed by now, I was NOT one of the masses lined up with a plate in hand.

There were also “normal” items on offer- Valentine had salad and Severin had some grilled guinea fowl. But I figured that I’d better save my appetite, anyway. After this , we’d be going to yet another post-Communion ceremony meal and it would be bad if all of us were too full to eat. That can really be seen as bad manners around here.

So, the twins swam in borrowed swimsuits. I chatted a while with a visitor from Paris who wanted to practise his English. JP ate tripe and warthog. He said it was really good.

Finally, we said goodbye. We got little tulle bags of pastel-coloured sugared almond from the hostess as favors. In the car, I opened mine and dug in ravenously. As we drove, Mallory happily enumerated how much more she liked HER party than her friend’s. The list of superior attributes included: tables and chairs, air-conditioning, the lack of cow organs and the fact that an evening party is just more “elegant”.

The next party was on the far northern edge of town. It was being held by another French/Burkinabé couple , people much less wealthy than the Ouaga 2000 crowd. The party was very simple and would have been quiet, if not for the hip-hop music being played by the teenagers. The girls ran around with their friends, having fun with the monkeys (3!) and the horses (8!).

I finally had some lunch, upholding the family honor. JP had eaten far too much wart hog and tripe to even make an attempt. First of all, I had some Babenda. It was so tasty that I took seconds, which is suprising, considering that “babenda means “dog’s underpants” in Mooré. (No, I’m NOT making this up. If I were, don’t you think I’d invent something less outlandish?) It’s actually a very delicious and healthy mixture of whole millet and spinach.

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This morning, we sat around watching the rain fall. “West African television” I call it as we sit in our locally made (out of sticks and goat hide) garden chairs out on the covered terrace.
The trees whip around and the rain pours down in sheets. It’s violent, but not really vicious like a bad storm back in Nebraska. And it makes good watching from a nice, relatively dry terrace.

The power was cut, so there was nothing much to do but sit and watch the rain come down. It was a nice way to spend a Sunday morning.

It’s 1 pm now and still raining, but much more gently. I bet the farmers are really thrilled. Everyone is so anxious to get the crops in this year. Belts have gotten beyond tight to crushingly constricting as the price of food here (and worldwide) has risen so dramatically over the last months. These days I notice women walking the dirt roads of Ouaga, selling pale yellow cakes from baskets balanced on their heads. These cakes are made of neere powder (from neere tree pods). It’s considered “famine food”- cheap and not very tasty. It’s what you eat when there’s nothing else. This it’s the first time I’ve seen it being sold in the streets of the capital city.

So, everyone is waiting for the rains and the new crops to start growing. And certainly the rain will be a good boost for the local market gardens. It’s been weeks since there was any cauliflower and the green beans are very tough and stringy. Tomatoes have gotten super-expensive.

I was writing up the household menu this morning. I plan it four weeks at a time on a big calendar and then post it on the side of the fridge. A month of salads (lettuce or beets or leeks or whatever), a main dish, sides and desert. I never dreamed that I’d be so organised, but it’s the only way to manage a household here really well. It allows you to order your meat and fish ahead of time and hunt down all the ingredients that you need. Anyway, as I did the menu for June, I was struck by all the stuff that we don’t have right now (like broccoli, cauliflower, decent green beans, etc) and things that have gotten really dear. Cabbage is still a good value. But it’s hard to build your menu around cabbage day after day.

I am SO going to love living in France again and having constant access to all kinds of good food for my family. One of the things I really adore about living there is going into the village of Boege on Tuesday morning. That’s market day and the stands are full of gorgeous seasonal vegetables and fruit. Our neighbours two houses down from us have a stand and they are always sure to clue me in on what is good and hold back choice things for me. Raspberries, endive, asparagus, plums. Heavenly!

Here in Ouaga, we have mangos. At least there’s that. In our yard, we have two trees full- plenty for us and our workers. There’s even enough for the guinea pigs and the turtles, all of whom adore the fruit. The vitamin C is good for the piggies and the turtles seem to find it a tasty change from lettuce.

