Retrospective 08: Electricity & Running Water are Overrated

Right now I am procrastinating. Instead of doing one of the many things on my to-do list prior to May 15! It has also been a while since a post for me, despite many promises otherwise. I don't have much to say about the current situation in Burkina Faso. There are many news articles out there. You can read them, but also do some research, too. The commentary around the actual fact is exactly that.

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My romance with the simple life

So, people often make a big deal about how I lived without electricity and running water for over 3.5 years. I worried myself, considering I don't camp and do enjoy cushy modern conveniences. I even found an essay I wrote in middle school about how I wouldn't enjoy living without them at all. In reality, this much simpler lifestyle, while physically stressful, wasn't terrible at all. I enjoyed it, and still miss it (except maybe washing sheets and towels by hand). As I rediscover these modern conveniences slowly but surely, I realize more and more how much the dearth of said conveniences impedes the productivity of nations like Burkina Faso. At the same time, great strides have been made during my short time there.

Peace Corps, even in Burkina Faso, is not camping. I had walls and a roof over my head and owned furniture and multiple matresses. I had a deep pre-dug hole to use as a toilet. My camping gear: my giant backpack, a sleeping bag, and a screened tent (Bug Hut II). My giant backpack traveled all around Burkina with me. My sleeping bag kept me warm during the cold season (anything <80° requires long-sleeves and <70° a blanket or many layers of clothing). My screened tent protected me from mosquitos. If I had to recommend one thing, it would be a screened tent to keep the mosquitos out, but let air in.

Water and Fire

I lived a few courtyards (read: lots/parcels of land) away from one of several pumps in my village. I woke up early each morning to beat the rush, and was usually the first one there... I often had to wake up the guy with the key to unlock it several times. I would pump the 40L of water that I might use over the course of the day and bring it back home (on my bicycle, I'm not that hard core). (I often used only about 20L, unless there was laundry, many dirty dishes, or I took a couple extra bucket baths that day due to the hot season). Pumping water each morning as the sun rose, was one of many physical activities that kept me fit.

I used this water for everything. The Peace Corps provided a filter to prevent the many diseases communicable by water. I took at least one bucket bath a day, as many as five during the hot season. My first bucket bath in Burkina Faso was at Yaneth's house in Komsilga during our Stage. We had biked out about five miles, and I bathed under the stars for the first time in my life. It was at this moment that I knew village life would be good for me. I heated the water for my bath during the cold season by leaving one of my giant jugs of water in the sun. Nothing compares to the stars in a country with virtually no light pollution.

It might surprise people to find out that our filtration/purification process did not incorporate boiling the water. Yes, this is a great option, if you have a good hot stove readily available. In Burkina Faso, the cost of propane has increased dramatically. In 2007, there were exorbitant rate hikes in food staples (e.g. rice, bread), fuel (e.g. gasoline, propane, wood coals, wood, etc.) as well. The majority uses wood or wood coals to cook. More inefficient in time and energy.

Electricity

Candles and kerosene lamps lit my home my first year, and my headlamp was my best friend for quick jaunts to the latrine. I paid twenty cents to have my phone charged at a little place down the way from me. It didn't matter much anyway. I had so little cell phone reception, that I had to hang my phone in a tree to send and receive text messages... most of which didn't go through. I kept it off mostly to conserve energy. At one point, my family called Peace Corps worried that they hadn't heard from me in several months. I guess my text messages had been lost, and back then it cost over two dollars per minute to call back home to America. Now, it's only thirty cents (half the cost of a domestic phone call in 2007)!

Afterwards, I bought a car battery to run a small flourescent light bulb (which they often called néons or reglettes). This increased my ability to work at night astronomically. As romantic as it is to read by candle/lamp light, the amount of light generated is actually very little compared to the amount of heat. My headlamp ran off of several AA/AAA batteries, which don't last long in heat. (This is due to science. I haven't charged my camera batteries since I left Burkina Faso, but they work without any problem. In Burkina, they would last a few weeks at best before draining.) My battery was not powerful enough to run a fan. Unfortunate, since the oppressive temperatures of the hot season leave you listless and on the verge of dehydration. The sweat dries so quickly that all that is found are traces of salt on your skin and clothes. At night the temperature drops siginificantly. While it is still hot (often >100°), the temperature is bearable and the power of light, increases productivity!

