Dinner parties

After we got home from Ghana it was time to settle into village and establish ourselves both as a married couple, but also Peace Corps volunteers.  Josh decided the first step to doing this was to have dinner with people.  But first we needed the invite.  His first prey was Antoinette, a young women (24 it turns out) with a school-age daughter and a 2 year old son, who is the treasurer of the CoGes of the CSPS and was very good friends with a past PCV here.  Getting the invite turned out easy; we saw her in the marche and made small talk, then Josh threw in how much he liked To and how I didn’t know how to make it- Bam! You must come over and learn how to make To.  The date was set for May 3rd.  We showed up around 5 like she said, just as she was starting to cut up the okra.  She gave us chairs to sit in and brought us a box of wine.  We were not to do anything in this cooking lesson, just sit, drink, and watch.  She talked me through the whole To-making process, including the okra sauce, and than ate it with us, even forming the To balls for us because it was too hot for our fingers.  While there were awkward moments, everyone in her family sitting and staring at us, it was quite nice.  We learned some about the old volunteer and the projects she did and about the community. 

For his next dinner venture, Josh decided to invite Ganga, his counterpart, and his family to our house for lunch, which I had to cook.  The plan was to make riz sauce tomato.  Two days before I was preparing a shopping list  and asked some of the girls in our courtyard how they make tomato sauce.  I know how Americans make their tomato sauce, but Burkinabe like it a bit different.  Well, one of the girls must have thought we really wanted to eat that and I couldn’t cook, so that evening she brought over a pot of rice and a casserole of sauce, which was very sweet of her, but this was after I had already made dinner.  We ate what we could and I took notes for when I cooked it, and then we packaged the rest up for tomorrow.  Sauce doesn’t keep after one meal, but the rice should be fine for tomorrow. 

The next day we had 2 neighbor volunteers visit, one of which was about to leave us, and I made such a huge feast of goodbye mac’n cheese that we couldn’t eat anymore that day.  Rice should keep for 2 days, right?  I started cooking early, well 10 am, the next morning to make sure every thing was ready for when Ganga came.  The rice smelled a little funny, but I hated to waste good rice so I threw it in the pot as I cooked up some fresh rice. More water and heat and it should be fine, right?  I tried my best to make the sauce Burkinabe, but I think it turned out more American, mainly because there were no hot peppers in it.  It was still delicious, I thought.  The lunch started off well, we presented our guests with welcome water and a box of wine.  Josh made small talk while I finished cooking and brought it all out to the table.  Just before serving the rice I tasted it to make sure it was done; it still had a slight smell to it and was slimy like it had been over cooked in too much water.  Shit!  It was too late now, everyone was waiting on me, I had to serve it.  Ganga and his wife ate it fine, but their son just picked at it.  In every bite I took all I could taste was funky rice.  Everything else went fine and Josh thinks our lunch date was a success, but damn that 2 day old rice!  I don’t think they will be coming to eat with us again soon.   Also, shortly after that event I learned the reason Burkinabe cook with hot peppers is to mask the taste of gone-off food.

To thank Antoinette for dinner we sent her apples we had purchased in Ouaga.  This, of course, resulted in another dinner invite.  This time dinner started out like the last- welcome water and sitting on a bench by ourselves as the old women and children stared at us- but this time Antoinette told us we must say hello to “the old” (what they call old men), and led us into another courtyard where her husband’s father was sitting, the master of the household.  She set out chairs directly in front of him and told  us to sit, then left us there.  The old man spoke French, but apparently conversation is not a big part of the culture and we sat mainly in silence.  After 30 or so minutes we started wondering if Antoinette was coming back for us, which was answered when she brought us a big plate of beans and placed it on a small table in front of us, then left again.  Then another women brought us omelet sandwiches, another, the man’s wife, brought out To and sauce, and finally, the man pulled out 2 sodas in glass bottles.  First of all, there’s no place in village where you can buy soda in glass bottles; this is how we learned that this man owns a bar in a near by bigger village.  Second of all, we’re lucky to find omelet sandwiches in the closest town, much less village. Third of all, how on earth are we suppose to eat this much food (and it’s rude not to eat it)?  These people were definitely putting on airs for us, but why?  After we ate as much as we could our plates were cleared and Antoinette finally came and sat with us.  We talked for a bit and took our leave.  We were headed to Ouaga the next day for a meeting, but Antoinette insisted the day we got back we came for dinner again.  This dinner was much like the last- was taken to sit and eat with the father-in-law, only thankfully this time we were just served To.  I know in this culture it’s proper for guests to eat with the head of the family, but it defeats the purpose of us trying to eat and talk, become friends, with our potential counterpart, Antoinette.  We were glad no dinner dates were set after that. 

Our latest dinner venture has become an exchange.  Massie was the women who took in the last volunteer as her unofficial host daughter, and they ate dinner together every night.  She is a bit older, 30’s maybe, with several children, including Fatiema who just got accepted into middle school.  It took her a little while to warm to us, but after a few occasions of chatting in the marche she invited us to dinner.  Dinner went well, not as awkward because she or her daughters actually conversed with us, and we actually ate in the same courtyard as her.  Although she did serve us our own bowl of To and sauce and we ate before the rest of the family.  We tried to reciprocate and invite her to dinner at our house, but she has to cook for the family and can’t leave.  “Just send food”, she told us.  And so we did- a few days later Josh made rice and sauce and sent a child to deliver it.  Since then, every few days we receive To and sauce or beans in a casserole dish and a few days later we’ll send rice or something back.  In between we’ll greet and chat a little here and there.  It’s perfect- maintaining a good friendship without all the awkwardness or hassle of leaving home!