Slimy, Smelly, Spooky

Ode to a Toad

I recently shaved my head again (out of choice this time), and as a result was covered in bits of my own hair. “Not a problem” I thought, “it’s as simple as taking a quick shower” (read: bucket bath). As my water pump is currently broken with no indication that it will be fixed anytime soon, I use well water. Skipping all the general preparatory details, I’m enjoying a nice cooling ‘shower’ when I feel something slimy of my face . . . and it’s climbing up . . .

I’ve had my fair share of unexpected surprises here in Benin, but when you’re naked with only a bar of soap as a weapon, and that sensation registers in your brain . . . unpleasantness occurs.

After a lot of arm/face flailing and a hasty retreat from my shower, I grab a towel and my spider killin’ shoe as I switch over to offense. It took me a while to find the culprit, but I was a bit relieved when I found it was only a baby toad the size of a penny.

I have no problem killing insects of any size or species, but I have a soft spot for non-venomous reptiles. It took me about 10 min’s to fish him out of my shower bucket (the little buggers’ quick!), but all’s well that ends well. I just had an extreme urge to rewash my face and will be pre-checking my shower water from now on.

17

I keep trying to gather random facts and interesting tidbits for my ‘Beninese gee-wiz collection’, and have found one gem worth sharing. As I’ve stated in the past, 9 people is about average for a bush taxi here.

Even this number is excessive, but I have one upped it (or 8 upped it?). On my way back to my post from the workstation the driver managed to fit 17 people ‘in’ a station-wagon as follows: 5 people in the front including the driver, 4 in the middle, 6 in the back, and 1 ON THE FRIGGIN ROOF!

This was not a short trip either, he was up there for an hour and a half. See facebook for the photo.

I know its hard to gain sympathy for this type of story cause 17 is just a number to you. So here is your “live in their shoes” homework assignment for the month;

Call your top 16 friends on XYZ social networking site. Have everyone meet up at the house of the person with a station wagon (warning, most people won’t admit to owning one) and pile in!

Rules:

1)      You must include 5 chickens, OR 1 goat, OR 2 pigs

2)      No one is allowed in the trunk (that’s for the animals and luggage), but the roof is fair game for 1 person (size unimportant)

3)      Speak in pig Latin to simulate a different linguistic environment and culture

4)      Don’t wash yourself for 1 week prior to the meet up, and finally . . .

5)      Drive for 65km at 50kph w/o AC. (try not to get pulled over, seat belts are difficult with this arrangement!)

Once finished, write and post a 500 word essay about personal bubbles at the comment section of this blog entry.

Best essay wins* a “La Beninoise” beer t-shirt (cause people will do anything for a t-shirt)

*Disclaimer: you will not receive said t-shirt for 2 years from entry date (shipping to America = cher!)

Postscript: On my next trip I beat the 17 record. I am now up to 19 adult in one station-wagon for a 4 hour trip.

Crap

I dropped my motorcycle helmet in fresh cow shit today.

That is all

Things Going Thump in the Night

1) Lizards? Scurrying across my platform ceiling

2) Goats head butting my porch gate

3) Bats running into my screen windows

4) Me, chasing all of the above with my spider killin’ shoe

Nutritional Value

After a particularly productive day, I was treated to a nightcap at the local bouvette by the mayor. He’s a talkative guy so I ended up staying well into the night. By the time I headed home the dark was palpable. On the way home I saw some kids randomly throwing sticks and stones into a nearby tree.

When asked what they were doing, they replied,”Knocking the bats out of the trees so we can eat them for their sorcery”. I am now officially intrigued. Despite the fact that bats are basically disease carrying sacks with wings, I couldn’t help but think, “What would be the protein content and nutritional index of a bat?” Hey, malnutrition is an issue here, don't judge me. I'm thinking outside the box (for those of you with thick heads, yes I'm kidding).

Cultural Exchange

 It was recently Halloween in America. This is a difficult subject to broach with the Beninese as they are legitimately afraid of sorcery, bats, owls, and dark magic. These are things we make light of in the States, and I wanted to explain a little bit of the holiday to my neighbors.

