Long bus rides

Hello!

One and a half hours til I'm free for Christmas! I'm really not being very productive at work today... But it's Christmas, so what can people expect?

I got back from the wedding in Ouaga yesterday morning, and I figure I should write about it before I get to lazy/preoccupied with Christmas things.

First of all, here are some pictures: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2273703&l=add84&id=13602253 I'm going to try to get Cédric's too - he took a bunch of things that I missed. He actually gets teased for being 'le japonais' because he takes so many pictures :)

In general it was pretty fun! We left Wednesday night at 8pm on a big, nice, air-conditioned bus (although sadly no toilets on the bus). The driver seemed ok at first, but we realised a few hours in that he wasn't quite on top of things... First he hit some huge pot-holes and the front of the bus actually lifted off the ground, and then around midnight we realised that he'd gotten lost! He took the road to Parakou (going towards Niger) instead of the road to Natitingou (Burkina). While trying to turn around, he managed to back the bus up off the highway and it got stuck - the wheels weren't touching the ground because there was a big drop off the side of the road. So we sat in some teeny town by the side of the road from 12:30am until 7am, when the driver and some helpful passengers managed to shove enough rocks, boards, logs, etc, under the back wheels so that the bus could move. I slept for a while on the road on my scarf, and then sitting in a chair in the little shop that finally opened around 3am (the police who came woke the shop-keeper up and she fed us boiled eggs). Around 7 we finally got going again and made it (without incident) to Ouaga around 9pm. It was an INCREDIBLY long day!

It had originally been planned that the UNHCR people (me, Florence, Cédric, and Yves) would stay in a hotel, but when we got to Ouaga it was decided that we would stay with Mme. Asse (also from UNHCR and mother of the bride)'s brother, Bébé, who lives in Ouaga 2000. Yes, his name is actually Bébé, even though he's probably 45 or 50. And the other brother's name is Doudou. We finally got to Bébé's around 10pm with all of our stuff, and my work people decided they were going to go out! I opted to go to bed as I could barely hold my head up. And it was a good decision - they stayed out til 4am!

Friday morning was spent just hanging around and planning things, and in the afternoon we went to this weird crocodile place. There are lots of pictures of it. It was vaguely amusing, but kind of odd at the same time. And I felt really bad for the poor chicken that was used as crocodile bait... Friday night we went out to eat roasted chicken and then went out for drinks. It was actually really fun! I think I managed to prove to my colleagues that I'm not lame (they thought I was very lame for going to bed the night before), and everyone had a good time :)

Saturday was wedding time, which was fun. In the early afternoon there was the church service part, which was pretty standard, and later there was the civil ceremony at City Hall. Both were un-eventful although fun. After there was a giant reception, although we didn't stay very long because we had to go back home and start cooking for the reception Mme. Asse was hosting Sunday afternoon. We chopped and prepared from maybe 7:30 til 11:30, and then some started again Sunday morning at 4am (no one woke me up so I only got up to start cooking at 8am...). I actually have blisters from cutting so much! The second reception went well, though, and I think everyone was very happy.

Sunday night we watched some weird French movie and then I went to bed pretty early in order to get up at 3:30am to take the bus home again Monday morning. Sadly, even though we got there on time at 4:30am the bus didn't leave til 6:30... Boo. And we got back to Cotonou around 1am.

Now I'm ridiculously tired, even though I didn't come into work yesterday morning (although I worked while lying in bed because I felt guilty)... But one hour til I can go home! And I'll nap and then prepare food for the Christmas dinner I'm going to tonight.

I should go do at least something in my last hour... I hope everyone has a good Christmas! I really miss Christmas at home - it's just not the same here without snow and family. Sigh.

love Katie