Voila, i spent 500cfa just to update my blog for all of my faithful followers! i will say upfront that there will be no real capitalization or proper spelling throughout this post, as this is a french keyboard and i only have 45 mins. left.

we have been here for only a week but it seems like so much longer than that. in the span of a week i have been in and out of different hotels between philly, ouagadougou (wa ga do goo), ouahougiyah (wa he go ya)  and now somyaga( so me a ga). last night was our first night with our host families. to further explain, our host families are the people we will be liing with for the next two months and immerse us in burkinabe culture. as a health volunteer, i have been placed in a pretty big, but rural village. there is no electricity, running water or any of those other western amenities we have all grown accustomed to.  so, i have a two room concrete structure with two windows a bed and me! its on my host families comppound which is like a small village. i have my own shower (a bucket behind a mud wall) and a my own toilet (a hole in the ground). what makes this even more fantastic is that there are volunteers with host families that had hd tv, refrgerators and all of the other western amenities that i lacked and will probably lack for the next 27 months. all of this being said, i am perfectly fine with it! my job here is far greater than those luxuries given to some of the other volunteers in there villages. i did turn the other room intoa yoga room with incense and my yoga mat lol…..when my host mother came into my room this morning to sweep, she picked up the yoga mat and placed it by the door as if it were a welcome mat and  i had to try and explain yoga to her in french. so i showed her. if you havent already gathered, my host family speaks only french and moore. and actually, only my host mother speaks french, all of the other eighty people on the compound speak moore. yep! so by the time i went to sleep i had a massive headache from communicating back and forth with my host mother!

here is where my first night with my host family gets interesting……..as my host mother was attempting to introduce me to all of the family, everyone would laugh when i greeted them in moore and everyone staed at me. the little children were actually really scared of me! my host sister, shes like 2 or 3, let out a blood curdling scream when i went to touch her! this is why, originally peace corps told me that burkinabe would assume that i was african and expect me to adapt quickly but its quite the opposite! they called me nassara which is like westerner or white person! i havent really figured out how i feel about this yet but i know i dont like it….i even asked my host mother in french like….you call me a nassara too? and she was like yea….i was like but im black…..i dont want to be called nassara! all in french mind you.  and that has been the response from most of the burkinabe that i interact with in the city.

im running out of time so i cant go into depth about how i analyzed and philosophized on the situation. but i really must run. i do have pictures and some funny stories so expect two another post maybe at the end of the day or tomorrow.  i also have a cell phone but i dont remember the number….sorry!

peace and blessings