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This is the Travel Blog of Andy of HoboTraveler.com
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Thanks to Mom, Dad, Family and Friends and Boy Genius From India
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| Hotel Paix Banfora Burkina Faso |
| Sunday, September 16, 2007 |
Hotel Paix Banfora Burkina Faso
Banfora, Burkina Faso, West Africa
Saturday, September 15, 2007
Andy of HoboTraveler.com
The floor is clean in my room.
6000 CFA for a room with a shared shower, and toilet, 4000 more than true value in a global market, however normal for Burkina Faso.
There is a sink, water and mirror in one location; I can shave with a mirror. The floor is clean, someone has mopped the floors, and I can walk around my room and not track dirt into my bed.
This is a trash basket, they have one placed just outside all the rooms, this is a good system, and pragmatic.
Ants
Dirt in the room
Smells
Mosquitoes
Flies
To keep these things out of the room, the wastebasket needs to be outside the room. I think a swap system is best, however I have never seen it, however I do rob the clean one in common areas and leave my full one.
The Islamic Religion has this small plastic pitcher full of water, before they enter the Mosque as best I understand; they take their shoes off, wash their feet, then enter the Mosque and sit on the small rugs to pray.
99 out of 100 travelers and tourist will live in crap, and romance it, they accept what they have and say it was wonderful. To adapt, learn, and modify their lifestyles to the conditions that exist is rare. They finally need to go home because they never can figure out why they are not happy or why the move hotels every two days.
Five Star Hotels and Resorts are a great experience for a person, they truly do not know, understand, analyze or really list the pros and cons, they just know for one to two weeks they felt great. The lived better than at home and the hotel functions more efficiently we hope.
Religions should in my opinion teach manners and proper hygiene to the 99 percent of people of all countries that need to be continually told to wipe their arse.
My present room functions, it works, everything in the room has a purpose, a good sound reasons.
Self-contained rooms, in this area of West Africa this is the phrase used to mean a room that has more or less the house inside. All the normal parts of a house are inside the room, the phrase self-contained to me is perfect. If you rented a suite, it is an apartment with a Living Room, Kitchen, Shower and Toilet.
The perfect hygiene room does not have a toilet and shower inside, there were jokes 200 years ago about some cultures.
- In America they put their toilet in the house! -
Geez who want to smell their fat ugly grandfather make noise, smell up the house etc?
I really do not want to share a toilet.
I do not want to share a shower.
I do not want the shower and toilet in my room, unless there is proper ventilation, window and fans. This happens in less than 10 percent of the room unless I make it so.
I 100 percent guarantee I want to know the person who cooks my food, I like to watch the cook, and I want a self-contained cook. I want to see the cook clean the dishes.
Muhammad of the Islamic Religion was genius, he taught good ideas, take off your shoes full of sand, wash your feet, and put down a rug that you have kept clean.
Buddhism does the same, the Buddhist pretty much demand you take your shoes off before you enter a home.
Good Hygiene! Leave what is outside in the streets, on your shoes and outside the house, do not bring cow, human or other crap into the home.
What is healthy? What is safe? My room in the Hotel Paix is safe, and it functions. The floor is clean, I have a great Mosquito Net, the fan is quiet, there is shower and toilet, there is toilet paper, and I can shave, clean my hands.
It is NOT Great. I will leave today as the neighborhood sucks; there are a couple of Barbaric Rasta Men roaming the city.
I really miss the Video City Hotel in Mampong, Ghana. I think about returning, if Ghana gave me any possible way of getting a Visa, I would go back for a Vacation.
I feel negligent; I said the rooms in the cave were great.
http://www.hobotraveler.com/2007/09/burkina-faso-hotel-air-conditioning.html
The Hotel room here at the Hotel Paix in Banfora is great, outside the hotel sucks. The Hotel room at the cave sucked, outside the room was great.
I feel negligent; I said an unsafe room for 99 percent of the people was great, while for me it was great. Africa has bars or steel louvers on the windows; there is too much theft in Africa to not put bars on the windows.
Risk Evaluation, I sometimes should keep my mouth shut, not type in this computer, sit, and think before I say anything, especially when I say anything nice. To complain is ok; it stops people from going and being annoyed or in dangerous situations.
The rules of Islam, Buddhism, and Hindu are good. People need to be told to clean their arse. People like these rules of because after they return from all this, they feel clean and refreshed, like going to a Five Star Hotel. A few times per day, they are in comfort.
