Fishing in Poverty Bay, Burkina Faso

I was a bit surprised a few days back to receive a SMS from one of my neighbours suggesting to go 'a la paiche du dimanche'. I guessed he meant 'la pêche' but I had to double check this, as he is still in the process of learning how to write French, and we sometime misunderstand each other.
I had not thought, fishing was a local hobby in a Sahelian country... But sure enough, you can fish here, and I'd soon find out there were the professional kind of fishermen, complete with stools and knee high wellies... and our kind...
Mazou had it all sorted for the coming Sunday. At the crack of dawn, he was at our door with two fishing rods made of bambou, a can of juicy worms and a noisy P50 to take us there...

Direction a reservoir some 20km south of Ouaga, we drove through Ouaga 2000 - aka the posh ghost town, passed the graveyard and stopped in the non-lôti of Nangrin, a shanty town, where his family lives. Here we had a nescafé and a bit of bread and carried for a few kilometers on the dirt track. This was the loveliest part, with the contrast of the red track and green mango trees under the rising sun.

Soon we got to a huge reservoir, where a couple of people were fishing on canoes, but most of them were sitting by the water, where we joined in. It is a serious business, so serious hardly anyone took any notice of me, except for when I caught my one and only fish, and decided to put it back, as it was a beautifule blue and silver colour and there was hardly anything to chew on it.
There was a coffee break at noon - had it been England, we would have opened cans of lager, France a red bottle of wine, but the conversation would have been the same, sharing stories of catching huge fish, coming face to face with a cayman... I could have happily called it a day, but the plan was to move with the sun to another side of the reservoir. Despite staying for another two hours, it was too hot and we hadn't caught quite enough to feed my friend's family, so we bought some fish off another guy to have a decent meal that night and said our goodbyes.

At dinner, I quite happily gave my share of fish and kept to rice and sauce, not feeling so hungry after starring all day in murky polluteed waters, and seeing the poor fish agonising on bits of black plastic bags. They also look far too tiny to be eaten, it would have been the decent thing to put them back in the water for a few more weeks, so they could grow and reproduce themselves, but here one can't be choosy, as even the heads and bones will be saved, dried and used to fragrance the stew.
No matter, how far you travel, it seems that people are the same sometimes, I was quite sure, on that same Sunday, my friends in Navotas in the Philippines also went fishing with the family barge... If they in Manila or us in Ouaga could just remember to look after our planet a little bit, not like the three fishing brothers Gruff...

Snowy nostalgia

'So what I'm wondering is this. Is it possible to have some kind of genetic memory of a place where you've never lived, but your ancestors have? Or am I just a sentimental fool, my judgement fuddled by nostalgia, Guiness and the romance of the diaspora' Pete McCarthy, in McCarthy's Bar.

...As an introduction for uploading some photos my godfather took yesterday in the Alps. I was just reading this book and this exact quote, when the photos arrived by email, and it seemed like a good match.

McCarthy's Bar is also a good read, if you just like travel, Ireland, pubs, colourful people and funny stories, or all of the above. (it's a pure coincidence, it is published by Hodder, where I worked in a very remote, distant, London life...)

But rather than dwelling on some existential thoughts and the answer probably being at the bottom of a third pint of Guiness, which are in short supply here in Ouaga... Let's just enjoy the view, and take a break from all this red dust... Amen.

A very hungry thief!

I came home last night feeling quite perky, Friday night, a good bicycle ride home, the first mangoes of the season I’d bought by the roadside… There was a power cut, which meant I could not turn on my computer, as I’d planned to, but just had to enjoy dawn on the terrace.
Went into the outdoor kitchen to prepare some sort of dinner, but there was something odd. First, I thought this damn cat had been scavenging again, as the bin bag was laying on the floor open. But then it took me a few minutes to realize that the fridge was also rather empty… Missing: one can of tuna, two cans of sardines, but even worse as the former were Eurocheapo versions bought in the Lebanese supermarket down the road, no trace of the tins of rillette d’oie and rillette de porc, Fathi and Helene had brought me last week. A Tupperware of black olives was also gone, as well as a carton of Dafani mango juice… Someone had obviously broken in and helped themselves to whatever they could lay their hands on for a little feast. Someone very undiscerning, who did not go for the half empty bottle of Pinot des Charentes, nor the tin of foie gras, and obviously did not like saucisson, but a thief with a sweet tooth, as the box of Broyé du Poitou cookies, I’d left on the kitchen cabinet was also gone and my two tiny metal teapots.
Nothing having been stolen on the higher shelves, I had the sketch of a rather tiny, hungry thief, that could probably not read the labels, might be of Muslim heritage and ended up with some sardines caught between two butter cookies, a very unique sandwich washed down by a gulp of mango juice. Whoever they were, they might be feeling quite queasy by now... I could not get quite angry… Especially, as our little friend had left the Champagne behind and it had been very naïve of me to leave the door open day and night for the last few months...
Now, this might sound like I eat better here than ever before, so I feel like I need to justify myself, after describing the contents of my fridge in such details! I stock up on luxury goods, brought by vry generous or very concerned friends and family, for special occasions and tough days, days when benga* won’t quite do the trick… The teapots need to be urgently replaced so the long, philosophical evenings sipping tea with neighbours and friends can resume...

* Burkinabe staple food, a delicious and very filling local dish of read beans and rice

Yamakoudji, ginger beer burkinabe style

Part 2 of the cookery class by Ebou: preparing yamakoudji during a quiet afternoon in Boromo. Yamakoudji is a ginger juice, I and thousands of Burkinabe enjoy drinking, especially during hot days... and there are many opportunities here! It is very spicy, and I understood why, when preparing it with Ebou. The first step is indeed to pound ginger roots and peppers together! I was later told that this was a cheap way to make it spicy and that a better yamakoudji would just have more concentrated ginger... I would not know...

After the pounding, we diluted the spicy ginger paste with water and a lot of sugar, mixing it with our hands. We then sieved it, twice to really remove any bit of peel and wooden fiber from the ginger that could still be floating, and bottled it in empty plastic bottles of Fanta, Coca or Youki... carefully washed with Omo Micro first. Below in 3 easy steps to make your own!

Water job!

I think, this is the first in a series of stories, where I try all sorts of income generating activities...

First attempt: Putting drinking water in sachets to sell at the local bus station... This water comes from the village pump, and is decent enough to drink. Less decent is the amount of plastic bags involved, that will end up littering the streets and being eaten by undecerning pigs and cows.

What helps sell, having a fridge, where you can store the sachets, so you tempt people with icy cold water... Required skill, that can be acquired with pratice, knotting the sachets properly, so they don't leak... Easier said than done, but Ebou was a good teacher! Empty the bag from any air bubble, twist the bag around your thumb and knot tight...

These sachets go for 10 FCFA each, while the industrial ones with filtered water go for 50 FCFA. The latter might be made of cleaner, UV filtered water, but often the water has a plasticky or chlorine taste, that makes me prefer the cheaper version... Another option is the LAFI bottle of water that would cost you 1000 FCFA a liter. Expensive, isn't it? So wouldn't you go for our cheaper home-made 'sachets d'eau' this time? Just bite off one corner to enjoy...