Family Reunion                             

 

e-mail on 11/02/03                                                       Return to List

 

Every year the family of the compound where I make my home has a giant family reunion. Members come from all over — Banfora, Bobo, and even some from Ouaga. They rotate where they have it each year among three or four villages. Luckily it fell to Labola this year, so I could be present.

 

Truckloads of people were carted in, as well as in drings and chairs. They also hired a person to come out and string fluorescent lamps so the party could go into the night. It was a three-day affair, though the first and last days were fairly tame, mostly with people arriving and going.

The middle day was when things really livened up. In the morning of the second day there was long series of sacrifices to their ancestors. This included a cow, some goats, some sheep, and numerous chickens. They asked me to take pictures of the day, which I was more than happy to do. I wanted to look nice for the day, so I donned a brand new pair of Khakis I had received in the mail. I was a bit naïve, since I hadn’t seen many actual sacrifices in my life. Let’s just say that many of the chickens didn’t just lie down and die. I only wear those pants in village now, as some of the stains have never completely come out.

 

After the sacrifices there was endless food (they eat the sacrificial meat; nothing goes to waste here), sodas, beers, dolo, and conversation. The men and women tend to remain separate, further dividing along the lines of age and status for the men. Each night, the whole night, there was dancing, usually right behind my house. I didn’t mind suffering a few sleepless nights, and even loaned them my stereo, even though the majority of music that my Burkinabe brother likes to play is probably the most annoying possible. Much of it is a collection of infantile sounds (like one of those cheap electronic ray guns) repeated over and over again to a techno beat. Though this music seems to be more concentrated in village, somewhat a mix of poor man techno and classical tribal beats, some of the other popular music of Burkina Faso is something I could get into. That’s a good thing, since music is pretty static here. Some of the hits being played have been around for almost a decade.

 

Shaffer  

 

 

To see more pictures of the reunion, click here.                                                                               

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