Return to Ouaga once again

I returned to Ouagadougou without any major problems. Although threatened with snow in Paris, it never materialized, and I made it to the airport without undue difficulty. The layover at Casablanca was a long 4 hours after an uneventful, but crowded, dinner flight, with a connecting flight not leaving until after midnight.  While the Paris - Casablanca flight had been completely packed, when I finally did take off for Ouaga via Niamey, I was delighted to have a WHOLE ROW to myself!  I could  almost stretch out and try to sleep!  Arriving at 4:50 a.m. made a long day, but my airport pick-up driver didn't complain about the hour, even though while I waited for him to arrive, I had to endure a goodly number of enterprising young Burkinabé men trying to help me carry my luggage, provide me taxi transportation into town, and sell me local SIM cards for my phone...

Upon reaching the SIL campus, I met my apartment-mates, unpacked, and crashed until 10 a.m.  The following day I was awake early as the days seem longer here now, being closer the the equator in winter, and the sun is up. There is no need for an alarm clock as the 5 a.m. call to prayer, that seems to occasionally go on for much longer, since all the mosques are not in sync, is reinforced by the crowing of cocks somewhere in the distance...

But the best part is that the days are somewhat cooler!  It is hot, but not overbearingly so, and there is the occasional breeze, or wind (the harmattan stirring up the dust from the Sahel), although I have only heard the latter as it rattles the roof, and have not witnessed more than the usual dust in the air.
 

My new SIL identification badge

The view from my bedroom taken through a screened window

My apartment-mates are two expat American kindergarden teachers evacuated from a private English language school in Bamako, Mali.  If you have been following the news on the Mali situation, you will understand the possible security problems for foreigners.  Below is a map of the region showing that northern Burkina Faso shares a common border with a portion of northern Mali, where most of the current trouble is taking place.

For a recent article in the Washington Post on the situation in Mali click below (or paste in your browser):

http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/africa/al-qaida-carves-out-own-country-in-mali-prepares-to-defend-it/2013/01/14/e87d4994-5e83-11e2-8acb-ab5cb77e95c8_story.html