Life of Ryan

2006-10-07T11:02:00.000Z

Les Vacances

I just was on vacation back in the states for my good friend Andy's wedding. It was a great time. Sorry to those who I didn't have time to see..it was a bit rushed..but I had a excellent time hanging out on the West Coast with the wedding party. Here are some pics.

Had to snap a pic of the Space Needle

I sat for 5min trying to get this shot of a salmon jumping upriver. It's not in focus but its still a cool pic.

My guy Andy and his best man at the reception with the mountains in the background

The Newlyweds!

Still had to get in a game of golf with dad.

2006-08-15T00:03:00.000Z

Uneventful
dedié à A.J.
In the time honored tradtion of putting out content regardless of what I must press on to provide my small readership a pittance of entertainment. Nothing really has been going on with me. I guess I'm at the point where nothing really seems blog worthy. I'm currently studying for the GMATs, still teaching my computer class, and getting ready to go on vacation to the states for 3 weeks. I will say however that I spent the last week in the Dakar infirmery with a small problem. It's all good now but I got to spent the last week eating well, showering with hot water and sleeping in AC. Anyway here are some pictures that may be slightly entertaining or particularly boring depending on what you are doing.

First up the Peace Corps Headquarters in Dakar. This shot is from inside the courtyard. It used to be Catholic Mission I'm assuming from the cross on the building.

Here is the entrance to the infimery (yawwwn) note the A/C unit

Bunk beds (yaawwwwwn)

Yet another excessive self portrait thanks to digital photography

A cool shot of the "Grande Mosquée" from the Peace Corps courtyard right before a rain

2006-07-06T15:01:00.000Z

"Before you think that I don't work..."

Here are some pics from the computer course that I teach at the high school. I'm currently grooming the people there to run and teach it on their own. Hopefully that will happen before I leave.

Basic or not so basic comptuer terms

The Beginnings of EXCEL

2006-06-09T17:06:00.000Z

Mesdames et Messieurs, Ladies and Gentlemen
AFRICAN TOUCH!

2006-06-09T16:08:00.000Z

Pics from Jazz Fest

Last week was the Saint-Louis International Jazz Festival 2006. Unfortunately over the last 5 years or so the festival has been in a steady decline, due to poor organization and people embezzling money. This is one of the reasons I guess that I was able to participate in the festival as an amateur musician. It was a great experience to play alongside professional musicians. It gave me an idea of what it would take to be a professional musician...something that I have been giving increasing thought to, although only in a lucid state. It was also a good opportunity to use the new tenor saxophone that I bought in Dakar a little over a month ago. The best part of the festival, I would have to say, were the late night jam sessions. Each night at this jazz club, Marco Jazz, a lot of the musicians that performed in the festival went to jam. It was a great opportunity to play with players that were much better than me...in other words it was a good opportunity to learn from them. Anyway, here are pictures from the jazz fest(more to come soon).

Warning: Due to the magic of photography musicians may appear better than they actually sound.

Afternoon Soundcheck

African Touch on the big stage

Soprano Solo

Marco Jazz Club jam session. The saxophonist on the right was so good he made me want to either 1) pack up my sax and never play again or 2) work twice as hard as I ever have

Perpective shot of the crowd at this tiny club

2006-05-23T12:51:00.000Z

Saint-Louis Jazz Festival.

So I've been really busy. Between the computer classes that I teach, helping out at the Cisco Academy, helping out with various small business projects, and rehearsing I haven't had much free time. This month Mondays have been the only days of the week that I haven't had rehearsal. The festival is fast approaching and I'm pretty pumped about it. It starts May 31st and I'll be playing on the first and last day. The group that I'm a part of (african touch) is playing on the last day while the first day I'm playing with a grouped dubbed the St. Louis Jazz Orchestra (put together just for the festival). Although I enjoy playing with African Touch more than the other group, it's the other group that is getting more hype. Here is an article about that group in a Senegalese newspaper. Either way things are going great all around. Being busy in my social life is making my work life more productive in return...unlike Burkina when I was just sitting around all day waiting to do some work.

2006-04-16T09:09:00.000Z

Anatomy of a Rehearsal.

This is a close up of the group I play with African Touch. Here are a couple of pictures from a rehearsal that we had yesterday. For the time being we have a guest among us. The girl in the picture is from Austria and she is traveling around Africa for 5 months. She'll be in Saint-Louis for an undetermined amount of time, but one thing is certain she is going to perform with us at least once. Yesterday we were practicing my very first song. I wrote it this week using some of the harmonies of another song we play (in the jazz tradition). What this means is that you take existing chords of another song and write a new melody over them creating a new song. There are tons of songs out the with the same chord progression, but what makes them unique is the melody. I also wrote some words to go with it. It was a weird experience hearing the song come to life, but one that I enojoyed nonetheless. I'm looking forward to writing more, however probably without words. It was kinda in this one case that words were necessary. Oh yeah, I didn't mention it was a love song. As embarrassing and hard as it is to share...here is the text.

I want you to be the one for me
I need you to be that one
but I know that it’s impractical
So I warn myself that I must stop
Now one thing I don’t understand
Is how, I still love you.

They say that love is unpredictable
And when love comes it’s undeniable
And you can’t stop what must be true
For us, although you think you know yourself
But one thing you can’t understand
Is why, you won’t love me too.

So what does this mean for the two of us
Does it mean that we should stop because
Not you, not me sense that love will work
For us, so we just keep holding back
Except the one thing we don’t comprehend
Is that love, is simply love.

So yeah once again below are pictures from the rehearsal....

The Bassit Vito is always all smiles.

Here is Jamal, Vito, and Verena working out a part together.

