Easter in Yako

God spare me from any more church. I have attended twice as many church services in the last few days as the accumulated total in my life up to now. There's only so much religion a girl can take, especially when there's no chocolate involved (the Easter Bunny is unknown here).

I arrived in Yako on Thursday, April 1st with the coolers in tow. Mama Zida was pleased, and she will never know what a hassle they were. Aside from the unplanned trip back to Accra and the heat stroke episode, border officials like to extort people carrying "luxury items" such as coolers. I had a few conversations where I had to play very, very dumb and open my innocent blue eyes very wide in order to hang on to my money. Stupid border officials.

Anyways, Mama Zida wanted me to go to church on Thursday evening after resting, and she told her second youngest child, Aristide aka Titi, to take me once I'd woken up. Titi, however, being a bit of a punk, went out with his friends instead and I had no idea I was expected to be at church. So whenTiti came home briefly for dinner and invited me to go back with him and his friends to Wend Panga (the hip place to drink and dance in Yako), I said yes. He drove his cousin there first and said he would come back to get me, but he never did. Adama, who will soon be joining the Zida family as Armelle's husband, showed up and brought me to Wend Panga on his own. Adama is really awesome, and Titi got stupid drunk. Did I mention that Titi is studying to be a border official?

On Good Friday I woke up to find the breakfast table set for one. Mama and Papa Zida take Lent very seriously: nobody in the family eats or drinks until the sun goes down, for the full forty days. It's the dame idea as Ramadan but during the hot, dry season instead of October when it's cool. That afternoon I went to visit the Sawadogos and I went to church in the evening. The service was in Mooré and it was very hot, but it was only an hour long and it made Mama Zida happy.

Saturday was the big day. The house was full of guests in the morning and a ridiculous amount of chicken was served. Mama Zida assured me that this was nothing, they were holding back because Armelle and Adama's wedding is coming up on May 1st. In the afternoon I went with Mama and Papa Zida while they did the rounds, and then we all went home to rest before church that evening.

The service began at 9pm. We pulled up in front of the church to find that there were so many worshippers that they had set up the service outside. Nobody but me seemed surprised by this high attendance rate.

We set up our lawn chairs near the back of the crowd and I took in the scene. There were hundreds of people in the open area in front of the church; those who had arrived too late to sit on the makeshift pews mostly stood. Everyone held candles and the hundreds of flames cast a flickering light over the trees, the church, and the crowd of faithful worshippers. The priest swept up to his pew on the steps of the church and the service began.

This is where I started to nod off. It was deliciously cool after a hot day, I was so tired, and the service was in Mooré. I awoke abruptly when the crowd rose up and ululated as one. This is a routine part of West African church services, but I can't tell you why they do it. Just picture hundreds of believers holding up their hands to the heavens and ululating for Jesus.

I nodded off again but this time my candle slipped and spilled hot wax on my lap. This happened a few more times because I wanted to stay awake and putting out my candle would have been an admission of defeat. Finally Mama Zida put out my candle for me.

I remember waking up a couple times and looking around in confusion. The first time a long line of people was getting baptized, and the second time an even longer line of people was taking communion.

When I woke up 4.5 hours later the service was still going on. It lasted another thirty minutes and wrapped up at 2 am. I couldn't believe it. How could a church service last for more than two hours? If Canadians were asked to attend a five hour church service, the few worshippers that remain in our country would promptly desert. Papa Zida explained that the priest's underlings hadn't been there and the priest had had to do all the baptisms and confirmations himself. Easter is considered an auspicious time to get baptized and confirmed, so it had dragged on. I went out dancing with my friends even though it was 2 am. I wasn't about to let wayward underpriests ruin my evening.

Sunday morning I slept in. Mama Zida laughed at me for still being tired after sleeping through the whole service, and she had a point. But who wouldn't have slept through that service, I ask you? We visited the Zida's friends in the afternoon and got home in time for dinner, which consisted of copious amounts of chicken prepared in an endless variety of ways. More people came to visit in the evening and we in the younger generation went out to Wend Panga once again.

Monday was pretty relaxed, I spent most of the day reading and playing with Ange (Adama and Armelle's baby, Mama and Papa Zida's first grandchild, quite colicky (sp?)). He's grown a heck of a lot since I last saw him as a newborn in January! I visited the Sawadogos in the afternoon and went out to Wend Panga yet again. I haven't been to a town with only one watering hole since I lived in Ottawa.

On Tuesday I went to the orphanage in the morning. The oldest kids - 3 years old or so - had mostly been moved to foster families or been picked up by their remaining relatives; some had been adopted by Europeans. A new cadre of babies had moved in, many of them in really rough shape due to malnutrition.

Here's a success story that shows just how effective the orphanage is. When I was last at the orphanage in January, there was a new arrival, a little boy, about 4 or 5 months old, who was so malnourished he couldn't even sit up. After two months of proper nutrition and the careful attention of the orphanage's nurse, he's now sitting up, taking in things around him, and scooting a little on his bum. He's still far behind the average child his age, but he's catching up quickly and his brain and body are developing normally. Without the orphanage, he would surely be dead.

If the orphanage does work that sounds like something you'd want to support, it's easy to donate at http://www.canadahelps.org/CharityProfilePage.aspx?CharityID=s88132.

I left Yako the next day and headed to Ouaga to get my visa for Mali. Soon I'll write to you from there!