Almost there...

In only a few more days I will finally be leaving Canada. Jeannette, Kevin and I leave Pearson at 6:50 on Sunday night, have a short layover in Paris, and land in Ouagadougou on Monday. Yesterday I finally started packing- mostly just so I can figure out what I still have to buy before leaving. I find that packing itself is not all that difficult. The harder part is figuring out how to tie up all the loose ends before going. It's strange to think that one week from now I'll be in Ouagadougou for orientation training and shortly after that I'll be moving on to Yako for the next eight months.

For those of you who have only started reading my blog recently, here's the two minute run-down on what I'm doing and expecting for the coming year:

•  I will be living in Yako, Burkina Faso. Yako is home to about 25,000 people and is about 100km to the northwest of Ouagadougou (the capital city).
• I'll be working with the organization SEMUS along with two other students from the University of Waterloo. I will likely be involved in some of the environmental initiatives that the organization is running. One is a community gardens project and the other is a reforestation project working with farmers in rural villages.
• The official language of Burkina Faso is French, however only about 20% of the people in the country are able to speak French. The majority still use indigenous languages. In my office, the working language will be French, however we will have a translator accompany us when visiting smaller villages. My French is a bit rusty, but will hopefully be back up to par after a couple of weeks.
• While the typical North American novelties (specifically food) will be fairly readily available in the capital, this is not the case in Yako where the market will be the main source of food and clothing (I'm excited about that!)
• The pace of life in Burkina Faso is very different from Canada. The pace of life is slower than it is here, partly due to the heat, but also because the culture is much more relaxed and seems to place a stronger emphasis on relationships than productivity.
• Internet connections can be fairly unpredictable (along with electricity and water supply). As a result, I may not be able to give updates on my adventures as often as I would like. Nevertheless, I will make an effort to give an update every 2-3 weeks.

A bientot mes amis!