Our incomprable Bayiuma is on the other side of the room beating polyrhythmic delights

Here is Verena trying to work out a difficult line

And out leader Monsieur Jamal Thibault. He's the one who created the group and taugh jazz basics to these Senegalese guys. Because of all of his hard work I was able to just join seamlessly like it was a regular jazz group. Despite the fact that the Senegalese guys were talented musicians the rules of jazz are quite challenging...There's a form that you must respect and you must know where you are down to the beat in the song form at every moment. And that is difficult to learn especially if you are used to just playing something simple repetitively or a call/response format as is the case in African drumming.

Not bad for a weekend...

2006-03-18T09:24:00.000Z

What took me so long?

Sorry that it has been awhile. I've been waiting for this momentous day for quite some time. I now have DSL at my house. Now I no longer have to deal with internet cafes with their old computers that don't have all of the necessary programs to support a good "web experience." Anyways I can now watch streaming video at my house with no problems. I'll also be looking to keep up with American TV by downloading episodes weekly. Anway here are some random pictures to look at. As for work...it's still coming. I will admit my last post was quite ambitious, but such is the nature of this kind of work. I'm still striving to reach all of my goals, now the hard part is mapping it all out.

Here is the famous bridge in Saint-Louis that connects the mainland to the island. It's a couple hundred years old (as St. Louis was the first place in Africa colonized by the French in the 17th century), and it's orgins are still being debated by historians.

The bridge upclose

Here is a picture of a Giraffe at a National Park that I went to while I was at IST (In Service Training). It was a pretty cool park because for once we got to see (giraffes, rhinos, water buffalo, and gazelle) which no longer reside in nature in West Africa...I have yet to see a lion though.

Here is a picture of my second concert at the French Cultural Center in town. Things are going well musically. I'm getting alot of opportunities to play here in town (in Burkina all I did was practice which got frustrating so more or less I stopped playing regularly). So I met a French pianist (the guy on the right) and we play/practice together weekly now. He composes most of the songs that we play. Currently we are looking for gigs wherever we can find them. We've got one coming up next weekend so that should be fun. The other three guys are senegelese. You may be shocked to see a contrabass (surtout en afrique), but that was the doing of the french guy. He's got a awesome house with a "studio" that has a grand piano, a contrabass, and various percussion equipment not to mention AC. He tought an electric bass player how to play the contrabass. Additionally he tought the two percussionist the jazz form. They are excellent drummers but they had to learn the layout and structure of the jazz form. Such as the concept of an 8 measure intro. Anyway, if you would like us to come play at an event for you, the name of the group is "African Touch" (must be said with the proper French accent, btw the group was named way before I showed up on the scene), we will be more than happy to come provided that you pay airfare and accommodations, lol. Believe it or not the bass player (who has "toured" in europe before with his senegalese afro cuban band, if you've been to West Africa believe me you know the type) is sending a recording of this concert to his friend in Belgium to see if we could play in a jazz festival. I must tell you that at best we are an amateur group that couldn't stand up against a band of professional muscians. That said however the music that we play is so niche that not many people play what we play. Also remember the mindset (partially drive by guilt of the vestiges of colonialism) of a person in Europe, "Let's get an African band from Africa to come play at our festival." Look, I doubt that it would actually happen, but wouldn't it be cool to get a free plane ticket to go to a jazz festival? The odds are not favorable but on ne sait jamais....

2006-02-11T20:47:00.000Z

Ma Parole

So it seems this time around I’m putting up much more photos and much less commentary. I’d have to say it’s the product of a fast internet connection and a busy schedule. Unlike my first 2 years of Peace Corps… I feel like my time here is a bit rushed. I just got here and I only have 11 months left. There is so much that I want to do, and it seems I don’t have enough time to get it all done. My goals range from personal to professional. To give you a brief idea of where I am right now and where I want to be in one year’s time (in no particular order) :

• Study for and take GMAT
• Help get the Cisco Networking Academy more students and organize its finances (coordinate with US and European offices to develop program goals in Africa) could possibly include travel to other African countries…we’ll see if Peace Corps will allow it ;)
• Work with the United Nations Development Program in Saint-Louis on Small Business efforts
• Possibly organize a summer program with Kellogg Business School (although the outlook is looking bleak)
• Complete CCNA 1 and 2 Cisco Certification
• Learn Wolof
• Perfect my French
• Get back into “near” marathon shape…so I can at least train for my second one upon “re-entry”
• Gig with my saxophone on weekends (ask for MP3 clip of my first concert and see pics below)
• Applications for Business School in the fall

So as you can see I’m going to be quite busy. No more sitting at home reading book after book. Even if some of the things don’t pan out I’ll still have a full plate. I just got back from a Cisco Systems conference in Dakar that had directors from the US and Europe as well as the directors of the academies from francophone Africa (made me feel like a real grown up). I had a little bit to contribute to the conference because the directors from the US and Europe either 1) don’t speak French or 2) have a clue about how IT works in the African culture context. I’m currently trying to I get an information packet together on how to request a Peace Corps volunteer for the academies. Also I met with the representative for the UN for Small Business in St. Louis and he can’t wait to start taking me around to show me all of the different activities here. As you can see there is definitely more name dropping which will do nicely for the B-School applications. Also, I bet you also noticed a difference in what I’m doing in Senegal compared to Burkina…I’m working locally and internationally at the same time. It just goes with my theme for this third year. BIGGER AND BETTER. Whether it’s my living conditions, work, or social life…that is the running mantra… to be continued all things mentioned above are to be put on hold for, you guessed it, I.S.T. (In Service Training) which will be three weeks looooooooooooooooooooonnng. So till then I got to be patient and get back to my grand plan in March which at that time I’ll just have 10 months! Allons-y!

