yovo yovo

So, what was it REALLY like?

2011-06-24T10:25:00.000-07:00

The slip of paper read. I stared bewildered. How am I supposed to respond to that?

What was it really like?

It was like watching myself grow old. Students who had never been to a proper school before, wearing hand-me-down khakis, grew to become young men and women. Babies were born and died. Goats were born and killed. Girls became mothers. Boys became farmers and carpenters. Old women stopped going to the fields and stayed home to watch growing numbers of children crawl in the spaces between legs, pots and mudwalls. I saw new buildings, new enterprise and growth. I saw displacement, decay and neglect.

What was it really like?

It was like watching Sisyphus toil for two years. Tears well up in my eyes when I think about the quiet afternoons shelling sesame seeds with Mama at the storefront, listening to her loud, percussive lectures in Fon. She gets up, stirs something in a pot with one hand, shoos a goat with the other, serves a customer, gives change to a child, hails a passing motorcycle all with the other other hand which has yet to reveal itself. She won't sit again until it is night, and her grown children have scrubbed the blackened rice pots. Women walk by with enormous logs on their heads shouting, "E-Kabo Wit-taou", I bow low in my awkward whiteness as they sweat on by. Miriam comes for a visit, walking slowly, waving shyly and balancing an enormous, heavy tray of shoes on top of her head she’d like to sell to make money for her baby’s medicine. Papa snores drunkenly under the shea tree.

What was it really like?

It was like listening to a symphony of car crashes. The quiet sitting of funerals. E-Ku-jo-ko. The slow, back-bent dance at weddings. The miraculous births. E-ku-djoun. The homecomings, the liberation ceremonies, the drums. The many, many fights. The bleating goats and screeching chickens. The women calling out "Awadja!" at market.

What was it really like?

It was like re-coming home. While here, in Africa, in a new community, I have been fortunate enough to rediscover the community I left behind. The unfailing support of my parents and friends, the dedication to my projects and goals, has been as much a blessing as it has been a surprise. My projects have all found their funding, and have either been implemented or are almost there. I could never have done my work here if not for the army of people that work at home. I am excited to go back and make it up to all of you.

What was it really like?

This question was part of a game during our Close-of-Service Conference. We were all to answer one question out of nearly 50 frequently asked questions for RPCVs. When I saw the slip of paper, tears sprung to my eyes.

What was it really like?

It was wonderful. And thank you. Thank you.

Happy Mother's Day

2011-05-08T10:21:00.000-07:00

Most of you have already seen this, but the sentiment is timely and necessary:

In the United States today, it is Mother's Day, a day we celebrate and appreciate the women who have made enormous contributions and drastic differences in our lives and communities.

As many of you know, I have spent the past two years as a Peace Corps Volunteer in West Africa, in the Republic of Benin. As my service is winding up to a close, there are a few things I'd like to share with you.

The first is, we cannot hope to reasonably combat abject poverty if we continue to underutilize the population that suffers the most: women. According to some estimates, women make up 70% of the world's poor. According to UNIFEM, Women perform 66 percent of the world’s work, produce 50 percent of the food, but earn 10 percent of the income and own 1 percent of the property. This isn't a political, economic or societal issue- it's a human right's issue through and through.

Now, this isn't new news- multinational and non-governmental organizations have been talking about the "Feminization of Poverty" for years; nor is combatting global poverty revolutionary. However, giving individuals, not corporations or large governments, the opportunity to contribute to individual projects to empower the world’s women, is.

With this in mind, I would like to bring to your attention Camp Success, a Girls' Empowerment Camp in the north of Benin. This week-long camp’s goal is to award high-achieving middle schoolers with the opportunity to learn, lead and navigate their own futures. I urge you, on behalf of all women and mothers everywhere, to support this generation of future mothers, who at this moment in time need all the help they can get.

The link attached to this message is to the site to donate. If you are not interested in donating, or cannot at this time, please visit the site anyway. Your support is not limited to your financial generosity. Please repost this link with a message of support. Or forward this message. Every little thing helps those with nothing.

Best,

Sarah Pedersen

https://www.peacecorps.gov/index.cfm?shell=donate.contribute.projDetail&projdesc=680-210

Pencils Down

2011-04-13T12:37:00.001-07:00

School is winding down. Easter break will begin in just a couple of days. It’s so hard to believe that the school year could begin in mid-October, and finish in mid-May. I know one Volunteer, out of nearly 30, who has said she has almost finished the curriculum for this year. I wish I had more time to complete the lessons I had wished to complete. I wish I had just one more month at CEG Manigri.

But I will not miss it.

I will not miss struggling to keep my temper down as students continue to talk and bicker amongst each other. I will not miss reprimanding 16 year old students for hitting younger students in class. I will not miss staring out at a sea of clueless faces, only wishing to lie face down on the bare cement floor. I will not miss drilling conjugation, sending students to be beaten, chalk dust, or dwindling class sizes as the year rolls onward.

I will not miss it.

I will not miss how kids will exclaim, “Teacharr!” when I’ve finally made a joke they understand. I will not miss the broken English phrases, phrases like, “I finish!”, “May I gho owwt?” and “Give me yo’ pen!” I will certainly not miss the headache of grading papers, filling out page after page of grades in different colored ink, and how no matter how many times I make them go back to their seats; they never wear shoes to the chalkboard.
I will not miss poorly pronouncing their names, names like Mournijatou, Souradji, Samoussirath, I will not miss children speaking to me in Nagot in front of other teachers just for laughs; or responding, knee-jerkingly, “oh-wah” or “moti yo”, to giggling girls in khaki.

I will not miss being strange, foreign, and awkward.

I will not miss acheke at 10am breakfast, or the harried woman who sells it. I will not miss the youngest students running out of their classroom to greet me and take my basket full of books and lesson plans. I will not miss them placing it on their heads and walking quickly back to class, breathing “goo’ morning teachar” through their winded smile. I won’t miss the other teachers, the men with their good-natured jokes and warm handshakes. I will not miss Hafissou asking me, “How do you feel?” and greeting Narcissis, through the door, with a salute. I will miss walking home with Arouna, I will miss getting fresh eggs, wagasi and cashew fruit from my students. I will miss the drumming, pounding and dancing part of singing in class. I will miss Zoumal, Douritimi, Azouma, Bariatou, Fassouni, and all three Azizes.

I will miss all of them. And I look forward to the last day, when I can tell them the impact they have had on me. How my life has been infinitely enriched as a result of their kindness, joviality, and strength. I will never know how (in)effective or influential my teaching or presence has been, but even if I have been a poor teacher, I am certain I am a good student. Finals are coming up.

Blood Sacrifice

2011-03-20T12:26:00.000-07:00

I have a feeling I'm going to have a difficult time coming to any coherent point in this entry. But I suppose when you consider the three months that have passed since I've last written, that can't be entirely surprising.
Manigri is more or less the same as when I last wrote. The babies are all getting bigger, the children keep growing and the dry stalks that so bravely fought Harmattan winds are now being rewarded with the Mango rains. Cashews are being harvested at break-neck pace, as last year the crop was dissappointing and many farmers are hoping to make up for lost profits and fill hungry bellies. The mangos aren't all quite ripe in Manigri yet. The boughs of the tree in my concession are propped up by big sticks to keep them from breaking and tumbling the unripened fruit on the ground. Everyday a cluster of five or six boys perch outside of my house, patiently waiting for me to motion them inside so they can play with paper airplanes, jump-ropes, chalk, markers, or any of the other 100 children's toys I’ve inherited from previous Volunteers. Typically they only last twenty or thirty minutes before I am throwing them all out for fighting, wrestling or trying to jump off my kitchen cabinet (Jojo). They're good kids, but their boyish energy is much better suited outside in the dirt where they can build cars out of baby powder bottles or ”pumps” out of tin cans.
But I suppose there is news. The presidential election was last Sunday. Since February there had been nearly constant parades of singing, chanting and drumming down the dusty streets, the cheering going well into the night. “ABT!”, women and children would call over and over again. Abdoulaye Bio Tchani was the challenger from the Donga region, his hometown being Djougou. The president, incumbent and front-runner, Yayi Boni, came to visit Bassila and Manigri. I saw him for only a moment as his motorcade drove through Ikanyi on its way to a former Minister’s mansion. Yayi Boni ended up with 53% of the vote, a clear majority given the 13 other candidates. On election day I toured the election booths at the primary schools and CEG, asking questions about ballots, counting and corruption. Mama Latifou, my next-door neighbor, met me outside of the CEG, purple ink still wet on her thumb. I pushed my right thumb to hers, gaining a sliver of purple on the outer-edge. I have one, gross and sweaty, photograph of it hidden in my new camera.
A few weeks ago my friend Djibril noticed that I am frequently sick. It’s usually nothing serious, just stomach pains or diarrhea, but enough to keep me beached on my living room couch for hours at a time. This was the conversation,
“Are you protected?”
“Protected? From sorcery?”
“Yes”
“No one would want to do sorcery on me… would they?”
“No, no, of course not.”
“So do I need protection?”
“Yes.”
And so last night at about ten pm, Bradley and I followed Djibril down the narrow, winding footpaths to his parents house. The wind shook the leaves of the enormous sacred tree as we slowly trudged through the yam fields beneath a moon much brighter and larger than usual. I met Djibril's father, dressed in his clothes from evening prayer, a long white robe and round, embroidered hat. He was washing his hands, face and feet in preparation as we arrived. Djibril's younger brother ushered us inside where a stone-faced man with a voice like a lion's purr sat on a prayer rug, also dressed in white. This was a clairvoyant, a seer, and Imam. Djibril's father sit on the floor and motioned to us two hard-backed chairs. The Imam lit two candles to call the spirits to us to listen, then two sticks of incense to intice them to stay. Djibril's father laid a large platter of corn with four kola nuts in the center on the floor. We exchanged nervous salutations and awkward small talk in nagot. Djibril's father nodded at the Imam, and then they began the prayer. Thirty, forty-five minutes, an hour- I honestly do not know- passed. The sunbaked ciment walls radiated heat from a sun that had set hours before. The Imam stood and then knelt in all four directions. His voiced raised and lowered in pitch, but never in volume which was like a dryer running in a distant basement. Djibril’s brother got up quietly and slipped outside. I glanced at Bradley as I heard the rustle of feathers of the white rooster we had purchased at the market. He was laid down carefully by the doorstep. I quickly began concentrating on my hands and fingers as it began to chuckle to the dark. The Imam’s voice grew louder. It rumbled and rustled the hair on my arms like a breeze through tall grass, wind through leaves. Djibril and his father punctuated the prayer, chanting. Amen. Amen. Amen. Amen. A distressed cry from the white rooster. Amen. Amen. Amen. I focused on my hands in front of me, willing myself to believe in magic, God and blood sacrifice. The rooster continued to call out into the night. My vision blurred. Then a loud shriek, a gurgle, a sigh.
Then silence.
Right now Djibril is coming with some teasane, a tea-type concoction of leaves and traditional medicines. Then he will take a razor and cut a very small incision into my legs. He will rub ash and poultice into the wound and bandage it. I will drink the teasane quietly and marvel at the cross-section between faith and mystery; medicine and science, as the church behind my house plays its drums to the darkening sky- the evening stars strung out like chicken feed, the moon a red, round kola nut.

Merry Christmas

2010-12-22T07:49:00.000-08:00

And to my mother, Happy Birthday.

They roar past like ghosts on their tired, choking motorcycles. Harmattan sands cake their skin and clothes. Many peer past clouded goggles protecting their eyes from the intrusive grit. These gray specters fly down terre rouge on their way from Nigeria near the end of every December. It's the rural exodus.

Nigeria's farming and lumber industries pay more, drawing economic migration from all over the country. At Christmastime, however, the migrants come home. The small dirt paths leading to villages all over Benin are crowded with moto-caravans, racing by in groups of eight or nine. Big, eighteen-wheel trucks, carry loads men in their beds. Men who cheer as you wave to them. Men on their way home. They're always blanketed in gray, a mix of ash from the fields being burned and the choking dust clouds of Harmattan.

In Manigri, you can tell when someone has finally come home. In my house I can hear cheers erupting from all over Ikanyi, as entire concessions pour out of their homes to greet their returned brothers. It's difficult to describe. For these men, their entire lives were spent in these concessions, surrounded by multiple inter-married and related families. And then they had to leave. Leave their mothers, fathers, wives, children, to seek work and better wages in a different country with a new language. They bring back gifts, the back of their motos are weighed down with cement sacks; pockets heavy with money. But the real gift, of course, is themselves. And it's not just the concession that celebrates- the surrounding concessions come out. Old mamas, babies, papas, brothers, cousins, sisters rush out of their homes to see the stranger who has returned. It's pandemonium and joy and possibly the most beautiful thing I've ever seen.

They don't really come home for Christmas, however, as you may think. Christmas is largely seen as a holiday for children. Papa Noel is just some cartoon character that gives presents to little kids. Of course, most kids don't get Christmas presents as families save their kabri for the New Year celebration, a feast that lasts up to three days. That is the real fête. While I never felt as though we celebrated a religious Christmas in my family, there remains a nostalgia for snow, lighted trees, and the general spirit of love, generosity and kindness encouraged through the season. This is the kind of nostalgia that makes me choke up when teaching my students, "We Wish You a Merry Christmas" in class. (I'll chalk this emotionalism up to not having had to endure christmas music, obnoxious advertising or shopping mall santas.)

The new pastor and his wife (of the church directly behind my house) are possibly the sweetest couple I've ever met. Their speech is soft and they shake hands earnestly. I like visiting them to ask them about their chickens, the service, the choir, etc. Last time I was sitting in their house, I glanced into one of their side rooms to see a stack of boxes. The side facing me read, "Samaritan's Purse". Where have I seen that before? I got up from my vastly uncomfortable seat to examine the cardboard boxes. "Operation Christmas Child." No. No way.

