Elephants, Hippos in Burkina. Oh My!

Hello everyone,
Right now we are in Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso (Lizzy,Tara and Taras friend Jen) . We just got back from Banfora (south western Burkina) where we spent 2 nights. On the 7 hour bus ride to Banfora we made a friend who decided to hang out with us the whole next day and take us to the amazing waterfalls and the lake where we went hippo watching. We also had lunch at a McDonalds. Funny enough they were out of ketchup. Tomorrow we will get back on a bus to take us north to the Dogon region of Mali where we will go on a four day trek.

p.s. On the road to Ouaga from Benin we saw an elephant on the side of the road and got to stop and take pictures. pretty cool.

more as it develops.

Return to the North – New and Improved with Monkeys!

The title pretty much sums it up. Today I took the 8.5 hour bus ride back up to Natitingou in the Atacora/Donga region (read: home). It seems that the heat from the south followed me; however I did manage to lose the humidity in transit. The VAC meeting went well and now I just need to check up on the gardening groups and try to hurry along the construction of a well for the school, since a garden with no water, well won’t produce much of anything. On the 11^th Feb. begins my second vacation in as many months. Four of us are traveling via Burkina Faso as a means to get to Mali (and to get visas) where we will take a four day trek in the Dogon region. We will then travel via Niamey (Niger) to get back to Benin on the 26^th of February. So that’s pretty much it. Oh yeah the title; four monkeys ran in front of the bus on the way up here. It was a real Africa moment; they come less and less frequently. So there you go.

N’kua sosi

Michael

p.s. For those of you that are keeping score out there my weight it at 152 lbs. (69kg for our European fans)

also... I think it should be noted that i just posted this email from a field in Natitangou. Yes a field. There is a NGO that has a unsecured wireless connection. I wonder what the guard was thinking.

Janvier/Février 2008

January 30th 8:00 I get a phone call from my homologue telling me that he got a call from the director of my NGO and that I need to write up the invitations for the importants. Being half asleep I agree and wait for him to pick me up. The absurdity of this occurs to me as my brain boots up. The invitations are for a ceremony in an hour. The ceremony is for la remise or presentation of materials for the women’s groups and high school group. Not only this but I have the lowest level of French among the members of my NGO, so why I need to write the invitations is beyond my comprehension. In any case the invitations get written after hunting around the French keyboard for the correct characters (to get to a period you have to shift). The invitations were delivered sometime after 9:30. This however was not a problem because no one had arrived yet. This gave me time to set up the materials (machetes, wheelbarrows, treatment tools, boots, hoes, rakes, watering cans, seeds, shovels, and chicken wire) in some kind of order. At around 10:30 the women’s and importants showed up and the ceremony could begin. This involved everyone thanking everyone one by one and saying a few kind words. Each respective president from each group came up and signed a document of the received materials. Then came the fun part where we got the groups to stand in front of their newly acquired swag and pose for some pictures. We then told them that they were free to take the stuff back with them, this is when they started singing and dancing. I posted some pictures from this event on my flickr account.
So the good news is that most of the needed materials are finally in the hands of the groups and this will require me to help and check up on them regularly (i.e. keep my busy).
My NGO – PELCA had a soirée for the members of the NGO. This event which I was told would involve dancing, food and drink did not start until 12:30pm. The food was not brought out till at least 1am. After which the dancing started. This continued till the call to prayer at 5am. I have to say I still have not found a great appreciation for the Beninese style fête or party. I think it is worth noting the picture of the DJ booth.

Currently I am in Cotonou for the National VAC meeting. (We bring complaints from our region to the attention of the Peace Corps administration) I will be using my time here to get a visa for Niger. Mid February we have a trip planned to go to Mali traveling through Burkina Faso and returning through Niger. I am excited for the trip and especially for our trek through the Dogon country part of Mali.
On a sadder note Benin preformed terribly in the Africa Cup losing to Mali, Ivory Coast and Nigeria; scoring only 1 goal total. It is pretty fun to watch the games on random television sets throughout Kouandé though. With Benin being out I will be looking forward watching the Ivory Coast play the host country Ghana in a thrilling final ending with an Ivorian victory 3-1 to take the Cup.