Speaking of animals, Cleo the Cat is definitely going back to France with us. She’ll get her blood test this weekend and then get her ID tattoo. Lucky girl!

The twins are spending this afternoon making passports for their favourite stuffed animals. Valentine is helping them make visa stamps. It's all looking very authentic.

More on the 1^st Communion tomorrow…

As I tried to go into the center of Ouaga this morning, I came across hundreds of protesters near the University. They seemed peaceful, but had all of the big Blvd Charles de G. (the major East-West axis in our section of the city) blocked. I turned back and went in on a more roundabout route.
Everything seemed calm in the town center and no one seemed to know what was happening over by the University.
I went to the bank and then went to mail a small box at the post office. At the regular window, they wanted over $60 US to send a 3.5 pound package to London!
So, I went around back to where the large parcels are sent out. It seems to be completely separate from the main office and the prices were certainly better. They asked for a little over $20 dollars. (This reminds me: while I have always had good experiences at the post office here, some people don't. I just heard from a friend whose family sent her a birthday card while she lived here in Ouaga. Her parents just got the card returned to them- THREE years later! The address was ONE digit off- instead of PO box 34001, they'd written 34007. ANd that was enough to get it lost for three years and then sent back to the USA. Crazy!)

I went on to Marina Market, the biggest supermarket in all of Burkina. Don't be impressed- it's not all that big. And while the shelves seem a little less empty than over at their competition, The Scimas, there is still little variety. No cream, sour cream, or anything like that.
I also noticed that they'd put out a bunch of canned okra! I'm guessing that's something that has been languishing in the back storeroom for months (if not years) and they finally trotted it out to help fill the thinning shelves. And I bet the person that ordered it in the first place got in big trouble! Maybe we don't have many things here in Burkina, but fresh okra is cheap and plentiful. I'm guessing that the canned version, being very expensive, is going to be a very tough sell.
Shopping done (no canned okra for me, thanks), I headed back home. Near the US Embassy, I had to pull over at let a truckload of CRS agents zoom past me. They were in full riot gear, heading toward the University.
I wisely turned south and took the long way home. I would have liked to know what was going on, but I am under strict instructions from my mom to be careful. Srsly.
I tried to catch some news on the radio- which is possible, but unlikely. However, my radio chose this morning to go haywire.
So, when I got home, I asked my household helpers if they knew anything. They'd been listening to the local radio all morning and they'd heard nothing. Not a word.
But it did seem to be very low key. Maybe there's not much to report. On the other hand, why were the riot police rushing to the scene all hot and bothered?

I'll post again if I find out anything interesting, if I have time. I am sort of in full crisis management mode. For the last three years, Alexa has taken the same two heart medications. I have always bought them at the same pharmacy- one near our house. They have to order them for us, as they aren't that common here. So, every month I buy a box of each and then they order again. It was a good system... until now. When I went in last night to get a new box of Flecaine, they didn't have any. They had forgotten to re-order it! No other place in the whole country has any and it will take 6 days for some to arrive.

Why yes, I am the World's Worst Mother. Thank you for asking.
And yes, I DO feel stupid for not having a reserve box hidden away.

So, I am looking at how to fix this and Al's doctor is also trying to help.
That's my day so far.

I guess being a Published Author hasn't transformed my life into one of ease and glamour.
Rats.