Charging my battery was an ordeal, and after two years, I succumbed and bought a solar panel. This actually allowed me to be much more productive my third year. I could even run a laptop off the battery if I wanted, and ended up charging many people's phones and batteries for free. Battery maintenance overall was necessary as well. The acid from the battery quickly evaporated. I had to regularly add filtered water into the system to maintain the acid levels, and on occasion, new battery acid. It's amazing how easy it is to buy a couple litres of H₂SO₄ in Burkina Faso.

Glass Windows

These conveniences, nonetheless, should not be the only consideration when one looks at "modern" cushiness. Windows are amazing. Especially, soundproofed and tripleglazed! Why are windows amazing? They keep out dust. I'm sure you've seen the pictures of our homes and seen the shuttered windows of the majority of BFPCV homes. They are not really shuttered windows, they are shuttered holes in the walls. There is no glass on the other side. Granted, Peace Corps regulations required screens to be installed over the shutters to prevent death by mosquito. However, there are no requirements for actual glass windows because of a combination of cost and also, the fact that it sets you apart from the rest of the community. The screens and shutters don't do much to keep out the dust.

Why is this a big deal? To maintain a spic and span home, one must sweep morning, noon and night and also mop daily. Dishes must be washed not only after use, but immediately before use as well to remove layers of dust. Clothes draped casually over a chair become dirty within a day. Sheets and mosquito nets and other linens become horribly disgusting as well. A casual shake of the sheets reveals more dust than critters. If you had windows, then your home would naturally have fewer of these critters anyway. Dust storms would be something to scoff at, instead of one of two other options: cover your face (optional) and go about your business OR hide under a sheet and hope the thread-count is high enough to keep out the majority of the dust.

You can read the Wikipedia article on windows to discover more about this fantastic modern convenience that saves people from many additional human hours of cleaning each day!

Conclusion

I wouldn't mind living without electricity and running water again, but only if I were guaranteed some glass windows and solid doors that kept dust and critters out of my home. Kudos to the Romans and all of Europe for their development of this modern convenience. I'm pretty sure that it is with this development that they soared ahead in development in the latter half of the second milennium, leaving Asia (where paper windows were popular) and Africa, quite literally in the dust.

Retrospective 02: Whether or not to Weather the Weather

When you fly to Burkina Faso for the very first time from Europe, America, Asia, and some parts of Africa, the first thing you will notice as you step out of the plane and walk down the stair cart (there are no jet bridges or airstairs) is the wave of heat that welcomes you regardless of the time of year. Burkina Faso is a landlocked tropical country, while technically classified as savanna, the northern part of the country is suffering from desertification. The temperatures range from 5 to 45+ Celsius (about 40 to 110+ Fahrenheit) in the Sahel (northern desert region), with a milder temperature range in the tropical south.

Technically, Burkina is considered to have two seasons: rainy and dry. However, the dry season is often divided into two or three sub-seasons. The south of Burkina receives more rain than the north, with light rains starting as early as February and running through December. However, the majority of the heavy rains fall between May and September. In comparison, the north typically has a shorter season from June through August (with a few light rains in April or May). The rain is essential for the subsistence farmers of Burkina Faso. However, like all things, one wants neither too much or too little. No rain = No grains = No food. Excess rain = Drowned-dead plants = No food. With the advent of global warming, the rainy season has gradually been shortening and shifting and the rains have changed from almost daily light rainfall during the rainy season (l'hivernage ou la saison pluvieuse) to extended rain-free periods broken up by torrential downpours.