Back in Benin

After a fairly uneventful but very long trip I finally made it back to Benin with mixed feelings I have to say. The temperature in the south is fantastic right now, since it’s the cold season or l’harmattan. When I was taking a Zemidjan around Cotonou getting some errands done I felt very much back at home and comfortable. The traffic even seemed somewhat subdued in comparison to the chaos that is Roman traffic. I spend 2 days in Cotonou (always a good idea before the harsh transition to village life) where Lizzy surprised me at the airport, what a great birthday present! I also was cornered into getting the flu shot at the bureau and managed to turn in my next vacation form a trip to Burkina Faso, Mali and Niger. After the 8 hour bus ride (leaving at 7am) I finally arrived in the North, Natitingou to be exact. From here is just the little, if not cramped bush taxi ride to Kouandé. Overall I am happy to be back, however on the down side I found out that there has been no work done on the gardening project. That is 3 weeks where absolutely nothing has been done. I wasn’t expecting very much but at least something would have been nice to come back to. Oh well.

n'kua sosi

Rome Again

I have been home for 8 days already. I have to say I have gotten used and started taking for granted most things fairly fast, such as having a bathroom only feet from your bedroom, or being able to enjoy a cold glass of milk. One thing however that is just as amazing at the first time is a hot shower. Checking email from my bedroom on my laptop with the wireless is pretty awesome too. Lest not forget how crazy the drivers are here, it’s a shock every time.

The weather has been ranging from close to 0 ºC to 17ºC. So it’s hard to tell if I’m getting used to that too, or it just has been warmer than the day I arrived. I did go shopping with my mom for new clothes on the second day here. Since I only had one pair of jeans and no jacket. We made several tactical strikes on an outlet mall. Mission Accomplished … and I’m looking good.

When I start speaking Itlaian I have to consciously battle to keep French suppressed. If I don’t think before I speak my Italian will turn into French. The first couple of days were bad but slowing its coming back. This is the longest since we moved to Rome in 1990 that I have been away from the Eternal City.

In closing; happy holidays to everyone. I hope that you are able to spend time with your family and the people closest to you.

Auguri!

Rome again...

The exciting new news is that I am going to be home for the holidays! 3 weeks in Rome with my family. Being there for my sisters birthday, Christmas, New years and my birthday.

Currently I am sitting in the airport in Paris, waiting for my connecting flight to Rome. Being here is not only amazing but it also is a different world from the one I came from. There (Benin) is a land of heat, colorful clothing and bad French. Here (France) is a land of -3 degree weather (26ºF), black clothing and mean French. I am the only person that I can see with a short sleeved shirt, not only a short sleeve shirt but also a lighter color than charcoal. I feel very dirty and unstylish here. More as it develops.

Soyez dans le Moov!

As of 18:27 November 20th 2007 Kouande now has cell phone reception!
my number is +229 (Benin Country Code) 95.29.07.95
people are really excited and calling each other left and right.
happy thanksgiving everyone.
Michael

Dindon

Happy thanksgiving everyone!

I will be spending the holiday in Natitingou with about 30 other volunteers. There will be pit roasted turkey (locally grown) some much needed time at the pool and the best local beers Benin, Togo and Ghana has to offer. I hope everyone is doing well.

Michael

Even the Spirits don't know...

Update, update. Well not too much new in the world of this Peace Corps volunteer. Work as usual is progressing slowly. Lesson to anyone working in development, things will not always go as smoothly and as according to plan as you might want them to. Specifically I am running into bureaucratic blockage with getting the money from Cotonou up here to Kouandé. My English club is on its way to asking permission and picking the students to at least start with. I have some other things on my plate that require more research but are possible projects for the future. These include; water filtering and packaging, photocopier installation, and working with the local informatique (computers you can use for money).