I was just talking about them last year in a scattered blog post. My sisters and I would get a slip of paper with the information: boy, age 13. or girl, age 3 typed out on it. We'd fill a shoebox with hard candy, small toys and picture books. It was, looking back, one of the better parts of Christmas. And as I wrote last time, as a kid I knew someone would put in a little book about Jesus and Christianity in attempts to proselytize, but that didn't bother me. The generosity and uncommon kindness to strangers was more appealing to me than any religious basis for the organization.

And then, there they were. Shoeboxes little girls and boys filled with hope for a merry christmas to kids they could never hope to meet. Shoeboxes filled with toys that will undoubtedly bring so much joy, excitement (and confusion) to the homes of children who have only tin cans and matchbooks to play with. I remember vividly helping my mom stuff socks and a toothbrush into a shoebox and wrapping it, wondering about the lives of those children abroad in the Philippines or yes, Africa. And now , staring there I was, staring at the same boxes that I had once wrapped. And I know these kids now. And those kids. It was like straddling the continental divide. It was miraculous to me that in all of the churches in Benin, this small mud-brick congregation was a recipient of Samaritan's Purse, and that I had the opportunity to be on the receiving end of someone else's generosity and charity. Someone else's christmas wish, if you will.

I know there are a lot of people out there who don't celebrate or even particularly like Christmas. I used to be one of them. In the United States it's really easy to see the seedy underbelly of this vastly commercial holiday. However, once removed from the status quo of gift-wrapping, terrible television commercials and nerve-wracking economic analysis, I find myself discovering what the holiday means to me. It's a shoebox, wrapped by small hands in the United States and opened in the bush of Africa.

With that I'd just like to say, Happy Holidays. I miss you all.

Mirror Phase

2010-10-02T11:10:00.000-07:00

What is the phase in Child Development Theory that toddlers finally understand that just because someone has walked out of a room, they haven’t vanished forever? The way things changed since I Ieft post have been unsettling; as though I expected Manigri to remain static during my prolonged absence this summer. My ‘sister’ Rafia (17) moved out of Mama's house and to Oke, where she's living with her 'husband.' Mama Victoire is now Mama Ines. The new baby is soft and sweet and smells like every other baby I've ever held. Sidou has a new baby brother, now there is a Mama Edison. Jo Jo is starting primary school, and he was so upset about it he hasn't been the same kid. It’s like he finally realized that at some point he's going to have to stop running through the bush naked. He's going to have to grow up; the inertia of the world is far too strong for him and his big belly.

The last time I was here it was the Fete for Ramadan. I live in an all-Christian concession, and so I had to seek out people to celebrate with. I ended up going to Bassila to see Mazou and a few of his friends. We saw a soccer game and ate at my favorite buvette despite the fact that we were invited to swankier restaurant nearby. Yvette, a tanti from Camp Sucess, was there in meme tissue with her friends. She chasitized me for not calling her to tell her I was in town. I smiled because I knew that it wouldn't have made any difference. She's too much of a big shot for me. Manigri was so loud, the air vibrated. I couldn't hear the bleats of goats over the stereos pumping and pilees pounding. Mama made cous cous and goat that actually tasted almost good. I have never been a fan of her cooking. It always makes me a little queasy. Perhaps it was the goat tooth I found in the bushes after throwing up my first night at post. Or perhaps it's just that she actually doesn't care how food tastes, just that it gets made.

Mama's little buvette literally exploded over the summer. She received a loan from her savings and loans group facilitated by (Danish NGO) Bornefonden. She built a small concrete store, where she now sells a lot of liquor and things such as detergent, cous cous, spaghetti, sardines, mayonnaise- basically all of the things that the other stores in Manigri sell. This has greatly dampened my incentive to go into Oke or even into greater Ikanyi since I've arrived back. Why go searching for toilet paper when... Oh yes, she sells toilet paper too. Just steps outside my door. I can yell from my couch and magically it appears in Gi's hands, his grinning face peering through my screen door. As a result I haven't seen my Nagot ladies in a long time, and I haven't gone to salue anyone but Olivier and the Director. Edwidge and her family moved to another town up north, I forget the name, but the same place she was born. I have no idea who the new pastor is. Papa's cousin in Oke died a few weeks ago, I missed the ceremony. KoKaDa (my cat) is pregnant. It's just so strange to be so estranged from a place that is so strange, and yet I am the stranger.

Also, petit chaleur has begun. Right now the sky is threatening rain and I can see lightning bickering around the edges of my back wall, but it is so bright and hot in the sun. I still have full buckets of water almost every couple of days, which is a luxury I am unsure as to how I ever lived without. Harmattan will be here soon and it will grow cold. I smile thinking about how during December the professors would show up at school in their down jackets and hats, asking me how I liked the cold. I always told them I loved it, that it pleased me, that I thought it was so much better than the heat. They'd laugh and shake their heads at my enthusiasm for the la frecheur. I wonder if it will feel as good this year, or if I too will be showing up dressed like a zemidjian, rubbing my hands together as if over a fire.

I have begun working on planning a bike tour for the Donga Region. I'd like to do about seven or eight hand-washing formations from Bassila to Aledjo and then up to possibly Djougou this Harmattan. After that I will begin planning the "Best Pratices: Camp BLOW and Camp GLOW" workshop for January. Then it's monthly meetings for Camp Sucess and Camp Espoir until July. Oh, and teaching. Of course. And Girls' Club, bien sur.

I have no fear that as I become habituated again I will venture out farther from the confines of my concession and experience more. There are always ceremonies and babies and school activities to go to. There are always people to have late evening conversations with about America, race, gender, development, time and, mostly, the familiar sound of silence. There are a lot of things in my periphery. I just want to focus on the most important ones, which are all right in front of me. My work, my friends, and my life in Manigri.

"We ought to see that the work that needs doing for [the poor] in their misery, not as mere "good work", but as a duty that must not be shirked." Albert Schweitzer.

Au Revoir Nos Cheres Amies

2010-07-25T14:16:00.000-07:00

Immediately after returning from the United States, there was Camp Sucess. I didn't have time to go back to Manigri, I met everyone in Djougou with a duffel bag full of tuna fish and ostrich jerky. I had always been told that the highlight of one's service was camp. Within the first day it was easy to see why. The way the girls' eyes lit up when they sang and danced. How motivated and interested they were in every activity- even the more difficult ones. How many of them had never seen a city as big as Djougou, or perhaps had ever been outside of their villages- and there they were, at a cyber cafe in the biggest city in their region, googling Michael Jackson.

My post has had a special relationship with this camp for almost five years. The first Volunteer in Manigri, John, created it with my current counterpart Olivier. Olivier then worked with Carly for two years on the same camp, culminating in a mega-ultra huge wonderful fantastic spectacle known as the current Camp Success, where 12 villages send 60 girls to Djougou for six days. It's the largest girls' camp in the country and also the most intense. By the end of it, there wasn't a dry eye in the room as my girls sang "Au revoir de notre cheres amies", one singer barely able to croak out the refrain, tears streaming down her face.

In teams of eight and paired with both a Volunteer and a HCN "Tanti", they learned about sexual health, stress, the importance of education and self esteem. They spoke to a panel of great professional women, they climbed a mountain, they saw Tata Sambas, they learned the greater art of journaling, they did yoga and sang songs. So many songs. So, so, so many songs.

We talked through-out the planning process about whether or not a girl could come back for a third year to Camp Sucess. It didn't feel right somehow that the same girls could come year after year when in reality we needed to help as many as possible. It was heartbreaking to watch the girls say goodbye to their friends. It was also heartbreaking watching my friends say goodbye to the girls knowing they too would be absent next year. As we do two year tours, so will they. And in between laughing and crying we'll find time to work and teach and learn. (oh yes, I am that cheesy)

Jessica Bruce, Naima Ferrell, Melissa Perry and Benjamin Jakob will all be leaving the greater Bassila Commune in two weeks for their homes abroad. I want everyone to know what an enormous inspiration and help they've been to me this past year, and that no one will ever be able to replace them. I only hope I can do what I can next year to be as half as influential as they have been to me.

I will leave Saturday to work Stage for the new Volunteers who have just arrived. I will not be back in Manigri until likely September. If I am at all difficult to reach during this time I apologize, I imagine a busy and interesting month is ahead.

Coming to America, Coming Home

2010-07-25T14:03:00.000-07:00

I feel as though there would be something amiss if I didn't take the opportunity to compare, once again, America and the United States.

I left for Boston the 2nd of June. It was late. With my large army surplus knapsack and small laptop carry-on, aided by my friend Kara, I slowly hoisted myself from the zemidjian and onto the broken sidewalk. My stomach was twitching nervously as I gazed at the large, formerly unfamiliar building in front of me. Kara walked me right to the line to check in and hugged me good-bye.
"Enjoy America," she said.
"I will," I replied robotically, my eyes shifting around to make sure my luggage was safe in front and behind me. Then she disappeared, I saw her blond hair and white arms for just a moment before she shattered into a million pieces and I was on the plane.

The man next to me was a Sergeant with the US Military. I didn't want to talk with him at first. I thought he would try to hit on me. I had been conditioned to not talk to men unless I had to. It's just easier to ignore them outright instead of engaging them and finding it necessary to do so later when they start harassing you to give them your phone number. He was nice. He had a blond mustache. He thought my Nagot was endearing. He was training Beninese soldiers near the Nigerian border. He uniform faded into the gray of his airline seat as I dozed off.

The food. So much food. Every time I awoke, Air France fed me. Dinner, breakfast, lunch and a snack. Real butter. Cheese. Bread. I couldn't touch the wine, worried it would be too rich. Clean, cold water was a blessing in a plastic cup. On the plane ride to Benin the first time, my friends Rich, Bradley and I all got drunk on the complimentary airline size bottles of wine. We were raucous and giddy with red mouths and teeth. I drank because I knew I wouldn't be able to sleep on the red eye flight, never having had to get used to sleeping sitting up. This flight I couldn't keep my eyes open. I didn't have time to watch an in-flight movie or listen to music or read. I just slept, lulled by the peaceful ride and vibration and relative infrequent bump in the road.

At Charles de Gualle I stared in wonder at the series of automatic revolving doors. Thinking about how revolving doors were so efficient. I drank a cup of coffee and listened to my Ipod for six hours, marching up and down the terminal trying to see what I would like to buy. The New York Times was sold out, I settled for the Herald Tribune. I watched lovers entwine their legs beneath cafe tables and harried parents usher small children past men in wrinkled suits with sunglasses. I tried to write. Nothing came out. I was tapped out. Dry. My brain was overloaded in the way that it was when I first arrived in Benin. Culture shock. I didn't want to talk to anyone. I didn't want anyone to know who I was or where I was coming from or where I was going. I was anonymous, the way many Americans like to be.

Arriving in Boston I was elated to see David. A pair of cow horns strapped to the top of my knapsack made it difficult to walk, they were almost twice as wide as my body and tied near my neck. People stopped and stared from their cars as we walked to his apartment. I felt as though I looked like a minotaur. I spent two days delirious. When I closed my eyes I'd see JoJo running through the bush, naked, as usual. I'd see my mama walking back and forth from the the house with a pan of water to wash dishes. I'd see Mouda scrubbing laundry beneath the mango tree. Red dust. Roosters. The constant sound of women pounding meager tubers into food. The call to prayer. Then I'd open my eyes and see cars, skyscrapers, white people, glass windows, asian people, curtains, brown people, soft beds, food. So much food. So, so much food.

Finally when my brain caught up with the rest of my body and realized where I was, it was time for all of that good food to make me sick. At a very nice Indian restaurant in Porter Square I suddenly realized I couldn't eat all of those saturated fats and sugars anymore. Perhaps it was a virus or food poisoning- or perhaps I just wasn't used to the way I used to eat. In the United States, food and restaurants serve as forms of entertainment. Eating is a leisure activity, typically served quickly and enjoyed with friends or family in a way that seems more foreign than ever now. Americans don't break bread over the same dinner table as their parents, they're sharing naan at trendy establishments with tall cafe tables and wifi. I can't tell you how many lunches served as 'visits' over the following two weeks.

The next two and a half weeks were a whirlwind of faces, similar questions, toasts, and travel. I saw my family for nearly a week and a half, successfully visiting with all of my sisters, friends from high-school, college and gave a small presentation to my sister Bek's 1st grade classroom. I realized dressed in "traditional garb" (A bunch of panges I wrapped around myself because I didn't think to bring any modeles), and speaking in front of a class of students that I was conditioned to speak with an African accent, my voice slow and consonants softened. I had found my teacher voice, and it was from West Africa. I danced the "chicken" dance, a kind of difficult and awkward dance, in a bar in Albany. I fell asleep into my chinese food in Queens after talking about buruli ulcers. I walked through Prospect Park thinking about sacred forests and urbanization. I complained that my friends walked too fast, were too scheduled, that the subways felt like slave ships. There was no time to sit. I couldn't write, I had barely enough time to sleep. I thought back to my days at the New York State Senate and college, how if I had just one day in two weeks were I didn't have plans it was a blessing. If I could finish a newspaper I didn't have enough to do. I began to see Benin as a bit of a haven, where my time was freer, the faces friendlier, and the work rewarding.

Frequently Asked Questions:

So how was Africa?
-- It was/is fine(?)
What do you eat out there?
-- Uh, grits beaten with a stick until starchy. Sauce made from fish and tomatoes.
What else?
-- ? Whatever I can find.
What is the most messed up/ scary thing you've seen?
-- Why would you want to know the answer to that question?
How do you go to the bathroom?
-- I have a latrine.
So no running water, huh? Wow. How about electricity?
-- Yes, but it does go out sometimes. I'm lucky to have it though.
When do you come back?
-- I don't know. Probably September 2011.
Why not sooner?
-- I don't know. I can't make plans that far in advance. On verras.

I met Chris Kotfilia, a friend who also served in Peace Corps Benin, in the same coffee shop where we used to work together. He asked me what kind of Volunteer I became. I instead just listed every kind of volunteer one could be before deciding that I had no idea. I don't have the luxury of categorizing myself and my work in that way. He told me about how he goes to Chinese markets to try to find West Africans. How he now mentors a middle schooler whose family is from Savalou. We talked about how we didn't want Benin to be 'It', the one cool thing you do in your life; the one accomplishment that you always draw on for your world perspective. He's thinking of traveling, but is juggling first world responsibilities such as degrees and long term relationships. I felt relieved to not be wearing the same cement shoes, even if my feet are tainted red.

