ALC

I’m spending the month of August working at the American Language Center (ALC) in Ouagadougou, the capitol of Burkina Faso. I’m working with 20 kids or so by helping them learn, and practice English. The program is organized kind of like school where there are 7 classes that meet 5 times a week between 8 and 12:30. The 7 classes mean that there are 7 Peace Corps Volunteers helping out and each volunteer is assigned to a class which meets between 8 and 10 everyday. Our roles vary by class but I pronounce words (so the students can learn how an American pronounces things), correct grammar exercises, explain tricky grammar rules, and occasionally translate French words to English and vice-versa.

The PCV’s are actually in charge of the “camp” portion of the program- which runs from 10:30AM-12:30PM. This is supposed to still have the general idea of learning to speak, and practicing English but is more camp oriented- songs, games, etc. We have designated this month to be the English Olympics and it’s built around pillars that are similar to those of the actual Olympics. They are: excellence and individualism, respect and diversity, teamwork, and community engagement. So, all of our ideas are tied into those themes which all relate back to the Olympics. Is it the most original idea? Nope. But, does it work? Yep.

ALC is a really interesting experience in that it’s really the first thing I’ve done in this country that has been mostly in English. All of the other teachers speak to us in English; the idea of the camp is to speak in English and to use a minimal amount of French, and the type of kids I’ve been working with is different than the type of kids I normally see in village.

First of all, the emphasis on English makes it more difficult to bring in Moore when I find myself in a situation that requires it (which isn’t that often here). But I will go back to my site at some point in time where I will definitely have to put in a lot of time practicing and studying (before I leave again).

Also, the grammar mistakes that the teachers make (various tenses, etc) create kind of an awkward situation, especially in front of the kids. Do you stand up, and say, “That’s actually not right”? Or, do you just let the mistake go and risk the kids picking it up? Either way it makes for an interesting conundrum.

The next huge difference is the kids. In the past, I have worked with kids who really want to be there, and are incredibly interested in learning what I have to teach, and usually it’s in a pretty fun medium (say for example, water). The first mistake is thinking that these individuals are actually kids. My class ranges from 13 years old to 21 years old (almost as old as I am). So the normal things that kids like don’t really apply here. They don’t really get into the games; they just care about winning- though to win, you have to get into it. They also don’t really want to be there, and who can blame them? It’s the equivalent of summer school. And, speaking English isn’t very high on their to do list- so about 100 times a day I have to remind them to speak English and that speaking French, contrary to popular belief, will not help them learn English. These are primarily wealthier kids who have laptops (including one with a macbook air, several with iphones, and a ridiculous amount with their own motos), and the differences between the socio-economic classes are staggering. Here, a wave will not make a kid’s day, and kids will not want to follow you around while you run, they will not be quiet when you talk for the sole reason that you are talking.

But I am learning things about teaching, about what I can do, about what appeals to kids, and how to handle a ridiculous range of maturity levels in a single classroom. And, am I having to think about why certain English rules are and why you never, ever end a sentence with a preposition? Oh yea.

Good way to spend a month? Most definitely. 

Camps and Other Extracurricular Activities

Seeing as how it’s rainy season, there isn’t a whole lot to do at site. Most days, most people are in the fields working hard and don’t have time to listen to me prattle on about health topics. Also, it’s summer vacation so kids aren’t really in school. This is the optimum time to do kid oriented projects such as camps (which is something we are mandated to do as part of Peace Corps: Burkina Faso).

Here in Burkina Faso, we have lots of camps: coaching for hope (playing soccer and learning about HIV/AIDS), G2LOW (Guys and girls leading our world), ALC (American Language Center), Science camp (this is in September), and I’m sure there are a lot more.

Camps are a nice change of pace and a way to interact with other volunteers and pick up their styles of doing things- basically a group learning process, and a much coveted opportunity to speak in English. Also, they’re a great change of pace and activity style. For example, education volunteers can help with health projects, and see how health volunteers give a health sensibilization. Health volunteers can teach students about astronomy or English and see what it is like to manage 40 kids at once while trying to stick to an agenda. And, everybody can enjoy playing the role of camp counselor. So, camps are awesome, right? 

Well, the answer is both yes and no.

Here’s the catch-22: doing a camp is a great way to share skills and help out the country. But you’re not in your village- and the village is the entire reason that you’re here. This means that there is an incredibly fine line between doing camps and such to enrich your service, while still being at site enough to be productive in your village. A lot of the weight of finding this balance is placed on the individual volunteer.

