I am officially bougie

11/13/11

Today I finally received my first wedding proposal. Sheesh took them long enough. I get invited to a bar with my home stay parents. My HS mother’s brothers are there. When I go over to the table I greet everyone with the normal handshake salutation. The brother then grabs my face and begins kissing my cheeks 4 times (This is a normal greeting here, but mainly for people who know each other). He then tries to kiss me on the lips! This is when I pull away. Everybody at the table starts laughing. The brothers know very little English and their lack of sobriety doesn’t help. One of them tells me that they have a cousin in NY and when I go home I should visit him. The brother lives in Ouaga and he invites me to come spend the weekend with him in his bachelor pad. He then goes on to tell me that I should stay in Burkina and marry him. His marriage proposal is in broken, drunk franglish, but from what I understood he offered me 10 chickens for my hand in marriage. 10 chickens, are you kidding me?! Me and some other PCTs received 2 chickens just for visiting the chief de terre, and this guy is offering only 10? I think I'm offended.  I'm going to hold out for a better offer.  I should worth at least some goats or maybe even a few head of cattle.

I think that it would be very easy to find a husband or wife here.


My hs fam's lovely house girl, Afou will be leaving Ouaga for an undisclosed period of time. So my HS 'rents got another house girl. 
I didn’t know how good I had it until Marceline came along. She talks back to my 'rents, she's not very clean, she isn’t as good of a cook, and she does not understand personal space. 
I decided to wash my hair today. As I begin to twist my hair Marceline(who has a cold) comes over and starts asking me a million questions in French while touching my hair with her germy, sickly hands. She is so close to me that her stomach in literally touching my arm. (I’m sitting down) She then takes the mirror that I am using and starts popping pimples on her face. She is still holding my mirror and standing over me. At this point I am beyond skeeved so I scoot my chair over. She finally gets the hint and pops her pimples elsewhere. 
You just can't get good help these days.
Afou, wherever you are, if you can read this please come back!

Afou holding a plate of spaghetti 

Oh, and I got the results of my last language test, I am now inter low!!  I need to be at inter mid to go to site, almost there.

My site is near MANGA!!

11/10/11

I’ve been in country for a solid month!!! There is NO turning back now. Today was a pretty eventful day. We get random assignments to complete throughout training that will prepare us for life as a PCV. Today’s assignment is preparing a meal. We split up into 3 groups (appetizer, entrée, and dessert). I of course joined the entrée group to make sure that something would be vegan.  Clarissa and me cooked a really good stir-fry. I would also like to add that we made rice over an open fire! Since all the burners were occupied we decided to build a fire and cook over it! According to Chopped, rice is supposed to be pretty difficult to get right, but we made over 20 servings of yummy rice au natural. I’m pretty proud of myself.

After a bon mangé we received our site announcements. ::drum roll:: I will be spending the next two years in a place near Manga which is in the south of Burkina.Looks like I’ll be making a trip to Ghana! 
Today elevated my excitement and anticipation 10 fold. I use the word excited a lot in English, so I figured I would use it a lot in French as well. Well, turns out that saying I am excited en française (Je suis excite) translates to sexual excitement not joy. So guess who decided to tell the interviewer of her excitement during her first language interview?  The same person who got in Novice Mid during our initial evaluation. 

encounters with wild animals

11/7/11

I think I`m going to start a segment on my blog called “encounters with wild animals”. Today I had two encounters. The first was with a cow. These cows do not look like the fat white and black American cows. All the cows here look more similar to bulls. They have this weird hump on their back that either stores water or fat. (It may be used to increase surface area to keep the cow cool, but I’m not sure) I’ve seen many different colors: white, black, tan, brown, grey, etc. They usually are pretty chill like any other cow minding its own business. But today’s encounter was NOT a friendly one. I’m riding down the rode with some of the other stagiaires and this cow decides to pull a lion king and tries to stampede us(yes one cow can be a stampede, if it's the right cow). Imagine riding straight on a dirt road, you then look casually to your left to enjoy the scenery of Africa and you see a wild cow coming for you at full trot! The riders in the front including myself decide to speed up while the riders in the back are forced to stop suddenly. You would think that this cow would slow down but crossing that road at they very spot was the most important thing on his mind at that time.

this cow is so fascinating

The second encounter was with a rabid dog. All the dogs here run wild like squirrels. Usually they are more afraid of you than anything. I happen to live near the baddest dog of them all because this one is not afraid of me whatsoever. Not only is this mutt mean, he has the exterior to match. Most of the dogs here are tan and short haired. El Diablo on the other hand in dark brown with white paws, he has bright yellow eyes, and longish shaggy fur. Whenever I pass him on my bike he gives me a little growl then he goes back to doing his doggy duties. Well this one night I pull out of my courtyard on my bike and he begins to chase me at full speed. I try to scare him and yell at him to go away but he getting even angrier and begins to growl and run faster. At this point I switch to the high gears on my bike and pedal as fast as I can. So far its Devil dog: 2 Jalysa: 0. I’ll get him next time.

the boy I tutor (papi) and my dog neuf aka 9

can't go any lower than this

11/6/2011

For the last few days I’ve been debating on whether or not to post this next topic on my blog because it’s very embarrassing. I figured that I want this blog to detail my true experience in Burkina so like it or not here goes.

Everybody knows that when you go to a new country with different and exciting new foods there is chance that your body may not react well. When we first arrived in country we had diarrhea-parasite-amoeba-etc training. It was a matter of when you get sick, not if. A lot of the stagiaires accepted the fact that they might get sick during there stay. But I refused to accept this reality. I figured that if I keep filtering my water, soaking my raw fruits and veggies in bleach water or cook them, continue to not eat foods from random venders, and stay vegan I will be safe. 
FAIL.

I didn’t realize how much I would miss raw yummy vegetables. I don’t know if this is the reason for my ailment but I gave in and ate a salad at a restaurant. I know that they rinsed the veggies in unfiltered water but I did not care. I’ve had this salad 3 more times since then  A few days ago my stomach started making weird noises. One morning I woke up and realized oh my goodness I have to go to the bathroom! I rushed around my room looking for toilette paper. I reach for the doorknob and before I could get the door open…it happens. Right there. After much cleaning and laughing at myself I realize that I am now officially a Peace Corps trainee. I also realized that life is A LOT harder when you have to hand wash everything.

Of course I kept this a secret from my homestay family. I don’t think that they would appreciate me having a bowel movement in their house. I’m sure Alice found it weird that I was washing random articles of my clothing in the middle of the week (we usually wash clothes on the weekend). Dialogue with my hs mother:

Alice: Jalysa you washed your mat this morning?

Me: Uhh yeah, it was dirty.

Alice: You’re washing your clothes right now?

Me: Uhh yeah, they need to be washed.

Alice: (skeptical) okay?

Me: (nervously smiles) Alright.

Mind you this whole conversation was all in French. Hahaha
This is going to be a funny 2 years!