Burkina Trip, pt 9: The end...

I'm really dragging these posts out, huh?  Sometimes life just gets in the way of blogging, and I hope you're all still with me!

 

We left Dano after lunch on Thursday for the 5-ish hour drive back to Ouaga.  Again, it was a long drive full of sights, singing, and long talks.

When they do road construction in Burkina, you drive on the side, on a true dirt road.  As you can see, it's a narrow passage for 2 cars.

 It's hard to tell, but these are people in this lake, fishing for food.

 Troy has kind of an obsession with these trees.

 We were traveling light compared to these guys.

 Two ladies and 2 babies on this moto!  So different from America where every kid better be wearing a helmet!

 We let them stay up late on their last night together.  They enjoyed Despicable Me 2 on the huge screen of my iPad!

Friday felt like a strange day.  I'm so used to getting up and heading to the airport in the mornings if we are going on a trip.  An 11pm departure was weird for us!
Troy and Philip headed to Souly's new house in the morning.  We met Souly and his friend, Tall, earlier in the week and were invited to come see his new house.

The men knew they were going to see the house but had no idea that Souly waited to actually open the doors until they could see it!  What an honor!

Souly and his wife, Ami, in their new house for the first time.

Ami had prepared a full meal, to (pronounced "toe")-the white stuff and some fish sauce (dehydrated fish, peanuts, veggies).  The men ate while the women watched and served.  It was a very fancy meal by Burkina standards.

The neighborhood kids.

When the men returned from Souly's, we headed out to an orphanage.  This sweet girl walked right up to Troy, arms raised to be picked up.  Yeah, I could handle bringing her home with me, too!

Lunchtime!  Two babies share a bowl but each get their own spoon.  The boy was sick..and sharing a bowl with the little girl... Wonder why they're always sick??

These guys were going to town on lunch!

I enlisted Emily's help.  This girl LOVES babies!

After the orphanage, it was time for lunch at the Ver Dwayont (I have no idea how to spell it!).  Emily said this place has the best ice cream!

The infamous Fraise Melba!

Their faces crack me up!

After lunch it was rest time.  The afternoon was spent playing and enjoying our last hours together.  After dinner at The Rec, we headed to the airport.  Tall, Souly's friend, came to the airport to say goodbye to Troy.  We couldn't believe he made such an effort!  I wasn't prepared to say goodbye so soon at the airport.  I expected to be able to check our bags and get our tickets first, but in Burkina, only people with tickets can go through the doors to the ticket counters.

After one last group hug, we were off! 

Getting checked in was nerve-wracking since we didn't know the language, but it really went smoothly.  We got fingerprinted again, went through the x-ray machines, and had our bags searched at the gates too.  Finally, we boarded and were headed home!

In Brussels we encountered yet another reason to dislike United: somehow just my ticket was cancelled for just that flight!  Really?!?  They were able to get me back on the plane but unable to seat us together.  Thankfully another passenger realized it was in his best interest to switch seats to put me next to Jonas!

Customs in Newark was a breeze, but our layover was LOOONGG!  The kids were pretty fried:

Thankfully, they both slept on the final flight; Jonas for almost the entire thing!  It was so nice to get home, take a hot shower, and sleep in a house with A/C!  The next morning it was a sweet reunion with Lachlan and Poppy (who slept great while I was gone, in case you were wondering)! 

We are glad to be home but constantly remembering and talking about what we saw and did in Africa and what we are going to do with it.  My friend Kathryn told me, "Africa changes you"; she was so right!  How can we be the same after seeing such tragedy, heartbreak, and poverty?

Matheny's, thanks for having us and know that it definitely wasn't our last visit!!

 

Burkina Trip, part 8: Land

When we finished at the well, we headed out to look at some land.  This land on the hill was given to the Dano team for an orphanage.  The plans are still being worked on, but the facility will look more like a transitional living center than an orphanage.  The goal isn't to take children out of families but to equip families to take care of children.  Oh, it's so exciting to see what's going to happen!

After a very full 24 hours of seeing the sights and a quick lunch, we were in the truck again!  This time we were headed back to Ouaga for our final night in Burkina.  It was hard to believe we'd done so much in just 6 short days!

Burkina Trip, part 7: Living Water wells

We woke up early the next morning to go into a village to rehab a well.  We dragged the kids along this time.  They thought riding in the back with no seats was pretty fun.

 Here's the well.  All the men were gatherer here.

 All the women and children gathered a little bit away, under a tree.  They brought out their nicest (plastic) chairs for us to sit on.  And then they all looked at us.

Sara and I weren't sure what to do!  The kids tried some songs, but then the people just stared harder and more quietly!

 Look at these sweet faces!

 These guys were pretty excited to have their picture taken.  They got really excited when I showed it to them. I wondered if they even knew which one was them; have they ever seen themselves in a mirror?

 After a short 45 minutes, it turned out the well had been satisfactorily repaired the day before.  Everyone gathered around for a prayer. 
Can you see our chairs back there under that tree?

 This little girl amazed me.  She was in charge of caring for that baby on her back all morning!  She's probably not older than Jonas!

 After the prayer, the kids headed out to hand out gum to the kids.  It was kind of a swarm, but they handled it well!

 We were especially proud of Jonas since this was WAY out of his comfort zone.

It was so fun to listen to our kids talking about which kids they gave gum to and how happy they seemed!