After another six days with David, I left for Paris. I said to him as I was packing that I was worried I'd be crying into my complimentary wine hovering over the Cotonou airport. However, the plane was comfortable, even though they fed me too much again. Instead of crying on the final descent, I felt relieved. Benin was going to be my home for the next year, and it felt good to be home.

Small Victories in the Bush

2010-05-30T12:20:00.000-07:00

Yesterday I made a point of being difficult as possible as I was packed into the backseat of a taxi tottering back from Djougou. As the driver slammed shut the door I protested, "Chaffeur, this car here, it's a five place. Not a nine place. Now with nine people there, this is dangerous." He shrugged and offered the common response to any foreign complaint, "This is Africa." I didn't let him off that easy. "It is not Africa. It's Benin. You think that in Ghana and Nigeria the chaffeurs put the people in the taxis like this? Absolutely not. It's not like this in all of Africa. It's only like this in Benin. Because the chaffeurs want to eat money. They are bandits. They bouf." (Bouf means to be gluttonous, it can be used for food or for money- it's especially used for bribes) I shoved my hand to my mouth to make my point.

A chorus of voices rang out in agreement, complaining that they shouldn't have to be made to sit like spoons in a drawer. Especially, as one woman pointed out, the old mamas in the backseat, hunched over, their tiny backs spindled awkwardly as they rested against the seat in front of them. "It's us who give you money, chaffeur. It is not you who must decide if there is a place for another person. We are the boss. Not you." The chaffeur started explaining that he doesn't make a lot of money, that with the price of gas and the "taxes" (bribes) he must pay, he only makes five mille (ten dollars) to go from Djougou to Bassila. I was outraged that he would dare to tell me that wasn't enough money. That's more money than even I make. I have to pay him three dollars, an entire day's wage, to go from Djougou to Bassila, typically sharing my seat in the front with some stranger, the stickshift awkwardly beneath me, and stop in every small village- sweating in the hot sun. I don't know why, but I couldn't just leave him alone.

I told him that every day there are buses that go from Cotonou to Nati, and that they are less expensive. That in a bus, you have your own place and you don't need to share your seat. That one day, there will be no taxis because there will be enough buses and everyone will know that the bus is better than a taxi because the driver isn't greedy.

The little mama next to me began whimpering a little, which infuriated me further. My legs cramping, I stood up, with half of my body out the window, and sat on the door. My legs and waist rested firmly in the car. I motioned to the mama to rest back against the seat where my back had been. It was far more comfortable up there on the door, my body out the window. The taxi was an old Peugeout, and sputtered at about 35-40 mph. It didn't feel dangerous. The chaffeur started yelling at me, telling me to get back in the car. I refused. The mama looked worried but smiled at me, perhaps grateful for the opportunity to rest.

And so I stayed there. Big trucks rolled by, the men on top of them yelling out, "Heyyyy Batouri!" I hummed quietly to myself and stared at people staring at me. I thought about grabbing my moto helmet and wondering if this was at all against Peace Corps regulations. At the next petit village one of the marche mamas who shared the three place backseat with the other seven people, including two children relegated to laps, got out and began unloading her chickens and cement sacks from the back of the taxi. The chaffuer got out of the car and stared down at me. I met his eyes and didn't dare blink. He told me to get back in the car. I told him I would only get back in the car if he promised not to put anyone else in the back seat. That five people was too many. Four people and two children were enough. He stared at me a moment, then shook his head and sighed, "Batouri...". I shrugged. I was pretty happy sitting up there, and it didn't matter to me if he kicked me out of the taxi entirely- which I knew he wouldn't do because he wanted my money. "On y va?" I asked. "Yes, let's go." I got back in the car, my face a slightly different color than the rest of my body from the dust. The ladies in the back seat looked satisfied, but I knew they were thinking I was absolutely crazy.

And to a degree, I was a little crazy. It's absolutely acceptable and common practice to put nine people in a five person car. Four up front, five in the back. Somedays though, I don't want to deal with it. It wasn't even so much about my comfort, although that had something to do with it, but the fact that this little old lady was visibly in pain by the way we were crammed in together. It was the idea that the passenger is at the mercy of the driver. It was that we were women and relegated to the back of the bus, as it were. I don't usually take it upon myself to yell at Beniniese people and argue with them, because I know that it won't make any discernible difference. However, sometimes you just want to pick a fight. I chose that taxi driver as my opponent.

And I won.

Waiting for the Man

2010-05-20T12:30:00.001-07:00

The first set of devoirs are finished, leaving me with approximately 200 papers to grade this weekend. I was hoping that since the material was something we had covered in great detail, and that I held a review session immediately before the exam, they would do fairly well. Unfortunately that was not the case. Not that they did especially terrible, but I am still coming to grips with lowering my expectations.

I am traveling again for most of June, a trip I am incredibly excited for. To do this, I will have to grade another set of 200 quizzes and devoirs. My Director was very compassionate and kind to allow me to finish the school year early, aided by the fact that I was one of very few teachers (Hafissou and Narcissis included) who continued to teach during the strike. Not that I had a choice, I am an apolitical employee and not paid by the state, therefore I have no recourse and could not participate in the strike even if I had wanted to. I guess I am using this opportunity to procrastinate my grading for just a few minutes, until it is time to sit down with the red pen and grade books.

In Cotonou, my dear friend Bradley Mock and I were out at a bar known as "Sunset", which rests right on the beach, overlooking the oil tankers trudging back from pillaging the Niger Delta. The sun was setting over the water in the West. It was cool and the waves were heading out to sea. A group of young men and women were pulling these enormous, heavy nets to shore. They were singing. We watched for awhile, lost in the fantastic reality of their lives. It was then that Bradley stood up, finished his Beninoise and said, "I'm going to go out there." Grinning and sipping my own beer, I told him he probably had to.

He came back forty-five minutes later, sweating and elated. He told us that when he went out there they were calling to him, "Yovo!" Brad's post is in a Mahi village, and so he speaks decent Fon. He told them, "There is no yovo here, I'm Fofo." (meaning "brother") As he picked up the net to help pull in the fish, against the current, the young men started chanting "Yovo... yovo... yovo..." As he stayed and continued to work, the chant changed. It was only a matter of time, with the rhythm of their pulls, that they began to chant "Fofo... Fofo... Fofo..." When the fish were in, tangled in garbage and tangled netting, they offered him some. He politely declined. There wouldn't be much use for the fish back at the bureau. I feel a bit strange telling Bradley's story for him, he has his own blog somewhere in the Peace Corps Blogosphere. I only hope he takes the time to tell his own version.

Right now I am baking brownies to give to Narcissis, Okounde and Mama's family. It has taken me awhile to get used to the idea of sharing food in the way that I am encouraged to. A Volunteer was telling me that in her village a popular phrase is, "If there's enough for one, there's enough for two." The numbers are interchangeable depending on how many people are sharing the meal, "if there's enough for three, there's enough for four," and so on. Last week, I was talking to a very drunken man in my village who was describing, in broken French and Nagot, about Fou-fou, or manioc, and some kind of sauce I am not familiar with. He smiled with a far away look in his eyes. "That is the kind of meal that would make you full." It was a startling realization for me that very few people have the resources available to them to eat until they are satisfied. Yet they are constantly offering food to share. While I may still guard my precious tuna fish and other goodies sent from the United States, I do see it as part of my responsibility to share what I feel I can share. My sister sent me some protein powder that I mixed with powdered milk and honey that I gave to Luc and Gi until it ran out. Once, while resting with me in my home, Mouda asked me about an apple that was sitting in my basket. It took a long time to convince him that "pomme" was not "pomme de terre", a potato. He had never had an apple before. When I gave it to him, he was so happy. "Please," he said, "the next time you travel, could you bring me back another one?" I was happy to oblige.

There aren't enough nutritious foods here. Not enough vegetables or fruits, even for someone who is supplementing their African diet with Western goods. The ones that are available are expensive. Yet, I find that the more I give, the more I receive in return. Coming home from Natitingou this weekend, I opened my fridge to see a small wheel of wagasi, the Fulani cheese, wrapped in aluminum foil. A gift from Luc. Edwidge, the pastor's wife who lives behind my concession, brings me tomatoes and little bits of corn when she can. My mama is always asking if I've already made food for myself, inviting me to eat with them. I typically decline the offer, as I prefer my spanish rice to her really greasy, kind of gross, food. However, the sentiment is... heart-warming. I do not cook here because I have to, but because I want to. There are more than enough people who care about me that would take care of me if I needed it. I'm slowly learning about living in a communal society. It's people to share food with, to cook with, to ask advice and laugh with. When bad things happen, they're the people that shake their heads solemnly and click in the back of their throats. When someone dies it is the entire village who mourns, and if the person was old enough, celebrates.

I was complaining to my mother the other day about the stress of living in a concession where everyone feels as though they are part of your family. I do not live in a house, per say, but in very large room in a very large home. If I am not up and my doors are not open by 9am, it is my Mama who comes by the house asking if I am sleeping or sick. If my doors are open past 10pm, it is Papa or Narcissis who will call to me to close my door and go to bed. All day I receive visitors from different places in my village. The children in my concession, other teachers, Edwidge, my neighbors, Papa, they all come by to saluter me and ask if I've slept well, if I am going to cook food, what I am doing for the day. Sometimes it's really frustrating when I think back on my life in Albany, when if someone wanted to come visit me they would call my cell phone before coming over. I could rest in my house all day and do work without interruption. I could lie around naked and socialize via instant messaging or email without leaving my room. I miss that independence, to make decisions for myself regarding where I was going and what I was doing. My Mama will absolutely not accept me coming home from Basilla at night, even though I have no reason to believe it is dangerous. She doesn't want anything bad to happen to me, but at 23 years old, I really believe it is my decision. Still, the few times I have done so, because I had school in the morning or just needed to come home, I was apologizing. "Ne pas fâche, eh Mama?" Don't be mad Mama. Your daughter is a grown woman. She needs to be able to do things for herself.

Speaking of daughters, Mama's third oldest daughter, Rafiatou, is pregnant. She is seventeen years old. I have not had the audacity to ask about the father, and I assume someone will eventually tell me. She is no longer in school and spends her days beneath the mango tree, resting on a mat. I don't feel responsible, per say, but the situation does make me think about how the importance of sex education. Rafia is not in my Girls' Club, as it was a selective process. I wonder if the experience of being in those conversations with the Sage Femme about pregnancy, sexual health and female empowerment would have made any difference. It's a moot point, I know, but it's a sad realization that Rafia will probably not finish her schooling now. On a more positive note, I am excited to meet this baby once it comes into the world. (She says she thinks it's a girl, but we'll find out come November)

Back, a long time ago, I used to go to Christian Sunday School. It wasn't that my parents were especially religious, but the United States being a predominately Christian nation they felt it was important for me to gain a good understanding of the Bible. Every Christmas, after the mandatory Christmas Story Pageant, there would be an "Operation Christmas Child" drive, where we would fill shoeboxes full of small toys and candies to be sent overseas to children who would undoubtedly never have seen a Christmas with presents. I know that someone, somewhere, would add little brochures about Jesus and salvation and all that, so children would understand who was sending them these gifts (and why).

I think I would like to do something similar, but perhaps without the Christian overtones. There are a lot of little girls here who ask me if I can help them get a "bebe", and little boys who would love a soccer ball or a toy car. I know I am not supposed to be giving gifts, in fact, I frequently remind people that I am not "Papa Noel". However, the children that I love and have a personal relationship with I feel deserve at least one toy. I know children will play with anything, I see them stacking dead batteries and playing with empty tin cans and making little cooking fires to play their version of 'House'. Yet, just a few baby dolls or stuffed animals, just a few toy cars or picture books with simple French words, would light up these children's lives. I don't know how I want to do this, but it's an idea that I've been slowly mulling over as I see their small hands working through-out the day, gathering wood, cleaning pots, clearing brush, sweeping the ground, and hoeing the fields.

I suppose that is all for now. Back to the grind. Wish me luck!

Scenes of Benin

2010-04-01T21:06:00.000-07:00

My Nagot Tutor and Friendly Roadside Peanut and Okra Saleslady

Mama's Stand (palm oil in the front, cookies in the back)

Door to Door Salesgirls (frequently eggs, this time it was spaghetti and condensed milk)

Looking out my front door

The well where I get my water

A lot of these next photos were taken from a moving vehicle
This is on the way from Djougou to Parakou, in the Borgou region.

Kouffo region (notice all the palms, it's in the south)

Mono region (also south)

CEG Manigri!

Kouffo region on the way to Klouekeme

On the way to the stilt village Ganvie, via boat taxi

A fishergirl in a pirogue. Most fisherwomen/men use nets, i have not seen line and pole fishing at all.

The traditional medicine center of Porto Novo. Everything in this photo, from the dead birds on the tables, to the animal skins on the floor, roots and herbs, are used in traditional medicine.

A lot of traditional medicament is comprised of two main ingredients: sodabee (palm moonshine) and sticks.
They use this medicine, which is far cheaper than modern medicine, to cure everything from malaria to sexual dysfunction.
These premade bottles of medicament cure AIDS and Hepatitis in 10 months... I don't really know where to begin with that.

The village of Ganvie, one of the three stilt villages outside of Cotonou in the middle of a large shallow lake named Lake Nokoue. According to Wikipedia the village has 20,000 inhabitants. To travel within the village, villagers take their pirogues (traditional canoes). The coolest thing about this is the marche, where women row their pirogues to a central area with their boats full of fish, tomatoes, onions and piment. Villagers then row their boats up to the edges of the market and barter with the floating marche mamas for goods.
Maybe about seven kilometers from land

Aural Memory

2010-03-31T16:59:00.000-07:00

“SUPPER!”

