A Day In The Life Of ...

This is our last full day with Kathy Arnett, the missionary from Cote d’Ivoire who is here helping us get oriented. We have been bombarding her with questions about language and culture, but she has been so patient and helpful. We’re so glad she came! We spent the day getting ready for language classes (which start on Wed) and exploring the city. Here are some of the things we did:

In the morning, we met with Kathy to discuss our language classes. We are expected to spend 35-40 hrs/week learning French. Classes start on Wed!









After the meeting we headed to a very nice bookstore called Diacfa to purchase French-English dictionaries. Most of the books were very expensive but we managed to find some reasonably priced dictionaries.
















We also went to a store called Orca, which the missionaries called the West African Wal-Mart. It is true – this three-story store was stocked with everything you can imagine, including Christmas decorations, kitchen wares, furniture, clocks, toys, and office supplies. We’re learning you can find pretty much anything here as long as you’re willing to pay the price.













In the afternoon we walked to the market, where Kathy taught us how to bargain for pagnes (cloth that is used as a wrap-around skirt). Here's Emily looking a little skeptical about the price that's being offered:


The streets in downtown Ouagadougou are insane – so crowded with people, cars, motos, and bicycles that it’s almost impossible to drive:


Fortunately, a few streets aren’t too bad; this is one of the main streets in town, and the traffic seems to be more civilized:


We’re looking forward to starting language classes soon so that we’ll actually be able to communicate with people! Please pray we’ll be able to retain all we can without getting too frustrated.