The epic tale continues...Who knew that a weekend trip to an obscure African village could be turned into a novel?
Other things are going on right now, of course. Bloggable stuff. There is a food-supply problem in Ouagadougou now, for example. The price of food staples is rocketing. Cooking oil is up by 25%. A sack of rice that used to cost about 25 US dollars is now up to 30 dollars. That means a lot of hardship for the average Burkinabé. And people have to be very careful when buying, as scarcity and high prices tempt merchants to "stretch" their stocks of oil with cheaper, sometimes dangerous, fillers.
Even luxury items are no more. There hasn't been a shipment for weeks of cold goods. Butter, cheese, cream, sour cream, etc are difficult, if not impossible to find. The only reason there is milk is because there are stocks of irradiated boxed milk that doesn't need refrigeration.
This is all linked(so I'm told) to higher transport costs. Practically everything here has to be driven in and the price of fuel has risen sharply over the last months. And certainly chaos in oil-producing nations like Chad doesn't help matters.
But today's photo isn't a sack of rice, though there are similarities. It's a picture that Freida just sent me of our Gourcy adventure. This was taken just before JP made his speech. You see what I mean about the pink outfit. I wasn't kidding.
Which all leads us right back to:
Part 4 in which Burkina Mom needs help from Emily Post. Desperately.
So, it was 10:30 at night and there we were, picking our way cautiously among the cabbages, lettuces, water hoses and other garden-variety hazards. The mystery of Antoine’s fabled garden was solved! And we were going to have dinner in it. Well, just behind it, in a small clearing that had been set up with about 40 chairs and a couple of buffet tables.
Now, the average Burkinabé dinner is eaten in relative darkness, which most people here have no problem with. They mostly only ever eat millet tô with sauce. What’s to see? They make do with a candle or a small kerosene lamp at most. Even at this fancy party featuring actual electricity, there were just a couple of feeble light bulbs hanging off a cord. It was very dark- that far-from-the-city kind of dark where you can not only see Orion’s Belt, you can also make out Orion’s Shoes, Orion’s Watch and Orion’s Nose Piercing. It was dark.
We each took plate and wandered over to the buffet. I was near the front of the line, thanks to the “ladies first” policy. It was hard to tell what was in the big metal pots. Even Celestine, who had prepared the food, was having a hard time. Antoine’s wife had a small flashlight that she used to venture a best guess on the contents of the various containers. The miniscule beam of light revealed fatty mutton, chunks of apparently anorexic chickens, couscous (nothing more than edible sand, IMHO. Hate the stuff), mashed beans (so she said -looked like mud), and salad (unless impeccably clean it’s a major health hazard. The normal rule is NEVER eat salad in the bush). Then, I peered into the last pot and saw smooth, pale blobs. Tô! I love tô- it’s the national food here: a dumpling made of either corn or millet flour. Very nice. .
“You like tô?” Celestine asked, quite surprised.
I so enthusiastically declared my love for the dish that she put a softball-sized chunk on my plate. Then she ladled a bunch of sauce onto it. Can’t eat tô without sauce. Too dry.
I made my way back to my chair, past all the other guests juggling plates in their laps. As I sat down, I reflected that a person could make good money selling silverware with built-in lights for use in the bush. My prototype would be a fork with a small penlight taped to it. With the light shining towards the pronged end, there would be no more surprise bites of hot pepper, bone or gristle! A true innovation! When travellers come to Africa, they often think that they need stuff like khaki vests with hundreds of pockets and a big fancy camera. What they REALLY need is self-illuminating cutlery. Take it from one who knows. If I had had Beth’s Amazing Safe-T-Glo Fork ™ , I never would have taken the first bite. The slime! The chunks! I didn’t spit, but politely swallowed, while quietly scooting closer to a light bulb. I could now make out a pool of greenish, shiny sauce. Here's the thing: I adore oseille leaf sauce and I’m crazy about peanut sauce. But gombo sauce? It’s viscous and goopy, made with heaps of okra. Some people don’t like tapioca because it is somewhat like (avert your eyes if you are sensitive) snot. The trouble with gombo is that it is exactly like snot. I’ve gotten used to lots of local specialties, but that one has defeated me.
And the chunks in it? That was soumbala. It’s a popular seasoning here made of fermented tamarind seeds. It is pungent. Scarily pungent. Actually, it smells a lot like Muenster cheese, which in turn smells like old gym shoes that have trodden in dog poop. Neither substance is for the faint-hearted or weak-stomached. I would have smelled it and avoided it, if not for the fact that my allergies were acting up from all the dust.

