Lucy In Burkina Faso

Culture shock

So after a lovely weekend including music, African dancing and swimming it was time to start work with my partner organisations Handicap Solidaire Burkina (HSB) and Tigoungnonma.

I’m not sure how much I have already explained about HSB and Tigoungnonma but here goes a brief summary of each. This summary is quite difficult as the longer Im with HSB and Tigoungnonma the more I am finding at about them.

Handicap Solidire Burkina...

Are a group of disabled people who have come together to try and help other disabled people within the community. To try and do this they offer services such as a drop in centre where anyone with a disability can come by and get advice and talk about the problems they face, a day centre for disabled children on a Thursday morning, make visits to the homes of families with disabled children to see how their families are coping and the children are been treated and organise disabled sporting events. HSB’s main problem is funding which severely limits what they are able to do and means most of the members of staff are unpaid. A recent donation from a mining company has mean that HSB have recently been able to reopen “Espace Bambino” which is a day centre for disabled children. However this donation will only allow HSB to keep the centre open for a year and only allows them to have 15 children in once a week and they still have very few resources such as toys, specialised teachers and specialised equipment.

Tigoungnonma...

Tigoungnoma is a bit easier to explain they are a section of HSB and are based in the same office. Tigoungnonma are a group of disabled artisans producing a variety of great products ranging from leather work, ceramic pots, paintings, wooden toys and jellewery. Tigoungnomas main problem is the marketing and selling of their products as there are a lot of artisans in Burkina and not that many people to sell the products to.

Plan of action

Our first week working with HSB has been a lot about finding our feet and trying to work out what we are able to do to help out the most while in my head I hope to get lots of funding and donations for HSB and solve all of their problems I’m beginning to realise that this may not be possible and that sometimes the small things we can do will be appreciated as much as the big things. HSB have given us pretty much a free rein with regards to what they want us to do for them so were still trying to work out what the best course of action is. A factor that isn’t helping much is that absolutely terrible internet connection at the HSB office meaning most small jobs takes all day.

Some of our immediate tasks are to be English lessons, running the Espace Bambino centre, finishing the websites, teaching the staff how to use the websites, teaching the staff to use the facebook pages, running twitter accounts, creating new displays to brighten up the office and running workshops in schools about disabilities.

Long term tasks are to secure more funding for HSB and in particular the Espace Bambino centre and to help improve sales for Tigoungnonma.

Espace Bambino

So on Thursday morning we were set with the task of entertaining 15 disabled children ranging from 6 months-14 years old. Not knowing much about the children who were attending it was quite difficult to prepare so we just decided to wing it. Not having much experience of working with kids I was quite nervous about it all. Heart wrenching would probably be a good way to describe the morning some of the children were unable to sit up unsupported so we had to try our best to keep them sat up while keeping them entertained a hard thing to do when you don’t speak the same language and have no idea what their disabilities is. Most of the children are undiagnosed and their parents really have no idea how to best support them. We did our best and the morning past seemingly without incident however it really struck home though how difficult these sessions are going to be to plan as there’s such a wide variety of disabilities to deal with.

During the morning we also learnt some stories about certain children one of the most upsetting was about a little girl with what is thought to be fluid on her brain making her have a disproportionately large head. When she was born her mother didn’t know what to do so tried to flush her down the latrine when this failed she left her in a bush. Only later on when she felt guilty did she go back and retrieve her. Now since coming to HSB and talking to the staff there and attending the day centre the situation has greatly improved for this little girl and her mum is able to cope a lot better with her disability. Burkinabe women have on average of between 5-6 children and are expected to work throughout their pregnancy and after their baby is born so dealing with a child who needs constant attention must be very tough and unmanageable for many.

Carers simply do not exist in Burkina Faso so when I tell people my job at home they simply do not understand. I coming to realise that Burkina Faso is so completely different from home it’s hard to understand.

A picture from Espace Bambino.

The weekend

All past quite nicely with a lovely meal out for one of the other volunteer’s birthdays, followed by a trip to the pool on Saturday which is much needed in the 44 degree heat and a trip to a mini zoo on Sunday. The mini zoo was not so fun as the animals were in very small cages that didn’t appeared to be cleaned out at all I don’t think there are many regulations on how to treat animals in Burkina. We also experience our first storm since we’ve been here and woke to find that they was now a river outside our house. It’s crazy how extreme the weather is here. One minute its 40 degrees the next everywhere is flooding. I don’t think I will ever moan about the weather in the UK again.