Running in Ouaga

Thursday! I am wrapping up my third week in Ouaga. My fellow intern arrived this week (conveniently named Julia and a grad student in Boston, which as caused no confusion whatsoever, none at all). We started our bonding with a run on Wednesday in Ouaga 2000. She brought her iPhone and is conveniently a better photographer than I am so I have stolen some of her photos for this post. 

She's a better photographer, but the jaw clench
 is immune to good photography skills. 

One of the things I was worried about when coming to Ouaga for the summer was whether I would be able to work out and run, and I was assured that it was safe and feasible to run outdoors. It is indeed fairly safe in the daylight, and I have found that if I go before 7 AM (ugh) or after 5 PM, the heat is not totally oppressive. It is still quite a bit hotter than my preferred temperatures for physical activity, but hopefully I will get used to it after a few more weeks.  I have run at least a couple of times a week since getting here, exclusively in Ouaga 2000. I have sadly not gotten too creative with my runs, because I have no sense of direction and there are not too many street signs to help me. I pretty much navigate by the space ship central monument thing and the handful of billboards near my house. 

I have had several amusing interactions while running. Every kid in the neighborhood wants to wave and say "Bonjour" when someone runs by, and I am happy to indulge them. One day, when I had gotten too ambitious on distance and was taking a walking break, a group of small kids who were probably 4 or 5 years old came running up next to me and encouraged me to run, saying "Allez!" They started running with me when I started back up, and it was pretty adorable. 

The only running experience that could potentially surpass that moment occurred on my first week here. I was running and said "Good morning" to a vendor in the neighborhood. He said "Faire le sport... c'est la vie" which cracked me up. I was expecting to get cat called while out running, and instead I got introspection. 

Here are two more pictures (from Julia) from our run. 

It's like a mango colored car! 

This is one of the borders of Ouaga 2000.
Which direction? I will never be able to tell.