My idea was to put on a skit about sleepy hollow. The Beninese students love skits! What could possibly go wrong?

Well, my problem didn't end up being with the students so much as with the dude who owns the donkeys in the village. I wanted to borrow one for the skit and have someone ride it with a watermelon head. One problem with this; language barrier. 

He speaks less French than I do, so I relied on hand gestures. After about five minuets, he was convinced that I wanted to chop the head off of his donkey. As a result, he ran around town collecting all of his donkeys (they're normally free to roam and eat whatever) and tied them up at his house. 

I felt really bad and had to find someone to translate French to Bariba for me and invited him to the skit. Luckily it all ended well and he let his donkeys go, but now I know that hand gestures are open to interpretation.

___________________________________________________________________________________

Storytime Part II

***Originally supposed to be posted Aug 27 2012***

Like my previous entry, this will include a series of stories with morals which I will do my best to point out to those less analytically inclined. However not all have a humorous aspect (as was a common theme last time). Ok, just the one then.

All Hail the Chief

My Goumori host father knocked on my open door while entering with breakfast; tea, Bariba sweet bread, and a hardboiled egg. He looked like he did every day in every detail: same gray slightly worn pants, green shirt with two yellow vertical stripes at the arms, and even the same facial expression as if to say “What’s the plan for today?” But instead, he simply said, “The chief is dead” and walked out.

I wasn’t sure how exactly to take this news. I had just gotten to the village and hadn’t even met ‘le chief de l’arrandissiment’ yet. As far as I could tell, he had been sick for some time now, and was unable to entertain guests. After eating my breakfast I decided to try to see what the appropriate steps were to take, and as I knew most of the department’s governing officials at this point, it wouldn’t be too difficult.

As it turns out, the chief was a non practicing Muslim, so I ended up going to the late chief’s house to give my condolences to his family. I didn’t stay long, though showing up was defiantly the right choice. It showed them I was, and am, an invested member of the community.

I hate to say that I never knew the chief. What kind of man he was, what he did in life, or who he loved, but I have to. He was an important man who has an entire village to mourn him. I can only hope that I leave such an impact over the course of my life.

Shortly after the funeral was the party. Unlike Americans, the Beninese celebrate life by having one hell of a party, sometimes for days. This event was no exception. I was fed rediculous ammounts of food and strange types of alcohol for almost 24 hours strait along with the rest of the 28,000 citizens of Goumori.

The Moral: Death means different things to different people. You can make of it what you will.

Mario Cart Racing

Long road trips always have some fantastical feature to them (If you’re doing it right), and my return trip from Goumori to Porto Novo was done right.

Before I continue I think it’s best to give my definition of a bush taxi. These are not your first world, yellow, safe (in terms of it has seatbelts), and driver friendly modes of transportation. These are (usually) 4 wheeled sardine cans with goats on top.

Here is how it works; take that car that you drove into the ground back in college and send it to Africa, use some sort of mechanical miracle to get it to start again, weld a rack on the top, stick an extra half an axel in the back, ensure there’s a gas leak in the cab, remove or disable all safety features, force the windows permanently down (so that the goat urine from the roof can leak onto those sitting by the windows), add an extra row of seats in the trunk, and shove 10 people plus 2 metric tons of luggage in a car that originally held 5 people and is tow rated for 1 metric ton.

Sorry grammar Nazis, I’m sure I violated about twenty rules just then, but once again, Josh = science stuff, Josh ≠ English stuff.

Back to the story. The other 8 trainees and I, in all of our wisdom, decided to take the wonderful bush taxi instead of the bus in which you actually get a seat to yourself and a noted lack of headache inducing gas fumigation. We did at least buy out the entire taxi so we were able to sit only half on the person next to us instead of full on ‘sitting on Santa’s lap’ positions. The overall trip is the distance of Pennsylvania (longways) which isn’t so bad in the states, but in Benin there are . . . test track conditions.

