Last week in Ouaga

The time has flown! Wednesday JeDene, Ezéchiel and I visited Simon's ICCV Nazemse project in the Cissin district of Ouagadougou, quite far from SIL, so I was happy to have JeDene drive. This time he showed us where he first taught children in 2007 with a simple chalk board attached to the side of a wall.

Not long afterward the children moved inside the walls where his former ICCV Nazemse library once stood, the complex later becoming the library when the nursery school/kindergarten moved into its own quarters some time later.  Since his organization's creation in 2002, some of the earliest children helped by ICCV Nazemse have since gone on to graduate from college, and some still volunteer for the organization that enabled them to do so...

Scarcely a year ago the library opened in its new location, after being under construction for 3 years.
  

The library steps leading to the study and teaching area above also serve as seating for theatrical and music performances and movies

 

Librarian Safia Yerbanga in the foreground

Ezéchiel checks out the periodicals

We also visited the women's cooperative where they sell flour, legumes, beans, peanut butter, etc. at below-market prices.

 

And then we stopped by the restaurant where we sampled some local cuisine. You may recall from my post a year ago that the organic food served here is locally grown by the community, and that there is even an herb garden inside the confines of the restaurant.  From time to time classes are offered to teach those unfamiliar with some of the ingredients with ways of incorporating them into their own local dishes.

While lunching in La Jardinière, Simon received a phone call from  the Ministry of Culture and and the individual who is responsible for the biennial book festival here in Ouaga, Mr. Boubacar Diallo, dropped by, having heard of Simon's work in Cissin! In talking with him and his assistant briefly, I asked if they were familiar with Friends of African Village Libraries, and they assured me that they were.  I then presented the librarian, Safia Yerbanga, with some books I had picked up last year at the Salon du Livre in Paris and elsewhere, and we exchanged business cards. 

Mr. Boubacar Diallo also had some books to donate to the library written by local Burkinabè authors

Simon's next project is a middle school...  I think Ezéchiel was quite favorably impressed. 


Meanwhile back at the Center I made one final stab at bird photography--these were outside my window, but oh, so very tiny.  The two in the photos below are  about 3" long.

Here's one more attempt.  This tiny bird looks quite plump in the photo, but it is not at all, and is unbelievably small.

And in the library, I recently updated the library software (with a hefty 96 MB update) and discovered that ResourceMate has now added a new self check-out module which I am playing around with. The SIL Library in Bamako, where I was a month ago, can really use this useful feature as it is not always staffed, and maybe we can use it here on the computer terminal with the Public Access Catalog (OPAC) for the same reason... I just emailed Dan Brubaker in Mali to alert him to it...  Of course this might not work with the frequent daily power outages we have been experiencing, given the current hot weather, as the computer terminal needs to be re-booted each time there is a power failure...  The module does allow partial translation to French, which is helpful, especial since Ezéchiel does not speak any English...  Where the software permits some modifications of wording, I have already translated it into French--but it is not allowing a complete translation, so I can see that this is going to require some tweaking by the ResourceMate people... I have already sent them an email about it, which they promise to address in a future software update...

I was able to change this page

but I am unable to change this one...

As you can see, this will not be helpful if you don't speak the English language...

And now that I'm getting ready to depart the country, I was alerted to this posting by the US Embassy here:

Event: U.S. Embassy Ouagadougou advises U.S. citizens to avoid the area around the Salle de Conference near the Laico Hotel in Ouaga 2000 beginning Wednesday, March 21 due to heightened police presence. More than 80 people will be on trial before a military court over the failed 2015 coup in Burkina Faso. Crowds, media, and road closings in the vicinity of the Salle de Conference can be expected.

Oh dear, I guess this means it will be a good time for me to take my leave...

Then again, I understand a day of general strikes is planned for the morning of my arrival in Paris... (RER, RATP, SNCF, Air France, etc., with the exception of the Metro which is supposed to be near normal)... In fact, it looks like a spring into summer phenomenon with two days of strikes planned every three days or so...