BURKİNA FASO - THE LAND OF THE İNCORRUPTİBLE.

The Land of the Incorruptible is what Burkina Faso means in the local language. This country was called Haute Volta by the French colonialists until independence in 1960. It is a much smaller country than Mali with a population of 12 million. 

We entered the country from Mali  by road. We passed the border literally in the middle of nowhere where there was a small cabin with a policeman inside, a big black book open in front of him. He asked for our passports, scrutinized each of them for 10 minutes, then wrote on the big black book for another 20 minutes (by passport I mean) and finally put his stamp. The funny thing is that we had been asked to bring a photo with us that one of my girlfriends had forgotten. Another one gave a photo of herself, and the policeman did not even flinch though he had two of the same photo. That shows how serious the control is. 

Burkina Faso has ridiculously long city names and we started by one of the shorter named ones, Ouahiguya.  The french presence can be felt here since you have huge ''rond-point''s (city squares) with five big avenues leading to it but all from earth; no asphalt whatsoever.   We were here just for a lunch break and were  going to leave without spending time  when we saw a stadium full of people and immediately stopped. They were celebrating something, but what ? A policeman was nice enough to satisfy my curiosity ; it seems a President of the Regional Council for the Northern Region had been appointed for the first time in the country's history and he was to make a speech. Furthermore, the people would be celebrating this appointment with music and dances. Great ! Let us celebrate as well. 

ONE OF THE UGLİEST MOSQUES I HAVE EVER SEEN. 

ROND-POİNT DES CHAMPS-ELYSEES ??????

BOULEVARD DES CHAMPS-ELYSEES ??????

PEOPLE  ARE WAİTİNG İN THE STADİUM

DANCERS ALSO ARE WAİTİNG

AND THE TOP BRASS HAS ARRİVED. 

DANCES CAN START

We left when the speeches started since we have to reach the capital of the country, a city which in my opinion, has the cutest name any capital could have : Ouagadougou. Who can do better ? Poor Ouagadougou really does not stand a chance; it has no serious tourist attractions and it is only a transit city for people coming from Mali to visit Burkina Faso. So we spent the night there to continue the next day to a city with an even longer name : Bobodioulassou, luckily referred to as only Bobo by the locals. 

The attraction of Bobo is its old town with an imposing Sahel-type mosque made of mud, though nothing as impressive as the Djenné mosque.  

We then go inside the old town, inhabited by three groups of people: Muslims, animists and fetishists. Actually, it is a village in the city of Bobo with streets of earth. There are places where animal sacrifices (mostly chicken) take place. And in the middle runs a small stream. It is here that I broke down. I started crying since I had never seen such abject poverty. The inevitable millions of children play in the water of the stream into which the sewage runs since there is no evacuation system for it. In the same water, their mothers do the laundry and wash the dishes (no running water at home of course). A bit farther away, pigs are eating the garbage which is also accumulated on the shores of the stream . This is the bottom of what a human being should be subjected to. There cannot be worse. People say India is poor and dirty. Yes, some places are but those are a few when you look at the whole country. Here, everywhere you go, you see the same poverty, the lack of roads and electricity, the earthen paths even in the middle of big cities, the poverty that surrounds you. Africa really seems to have been forgotten by humanity. The irony in all that is that our guide Kunta did not understand at all why I was so depressed; this place was so natural and ordinary for him. 

THE MAİN STREET OF OLD BOBO

                                              A SİDE STREET AND A TYPİCAL HOUSE. 

WHERE ELSE COULD A CHİLD SLEEP? İN THE MİDDLE
OF THE STREET OF COURSE !

THİS İS A PLACE WHERE  ''DOLO'' (SORGHUM BEER) İS MADE.
THEY OFFERED ME A GLASS BUT I DİD NOT DARE TASTE İT. 

THE DİSHES HAVE BEEN WASHED İN THE STREAM.

EVEN THE BABY HAS BEEN WASHED. 

AND THAT İS THE POİNT OF ''TOO MUCH'' FOR ME. 

