“Are we going to land in the desert?” - Asked my Burkinabe neigbour on the plane looking anxiously from the window. “We are approaching the international airport in Niamay, temperature on the ground 38°”. The view from the window was perfect for the first landing in Sub-Saharan Africa – desert, with enormous river splitting nowhere from nowhere, few little village houses. The view notwithstanding, Niamey must be a dynamic city, because 90% of the black and white passengers with boss bags, DG jackets, Samsonite suitcases and tones of Belgian luxury chocolates left here before the plane set off to Ouaga, where I haven’t seen much of the landing because of the dazzling sun. The posh outfits of the predominantly African airplane passengers were a smooth transition from Brussels to Ouaga. There I will see less of posh, more of African and certainly more of poor.
I can hardly imagine a greater contrast than between Brussels and Ouaga. Brussels with its center-of-the-world-feeling, top end restaurants, fancy people with expensive gadgets, and cars, rainy and chilly summe
r, and Ouaga – have you ever head of it? I haven’t, till I started my research for an internship in Africa. In terms of food, in Burkina its predominant function is still to feed and not provide you with a culinary ecstasy in a stylish setting. Ouaga’s women substitute expensive gadgets for colorful African clothes, but most of the people don’t seem to have spare resources to invest in outfits.
Burkina is really poor. I can quote one of the “impressive” statistics, according to which it’s the second poorest country with GDP per capita of 1300$, 77% unemployment rate, 46% of population below the poverty line. Being in Burkina, these numbers turn into people and their fates. These are people on the streets, friendly and smiling, young and old, pushy and annoying who can expect to live no more than 47 years, who have a very big chance of staying analphabets throughout their lives (estimated literacy rate for men is 29%, for women 15%), who have hardly any access to health care not mentioning other luxuries we consider essentials. This is hard to look at, even harder to do something about it. I’m happy about the sunglasses I can hide behind while walking around as the only white who seems to be using feet for transportation and I cannot spare myself an “on the other hand”.
So on the other hand, it’s cheerful. People drive around on their motorbikes and scooters, like in Rome, they look friendly, smile and shake your hand offering another lovely telephone card. The women do carry on their heads colorful mangos. Internationals, or nationals working in international organizations are proud drivers of good cars and hopefully employ a lot of cooks, maids and drivers to let the others participate in the fruits of Burkina going international.
I can hardly imagine a greater contrast than between Brussels and Ouaga. Brussels with its center-of-the-world-feeling, top end restaurants, fancy people with expensive gadgets, and cars, rainy and chilly summe
r, and Ouaga – have you ever head of it? I haven’t, till I started my research for an internship in Africa. In terms of food, in Burkina its predominant function is still to feed and not provide you with a culinary ecstasy in a stylish setting. Ouaga’s women substitute expensive gadgets for colorful African clothes, but most of the people don’t seem to have spare resources to invest in outfits.Burkina is really poor. I can quote one of the “impressive” statistics, according to which it’s the second poorest country with GDP per capita of 1300$, 77% unemployment rate, 46% of population below the poverty line. Being in Burkina, these numbers turn into people and their fates. These are people on the streets, friendly and smiling, young and old, pushy and annoying who can expect to live no more than 47 years, who have a very big chance of staying analphabets throughout their lives (estimated literacy rate for men is 29%, for women 15%), who have hardly any access to health care not mentioning other luxuries we consider essentials. This is hard to look at, even harder to do something about it. I’m happy about the sunglasses I can hide behind while walking around as the only white who seems to be using feet for transportation and I cannot spare myself an “on the other hand”.
So on the other hand, it’s cheerful. People drive around on their motorbikes and scooters, like in Rome, they look friendly, smile and shake your hand offering another lovely telephone card. The women do carry on their heads colorful mangos. Internationals, or nationals working in international organizations are proud drivers of good cars and hopefully employ a lot of cooks, maids and drivers to let the others participate in the fruits of Burkina going international.
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