You know those commercials showing how great ford trucks can swerve between cones and drive over a long series of 2 inch speed bumps? Well, the cones are felled trees intentionally placed on the roads, and the speed bumps are just a tad bigger with foot deep pothole surprises in-between them. All this at 50 to 60mph, and that’s before you get to the fun road.

Now China has been busy replacing many of the worn out roads here, but the project is far from completed. Once you get about halfway down the country (to Parakou) you have a choice; take the nice brand new road directly to Porto Novo (my destination), or take the real life version of Choco Mountain from Mario Cart Racing Pothole Edition to Cotonou (not my destination). Seriously, all we needed were shooting turtle shells and it would have been all set.

Banana peels? Check

Oil slicks? Check

Swerving at 50kph into oncoming semi’s? Check

Actively racing the cars next to you like you’re on a bumper car speed track? Check

As you can guess, our driver decided to take the bad road, and unlike the game, I don’t have a little angle dude on a cloud to fish me out of a ditch. However he must have had some practice cause I’m writing this post and only had to stay in my happy place for 5 hours.

We actually didn’t make it back to Porto Novo that day cause by the time we made it to Cotonou it was dark, and Peace Corps gets touchy about that. I’m not complaining in the least though as I was able to stay in a German Hostel in the Yovo district and eat actual pizza.

You might think that the moral here is take the bus, not the taxi, but it’s not. You’ve gotta do things like this in life because while it can be ‘interesting’, you need to experience what poor Mario goes through countless times cause you don’t want to talk to the other people at the party.

Sorry to those of you who have no idea who Mario is. If you ask anyone under the age of 25, I’m sure they would be happy to clear it up for you. If you are under the age of 25 and don’t know Mario, your parents and friends failed you horribly (Cause even my host brother here in Africa knows Mario).

How To Build A Mud Stove

So I’m now back in Porto Novo for ITT (Intensive Technical Training) which is exactly what it sounds like. One of my professors back in the states put it best,

“The knowledge is the water, and I’m the fireman aiming the hose at your face expecting you to drink every drop, open wide.” Maniacal laughing . . . fwoosh!

Anyway, one subject was ‘how to build a mud stove’ and it was awesome. Here are the steps as I took them.

1. Revert to 5 year old you

2. Remove your shoes

3. Jump in clay/mud for a good 10 minutes making “that’s what he/she said*” jokes

4. Ignore that there are probably hookworms and glass in said mud

5. Grab huge handfuls of thoroughly aerated mud (throw a few at other people if so inclined)

6. Build a mud man (like a snowman, or throw mud at a man, your choice)

7. Build actual mud-stove (Google it if you want to know how to build an actual mud stove, these instructions won’t help with that)

8. Continue making “that’s what he/she said*” jokes

9. Write things that 13 year old you would have written in the final drying product with your finger

*Revert to 13 year old you for this step

This concludes how to build a mud stove. I expect all of you to be cooking with these when I return in two years.

Stop Screen Hacking Me Bro!

You know those wonderful offers from Nigerian Princes offering you their fortunes for the mere price of your bank account information and social security number? Yea, they have those here too. Not that difficult to believe considering I could probably throw a rock into Nigeria from here.

Anyway, I was sitting at the local cyber cafe checking my e-mail/facebook stalking America, when I get a new message. Custemer.Sirvice@WesternUnion.benin.com (or some such thing) wants me to know that I have untold fortunes waiting to be picked up from their Benin location if I just send back my bank account number for confirmation! Oh lucky day!

As this seemed a bit to convenient, I looked around the internet cafe on a hunch. Low and behold the guy sitting next to me (currently smiling at me nonetheless) had this exact email on his screen.

Moral? Douchbags screen hack in every culture. Oh, and don’t show private info on a public terminal, you know, like bank log-in stuff at a public cyber cafe in Africa.