2006-02-01T11:14:00.000Z

L'appartement
I don't have alot of time, but I wanted to throw up pics of my apartment and view in St. Louis. I'll of course update them as these are the pics of the day I moved in with my apartment yet to be set up.

The Living Room

Living Room Angle 2

The Kitchen

Kitchen Angle 2

The Bathroom

Bathroom angle 2

The Balcony

The View from the Balcony (Senegal River with Atlantic Ocean and the city's island in the distance)

So as you can see living conditions have improved and la vie n'est pas mal en ce moment. Now I need to get it together, learn some Wolof, and start changing the world for the second time round ;)

2006-01-14T23:47:00.000Z

Finally Here!..Super Post
So here I am in Senegal. D'abord pour mes confrères volontaires Burkinabés (actuels et anciens) une vrai grand bouteille de Coca à vous; regardez la photo ci-dessous. C'est comme ça qu'on fait au Senegal. Mais il n'y a pas de 50cl. Maintenant ça depasse la "million CFA" difference. Check out these pictures of Senegal. Dakar is a much different place than Ouaga. The pictures, I hope, will do the explaining.

There's coke everywhere you go.

A cool round point downtown

a 2 story sports store where they sell even surfing gear...wow

random picture of a street

and of course the beach

2006-01-14T23:29:00.000Z

a cool bird flying against the wind

beautiful coastline

beautiful spot for a hotel with the city in the background

but don't forget it's still africa!

2005-12-21T00:13:00.000Z

Salut. Voila. La hyper belle vue que j'ai actuellement a Chicago. J'espere que tout va bien ou que tu sois. Joyeux Noel et Bonne fete.
Wow it is hard to keep up with posting in America. No time and too much good food to eat. Here is a picture of the view from the apartment where I'm staying right now in downtown Chicago. Who knows when I'll have the time again to post like I usually do...I'm sure though that it will happen once I go back to Senegal. Till then Merry Christmas wherever you are.

2005-11-30T16:55:00.000Z

Hard to come, harder to stay, hardest to leave...
That's how I would describe my 2 years in Dori, Burkina Faso. Yesterday I left for good the place that I have come to love. It was much harder than leaving America. Mostly because I have had some real genuine friendships (complete with fights, inside jokes, and all around good times) during my time here and now that it is time to leave I know that I'm leaving for good. When I left America and said goodbye to all my friends there I knew that I would be coming back and would see them again. When leaving Dori I realized that isn't the case for my friends here. So goodbye really meant goodbye. As the bus pulled out of my village and my friends waved goodbye I started to well up a bit. Of course I didn't cry, I'm a man after all...but it wasn't easy ;). A tear may have snuck it's way down my cheek if not for the fact that my heartfelt nostolgia got smashed by frustration as the bus broke down just 1K outside of town. So all in all it was a bittersweet experience. I was sad to go, but ready to leave. If you had told me I had to stay another 6 months I would not have been d'accord. So now the task at hand is to go through the obstable course necessary to transfer to Senegal and come home for Christmas. I've got about 4 tedious reports to do summing up all that I've done these past two years. On Sunday after all that stuff I fly out of Ouagadougou, BF and onto Dakar, Senegal. I'll be there for about 2 days then I'm coming home next Wednesday. For mes amis de Chicago I'll be in the "Chi" from the 16th to the 23rd of December. And as they sing "I'll be home for Christmas."

A Bientôt

2005-11-19T18:53:00.000Z

You gotta love Africa.

This is my third time writing this same post. The two other versions were so humorous and clever but they weren’t meant to be posted I guess. The first time the website took my post and lost it. The second time my computer decided to loose it by tricking me into clicking “No” when prompted about some Auto Recovery feature. So here I am. Instead of painstakingly recreating the posts I’ll just tell you about them. I’m sure you would have laughed at them for sure. I told the story of my return to the states for the first time in over two years. I ingeniously used the words “triumphant return.” After that I went on to describe how I was going to be flying on a direct flight from Dakar to New York (first a flight I didn’t know existed and second a three thousand dollar flight that Uncle Sam has zero qualms about despite the fact that he could have sent me through Paris for ¼ of the price). That would have surely partially taken you aback. Then I expressed my astonishment in my eight hour layover in New York due to the fact that most of the commuter flights between NY and DC go out of LaGuardia. I would have surely made you chuckle as I played with the idea of going into New York during my layover given that NY is a shocking experience for a small town American and how it would have been much more so for someone like me who has spent all but 17 of the last 800 days on the African continent. I ended the post describing the accompanied photo. It’s a photo of me spending my last days in Dori foot deep in sand at my favorite but laborious intersection. Subsequently I told the joke of how my town is just like the beach but without the water. I don’t think you would have laughed so much at that one but maybe….

Prose exercise for The Onion aside, folks my time is ticking away. In Dori I’ve got but 9 days left followed by 5 days in Ouagadougou. Then I hop over to Senegal to spend 2 days in Dakar and finally make my way to DC via NY (with the 8 hour layover).
I’ll then be hanging out stateside for a month with a weeklong stint in Chicago. I hope I get the chance to see you all!

2005-10-25T20:33:00.000Z

"One more 'gin"
So this roller coaster called the Peace Corps is roundng it's last hill right before it coasts into a gentle stop. But for those of you who know me, you know my love for a good roller coaster. And much like I would at an amusement park, despite the queesy head-jerking highs and lows, I'm getting back on for yet another ride. That's right it's official. Now I can say with confidence I'm doing a third year with the Peace Corps, and this time it will be in Senegal. In effect it's not like getting on the same ride again, but more like jumping off the wooden coaster and running to the front of the line of the new smooth 0 to 60 in 3 seconds super coaster with the VIP pass (I'll be in a big city Saint Louis (for Africa) with a jazz scene, working with CISCO Systems and on the beach to boot, can you say heaven). So currently I'm steadily climbing up the hill of anticipation of that first big requisite drop that typifies all great roller coaster rides...anyways enough of the extended analogy let's just say je suis trop content!

