An Atypical Night

I stopped by la nuit atypique de Koudougou (The Atypical Koudougou Night) yesterday. It's an arts festival in my regional capital Koudougou which is one of the largest cities in Burkina known for its rebellious tendencies. The night was certainly atypical in the sense that there were more foreign people than normal (mostly French folks) and the traffic seemed more life-threatening due to the influx of tourists. Although even more atypically the traffic parted almost biblically just as we needed to cross the street to the festival.

I didn't go last year so it was very surprising to see stages and booths set up in a city that I frequent. It had a sort of county fair or folk festival feel--an eerily Americana-like atmosphere with an African flare. The booths were packed with art, crafts, foods and clothes. I bought some shiny fabric for a shirt (can't get enough loud fabrics) and a large bag of garlic/parsley cashews, which will probably only last for one sitting because of how delicious they are.

What little we saw of the music and performances was a bit strange (maybe more appropriately labeled atypical, although I am not sure they are atypical for Burkina). We did not actually stay for the headliners. When we arrived there was a lot of booty shaking with strange sound effects and a cigarette swallowing magic act. It's just better not to ask what exactly that means.

We went into the fair with some friends of the Koudougou PCVs including a former university English Club president, a current university English Club president, an artist/comedian and a colleague. Due to the reputation of pick pocketing that high-density events have our friends took on the role of mother hen coralling us to each booth and pecking at the ankles of the stragglers. Our friend who is away to recover from an illness was sending us public service announcements about theft via text messages. It was rather comical.

I was glad to spend part of an evening checking out the festival and I would recommend it to people who happen to be in Burkina in early December, but I wouldn't say it is worth flying to Burkina to see (unless you think a county fair is worth a $3,000 plane ticket). But, I'd say that's atypical.
Sent from my BlackBerry® smartphone from Airtel Burkina Faso.