I'm not sure if I have already said this before but Benin is considered the home of Voodoo. The practice of animism, spells and charms is alive and well not only in Benin but many parts of Africa. People believe various things for example to cure certain diseases they will do scarification on a certain part of the body and this should cure it. Another conmen type of gris-gris (read: charms or magic) are special herbs you eat for certain effects, for example there is one that if someone shoots you with a gun you will disappear and after the bullet passes you will reappear. I have talked to people who swear by this and said that they have seen it happen. It is really interesting and very much a part of the culture here. There are also things called fetishes, these are spirits that are usually in a large rock or old tree. People will come to ask for things with a ceremony wherein they will pour sodabe (moonshine), palm oil, and chicken blood on the fetish after sacrificing a cock. My friend went to a woman who is supposedly can channel demons and will answer any question for you (for a price of course). He asked her what he should do after Peace Corps, if he should go back to school or travel etcetera. She went into a room where he heard what he said sounded like Beaker from the Muppets talking; this was the spirits talking to her. When she reemerged she told him that the sprits had no idea. That since he was from so far away, they had no idea. Haha so even the spirits have no clue as to what we should do after Peace Corps.

Oh yeah and the pictures I have most recently added are of a artisan and agricultural fair they had in Kouandé a couple days ago. It was interesting to see what is actually locally produced. We all wore the same tshirts and has a parade through the town. It was a real socal event and really excited the town for a couple days.

VAC, PONG, OUEME, BASQUIAT

I don’t remember if I had already said that the Telefood funding had been approved for my women’s groups in Kouandé. In any case it has been, and we have been getting them ready for it. In domestic news my neighbor died. He had a fatal motorcycle accident. He is survived by his wife, two children and a baby. They moved back south before I returned from working stage. Dead here is so matter of fact. It really reminds you that you can go at any time; there is no guarantee, not for anyone. I did however get a new neighbor, the CBA (The second in charge at the Gendarmes) He is very nice and so is his very large family. They have only been there for a week and have already made me food. It doesn’t take much to win me over. I left post for the regional VAC (Volunteer Advisory Committee) meeting and on the way south for the national VAC meeting I stopped in Parakou for Annie’s going away party. This involved a hired covered truck to take us to the auberge, where there was a pool table, beer on tap, dancing and beer pong (with real solo cups) it was a good time. We also took a zemidjan ride through little villages to see the Oueme river, the largest river in Benin (it runs 310 miles or 500km). Another surprise was that in Cotonou we found an exhibition of Jean-Michel Basquiat which was amazing. The art center itself was air conditioned, modern, clean and free! It was nice to do something that you would be able to do back home. Overall it has been a good week and I look forward to getting the money from Telefood to actually start buying things. Hope all is well with you and yours.

-Michael the Dutchman Deep in Bariba Territory

ps- enjoy the new pictures.

My Peugeot 405

You try and remember especially terrible taxis by color or a particular sticker. Usually something like ‘God willing’ or ‘Lazy Man Is a Hungry Man’ or the inexplicable ‘Stop, Don’t Kiss Me’. Sometimes these cars actually have names; names such as ‘Never late’ and ‘God Will Provide II’. The actualization you make is that all the taxis are in all such terrible disrepair that they simply become indistinguishable from one another. These factors could include having a blue car with most of the paint scraped off; or the inside door panel missing with the door handle replaced by a coat hanger like piece of metal. These things simply are not rare enough to be able to tell them apart, and only once on the road and the car breaks down or the driver makes forty stops do you realize why you marked this car for the ‘never ride in again’ one.

Mid Service Medical Checkup and the 52 new volunteers

My check up with the doctors went relatively well. The information learned can and will be summarized in bullet point form:

• I have lost 10 pounds (4.5kg)
• I have a low resting heart rate
• I have giardia
  

I have the medication to treat giardia and will take it when I get back to post. The med unit is nice mainly by having unlimited access to internet and hot showers. There is a 8:00pm curfew though. I have also had some time to think about what makes hot showers so great and it comes down to one word… solubility.

