Today being Saturday, I was staying home and we were expecting Florence. Florence is Awa’s friend and used to clean here, but she left in May, to give birth. She is now ready to come back and will bring little Malika with her.
We sip cups of Nescafe, while talking about motherhood and their respective plans… Awa will have to look for a new job, I can’t keep both of them here, I promise to ask around for her. There is a new Belgian co
uple I met yesterday, they are looking for a house, and I am guessing they will need a cleaner. I just wonder, how they will cope with Awa’s very own cleaning techniques. Most importantly though, it’s back to school time. They are both 20, but Awa will start the CE1 (grade 2), and Florence promised to resume her CP1 (grade 1), the pressure is on for her to learn how to read and write, so she can help her daughter later. Awa doesn’t have a child, but she has another motivation to study… being able to text her friends… Maybe mobile phones will help reduce the illiteracy rate? It is as high as 76% in Burkina Faso. The fees are not prohibitive, 15000 F, about 23 euros for a year, I’ll pay for it, but I expect some good grades! They smile… I know it will be hard to keep them both motivated, adult classes are from 6 till 8pm on weekdays, but oversubscribed with 80+ people in one class and the teachers are not the most assiduous,they prefer giving private lessons for more money. But we have to start somewhere.
After they leave, I go to the market, but I have to stop a few times along the way... First at Alioune's place, a tailor friend. He and his wife had malaria for the last two weeks, th
ey had to go to hospital, luckily the kids were spared. He is back at work and smily as ever, but lost a lot of weight. A few doors down is a handy man that came once to fix the kitchen cabinets (they’d been varnished and closed by a not-so-professional furniture maker and the doors were hermetically closed!), that day, he had a terrible toothache and hamster’s cheeks, I’d given him some paracetamol and since then, he always offers to fix something around the house for free, unfortunately, there is not much to mend in a two bedroom house… Next at the Maquis 'De Bouche à Oreille', there is an Ivorian guy, whose name I forgot long ago, he holds a stick of Johnny Walker… yes, after Nescafe, creamer, ketchup and sugar plastic doses, they have thought about doing the same for alcohol. I point out that it’s a bit early for a swig of whisky, not even noon, so he promises to wait until I go! We always have the same topic of conversation, politics in Ivory Coast. He’s been saying that he would return home, since I know him, but it’s been years, he is in Ouaga, merely drinking away his return bus ticket to Port-Bouet.
The market at Cité An II is buzzing on Saturdays. You can find everything you wish for, soap, dried fish, fruit, vegetables, s
easonings, live poultry, bicycle parts, pots and pans, fabrics and the latest in Chinese flip-flop fashion! I take some limes, spring onions, parsley and mint from one little old lady. Next door, I find a bunch of very tasty but weird looking carrots, and in another alley one kilo of tomatoes, the stall holder winks and adds some peeled garlic in the bag for free. Further down, cucumbers and aubergines, the green, bitter type, we get here. Here again, I get a few extra cucumbers for free. Two bulging bags for less than two Euros, but ten times more than what people in the bush spend on food per day.
By the tarmac road is a new degue* store with yoghurt to die for, I take a little bowl of it for 100 F, watching the ice slowly melting in the thick, creamy, yoghurt, while the women chatter away and repack my bags. There is nothing I can say to stop them pulling out a string of black plastic bags to separate my cucumbers from my tomatoes, they pretend to look offended, surely they know better, they are old enough to be my mothers, and by the way, I look a bit skinny, shoud I not get another bowl of degue. I only live 5 streets down, but the guy next door worries about the weight of the bags and wants to give me a ride home on his motorbike. Walking under the midday sun seems a bit crazy to him, but then again nassara** have their own strange ways! Walking rather than taking polluting little mopeds, refusing plastic bags to save the planet a little bit...