I am looking for a 10-day hotel; it would be nice to take a vacation in a comfortable room in a nice neighborhood. I like the neighborhood at my cave. I could walk over in the mornings and eat some freshly cooked Beignets or Bread, then at sunset I could walk over, the woman would be sitting cleaning and cutting long potatoes into wedges, then cook them right in front of me for 100 CFA. I ate some French Fries last night in the Hotel Paix for 800 CFA last night in what is a reasonably good restaurant. I am nervous thinking about this, they cooked them very fast. There is NOBODY in the hotel, the restaurant was empty, zero, and the French Fries tasted good, soggy and too much oil, not crispy and obviously fresh though. I had to ask for salt while the woman in the street offered salt and some pepper sauce.
I feel safe in the Hotel Paix in Banfora, I did not feel safe at the end of the day as I needed to leave the window open to be comfortable, and if I left the window open, I was not safe from theft.
Having the shower, toilet, and wastebasket outside the room is brilliance. There is no trash in the room to feed the ants, no water in the room for mosquitoes, and there is less humidity in the room so the room is cooler. All the mess is outside the room, whereby I do not need to allow a person inside to clean and allow them to steal my camera. There is a long hallway leading to the room, and by the time you arrive at the room your shoes are free of sand. I have a very clean room. I like a shower in my room so I can wash my clothes.
This hotel has what is needed, in the wrong neighborhood. The other in a good neighborhood, nice surrounding and what 99 percent of people want, with no way to shave or keep the burglars out. There was no restaurant to give them food poisoning so go figure, everyone wants to get food poisoning, I am pretty sure it kills more than Malaria.
The Hotel Paix security man came and woke me for the first bus, than had some free breakfast ready, exceptional service here in this Hotel.
Hotel Paix Banfora Burkina FasoLabels: Burkina Faso, Burkina Faso Hotels |
posted by Andy HoboTraveler.com @ 6:55 AM   |
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| Burkina Faso Hotel Air Conditioning |
| Wednesday, September 12, 2007 |
Burkina Faso Hotel Air Conditioning
Bobo Dioulasso, Burkina Faso, West Africa
Wednesday, September 12, 2007
Andy of HoboTraveler.com
I am living in a red clay cave for 5000 CFA or 10 US Dollars.
The first Hammock I have seen in Africa is here in Bobo.
I have never thought of Air Conditioning as a solution, however, as I lie here in bed analyzing my present non-AC room, I thought,
- Air Conditioning is the answer. -
I French West Africa to request an Air Conditioned room, I need to say,
- Climatisé. -
I was making a list of small problems in my room when the answer popped in my head,
- Air Conditioning. -
Then I started to laugh; Air Conditioning is the solution to a plethora of Hotel room problems. I would not say I respect owners of Hotels, or the management of Hotels, I could best say I avoid having long conversations with the management of Hotels, it probably is Biblical in nature,
- Lead us not into temptation -
My Mother and Father I hope are happy, their talk too much, opens his mouth and embarrass them son has finally learned to keep his mouth shut.
I am in a GREAT Hotel room in Bobo, Burkina Faso, the overall in-compared-to-other-rooms I am in a very good room. I love to read the ludicrous emails I receive on recommendations of great hotels. The person will write and tell me about this wonderful great room in some exotic country like Thailand, going into blah blah blah and then finally I learn the price of the room was 350 US dollars per night or about one years pay for the normal world.
Strange as it sounds, I can find Air Conditioned rooms in Burkina Faso and most of West Africa easier than I can find fan rooms. The world is full of business travelers, people on luxury two week vacations, NGOs who are not on a budget, normally spending someone else’s money.
The average person in West Africa may have never stay in a Hotel in their life; many of the girls know a room for one hour. The rooms in West Africa are designed for people who are rich compared to the average person, for example ME. I am outrageously rich compared to the average Burkina Faso person.
I earn about 95 times the Average yearly wages of a Burkina Faso person, if the person next to you earned 95 times more than yourself, you would think, this person is super-rich. I am super-rich compared to the average West African person.
Therefore, the Hotels rooms have AC and cost 10-40 US and not 1 dollar per night or a price the Average Burkina Faso person could afford.
I am in a great fan room, however my list of problems with the room makes me think Air Conditioning is the simple solution.
I am living in a red clay cave.
Ok, it is not a cave; I think a cave needs to be below ground level or maybe in the side of a mountain.
My great room is inside the left part of this building made of clay.
Cave:
- large underground hollow: a large, naturally hollowed-out place in the ground, or in rock above ground, that can be reached from the surface or from water. -
I am in an above ground cave, made out of red clay, with a couple of holes to so I can breath.