My mother’s voice would ring out like a dinner bell in a train yard. On the table there would be a delicious, cold green salad. On the stove, served buffet style, baked potatoes, steak with béarnaise, corn and green beans. For dessert there would be fruit, cookies or ice cream depending on the occasion.

“Vien, Manger!” or “WA, Kadje!”

The child lifts her sticky hand off pate up off the plate and waves it near my face, bringing the scent of the greasy, mutton and tomato based sauce d’arachide. Cornmeal boiled in water and beaten with a stick until it becomes pure starch, it sticks to everything. Pate Rouge, which is cooked with tomatoes, oil and onion and Pate Noir, which is as far as I can tell beans boiled and then beaten to a similar consistency, are two variations of the same meal. The sauce de legumes, de sesame, d’arachide, de tomate are the usual side dishes. You wash your right hand with water from a pitcher, pouring the run-off into a small bowl beneath. Sometimes there is soap. That’s always nice. You use that hand to grab chucks of pate and with some practice you then whip it around the sauce that settles nicely in a communal bowl. If you are wealthy, or at a restaurant, you can have wagasi cheese, goat, beef, or fish. The meat varieties are barely recognizable as they’ve been fried within an inch of their being and hard to chew. Wagasi is delicious, but difficult to find in Manigri. It is sold wrapped in big green leaves that turn the white skin a bright, beautiful red.

“SA-RAHHH, It’s TIME TO GET UP”

My mother’s voice again, jarring me from the dark haze of sleep. I’d fumble around in my bed, wracking my brain for any reason at all why I could not emerge from my room. I’d tumble out of bed and half crawl, half run to the intercom before my mother could decide to ‘beep’ me. My parents installed an intercom in my room when I was thirteen. The beeping sound, even when done accidentally, still irritates me to this day.

[ a cacophony of animals ]

The animals wake around five thirty in the morning. The roosters and goats must wake each other from their own rumbling sleep to then flail about the concession, screaming. Goats that sounds like small children, roosters that must want to fight everything in sight. And the sweeping. The sound of stiff bristles scraping against the sand.

“You fly, I’ll buy”

A monstrous building in the middle of a parking lot that could be full but once a year. Cars. Shopping carts. Seagulls eating trash. You drive yourself there, park it in a space and then march into the supermarket with the intent of only buying one thing. You emerge fifteen minutes later having in fact bought six or seven. Those companies are so much smarter than you. How did they know you’d find the 2 for 1 L’Oreal Shampoo sale so alluring, and when is the last time you ate White Cheddar Cheese-its? But there they are, in your ‘reusable’ shopping bag. Because you care about the environment and will absolutely use those petroleum-based plastic shampoo bottles again and again. And, I don’t know, fix your car with that cardboard box from the Cheese-its.

“Ouebo! Ouebo! Viens! Viens! Wa-Wa-Wa!”

The wrinkled ladies crouch down over their wares like they’d like to strike at your knees. There are people pushing in every direction, their shoulders digging into your back. Huge trays of food pass above as Marche Mamas with babies on their back walk by, balancing their entire stock on their heads. You argue, plead, and feign disgust over their prices. You walk away. You tell them that you know the real price (even if you don’t) and insist that they don’t rip you off just because you’re white. You reach into your pocket to pay her, and then it is her turn to be disgusted. “Il n’y a pas la monnaie!” They’ll exclaim, pouting at you. You stare them down, and for a moment it’s like the two of you will really fight over this transaction. Finally she’ll break down and shrugging walk off, leaving her stand (safely guarded by the other women hovering around anticipating your business), in search of change.
When you’ve found the gari (manioc powder), the okra (known as gumbo here), and maybe the dried beans you came for an hour later, you head is ringing from the incessant microphone that screeches “My Heart Will Go On” as a midi file, and you’re less hungry than you were when you came. Maybe it’s the goat meat sitting on the wooden stand collecting flies. Or the little girl who is peeing right next to the place where you just bought your vegetables.

“Well, what will it be?”

A gin and club with lime. Jack on the rocks. A martini. A seasonal microbrew, maybe with blueberries or orange slices, from the tap. It’s served to you in a frosted glass. The music croons via a juke box in the corner. There are three different televisions showing various sports games. If you’re a regular your drink is waiting before you walk in the door. There is ice. Delicious, cold ice. Everyone minds their own business for hours. There is no eye contact, no joining a stranger’s table, until those who are scamming to pick up sex for the night are left to feed on one another.

“Je voudrais une beninoise” or “Fu me Sodabee”

The skunked beer in a gritty green bottle. She will bring the beer in a little basket, but for some reason- no matter what bar you are in- she has to go back to the same place she came from for the bottle opener. Liquor is ten dollars a glass and they have no idea how to serve it, and so most of their mark-up is lost. The majority of bars have only beer or soda, the beers being limited to five different kinds of domestic or African imports. No two Beninoise beers are the same. Music pumps out of the nearest television at its loudest pitch, encouraging people to dance but making it difficult to talk. The Tantis sit with the men who they think will buy them sodabee, or perhaps pay for other services. There is no ‘girls night out’ in a society where women rarely have their own income, and so it can be assumed every girl in that bar is looking for the same guy (named John). Frequently someone will sit down with you and try to talk to you, to try to befriend you into taking them to the United States. Or give them money. Or buy them beer. Sometimes their advances are funny, usually irritating, and once in awhile just sad. The bartenders (the tantis) may be the worst of them all, but frequently also the saddest.

Happy Birthday Hannah. Hannah Happy Birthday.

2010-03-30T15:20:00.000-07:00

The 9th of March and the first rain is here.

For two days it's been unmercifully teasing. The humidity rises, the clouds gather, flashes of lightning were flickering in the distance. But at 10:20pm, the hot silence finally broke and for the first time since October it rained. Odje. Nagot for rain. I haven't been this excited in a long time. The wind has been wrecking havoc all afternoon, kicking up dust and covering everything in a fine coat of brown, including me. I was reading outside and had to retreat into my house to hide from the small windstorm that made it impossible to see.

I lined up about six buckets beneath my roof so the rainwater could trickle into them. I'll use it to wash dishes and clean the sheen of dirt that has consistently covered everything in my house through the screened windows and doors for months. I'll use it to save Luc and Mouda and myself from carrying heavy buckets of water from the well. I'll use every drop. Water is so precious.Life is so beautiful.

Narcissis and Okounde barged into my house just before it arrived, animated and drunk, to talk about their plans to build a tall wooden fence around our row of houses. Narciss will co-opt students who arrive late to school or who are sent to him by frazzled teachers into building this fence. The labor will be free and we will only need to pay for minimal supplies. They are looking forward to cooking outside and sleeping on mats in front of the house. It is unsafe to do so now. I did not have the heart to tell them that I have a gas stove (They've never seen my house beyond it's elaborately furnished front room) and that I have been sleeping outside when the power is out between my shower and latrine on a cot, my mosquito net hung over the clotheslines.

I had been having an extremely difficult time adjusting back to life in Manigri after IST. It was difficult seeing all of my lovely friends and listening to their stories. My best friend in Peace Corps, my dear Emily MacDonald, is leaving to continue her service in Namibia. I had been depressed that she was leaving. The 107 degree heat and intermittent electricity was of no help either.

However, to bore you with some teaching details, before IST I had broken my classes up into teams. They were allowed to pick their names, and each activity now functions as a competition to earn points. I promised the team with the most points at the end of the year a prize. I think I will do something fantastic for them, but I will not yet say what it is. Anyway, this method has made teaching a lot more exciting for me and the students. They lose points for bad behavior and earn points for answering questions and doing well on exams and interrogations. It also helps that the bulk of my grading for the semester is over- nothing makes me feel more uneasy than staring at a stack of ungraded papers that I know will only make me feel inadequate as a teacher and desperate as a person who hates tedious desk work. I am now in the middle of calculating the averages for the semester, and it's been a pleasure noticing how my grades compare to the rest of the teachers. Either my exams are easier or my students are in fact learning.

Yesterday was International Womens Day. I took ten girls from my GIrls Club to Bassila on Saturday to meet with three other local PCV-run GIrls Clubs in Bassila, Pira and Pennesoulou. The girls had prepared sketches and I was so impressed with everything they had put together. The girls from Pira sang songs and danced, the girls from Bassila did a skit about sexual harassment in schools and unwanted pregnancies, the girls from Pennesoulou did a hilarious sketch featuring the much detested teacher 'Dieudonne'. My girls did a very simple sketch called, "Je suis." Each girl wrote a "Je suis" poem during one of our meetings which we then turned into a larger production where each girl named one thing that she was. Such as, I am a girl, and I am strong. Or, I am a girl, and I am a good example for other girls who want to succeed. I am a girl, and I am intelligent. I am a girl, and I can be the best in every domain. It was cute. We sang a lot of songs, including Rilo Kiley's "The Frug" and a song that proclaimed each volunteer as the mother of a family.

Unfortunately, while at the Maison des Jeunes in Bassila, someone had gained access to my purse and stole my cell phone, about thirty dollars worth of cfa, and about five dollars worth of phone credit. I was pretty upset about it for a short period of time. I just felt so stupid. However, thanks to my wonderful parents I was able to get enough money to make it through the next couple of weeks. When people ask me in village, even those who I haven't told but I suppose found out from others, I just tell them that i'm not upset and that money isn't everything. I suppose it isn't, now that I have some.

My friend Benjamin in Bassila had a visitor this weekend from Hamburg. The three of us spent Saturday night playing poker in a bar in Bassila. It was fun. I took Stephen (the foreinger) to see Manigri. It was kind of nice to have a westerner who hadn't been living here for the past seven months and show them around. He was very impressed by the cows, the flora, and- of course- the poverty. I was talking with our beloved Tanti at Marquis, the buvette I go to with my close-mates, and she told us that she makes 500 cfa, roughly a dollar, a night. Of course, as we discussed in a bit, depending on inquiring male customers, this amount could be raised. He was shocked that even for two dollars, someone could buy a girl. I explained that just about anyone you see in my village makes only 500 cfa on a good day. The women who sell tomatoes at the market, my lovely Petit Mama who sells yams on the road, the zemidjians- 500 cfa a day is barely a wage, but they survive.

I try to stay away from Peace Corps cliches, such as "Ups and Downs" to describe my experience here. However, I find that as it has permeated my perceptions as to my frantic mood swings in this country, that it is the only phrase that will suffice. Despite the fact that I was sad and lonely when I first got back to post, the past few days have been wonderful. Despite the heat. Despite the missing my friends. Despite my cell phone being stolen. I was asked about procuring mosquito nets for a local NGO, and I am going to go see my health center about planting Moringa. There is an orphanage to build in Bassila. There is work to do.

It's Getting Hot in Here

2010-02-21T05:16:00.001-08:00

(i am texting this blog post while riding a double decker bus to cotonou. Any grammatical errors must be ignored and all hope for any intellectual scope abandoned.)

First, even though just about all of you who read this never met him, i want to talk about my friend Jonathan Pratt.

You probably know the kind of guy he was. Larger than life. A musical prodigy who flew airplanes and rode his motorcycle on cross country trips at a whim. He wrote exhaustive, meticulous poems in thin black ink. He had a smile that turned the head of everyone in the room and a voice that could break your heart. He didn't walk through the dorms, he strut and swayed, singing The Doors through the halls. He was always reinventing himself while remaining the guy everyone wanted to be friends with. To party with. To play music with. To talk with. He was the guy who when he focused on you, made you feel like you two were seated on top of the world.

When a loved one passes away you're supposed to list their generous, inspirational qualities. People use phrases like 'hero', 'angel', (and 'larger than life') and forget under the niceities, there was a real person. Someone who you loved not only for their gifts but also their faults. It always seemed incredibly disingenious to me, this praise of the dead. I bring it up because i want to try to convince you that i wouldn't exaggerate. If there ever was a Paul Bunyan in my life, it was Jon Pratt.
It was spring in 2005. I was walking from a stuffy lit theory class with my (ex)boyfriend Adam, revelling in the warmth and the sight of lilac blossoms. A wafting acoustic guitar played the most aggressive Dylan i've ever heard. I craned my neck at the sound of Jon's voice. There he was, all six foot three, fifteen feet in the air, perched comfortably on a huge industrial art monstrocity in the middle of the courtyard. Grinning, radiant, beautiful. Adam and i scrambled to the top, to be near him. We sat there for the better part of an hour. Students walked past, grinning outright or with bemused smiles on their faces. It was an afternoon that to this day reminds me of how beautiful it is to be young and in love.

Jon shone in my life for a short three years when he went off with his band to L.A. to record an album. When he came back home he was different, sick in someway we could not identify. He still rapped poetry with the best of us. His fingers still stretched over his keyboard with prolific intensity. But he joked less, his charasmatic smile seemed held back beneath increasingly desperate eyes. Jon killed himself one year ago last week. I haven't been able to listen to Subterrean Homesick blues since without thinking of how when Jon looked you in the eye and smiled, he eclipsed the sun.

A note about comments: apologies are nice, but unnecessary. I'm sorry too, especially for his family. If you knew jon, you would be sorry too. If you didn't, it's really ok. Let's leave it at that.

Chaleur is here. It's been over 100 for the past three days, and i'm sure the worst is yet to come. The humidity is low though, thank god. It still gets cool in the early hours of the morning until the sun rises without all that water in the air. Thank god i was placed in the North.

That's all for now. If i have any time at a real computer this week (doubtful), i'll try to write again.

À la prochain.

"C'mon... Daddy needs a new solar-powered hammer" Erik English

2010-01-15T11:20:00.000-08:00

This has been the fastest internet turn-around ever! Mostly due to the fact that Benjamin came to visit me in Manigri a few days ago and brought his computer- and the internet was working. How technology changes all...

Here's another solemn blog-post for y'all.

Three days ago, Mama fell while she was sweeping the dirt outside her house. Sweeping is a daily ritual, between starting cooking fires and cleaning pots. I doubt there was anything more than just a streak of light in the sky when she fell. She landed on the hard, mud-topped well, striking her right arm on its thick edge.

