Toubabou!

I’ve begun to adjust to having kids stare at me. One of the first Dioula words I learned was “toubabou,” which means “white.” It sounds almost singsong the way a lot of the kids yell it as I go by. Other times they call me “la blanche,” or proudly say “bonjour!” which I think must be because they’re learning French at school. It’s pretty cute, even though it’s totally weird to have people know you only as “white girl.” [Sidebar: All of my spellings of Dioula are going to be phonetic, since I’m hearing it without seeing it.]

The one thing that I still find hard to get used to is the way that everyone multitasks. For example, we’ll be sitting in a bar to conduct interviews, or just chatting, and people will walk through selling goods that they’re carrying. People at the table will stop and examine things (like clothing, or shoes), take phone calls (people really love talking on the phone), and carry on the conversation. It’s pretty impressive. I guess the way we spend all our time on the phone playing on the internet, they spend it on phone calls instead. 

It’s funny how quickly everyday sounds become background noises we hardly notice – at Penn State, it’s the [constant] chiming of the bell tower, and in Bobo it’s the Mosque’s calls to prayer. Amadou told me that about 75% off Bobo is muslim, although given the prevalence of beer and the fact that most women don’t wear any sort of veils, it doesn’t seem to be the hardcore variant.

  

I also learned that in Burkina, weddings are on Thursdays and Saturdays. Amadou said that often the official ceremony at the Mosque is Thursday, and the real party is Saturday (or it will be one after another on Thursday). Weddings are also typically in December/January and June. People will drive around the city honking their scooters (mobylettes), and the parties we drove past were big and filled with music and dancing. It looks like a lot of fun.