As Bobo is known as the music capital of Burkina Faso, we decided to go listen to some jazz in the evening and the performance was way above my expectations. 

THERE ARE A FEW TYPİCALLY BURKİNESE İNSTRUMENTS

THE BALAFOON WHİCH İS A KİND OF XYLOPHONE

THE KORA , A STRİNG İNSTRUMENT
AND OF COURSE LOTS OF PERCUSSION,
THE DJEMBE. 

The next day is very important since we are to meet with a real ''king'', the King of the Gan people. So we head for Loropeni. The king really comes. He speaks perfect French, has studied in France and has been chosen king because of his education. Here I learn something that I did not know at all and which I found very interesting. Explained in a simplistic manner,during French occupation, the local nobility would not send their family members to French schools since they estimated this was ''below'' them. But they would send the children of their servants and slaves. So when independence came, all the educated people were from the lower classes of society, usually from a poor background,  with no experience whatever  in managing and they are the ones who came to power. Could that be a reason why so many corrupt regimes have ruled African countries for years?  

We first visit the Gan village and then meet the king. 

ISN'T SHE AN İNCREDİBLE BEAUTY ?

HOW CUTE CAN ONE GET ? 

THE KİNG OF THE GAN PEOPLE

MY FRİENDS, OUR TWO DRİVERS AND OUR GUİDE, WİTH THE KİNG. 

From there we drive to a Lobi village. The Lobi people do not have a king or even a chief since everybody is considered equal. How modern ! They are animist too, of course. 

A FAMİLY   İNSİDE İTS HOUSE

GRAVES İN THE MİDDLE OF THE VİLLAGE. 

YOU ALWAYS HAVE TO BE CAREFUL WHERE YOU PUT
YOUR FOOT, SİNCE YOU MİGHT AT ANY TİME STEP ON
SOMETHİNG SACRED,  A FETİSH OR OTHER.
 HERE İS A GRAVE AND FOOD HAS BEEN GİVEN SİNCE
THE LOBİ BELİEVE ALL THEİR ANCESTORS ARE STİLL ALİVE. 

Our last stop in Burkina Faso is Tiebele, inhabited by the Kassena people. The most distinctive feature of the Kassena is the elaborate decorations on the walls of their houses, an important part of their cultural legacy. Wall decorating is always a community project done by the women and it is an old practice that dates from the 16th century.  

VERY İNTERESTİNG .

 The Kassena people build their houses entirely of local materials: earth, wood and straw, mixed with cow dung allow to shape almost vertical walls. As the houses are built with defense in mind, be it against the climate or potential enemies,the walls are over 40 cm thick and the homes are designed without windows except for a small opening or two to let in just enough light to see. Front doors are usually very low for the same reason and can be closed with a rock. The roofs are flat, usually used to store cereals, and are protected with wood ladders that are easily retracted. 

After construction, the women make murals on the walls using colored mud, chalk and coal. The motifs and symbols are taken from everyday life, or from religion and belief. The finished wall is finally coated with a natural varnish made by boiling pots of ''néré'', the African locust bean tree. The varnish protects from the rain enabling the structures to last longer. 

COOKİNG DİNNER 

THE FLAT ROOFS SEEN FROM ABOVE. 

This trip to Mali (previous post) and Burkina Faso made me realize that the world has abandoned Africa to its sad fate and allowed me to understand why so many African people try to escape by all means to any other country; nothing could be worse than what they have anyway. Because they have nothing, a big nothing. I have the impression of having gone to times before the industrial revolution ( but a few mobile phones here and there) , before modernity set in. And I loved the people I met. They are warm and nice. They smile at the ''white man'' despite what the white man did and is still doing to them ( the help of the black men running the country being very important too !!!). They are helpful and they are happy you came to visit their country.  They do not say ''if you come again...'' but ''when you come again next year...''. I am happy to have gone there because I saw a whole different culture, Muslim mixed with animism, animist villages where the fetish is the most important thing. I had never done that before and that is an experience I will hardly forget.