That morning my neighbor Okounde was sitting in my living room, asking me for my help in finding him an American wife. He was in the process of explaining to me why he couldn't take an African wife, something to do with the fact that he is estranged from his family (and therefore perhaps he couldn't afford an African wife? I didn't have time to ask many questions), when Papa came in. He asked me if I had anything to help with sprains. After digging through my Peace Corps med-kit I found an ace bandage and a bunch of ibuprofen. Once I saw her though, I was pretty sure that this ace bandage wasn't going to do the trick.

Her arm was very swollen, black and blue, and her fingers were fat. I looked at her skeptically for a second, noticing how the arm ballooned about five inches from her wrist. "Mama," I asked. "Can you move your fingers?" She couldn't. I'm no doctor, I thought, but this arm is definitely broken. (It should be mentioned I feel as though I am an expert on the subject. I've cracked all four limbs on two separate occasions. I know very well what that limited mobility means.)

They can't afford a doctor, so my Papa called a traditional healer who assured Mama, despite my protests, that it is only a sprain. He touched her bones through her tender skin and reassured her that they're in place. I pouted. Maybe they are in place, which no one can know without an x-ray, I argued with Okounde, but that arm is not sprained. Not in the middle of her forearm. I gave up after just a few hours- when I realized that the nearest place to procure an xray is in Djougou, two hours away, and that I don't think even I could afford the procedure.

If that arm is in fact fractured (factured?), it's going to have to mend itself just like every other thing that breaks here: slowly and grotesquely. I've been in the process of searching for a secondary project in Manigri. I've made contact with a group of women who want micro-credit so they can grow vegetables for the marche. I've had the idea tossed at me to begin a small emergency medical fund. There are scholarship girls. There's the school science lab. There is so much need; so many things that are broken. I don't want to be a splint on an arm that will never heal correctly. I want to practice good medicine.

The main thing they impress upon you during training (Stage) is that nothing here is easy, and everything takes time. For example, I want to show the Planet Earth documentaries at the community center, using a borrowed projector from the Parakou workstation. I spoke with my Director (and Chief de Village) about this a few weeks ago. He needs to speak to a number of other people before I can be permitted to make this showing. Ideally, this project, which in the States would be a matter of a couple of days, will take a month and a half to be realized. Everyone that could have something to do with either the school, the community or the parents-teachers association, has to be notified of this. They have to discuss their concerns, if any. They have to make sure that there is a consensus among the many. If you do not go through these channels, I've been assured time and time again, your project will never have the community support it needs to succeed. Unfortunately, writing checks is the easy(ier) part.

So while I'd love to set up some small medical or educational fund in my village to help people when things go awry, as they will, I have no idea how to see that idea through. Who would qualify? How would it work? How can anyone prove eligibility in a place without birth certificates, addresses or phone bills? How would I make sure that this fund would see people through more than the two years I am here? And even if this were to successfully created, who would be in charge of it once I left and my ties to the community diminished?

It's obvious that development is complicated. Charity is easy. If I didn't care about the longevity of my projects I could go build some latrines no one is going to use because they'd be in a place where no one cleaned the land (true story). Or I could build a well to help some lady farmers who will then fall apart as a coalition because the ownership of the well will become too large a burden (somewhat true story). Or I could build one of those hundreds of beautiful, empty NGO facilities that run out of funding because someone in local government sucked them dry.

It doesn't mean that I don't want to throw myself through a window every time one of my neighbors is sick or hurt. It doesn't mean that I don't think about how I would love to pay for those little girls in the market to go to school. It definitely doesn't mean that I don't feel a little twinge of guilt every time I see Mama's arm, wrapped in a scarf, bloated as Liza Minelli on a bender. I think part of living First Class in the Third World is that your mantra is, "I can't help everyone". Which is true. You can't help everyone. But there's nothing that says you don't have an obligation to try. At least that way maybe you can help someone. The problem is if you try to do so messily, without proper planning and political support, you in fact help no one.

"We have an obligation to fight for the world as it should be." Michelle Obama

turn up the boombox

2010-01-09T11:57:00.000-08:00

La Bonheur: Good Morning Manigri!

Manigri-- Narcissis Last Name Unknown and Likely Unpronouncable has been promoted by the Ministry of Education to the position of Surveillant General at CEG Manigri. This administrative position combines the responsibilities of Secretary, Treasurer and Referee with the disciplinary duties of BDSM sadists. Narcissis, age 26, was overheard to have said, "I will beat them well," them referring to his students. A biology teacher at CEG Manigri, Narcissis knows enough about the human body to know where the pressure points are. "I hear he's a real bone crusher, " said American Peace Corps Volunteer and English Teacher Sarah Pederson. Ms. Pederson and Narcissis have been neighbors since they both moved to Manigri. The two reside in the Professional Building District of Oke, after the Grand Mosque and before the swamp. Ms. Pederson remembers the first time they met, when he asked her to marry him. "It was very sweet. He asked me if I wanted to go running with him a few days a week. When I accepted the offer he asked me if I'd like to take a nap with him afterward. I said no, but now that he's the Surveillant..." Ms. Pederson's eyes grew glassy and she quickly became unresponsive with the thought.

The general consensus is that Narcissis, while new to the job, will nevertheless stay on task. He has already arranged an open house and has beaten several children with a thick piece of rubber rope. "It doesn't hurt that bad," assures one 5eme student who requests to remain anonymous out of fear of retribution, or harsher ass-beating by the Surveillant. "My dad hits me harder."
"These are all children of farmers," explains veteran English teacher and scholar Hafissou. "The way that they are treated at home requires us to utilize corporal punishment while they are at school." When asked whether or not Narcissis was fulfilling his responsibility of Ass-Kicker in Chief, Hafissou replied, "I'm sure he will do very well. It is not an easy job, it is a lot of work. But you know," he giggled, "I can take care of discipline problems myself." He brandished a thick stick cut from the surrounding cashew trees.

With the Director also serving his political office as Chief of the Village, the fate of Manigri will rest on Monsieur Narcissis' lanky shoulders. Already underway are plans to arrange a Correspondence Club with Ms. Pederson, and seek funding sources to build a science lab. "He's really hit the ground running," said Ms. Pederson. "I just hope he doesn't need to take a nap," she laughed gaily, her eyes glazing over once again.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

Let it be known first and foremost that Narcissis, if he were to see this, would laugh. We are very good friends, and I am very happy he's been promoted. Despite the marriage proposals, which I only find as a minor annoyance, he does always do his best to look out for me. And I appreciate it. Even when his best constitutes beating my students in front of the rest of my class. I know he's doing it so I won't have any problems. It's his way of being nice. Strange, right?

I can't get myself worked up about corporal punishment in schools. I know there are vindictive Surveillants, those who really abuse their power and in turn their students. The same goes for teachers. It's by far not a perfect system, and while I wish there was another culturally-appropriate technique available, the fact of the matter is that the teachers are ill-equipped and untrained. They punish their students the same way they themselves were punished. Rarely is anyone seriously hurt, and as we all know: pain is a motivator. While I have never hit a child, I don't blame those who do. Even if it is technically illegal. This country's education system has a lot of problems, and I would place this policy near the bottom.

Narcissis is a great example of this. He isn't exactly graduated from the University yet. He has finished his core classes and has been asked to serve as a teacher in one of the rural schools of the North. He isn't from Manigri, he's actually Goun (an ethnic group from the South). He didn't know anyone here when he moved in, which is partially why we're such good friends. He teaches ALL of the biology classes in CEG Manigri, ALL of the biology classes for CEG Biguina, and two classes in Bassila. He does this so he can make some money, but he isn't- from our Western perspective- qualified to do so.

The pay rate for teachers in this country is politically tricky. While comparatively speaking, they are well paid in contrast to the rest of the country- they are far underpaid as government employees. Most teachers make approximately $25 dollars a month. This changes depending on your school district. Whereas teachers are not civil service employees, but recruited and contracted ones, their pay scale is marginalized. (Sound familiar?) This accounts for yearly strikes by teachers, where the government promises better pay in turn for teacher cooperation. A new contract was signed last year giving teachers a 100% pay raise, which would be a phenomenal accomplishment, but it has been working it's way through the bureaucratic channels for the better part of two years now. Because the pay is dismal, the government has a difficult time recruiting teachers, despite the high unemployment rate of college graduates in Benin. This forces them to contract university students and army officials into being teachers in their lesser paid school districts in exchange for some money and school credit.

The result being, that because most of these teachers have never taken an education course in their lives, they have no training. During Stage my fellow PCVTs and I received nine weeks of methodology and theory. (To be honest, i thought it was a complete waste of time seeing as teaching seems to be equal parts instinct and discipline, but what do i know?) This makes me nine times more qualified to teach in the Beninese school system than my counterparts who have been teaching for twenty of more years. To be clear, that estimation is not mine, but something that has been repeated to me by teachers time and time again. We have no formal training, they say. What can you teach us about teaching? My eyes grow wide with a deer in the headlight kind of look when they ask something like that. I grow tongue tied. I look up to Hafissou, my homologue, quite a bit. He is probably one of the most intelligent people I have ever met. What can I teach him? Should I really be concerning myself with the fact that he makes students get on their knees and them hits their hands with a thick stick? I don't think I can, or even necessarily want to, correct him. He knows what he's doing far better than I do. Even if he results to punishments that make me uncomfortable. I actually pretty sure that everyone knows corporal punishment is forbidden, but they do it anyway because it's effective. (Why mess with success?- tasteless joke)

Narcissis and I were talking about science classes in Manigri a few weeks ago. He was telling me that when he wants to explain what various reactions to chemicals are, he has to draw it on the chalk board or try to explain it via a text. They have no resources for a science lab. There are two broken microscopes in the Surveillants office, and one beaker. Nothing else. I find that really disconcerting considering so much of university level science has to do with experiments and lab reports. How can you ever hope to build a class of professionals in the science fields, including doctors, if you do not have the capability of teaching laboratory techniques? If anyone is at all interested in brain-storming with me how I can help get them a few microscopes and some basic laboratory equipment, I would find that extremely helpful. (Not electric microscopes, the old-fashioned mirrored ones- maybe someone knows of where they go when schools get new, fandangled microscopes)

I find that my french is getting better from day to day. I'm trying to focus better on using grammar and asking to be corrected if I think I am not saying something correctly. Luc, my best friend in village, helps me out a lot with that. I lent him my bike for the day so he could go visit some family 20km away. It's hot so I gave him a water bottle as well. I find I have to be careful when I give away my garbage, it causes jealousy among both children and adults. If I give Gi or Mouda a small possotome bottle, I have to make sure none of their friends are around. If I give Mama a wine bottle, I sometimes hide it behind my back as I walk out to her by the road so our neighbors don't see. It's kind of nice that this recycling takes place, but a little sad as well that I will never find so much treasure in my own trash.

A week ago I went to Cotonou to be checked out for any bugs I may have picked up in the past couple of months. I had a few ameobas and so I've been taking this anti-parastic medicine that really tires me out . It's been kind of nice resting in my house and reading the many magazines my lovely mother has sent me over the past month or two. It's worried my neighbors like you wouldn't believe though. I received so many visitors everyday, neighbors, friends and work colleagues, all making sure I am okay. The former President of the APE (the PTA) came by with a bunch of limes for me, limes and honey being a traditional remedy for stomach sickness. I thought it was sweet, but as David says, the last thing these people want is a dead white person on their hands. Also, maybe, just maybe, they care about me too.

I hope to be starting a Girls Club in the next couple of months. I need to talk to my director, Hafissou and Narcissis to get the green-light and then start selecting girls for it. I want to have some sort of mechanism to train girls to help other girls, in a way that maybe there will be a lasting impact for those who cannot be in the club as well. Girls Clubs here are really interesting because not only are women completely marginalized, but sex education is seriously lacking in this country. The average age of a sexually active individual in Benin, or rather, in my village, is twelve or thirteen years old. Sex education does not begin until most students are seventeen or eighteen years old, and frequently older. Even then, it's abstinence based. I'm sure that type of sex education is the result of some sort of loan conditionality, although I can't prove it (that's the sort of research that requires a good internet connection and a lot of time).

I suppose abstinence based sex education does make sense to a point here, in that condoms aren't free or really even available anywhere- and condoms are a hard-sell just about anywhere. The AIDS rate is lower here than in the United States, but the teen pregnancy rate is astronomical. Birth control may be considered by some to be a human right, but it's expensive. It is not unusual for a student to have a teacher as a sex partner, in exchange for food or good grades. I know a few teachers in my school who have young girlfriends in khaki. It's sickening, but I know that if I tell them I don't like it, it won't change a thing. It will just make them uncomfortable or resent me. There's a lot of tongue-biting on my part here. I am not going to try to impose my view on these people who have more problems than I can understand. That's not why I'm here. I can however, offer education to young girls so they are aware of the consequences of their decisions, and their options. Ideally before they become pregnant by their math teacher.

I just got scolded for leaving my house in just a pagne wrapped around my shoulders. Mama told me to go put a shirt on and come back if I wanted to saluter her. I thought that was pretty funny. "Go put some clothes on!" She basically said. The men sitting at the bar chimed in, "Yes, you shouldn't be out of your house like that." Which was even funnier because their wives were just wearing a few pagnes as well, and they were out of their concession. Maybe my white skin was blinding them.

I don't know if I'll ever really be Benin-Integre here, or even if that is something I'd necessarily want. It's tricky, because no matter what I will always consider myself an American. I've lived in the US for 23 years, and at the end of this I will have been in Africa for only 2.5. And no matter what they will always consider me a foreigner. I have white skin and a funny accent. Even if I learned to speak Nagot fluently and sat under mango trees all day, and wore nothing but tissue, I will always be a foreigner. It seems a little disingenuous and quite insulting to me when I hear about other PCVs (specifically white ones) trying to become fully 'integrated' into their community. It really shows to me a lack of understanding to the importance of history and ethnicity that built this culture. My African American friends have a much easier time being accepted by their villages, which I think makes sense. Many of their ancestors came from places like Trinidad or Haiti, (or East Africa) and culturally speaking they have the ethnic and historic implications of their existence running through their bloodstream. I don't mean this in an Alex Haley 'Roots' kind of way, but in that despite their upbringing in the United States, they're not seen as invaders, or as oppressors. No matter what I do here, the legacy of Western dominance will follow me wherever I go.