Big News! The cell providers have finally reached agreements with the government and have resumed service. This means my phone is now working I can be reached at

+229 (Benin country code) 95 29 07 95 (Télécel now called Moov)
or
+229 (Benin country code) 97 01 62 95 (was called areeba but now bought by MTN)

depending on is I am within coverage. I am not sure if the two towers have been turned on in Kouandé as of yet. One way to find out…

Tara met me in Cotonou and together we took the shuttle up to Aplahoue to work the final two weeks of stage (stage is French for training or internship). It was good to be back in Aplahoue and see the EA crew. They are all doing well. The biggest surprise was that 2 more PCTs (Peace Corps Trainees) had decided that Peace Corps Benin was not for them. The other surprise was the level of French achieved for the people coming in with very low French. It is amazing to think that only 6 weeks ago some people spoke very little to no French and now are able to communicate all by themselves. I think the group as a whole is ready and pumped to go to post and graduate from Peace Corps High. The other thing I noticed was how much more mellow the group is now. I had said in an earlier post how it was really tiring working because they all had so many questions and need a lot of hand holding. That is completely normal and I chose to work because of those reasons. It is great to see that now they are more confident and comfortable (I think they are also tired). The last two weeks are programmed based on specific needs; since they already found out where they will be posted and have made a 2 day visit. We also had a trip to Grand Popo which is a beach about 2 hours away. All the sectors met there and spend a very nice sunny day at the beach.
Swearing in will be held at the American ambassadors house the 21st of Sept.

I will now leave you with an interesting fact:
“The seed of the Mediterranean Carob tree (ceratonia siliqua) is so regular in size it was originally used as the measurement for gold, the carat.”
Trees: Their Natural History – Peter Tomas

-DutchOut

Being at Post for 2 weeks, My Garden and a Road Trip

After working with the new volunteers for a week in the south I decided to make my way back up north stopping in a town called Ouéssé; Lizzy a TEFL volunteers post. It always is nice to see what other people’s towns and houses are like. Ouéssé is nice and Lizzy’s house is very nice. They are replacing an old volunteer so we went to look at the new house and the CEG (High School) where Lizzy teaches. The classrooms are wood and thatch and at the beginning of each rainy season they fall down and have to be remade for the new school year. The paillote as they are called does not provide much in the way of protection from the elements. The teachers also have to use a propped up chalkboards, which some students can’t see because they are behind the wood poles. It goes without saying that there is no lighting in these paillote. So Lizzy has started a PCPP (yes, I know more Peace Corps acronyms. PCPP = Peace Corps Partnership Program) they are projects in which the funding comes from anyone that wants to donate. You could for example visit the Peace Corps website and find her project and donate some money for the construction of new classrooms.

READ MORE and DONATE HERE

I’ll wait till you are done donating to continue…

Ok. So after my visit I went back to post and spent a good two weeks there. The rains have started and this means not too much leaving the house. The Beninese don’t like being out in the rain and meetings are not a good enough reason to leave the house. I guess I don’t blame them and at least everyone knows that’s how it works so no one leaves the house. This is a good time for gardening. I had started a garden before I left for stage but upon my arrival found it to be a garden of weeds. I decided to give the garden another go. I planted basil, tomatoes, ruggetta salad, carrots, parsley, corn and both green and dark beans. So far the tomatoes, ruggetta, corn and beans have been showing some progress. I have some pictures posted of my garden and will continue do post them showing the progress.

Off topic I thought I would share a funny story. I was at home when a man and woman came to my door asking me if they knew what these were, handing me $6 dollars. (A $5 and a single) I said yes that they were American dollars. They asked me how much they were worth and I told them that about $1 = 500CFA. They asked me if I could exchange them, I decided that eventually I could use those dollars and these people could use the money. I asked them where they got them from, they said that they found the money in a pair of pants they bought at the market. Don’t you love it when you find money in your pants?

Later I realized that the rate is $1=480CFA and I had lost money on this deal. I had to laugh like hell.

