As you all know, today is International Women's Day, which has been around for nearly a century now. While in some countries it might seem like a silly thing to celebrate (because everyday should be women's day), in others it's quite a big deal and in some it's even a national holiday. In those countries, namely African ones, the streets of the main cities are flooded with parades of representatives of women's groups and civil society in their Sunday best. That's the case in most African countries, such as Côte d'Ivoire, where there's still a long way to go in equality for all. Like in other African countries, the preamble of its constitution is inspired by the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and there are a lot of legal provisions protecting women's rights and promoting equality. But unfortunately the reality on the ground is far from those ideals, and in the day to day life paternalism rules and women are expected to obey their husbands and fathers without any questioning.
I was lucky enough to spend an International Women's Day in Goma a couple of years ago, a city in a region in Eastern Congo that is usually described by media as "war-torn", "hell on earth", etc. Although it was pouring rain, women paraded proudly in front of the authorities, and none of the activities of the day were cancelled. Although every day should be women's day, that's the day when they can show themselves to the world defiantly and show the men that their submission is not going to be around forever.
Here in Côte d'Ivoire the feeling I had today was similar. The city hall (where the main celebration took place) was filled with very well-dressed women representing all layers of society, with only a handful of men representing the local authorities (including the king). Even I was wearing a two-piece dress with a golden pattern and a bow that I got made at a tailor for the occasion.
They gave speeches, they sang, they clapped, they danced and they showed their pride at the little steps they're accomplishing. At the end, they performed a theater play in which two men sitting in a bar complain to each other about their wives being so busy with meetings that sometimes their dinner is late. Their tone and mannierisms were so accurate, that people were almost falling off their chairs from laughter.
Later in the play, one of the "men" in the play was yelling at his wife for her political aspirations because her place is at home. The man wouldn't listen to the women telling him that his wife had the right to her own opinion and to become whatever she wanted to be, which only made him angrier. In the end, a double of Ellen Johnson Sirleaf's entered the stage to show the audience that a woman deserves everybody's respect because she is able to accomplish anything - even become the President of the Republic. If only the parents and her surrounding believe in her and let her have an education. Three cheers for Ma Ellen.
Remember the Yam Festival of the Indénié King, the most important event of the year in the Abengourou region? And do you remember the body paint women traditionally wear on such occasions mostly on their faces and their arms, such as the one pictured on the right? As I explained then, during important celebrations and traditional rituals, women paint their bodies with a type of special white clay called kaolin. They do it as a sign of joy, celebration and purification, and to go with it they typically also wear white and blue outfits as you can see on the picture.
As it turns out, a formidable lady I met once in one of the high schools (she's the president of the parents association) offered me and my friend H to get some kaolin painting done so that we could have a better immersion into the festival's traditions. When we enthusiastically accepted, as it looked very nice on the other women, she took us to a neighbor's house and proceeded to an improvised application of kaolin. Since the ceremony was about to start, there wasn't enough time to create a proper design on us, so she just used her hands and fingers to create some improvised patterns as you can see in this picture of me and her below.
During the few minutes that the painting work took, several neighbors came out to watch the procedure with great curiosity and amusement. When the kaolin artist lady finished, she took a good look at us that should have been of satisfaction but in fact wasn't very pleased: the paint was almost invisible in our all-too-pale bodies. So she tried again to apply some more kaolin clay, but with the same results. Then one of the neighbors suggested to re-paint us with some charcoal, now that would be visible. The ever-growing audience in the yard burst out in laughter. She laughed too, but in the end she took the suggestion and did indeed use some charcoal mixed with the kaolin, and in the end the result wasn't too bad.
A few days ago this sign appeared on one of Abengourou's main street, announcing the pre-selection for Miss Côte d'Ivoire. I have no idea when the competition will actually take place, or how the selection process works, but I'll keep an eye out for the Abengourou representative. And I think it's a nice touch the sign is right next to the main mosque, creating an interesting juxtaposition.