+_+_+_+_+_+_+_+_+_+_+_+_+

"I have faith. Faith in penicillin, riflampin, isoniazid and the good absorption of fluroquinolones, in bench science, clinical trials, scientific progress, that HIV is the cause of every case of AIDS, that the rich oppress the poor, that the wealth is flowing in the wrong direction, that this will cause more epidemics and kill millions. I have faith that those things are true too. So, If I had to choose between lib, theo or any ology, I would go with science as long as a service to the poor went with it. But I don't have to make that choice, do I?" Paul Farmer, Founder of Partners in Health.

Merry Christmas

2009-12-25T01:02:00.000-08:00

Celebrating Christmas with twenty of your closest Peace Corps volunteer friends has a lot of benefits, but one major drawback. That drawback is that at 930 am I woke up feeling like hell, on Christmas, on merely four hours of sleep. But last night was so much fun. We ate snickerdoodles and had a dance party. Later today we're having a legitimate feast, with cheeseburgers. What luxury.

Right now I'm drinking a cup of instant coffee and blearily squinting at the screen. Soon I'll go with my friend Emily to get bread and eggs for breakfast.

Merry Christmas to all.

Remember that I love you.

To my mother

2009-12-23T03:29:00.001-08:00

Happy Birthday.

Love,
Sarah

More Self Righteous 1st World Guilt

2009-11-22T07:44:00.001-08:00

I once read a blog by a Peace Corps Volunteer that described the most heart-breaking scenario I could never dream up. In her village in rural Niger almost everyone survives during the dry season on millet. Millet has thick, long stalks with little kernels at the top that get turned into powder, which can act as a type of flour. In West Africa, women are in charge of the tilling, the planting and the harvest. Farming is women's work. Harvest and planting seasons are exceptionally brutal as these women toil in the fields for hours on end. Their skinny frames are already wracked with malnutrition and fatigue from the innumerable chores she must do to keep her household somewhat clothed and possibly fed. The saddest part, the absolute worst part, is that nursing mothers who work in the fields, work so hard they stop producing milk for their babies. And it's not like they can just give the baby to someone else as at wet nurse, because all of the women work, and sometimes they all run dry.

The blog post was about this girl who was living in this tiny rural village in Niger, who had sat up all night with a family that was very dear to her. They were waiting for their baby to die. Their son, their baby, had been taken twice that week to a doctor in a village ten kilometers away, who told the Volunteer that there was nothing to be done but to try to give the baby some formula. Formula that the family could not afford. Even if they could, he was already too sick and weak. He was going to die.

When I read that, I had only just applied to the Peace Corps. Even as an infrequent crier, I couldn't hold it together and burst into tears hunched over my computer. Absolutely not, I thought. I cannot, absolutely cannot, do that. I will not do that.

I called my boyfriend, David, and allowed him to talk me down into rationally discussing the situation. I know that children die all over the world of diseases that never plague the 1st world. I know that children die of malnutrition and dehydration everyday. Some fifty thousand a day. I was only upset because it was something I was terrified would happen to me. It never occurred to me to be afraid of crime in West Africa, as I had seen crime in the United States quite vividly for many years. But I had never seen real, abject poverty. What was scary was, I wasn't going just to visit, snap a few pictures and press some coins into the palms of beggars- I would be going there to live. To be the person who might have to try to find a doctor for that baby. To be the last vestige of hope, because I would be the American with resources and money. I couldn't imagine that burden. I still can't.

When I peeled myself off of the mattress in Djougou this morning, my only concern was finding something to eat and procuring a water bottle for the 94 kilometers home. The remnants of a great night of drinking Sodabee- palm moonshine mixed with honey and citron- pressed into the backs of my eyes and felt sour in my stomach. I had a fairly enjoyable early taxi ride home, and was looking forward to cleaning and healing myself the rest of the day. But when I arrived at my concession, I knew that bucket shower would have to wait. In front of the yurt-like buvettes sat about twenty motorcycles. There was no one minding the stand by the road. After paying the zem, I walked up cautiously to see over fifty people standing and sitting, many of them with tears in their eyes. Very few of them talking. Oh no, I thought. Oh no no no no no. Not now. Not here. The faces of the children in my concession swarmed my head as my eyes searched frantically for them. Please don't let it be Mouda, I thought. He had been sick a few weeks ago and had lost so much weight.

I could feel myself making everyone uncomfortable, not speaking, standing there with my obvious white cluelessness, carrying unwieldy shopping bags full of bread and vegetables. I knelt down next to Roukaya, the second oldest of Mama's children, and asked her what happened. She told me a child had died this morning. I sank to my knees, involuntarily. "Who? Who was it?", I asked, trying to keep the panic in my voice hidden. She told me it was the boy, one of my students, who lived behind the concession. My stomach suddenly felt as thought it weighed fifty pounds, stuffed with pure guilt and a twinge of grief. Okay, so it wasn't Mouda. It wasn't the one of the children I play with. I was disgusted and dizzy with my own relief.

The rest of the morning we sat on door steps and ledges, barely speaking. Eventually I went in to scrub the dust and moonshine grime off of my skin. When I came back out there was a large taxi parked outside of Mama's house that would serve as a hearse. They would take him to Bohicon, about three hours south of here, for the burial. A wailing like I had never heard before, something I had only read about and seen in some movies, ruptured the solemn silence, ripping through me and my heavy gut. The parents walked with their child in their arms toward the taxi. The mother wept and shrieked, heaving her body from one step to the next. She barely made it past her front yard before she just gave up and needed someone to help carry her. The other women started wailing as well, aunts and cousins of the boy wrapped in a flowered bed-sheet. They put him in the back of the van. I watched from the edge of my stoop the procession to the family's house once it drove away. I had no desire to follow. I just needed a lot of time to think.

When an old person dies in West Africa, it is not a sad affair. Most people have parties with loud music, lots of food, a funeral procession with loud singing and tambourines, and of course- dancing. There is undoubtedly an initial period of grieving, but then the preparations for these fantastic parties must be made. Funerals are expensive here too, I read recently that they rival American weddings in proportion of income spent.

When it is a child, well, there's no celebration. There are no drums or tambourines. There is just a bed-sheet and parents with empty eyes.

Children are so fragile here. They come with these open mouths and tiny limbs and great big eyes, sucking in the sweet air past their gums. As they grow they are continually deprived of the protein a young, healthy brain needs to develop properly, and never get enough vitamins. They work in the fields or in the marche or in less desirable places to help pay for their own food costs. Little fingers picking tomatoes. Girls no more than six walking up and down busy roads selling oranges from a platter on top of her tiny head. They get sick; they get sick so easily. There is no such thing as health insurance here, if you cannot pay for a doctor he will not see you. There is too much need and medicine is expensive. When they get sick there isn't much that can be done for a poor family except maybe see a traditional healer, who can make tea out of sticks, herbs and prayer.

When a child dies in the United States, we see it as a huge injustice. Even if the problem is absolutely outside of the capacities of modern medical science, like an inoperable brain tumor. We shake our fists at God and the universe, demanding to know why this happened to us. It's not that way here. Not when child mortality is so high. Your child could die, your neighbor's child could die, and likely one of them will. There is no blame, just empty resignation. When the child's mother shuffled over to me this morning, I laid my head on her hand and professed my condolences. "We can't do anything, there is nothing we can do," she said, tears in her eyes, looking past me in her grief.

The worst part is she's right, there is nothing they can do. It's not their fault they're poor and their child got sick with dysentary. It's not her fault that there are people living with inoperable brain tumors, getting heart transplants and surviving lymphoma where I come from, and her child died of dehydration.

I recognize that this is part of living in the 3rd world. And if you can't understand that the world is a horrible place, and that people are terrible to one another, then get out of hell's kitchen. Children die. Bad things happen to good people. Life isn't fair. These aren't laws of science, they're the realities of humanity. The initial guilt over my relief that the child who died was not one I knew well is superficial because that's not a choice I can make. If I could no child would die in Manigri at all. Or in Niger. Or in the United States. And especially not due to malnutrition or diarrhea. But I didn't make the world, it made me. It will be here long after I die. I'm just a visitor, taking photographs.

"Rain Falls, Angry on the Tin Roof" -- Bradley Robert Mock singing Edwin McCain

2009-11-22T07:39:00.001-08:00

(warning: overly poetic and overall boring subject matter)

The rain here is of a completely different caliber than the rain at home.

In upstate New York, the light, peaceful autumn rain strokes the leaves and gently cloaks the ground in mist. The weather is gray and damp; the cold taste of decay sticks to the back of your throat.

Here, the rain slams into the ground like millions of angry fists, punishing roads and roofs, turning trenches into torrents; threatening hot, dry afternoons with distant rumblings of thunder.

In New York, the rain starts slowly, sometimes as what we love to call a 'drizzle'. It builds a crescendo the same way you start a fire, feeding the ground small bits of water at a time- giving what lives below the clouds time to breathe before breaking into a full, furious downpour.

Here, there are spastic starts, stops and spurts- as if someone is sprinkling the rain to test where it will fall. And one pregnant moment later, it all comes down. Not just buckets. Not just cats, or dogs. But unfathomable fathoms of water. The thunderous rain makes me picture my house trapped under an enormous waterfall.
Like a cruel child, the force of the water dunks it under, preventing its emergence. My house, it's drowning. The rain pounds violently for only eight or ten minutes before slinking off into the distance, followed by a few more smatterings of late-coming clouds.

It is exciting, in a way, to be so captivated by an act of nature as benign as rainfall. The sound is so loud it permeates every activity. If I am teaching and a storm begins to break, I must pause my lecture- allowing my students to glance nervously out the windows, wondering if they will have to walk the many miles home in the sky's sudden tantrum. At home, the noise prevents me from doing anything at all but listen and eventually move to a window to watch the trees in my concession whip around- as I've always enjoyed doing in the States. I only write this now that the rain has stopped, and the crickets have taken up singing again.

Adam Morey once told me he loves autumn, because everyone suffers through the heat and the humidity of summer while the flowers flourish. But at least, he says, there's fall- and that's when "the plants get theirs." Here, there is no fall. There is only rain, and no rain. Flood or famine. The plants 'get there's' the same as those who depend on them. It is why deforestation is such an issue here. Tropical rainfall is so heavy and brutal that you need those trees and plants to hold the soil together or it, and all of the vital minerals in it, will be washed away in seconds.

Also, there is no way Edwin McCain ever had a tin roof. If he did he wouldn't write pop panty-droppers. He'd write wooden drums and the sound of a reedy voice in the distance, thanking god for the rain.

Regarding Slavery, Oppression, feeling good on the beach, and a little bit of Otis Redding

2009-11-07T01:45:00.000-08:00

Before training ended, our teachers took us to Ouidah, which was the slave port in Benin for centuries. Most people were taken from the interior of the country by the King of Abomey. The King of Ouidah would then sell the slaves on behalf of the more powerful King of Abomey in exchange for firearms, alcohol and silk. While most of those goods made their way back to Abomey, you can imagine that no King was going to just let these treasures slip by tax-free. In this, the King of Ouidah went from being complicit in the slave trade to also profiting. Ouidah is mostly Fon, and the Fon like many tribes in the South of Benin, have a long history of Voodoo practices and beliefs. Benin is, for those of you who don't know, literally the birthplace of Voodoo. It resembles very little of the pentacost drawing, pin pushing, witchdoctoring voodoo that you see in movies, but it is the origin of that interpretation. Anyway, selling people into chattel slavery for a bunch of savage white people is definitely some bad gris-gris. One King had an enormous tree enchanted to protect himself from the spirits of the people he was sending across the ocean. Men would circle the "Tree of Forgetfulness" nine times and women would circle it seven times, to make sure that their spirits would not remember where they came from. (Just one of many steps taken to try to force the Africans into forgetting their past.) Then there was also, I believe planted by another king, the Tree of Remembrance which would trap the spirits if they did make it back to Ouidah. They would remember to come to that tree and therefore vindictive spirits could not haunt the King. The interesting thing about the Tree of Remembrance is that it was basically just in a neighborhood, a neighborhood where people had lived for a very long time. There were barefoot, mostly naked, babies running around, women crouched over their cooking stoves. I wouldn't be surprised if the children in the village tried to climb the tree once in awhile. While the impact of the slave trade absolutely effected the lives of millions across the continent, it seems as though it is a less poignant atrocity when looking at it specifically from it's point of origin. The timelessness of suffering in Benin is not just contained in this brutal shipping of 20 million human lives, but lives on in the empty bellies of children and behind the wary eyes of women who never stepped foot inside a classroom. I realize I am being condescending, but I do not know how else to make this point. The same way that I have nothing to do with slavery, being born in this place and time, they have nothing to do with the slave trade. Only in so far as I was born in and lived in a country with all of the worlds' opulence that thrives on the depletion of resources in poor countries such as this one, I have everything to do with slavery.

The inescapable plague is greed at any expense and the only antidote for our consciences seems to be rationalization. But hey, I should not be allowed to be self-righteous. I live in a house at least one hundred times nice than anyone else's in my village. I have a college education, a life-time of good health, and in village I am without a doubt the wealthiest person I know. I have a refrigerator for godsakes.

Ouidah was interesting for me because ever since I was a young teenager in Bourdeaux, I have wanted to visit a slave port. I really wanted to internalize the narrative I knew so well. Packed like spoons in a drawer, iron chains cutting into festering wrists, the separation of linguistic groups to prevent mutiny, the desperation and countless deaths. I thought visiting a place that has held these poor souls before they were marched to the sea would make me feel closer, or moved, by the experience. The truth was that the people here don't see the same blockbuster gore that I have had described. Their history is one of magical kings, betrayal, oppression and corruption. Their stories aren't about the Portuguese's slave ships or the Dutch trade or tight packing. They're about communities, families and tribes.