Some Other Funny Titles With Not Such Funny Stories That I Don’t Feel Like Going Over Just Now But You Can Still Use Your Imagination to Figure It Out

I’ve Got Something in My Pocket (That’s Not) For You

Hey Look, A Bush Rat . . . Mmmmmm

Bush Antelope = Dog. Wish I Knew That BEFORE I Ate It

I Think That’s Infected

Why 120,000 (fcfa) Might Not Be Enough For That

So I graduate from ‘Stage’ on Friday the 14^th. It’s been a hell of a time, and while I’m sure I’m going to miss everyone from my training class, I cannot wait to head back to post. . . I get more flying bull stories there.

Storytime

These are not all stories with a happy fairytale ending because Africa is not Disney. Don’t let “The Lion King” fool you, Symba would have finished off Pumba in a second. These are more along the lines of Grimms fairy tales. All good until someone dies and there is always a lesson to be learned.

The Rabbit:

My host father has taken to showing me around Porto Novo, more specifically, its bouvettes (bars). On one such occasion we visited his personal mentor (who yes owns a bouvette) and as I’m walking in I notice 2 cages full of rabbits. They are so freaking cute that even my stone heart softens a little. Big puppy eyes, floppy ears, twitchy pink noses, and all the innocence that comes with it (other than the F*#@ing like rabbits part, that part is far from innocent, but I digress).

So I’m looking at these when my papa’s mentor comes over to feed them and asks me which one I like. My papa had told him that sometimes volunteers want a pet at post and while I didn’t want a rabbit, I know another volunteer who did. So I looked them through and found one that was small with huge floppy (yet perky) ears, black fir, and a white T shaped puff on its belly.

He then took it, smiled at me, said “this is a good one”, and broke its neck . . .

I should have seen this coming, I should have said ‘stop!’, I should have done a lot of things, but I didn’t. Instead, 1 hour later I was enjoying some succulent white meat with an ice cold Coke and listening to Bob Marley’s “don’t worry, be happy”.

So now you ask me, “But Josh, what could be the possible moral of this child scarring story?!?!” to which I reply, “Simple my dear friend, Don’t judge a book by its cover” and as you begin to open your mouth again in retort I continue with, “Don’t look at the cute outside, think of the delicious, tender, juicy inside; Because while rabbits are cute, they taste even better grilled with some garlic, lime, and pimant sauce on the side.”

My Nap:

I’m now at my site in Goumori, and about to enjoy one of the many perks of the Peace Corps. The medical staff recommends that we take naps. For those of you who know me, you know this is not something I need to be told twice, and I have no qualms whatsoever over utilizing this perk. If it involves sleep or food, I have very strong opinions on the matter.

Anyway, I was following my doctor’s advice early one afternoon and took a nap with the door open cause (go figure) it can be freaking hot in Africa. Fast forward 1 hour and I wake up to a blurry white object 2 inches from my face. This peaks my interest because there was no such blurry object here when I went to sleep. To investigate this newfound mystery, I reached for my glasses (cause even bats and naked mole rats see better than me). At exactly the same moment the U.B.O. (Unidentified Blurry Object) moved and makes a great deal of noise. About the same time I notice two other U.B.O.’s near my chest and feet on the bed freaking the hell out with U.B.O. #1.

Now I’m not a timid man, but having woken up 5 seconds previously, my 1^st reaction is a ‘manly’ yelp and getting the hell off the bed. This turned out to be a bad idea because mini U.B.O.’s #4 through #18ish were on the ground and I almost crushed a few.

About this time I realize that the noise coming from said U.B.O’s is clucking. Aha! A clue! By the time I have my glassed on, my face has been thrashed by a chicken wing, and my body has given me a healthy dose of adrenaline. I then realize that not only were there 2 chickens and a cock on my bed, but all of their chicks were on the floor cause they couldn’t make the jump up to the bed.

The moral(s)?

Screw closing the door, it’s too damn hot, but mosquito nets keep out big and small flying things alike.

