The artisan market.

Today Mirabelle picked me up on a Saturday out of the kindness in her heart to take me to the artisan market. Every two years in Ouaga there is a huge Africa trading market happening very close to my home. The next one isn’t until 2012 but it is where all the best African artists form all over come to this location to sell their traditional crafts. During the off seasons there are however local craftsmen in a sort of convention area selling their goods. There were all types of things, clothes, masks, pictures, paintings, bags it was a plethora of different ethnicities making their traditional garb. There were also some people; dad even sells a book about it, making sculptures out of recycled materials. I believe his book is about recycled art in Kenya, but its the same concept. They use old motorcycle or metal scraps found in the trash and make art out of them. Some are as large as me and others are very tiny. I bought a little one made from a motorcycle, of a man with a wrench and an old spark plug from the US that says “thank you.” There were lots of things all over the place, but it’s always hard to buy things and see them out of their context. Would this work in my home? I bought some pottery things, which look like chickens, to bring home but I think the nicest thing is that I put them out in my apartment and it made it feel more like home. They are weird looking and yet comforting. All the artists were there working on their things, Mirabelle says that its an artists goal to make it into this center to provide them with a lot of tourists. The funny thing is that in the center of this giant circle of crafts, and I mean there were at least 60 booths, is an air-conditioned building with all the different crafts in one room. Mirablle says its where the white people shop because they don’t like to bargain and are okay with paying a little extra to shop in the comfort of the cool air and the non dusty items! We went in just to compare prices, they aren’t just more expensive in the shop, they were 3 times the price! I also all most passed out walking around it was so hot, I needed the air to sit down before getting back onto her bike. I think I will go back closer to the end of my trip to collect some gifts there, but it was really fun walking around.