At the beginning of l'hivernage, the temperatures are still high since it's the tail-end of the dry season. Even without a meteorologist though, the arrival of rain can be anticipated. The humidity combined with the heat makes the temperatures nearly unbearable (especially for a first timer living without air conditioning). It appears to settle down upon you oppressively and gives you wonderful things like prickly heat (heat rash) and leaves you changing your clothes, especially underwear for women, a few times a day. Then from a distance, you can feel a cool breeze and see the forming of dark, ominous clouds (the best kind). In a country with few modern buildings (mostly one-story houses made of mud bricks), these clouds are actually very far away. Anywhere between one to six hours later, the winds pick up, bring dust and rattling your tin roof (if you're lucky; if you're not, thatched and/or mud depending upon the ethnicity in your region), and the smell of rain is in the air. Finally, the much anticipated rain arrives. The next day, greenery may carpet the countryside, and you think to yourself Burkina is like a Chia pet! This rain can be or it can last for over 24 hours! Though, as I said, neither too little nor too much is appreciated. In addition to drowning plants and flooding fields, heavy winds and rains can tear off roofs and collapse buildings. As the season progresses, the overall heat diminishes and the temperatures are milder, with the rains happening frequently (daily in some areas). If you are a Trainee, you begin to think to yourself it only rains on Sundays (your only full day off from formal sessions during Training).

Before you know it, the season tapers off in about September or October. This is the beginning of the dry season, and what I find to be one of its three sub-seasons: the mini-hot season. The first dry winds start circulating, and within a few weeks, what you thought were ponds or lakes in your village disappear completely, leaving behind dried out shallow depressions covered in hoofprints. The air is hot once more, but no longer humid. The plants begin to ripen and the HCNs prepare to harvest (recolte) from October to as late as December. Quickly, the greenery of Burkina disappears, and if it is your first time in a desert, it can appear barren, dusty and dreary. Though the savanna vistas become lovely and quite fantastic in retrospect and as your service progresses. One can almost imagine and wish that Dr. Seuss had been inspired by the West African scenery.

The temperatures start to drop in November, and by December at the latest, the Harmattan winds are in full effect, bring on the cold season. Carrying dust throughout the area. The dust storms can be fantastic and arrive quickly, or they can creep in slowly and diminish visibility to less than 20 meters. The air cools off and at night, the wind can bring temperatures into single digit Celsius (40-50 Farenheit). In your first year as a Volunteer, you might find this as a wonderful relief. If you are not a member of Posh Corps, then during your second (and third) years, this becomes a terrible time of coldness and dust, where you find yourself dressed like the host country nationals in your site, wearing a sweater, sweatshirt and/or winter coat. The cold typically leaves in February, though this year, it started to heat up in late January. This usually results in a light drizzle in February or March somewhere in the country (no guarantee it will be where you live) and signifies the end of the cold season.

The hot season is quite frankly unbearable at times. The nighttime temperatures outdoors can be over 40 Celsius (110+ Fahrenheit)! Very few people sleep indoors during this time of year. Nighttime becomes a time of activity since it's actually cool enough (yes, 100+ weather is cool... cooler than 120+ weather) to move around. People often stay up until the wee hours of the morning chatting and hanging out, before catching a few hours of sleep. During the day, the noon to three pm siesta is a mandatory part of survival, and also, the pre and post siesta bucket baths. The average person rinses themselves off at least four times a day to keep themselves relatively cool and clean. Once you think you can't survive this heat anymore (luckily its dry), the humidity settles in and you know that the rains are about to start. Bringing us back to the rainy season!

So, I survived this for four years, and you can too! That is living without modern conveniences like plumbing and air-conditioning. The key to the hot season is to remember that evaporation is a cooling process, and even wet laundry air drying around you will cool off your surroundings a little bit. So now, I hope you understand why I find it ridiculously cold in all of America and will be wearing long-sleeved shirts and sweaters if it's under 80 degrees Fahrenheit.

The downside to all this extreme weather, is of course the different illnesses. The rainy season promotes malaria and schistosomiasis. The dry season promotes meningitis and tuberculosis. More in-depth information about health issues in Burkina Faso later...