My problem is this: I love my site, and I would actually prefer not to leave. Now that’s not in the I’m-a-shut-in-and-just-want-to-sit-in-my-house way but more of a I-feel-most-effective-at-my-site-and-I-have-a-good-working-relationship-with-everybody way. I’ve been at site for 8 months now, so it’s a very interesting thought to think that I’m going to go an entire month without being in Poa (my village). Hopefully, my absence will inspire people to want to act because I have been there helping out with things for a while and now I’m gone- meaning that they can have a clearer idea of what I’m there to do, what I can help with, and other things like that.

Now, the opposite problem is this: there are some people who absolutely hate their sites. This can be due to any number of factors: people, bad workplace relationships, bad living situation- you name it, I’m going to guess it’s happened. This means that the chance to do camps offers an escape from site. While this isn’t exactly bad- but, it is hard to get stuff going in your village, if you’re gone for two weeks, come back for three days, gone for a week, back for a week, gone for two weeks, etc.

I guess what I have to say about camps and other extracurricular activities boils down to this: they’re awesome. Learn as much as you can, and enjoy it as much as possible. But don’t forget the reason why you’re here- take everything you learn, see, and accomplish…and bring it back to your village and share it with everyone else. 

Rain

Whenever I think about rain I think about the Family Guy episode where Weatherman Ollie Williams says, “It’s gonna rain!” or “It’s raining sideways”. So here we are in rainy season and I find myself looking up at the sky and thinking, “It’s gonna rain!” Let’s just say that working at a beach has given me a very acute sense of when it’s going to rain.

Anyway, the rain brings big changes to Poa (my village). First of all, everything is starting to get green. The trees and bushes that have been dead-ish for the past 7 months are most definitely not dead now. There are little rivers that trickle during the day, and right after it rains are somewhat reminiscent of the flash flood scene in 127 Hours.  Also, it’s really awesome being able to sleep comfortably at night.

Another one of the big changes is that everyone is in the fields. The way it used to be was that everyone was around all the time (again with a village comprised of for the most part subsistence farmers, when it’s too dry to plant, what else are you going to do?). Now, it’s almost like a ghost village in the morning (CSPS patient numbers are down at the moment), it slightly lightens up during the repose (nap time), and then drops slightly during the evening, only to pick up again (slightly) at night.

It also messes with attendance at things like baby weighings, and other meetings, and if it was a consistent change that would be okay and easy to deal with but it’s an inconsistent change. Sometimes people show up, and sometimes they don’t with little rhyme or reason, and the pattern is expected to continue throughout rainy season (which will go until the rain stops where it will start being cold season again).

This year the rainy season came a bit late (and by a bit I mean a solid month). Put together with the past two rainy seasons being less than spectacular this had some people worried, but now that it is solidly here people are cautiously optimistic and are saying “ca va aller”. It should be pretty smooth sailing unless the rainy season ends early.

But rain means, things are green, things get wet, things leak, and it is awesome. 

Success?

How do you define success?

Let’s say you do something by accident, you didn’t mean to do it but it worked out anyway, that can be a success too, right?

You can spend weeks planning a project and have no one show up. You can organize a meeting to help people make some money- something that people always profess to want or need; and no one shows up.

This is all kind of frustrating. But this can mean one of many things. Among them are: something came up and the person was legitimately busy and couldn’t come (why they didn’t call is a mystery), they forgot (also possible though forgetting something like that in less than 24 hours is hard to believe), they’re not interested and this is a way of expressing that, and so on and so forth. But because your job is a facilitator you say no problem, if you still want to do it let’s reschedule. And because you’re a representative of the United States you can’t show anger, or annoyance, or anything like that.

Now you go about dealing with the frustrations.

Since there are no pools here (or beaches) I’ve been running daily. It helps a bit with the frustrations of people not showing up or just anything.

While I was running these kids showed up, and started running with me. So we ran, and we ran, and we ran some more. The kids sat down and took breaks but since I was running in circles anyway (I found a 400 meter circle so it’s like running on a track), they were able to rest, catch up, and then repeat the cycle. The kids then started emulating the push ups, crunches, and pull ups I was doing too so we did that together. And then, we discussed the importance of hygiene and such. So something totally unplanned, turned into an educational experience.

So how can something with no planning whatsoever, be more “successful” than something I sat down and actually planned?

Then it started raining and the kids disappeared, but it was nice while it lasted. I’m sure once everything is done being planted they’ll come back though.

Motivation

People have different reasons for engaging in activities. Those reasons can be selfish, they can be selfless, they can be resume building, altruistic…you name it it’s a reason.