Second, a chicken’s only redeeming fact is that they are delicious. They are the polar opposite of the cute rabbits in every other way; Small beady eyes, sharp beaks, no obvious ears, creepy feet, shrill cries, and they excrete the scent of pure evil. Thus my war with these avian terrors is still in full swing. After all, I eat them because “I just want to be sure it’s a real bird and not some kind of multidimensional cybernightmare” (Adams p. 780) I know that was a random side track quote, but I had to work it in for Mel who has sent me a package and deserved public recognition for it. Also she hates all birds in general so much that she will only work in an office with no windows so there isn’t even the possibility of seeing them during the work day. (Love ya Mel!)

Finally, I need to invest in a screen door.

Haircut:

So Goumori is a predominately Bariba speaking community, and for the past 7 months I have been studying French. This does not bode well. Anywho, on with the story

 As has been previously stated and can be generally assumed, it is hot here in Benin. My continually growing hair does not aid my comfort with this. The simple solution is to get a haircut, however this poses a problem; the barbers have no idea whatsoever how to cut my hair. This is not because they are incompetent, what I mean is that the only hairstyle here is bald or a slight variation thereof. When asked about my hair, they will laugh and walk away, or show me a razor and point to a picture of a bald man.

My solution to this issue is simply to cut my own hair. For this I would need scissors, a mirror, and a comb. I asked my Goumori host family to help me find these things at the market in horrible French and off I went with the guard. Here things got a little mixed up. Apparently they thought I was describing a barber shop to get a haircut, not to buy said items, and thus sent me to the closest chausurre (barber). I was blissfully ignorant of this fact and thought that the barber would sell me what I needed.

I sat down in one of the side chairs in the shack as my guard spoke rapidly in Bariba to the chausurre then left. A small warning sign went off in my head which I promptly ignored. Another man then walked behind me and in one swift, coordinated move, the man put a cloth around me while the barber turned on a shear (electric razor? shaver? I never know what they’re called) and took a swipe down the middle of my head. I now had a reverse Mohawk and was adamantly protesting in French, English, and probably some Pig Latin and expletives. The problem with this was that the warning light from earlier was trying to tell me that no one left in the shack spoke any of these languages.

With my only choices from here being, taking it all off, or receiving an undesirable nickname in a language I don’t even speak, I sided with going bald and going to the market alone next time.

The moral?

Even if you speak the language, you never speak the right one when it matters.

AAAAHHHHHHHH!!!!

This is what you say when a motorcycle with a full grown freaking bull strapped ON it, crashes, and flips through the air toward you.

Bread

So bread is a dry, sometimes sweet, sometimes hard food that . . . ok, bread is boring, I’ll go back to the flying bull and give you a little back and forward story.

So at the end of every day the men all sit in front of the gate, which faces perpendicular to the road, and watch traffic go by. Here I’ll make you a picture!

(figure A)

--------------------------------------------#-----------------------------------------<-- that’s the road

I  <--That’s the gate                                     ↑That’s a motorcycle with a bull on the back

It had just rained buckets that morning, so the dirt road had the same consistency, and appearance, of melting rocky road ice cream. That evening was also the end of the bi-weekly cattle market. A popular way to transport our bovine friends long distances in Benin is to pick them up, place them of the back of a motorcycle (think mini-harley), and strap them there with elastic cord and twine.

I don’t quite understand the physics behind this task but think it would be a great topic for a doctoral thesis in theoretical physics.

Moving on, I was sitting in front of the gate (see figure A) when the guy driving the moto lost control on the melted ice cream-like road. He fell in a way that the bike landed on his leg, flipped entirely over his body without touching him (imagine what the bull is thinking at this point) and continued to cascade towards me.

You know those movies where there’s a massive abject on a collision course with the main protagonist who just stands there like an idiot while his impending doom slides to a sudden stop inches from his feet? This was almost exactly like that except I almost lost the bet. Losing the bet is shitting your pants (sorry for the graphic detail grandma). I would have ran, but there was a closed, 10 foot tall steel gate behind me, a wall to my side, and a flying bull in the front. (Rock and a hard place has a new meaning for me now)

