Barak Obama discounts, homologues, etc.

On Saturday we took another language test to see how we have progressed over the last four weeks. There are three main levels: novice, intermediate, and expert. And each level (at least the first 2) have three subcatagories: low, mid, and high. When we first got in country, I tested in novice-low and now I have moved up to novice-high, which is exciting. Aaron is intermediate-low now. In order to "pass" training and become teachers we have to get to intermediate-mid, so we are getting close.

I met my counterpart (homologue) this week. He is really nice. He speaks English, jackpot! He works as a French and English teacher at the school where I am going to work. We've been doing a lot of U.S. vs Burkinabé culture activities. Monday we played a game that asked questions to see how well we know each other's culture such as "what is starbucks?" (the Burkinabé answer: tv show). One feature of American culture that all Burkinabé seem to be informed about is the upcoming election. Everyone wants to talk about Obama. At our local bakery, we have what we call the "Barak Obama discount". Go in there, make sure the owner knows you are American and that you will be voting for Obama, 15CFA off your baguette. Perhaps this is an abuse, I don't know.

Oh, here's a fun story for those of you who are more scientifically inclined. Friday night we had a big rainstorm. Really big, huge... Now I am not sure if you have seen this in the pictures but we have metal things on our windows that serve as blinds as well as metal screens to keep the bugs out. So Saturday morning, Aaron got up and went to open the blinds and noticed that he was getting a small shock when he touched the metal. Something happened Friday night and now there is a connection between our outside light (which doesn't work now) and our window. This was very difficult to explain to our host family. When we just had them touch the window to see for themselves, the kids totally freaked out and thought they were going to die. I think our host dad is going to call an electrician so hopefully it will get fixed.

Thanks to Ashley's mom and Uncle Dale for your comments and uplifting words. Uncle Dale, we haven't heard of those books but there is supposed to be a big PC library in the capital so we will see if they have any of them.