Katja

Mr. P, the research assistant

Mr. P helping Elli with the evening measurements of her lysmeters in the depression.

meditation for the soil scientist (Written on November 21)

The last day in Ouahigouya I went with Elli to Reko to watch her make a last set of infiltration measurements. Watching bubbles float to the surface in a see-through plastic tube filled with water is mesmerizing. My thoughts got all soft and contour-less, and after a while I couldn’t keep my eyes open. SoContinue reading “meditation for the soil scientist (Written on November 21)”

gifts and blessings (Written on November 21)

In every village where I have been, doing transect walks and interviews, they have offered me zumkum during the lunch break under the tree in the middle of the village. It is a drink traditionally given to guests, and it is made of small millet flour, sugar, water and sometimes spiced with some wild herbContinue reading “gifts and blessings (Written on November 21)”

the Ouaga break (Written on November 20)

After three days in a town called Gourcy, situated a little bit closer to Ouahigouya than Ouagadougou, we arrived back in the capital on Monday evening. Since then, I’ve been transcribing notes, going through photographs and making map sketches. Elli got sick the last night in Gourcy, and she’s just now starting to get better,Continue reading “the Ouaga break (Written on November 20)”

the red dust (Written on November 20)

There is a thin film of red dust on everything I own. All my clothes have gotten a slightly orange tint. No matter how often I dust the surfaces on my laptop, the dust never quite goes away. My straw hat looks like it has chickenpox.

a re-awakened love for numbers (Written on November 20)

I’m a geographer, so the concept of projections and coordinate systems is nothing new to me. But working here, walking around with a GPS device and then having to produce map sketches of the places that I have just visited, connecting real-world experiences with points in a shapefile, well, it has made me realize justContinue reading “a re-awakened love for numbers (Written on November 20)”

so, what happened with the coup? (Written on November 19)

I did a lot of writing about the events that weren’t quite a military coup, but that had too much military involvement to only be a public uprising, back when there was a lot of action going on and Elli and I were put under house arrest for safety reasons. It had quite a tollContinue reading “so, what happened with the coup? (Written on November 19)”

the Summary – why we are here (written on November 19)

I’ve been writing a lot about certain aspects of my project here, but I’m actually not sure if I’ve ever written anything about the project as a whole. What it is all about. What are all these transect walks good for? Why has Elli dug up all this soil? What are we even here for?Continue reading “the Summary – why we are here (written on November 19)”

INTERMISSION

Dear readers. As you probably have noticed, I’ve been very quiet here lately. First, it was because I had to do the last transect walks in Gourcy, three villages in three days, and that simply didn’t give any time to write. Then, once we were back in Ouaga, I had to log photographs and transcribeContinue reading “INTERMISSION”

I met a baobab tree today

I was doing follow-up visits to some of my villages today, and we got a little bit ahead of schedule. And since we were in Teonsogo, we decided to go to the Tor rock formation, so that Elli could see them too. I like stones. I’m a closet geologist. The much nerdier variety ofContinue reading “I met a baobab tree today”