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In other news... I thought I was done with preparing stool samples. Darn you, schistosomiasis!

There are two parts of the Peace Corps experience spectrum:

Posh Corps = Peace Corps experience of Peace Corps Volunteers who have access to electricity and/or running water. Some people also install DSL lines or even have air-conditioning!
Hard Corps = Peace Corps experience of Peace Corps Volunteers with neither electricity nor running running water, and/or have to travel (long) distances by bicycle to catch transport or find (cold, if they're lucky) water.

Peace Corps/Burkina Faso is moving away from Hard Corps and towards Posh Corps (though it's not as posh as some other countries) because of security issues. More information about Burkina travel warnings and restrictions can be found at the Ouagadougou US Embassy website. While fewer Volunteers are being placed in sites without electricity/cell phone coverage/running water, the majority of Volunteers are found somewhere in the middle of this spectrum, with one of the three modern conveniences. I find this unfortunate because these convenience-lacking locations are often those suffering from the most need. The communities don't have the political sway to get these conveniences installed. This keeps governmental and non-governmental organizations from trying to stay in the areas as well. Either way, if you are an incoming Trainee, be mentally prepared to have nothing: no running water, no electricity, no cell phone coverage. These modern conveniences actually take you away from the majority of Burkina Faso's population living conditions and set you even further apart from them, making integration and exchange more difficult. While I struggled my first year, having to bike about ten miles to make a phone call, and standing in certain spots of my village on top of a chair just to send a text message, it gave me a chance to bond more closely with people in my village and learn more about the surrounding area as well. I missed out on having some great memories with my stagemates, but made some fantastic ones with people in my area. I know it helped with the success of many of my projects, as well as helped people better understand the United States (goal two).

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Amazing in Americaland: beverages (except those with (high-fructose) corn syrup or added sugars), bacon, meat
Undesirable in USA: customer service, preservatives, healthcare system
Still Missing Faso: friends, warmth, sunrises, sunsets, stars, tailors

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This is one of my favorite songs from Burkina. It basically is saying that Burkina is a great place and that their proud of their country and love it! It's one of the few songs that uses traditional rhythms in the music. Long before I understood this song, I loved it!

40 km WNW of the Bush

Hi, I am alive and typing in Tougan. What has been going on? Mostly teaching or scolding, I don't feel like there is a big difference between the two. I guess I have mentioned that I am teaching twice as much this year as opposed to last year. I am twice as tired and much less dynamic or friendly as is usual with me.

My service is winding down. I am considering applying for a third year, and despite my interest in doing so/desire of colleagues/needs of the village, I might not. We will see. There are certain factors weighing against a third year (people I love very much!)

PCBF just got a new IT committee going and I have the chance to contribute to it. Unfortunately, I'm technically not around for much longer (unless of course I apply and get accepted for that mystical third year) so I hope to push it far enough so that we can go live with a beta-version of a publicly-accessible website in August keeping all you interested parents, friends, prospective volunteers, and Burkinabè-loving people up-to-date on what we crazy volunteers are actually doing to try to help Burkina Faso develop on top of other fun stuff for us PCVs in BF.

So, in other crazy news, the weather! First week was cold (50s to 60s); second week was HOT (over 100); third week it was hot and humid which meant it RAINED!!! Twice in fact in the third week of February. This week it has just been hot is all. So, the month of February has gotten all four "seasons" that BF normally gets in a year:

• hot season, March through May, over 100 daily
  
• rainy season, June through August, rains often
  
• mini-hot season, September through October, gets hot as everything dries out
  
• cold season,November through February, dry, windy and cold (for Africa that is)

March is upon us! So happy birthday soon to my dad and all the other March birthdays! I will be heading back to village probably tomorrow morning with a nice cheery 65 km bike ride (short story but not a lot of time) or 15 km (if I get lucky).

Thanks to all the people who have written recently: TE and CS in particular.

I promise to be online in the second week of March, so be ready for more contact from Africa!