2005-10-16T19:30:00.000Z

Here is the market or "Mall" if you will. You see those pants there...those are the pants you give to the salvation army..for free...then they end up on sale in the market. It reflects one of the many things that come to Africa in the name of goodwill and end up on sale by those with access to them first (other examples free medicine, food, and school supplies). In the case of medicine there are times when doctors get medicine for free from the World Health Organization and end up selling it to make money...so sad. Anyways continue below for my latest post.

2005-10-16T16:25:00.000Z

The Last Two Weeks

So let me tell you about my little project. For the last two weeks I've been running a computer training in my town. I got a grant from Peace Corps funds to fund the project. Basically it was a training for just about anyone to teach them the basics of computers and the Internet. Here's an excerpt from the Grant proposal:

While there are currently two Cyber Cafes, they are underutilized by the population. This became clearer when both Cybers lowered their prices when Fasonet/ONATEL (the national service provider) lowered its rates and saw no increase in customers. Despite a more affordable price, connecting to the Internet was left to tourists and business travelers from the capital. This is mainly due to a lack in the understanding of what Information Technology (IT) is and how it can be used for work and everyday living. If there was a greater understanding of the possibilities and applications of the Internet there would surely be an increase in use.

So yeah I was "on a mission" to show people why the Internet is cool, useful, and convenient. It turned out to be a really good idea and was a really successful project in my opinion. There were people who had never sat in front of a computer before and they learned how to create a Yahoo mail account read and write emails and all that. What's really funny (and calls for alot of patience) is seeing someone who has never used a mouse before try to manipulate it on the screen. They do all sorts of funny things with the mouse like lifting it up, shaking it, and and clicking the body of it instead of the buttons. But anyways it was funny seeing the progression. People went from asking what is the internet, to being addicted to it. They even came near to fighting over who got which computer (once they realized which ones were fast). You might be asking yourself why would I need to do a project to do something as simple as teach internet. Well, the cost of internet is nothing like the 19.95/month of the US. For a 24/7 56K connection it cost about $1000 dollars a month (no I didn't accidently type too many zeros). So obviously people who live on about a dollar a day can't exactly afford to surf the net. And those who do have a bit of money don't see the benefit to spending money on it. So anyways I got money for a half of months worth of internet teamed up with a Cyber Cafe and did the training. The best part now that it is all said and done is there are about 50 people in my town now addicted to the internet. That makes the project a double success. One it brought new knowledge to the population and two it created a client base for the Internet Cafes in Dori. Also now that people rooted in the community know how to "naviguer" they can teach other people as well creating a nice wave. In any case I've got my "high" for a couple of weeks.....

2005-10-05T16:01:00.000Z

Busy Busy Busy,
Here is a post just to say that I have made one recently. I'm currently running an internet training in my town. So far so good. Let's just say I'm going all day from 8 in the morning till 10pm at night. Teaching folks the difference between a left and right click. 2 straight weeks. Today is day number 4. More details to follow. If all goes well I'll be going out with a bang....

2005-09-17T08:31:00.000Z

Rien à dire

I don´t have all that much to say really. This past week has been full of sorta interesting events. We had a workshop that I helped facilitate and "Close of Service¨conference in which we learned about all the joys and steps (both procedural and emotional) of re-entry. Boy it takes almost as many steps to leave as it does to get here. But as many of you know I'm not totally leaving since I'm transferring. However there were some interesting insights about re-entry to the states. For one thing they told us that no one would really care about our experience. A better way to put it, is that no one would have the patience or the interest in our experience they way we would want to explain it. It has been found that returned PCVs have gotten frustrated because the usual conversation goes like this.

Friend: So how was Africa?
PCV: Oh wow I don't know where to begin. It was a great experience...(pauses for thought)
Friend : (interjects) That's cool, so have you seen that new movie out yet?

So the point (and not that it is a reflection on people's character) is that not everyone is going to be willing to listen to long drawn out descriptions of your experience. Moreover there are going to be things that are impossible to explain since there are no close equivalents in the US. All this leads to frustration and inner angst, so they say. I don't know what to expect from my friends but either way I'm putting that off another year by staying put.

As for that conference that I helped facilitate, that was a new experience. So I've gotten quite comfortable with my french in my time here. I've taught business basics, how to use computers/internet, and organized and ran a summer camp among other things all in French. But this conference was the first time I was in front of a group of educated people (which means good french speakers) in a professional setting. So that meant that on top of the usual ills of public speaking there was an added element of speaking in a "foreign tongue." So I basically felt like a beginner once again. And don't even try to talk off of the top of your head about something you hadn't already thought though prior! That's just asking for disaster. Anyway, I more or less did a decent job, but learned alot about what I have to do to improve my french if I really want to pursue a career which uses the language that I have come to love speaking. Unfortunately I've plateaued for the moment because of the level and proficiency of the people I live and work with. Hopefully that will improve next year in Senegal when I'll be living in a bigger city...Inch Allah ;)

2005-09-11T10:26:00.000Z

Back "Home" in Burkina Part II

So how were the adventures passing for an African you may ask? I’ll tell you they were quite interesting. I do it in Burkina from time to time in order to not be hassled by aggressive tourist guides in the capital or to avoid a person I don’t want to talk to in passing (this one in particular surprised me...believe it or not if you are walking down the street, excuse me, if you are black and walking down the street in a country full of black people, it is possible for people who know you personally not to notice you. Even if you walk right past them! I guess you just blend in to the crowd, I’ve pulled it off a couple of times in fact). But anyways the results of playing an African in Ghana were favorable but they had a few twists of their own.