The Moringa, Terminalia and Gmelina tree nursery is doing well; we even reseeded some of the sacks that didn’t grow, with the rains they should be able to grow in time for the planting.

I also took a day motorcycle trip with my friend Chabi (see Gallivant). We had been planning to visit his hometown of Birni and since he is on summer vacation we decided it would be a good time to do it. We took the moto from Kouandé to Birni on a more direct dirt road with not one but two broken bridges. The first was passable with getting a little wet, the second as my pictures show is passable by a 30cm strip. You pay someone 200CFA (40 cents) to walk the moto across the river. The ride was quite pleasant through millet, sorghum, corn and cotton fields. We also were lucky with the weather and didn’t get rained on. Just as we arrive at Chabi’s concession in Birni his sister starts screaming and crying hysterically and collapses into her family’s arms. Chabi pulls out two chairs for us and his aunt and other sister are talking to him he also explains that his sister has some kind of mental illness and will have these episodes from time to time. Before I can yell at him for not giving me some kind of warming beforehand he starts crying and says to me; look at my situation. I ask what situation and that just his sister is sick. He said that his cousin also has the same illness. It’s very sad because there really is no mental healthcare in Benin. They think that these things are caused by voodoo and that the treatment can be done by sending them to a traditional healer. Chabi was very quite and I got the feeling he wasn’t very happy to be home, maybe he was embarrassed. He did cheer up when he saw a high school friend and we chatted a while, including a heated soccer debate. (Will Benin make it in the Africa Cup in Ghana this wear, and will they win? Not to mention that the Dutch national teach is the best team not to have won a World Cup)

The next stop on our little trip was Perma to visit my host family. This is where Environmental Education sector had training for 9 weeks. It was really great to see my family, they all happen to be there because the kids come home during summer vacation. (Three of them go to school in Natitingou) I got to see Tara’s family as well. Everyone was doing well and they were genuinely happy to see me. I brought them wagashi. (Fulani cheese) Also my little brother doesn’t want to be a bandit anymore he wants to be an actor. So hopefully there will be more than just one famous Beninese Actor

Then we make the trip back to Kouandé. As I am typing this I am in Cotonou for my Mid-service (can you believe I have been here a year, because I can’t) medical check-up.

Stay tuned for my next adventure – Stool samples and getting a physical. What a cliffhanger that is…

James Bond Drinking Game!

James Bond Drinking Game

Drink every time:

• James Bond orders a martini
• James says something now considered to be sexist or racist
• He wins at a card game
• Double for anything other than Baccarat
• He goes SCUBA diving
• He goes sky diving
• He goes skiing
• He makes love to a woman
• Double when he does so forcefully
• He loses or someone takes away his PPK (gun)
• You see James topless
• A woman says: “Oh James”
• The villain reveals his plans to James prematurely
  

Note: I write this after watching the first 17 James Bonds...

And I can't wait to get on the road again...

Another update you say? Crazy I know. I have been traveling lot in the last week. My first trip was by accident. After playing bocce ball one of the men said the king wanted me to come with them to the ceremony in Firou. He elaborated that the ceremony was cleanse the bad will left there by the Bariba people. That a long time ago the Bariba killed a lot of Houssa (an ethnic group from Niger) and just put them in a mass grave and this is one reason why Kouandé had stopped developing. They decided it was time to go to the site and pray and make animal sacrifices. I said I would go and they said they would come by the house at 7am. I thought that they would forget but at 6:30 they started tapping on my door. I got ready and we went out in front of the king’s concession. There were a lot of cars starting to fill up including a large 18 wheeler type vehicle for people.

I ended up in the extended cab of a Helux truck. In the truck bed was a cow, a goat and a chicken for sacrifice and a number of human passengers.

The king had his own covered truck and sat shotgun. In the back he had people playing drums and horns every time we passed through a village.

After about 3 hours we started to come close to the town of Kerou (where there are two Peace Corps volunteers) at this time a sage femme started handing out beers. I was given a Guinness and started looking for Ben and Chanti only to find some French girl scouts… yeah. After stopping in Kerou to have a beer and say hi to the king we continued the 25km to Firou.

