Chad thinks that Lassie was a German Shepherd.  He has clearly been away from the States for too long.

I have come to appreciate the feeling of a freshly swept tile floor.

Thanks to my other mother and father, we just got package one today.  That took over three weeks to get here, so it looks like sending mozzarella sticks is not going to work.  We’ll probably just have to travel to Italy or something.

Plans are underway for our big Thanksgiving dinner with all of our classmates.  I am on the stuffing committee and Chad is on the “things you can buy so you don’t have to cook” committee. We are both very excited as well to make handprint turkeys as decorations for our makeshift dining hall.  This is also when we plan to do the big unveiling of our matching authentic Burkinabe garb.  We know you can’t wait to see it, but hang in there.

In Jula, Tana means totem, or something that your family can’t use/eat.  We learned that our host family’s tana is the dog, so they don’t plan to eat our courtyard dog.  That’s good news for us because it means we can stop thinking of ways to politely refuse dog meat when they serve it to us.

Thanks to Mom for sending two cute pictures : )  I have been showing them off to everyone.  In Jula, there is no word for niece so now everyone will think I have a baby, haha.

Also, card games can get weird here. All the suits go by different names in French.

• Clubs are peanuts. 
• Hearts are tomatoes. 
• Diamonds are boxes. 
• Spades are “pricklies.” 

The official literature we read to acquaint us with West African culture informs us that in Burkina Faso, kitchen utensils are never used for taking a shower or to attack others. Important to know, I suppose.

Happy almost birthday to Makenna!