Luck Of The Irish

Written By Mollie Cohen

Our time at APIL is coming to an end, and this week we entered our penultimate week of work. However, as sad as that is, ICS are kind enough to provide us with an abundance of forms and documents to complete before we end our placement. We are almost 99% sure this is just a preventative measure - preventative of our tears. In reality the forms weren’t actually too bad, the only complication is the amount of laptops that we have in our team, but sharing is caring after all. Although throughout our time at APIL there has been some disappointment regarding the logistical and communication issues with holding our awareness raising sessions, it is clear from filling out the ‘team debrief’ and ‘narrative report’ that we have done so much preparation and so much work to be proud of – regardless of whether there is a lack of ticks on our checklist.

Salifou and Khader working together to
lead the team for the day

This week there was also an interesting development in the team leader challenge, this week we were to lead in pairs. Mary and Dramane took the reigns on Tuesday, followed by Mollie and Josephine; Khader and Salifou, Albert and Amy, and finally Sonia and Augustin. Many of the members of our team are considering being team leaders themselves in the future and this task was a very realistic look at how to manage being a co-team leader.

On Thursday afternoon we held a cultural exchange on ‘public holidays’ and ‘festivals’. This wasn’t in the original schedule of the day but after experiencing a lengthy power cut, which left all our precious electricals dead, and our precious, precious wifi dead also, a nice light-hearted discussion about our different cultures was a good back-up. The Brits learned that there are a number of different public holidays in Burkina, many of which have historical context. For example, every year on the 15^th October Burkinabes take to the streets to protest and question their government – why has Thomas Sankara’s murderer not been brought to justice yet?  There are also a number of non-culture-specific holidays that are widely celebrated across Burkina, including Christmas. Although this wasn’t that surprising considering that Burkina is a very religious country, it was interesting that the way they celebrate is very similar to how we celebrate in the UK; including, having a Christmas tree, midnight mass on Christmas Eve, having a big meal with all of your family and of course Christmas music. Although, we aren’t sure if Mariah Carey and Wham! have made it as far as Burkina Faso yet.

Albert, Dramane and Augustin getting into the spirit

Leading nicely on from our cultural exchange on Thursday, where everyone was clearly instructed to wear green on Friday, came St. Patrick’s Day.  In terms of work everything was normal… but as soon as it turned 3pm the ruckus commenced. Amy whipped out her green eyeliner and starting adorning everyone’s cheeks with shamrocks; green and orange paints were smeared across people’s arms and foreheads to make the Irish flag; and some glitter was thrown about for fun. Mollie and Amy then attempted to demonstrate and instruct some Irish dancing, which was actually very successful. Salifou might actually have been a leprechaun in a previous life. 

Come Sunday night, although the week was ending, the fun was not. All of the Burkinabe volunteers from both APIL and Kabeela clubbed together to throw the UK volunteers a party at Barry’s host home. There was a lot of food and drink; crepes, tofu, a yummy version of Burkina scotch eggs, salad, fish, chips, and CHAMPAGNE. We danced the night away – or danced till 8.30pm, before everyone raced to their bikes to make curfew, because yes we are all responsible volunteers.