Sunday, May 13, 2007

Hiding Out from the Heat

Not much has been going on since dad and Gwen left. It has been too hot to think really and I have been spending a lot of time hanging out at the pool in Koudougou in order to avoid the heat. I realize that it may seem crazy to bike two hours there and another to hours back just to swim, but, believe me, it is more than worth it!

The theatre troupe recently finished a tournee of the local villages doing a Moringa play. This will officially conclude the district wide series of Moringa sensibilisations we started last summer. We passed through each of the 12 villages at least 4 times. Also, I recently synthesized the results on the baby weighing study, however, the study was too small to really see a significant change.

The group and I are also currently still working with a group of returned Peace Corp volunteers from Burkina to get our sound equipment. We are currently awaiting the final decision so everyone please think positive thoughts.

Currently I am working with a women's group on a variety of environmental projects. They are going to plant alley crops of Moringa trees in their peanut fields to see if there is a higher crop yield. They are also planting a hard wood nitrogen fixing tree as a living hedge around their gardens. This way they don't have to chop down trees to make their fences. Since they use wood to cook, they can use branches from the living hedge and therefore will not have to go into the forest to search for firewood. This will save their time and the forest. Finally, I have a contraption that makes fuel bricks to use in place of fire. The bricks are made of peanut shells, dried leaves and recycled paper. This will hopefully cut down on wood usage. The women have been making and using the bricks. They told me the other day that they really enjoy using them because they last a long time. Then, one women said, "We can use these during the rainy season when the wood is wet." I hadn't even thought of this but it is true that last year my family went without eating dinner more than a few nights because the wood was to wet to prepare food. The women are thinking about selling the bricks.

Well, that is a quick update on my activities. Not much else is going on.