FESPACO

The past few days have worn me out. It began Friday morning with a polio vaccination campaign in my village. My CoGes president and I went to each section of my village administering the oral vaccine to as many children as possible. He gave me the option of forcing the kids mouths open as they are crying and screaming or marking their pinky fingers with a sharpie to keep track of whose received the drops. Of course, I chose the marker, which was a good call considering that most of the kids were terrified. It didn't help that many children still didn't know me. I may as well have been a white devil to them. That lasted until 1pm or so until I returned home to get ready to bike into Ouahigouya.

The next morning I caught a 9am bus to the capital, Ouagadougou. Every two years, this busy city gets even busier as tourists from all around the world come to FESPACO, the largest and most famous film festival in West Africa. I stayed there for 4 days, watching a total of 8 movies that included films from Burkina, South Africa, Egypt, Ghana, Senegal, and even America. Some were really interesting, like Drum, a South African film about an African journalist during the apartheid in Johnannesburg in the 1950s. I also saw a great Senegalese documentary about a Muslim singer whose country shunned him for making pop music with religious themes. There were also a few number of duds, like Zimbabwe, a South African film that looked like a home video about of a woman who wants to cross the border from Zimbabwe illegally for a better life. I couldn't tell you how it ended because we walked out an hour into it.

All in all, it was really interesting to see so many different African perspectives of life on this continent. I also walked around a lot, so I gained a much better understanding and comfort level of the layout of this sprawling city and ate a lot of good food too (but spent way too much money in the process). But I am happy to be home, back in my village. Besides, I have less than two weeks until I leave again for a three week training session in Ouahigouya and Ouaga. Oh and mangos are beginning to come into season. One word: amazing.