Case #1
Once I was walking down the street in Accra and out the corner of my eye I saw an old guy stop walking once he spotted me. He then started to hiss at me to get my attention. As usual when presented with this situation, I ignored his hiss and kept walking which in this case was quite easy since we were on opposite sides of the street. He continued to hiss at me and at the crescendo of a hiss I looked back at him and he gave me a look like I was being unbelievably rude. We were both on opposite sides of the road with traffic rolling by and I turned around and walked in his direction to see what he wanted, however I wasn’t going to cross the street. He gave me another look of disappointment as he motioned for me to cross the street. I waited until the traffic was clear and ran across the street to see what this guy wanted so I could continue in peace. He said in a semi-harsh voice, “Teid nbje und tigedj ngnnae” (or at least that’s what my ears picked up). I replied, “What?” with a confused look on my face, He continued but this time more forceful, “Teid nbje und tigedj ngnnae cha!” with a disappointing look on his face and I felt an expectation of me to do or say something apologetic. I was left no choice but to say, “I’m sorry, I only understand English.” A slight smile formed on his face and he pleasantly replied in perfect English, “Oh, I’m sorry, you resemble someone I know. I thought you were him.” Without faltering he immediately turned around and went on his way.

Case #2
On the same day I was walking down a street and a lady from a store front yelled out at me and said, “Hey come here!” Perplexed I pointed to myself and mouthed “Me?” She shook her head yes and motioned assertively for me to get over there. I hesitantly approached her to see what it was she wanted. She asked me, “Where are you from?” I quickly said “The U.S.” She demanded belligerently, “You aren’t Nigerian?” I told her no, and then she launched into quizzing me on facts to make sure that I was American. After I provided enough evidence to her liking she apologized for yelling at me and told me that I looked like a Nigerian businessman she once knew.

Case # 3
I was staying at a beach resort in Krokrobite and I was shooting the breeze with the security guy. He was telling me that the first day I came to the resort and went to the “Reception Desk/Hut” that he thought that (once again) I was this Nigerian guy (no lie) that had come about half a year ago. This particular guy didn’t come as a guest but as a businessman who wanted to sell some goods to the owner for the resort. Ultimately the Nigerian guy ended up stealing some tents from the resort. The whole businessman thing was a con. The security guy said he was shocked to see the Nigerian guy come back months later and then go check in like nothing ever happened. He said that we would have gone after me if hadn’t see that the owner didn’t react negatively to my arrival.

Those weren’t the results that I was expecting to achieve but I guess it’s the price you pay to avoid being hassled for being American. On a side note, be on the look out for the Nigerian guy who looks like me. I would have thought nothing of it if not for the two people in two different cities who said that I looked like a Nigerian businessman that they knew. If you see me around and I’m acting shady or slightly weird, be warned! That is not me! Call the police immediately so that we can catch this Nigerian guy. Ironically, I bet he’s in America trying to pass for a native African American.

2005-09-02T20:45:00.000Z

Back "Home" in Burkina Part I

Here you go faithful readers. I'm going to do this one in two installments hope you enjoy Part 1.

So I’m back from Ghana. All in all I’d say it was a decent vacation. I hope to do it once again sometime but on a real vacation budget versus the Peace Corps one I had. The total cost for the vacation from my porch in Dori and back again with all expenses was only $250 dollars for 11 days. That gives you an idea of how cheap Ghana can be. Here’s a breakdown of my costs.

Ghanaian Visa: $25
Round Trip Cost of Bush Taxi’s : $50
Average Hotel Room Cost Per Night: $5
Average Meal: $0.75
Passing for an African: priceless

You gotta forgive me for that, I just couldn’t resist…it may be an old joke depending on whether or not Mastercard still runs that same advertising campaign, but cut me some slack it has been two years since I’ve seen an American commercial.

The vacation was good and I just realized that it was the first time that I had been in an Anglophone country since I left the states. Also during my service I went to Mali (which is like Burkina Faso Part II, like most sequels it’s bigger with more action but not necessarily better) and La France, deux pays francophone. So being back in an English world was kinda weird. In my mind due to my limited experience in BF, conceptually Africa was French speaking. In any case, I saw commonalities in both countries that goes back to pre-colonial Africa, and I also saw differences as a result of the different approaches the British and the French took that came from their respective cultures. In any case I would say Burkina is about 15 years behind Ghana on the road to development.

Interacting with people was a surprising challenge. If I were to have talked normally I wouldn’t have been understood. Consequently I had to speak with the elocution of a computer voice (slow, clearly annunciated, and monotone). Furthermore, I had to go through the same thought process as if I were talking in French. Let me explain. Generally to speak with someone in BF you take a look at them and guess their education level (i.e. villager, farmer, merchant, school teacher) based on their how they are dressed, method of transportation, the situation, etc. Then from there you base your French on that. You can’t use the same level across the board because you won’t be understood by everyone. Unless you use the “villager’s level” but an educated person would think that you were really stupid or couldn’t speak French that well. So basically you have to feel a person out and adjust your grammar and vocab as the conversation goes on until you find an “equilibrium of language levels.” I feel well educated Burkinabé or the French (someone who has mastered the language) do the same thing when talking to me, a non-native speaker. So basically in Ghana I had to do all that with English in order to ask directions, buy food, and bargain.

Quick Highlights of what I saw and did

1. The Beach. I spent half a week getting re-acclimated with the other side my old friend, the Atlantic Ocean.

2. Ate Pizza. France and her former colonies consider thin crust pizza the only kind of pizza. I prefer something other than a glorified version of crackers and cheese and took full advantage of having real pizza available.

3. Met other travelers. There was a British couple that was in the middle of a Tran African trip from the U.K. to South Africa by car in a 6 months.