I've talked before about how fascinated I am by the popularity of traditional healers who seem to be able to cure everything from a soul theft to a sore throat, malaria or an evil curse. All with just a few herbs and liquids of uninspiring colors. So of course, you can find them in the market too, selling their magic remedies that will cure anything you could think of. This one, for example, is often sitting outside the main market, just in front of the most popular supermarket in town awesomely-named 'King Cash'.
To enlarge, click on the image.
Judging by the flag on the hand-drawn sign, this 'tradipraticien' as he calls himself, is from Burkina Faso and like everybody else around here has two cell phones. You should click on the image for more detail, since the pictures for all the stuff he can cure or help with are quite funny: apparently he has herbs for snake or bug bites, as well as common ailments such as headache, fever or ear-ache. But also remedies for such diverse things as "male potency" (check out the drawing for that one), swollen breasts, women's periods, poo or even love.
By now everybody knows the impressive aerial photography by Yann Arthus-Bertrand, who apparently got his passion for landscape photography while living in the Maasai Mara national park in Kenya for 3 years during the 1970s. Well, browsing his website today I stumbled upon his pictures taken Côte d'Ivoire, including one from Abengourou. And interestingly, it's not of a landscape, but of a bunch of people looking up. Although I looked really closely for really long, unfortunately I didn't recognize anybody:
There are other photos in the album that I liked, such as this one of a pile of cotton bales taken in the Korhogo area:
Or this other one of people doing laundry in the Adjamé market in Abidjan:
Check out the whole Côte d'Ivoire album here.
I haven't been online much lately mainly due to the rolling blackouts that the CIE (the national electric company) started last weekend. But I keep wanting to post some photos of the famous Yam Festival I attended last Friday at the king's palace (Nanan Boa Kouassi III, pictured on the left) in Abengourou.
According to the king's website, the Yam festival (or fête des Ignames in French), the origin of this festival is that during the hard times of the founding of the Indénié Kingdom a certain type of yams helped them fight hunger and survive, and establish themselves in this region. So honoring yams is a way of honoring the founding fathers of the kingdom, the ancestors and welcome a new and prosperous season. In fact, the Yam Festival marks the start of a new year for the Indénié Kingdom, and everything needs to be renewed, such as the embers in the fires and the water in the containers. And the mortars and other objects of daily usage need to be cleansed.
The celebration, which lasted several hours, included lots of dancing, drums and pantomime. But hte most important part of it was the ritual to honor ancestors, in which a line of royal stools from previous Indénié kings (it's interesting to note that in Europe crowns represent royal power whereas here it's a stool to sit on) were offered various gifts. Including gin, purifying herbs, yam powder and the blood of a freshly sacrificed ram.
Although I didn't enjoy watching the poor ram being killed and bled out, the offering ceremony was the most interesting bit of the day and the whole procedure was interesting to watch. Once that was done, bowls of pounded yam were offered to the attendees, since it was then ok to consume the sacred tubers. All the while some lively music and comic dancers entertained the audience.
And for some reason one goofy dancer (pictured on the right of the picture above) became infatuated with me and so I became the butt of a few jokes and loud laughs. Fortunately one of the distinguised guests (the mayor or some minister) helped me out with a 1000 FCFA note so I could get rid of my insisting admirer after he tried to kiss me several times.
Another anecdote I enjoyed more was being painted with kaolin, a type of white clay or porcelain that women use to paint their bodies as a sign of joy and purification (like the one pictured on the right). You can read more about the experience here, but basically once the women realized the white clay wasn't as visible as in their bodies (obviously), they were extremely amused and I'm sure they talked about it for days.
In spite of the blazing sun and the trying length of the event I felt fortunate to have witnessed it, and having been part of it, somehow part of the Abengourou community for a little fraction of time. My only frustration was not to hear the king's voice, since he never speaks in public but through a spokesperson. He just sits royally wisely observing everything.
> You can check the whole photo album of the famous Yam Festival of the Indénié Kingdom here.
> For more information on the Inénié Kingdom, you can visit their official website [in French].
