Blogs from Centre, Burkina Faso, Africa - page 14

Hello everyone I hope you've all been having a good week. It's hump day! Of course when you're an expat who works 7 days a week, that expression loses some of its meaning... Yesterday was an exciting day, lots going on here in Ouaga. In addition to losing power at the guest house, the office lost internet and phone connection for a couple of hours too. Since there was no way to get work done, one of the geos and I went on a little trip to the Artisanal Village. This is a project sponsored by the local govt and the govt of Luxembourg to promote artisanal activities and income locally. It's basically an enclosed market with stalls where people produce and sell ALL SORTS of things, like statues in wood and bronze, puppets made from ... read more

Hello everybody, So last night I had my first night on the town. Sort of. It was a Sunday night so it wasn't too busy, and there was only myself and one of the geologists here, so the two of us went out for pint (we found a place that had draught beer!!!!), and then some dinner, and then to this place called "Le Jardin de L'Amitie" which has live outdoor music every night. I guess I should mention that pretty much all eating and drinking establishments here are outdoor. Anyway, it was a really fantastic time. The geo is someone I met while I was here last time, so one of the few people I already knew. We had some great talk about social projects (he used to work for a water NGO) and other ... read more

Geo: 12.3569, -1.5352On the morning of April 19th, we left Mali to cross overland to Burkina Faso. Our main reason to go to Burkina was to get a visa for Ghana. The easiest way to get where we were in Mali to Burkina was to take a bush taxi to the border town of Koro, at the edge of Dogon country, and catch some other transport into the capital city of Ouagadougou (Ouaga for short - pronounced "Waga"). What an adventure that turned out to be!To be quite honest, at the time of travel, we were both miserable from the rigors of the travel and a bit homesick - it is only now that we are safe that we can look back with any sort of amusement.We got to the "taxi stand" at 6:30am and bought ... read more

I spent my week in Burkino Faso at FESPACO - the Pan African Film Festival. The festival is held in Ouagadougou every other year. This year was the first time that a South African film won the major award and only the 2nd time that an English language film has won. The film that won, Drum was a very good film, but it wasn't my favourite. My favourite was another South African film, Max and Mona - it was funny and that goat was a star! During the week I watched a lot of films, some of them were dreadful, a few were world class, and well worth an international release outside Africa. I've been to quite a few film festivals and it is quite usual to have to sit through some bad films! The festival ... read more