4. Slave Castles. Saw the two oldest ,biggest and most prominent slave castles on the African coast (slightly harrowing experience). Because of the mixed lineage of African tribes and slave masters families I can’t trace my roots precisely but in any case it’s from those castles where les noirs made their way to the New World.

5. Rainforest Canopy Walk. I walked on a suspended plant of wood high in the canopy of the Ghanaian rainforest. I didn’t see any animals as they are mostly nocturnal but it was exhilarating being high off the ground on a small plank of wood supported by ropes on the tree tops.

Next week I'll post what is was like passing for an African in Ghana stay tuned...

2005-08-25T17:42:00.000Z

Ghana is crazy!

I only have six minutes in this Cyber Cafe in Cape Coast, Ghana to let you know how things have been going. From the look at the web counter my readership is at an all time low, but it's all good I write the blog for me anyways, lol. So, all of my Peace Corps language and cultural training got wiped out as soon as I crossed the border into Ghana. It's a whole 'nother world. Also you really can see the differences in effects of French versus British colonialization. Anyways a quick example of what's been going on: I've been getting ripped off. My bargaining skills don't work here (lack of perfect information really sucks I'm sure M.W. would agree ;0). I tried using the same little cute French catch phrases by translating them into English, but they get me absolutely no where. The people were refusing to drop their prices. Also the taximen where ripping me off charging me prices that could get me across the country let alone a couple blocks. However a new plan has emerged..I no longer ask for prices like a tourist, I now try to pass as an African. I hand over money as if I know the price and give a look of expecting change. So far so good..even though they must think I'm weird when they talk to me in TWI and I just shake my head, ah well...TIMES UP!

2005-08-17T23:29:00.000Z

je suis en vacances

Before it was too late to use my vacation days I decided randomly to go to Ghana. So I'll be at the beach for a week and a half eating well and swimming. I even here Ghana has a bona fide Mall with a Food Court, crazy! All I have to do to get there is sit through a 24 hour bus ride....nothing comes free. Hopefully I'll be able to give you the "blow by blow" since there are internet cafes all over Ghana.
Later

2005-08-13T13:51:00.000Z

Getting from Point A to Point B

Here's a picture of the Transport Bus being loaded. The Greyhound of Burkina if you will. Transport in Burkina is remarkable by West African standards. Most times it's just a random "Bush Taxi" that has no schedule or pattern to where and when it goes or it's a huge truck like the one below. At least between the main towns in Burkina they attempt to keep a schedule and have fairly reliable buses that were problably used in Europe 20 years ago. However, that doesn't mean however that you won't get stranded in the middle of no where from time to time because the bus breaks down. That makes it all the more fun since the "mechanics" ride the bus..so if, I mean when it does break down there are there to rectify the problem. If not you can always catch the next days bus to continue your journey. My favorite thing however would be the motorcycles on top and the goats stuffed alive in the underside carriages screaming along the way (PETA would have a conniption). And don't forget on any given day you could be sharing a seat with a live chicken (quite amicable btw)!

2005-08-06T15:50:00.000Z

Here is what I think is one of my better self potraits...what is it about digital cameras that lead us to take excessive self photos? Anyways in this one I'm making the journey home after visiting a friend. On this road between my friend's village and mine there is no usual transport so you basically got to sit on the side of the road and wait for someone to pass and voila there is your ride. In this case I got to ride shotgun in an 18 wheeler...only in Africa they've only got 10 ;)

2005-08-06T15:30:00.000Z

Back from the "Training of Trainers

Ouais Maintenant je me sens mieux. Quelques uns ont fait des commentaires sur mon blog-là. À ce moment iI semble que j’ai une raison d’être. Je vous jure que je vais vous donner mon meilleur. Merci à el flo flo pour m’avoir salué. il est en train de vivre la vie française et pour cela je suis jaloux. Alors que je suis au centre du Sahel en train de souffrir. Mais ça va aller quand je serai au Sénégal j’aurai la belle vie moi aussi. il me faut de la patience…
Introductions aside…I’m just getting back from the conference that was for organizing the curriculum of the trainees that will be coming in a couple days. It was very interesting because it gave me a bit of perspective on where I am and what I’m doing here. I can’t tell you how much I doubt what I’m doing here at times. A part of the time it feels like I’m just wasting taxpayer’s money by being here. When you break it down it takes about $30,000 a year to support the average Peace Corps volunteer (about 15,000 in Africa and much more in more developed places like Eastern Europe). At times I feel that it is well spent and others it feels like a waste. It’s definitely not a waste overall because the Peace Corps approach is definitely the way to go (instead of giving a man a fish, teach him how to fish). More so than that we as Peace Corps Volunteers are integrated and living with the people we help. I can’t tell you how many times well intentioned people have come and donated this or that only to have it stop working the way they intended once they leave. For example a group of people come and donate computers to a town for students…however when they leave it turns out the computers are hoarded by the Mayor’s office who charges money to everyone to use them (that touches on corruption and that is another post altogether). Another example would be an NGO that comes and builds a sophisticated water pump in a village where women in the past had to walk 2 miles to the nearest water source. Soon after the pump breaks (they always do), and no one in the village knows how to fix or maintain it. Therefore in the end its as if you haven’t done anything for the villagers. So as I was saying the Peace Corps approach to development is the best way to go. The only problem I think Peace Corps goals don’t line up with George Bush’s goals for Peace Corps. It seems that he thinks of it as a program to market America to the world. “If we spread out Americans all over the world and almost everyone knows one personally or has one as a teacher at some point they won’t think that we are all that bad.” That’s something I can imagine him saying to himself. The opposite position is taken by Peace Corps. It takes itself as an organization that seeks to develop the world from the grass roots approach. The conflict between the two comes into fruition with the budget that PC gets from Congress…a measly 300 million (not even one percent of the defense budget). If PC was a program really equipped to help the common man I feel that there would be a much bigger budget and more organization in how the work is carried out and monitored. I’m telling you if I wanted I could just chill and do nothing everyday as long as I write a good quarterly report. When they said it was going to be the hardest job you ever loved I didn’t know that it was going to be hard on all sides.