To be honest, I was a little disappointed with the entire trip. The mass graves were in fact quite sad. I left a rock at the memorial that I had found at the fort where the slaves were kept, and felt sacreligious standing there in my pale feet, thousands of long ago decomposed bodies beneath them. But that was it. At the beach where I watched my friends play in the surf and climb on top of each other and pose for pictures, I laid back in the sand and listened to Otis Redding.

Three thousand miles I've roamed

Just to make this dock my home

It was impossible to picture emaciated, brutalized people marching west toward an undeniably horrifying future. The sun was shining beautifully, and I couldn't help it, as I was trying to conjure an image of a 17th century slave ship on the horizon, I just thought, "Now that's home. That is where home is." Picturing my friends and family living their lives on that side of the world, I just smiled and leaned back to enjoy the sun.

Sitting on the dock of the bay

Watching the tide roll away

Sitting on the dock of the bay, wasting time.

"I'm full of shit, but this is ridiculous" Brandon Tolbert

2009-11-07T01:32:00.001-08:00

This is a letter I wrote to my lovely friend Steven while I was at post. Some of the information was relevant so I thought I'd post it here.

I want you to know that I am writing this letter in my

(steamy) hot living room, sitting on a plastic floor mat decorated with
white flowers, definitely an import from China. In the relativey
short distance behind my house there is an Methodist Church. They have
service every night, a midde aged skinny woman named Edwige leads a
small congregation in the same songs night after night. It sounds
exactly as you'd expect: fast, complicated drumming, call and
response, and almost three hours of repetition. They sing in a
language that I am not familiar with, either Aja or Bariba or
something else. Anyway, It doesn't sound like Nagot, the main language in my
village. The only word I can make out is 'Allelujah'. The
crickets are as loud here as in Upstate New York and the air smells
like wood smoke and thick grease. My house here is roughy the same
size as my Chestnut St apartment, maybe a bit larger actually, with an outdoor latrine and a shower
that is really just a drain in a cement floor. I have a cement house,
not mud, and a tin roof. All in all, it's really nice. I ike my house
quite a bit. You would like it too I think. There is a large
bookshelf full of books and many maps on the walls and sturdy handmade
wooden furniture. At night, when it is unbearably hot, I drag a cot
into my back patio and hang a mosquito net over my clotheslines. The
stars are incredible, you can see everything. I mean everything. Even
when the power is on you can still see the Milky Way. In the morning,
five am, I go back inside because the mosque down the road is so close
the call to prayer could be in my living room. Even if I was able to
magically sleep through it, the roosters outside of my house scream
from five thirty until about seven. They are so loud. My
house sits in a concession that I would love to draw for you, but I
cannot. It has a mud and thatch yurt-like buvette at the front of the
property that meets the main dusty washed out dirt road. Next to the
bar is my landlady (only ever called Mama) usually cooking on her
mudstove outside something for either her patrons or eight children,
and Mama's peyote, which is like a rustic gazebo where Mama sells
candy, cookies, cigarettes, soap and whatever she happens to pick up
from venders who pass by on the road to or from marche. Sometimes she
has vegetables.

Having a buvette in your concession is fantastic because her children
will deliver a delicious (by beninese standards, not microbrew
standards) 21 oz beers right to my couch. Or fruit cocktail soda.
Those kids also have been helping me get my water from the well and
come in to color, play Where's Waldo, or play games on my cellphone.
It's really nice; they call out KO KO KO at the door and clap their
hands to announce that they're there, the first word out of their
mouths is always 'S'il vous plait', sometimes I wonder if that is my
name.

Next door there is a young teacher named Narcissis and a few other
teachers from my school. I like Narcissis a lot, he and I wil likely
become good friends by the time I leave here. He is new to Manigi like
me, he just graduated college and is twenty six. He is kind to his
students and doesnt beat them. He is Fon which is the biggest
ethnicity in Benin and I think second or third in Togo and Nigeria.
In Manigri, which is about 200 km from where most of the Fon live, is
mosty Nagot with some Ani from the neighboring big town, Bassila.
There are some Bariba as well. The Bariba are kind of desert people,
they carry sheathed swords and during festivas ride horses decorated
wildly through the town. There are not a lot of festivals though, I
am told everyday that life au village is slow and simple. I am
inclined to agree. I find it kind of boring sometimes. It is not
really socially acceptable for women to go to bars or really even
drink. Women here are largely un(der)educated and male/female
friendships are pretty much unheard of unless there is a more intimate
relationship underneath. I am not seeking to be or know of anything
underneath anyone.

I have a lot of new very pretty dresses that I had made here for
little more than a few dollars a piece. You buy the fabric, called
tissue, at the marche after haggling for about ten minutes or so, then
find a tailor who will show you pictures of about fifty dresses with
scary photo shopped heads on them at weird angles. They measure you
and in two or so days you have a new dress. Tissue is really
interesting because while it resembles what we call traditional dress,
it was introduced by the Dutch during the 18th century. The fabrics
are in these really wild and loud designs. Apparenty it was a real
fight to try to get the West Africans to wear tissue because well,
it's fucking hot here. Most old paintings and drawings of that time
have the topless women and white loincloth deal going on. So the Dutch
sold it to the French who forced the Africans to cover themselves,
being catholic imperalists. White people were, and still I think are,
squimish about naked bodies. Especially breasts. It seems as though
they got here and were like OH NO BREASTS! A NAKED WOMANS BREASTS. SO
INDECENT, SO VULGAR, SO PORNOGRAPHIC (because a naked woman equals
pornography...). The French and Portuguese also, I am told, introduced
facial scarring to separate slaves. Today just about every baby gets
facial scars, some are very discreet small horizontal lines on their
cheeks, others are really intense full over scars that make them look
like they slept on a couch cushion. So while it began as a really
ugly and cruel symbol of oppression, it now denotes ethnic and
patrilineal pride. I think that is interesting. And sad. But mostly
interesting.

I have been eating a lot of delicious fruit lately, like bananas (much, much smaller than those Chiquita monstrocities that have wiped out real bananas in our hemisphere) and green oranges (a bit of an oxymoron, I know). I make my own bread now, it's relaxing and rewarding and tastes delicious. Every other city in the country has bread, so much bread you can't go somewhere without seeing a woman carrying easily one hundred baguettes on her head, shouting "Pain chaud! Pain chaud!" like a hawker from the crooked streets of London or something. There are only three Africa food groups, as a matter of fact. One is protein, the other carbohydrates, and the third is listed as "other". In this other I think is where pot de vache, literally a boiled pot of every part of the cow- including skin and intestines- remains. The food really isn't bad though. It's just different. It's spicy and full of carbohydrates and fat, because those are cheaply made and people here can't always eat everyday- never mind three times a day. Some of the professors at my school complain that they don't get enough to eat, as they are supporting both their nuclear and extended families on a budget of one hundred dollars a month. And really, that is a great salary here.

Speaking of my colleagues, I have school tomorrow from 10-12 and then later from 3-5. 12-3 is repose time, which is like a siesta. I should really be lesson planning for tomorrow but I want to keep talking to you. Tomorrow I will go to the marche and buy onions, garlic, yams, rice and maybe plantains. I don't really eat meat here, it's expensive and difficult to find. You can only buy cow-meat at the marche; goats, chickens and rabbits you have to kill and clean yourself. It is not that I am opposed to doing any such thing, but that is a lot of work when I can just eat lentils or beans. The meat here is also a little gamey because it is all free range, so making roasts is a bit of a challenge. Everything dries out pretty quickly. I haven't been that impressed with the cooks in Manigri. I accidentally swallowed a goat tooth my first night here and immediately excused myself to throw it up in the bushes. Since then I have been cooking for myself while I am not traveling. So far, I like cooking. I am incredibly spoiled in that I have a refrigerator, making cooking very simple. Especially since the marche is only open once every four days, so some of my things need to keep. Don't worry, I am taking vitamins. Don't worry your little fawn head.

I wish you could come visit me. We would go to Penjari, a national park here, and spy on elephants and lions. We could run away and live in the baobobs with the monkeys. Oh monkeys!

There is a small village, only about six kilometers away or so named Kikele. It has your typical mud and thatch houses, no running water or electricity, etc. There is a sacred forest in Kikele where these small black monkeys live. According to tradition, there is one monkey for each person born in the village. The monkeys are like spirt animals. They come to baptisms and weddings and are very sacred to the community. Apparently these monkeys are very rare because they are only found in this sacred forest. That is not to say that at some point they were elsewhere as well, but may have been chased out or hunted or had their habitat cut down. I think the idea of one baby monkey for each baby human is sweet.

It is morning now and I have skipped my morning class because most students are still not showing up and I do not have the necessary supplies, such as chalk or an eraser for the blackboard. Many of my students are still in Nigeria, working in the fields, until next week. This is how they are able to to pay their school fees, they work in the cane or oil fields in Nigeria and save money for their families. Some kids take entire years to go work in the fields, returning to school every other year. As you can imagine, if they finish the eighth grade they are twice as old as their classmates. Some of my students are older than I am, and I teach the equivalent of 7th or 8th grade.

I am still not wholly comfortable to be an English teacher to these kids. But I am comfortable being a role model for girls here. Girls have it tough, it's still very much a traditional society. I am told things are changing though, you know, by men. They tell me that just last year a law was passed prohibiting a man from beating his wife. I suppose that is something. The law doesn't really have much teeth if there is no one to enforce it though, and police seem to be confined to the main road (yes singular) in the country where I believe they mostly collect tolls and take bribes. Women are absolutely seen as inferior, even though they do the majority of the work. I rarely see my girl neighbors at rest- and even less at play. They are always gathering wood, cooking, cleaning, doing laundry, helping Mama with the stand or the buvette. The boys dick around all day and play soccer. And this is the natural order of things here. Female literacy in Benin is one of the lowest in the world, according to the 2006 world fact book I glanced at in the Parisian airport. School costs money and most girls are needed at home to help with the household work. Also, when a girl is married she will not be the provider for either her family or her husband's family, so the incentive to educate her is mostly lost in that she will not have a job that requires education. She might sell tomatoes at a marche, or have a buvette like Mama, but she will not be a lawyer or a teacher. I am the only female teacher in my school, and I am an import.

Another really interesting aspect of education here is what children are taught in their classes. Communisim is completely wiped out of the curriculum, even though this country was communist into the 1990s, and into many of these childrens' lifetimes. My guess is that the focus on democracy is seen as the upmost importance, as the birth rate is so high there are perpetually too many unemployed young people. As we know, unemployed young people are quite dangerous. I also wouldn't be surprised if democratic indoctrination was some part of loan conditionality for helping pay for education here. A lot of people are very suspicious of education in this country because parts of it are imported from Canada. Canada being a country full of white people, they think that perhaps those in North America just want to keep Africans dumb so they can steal their natural resources and keep them forever in debt. I usually say I wouldn't put it past those Canadians, the people in the United States ('americans' being slightly inappropriate in that sentence) have always been wary of them. This usually grants some laughter, then sighs, then shifty glances toward me. I think they think I might be a spy.

I am not a spy. Although, that is exactly what a spy would say, isn't it?

feeling good was good enough for me

2009-10-17T06:57:00.000-07:00

I had written a huge blog post on about four or five sheets of grid paper that I was so excited to use. After the three hour bus ride up north to Nattitangou, which was really beautiful, I sat down at the computer at the work station and realized, true to form, that I had left the paper at home.

Manigri is really great. Whatever reservations I had before are completely vanished. The people are so happy to see me and everyone is so kind. I really love walking to school and salutering (or trying to) the ladies on the side of the road. My Nagot is just starting to become passable, in that I can saluter Marche Mamas. It's always a really good feeling when someone laughs out of pleasant surprise or just plain shock that you know how to speak their language.

The Yovo-ing here is really different than in the South. In the South there are many different ways the Fon or the Aja would call white people. Sometimes it was excited, sometimes aggressive and other times taunting. I never feel as though someone is being racist or cruel when they call me Ouebo, the Nagot word for Yovo. (to be fair i decided a long time ago to never be sensitive to any 'Yovo' at all) They are more just trying to get my attention so I can wave at them and saluter. There are a good number of Fon in pockets of Manigri, and there the Yovo calls are still calmer than in the South. It's a greeting, not a verbal assault. It's nice.

Also, true to what I've been told, everyone wants to help me and be friends with me. Regardless of what their motives or intentions are, I find that really welcoming. They want to carry my bags, they want me to visit their stores, they want me to sit with them. Eventually I will start visiting houses, but right now I am still getting settled into things. The women at the couterie I started going to are all so beautiful and so excited to see me everytime I come in. They all shake my hand twice and eventually I start blowing kisses into the air as if I were the President or the Mayor. The babies in that shop are really friendly as well. I had one on my back just a few days ago.

My colleagues are really refreshing to talk to. Not a lot of people, on average, speak French well enough to carry on a conversation. However, I have spoken a number of times to the teachers at the CEG, who have their own ideas about international politics, development, and education. I find some of it englightening and some of it reassuring. (other times, as is the nature of those discussions, frustrating) It is good to hear that the people here are not ignorant to loan conditionality and the Debt Crises. It is good to hear that people outside of banks and policy makers do understand how international lending institutions make decisions and how that effects their daily lives.

The roof in my bedroom leaks. Not a lot, just the littlest bit. Just the littlest bit on my computer charger. Just a little, tiny bit. Enough to effectively fry my computer charger. This makes music listening impossible unless it is on my shortwave radio, but eventually I will get a new one sent to me and it will be pas grave. In the meantime it has been great to be reading all the time. There are so many fantastic books in Natti that I am really excited to take home, like treasures.

I am really sorry this has been another messy, unsubstantive post. Just be assured, you have a good one coming to you. I have to go back to Manigri and play with my kitten.

