I'd Like to Give the World a Coke...

Picture this… Four Christian village leaders and a nun coming to eat at the home of the president of the Muslim’s on the Muslim holy day celebrating the end of Ramadan. After serving them food and conversing, the president of the Muslims brings out a Coke for everyone.

No, it’s not a Coke commercial. This is the reality of religious tolerance in Burkina Faso and I think the whole world could learn a little something from it.

Surprisingly, a country with 160 different local languages, several different ethnic groups, and a 50/50 split of Muslims and Christians manages to live up to its hype as “the land of upright and honorable people”. I’ve concluded that they really just love a good party and more religions means more parties, with the Christians celebrating the Muslim holidays and the Muslims celebrating the Christian holidays. And you can’t forget traditional animist beliefs which pervade both of these major religions in Burkina.

Since my host family is Muslim and my host father is president of the Muslims in our training village, I’ve been especially privy to Muslim beliefs here. I was fortunate enough to experience Ramadan with them, the annual month of fasting that Muslims undertake each year as one of the five pillars of Islam. During Ramadan, my family did not eat while the sun was up. As soon as the sun set, they would eat their first meal of the day and then we’d get ready to leave for mosque. I would wear a long dress and a scarf to cover my face, shoulders, and neck. (Unfortunately, this doesn’t hide the fact that I’m white so I just end up looking like an extra weird Muslim nasara.)

At the mosque, everyone is positioned outside facing the front of the building. It is a white building with one archway entrance and two large columns on either side with a crescent moon and star at the top of each column. The prayer starts just after sunset so the backdrop is a picturesque dark blue sky lit up by the moon and the stars.

Before the praying, they bring out a giant loudspeaker with a microphone and chant the call to prayer into it. They repeat a phrase in Arabic over and over again which means “may peace be with you.” In fact, this is what you are supposed to say to all Muslims upon greeting them. (Next time you think that Islam isn’t a peaceful religion think about that). The men have mats on the concrete floor right in front of the mosque while the women sit in a row behind the men on the ground. Verses of the Koran were read in Arabic by a man in the front as we sequentially put our hands on our knees while standing up, dropped to the floor and put our heads on the ground in front of us, and then stood back up. I was simultaneously frustrated that because I’m a girl I automatically get second-rate seats and thankful that I could mimic what the men were doing from behind, since I’m an Islam novice and had no idea what I was supposed to be doing at any given moment.

At the end of Ramadan, my courtyard held a big party and most of the village attended. My family killed many of its chickens to make soup, shredded coconut to make little cakes, and made fresh ginger and hibiscus juice. I got to help make the hibiscus juice, which involves boiling dried hibiscus leaves and then adding sugar and mint leaves before letting it cool.

It was a fun game watching the kids corner the chickens in the courtyard and then tie them up. I would have loved to avenge the french fries I lost to those pesky animals one morning but, unfortunately, women aren’t allowed to kill chickens in this culture. I did, however, get to look on with gratitude as my host dad killed a chicken. He explained that we had to face East while killing a chicken just like we have to face East towards Mecca while praying. Personally, I don’t think these awful creatures deserve such consideration. I much prefer to see them saran wrapped or in the frozen aisle.

It felt a lot like Christmas, with all of the kids getting new clothes and running around annoying their mothers who were trying to cook. Some things are universal, like little kids making their brothers or sisters cry and men sitting off in a corner talking about man stuff.

The first guests to show up were the Christian leaders in the village. They brought Fanta as a gift and ate what my family had prepared. And yes, my host father really did bring out Cokes for everyone. I started humming the jingle “I’d like to give the world a Coke…” to the amusement of some nearby nasaras who also thought this was a perfect commercial opportunity. But the funny thing was this wasn’t a commercial, it was real life. Somehow, religion had brought people together instead of dividing them. I wondered how the Burkinabe, many of whom suffer from extreme poverty and little to no education, had learned how to regard religion as such an integral part of their lives while simultaneously respecting the beliefs of others.