Abengourou, a royal city
After two weeks freezing my ass off in deep Northern California, it’s been a few days that I’m back in my temporary home in Abengourou. As usual, the excitement and longing of arriving in Côte d’Ivoire for the first time was replaced by anxiety and impatience to be already there. The more I travel, the more I dread the moving party of traveling - I wish teletransportation was already invented.
Before my arrival in Abengourou I spent a night in Abidjan, staying with random strangers found at the airport (but working for the same organization as me), and half a day spent fighting with bureaucratic inefficiency. At least I got to see a couple of friends and eat a 4 cheese pizza before heading to cheeseless Abengourou.
I’m very happy to be back in Côte d’Ivoire, although I’ve replaced cold and fog with dust and ashes in the air, from all the brush and trash burning on every street corner. When I stepped inside the house, my feet left white marks on the floor which was covered with a thick layer of red dust. And every door that I had left open seemed to have grown endless spiderwebs with invisible spiders that it took me forever to get rid of. Only after over two hours of intense moping and killing spiders, was I able to crash on my unbelievable dusty bed. My cold shower felt like heaven.
Typical trash-burning on my street
Surprisingly, my watchmen were still sitting in front of my house although I hadn’t told them when I was coming back. They even seemed genuinely happy to see me again, if only because that meant disrupting their boredom. They immediately requested a new broom to sweep the dust and debris in the terrace.
Besides buying myself a fancy new broom, the next day I also bought considerable food supplies to fill up my fridge again, including abundant chili peppers as is required here. 
The lady where I usually buy my vegetables also seemed happy to see me and wished me a happy new year. Instead of giving me some free lemons as usual, she gave me free mangoes. Mangoes! I keep saying the season is here but then I’m told it isn’t, so could it be finally it?
And asked a friend of a friend from Benin who cooks wonderfully well to teach me some of her specialties that I tried one day. I have been eating way too many mangoes and pineapples since I got back, instead of proper meals. Except on Sunday when I ate some attiéké and fried fish at a new friend’s house, whom I also asked to teach me how to cook some local dishes. I’m afraid I’m much more of an eater than a cook. She seemed more interested in meeting up for some dancing than for cooking. Seeing the way she can shake her ass, I’m terrified to go dancing with her.
Fried fish, chili sauce and attiéké, ground cassava that resembles couscous
Since I got back I've been quite tired, so I’ve been sleeping with earplugs to try to overcome my jetlag as fast as possible. I don’t know if it’s my imagination, but the morning roosters seem to be louder than ever. Also, since I brought a soft Ikea pillow in my suitcase to replace the hard foam one that seems to be the only available type in Abengourou, now after wearing earplugs my ears don’t hurt.
Life is quiet in Abengourou, but occasionally things get exciting like last Friday when Côte d’Ivoire beat neighboring Ghana at the African Cup of Nations. The whole town was celebrating the victory, no exceptions.
I’m also happy to report that since I’ve been back I managed to finally pass my driver’s license test to be able to drive here, which has all of a sudden made my life a lot easier. Although undoubtedly I’ll still be walking a lot and taking plenty of taxis, and not only because they’re red. But I can’t help being amused at the fact that after some 14 years of having a driver’s license in my possession, the last five days were probably the most I’ve driven in my entire life.
Although I'm sure they abound in many other countries, it seems to me that in Côte d'Ivoire traditional healers are etiher extremely popular or very good at promoting themselves. Not only they advertise their services in the towns, but also on the side of the roads indicating their presence in the adjacent villages. Maybe it's just that Ivorians are better-versed at marketing, but I had never seen so many signs of traditional healers than here and so informative.
For example, take this one below seen in Abengourou. It says that the healer in question (guérisseur in French) is a Master in spiritual and natural sciences (although it doesn't say who gave him that title), and that he's a specialist in "mystical and spiritual ailments". He also fights against witchcraft, spells and curses. Even the price is listed on the sign: only 225 FCFA per consultation, which is just half a US dollar.