Burkina Trip, part 6: Widows' Garden

After visiting the infants, we headed to a plot of land where a Widows' Garden is being prepared.  In Burkina, widows are typically left to fend for themselves.  In addition to orphans, the Bible commands us to take care of widows, and that's the plan for this plot of land.

Can you tell how big it is?

These men are being paid to prepare the land and have dug several wells for watering within the garden.  When it's ready, each widow will have a section to grow crops for herself, her family, and possibly to sell/trade.
These boys were following us. I'm not sure they'd ever seen white people before!  Troy shared some cashews with them and snapped a quick picture.

The umbilical hernia on the boy on the right is really common in Burkina.  I'm not sure what makes it more common there than here, but when a child has that here, parents almost always opt to correct it.

Burkina Trip, part 5: Infants in Distress

After a quick lunch in Dano, the grown ups headed out to see ministry in action.  The kids stayed home to watch a movie while we headed out to see some infants.

This sweet doll's mother died in childbirth.  She was brought in by a grandmother.  She was so tiny!  We received news the next day that this poor baby had died in the night.  So sad!  I cannot even imagaine.  Did you know in Burkina they don't even name the baby until they're sure it's going to survive?

 Then we visited these twins:

 Again, mom had died in childbirth.  This aunt took the babies in, as well as a sister.  The 6 (!) other children were split among other relatives.  This woman had to quit her job to take care of these babies.

 This was her home, where the roof had partially collapsed.

 This child was sleeping inside the house; we're not really sure who she belongs to.

Seeing these babies and the difference being made in this village was inspiring and makes us want to do more somehow!

Burkina Trip, part 4: Roadtrip to Dano

After 2 nights in Bobo, we were on the road again!  This time we were headed to Dano, the town the Richters live in.  We were so excited to see the ministries they're doing there and to hear their dreams for the future.

It was a "short" 2ish hour drive.  We were thankful to not be pulled over on this journey.  We passed lots of bush taxis like this one:

 And markets like this:

 These roadside villages amaze me.  I just cannot imagine living like this:

 Goats always get the right of way.

 This bus was loaded with people, motos, and water containers.  As a side note, this one has a soccer player on the back, but we saw at least one with Obama on the back.

 This little trip was short compared to the others, and we were so thankful to arrive just in time for lunch with the Richters!

Burkina Trip, part 3: Bobo

After 3 nights in Ouaga, it was time for our first road trip.  We loaded up early Monday morning for the 5-hour drive to Bobo, where the Matheny's are renting a house.

We travelled African-style, with all of our belongings strapped to the top of our car. 

 There were 10 of us in the car:  our 4, the Matheny 5, and Paul, Philip's language tutor.  Not 10 minutes into our trip, we were pulled over by the police!  I can't tell you how stressful that experience was!  We were so thankful to have Paul with us since none of us are fluent in French.  It turned that some of the paperwork said only 9 people could ride in our car even though it had 10 seatbelts!  Apparently, white people get pulled over a lot in Burkina since we probably have money to pay a bribe.  That's what happened here.  The police officer asked for a certain amount of money, and Philip offered him less.  He took the money, and we were back on the road, praying that was the only time we got stopped!

About halfway into the trip, a tummy ache set in for poor Reef.  We stopped once at a gas station, where it took them awhile to even find a toilet, and Troy says it was the worst toilet he's ever seen!  The next time we stopped, it was in some bushes on the side of the road.

 FINALLY, after 7 hours in the car, we arrived in the city of Bobo.  I'd say this road trip might have been my least favorite part of the whole trip.  Can you see the mosque in the back of this picture?  It has logs sticking out of it; my boys were sure they could climb to the top using those logs.

 The Bobo house has bunnies!

Upon arrival at the house, we sat down to a typical Burkina meal of "rice and sauce" that the housekeeper had left for us.  While not my favorite meal ever, Sara and I were thankful not to have to cook dinner.

Reef woke the next day feeling much better.  The kids set out to explore the gardens and feed the bunnies.

 The plan for our only full day in Bobo was to visit the local orphanage.  First, we drove to pick up Paul.

 The amount of stuff they piled on the buses amazed us!

 These guys were playing outside Paul's gate.

 This is where this neighborhood goes to get water.

 Another bus/bush taxi.

 I have tons of pictures from the orphanage, but the director asked us not to put them on the internet.  You'll just have to ask to see them in person.  The orphanage was tough; the smell was enough to make me run back outside.  The toddlers were excited to see us, and then we headed to the baby room.  There were 7 or 8 babies on a rug in a room all by themselves.  Oh, how I wanted to bring some home with me!  Jonas struggled with the smell and too much attention from a toddler almost as big as him, so he headed outside, but Reef loved those babies.  He says this was the highlight of the trip for him!
That night we had smoothies for dinner, celebrated the arrival of another care package for the Matheny's, and presented Emily and Titus with letters from the Northside kids.

 Then Philip and Troy headed out to have tea with Jack, the night guard.  They were gone for a really long time!

 They had special tea (in a glass that Jack cleaned with his finger), visited with other guards on the street, and learned that Jack is armed with a slingshot that shoots both rocks and arrows.

Troy thought is was so cool that he bought it from him for Survivor.

After 2 short nights in Bobo, we were on the road again to visit the Richters, the Oak Hills missionaries in Dano.  Before leaving town, we visited Paul one more time.  These guys were trying to pick mangoes just outside his gate.