The job
I can’t tell you how many times I’ve been stood up for a rendez-vous with someone that I agreed to help out. Whether it is how to set up an email account, or general accounting people just don’t seem to be all that concerned. I guess that happens when your services are free and only based on someone’s personal motivation. So in order to get the job done you gotta be persistent
Health
West Africa has the most germs per capita than whatever place you thought had a lot of germs. I’m constantly fighting off intestinal problems, boils, hair loss, heat rash et al.
Life
The weekend doesn’t exist in my town. It’s just another day no activities to go out and just kick it. The people don’t have any real hobbies outside of talking to one another. La belle vie n’est pas developpée ici.

But I digress, I’m still here and trying to find my way and I’ve even signed up for another year (however that new village will be a city on the beach with a lot of amenities I lack currently, so not too bad). Also its fun getting pity points from you guys from describing how life is for me ;) But I gotta to tell you all things aside it is fun living and working in Africa. Everyday is an adventure and the people are really cool. To live here you got to be on your toes and you are constantly learning and using what you learn to make it from day to day. Then the real fun starts once you understand the culture. Now that I’m fluent in French and can express myself comfortably there still are 80 other languages in Burkina (only about 30% speak French fluently). My goal is to learn a bit of the local language here before I leave (it has been harder for me since I live in a big town pop 25,000 in which a majority are French speaking). Moreover, I wasn’t motivated at first because once I step a foot outside of Burkina the language is useless. But something I’ve noticed is that if you want to understand “a people” and their culture you’ve got to learn their language. What and how they say can teach you a lot….it’s kinda like how in Inuit languages there’s 100 words for snow. Anyways I’d better stop before my thoughts get too disorganized and irrelevant.

2005-08-04T21:53:00.000Z

Accounting in Burkina

I just recently wrote a small "case study" for the new trainees. I'd thought I'd share it with you so you could get an idea of my work here. Keep in mind it leaves out a lot of the annoying stuff and kinda supports the Peace Corps idealism that slowly dies as you try to help people in the real world. Not to sound negative but in reality helping people is hard! But anyways enjoy and I'll be sure to post something soon to balance out this story. I would have to say however this makes my two years feel somewhat successful and worthwhile.

How accounting can help entrepreneurs improve their businesses

I currently work with a master tailor who owns a workshop with about 10 other tailors and apprentices. Before we started working together he was running his business “dans le noir” which means that he didn’t have a system of accounting whatsoever. He did have tons of notebooks tracking how much work tailor “A” had done and how much tailor “B” did so that he could pay them. He even had a book that noted how much he sold each article of clothing for. The problem is that these books although in decent order served no ultimate purpose. The head tailor had nothing that told him if he was earning or losing money. He made the mistake that most entrepreneurs here make; he judged success by whether or not there was cash in his pocket at the moment. As long as there was some cash in the safe (wooden box with a lock) for the workshop, even if he had taken out several loans in the past month, he felt that he was doing well. One day after I had a shirt made the tailor asked me if I could help him start doing accounting. We started by creating a very simple system that monitored how much money was going in and out. There was a basic table with two arrows representing money coming in and money going out. We detailed his expenses into categories such as, operations (electricity, water, tea for him and the employees throughout the day), materials (buttons, thread, lining for garments), salaries, and personal expenses(money so that his wife could go to the market and buy supplies to make lunch for the whole workshop and his family, loans to family members). I worked with him for about 4 hours one day explaining this system to him. The mini lecture I gave was good but the system came alive when I gave him scenarios mirrored his daily business transactions (ex. Madame Diallo come into the shop and buys a dress for 500FCFA, the electricity bill comes in, tailor “A” asks for an advance on his salary). After the initial session I followed up everyday for two weeks to check his entries to see if they were any errors. At first there were a lot of problems and the tailor was confused. However, these were problems that were beneficial for the tailor. Suddenly he found himself having to justify each expense, each CFA spent by placing it into a column. This made him almost immediately conscious of how much and how often he was spending and receiving money and for what reasons. After the first month of bookkeeping we did a simple Income Statement. We added up his revenues and all of the columns of expenses. After subtracting his costs from his revenues we found that he had a small profit for the month. He also had a total of how much he spent in each category of his expenses. This also brought up some new issues/observations. He realized that he was taking too much money for personal reasons and he needed to create a fixed salary for himself. He also realized that his workers were taking more advances than the work they were doing. Additionally he recognized that he could use his own profits to reinvest in his business instead of asking for a grant from a NGO. Lastly he became conscious of the effect of some cultural elements such as buying tea or supplying lunch for the whole workshop on his profits (nothing has changed but it is better that he is now consciously buying tea everyday knowing how it plays into his profits) .

We continued with the system and the next month he was in the negative. This was because of a loan he took to buy a new machine and to build a porch for his store front. The fact that he lost money when compared to the last month’s revenues showed him that he simply exceeded his means. He really didn’t like the fact that he lost money. This made him think about whether or not taking out the loan was a good idea. He also saw how his employees had once again taken more money than they had generated. He now became determined to find a solution to that particular problem. This problem was due to a cultural factor. In general, there is an African understanding between people if a family member or friend needs money and you have it, you should help them out and give it to them. His workers in a way were taking advantage of this and would come and ask him very often for money to take care of family emergencies or even regular expenses. For example if there was a worker who had already had taken an advance and he was asking for more money because he spent all of his advance already and now needed more money so that he could eat that day, the tailor would give him more money. Because of that a majority of workers owed money to the tailor and were essentially working off debt instead of earning money. However, this became a vicious cycle however since they kept taking loans along the way.

