We’re grounded again. The governmental rental service won’t let us drive today either. I moved my office outside our room today, and I’m sitting in the shadow and light breeze, transcribing my field notes into neat tables on my computer. This place is better than the wi-fi area by the reception, because there is no breeze there. I’m eating the last of my homemade Swedish Christmas toffee to keep my spirits up, completely melted of course but still good.

In the morning, we still thought we would be able to go out to the villages. I had prepared for a whole day of transect walking. But then at seven, the driver called and said that we weren’t allowed to leave the hotel again, mostly due to the rental service not wanting to risk any damage on the car. Apparently, when people are angry at the government here, they attack government registered cars. So consequently, I guess, it’s a safety precaution for the people sitting in the car too, to stay put.

Now though, I’m feeling quite happy we didn’t leave. Since ten, the wind has carried faint shouts and megaphone speeches from town, and there has been sirens too. The protests are not happening anywhere near where we’re living, so here everything is calm, but to get out of here we would have had to go through a major traffic hub, and that’s where some of the noises are coming from.

Tonight, we will know if the proposal to hold a referendum passed in the parliament. If it does, there are more protests to be expected, and we don’t know when we will be able to get out of here. I’m not concerned for my own safety or health, but both Elli and I are starting to worry a little bit about our projects, about time and money. If this situation continues, we will have to make some major adjustments to our fieldworking plans.

Oh, well. Maybe today I will finally have time to wash my hair. I haven’t washed it since we left Sweden. There’s so little water in the showers here, and my hair is so long, and our schedule so tight. I have prioritized sleep before trying to get the shampoo out of my hair. Now, though, there’s plenty of time. Always look on the bright side.

I’m sitting outside our room, in the shade, on a rock, while Elli and Desiré are still sleeping inside. Just now, moments ago, when I opened my laptop, I found a dead mosquito cushed against the edge of the screen. I must have unknowingly killed it when I used my computer last. I can’t remember when that was. Not yesterday. That was the most intensive day yet of my fieldwork here in Burkina.

There are lizards running around on the walls. Somehow, they seem bigger than the ones they had at Chez Tess. I don’t understand how gravity allows them to just sit still on a wall, watching, not falling down. There are also two small white hens gallavanting around in the yard. A skinny kitten just walked past. That’s the kind of guesthouse that we’re living in.

I think I hear people shouting and honking horns and blowing in whistles and talking in megaphones and the sounds come in waves, like they would if they were screaming SLAGORD. I imagine it’s the sounds from the manifestations, but it could just as well be the general noises from the city. It’s hard to tell.

We might be grounded here for safety reasons, having been told by basically our entire network of contacts in Burkina that we shouldn’t leave our hotel today, but I must say that for me personally, it couldn’t have come at a better time. I need a day to gather my thoughts. I just wish I could have gotten it for less anti-democratic reasons.

Because of the nation-wide manifestations tomorrow, and therefore us being grounded the whole day) we decided to go for a beer together with Desiré and Theo after I finished my first day of transect-walking, to celebrate this (almost) first week of field work.

We ended up by a plastic table with a mended leg, standing on a big open space covered in dirt with a bottle each of Brakina. The moon was half-smiling, just like expected this close to the equator. In Tanzania, I told the others, the moon lies down completely.

We drank, and talked about politics and travels and laughed at mine and Elli’s bad French and by the time we got back to the guesthouse, I was quite drunk. We made dinner. I was starving. I ate tons.

Then I started peeling a papaya, which no one wanted to share with me, so I ate it all myself and started thinking about the monkeys in the park in Villa Tunari, Bolivia. They got papaya every day, there were enormous amounts of papaya in the food storage in the main building. And the monkeys’ favorite part of the papaya was the seeds, back and shiny and round.

These Burkinabe papayas don’t have seeds, for some reason. Poor monkeys, loosing out on their favorite treat.