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Medium-sized Trees - 19/02/07
Another week, another West
African state.
The journey from Tanguieta in Northern Benin to Ouagadougou was,
as expected, long and arduous. We left the hotel the morning
after the night before (the "chicken" night), and walked towards
town, only to be picked up by a bus coming to collect us, word
gets around fast in these towns and they obviously were keen to
fill their bus. After the usual packing of the roof and
squashing us like sardines inside we eventually left at 8am. By
10am we had made the 50km to the border, after several times
stopping, once to let a mad woman out who saw someone she knew
and decided that it was more important to talk to them than to
make this trip. We also stopped when the driver thought there
were bandits ahead, everybody panicked, except us as we were in
blissful ignorance until after the event, but in any case it
turned out to be a bus with a puncture! There were also stops
for no apparent reason, someone complaining, we stop, everybody
out, a bit of shouting and everybody re-boards in exactly the
same place.
The border formalities were surprisingly easy and free of any
payments, although the Burkina Faso officials had trouble
recognising their own visa. Just after the Burkina border we
had our first major delay, we waited by the side of the
road in the heat of the day until eventually our driver put us
in another bus and paid their driver. He gave us the coveted
front seats, much to the dismay of a posh couple who had
travelled with us from Tanguieta and had already staked their
claim. It is great in West Africa that when you pay a journey,
if you change vehicles along the way the driver pays the next
driver their share, you pay once and they do the rest, a far cry
from some countries, India or Indonesia for instance where they
would probably try to make you pay double the full fare each
time!
We stopped in every village enroute to Fada N'Gourma, just 80km
from the border. At each village were vendors selling
unidentifiable fruits, snacks and drinks. There were also those
at a loose end who just came to stare at us, this is the same
(in some cases much worse) all over the world! And always there
are a couple of typical African women, loud and throzing their,
both proverbial and very real, weight around. The landscape of
this part of the Sahel is unending scrub, dusty plains and
nothing but medium-sized trees as far as the eye can see.
Sometimes, very occasionally, one might wish for an AC bus with
tinted windows, keeping the sun out and ones identity in. Only
occasionally, but maybe, in the heat of the day, inching closer
to the Sahara?
We arrived in Fada at 3:30pm, Eighty kilometres in four hours on
good roads, not bad going! There were still 220km to
Ouagadougou. By now the sun was beginning to cool and in the
fading light we followed the trails left by herds of cows,
and passed children playing football, kicking up dust storms.
With 130km still to cover we were transferred again, but this
was the last time, and with darkness now upon us there were not
so many people to halt our progress.
We arrived in Ouaga after dark, at the Gare d'Est, 10km from the
centre. A demented taxi driver offered us a ride but was unable
to follow instructions, even after stopping at a hotel for a
translation, so we paid him and abandoned him at a junction,
unsure whether he would be able to find his way back to the bus
station. We managed to find beds at the Foundation Charles
Dufour, where apparently the profits from the rooms pays for the
upkeep of 20 local street kids, a worthy cause. I just hope the
hairdressing bills of the female staff did not come out of the
profits.
By this time the only food available to us was a big plate of
chips each, what a shame, cooked up by a couple of enterprising
young kids in a cafe.
Ouagadougou
Ouaga, as it is affectionately known by the locals, is a
surprisingly nice city and everybody was friendly and welcoming
to us. It also appears to be quite rich, despite Burkina Faso
being one of the worlds five poorest countries. There was even
a supermarket with about 50 types of imported cheeses, 100
French wines and various other delicatessen delights. It seemed
to be run by a group of Middle Eastern men, as was the all night
liqour superstore. Despite the relaxed atmosphere there was not
actually much to see or do and so, after eating well, acquiring
Malian visas and catching up with the world via the Internet we
soon headed on for the south-west of Burkina. It seemed a shame
to leave behind the excitement of touring the supermarket for
the, perhaps more mundane, pleasures of hippo spotting and
climbing waterfalls!
Bobo-Dioulasso is Burkinas second largest city and seems to
enjoy some friendly rivalry with the capital, especially with
regards the choice of preferred beer. Whilst being as friendly
as Ouaga, Bobo also has some amazing Sahelian architecture, the
best examples being the Mosque-styled train station and the
towering centre of the Grand Marche. On our first night in Bobo
there was an open-air concert in the train station car park by a
French soundsystem, Improvisateurs Dub. Whilst not my sort of
thing at all, it was interesting to see the way the locals
reacted, everyone interested and enjoying it, most of them
dancing as if they had heard the music all their life. Of
course I thought the sound system members to be very
pretentious, but it is probably more my problem than theirs.
Still, we enjoyed a beer and BBQ chicken whilst watching the
goings-on.
Bobo also has a very traditional Sahelian mosque and we visited
this in conjunction with a walk around Kibidwe, the old
district, very different to the rest of town, buildings
(including Bobo's oldest) built from mud bricks, crammed
together across winding alleys. We also saw a local brewery,
making the millet beer, a blacksmith and a tailors and the
sacred fish in the river, which are surprisingly similar to cat
fish, but clearly sacred.
Sahelian mosque, Bobo Dioulasso
Close to Bobo is the town of
Banfora. Uninspiring in itself but close to a few natural
attractions. We got a room in the local office of the Red
Cross, hired a moped (one of the peddle-and-go variety) and set
out to explore. The first stop was the Karfiguela Waterfalls.
They were actually quite impressive, even to someone as cynical
of waterfalls and caves as I am. The water comes down over
giant rocks into the river, flanked on either side by mango
trees. The highlight was, after climbing to the top, the view
over the surrounding area, a view that was stereotypically
African, undulating acres of trees, lakes, dusty roads and, over
it all, the sun burning everything from above.
Karfiguela Waterfalls
From Karfiguela we crossed the
country along the, even more, backroads to Tengrela Lake. We
had to ask directions every kilometre but everyone was happy to
oblige, probably amused at our steed, hobbling us along at an
unimaginably slow speed. Tengrela is famous for its colony of
hippo's and we took a pirogue trip to see them. We got very
close, a bit too close considering that the hippopotamus is
responsible for more human deaths in Africa than any other
animal! We were about 20metres away watching them bathe, they
may not be the most beautiful animal or graceful bather but they
are fascinating to watch, especially when one made to charge at
us.
Hippos at Tengrela Lake
We just had time to return to Bobo, watch Norwich capitulate
against Chelsea on live TV, enjoy more beer and chicken and
prepare to leave for Mali.
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