Ouaga Ouat?
Spent the oueekend in Ouagadougou and now I’m convinced that it’s far more fun to write the w sound ouith ou in honour of this fun city. It’s amazing how far Bolgatanga can seem from things sometimes, ouith Accra a 15 hour bus ride south. Potatoes are a rarity, coffee (except Nescafe) and cheese (except processed) nonexistent. So I spent the weekend there with a couple of friends, two Danish girls writing a report on the basket-oueaving industry in the Upper East for a fair trade project, and a Canadian ouoman. We gorged on cheese, coffee, strawberries and good bread (there are patisseries everywhere!), saw live music, and generally just got decadent. And it’s only three hours away! It seems so strange that you can pass from what one of my Ghanaian friends called a “hinterland” to a cente of culture and food in the space of a few hours.
The Burkinabe, as citizens of Burkina Faso are known, are reputed to be a very easygoing people, relaxed and open. While this was the case with some that we met, the vendors (definitely the most predominant aspect of the city for us white folks) were super-aggressive. Not that we had any bad experiences; often I found the people to be fun and friendly, just very forward. Still, they made Ghanaians look like quiet introspective people, who don’t often approach strangers, which is not something I would have ever thought to say.
Outside of Ouaga (as it’s commonly called) the poverty is intense. I have heard that the north is worse, that Sahel landscape, dotted with trees and the creeping sand of the Sahara. You can’t farm sand, and it reaches its fingers further south every year. The reality of desertification is apparent enough in parts of northern Ghana, so the situation is far more desperate in Burkina. I am curious about Mali, where I will be headed in April. I am bracing for the kind of poverty that comes when farming is impossible.