We arrived in Firou and were met by half the village they were all excited to see us. Of course we continued to give our respect to the king then made our way a km away where the mass grave was. This was a mound covered in rocks. Just as the prayers started it started to rain. Then it started to rain heavily. People ran under trees and back into the trucks. I was glad I brought my rain jacket and must have been a sorry sight, standing under a tree getting rained on. Once the rains stopped the animals were sacrificed and we were able to leave. We ate with the nurse at the hospital then stopped at a buvette for a beer. This beer turned into 4 because various people kept buying us rounds. The part that makes this interesting is that everyone else was drinking small beers and the beer I requested they only had large ones which is no big deal for one of two beers but for 4 it becomes a different story. At this point its starting to get dark and we drop off people in Kerou and I decide to try and find the other volunteers. As I was asking the zemidjan if he knew where Chanti lived he said yes but she is standing right there and sure enough she was across the street. She was on her way to meet Ben for a drink. It was a nice coincidence. We finally left Kerou and made the 3 hour trip back to Kouandé, the beers helped me sleep on the terrible muddy road. We arrived after 1am. What a long day.

Later that week I decided to visit Lizzy, a TEFL volunteer in Ouéssé. This took 4 taxies and all day. She has a really nice house and a fun village. I enjoy seeing other people’s posts. I saw the school where she teaches and met some of her friends. There also happen to be a death in the family next door and this as we all know means that very loud traditional music needs to be played for one and half days. Literally all night this music played, well no actually it stopped from 5am to 6am. Then started again and lasted well after I left. Right now I’m in Parakou workstation hanging out with the TEFL kids on their way back from post visits. Heading back to Natitingou today. Still no word on when the cell phone situation will be resolved but everyone has heard something from someone saying that it will be turned on this week… then next week… and so on.

Let me leave you with some Allman Brothers song lyrics:

Lord, I was born a ramblin' man
Trying to make a living and doing the best I can
When it's time for leaving, I hope you'll understand
That I was born a rambling man

Ghana, Girls Camp, PSL20 and Adja Land

It has been a while since I have updated and this was written over a couple months so bear with me.

I did end up going to Ghana and it was just what I needed. Some R&R is a somewhat English speaking country. I had to rush back up north to Ouassa-Pehunco since my postmates and I held a 3 day girls camp. We had 20 girls from Ouassa and the neighboring village of Tobre. We had talks on women’s health, the importance of education, nutrition, money management and Moringa. We also had a basketball lesson and field trip to the local cotton factory. The camp went really well and I think they really enjoyed having a couple days that were just for them.

Over the last two months we had two training sessions. ToT (Training of Trainers) and TDW (Training Design Workshop) in preparation of the new volunteers. (stagiers) The training was held in Cotonou and this kept me busy traveling from the north to the south. They finally arrived on the 20th of July. Even though I was not scheduled to work till the 2nd week I had to be in Cotonou for the VAC meeting (Volunteer Advisory Committee) representing the Atacora-Donga region. Since I didn’t want to make the 7 hour trip back up north only to return in a week I decided to stay and help out with the new volunteers. I was able to get on the bus to the airport and was part of the group of old volunteers that waited for the plane to arrive and clap as they exited the airport. There were a total of 59 of them. They all were tired and little bewildered to have finally arrived. The first couple of days were spent shuttling them to and from the office for medical interviews, meeting the staff, bike fitting and zemidjan training. They seem like a good group and have a lot of energy; they now start the long process of stage in various towns in the south for 9 weeks.

After I work the second week (week 2), I return to post for 6 weeks then work again the final two weeks (8 and 9).