I just went and talked to John, and returned to my bed, and decided, enough is enough; I open the door and the window to allow this cave to breath. I walked in last night at around 9:00 PM and instantly thought,
- Dank -
I was wrong, not the dictionary correct word to use, it is not cold, my room was warm and humid because when I left the room, I locked it up, closed the window, when I returned to my cave it was humid.
Look at small hole above window. There is this small hole at the top of the room, I hope to learn why? Why is there one small hole at the top of the room?
The naturally cool room in a Hotel is on the bottom floor, and beneath a few floors of concrete, with no sunlight. The problem with room is how do you breath, a person starts to suffocate and has this real inclination to climb out of the hole and find a place with air.
Burkina Faso people are smart, they construct home out of red clay colored dirt, and then make the ROOF of clay, and essentially, it becomes an above ground cave. There is a real danger, if one of these roof fall in on a person they can be killed. When I was in Bolgatanga, Ghana it was raining and one of the young women cooking was telling me the rain kills people, because the homes collapse and kills the occupant of the cave.
My room is great, it is clean, it has a fan, I have my own private toilet and shower and there is a courtyard with hammock and chairs. I also have a kitchen to use; however, I am supposed to donate money for propane if I use the burners, price confusions because they never rent the rooms. I am sure, I am one of the few people who has rented a room and there are no clear and established prices for room benefits.
I am living at a Slovenia friend of mine Tito, I met him in Ghana as normal he is on a Mission, semi NGO, or Project, the sign says
- Humanist
Humanist:
- concern for people: a concern with the needs, well-being, and interests of people.
This is probably a 7 on a 1-10 scale of projects, I so far think a very good project, and at least I have not seen the managers driving 4-wheel drives around. They have a library for the people to use and help with textiles, and somehow people sponsor and pay for school fees for children, everything is on the up and up and seems great.
One-way for a project to supplements their overhead is to rent rooms to Foreigners, they call me Foreigner, and my name in Bobo is
- Tubabu (Che) -
In Ouaga my name was
- Nassara -
Looks like the stereotype door to a cave. This place is great, and if you leave the window and door open a reasonable good value for 5000 CFA or 10 US for a person with a car. You need a car as this is about 3 Kilometers or more from the Central Market, however cultural immersion is guaranteed. I do not have a car, so I will move to the city in a day and stop the long hoof or fights with taxi drivers.
AC is a solution to a list of Hotel Problems:
1. Keeping the bugs and mosquitoes out of the room, because you do not have to open windows.
2. Damp rooms
3. Fans that are loud, the new type of AC is quiet.
4. Having to rent a room on the bottom of a building to be cool.
5. You do not need a mosquito net.
6. Privacy because you close the windows and doors.
7. Quiet because the windows are closed.
I never thought how AC is a simple solution to a hotel needing to be designed well and located in a quiet neighborhood.
I am in a nice quiet neighborhood, far from the central city and a great food market is around the corner. A semi-ideal location for a person driving a four-wheel drive, and wants to park the car. More or less easy to find in a car at the end of Sector 21 before a Yellow Mosque.
The room is typical construction methods of Burkina Faso and clean and interesting sleep in a clean version of the local Burkina Faso Architecture and building design.
Burkina Faso Hotel Air ConditioningLabels: Burkina Faso, Burkina Faso Hotels |
| posted by Andy HoboTraveler.com @ 9:25 AM |
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| Ouaga Hostel |
| Tuesday, September 11, 2007 |
Ouaga Hostel
Ouaga Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso, West Africa
Monday, September 10, 2007
Andy of HoboTraveler.com
I am a flop called Fondation Charles Dunfour on Rue de Chance; the guidebook says Rue du Mosque. I am in a different country, therefore a different guide writer; nonetheless, this writer’s maybe does not have a car and is more ready to forgive than the Ghana writer not on a budget.
I am in love with this Hostel for one night, and I will kiss it goodbye today and say hello if I see her again. I will not exchange numbers. There are two French Girls in one of the room who brush and combs each other’s hair, to other French Girls in the dorm beds I think, and another French guy named Thomas. Thomas is the only person, who speaks English, and his English is great, they do not seem to smoke… strange?
There is literally one of the 5-7 various boys flopping on the floor just beyond he swing of my room door. I woke at about 4:55 am, did the SOP walk to find a switch to the John, and find some water for coffee. Upon return to the room, I used a pillow from the bed with no pillowcase to block the three 2-inch gap under my single room door. I know the light from room would glare into his eyes on the floor and possibly wake him, I hope.