Since I haven't visited any of these healers I can't speak for their effectiveness, but I'm convinced that they serve a purpose for certain problems. Almost certainly I wouldn't trust them for things like malaria, HIV/Aids or other sexually transmitted diseases, it seems they have a placebo effect on mental health issues:
Usually we think of traditional healing as easy to “respectfully dismiss,” as clearly it’s not evidence based… right? Well, actually, there is some evidence supporting traditional healing. Joop de Jong, one of the founders of the global Transcultural Psychiatry Organization, presented some evidence just over a year ago that in a randomized clinical trial of counseling versus traditional healing in Burundi, the traditional healers had a much greater healing effect.
Next time I feel some mystical pains or somebody casts a spell on me, I'll have to visit my local healer to test his powers. I wonder if they have a cure for jetlag, though...
Today was the International Day agains HIV/Aids, aka World Aids Day, and naturally it was celebrated all over Côte d'Ivoire. Even though the Ministère de la Lutte contre le Sida (the Ministry for the fight against Aids), seemed to have forgotten about it and was doing some works on their website, so it was not ready to be visited today:
In Abengourou there were several activities during the weekend, including a football league between different schools in town, an ecumenic mass and an art exhibition. The vernissage of the art exhibit took place yesterday afternoon at the Alliance Franco-Ivoirienne, which is one of the nicest places to eat or have a drink in Abengourou. One of my friends was involved in organizing it, so I attended all of it during several hours. The thing is that any event with authorities present in it, even if these authorities are very local, needs to have many repetitive and boring speeches. I guess otherwise it doesn't feel important enough.
Some of the works of art were quite interesting, though, especially the sculptures around the garden. I saw a lot of eyebrows raising while looking at them, and with good reason. Take a look at this one, for example. What the hell is this woman doing?
According to the artist, who was there answering some questions about his works, the overall theme of the sculptures was that nothing should be taboo or embarrassing when talking about HIV/Aids, everything should be discussed. Such as the female condom, which was discussed at great length with some visual aids as you can see below:
Today at 8am the students of Abengourou marched around the center of town with banners. Some of them had the usual messages to be expected, such as this one saying "Ensemble contre le Sida" ("Together against Aids").
But other signs were more interesting, like the one by the awesomely named Réseau des Planteurs contre le Sida et les Grandes Endémies (the Planters Network against Aids and the Great Endemic Diseases), saying: "Planteur sain, cacao sain", which means "Healthy planter, healthy cocoa". Do I need to add that the guys had great costumes made of cocoa tree branches?
Other signs were written using Nouchi expressions (Ivoirian French) such as the ones below. I'm not sure about the meaning of the one on the left, but the middle one says "Pas d'enjaillement avant mariage", which literally means "No enjoyment before marriage". The one on the right says "Qui ne fait rien, ne risque rien, et n'a rien", which means "The one who doesn't do anything, doesn't take any risks, doesn't get anything".
Then we enjoyed another official marathon of official speeches and a never-ending awards ceremony in the City Hall's gardens. The awards were for organizations and people who had shown great commitment to the fight against HIV/Aids in Abengourou, and each time they had to call somebody to give the award and pose for the photographers.
For me, the big hightlight of the day was seeing the King of the Indénié sitting in his throne throught the whole thing looking, er, royal. Naturally, they honored him with a couple of awards but he didn't collect them personally, only getting up at the very end to be greeted by a select few and get into his car. While being sheltered by a golden umbrella by his aides:
Next on my list: visiting the King's Palace and, who knows, even meeting him.
If by any chance you didn't get enough of World Aids Day in Abengourou, then you can satisfy your needs at Ndzulo's blog.
There's a street in Abengourou that I really like as it has the seat of the Indénie King, but also a couple of buildings with very cool murals. Such as the one below, titled "Pour mieux vivre" (For better living). It says:
-Ne rien dire (not saying anything)
-Ne rien entendre (not hearing anything)
-Ne rien voir (not seeing anything)
Surely a great and timeless piece of advice.