 Once my life stops flashing before my eyes I go see if the guy was alright, but felt weird case everyone else was only interested in getting the bike right side up again (a difficult task when you try it with the bull still attached). The driver is walking around a little and I don’t see a bone fragment which is a good sign, it means his leg isn’t shattered, he’s not dead, and he is conscious (I know, one implies the other), win! From there I check ***[TEXT MISSING]*** and with the fire out I move back to the moto. By this point the bull had been untied, and while it’s not nice to say, I’m glad it had snapped its neck in the crash. It normally would have been slaughtered with a slit neck, and if it had survived the crash, it would have been rampagingly pissed! I then help the men turn the bike right side up and like an idiot, I grab the muffler, which I immediately release (cause it happens to be hot. Palm meet face, slap!). We finally get everything situated with the bull going to the butcher, and the driver getting a ride to the local clinic.

I have absolutely no idea what the moral for this story is. Don’t drive on wet roads with a cow strapped to your moto? Make sure there are no ignition sources near leaking gasoline? Always have an escape route? Don’t grab burning metal? Whatever, take from it what you will, I just liked the story.

That about sums up how much I want to tell for now, cause even though you don’t know the other ones, I’m not sure you want to. So before I leave you again for an undetermined amount of time . . .

More random facts/things about me in Benin:

I have a dog now. I don’t know why, but when I came to post they told me it was mine and now it follows me everywhere.

I now hoard coins like a (very tall) leprechaun cause getting change here is like pulling impacted teeth.

The lake behind my house is filled with crocodiles

If the bar does not have chickens wondering through it, something is wrong

Peeing anywhere I want is not a crime here, in fact its encouraged (at least for men)

I have seen the following combination of things on essentially a dirt bike (not tied to, following, or around, ON):

• 3 men and 5 dogs
• 2 men and 4 full grown pigs
• 1 man and 7 goats
• 1 man and 1 full grown freaking bull
• I have also started carrying my camera everywhere to get photographic evidence of this
• I could do my own laundry . . . or, I can pay someone $1.50 to hand wash, dry, iron (heated with fire, not electricity), and deliver a full load of laundry

Rice hates me, which is bad, or maybe it’s the tomatoes

We’ll get to the title later, but I think it’s rather self explanatory.

For now, ‘A Typical Day in the Life of Trainee Josh’

Some random hour in the night – Depending on a variety of factors, run to the bathroom.

05:30 – Well good morning 500 chickens 20 feet away from my room, I will eat you all someday. Deep fried, grilled, baked, sauteed, or raw if I have to. But mark my words, I will have my revenge. /go back to sleep.

06:30 – Wake up again to my alarm (I have been ignoring the chickens and roosters). Still tired, don’t hear too much activity around me, and its a little cold in the rainy season w/o sheets. My solution? Go back to sleep.

06:50 – Ok, my family is awake and I need to be too if I want breakfast. Push aside mosquito net, clothes, toiletries, breakfast, etc, etc.

*Side note, breakfast every day without fail is this: Lipton tea, a hard-boiled egg, a baguette, and 2 cubes of sugar for the tea. Though considering that if left to my own devices I wouldn’t eat any breakfast at all, this is awesome.

07:45 – Ride my velo (bike) a few kilometers to a fellow volunteer’s house for class (every forth day it’s at mine). This is how I wake up, cause all they have here is Nescafe (insert trademark here) for coffee. I could take a Zemi, but that adds up when you make as little as a volunteer trainee (about $3/day).

***Sometimes we replace class with a trainee wide meeting at Project Songhai for medical, admin, culture, and diversity training. It’s basically an excuse to round us all up so they can shoot us full of chemicals (this week it was Rabies!). But don’t mis-interpret this; I love my vaccines almost as much as I love not having Rabies (or Yellow Fever, or Hep A, or any of the other wonderful viruses and bacteria that are prevalent in the world).

08:00 – Start class with my facilitator Masso and three other students who are way better at French than me (both a curse and a blessing)

10:30 – About now my brain is ready to explode, so we take a break for 15 to 20 minutes. We all speak English while Masso continuously reminds us that “Anglais est mort, parle Francais!”

