Yes, I may be counting down the months BUT things are going well in Burkina. I'm just ready to be part of my own culture again and more than anything a tangible part of y'all's lives again. With only six months left to go I've thrown myself into my village trying to get everything out of it that I can. I just spent 5 un-interrupted weeks there and I'll probably only leave village once a month for the rest of my service.
One reason that i'll be leaving less is because I have started a new project. There is a group of 7 nuns that live in my village and run several operations. They are all Burkinabe excpet one who is
Ivoirian (Ivory Coast). There they are in the picture up above! Two of them work at a private catholic elementary school. Two are nurses. One runs a pharmacy. One runs a girls technical school (the girls learn how to sew, knit, crochet, and dye fabrics). The last one (the one seated at the far right), Sister Anastasie, teaches french at the high school with me. She was telling me one day that the Nuns all love English and would like to learn so i offered to teach them. We have class on thursdays and saturdays for one hour. I ADORE them!! They are super cute and laugh a lot and give me things (yogurt, lemon juice, pagne). So, i like to stay on the weekends in village now because i don't want to lose an hour with the Sisters. Also, we are planning to do some other projects together on malnutrition.
Other than the Sisters, much is the same for me. School started the 5th of January and goes til the 21st of March. EEK!! L'enseignement vas me tuer. C'est sur. So my life is lesson planning and grading tests. And dreaming about being back in America. AMERICA!!
I'll be back in Ouaga probably around the 28th. That weekend is FESPACO which is a huge african film festival that Burkina hosts every two years. Should be interesting.
Eloise is (i'm pretty sure) pregnant again. Well, last week she started acting all crazy and these two boy cats kept hanging out at my house making all kinds of racket and keeping me up at night. One even followed Eloise inside my house through her "kitty door" in the window. Not cool. I've had enough of this kitty kat courtship business and Eloise will be getting spayed here shortly (slash maybe an abortion depending on how you look at things). Kittens! I am tired of kittens!
Let's see . . . can't really think of anything else. My life is cool but not a lot happens. Ok, c'est tout. A bientot!