Back home, Cheick and his friends are playing in the street, Cheick is a 10-year old Don Juan who has taken to greet me by kissing my hand, like he’s seen in a movie. They look distressed, our football has been run over by a car, and the guy just drove away, without giving them any money to buy a new one. They are gutted, and a bit shameful, because the ball was a gift from us. But they have come up with a fair deal, there are footballs for sale down the road for 1250 F, will I contribute 1000 F for a new ball, if they gather 250 F? Of course, I will, and our local football team is smiling wide. It brings tears to my eyes.
uple I met yesterday, they are looking for a house, and I am guessing they will need a cleaner. I just wonder, how they will cope with Awa’s very own cleaning techniques. Most importantly though, it’s back to school time. They are both 20, but Awa will start the CE1 (grade 2), and Florence promised to resume her CP1 (grade 1), the pressure is on for her to learn how to read and write, so she can help her daughter later. Awa doesn’t have a child, but she has another motivation to study… being able to text her friends… Maybe mobile phones will help reduce the illiteracy rate? It is as high as 76% in Burkina Faso. The fees are not prohibitive, 15000 F, about 23 euros for a year, I’ll pay for it, but I expect some good grades! They smile… I know it will be hard to keep them both motivated, adult classes are from 6 till 8pm on weekdays, but oversubscribed with 80+ people in one class and the teachers are not the most assiduous,they prefer giving private lessons for more money. But we have to start somewhere.After they leave, I go to the market, but I have to stop a few times along the way... First at Alioune's place, a tailor friend. He and his wife had malaria for the last two weeks, th
ey had to go to hospital, luckily the kids were spared. He is back at work and smily as ever, but lost a lot of weight. A few doors down is a handy man that came once to fix the kitchen cabinets (they’d been varnished and closed by a not-so-professional furniture maker and the doors were hermetically closed!), that day, he had a terrible toothache and hamster’s cheeks, I’d given him some paracetamol and since then, he always offers to fix something around the house for free, unfortunately, there is not much to mend in a two bedroom house… Next at the Maquis 'De Bouche à Oreille', there is an Ivorian guy, whose name I forgot long ago, he holds a stick of Johnny Walker… yes, after Nescafe, creamer, ketchup and sugar plastic doses, they have thought about doing the same for alcohol. I point out that it’s a bit early for a swig of whisky, not even noon, so he promises to wait until I go! We always have the same topic of conversation, politics in Ivory Coast. He’s been saying that he would return home, since I know him, but it’s been years, he is in Ouaga, merely drinking away his return bus ticket to Port-Bouet.The market at Cité An II is buzzing on Saturdays. You can find everything you wish for, soap, dried fish, fruit, vegetables, s
easonings, live poultry, bicycle parts, pots and pans, fabrics and the latest in Chinese flip-flop fashion! I take some limes, spring onions, parsley and mint from one little old lady. Next door, I find a bunch of very tasty but weird looking carrots, and in another alley one kilo of tomatoes, the stall holder winks and adds some peeled garlic in the bag for free. Further down, cucumbers and aubergines, the green, bitter type, we get here. Here again, I get a few extra cucumbers for free. Two bulging bags for less than two Euros, but ten times more than what people in the bush spend on food per day.By the tarmac road is a new degue* store with yoghurt to die for, I take a little bowl of it for 100 F, watching the ice slowly melting in the thick, creamy, yoghurt, while the women chatter away and repack my bags. There is nothing I can say to stop them pulling out a string of black plastic bags to separate my cucumbers from my tomatoes, they pretend to look offended, surely they know better, they are old enough to be my mothers, and by the way, I look a bit skinny, shoud I not get another bowl of degue. I only live 5 streets down, but the guy next door worries about the weight of the bags and wants to give me a ride home on his motorbike. Walking under the midday sun seems a bit crazy to him, but then again nassara** have their own strange ways! Walking rather than taking polluting little mopeds, refusing plastic bags to save the planet a little bit...
Back home, Cheick and his friends are playing in the street, Cheick is a 10-year old Don Juan who has taken to greet me by kissing my hand, like he’s seen in a movie. They look distressed, our football has been run over by a car, and the guy just drove away, without giving them any money to buy a new one. They are gutted, and a bit shameful, because the ball was a gift from us. But they have come up with a fair deal, there are footballs for sale down the road for 1250 F, will I contribute 1000 F for a new ball, if they gather 250 F? Of course, I will, and our local football team is smiling wide. It brings tears to my eyes.
The wind is starting to blow, announcing another heavy rain. It is nearing the end of the season, but there are still some rains in the afternoon, making Adama worry for his pea crops, one more rain, and it might all just get rotten. I got home just in time to bring the washing in. And sharing with you a little slice of African life!
* Thick sugary yoghurt served with ice and millet couscous
** White people
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