With regard to work I am still waiting on the funding from Telefood to be approved. The Environmental club has been created and held its first meeting in Guilmaro. They will help installing and taking care of the botanical garden near the newly built high school. The woman’s group in Kouandé has been neglecting the tree nursery so I had to weed and replant some of the Moringa seeds. I hope that they are able to self manage better. I will try and develop some accountability system between the different woman’s groups. The woman’s group near the high school works better. There also have been some changes with my ONG (read: NGO), for starters the director has accepted another job and will not be able to keep running the ONG. The second change is that my homologue, Moura also got a new job working as the tractor driver for the Community of Kouandé. This also means he will be around less.

The big news these days in Benin would have to be that the big cell phone service providers, Moov (formerly Bell Benin) and MTN (formerly Areeba) have been having some issues with the government. The whole story is a little confusing but the result is that they cut service. Of course these are the two providers that 95% of the volunteers use and to which the Peace Corps office switched to. This leaves the volunteers even more out of touch with each other.

I just returned from the first week of staging for the new volunteers in Aplahoue. Aplahoue is in Adja land. Where the dominant language is Adja. The people are very loud and aggressive when compared to the people in the north. This had been my first real exposure to this different kind of life. It takes a little getting used to. For example the Zemidjans (moto taxis) will run over to you and grab your bags and fight with one another to determine who wins the faire. I found that it’s really fun to call them from a distance and watch the scramble to get to you. The new EA stagiers are doing well. We lost one already the first week. She had a boyfriend back home and decided this was just not for her. Better that she make that realization now than in two months. We also had one girls have to change host families since her ‘papa’ was never around and the only person who spoke French thus defeating the purpose of a host family. We moved her to a new family and everything seems to be fine.

I took the stagier out for a cultural lesson after class one day to discover the local drink Sodabe (read: distilled palm wine). We each had a shot and toasted to a great next two years. This cost me just over 60 cents.

We celebrated Benin’s Independence Day on August 1st. There was a big parade in Aplahoue. Of course we were told to be there at 9am, but it didn’t start until after 12. There was choreographed dancing, Zemidjans rode by and some doing tricks. The tailors made a dress; the taxi drivers drove by and almost killed us, singing women’s groups, the Bocce ball group had a demonstration as well.

There also was a voodoo ceremony taking place in the neighboring village that we were invited to. Since this was only the first day of the ceremony we just saw the chief Fetishiers arrive, one on a hammock being carried by people and the other on a person drawn cart. We saw people carrying Fetishes (spirits in various objected used in ceremonies) usually covered in Sodabe, palm wine and blood. The highlight was that the man in the cart had the head of a pigeon in his mouth with the body dangling from it. Slightly strange.

Overall working stage has been more exhausting that I thought it would be. Always having to be there to answer questions, work out problems, translate and help run technical sessions has really kept us busy. I only worked one week and can’t imagine how working two in a row would be and I will find out in 6 weeks when I work 2 in a row. I did enjoy feeling useful and having a lot of answers since I was just like them a year ago. They are a great group and will enjoy working with them in the future.

I'm Alive, and thought this was funny.

TDW

This week was TDW (Training Design Workshop) for all the volunteers that are going to work stage (French word for vocational training) for the incoming volunteers. The whole purpose of this workshop was to plan the 9 week training and decide who was working what weeks. There were 7 of us for EA (Environmental Action). The sessions took a long time and thanks to Peace Corps Washington were made more difficult than they should have been. We stayed at St. Jean Eudes, this was the same place we stayed when we arrived in country, now exactly 10 months ago. It is a good 20 min form the center of Cotonou which is about a 500cfa ($1) zem (moto-taxi) ride. Of course this didn’t stop us from going into town to enjoy European and other ethnic foods. I also got to see a Reggae show at the French Cultural Center. It was good, all Bob Marley covers. The traffic and pollution is really quite astonishing, especially when you are coming from a small village in the north. The other thing that not only I noticed but other volunteers was our perception of the road to St. Jean Eudes. When we first arrived we saw it lined with run down shacks of shops, but now it was alive with commerce and we could tell what kind shops they were. Its funny how that has changed that at first glance you don’t see anything of importance then now we can tell that this shop is a bar, this one where they sell foam to make cushions etc.