Four French Girls, One French Boy and One American
5 Men and 2 Girls from some African Country, I hope Burkina Faso living in the Hostels.
A single room is 5000-6000 CFA or 10-12 U.S. Dollars. A dorm bed with a mosquito net on the bed is I think 3000 or 6 US Dollars, my room did not include a Mosquito net, the hotel is one short, so I pay more and have none, go figure.
This is a “We are in this Together Hotel,” so we all overlook and look the other way and pretend. The French girls are in Africa to visit one country, and Thomas is visiting two. He said to me, “The Hotels are very expensive, yes?” I then taught him some curse words in English to expand on his vocabulary in agreement.
It has been ages since I have stayed in a Hostel or Hotel like this, it reminds me of a place long long ago in Managua, Nicaragua. The Managua place was great, full of Peace Corps not at their village as normal and Israel people, and one exceptional Israel girl named Maya, she was a dream that did not come true. The room was about the same quality; a lizard climbed in my room and ate my bread in a plastic bag hanging on the wall no less. The room was one dollar.
I closed the window here; the only guaranteed of nothing crawling in, however, there is a two going on three-inch gap under the door I cannot lock because it has expanded due to moisture.
This room is 10 US dollars, my room in Po comparable for 8, but with a mosquito net in Po.
I walked back to the Hotel Oiseau Blue diagonally across from the Rakieta Bus Station three times yesterday. The vendors in front of the station are the only ones selling food in this area on Sunday. The neighborhood is very organized, the grid system of wide streets, the traffic is not too bad, and all is easy. The red clay sand is covering the city in a slurry of mud today, as it has been raining nightly.
I paid 10 US dollar for the experience and money well spent to live in the Fondation Charles Dunfour Hostel here in Ouaga, Burkina Faso, and I would suspect if Charles is alive, he is doing well from the proceeds, as the cost of proving services to income is a good gap. Everyone should stay in a Hostel like this one time in his or her life, they can be either at home or hell, but they are for sure a trip to somewhere. This type of Hostel with the correct people inside can be a joy to live in, the camaraderie makes the “we are in this together” help you to forget you are in a flophouse in and industrial wholesale section of town. I really wish all the French were smoking as normal… it would make all more SOP and in the right Frame.
I cannot remember, I think it is called Crystal Hostel in Accra Ghana was a challenge for worst over-all value for the buck. It was also a “We are in this together Hostel,” very low utility value, also located on the wrong side of the tracks.
I think if I lived in this Hostel long enough, a local girl would say, why are you living in that neighborhood don’t you know it is the wholesale industrial area. About 5 blocks directly east of here is a large modern street with a few good place to hide, and way to expensive hotels. It is where I will go to use the internet, and then retrieve my backpacks that are locked to the table because the room will not lock, and scoot on down the road to a city named Bobo, surreal and real.
My fan is quiet, a benefit.
Ouaga HostelLabels: Burkina Faso, Burkina Faso Hotels |
| posted by Andy HoboTraveler.com @ 2:25 PM |
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| Po Mosquito Net Hotel |
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Po Mosquito Net Hotel
Po, Burkina Faso, West Africa
Sunday, September 9, 2007
Andy of HoboTraveler.com
I am under a mosquito net provided by the Hotel of the Auberge ADPO in the room he says is,
- Bien Propre -
I am one hour away from needing to make a decision, do I stay or do I go? My Auberge room for 4000 CFA is 90 percent cheaper than 7000 CFA in Ouaga, and difficult to say if better or worst. Obviously the Auberge de l'Oiseu Bleu appeared cleaner and running water in my room is nice. However, a mosquito net is safer than a clean room with no screens. Ok, this is easy, the neighborhood of the Auberge ADPO in Po is leading by 15 photos, I have taken in one day 15 more photos of Po than of Ouaga in two days.
Po is a clean little village with an inordinate amount of Bars, I am close to saying Burkina Bars, or maybe the Burkina Buvette, I just am caught off guard by the ratio of Bars to people in Burkina, Faso, seems like Ho Chi Minh city, Vietnam with renovations and wider streets, with red pepper poured over it.
In both cities I heard the boys coming to bed around 2:00 PM or later and this makes me nervous, Alcohol and Macho does not mix well.
Po Mosquito Net HotelLabels: Burkina Faso, Burkina Faso Hotels |
| posted by Andy HoboTraveler.com @ 2:18 PM |
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