This is a massacre of zombie proportions. - Rich Pasquesi

2009-09-08T09:05:00.000-07:00

I received some really good news last night; I hear that Barack Obama has fixed the economy. Right on. Anytime you would like to send me some interesting news stories, please feel free to do so. I do not have enough time to research current events on my own and definitely not in the same capacity I have grown accustomed. My French is just starting to get good enough where I can make out some of what they are saying on the news, but it is mostly about politicians and pharmacy corruption. Not that I do not find that interesting, it would just be nice to break out of this bubble from time to time. The lack of information is a little bit overwhelming sometimes.

Model school has been torturing me for two weeks now. Not that it is really torture, but I would not call it fun. Each week I teach a different level of English students, all of them rougly middle school age. I teach for about seven hours a week in the mornings, have class until four, lesson plan for two or more hours and then go out to the buvette. After a grand bier or two I head home and eat dinner and continue to work on my lesson plans. This teaching stuff is a lot of work I did not expect. I am told it gets easier. With time. In case you teachers out there are wondering, I have pretty awesome classroom management. However, my lesson plans seem to fall apart and my board organization is a complete mess. It sort of reminds me of what being taught to wait tables was like. I had seen this job on the other side so many times by eating in restaurants. However, there is a lot of work I had never really considered, like refilling ketchup bottles and cleaning out the salad bar, that were hidden. It is frustrating because I know what kind of teacher I want to be, but I do not have the experience yet to be that person. I also do not really know if I will ever really love teaching English. Not that I need to. I absolutely do not think it is necessary. We will see when I get my own students. The first day of school is October 1st.

Christopher Kotfila was a good friend of mine back in the States. We worked together at Professor Javas Coffee Sanctuary in Albany for almost two years before he left for Peace Corps Benin. That is right. He is now in Cotonou awaiting medical debriefings and filling out tons of paperwork; his plane departs next Monday. It was so awesome having him around, it was really comfortable. It was also a little bizarre. He is, and has been, ready to leave this country to go back home to Upstate New York. I am anxiously awaiting a new life in Northern Benin where he has spent the past two years of his life. It is an interesting crossroads. He was an enormous help while he was here. We will of course see each other when I return, which I look forward to.

I noticed that a lot of my pictures, which I do not have the time or patience to upload until I am in a Peace Corps Bureau office with reliable and reasonable fast interent, are of people I am training with. This obviously makes sense as we spend all of our time together and do not seem to go anywhere except for the school and the Songhai farm. By the way, if someone could let me know where the capital of the ancient Songhai Empire was, I would be thankful. I have been wondering about that since we arrived.

I am trying to think of some mundane, yet vaguely interesting details about my life here. I spend the vast majority of it at school, six days a week. On Sunday I do my laundry by hand, which takes a couple of hours- and is fairly exhausting. I had a conversation with my Mama here about gender roles in Benin. I am her third female volunteer, so she basically knows what I am going to say before I even say it. She asks the right questions though to allow me to practice my french. She asked if women in the United States, well she said Mamas, do as much work as the men do. I responded that the United States is huge and it is difficult to make generalzations, that of course the men have some actual responsiblity in the United States in terms of housework and child care. Not just monetary responsibility. This seemed to be a point of contentions for Mama, whose daughter cooks all the meals and cleans the house all day. She works at the marche selling pharmacueticals and needles in Nigeria and Cotonou, both are fairly long commutes by American standards. "In Benin," she said, "The Mama does everything, everything. The husband, he comes home and sits like this," putting her hands on her chest and lounging about. I laughed because it really did look like Papa after he comes home from selling cell phones. It is a different culture I said, but I did admit that I thought the American standard was a bit more fair. We talked about the difference that shared income families make for women. I was told that it is a slow change, but it is a discernible change in the middle class here. When you have two people working, their roles are not as clearly defined. It is pretty neat to think about. Although, the husband apparently never ever tells his wife how much she makes per year. It is just not done. He has things he wants to do with that money. And only sometimes will the wife not tell her husband how much she makes at her job. The power is still not equal, but the impact of dual financial responsibility is something to chew on for sure.

As it is Ramadan, my family eats at four in the morning. They eat outside of my window because that is where there is enough seating for everyone. I have taken to blowing my fan directly into my face, even when it is not hot, so I can sleep through the noise of Yoruba and dishes clattering. They are so tired by the end of the day too, even if they haven't done anything. Oh, and I always eat by myself. There does not seem to be such a thing as a family dinner here. The papa eats first, then the oldest boy, then the rest of the children, and usually last is the Mama. Or some variation thereof. In my family I eat first because I am still very much considered a guest, then Papa, then Mama and then everyone else. I am not really sure how they serve other meals because I am never there or awake for them.

As expected this has sort of turned into a bunch of disjointed experiences awkwardly woven together. I know you all expect and deserve a bit more, but at some point I will have all the time in the world to craft actual journal posts instead of just a melange of weird memories.

There is a HUGE turkey in my quartier. We eye each other every morning as I ride by on my bike. His head us almost to my thigh when I am ON my bike. I know someday he is going to get up the nerve to chase me, and when that happens I am going to cry like a little girl.
I swear in the 25th, I leave the 26th for Manigri. I am getting consistently more excited for Manigri the more I hear about it from the Volunteers. Sarah Ellison told me it was a fantastic post for working with womens groups, which is all I want to do while I am there. She is also currently my Volunteer trainer for TEFL, and has been absolutely fantastic.

*it is not that he forgot his umbrella, it is that he remembered he forgot.*

Cest lAfrique

2009-08-23T06:01:00.000-07:00

Here are a few excerpts from my journal, since i do not feel as though i have the ability to adequately summarize four weeks of bizarre and completely fluid circumstances that i have been going through.

July 26, 2009

St Jean Eudes is named after a french martyr from the 17th century, who died about the same time the first African slaves were brought to North America. The entire compound consists of a church, two dormitories, classrooms, a cafeteria and most importantly, a bar. Apparently, even priests get drunk on vacation. At the moment this massive property far outside of the center of Cotonou serves as a playpen for would be Peace Corps Volunteers. On day three I already feel as though I have been here two weeks, the days are just so long. We typically have to be at breakfast at 730 am and each night have been staying up till 330 or so. A few of us, Bradley, Rich, Laura, Hannah (i know a little weird right?), and Mark went to a catholic church service today. After standing around awkwardly outside as we couldnt find anywhere to sit, a woman waved us inside and individually found us a place to sit. The church was packed with probably close to three hundred people with another one hundred or so outside sitting on pagnes so they could listen. The pastor asked all of us, stagiers, to stand so we could be recognized by the congregation and later worked the Body of Peace, the Peace Corps, into his sermon. The service was three and a half hours long, broken up by a phenomenal twenty minute dance party when everyone gave money to the church. They were so happy to see us dancing and having a good time. I think that perhaps, when in doubt, it is best to dance.

July 27, 2009

First night at my host familys house, and all I can say is- Jesus, they are loaded. They picked me up in a Mercedes and have this enormouys house with electricity, running water and a shower. The power did go out for about 30 minutes or so but, Cest lAfrique. I have two host brothers and two host sisters, my papa has two wives but one lives in Cote dIvoire. I met papas mother when I first came in, she clasped my hand in one of hers and with the other slapped my palm lightly singing a song in a language i had never heard before. It ended with Amin. Amen. Camille, the youngest, explained that she was happy to see me. Afterward though, Grandma asked me for a massage. I complied, I didnt feel as though I had much of a choice. It was weird.

I heard my first yovo song today.

One baby at Papas brothers house is terrified of me. He has never seen a white person before and I freak him out. He was toddling up the patio toward his mother when he just stopped dead in his tracks and fell backward as if I had hit him. After staring for approximately thirty seconds he started crying. Il a peur, my aunt explained. I told them that it was good, that I eat babies. I went to grab his tiny hand, which was obviously a mistake because then he got REALLY upset and started screaming, at which point i felt bad. Poor babies.

July 31, 2009

The diet here is all starch cooked in palm oil, the fattiest kind of oil you can imagine. So much for all of the corned beef reubens and beer I indulged on in the States thinking it would be no problem to shed the residual poundage. Soon I will be what the Beninoise call, Bien Grossi. Good fat. I dont think they distingiush between good fat and bad fat. Although in the states I guess we dont either, its just all bad fat.

August 1, 2009

Today was the 49th Anniversary of Beninise Independence. Next year will obviously be a great party, although I may be au village. My family took me to a parade in Porto Novo, where I saw many voodun, marching bands, soldiers, and officials. Including the Kings of Porto Novo. A couple of men with their drums came over and literally drummed them AT me. They looked as though they were trying to intimidate me so I just started dancing as wildly as I could, and with positive results. The crowd absolutely loved it and many people greeted me afterward with such kindness and excitement. When in doubt, dance.
Afterward we went to the ocean outside of Porto Novo, and it was beautiful, albiet too cold and wild to swim. I drank my first coconut macheted open on the beach by a beautiful woman who carried a stack of coconuts and balanced two machetes on her head. The sweet; slimey flesh of the inside was delicious. A cousin, four or five years old, slept in my lap the entire way home.
Later that evening I went to my first mosque. I did the ritual washing and wore a beautiful green veil over most of my body. However since it was call to prayer and there was no Imam, everyone was just kind of doing their own thing and I had no idea what to do. I kind of just made it up and did what I saw Papa do three times in a row and then skipped out of there because children were laughing and giggling at me. I think because of my overall Yovo-ness.
Yovo related behavior from children and adults doesnt seem to bother me, this is my first experience being a minority. I just hope I keep that perspective. I can go home and blend in anywhere easily, if there is anything I wanted out of this it was not for it to be easy.

August 12, 2009

Birthday one of three in Benin. Caddy, my younger sister, pushed me sleepily immediately after waking me into Mama and Papas room where everyone greeted me with presents. I got a pair of gold stud earrings from Caddy, a really comfortable tshirt from Papa, Cookies from Camille, tissue for a dress from Mama, and candy from Sara and Kahled. It was so sweet. After my daily deep fried omlette and bread with lemongrass tea I rode my bicycle to school listening to the Velvet Underground. It was heavenly. The roads are chaotic, but in fact are a perfect exercise in cooperative clusterfuck. That does mean, of course, that sometimes people do die in the street in accidents- but for the road conditions (mostly packed red sand or dirt washed into deep troughs) and the lack of regulation (no laws requiring helmets, vehicle inspection, speed limits, perhaps even licenses) the people are pretty careful. Because they have to be. In the afternoon I sat with Eric outside and listened to my Ipod for three hours, circling Indie, Funk, and 70s rock. I listened to some lovely Nusrat Fateh and Paulhino Moska. Emily gave me some pineapple. It was lovely. After class the girls, the dudes had a soccer game to lose at Kokotia against the other stagiers, took me to the buvette and bought me a beer.
All in all, A+ Birthday.

August 13, 2009

Ahhh I found out my post and I dont even know if I remember its name! I think its Manigri, it is in the North and pratically in Togo. I know nothing about it but everyone is telling me that it is a great post. I mean, would they tell me if it wasnt? Do bad posts even exist? Probably not. I hope not. Guess I will see.

+°+°+°+°+°+°+°+°+°+°+°+°+°+°+°+°+°+°+°+°+°+°+°+°+°+°+°+°+°+°+°+°+°+°+°+°+°+°+°+°+°+°+°+°+°

Since I have now returned from post visit, I can let you know exactly how I felt about Manigri. Despite the fact that I have no real concentration right now because some jerk isnt letting me type and is hitting on me inappropriately. It is not that i am angry with him, although I have to act as though I am because they do not leave you alone if you are not mean.

Manigri is a really pretty, pastoral large village of about 16 thousand people. It is predominately Muslim, and from what I can tell, pretty developed for a village in the North. There is running water and electricity, and fantastic cell phone service. My house even has a refrigerator. Oh, and speaking of my house, HUGE shout out to Carly for leaving me absolutely everything I could possibly need when I first move in. The most precious of all being an enormous bookshelf full of books including the Poisionwood Bible, which is a mandatory re-read. I have pots, pans, a GRILL, a douche and latrine right outside my backdoor and enclosed by walls on all sides (meaning i could go to the bathroom and shower naked if i wanted to), a big bed, extra sheets and towels, a new headlamp. i think the only thing i need to bring with me is a fan, which is incredible.

The people, from the minor interactions I have had with them, do seem a lot more relaxed. I swear people walk with a different rhythm here than in the states. I swear their swagger is syncopated. I did not hear the yovo song once, although I was certainly called yovo, which still fails to annoy me. I found my assinged homologue to be kind, intelligent and very very well spoken. His English is better than mine.

My school has about 800 kids, so my Directeur says. I will be teaching four classes of sixty students, which somehow isnt as scary as it was a month ago. Sixty kids is better than one hundred.

Although I am a little bummed that I have been posted so far away from many of my good friends and in an area I had no expressed interest in going, I am taking it on the chin. Aint no thing.

I still miss everyone; thank you for the letters and phone calls. Everytime I talk to you from home it gets a little bit easier for me to be here.

Love
Sarah

rushed second post

2009-08-08T06:11:00.000-07:00

To the Sallie Mae representative who denied my deferrment: stop being a jerk.

To others that I love and miss:

After spending four days in Cotonou sequestered in a compound with fifty-five other would-be peace corps volunteers, i moved in with my host family in Porto Novo. it's been mostly very comfortable, they have both electricity and running water. I have a host brother Camille who is ten, a host sister Cady who is fifteen, another host sister Sarah (21) and another host brother Cadiou (28). My french is improving quite a bit due to both the living situation and the sixteen hours of french class a week. I am having a blast riding my bike around Porto Novo and hanging out with other stagieres at various buvettes. I have a number of posts that I would like to, at some point, put up here but I dont have the time at the moment. It's going to have to wait until I have an opportunity to get to Cotonou again. I find out about my post next Friday, which is really exciting. I also start actually teaching students for Model School starting the week after.

that is probably enough for right now.

First Post

2009-07-18T20:02:00.000-07:00

So, for my first act I will simultaneously hang out with my friend Mark, watch cable television, nurse a hangover, and post this blogthing.

My second act will hopefully be more interesting.

I will miss you all. See you on the other side!