mobs, trains, and automobiles

2 weeks ago, the other African American/Black volunteers and I had a 3 day get together in one of the bigger cities in Burkina. Out of 170ish volunteers there are only 12 black volunteers; therefore me and another volunteer decided to have a weekend to celebrate our culture by sharing our different backgrounds and experiences. Although only half of the invitees showed up I had a very good time. We discussed politics/current events, swam, and shared fun personal stories. I want to have another one later in the year. Hopefully the attendance will be greater next time.

After a long day, I am on my taxi brusse heading back to my site. At about 4pm and 1hour away from my site we enter this town and we see hundreds of people running towards our moving vehicle. There are also other trucks and buses pulled to the side of the road. The driver pulls over with all of the other stopped cars. Apparently in that town a woman was killed in a car accident and the people decided to express their grief and frustration through striking. They would not let anyone pass in either direction. We all got out of the van and waited on the side of road. Cars that made the attempt to pass were stoned or the tires were set on fire. At this point I'm standing on the side of the road with the other passengers not sure if I should be scared or annoyed that we stopped. luckily there was this really nice Ghanian woman that explained things if my french comprehension failed me. We wait on the side of the road for about an hour before I call the PC saftey and security guy to see if I should be worried. He tells me to not do anything that makes me stand out and he says that things like this are usually not violent. After some more waiting the driver proposes that he try and go around the mob while the passengers walk through it. I think that this is a great idea other than the fact that its a 3mile walk with all of my bags. Despite this we end up walking/running the stupid 3 miles. While the driver cut around the mob on brusse the van got messed up somehow. So about 45minutes and a few outdoor urinations later we get moving. At this point its pitch black outside. I look out the window and see sparks flying! The guy on the road yells something through the window and the driver pulls over. The guy yells something again (in Moore) so of course I don't understand. After that, all of the sudden everyone jumps up and rushes for the door. People are pushing and shoving trying to get out. Of course I chose to sit in the back so if the van was about to blow up I would not have made it off. I was so afraid. When people start running I'm not going to stick around and observe. Luckily it was a false alarm. I'm still not sure what really happened, and why people started to freak out. I finally got home but that was one of the most stressful trips of my life.

 Long story short a 2hour journey took about 6hours. I still don't see what holding up traffic/ destroying other people's cars is going to do for your grief.