the search continues...: Bye-bye Bobo

Wednesday, April 06, 2005

Bye-bye Bobo

Yesterday we saw Bobo Dioulasso(correct!)'s Grande Mosquee, a rather impressive example of Sahel mud-and-sticks architecture. Not that I have seen many others - although we did spot a few from the bus window at Bani, which also looked amazing. Then we had a quick tour of the 'ancient quarter' of Bobo, with its animist and Muslim quarters and its 'poissons sacred' - astoundingly big catfish who are barely able to submerge themselves fully in the shallow stinking stream. My crappy camera did an okay job with the mosque and the village, and I took a cute photo of a 4-year-old boy drumming on two empty tomato tins with a huge smile on his face. It's hard to get photos of people here - they're often averse to them; and I feel bad asking because there's a tangible sense of 'taking' the only thing they have; or the opposite happens and you get 50 people excitedly piling into one frame!

We went with a local man, Yacouba, who we were put in touch with by a lovely American couple we met at Gorom Gorom. Yacouba grew up here but at about 18 went to study in Norway and lived there for 17 years, before returning here in 1996. I think the culture shock was considerable. He's a lovely friendly guy who introduced us to his favourite tailor, who is making some non-bumblebee-ish clothes for me (his assistant took me shopping for some decent fabric).

Tomorrow we go back to Ougadougou and on Friday we fly to Paris (thankfully arriving the day after the Pope's funeral), then Sunday get the train to London, where there'll be a marked absence of:

every second person we pass on the street greeting us and every fifth person wanting to have a conversation.

sitting next to people in internet cafes struggling with sticky keyboards and sharing a single dial-up line with patrons sending 'URGENT BUSINESS PROPOSALS' to their many friends

kids hustling to sell packets of tissues

morning sounds of men clanking scissors together (I think they clean your nails for a pittance, although we haven't tried it).

yummy cheap French food, strangely addictive Nescafe-with-condensed milk, sachets of yoghurt, or 5p mangoes

women in truly fantastic wax-print outfits

terror at the sight of a mosquito

footpaths full of holes and hazards

..and a million other things I have got used to over the past three months.

posted by 8k, 12:24 PM

5 Comments:

I'm sorry you have to go home as I've been enjoying your stories so much. I've been wishing I could have been there too. Oh and yeah when I got back to London for the first week I was chatting (or trying to) to everyone I saw on the street - but not recomended as I think people think you are a bit of a weirdo. I think it would be fine back in Brisbane though. I remember I actually got a bit depressed in the first few days cause no one had asked me to marry them just as a natural part of conversation or as the first thing they said to me!

commented by

ros, 7:24 AM

Ros - I know! I didn't get so many proposals on account of hanging out with Dave, but whenever we we apart it only took about 30 seconds to get the first one! We walked around in Paris and I couldn't believe how neat everything was, and kept expecting people to walk up to me and say 'bonjour mon amis! ah, you speak English? are you Americano?'.

Caitriona - funnily enough I just saw a real bumblebee in Dave's parents' garden this morning... sooo furry and cute! Ah, lovely English spring...

commented by

8k, 11:41 AM

In China you have the opposite problem with photography. I think it's different in the country but in places like Shanghai, they're mad for having their picture taken so they'll stop you and get you to pose with them while their friend takes photos (I think blonde hair helps).

In Turkey, I was in a village in Cappadocia and there were these really cute kids there. I wanted to take a photo but thought it would be rude so I kept walking - until they spotted my camera (just a small compact) and yelled out 'photo, photo').

It's best to be sensitive but sometimes it's fine.

Re, marriage proposals ... I've had that too. I'm sure all women travelling without a man get that. The most memorable one for me was a busride in Laos with a rather matronly lady trying to broke a match with her son who was a monk.

commented by

Caitlin, 8:56 AM

Something weird is going on with my blog. I just tried to link to my stuff about Turkey but instead it turned out to be a link to my Chinese New Year pictures. I went back and checked and there are about three posts that have the Chinese New Year URL but different content. And one of them has the link there but has entirely disappeared. Hmmm.

commented by

Caitlin, 8:59 AM

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commented by