12:30 – Break again for lunch. Time to put that French to use! I have three choices every day; Rice, Pate, or if I’m lucky, Spaghetti. I don’t really choose pate very often, paying for it seems . . . wrong, you can’t understand why until you try it.  They like to put fish on everything in the south, but I’m not a big fan, so I’ll take the bread and sauce tomate instead.

13:30 – Continue avec le francais! Tell Masso what happened at lunch en francais.

For example, try translating this:

We all wanted rice for lunch, and we found a place who said they had rice. Once we sat down (chairs are not expected here by the way) they asked if we wanted avocado. I assumed they meant with the rice and three of us said yes. Then I said I want bread with mine. When the food was served one person got rice, two people got a salad (with avocado, and one with an omelet but not the other) and I got a piece of bread (no rice, no avocado, just bread).

Isn’t speaking remedial French fun?!?

15:30 – My brain has shut down. I’m smiling, nodding, and have ‘repute si vous plait’ engrained in my vocabulary. Unfortunately at this point I’m spent, but at least I get a quick break to recover and finish off the school day.

17:00 – Officially in zombie mode. My brain is mush, I operate on basic motor functions to get home and eat a snack my papa has gotten me. This food is normally great; homemade tapioca, yovo doughnut holes, Kluis Kluis (a spicy peanut green bean looking thing), corn based pudding, fried sweet potatoes, etc. This is one of my favorite parts of the day.

17:30 – Start French homework, bang head against wall, study verbs I didn’t remember in class, bang head against wall, practice oral comprehension with my family, bang head against wall

20:30 – Dinner time! I help if I can, but I’m normally only allowed to watch, so yea. Wash hands in a series of bowls, eat traditional (with your right hand) or western depending on the food, and enjoy fruit for dessert (always an orange before today, yay mini bananas).

Quick side note about fruit: Banana in French is banane. Pineapple in French is ananas. Try saying Banane ananas five times fast . . . I’ll wait. Longue langue is another one (long tongue). Yay tongue twisters.

21:00 – Take a bucket bath/shower. This is my second favorite part of the day; it’s HOT at night so semi-cool well water feels like a polar swim back in Colorado. Write a quick paragraph or two for this blog (I have to do it all in advance and upload it at a cyber café), boil and filter water for the next day, sweep/clean my room, finish any lingering French homework or practice.

22:30 – Go to sleep. I have not had a bed time for over 14 years, but this one is self enforced. The Beninese seemingly never sleep cause they stay up later than me without fail, and are awake before me every day (is country-wide insomnia a thing?).

Back to the Rice (or tomatoes)

So I got sick for the first of, an expected, many times a few days ago. I blame food poisoning, which is probably a safe bet here with some of the street venders. I know how to look for a safe one, but sometimes you just pull the short straw.

The vendors are comparable to hot dog venders in the states, but instead of a cart, they have a table, and instead of a grill, they have covered (if you are smart) coolers. And I’m decently sure that you don’t need a license here to sell food. So when I say I know what to look for, I mean that I look for the vendor (normally women trying to contribute to the family) who covers her food, cooks in front of you if possible, and has something of a permanent set up. This usually (but not this time) works.

In any case after puking and running to the latrine every two hours like clockwork, I decided I wasn’t going to class the next day and called medical. It was a bit confusing cause I called at 6 in the morning, but that’s what on-call is for (French is difficult, but Franglish with a drowsy accent is indecipherable). After around 6 phone calls and poor phone reception, I decided to just sleep it off rather than go to the medical unit in Cotonou. I’m all better now, but I have nightmares about rice and sauce tomate. It’s just on a plate not doing anything, but I know that it’s just bidding its time, waiting for its next opportunity.

My end result; Healthy with a few extra bacteria running around in my system waiting for friends (otherwise known as reinforcements). 

Final 3

I tried to upload some pictures, but it's proving to be a futile effort. Sorry.

I also updated my contact info with accurate shipping info, and how to call/text me.

I (will try to) update a list of things on the sidepanel which if you send me, buy my love for the period of time it takes me to consume them/it.

I'm in Benin!!!