The first time I brought up a project idea here the response was, “what’s the motivation?” Having just arrived at site I responded, “If they want to (do the activity).” My counterpart looked at me as if I didn’t understand the question and then said, “If people are going to come to this project (I think it was when I first had the CPR project idea) then they’re going to want money to come.” I explained that the course is actually quite costly in the US (maybe a slight exaggeration) but we would be doing it for free and that should be the motivation in itself. He gave me this dubious look that said, “I see where you’re coming from but I’m not sure other people will.” So we decided that if we got the support of the higher up agencies (those responsible for the nurses, teachers, etc) then maybe the motivation issue wouldn’t pose that much of an issue.  Since then the project has been shelved indefinitely until I can find another way to approach the entire idea.

But the underlying problem remains the same. Being a volunteer without financial resources making an effort to work without financial resources in a capitalistic society built mainly around subsistence agriculture is a tough job. The way I see it is this, if I’m giving two years of my time to be here, and not make any money, then you can give up an hour of your time to learn a skill that will help you for years down the road.

To get people to do what you want them to do usually involves some ego stroking, telling them they’re special, and that they can really help. For example, for my exponential hygiene project (30 people teach 10 families each about personal hygiene) I worked with the centers of alphabetization (teaching people to read and write in moore) because well, these people can read and write to some degree, and the lessons covered in the moore books (yea, I read them too) deal with hygiene (like don’t pee in the well you get your water from). So I went to the groups, told them that everyone in the village respected them because they could read and write and because they were motivated, etc. It was most definitely true, but it also helped to get my point across. I also mentioned that because I’m a foreigner if I go around saying things people will listen but not necessarily adopt because I’m different and I don’t know how life really is here (and it’s true I’ve been here for 9 months- not 20 years). So by telling people that I can’t do this but they can- really helps people get going.

On the other hand, you have the incredibly altruistic people who will help you out no matter what you ask them to do, whether it be gathering people for a meeting, helping dig a 130 meter long trench, or coming along as a translator.

I guess it breaks down a little like this:

In different societies you have the same types of people. You have mean spirited people, you have nice people, you have motivated people, you have lazy people, you have happy people, you have depressed people, you have altruistic people, you have selfish people, and the list goes on. They might manifest themselves slightly differently but anyone that says people in the US are way different than people in Burkina Faso or vice-versa has to look harder because deep down, they’re not. Sure, they might have the whole not rushed, everything will work out mentality that the US doesn’t quite have but I don’t think that defines the people that defines a way of life.

So if this rule is true, can you count on the volunteerism and altruism of the people you’re trying to work with to aid with your projects (without overusing the same people and creating a burn out effect)?

Campaign Season (no, not that one)

As things in France cool down (Hollande won) and things in the US heat up (will Obama get a second term?) it has stayed ridiculously hot here in Burkina Faso.

Also, on the health side of things, we’ve been doing a variety of campaigns against various health related things.

We did nutrition: going door to door to find out how many kids are malnourished in Poa (my village).

We did Polio: going door to door to give polio vaccinations to kids.

We did Mebendazol and Vitamin A: going door to door to give kids a deparasiting agent and vitamin A.

Now, we’re handing out albendazol and mictazine. Albendazol is a deparasiting agent (chemically the same as mebendazol but it’s a higher concentration and thus, for adults. Mictazine is a drug against filariose and hydrocele, more commonly known as elephantitis.

Next week looks like it’ll be trachoma but we’ll see what happens.

My role in all this is relatively simple. I plan. I divide the community health agents into teams, and help divide the village into manageable areas for each team. I then divide the medicines into which group gets how many pills, then I help explain how to give the medication and explain that if someone refuses to call the Major or myself and we’ll come out and figure out what the issue is (side note: this is where the color of my skin is actually a benefit).

Anyway, not the hardest job ever. Important? Kinda. Fairly straightforward? Absolutely.

The people who do all of the actual labor are the community health agents who are easily overlooked in the healthcare system here and play one of the most important roles. So they most definitely win the unsung hero award. I’m a foreigner. The nurses and doctors are civil servants so while we’re both here and they’re actually Burkinabe none of us really belong. This is where the community health agents come in. They belong. They live in the village, they were (more often than not) born in the village, and they’re well known in the village. Some can speak French, some can’t- but it’s really no big deal. People in the village know the community health agents and because they are actually part of the community (not just integrated into it) people invite them into their houses and they don’t feel self conscious or anything like that.

The thing about this though, is that these community health agents are just normal people. Some went to school, some didn’t. And all of them have other things to do. Most people in Burkina farm. Some people raise animals, some do both. All of which can be a full time job, so where do they find the time and energy to help out the health center?

So these people are a huge resource but with almost five weeks now of consistent campaigns each weekend (lasting for four or five days), I’ve got to wonder, is there a line where there are just too many campaigns and the people that help us out so much just say, “sorry, we’ve gotta plant our fields, or take care of our animals”?

