OUAGADOUGOU - Since moving to Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso’s capital, I’ve taken to roaming the streets late at night, when the city empties and takes its last breaths before settling down to sleep. It’s during the calmness of the night that I often see and feel things that pass you by during the hussle of the day.

One such night, I get lost in the streets of the Pissy neighborhood in the west of the capital, where a strong smell of smoke overcomes me. That was my first contact with the granite quarry, which sustains numerous families in the neighborhood.