Working Up a Village Sweat

Neighbors out to help weed the chief's field.



Elois and Ibir digging trenches to catch rainwater on the school ground.



On the only television station in Burkina Faso, there is a recurring commercial for Castel Beer. Three friends are working out in a gym, on the treadmill machines. The first two are sweating and jogging along, but the third seems to be motionless. He smiles, and the camera pans down to show the roller blades on his feet, spinning their wheels on the moving belt. As the ad fades out with a shot of the friends enjoying a beer at the bar, the slogan appears on the screen: “Castel. Be Different.”

It doesn’t take a marketing professional to figure out at what demographic the commercial is aimed. First, one needs to own, or at least have access to, a television to even see the commercial in the first place. Also, the potential buyer needs an income level high enough to afford a dollar fifty for a twenty-two ounce beer. Furthermore, the target audience needs to be educated to understand the English slogan, in a francophone country where a sizable percentage of the population doesn’t even speak French. Finally, the location of the shot would confuse a lot of people who don’t have the slightest conception of what a gym or a health club is.

The very idea of working out is absurd to most Burkinabe, let alone going to a special place and paying money to do so. Yet, most of the people, male and female alike, despite rampant malnutrition, look like they spend a couple hours a day in the weight room, arms the size of thighs, muscles on top of muscles.

The reason being, people’s daily activities resemble an extensive workout plan. I have had the pleasure of participating in a few of the muscle taxing chores, and calculated that if I multiplied my few hours of work times a lifetime, I too would look like a professional athlete . . . maybe not, but you get the idea.

Weeding the fields is not so much a chore as a community event. One day, the village chief called all the neighbors over to help him. We formed a line twenty people wide, holding our short handled hoes and bent over at the waist. In unison we advanced across the field, scraping the grasses and weeds around the six inch tall millet stalks.

In an interesting twist, all Burkinabe are right handed, for hygienic reasons best not elaborated on here. Curiously, though, they wield their hoes with the left hand on top, guiding and powering the tool, the opposite of what is expected. Hands oriented either way, the work is surprisingly tiring, taxing not only the arms but the legs, which brace and support bodies nearly folded in two.

Just as the group’s energy levels started to flag noticeably, a troupe of tom-tom players arrived on the scene, and everyone redoubled their efforts, marching step by step in time with the beat, frantically scraping the weeds to keep up with their neighbors.

The field was long, however, and by the time we reached the other side the workers were unanimous in wanting a break. At this point the chief came through to offer hard candy, cigarettes, and kola nuts, which are West Africa’s answer to amphetamines. A small chunk of the shockingly bitter meat cuts through fatigue like a shot of espresso.

After the break, we saw that the work was far from finished. We lined up again to cross another section of the field, and that finished, another and another for the rest of the afternoon and every day for the rest of the season as people moved into their own and their friends’ and neighbors’ fields. Personally, after the second repetition I decided the best course of action was to sit down and talk to the girl selling dolo next door. So much for my professional rugby aspirations.

Another fun activity was digging holes, and then filling them back up. There was a reforestation project at the high school, and the ground was less dirt than sedimentary rock. Shovels were useless except for removing the chunks of stone dislodged by our pickaxes. Each hole needed to be dug to 50cm in diameter and depth, then filled with better dirt imported from the other side of town where it isn’t quite as rocky. This process gives the roots space to grow thick and strong before having to contend with the rock layers. I offered my assistance, and a 60 year old man in a cowboy hat laughed at my feeble performance until I bent the tip of my pickaxe, at which point I was again sent off to buy some dolo to quench the thirst of the real workers.

Well digging is a similar procedure, except the hole is two meters wide and up to 25 deep, depending on the water table. The laborers chop holes in either side as they descend, so they can climb in and out like a spider. When the well is finished, the workout isn’t: Every day men and women draw up dozens of buckets of water to meet their household needs. Even everyday food preparation tones the arms, as the women lift the heavy pestles over their head and slam them into the mortars over and over to crush the millet seeds into a fine flour.

However, it seems like the very strongest Burkinabe aren’t out in the fields, nor in the kitchen, and probably don’t haul their own water. Instead, they live in the city and have paying jobs. It’s the guys at the bus station who have the really intimidating muscles, the ones who spend all day doing their version of the clean and press, lifting rice sacs, livestock, motorcycles, and all manner of luggage fifteen feet up to the roof of the bus, by manpower alone. Picture a man, standing alone on a platform, holding a full sized motorcycle over his head like a trophy, and think long and hard about revising your workout plan.