Or is the sense of doing things for the greater good and that giving up a couple hours each day to hand out medications for the betterment of all is totally worth it really that strong here?

Of course, everyone who helps out is paid for their work but in a village of subsistence agriculture time doesn’t necessarily equal money.

I guess what I’m trying to say comes down to this:

1) The fact that we have campaigns like this every week is awesome. I’m not quite sure who donates everything we give out but I think if they came to visit they’d see that, in Poa at least, their resources have been well used.

2) The fact that there are people who rain or shine (usually shine) show up and do what needs to be done is a standard that more people all over the world should try and emulate.

3) When you have a resource of people who will give up their time to go door to door to hand out medications, don’t take it for granted- and don’t overuse it.

4) The little things count. I’m not rich. I probably will never be rich. And, that’s okay. But it’s not like I can give everyone who helps a ton of money to say thank you. But what I can do is go and buy water for everyone to give out when we visit people as they hand out medication. I can smile and say you’re doing awesome, thank you for helping us out, and give some moral support.

We don’t do vaccination campaigns like this in the United States but, I can’t help wondering if we did: would we find people like this to help out? I certainly hope so. 

All it takes is One

I’ve had a lot of interesting conversations over the past few weeks- and they’ve all revolved around what it means to be a leader, what it means to set an example, and how much good all of that can actually accomplish.

Let’s backtrack a bit. I was watching the French election with a few people here and we discussed politics, what a democracy was, and the relationship between Burkina Faso and France. Needless to say, it’s interesting to see what the perception is versus what I imagine versus what probably is the actual relationship.

When we first started talking a democracy was used interchangeably with utopia which, while that would be awesome, isn’t quite right. But, it certainly contained interesting ideas such as: while a democracy is fair and just for everyone- who decides what is fair and just? For example- a conservative Islamic leadership style might be exactly what a country wants, and is it necessarily bad just because it’s not what we have? And no, someone who is not Islamic is not by definition a member of the Taliban, although that was something I did have to clear up.

So this talk about democracy brought us to France/Burkina Faso relations which, admittedly I know very little about; and, is also an incredibly grey area. Our conversation reflected that we didn’t know for sure how much influence France has over Burkina Faso and how often it is wielded. But, if Burkina Faso as a whole is unsatisfied with the status quo, then it’s the responsibility of the country to change it. It’s one thing to talk about changing something, it’s quite another to get off your butt and actively change it.

Fast forward a few days and we had a staff meeting talking about practices that work at our health center, and things that we could do better, that kind of stuff. And the point that I brought up concerned that ambulance and, more specifically, how we (and other health centers use it). As it stands now, the ambulance is like a giant taxi- with a cool flashing light, the ability to speed (though speed limits seem optional here), and the word ambulance on the side.  So when the ambulance takes people out, there’s no one actually giving care. I tried to point out that this probably wasn’t the most prudent idea ever- and, they just laughed at me. Not the response I was looking for but, that’s life. The doctor and the Major actually did step in and say stop laughing, he’s right- but, that didn’t help anyone take the idea any more seriously.

I decided that I was right about this so kept pushing. I said that sometimes there’s hours between when someone refers a sick person to the hospital and if there was someone in the ambulance they can track changes in vital signs and even perform CPR if needed (I have to train them in CPR first but that’s coming).

The response to the idea was something along these lines: it’s the sick person that pays for the gas of the ambulance. And the gas is: from Poa to the village, from the village to the hospital in Koudougou, and then back to Poa. This means that if any village to the east of Poa (Koudougou is to the west) refers a sick person and if they send a nurse with the ambulance the nurse will only get as far as Poa on the way home unless they pay for the rest of the gas. So, then it became a question of, why should we put extra work on ourselves when other villages don’t. My response to this was simple: it’s your job. You have a responsibility to the sick people- it doesn’t matter where they come from. This isn’t my American imperialness speaking- some of the medical professionals that I’ve met in Burkina have expressed this outlook on more than one occasion.

It was starting to get late and we had a lot of other things to discuss so I let the subject go, decided to let it ruminate in people’s minds and then wait for the opportune moment.

A couple of weeks later, the opportune moment came- and I brought up the subject again, this time coupling it with the argument that all it takes is one person to change the status quo. And, somewhat surprisingly the Major and the Doctor looked at each other and said, let’s do it. So now, whenever our ambulance goes out- no matter whether it goes to the east, west, north, or south to pick up a sick person someone always goes with it. It’s not much. But, it’s a start. And, with a little luck the hospital will notice that when our ambulance comes in, there’s always someone who knows what’s up with the patient and that will then become standard practice.

Because, really, it only takes one to set an example for others to follow.