So, there I was, sitting with this huge plate of tô and gumbo sauce balanced on my lap. I saw no way to get rid of it without being incredibly obvious. I didn’t want Celestine to think I didn’t like her cooking. I didn’t want to reject a dish that millions of Burkinabé love. In short, I didn’t want to be the Ugly American, I wanted to be the Good Guest. But I just couldn’t do it.
Then, Antoine strolled over and noticed my full plate.
“Having trouble there?” he asked.
I said “No.” And it was true. There was no “trouble” - I just wasn’t going to eat because I am a doofus.
Frieda, sitting next to me, leaned over and said “Actually, she doesn’t like gombo.”
“No problem! It’s my favourite!” Our host cried genially. “Hand it over!” He took the plate off my lap and grabbed my fork.
“But I already …” I started to say.
Antoine quickly took a big bite.
I felt like a really Bad Guest now. I had rejected their food and then allowed my host to eat with my used fork from a plate of tô I’d had a bite out of. Not like I have any contagious illnesses that I know of, but still…
Antoine sat down nearby and dug into the meal with enthusiasm.
I went back to the buffet table and got a small plate of mashed beans and bread. It was very good.

Part V: The Magic Pumpkins of Death

The invitation to Saturday's fête requested that guests come in the traditional garb of their home country, Chinese clothing or informal dress. The latter only seemed like an option for the profoundly uncreative. But what would the traditional clothing of the citizen of the USA be? Native American would be the most accurate, but probably politically incorrect, as I have no Indian ancestry whatsoever. Plus I would look like an idiot. But that leaves what? A sunbonnet and a calico dress? Levi’s and a t-shirt with a snarky remark printed across the chest? I had no clue. But then, a miracle occurred! I went to the Rec Center jumble sale and there was an American woman selling a red silk oriental-style outfit. In my size and very cheap! Amazing!

Ok, I had clothes. Which was very good. But what about my hair? That would require professional help, I knew. As I sat there in the swivel chair at the salon, I had an epiphany: My hair is evil. Not difficult, unruly or untameable. It’s evil. It took two people three and a half hours to make me look decent. No wonder I can't manage to make it look even marginally ok. The avaerage mortal has no chance against it. The primary obstacle to any degree of coolness is the front lock that swoops down into a sort of question mark over my forehead. It’s a look that worked for Ruby Keeler in 1937 (see photo above right), but is considerably less attractive in 2007. It’s a bit sad to have hair that would have been a hit 70 years ago- seems like a waste, really. But here I am in the 21^st century, trying to no avail to make it attractive. But at least now I know why I never succeed in this task. Just defeating the dreaded wayward front lock alone took two trained professionals a quarter of hour: one had to tug at it mercilessly with a huge brush while blowing super-heated air onto it , while the other simultaneously applied copious amounts of hairspray.
After the Herculean task of fixing my hair, I let the makeup specialist have a go. She did a nice job, very natural. And at about eight dollars, it was a good investment, considering that I don’t own any makeup, except for a tube of mascara and some lipstick.

JP and I got to the party at about 8pm. It was at the home of a Taiwanese businessman here in Ouaga. Why not at the Embassy? Well, lots of the guests wouldn’t be allowed to come if it was held at an official site, such as the embassy itself. The US Ambasador, for example, is forbidden by our government to even visit the home of any Taiwanese government employees.
It was a very impressive home in Ouaga 2000. Four stories, two pools, lovely landscaping and plenty of room for a stage outdoors plus tables for 300 people.

The first part of the evening involved standing around with a drink in hand, not knowing anyone. God, I hate parties. But then the US Ambassador and her husband showed up. We ended up sitting together and it made the evening much nicer. Despite the fact that the ambassadorial spouse kept asking JP about various digs and his opinion of the new archaeological museum at Oursi. He didn’t seem to understand the difference between an archaeologist (like me) and a cultural anthropologist (like JP). His wife was excruciatingly embarrassed and kept trying to clue him in, but it didn’t do much good.
The food was very depressing. No amazing Chinese cuisine in sight. Not a single bean sprout or mushroom. There was couscous, roast mutton, fried potatoes and fish in tomato sauce. Typical Burkina party fare. The only nice thing was the asparagus from the Taiwanese experimental farm, which was a treat. We don't get a wide variety of vegetable in Burkina.

Coming tomorrow: The end of the story. Really.