In work related news the Moringa plants are doing well and will be transplanted with in about a week. Our Telefood proposal has been written and I am going to meet with the FAO representative to work out some of the details. The project will help 3 groups of vegetable gardeners in Kouandé, 2 women’s groups and 1 garden club at the CEG (High school). The funding is for about $6,000 and will cover seeds, hand tools, closure for the gardens, 1 well, irrigation systems. It will really help these groups to continue producing vegetables for Kouandé. The goal is they will continue to invest to keep up this process and increase the availability of vegetables and lower malnutrition.

I also decided that since my parents are going on a vacation to the Netherlands I myself could use one. I am in the process of getting Togo and Ghana visas. The problem is that Monday is a holiday and this gives me one more day of hanging around in Cotonou. More as it develops.

Becca Weru. (Welcome)

24 hour electricity has arrived to Kouandé! After a month with nothing (the SBEE took our generator to repair it but never gave it back) the connection to Natitingou has been completed. This took me by surprise on May 8^th at approximately 9:10pm as my lights suddenly turned on. The other good news is that the tree nursery with the womens group went well, after the date had to me moved three times because of holidays, a death in the family (therefore visitors from other villages were visiting) and scheduling conflicts with the local gardener. The nursery consist of the 80 Moringa trees, 50 Gmelina and 50 terminalia. In about a month the Moringa should be ready to be transplanted to the field. We also opened an account at the local post office for the group to be able to save money.

I found out that I will be working training for the new Peace Corps Trainees (PCT); a week this month and then again a week next month. The new volunteers (PSL 20) will be arriving in July. It is hard to believe that I have already been here almost 10 months.

I also was voted in as the VAC representative for the Atacora Donga region. (This corresponds basically to the Natitingou workstation area) This is a system for volunteers to air their grievances and problems locally to the VAC rep and then have their issues brought up to Peace Corps Administration.

All Vol

This week was the all volunteer conference in Cotonou. This meant that all 96 volunteers were to meet in a nice hotel in the capital for meetings. Overall it was a great success. For most of us just having running water, electricity is enough to justify the up to 12 hour trip. Having a pool, AC and hot running water with Peace Corps pick up the tab is something no volunteer can pass up, it also was mandatory. We had sessions for two days with topics varying from post office announcements to specific projects that were regarded as successful. For example one volunteer had a contest for her town, where it was divided into sections and after 3 months each section would be judged and prizes awarded. She said that people spent a lot of time cleaning up and the results were evident. Here there is no waste collection (for the most part) so everyone throws their garbage everywhere and anywhere. The American ambassador spoke as well. There also was a male date action to raise money for GAD (Gender and Development) since the male to female ratio is such most of the guys were bought up. Something about decreasing the supply to increase the demand…I don’t know. I did feel like a piece of meat but it was for a good cause. My date included a bottle of Italian red wine and NPR. The bidding got pretty ridiculous the more alcohol was consumed. Following the auction there was the first annual peace corps Benin talent show. For only being announced a day earlier I was impressed with the 10 or so acts. The highlights would have to be Gina’s interpretive dance with James Fisher on guitar. Paul Oxbows version of “Take me home sweet goudron.” The acapella theme song of Fresh Prince. The synchronized diving. A dance inspired by a Lairum dream and MIF kits. And the Operetta about being a Peace Corps Benin Volunteer. If I had more time I would have tried a spoken word jazz thing but alas, there is always next year. The next night was the catered GAD dinner. This gave everyone a chance to dress up a little and enjoy a fabulous meal where a silent auction was taking place to again raise money for GAD. Some of the items for auction were digital cameras, a thermarest mat, a jar of peanut butter (I bid on and lost), local artwork, razors, gift certificates to restaurants, a box of tampons (that a guy almost won), a basket of cereal and milk and so on. It was a very nice evening. At this point I am trying to leave Cotonou but it is hard to leave, the one factor that does make it easier is that you start to run out of money fairly quickly.

I was asked to write and add pictures of what food I eat here. If you have any suggestions on other topics you want to know about let me know.