Also there have been other setbacks as well. After I taught him the simple system, he felt very confident. He actually found a free training on accounting in our village run by an NGO. He went and learned a much more complicated system. This included making receipts for every transaction and signatures from each worker everyday. At the end of the training they hadn’t shown him how to make an income statement (the most practical document for him) but promised to do a follow up in a couple of weeks. Unfortunately they took four weeks to do the follow up and when they did come the person who came didn’t know how to answer the tailor’s questions. Eventually the people who ran the training had left my village and left the tailor with an incomplete system that he didn’t really understand. So for about 2 months the tailor had followed their system and became discouraged because he didn’t have a real understanding of what he was doing. At first I didn’t do anything because I didn’t want to step on the NGO’s toes since it seemed that they were trying to help him reach a higher level of accounting. But when for all intents and purposes they abandoned him I then tried to help him adapt the system. The system didn’t make much sense, had no real way of monitoring progress and seemed superfluous. At that point I recommended that we go back to the simple system that we started with.

Today, months and income statements later we are still working together and now the system has evolved to a more sophisticated system that includes: a general ledger, a cash book, a book to follow the work of each tailor, a book to follow the trends of clients, and an idea/future projects book. It’s simple enough for the tailor to do in his free time and advanced enough to give him all the information he needs on how his business is doing. We have also found solutions to a lot of the problems that were plaguing the business. All this came from a simple table that showed money going in and money going out. Once he understood the system of accounting the problems that he had in management revealed themselves. By seeing a big difference in his revenues and profits he naturally tried to minimize his costs in each category so that he would maximize his profits. For that to happen he had to address issues such as where he bought his inputs, how he paid his employees, how he paid himself, how he spent his profits, and how to accomplish his future goals with his own money. These are just a couple of examples of how accounting made the tailor start thinking about all different sorts of issues that ultimately helped him improve his business.

2005-07-20T18:23:00.000Z

What's up all.

So I've added a counter to the website. I've got a feeling that some of you are checking it out without leaving comments. Leave comments! It really makes my day to read your words in my little internet cafe in the middle of the desert. Anyways all is good here and I'll be doing some traveling. There is a conference for volunteers who will be helping out with the next training group who is coming in August. It's always fun helping America's cope with the conditions here. You also get looked at as an expert because you can function under the conditions here. Anyways check out this link.
http://www.aznraps.com/public_site/news/articles/2005/07-11-05_etan_david/index.shtml
My guy David Yi from college is on the road to being a hot producer. For all of you in DC...he's the one that produced the spoken word track with Etan Thomas of the Washington Wizards being played on WPGC 95.5 currently. So yeah I'll be back soon as I'll be getting regular internet for the next 2 weeks.

2005-07-17T12:41:00.000Z

Salut et bienvenu au blog de Ryan.
What's up. I have nothing of real substance to say to kick this thing off but take a look at the pictures and enjoy. I've got about 4 months left here in Burkina Faso with the Peace Corps and then maybe Inch Allah I'll be off to Senegal to do one more year in Saint Louis, Senegal with the Peace Corps program there. I'm sure Nelly would approve. I'll try and post something new soon. Till then prends soin de toi.

2005-07-17T12:31:00.000Z

Here is my toilet..so to speak. It's really funny to me that this is what it comes down to. Yes I'm a volunteer that lives in a bigger city and I do have some amenities that some volunteers don't (phone, electricity, cold drinks), but this seems to be the common denominator. Only in Africa can you be so far ahead and behind at the same time. "Yeah, we got cellphones now, but that toilet thing..we'll get around to that" ;)

2005-07-17T12:28:00.000Z

Here is the view from my porch. There is a neighbor's kid playing on a broken chair. Almost as fun as the Fisher Price variety. The two tin doors are the "showers" where you bathe with a bucket. To the right of that is a spicket. That is where all the water comes from. Usually you fill up a bucket take it back to your house to do whatever...laundry, dishes, cook, etc. On the far left is the latrine.

2005-07-17T12:24:00.000Z

Here is what the row of houses looks like. You can see my bike sticking out on the second porch from the end. As may be expected I live amongst Burkinabé, in fact the clostest American is 25 miles away on a dirt road. During the hot season the courtyard is full of people sleeping as it is too hot to sleep indoors.

2005-07-17T12:23:00.000Z

Here is my porch. On it is my Peace Corps issued Mountain Bike..which has allowed me to go around 1000km to date. The bucket is full of my dishes which I procrastinate doing..it's just not the same without a sink. The big A-frame is a pull-up bar constructed by a local metal worker, and next to that the H-frame which is a dip bar.

2005-07-17T12:20:00.000Z

Here is my big front room (the kitchen is on the other side). I have it hooked up to my laptop and that allows me to play my music and watch movies and TV shows that I have saved on my 80GB external hard drive. Who knew, but it is in Peace Corps where my music collection went from 5GB to 80GB. I have 40 straight days of music altogether which is good because I don't like listening to the same song again for about 40 days (on average).

2005-07-17T12:17:00.000Z

Here is my "kitchen" more like a corner in my front room. To the right is my $300 water filter (gone are the days of having to have to boil water to make it potable). It is sitting on top of the gas bottle that powers my stove which is much like the camping variety. Next to that is a green container, that is where I store my water for bathing, drinking, and occassionally swimming . Above that is one of the speakers for my stereo system. On the table next to that is my blender. If it wasn't for that thing I would really be suffering. Thanks to the blender I've had many a mango smoothie.

2005-07-14T14:17:00.000Z

something new for ya