Eating Baba Ghanoush in Burkina Faso

Burkina Faso

Lebanese food. It’s not quite what I expected to see on the menu. We are in a charming hotel, the only one in Gaoua town, tucked away in the hinterlands of southwestern Burkina Faso. The Hotel Hala is airy and unpretentious. The rooms are basic but mercifully equipped with running water and AC units. The food we order – an assortment of appetizers that my colleague and I share for dinner – is fresh and delicious. We are content and delighted by all the pleasant surprises we keep encountering in this flat and smallish land-locked country.

It is late June. The rains are late, and the FIFA World Cup is going strong. Our evening activity includes not only writing up notes of the day but also watching soccer matches on plastic chairs, gathered with locals in front of an old television that’s been in use since well before the advent of HD and flat-screen TV.

Our days start early, around 4:30 am. I get my obligatory caffeine fix by scooping a local brand of instant coffee into my small water bottle. A few vigorous shakes are enough to create something brown and strong and room temperature that doesn’t taste great but does get me moving. I eat a few handfuls of cashews (my African travel survival food), and I’m good to go.

 

Up with the sun to start the milking

We hit the road and arrive at our destination before sunrise. The farmers and pastoralists we visit are already busy starting the day’s activities. Women prepare food. The cows are let out of their pens for milking, after which they will be herded a dozen or more kilometers to the nearest watering hole. It’s a daily ritual that we have seen across numerous cultures and countries of Sub-Saharan Africa as we travel to see and discover the continent’s indigenous cattle.

Lobi cattle: small, humpless, and made of tough stuff

But these cattle look very different from the others we have encountered. They are a dwarf breed, beautifully proportioned, but only about ¾ of the size of other indigenous cattle. Called Lobi, after the tribe of people who own them, the cattle descend from an ancient lineage, the Bos taurus, which arrived in Africa some 10,000 years ago. Unlike the zebu cattle, descended from the more recently introduced Bos indicus, the Lobi have no hump.  And while you encounter zebu breeds all over Africa and Asia, the little Lobi cattle are a rare sight, found only in this remote corner of Burkina Faso and in a small area across the border of neighboring Cote d’Ivoire.

 

At work

We speak with cattle owner, herders, and researchers about the Lobi cattle and their remarkable hardiness. Though pint-sized they pull ploughs and fend off diseases, like trypanosomiasis, that devastate cattle herds across the continent. They require less food and water than bigger breeds, and pound for pound are much more efficient at producing milk and meat. But appearances are deceptive, and their diminutive stature means that the Lobi cattle are vastly overlooked and underappreciated.

Meanwhile, we are enchanted with these small animals and the people who care for and rely upon them. The stewardship of Lobi cattle is split between the Lobi farmers, who own the animals and use them to plow their fields, and the Fulani herders, who take care of them in exchange for payment, food, and the use of the animals’ milk.

A welcome as warm as this woman's smile

We spend a few days here. We talk, we walk, we listen and learn. We take photos. Mine are amateur, and mostly a way to connect with the people I interview. My colleague is the pro with the big backpack full of equipment, the eye for lighting and dramatic angles, and the years of experience working in the bush.

One late afternoon, we sit in the shade of a thatch hut waiting for the cows to come home and listen to the mischief making of a group of 3-year olds playing inside. Their giggles are contagious and remind us of the universality of childhood laughter and delight.

We are far from our familiar, and yet connected by the small moments and gestures that define human life. After a few days on the ground, we go to say our farewells to the Fulani pastoralists, who watch the cattle so assiduously that they will spend the nights by the animals’ pens to safeguard them from potential marauders. Their lives are basic, their food security is fragile, and they survive very much on the margins of modern ways. But their parting gesture is a gift– eight guinea hen eggs, oblong and slightly bluish, holding all the delicate and precious promise of life and sustenance.

 

Drinking the morning milk

Epilogue

In late October, normally quiet Burkina Faso hit the headlines.  Several days of civil protests successfully brought an end to the 27-year presidency of Blaise Compaore in Burkina Faso, who was trying, through an act of parliament, to further extend the number of terms he could serve. Protestors burned the parliament building. Compaore resigned and fled to Cote d’Ivoire. A military government filled the power void and is supposedly in talks with civil society and opposition groups to set up new elections in November 2015.

Encouraged by this momentous change, hopeful pundits began talking about the possibility of a Black Spring that might ride a wave to end the limitless terms of Africa’s presidents-for-life. However, that trend seems to be stymied, and in the meantime the list of ensconced leaders is impressive. For example:

President	Country	In office since
Paul Kagame	Rwanda	2000
Denis Sassou-Nguesso	Congo-Brazzaville	1997
Idriss Deby	Chad	1990
Robert Mugabe	Zimbabwe	1987
Yoweri Museveni	Uganda	1986
Paul Biya	Cameroon	1982
Jose Edoardo dos Santos	Angola	1979
Teodoro Obiang Nguema	Equatorial Guinea	1979