A night in Ouaga

Our arrival in Ougadougou made me thoroughly glad to have funded Sofiatu's partnership. The central station was an all-out assault from a massive language barrier, and I'm not sure Sofiatu translated everything perfectly, but she got us into a taxi headed to the city-centre and that was perfect for me. Ouagadougou is a very unique place in that nothing signifies why this amazingly sprawling city is where it is. No infrastructure, no rivers, no defensively strategizing landscape. The approach into Ouaga is quite literally an instant transition from empty sand lands to sand lands with houses everywhere.

I had, in spite of this, planned it as one of my layovers for travel, and had found a rather nice hostel called La Pavillion Vert. I heard tales of a restaurant, and a nice courtyard and decent beds with fans for around 15 dollars a night. When I arrived, I was not disappointed. It was everything they had said it would be. A haven among the moto-filled craziness of central Ouaga. I was disappointed, however, when I went to the registry to see it all filled up. Not a bed in the house! After today, I was just ready to crash into a bed in a semi-hot room for a while, so when the taxi driver told Sofiatu he knew a place downtown I just agreed and we rolled away from the bless-ed La Pavillion Vert. We pulled up to this place:

This place might look bad from the street, but the street was really an alley behind some street vendors so not that many people really saw it. Besides, no matter what the facade was like it couldn't relate to the experience inside. We walked in to the register and the clerk, I think his name was Baba, stood looking like a slender Mr T. Gold chains and teeth abounded to show his obvious success as a hotel clerk. I must admit he scared me a bit at first, but tomorrow Baba becomes a friend and ally so I won't instill any wrong ideas in your imagination by further describing his appearance. He agreed to a lower price than I could have gotten at La Pavillion Vert, and that was perfect for a man of my traveling stature. I will say the concern on Sofiatu's face and her persistence in making sure my door locked properly troubled me a bit at first, but I'll just credit it to her motherly instinct to over-react. Now that I think about it, the door concerns may have been legit as they were made of steel and 3 or 4 of the vents had once been bent assumingly to the size of someone's arm and they did give me the only room with a large steel-barred bathroom window opening into the outside alley (only 1 of the vents had been bent open here). Nevermind, I just taped my passport and debit card to the back of the window box and went to sleep. A rough first day of travel, but tomorrow is a new day!