Just as a forewarning, it’s going to be a long one. That and no pictures, they don't like me on this internet connection (sorry)

Language

Good day . . . my name is Gosh . . . how are you . . . good

So this is how mine host family and speakers French hears me must. It is love Russian who knows yes no English yah?

Ok, back to writing like my college degree was worth something. So I have my good and bad moments with francais every day. Most days it goes along the line of being thrilled that I understood someone (usually my papa or one of the kids around the block) give me a basic greeting. As the day goes on I get frustrated at how much I forgot last semester in French as I re-learn in at an accelerated pace. Then at the end of the day my host brother (who speaks more English than I do French) helps me with repetition and basic conversation that I have learned that day.

Rinse and repeat.

On a side note, in order to understand some of the French I have to try and forget the related English rule. So as a result I expect my grammar to fail soon, and you are not allowed to judge!

Finally, there are a few aspects of Beninese culture that I knew about, but didn’t fully comprehend until now.

First, I am a “Yovo”. A yovo means foreigner in Fon. Every child that sees me calls me a yovo. Try to understand this; the youth population here is HUGE. On any given street there are 20 to 30 or more kids all calling me a yovo. Important side note, yovo is NOT a derogatory term; it is not impolite or rude to call someone white, black, fat, skinny, old or any variation of the above here. Ok, continuing, I hear the ‘yovo song’ at least once on each street which, for your viewing pleasure, is written below.

Yovo yovo bonsoir, sava bien, merci

Once one kid says it, it spreads and eventually the whole street is singing this song to you.

Second, before I cam e here I was told that the people would essentially congratulate you on everything. Turns out its true; “good sit, good eating, good work, good walk, and good arrival” are all examples. It makes you feel rather accomplished for the day when you are complemented on relatively rudimentary tasks.

That’s about it on language for now. On-y-va

Food:

I am, for a fact, gaining weight. The people in the cities here almost literally shove food down my throat. This is not because I am skinny or white, it is because I am a guest in their country and a full yovo is a happy (and fat) yovo. I eat many of the same foods too: noodles, omelets, salad, tea (oh, sooooo much tea), baguettes, hard boiled eggs, fish, pork, goat, etc.

There are however some more exotic foods available, and by exotic I mean . . . different. Pate (pronounced like Patrick) is a good example. Think of jello mashed potatoes and you have pate. It’s a delicious image I know but rest assured it has absolutely no taste what-so-ever, that’s what the sauce is for. The sauce is usually made up of a combination of oil, tomatoes, and vinegar. I also was taught how to de-feather, gut, prepare, section, and fry a chicken today, so yea, there’s that.

I had a hamburger, French fries, and an orange soda on the 4^th of July! Well, it was the closest thing they have here to resembling a hamburger. But it was fantastic, I know I’ve only been here a little over a week, but you would be surprised how much I miss American food already (hint hint for food in care packages).

The women cook here, which is to say, when I tell my family that I want to help cook they laugh at me because men don’t cook. Today they let me watch (yes watch but not help) my mamam cook. In fact she was the most insistent that I did not get in the way and mess anything up.

Beninese

I can’t say enough good things (and some odd ones) about the people here. They are all kind, happy, accepting, and understanding of me which says a lot about the culture. I am however the obvious minority (see previous section about ‘yovo’). Most of them speak at least three languages and have something of an education depending on their local.

Now for odd things (to me)

They eat their oranges in a strange way. They cut off the outer orange part, but not the entire shell, so you still have to peel it anyways.

You eat the fish with the skin on

Everyone drives a moto (scooter)

Rent is like $30 or $40 per month

Catholic mass is high energy and colorful (yes, it’s not all weird priest singing and somber songs!).

Kids don’t misbehave. It’s simply not a thing here. No temper tantrums, crying in church, saying ‘no’, and they are all still crazy happy and excited all the time. I think we’re doing it wrong.

Gasoline sold from glass bottles every hundred yards or so.

Living literally 20 feet away from a chicken and rooster farm (oh look, its 5:30AM). I’m not a morning person, but I guess I am now cause not even I can sleep through that.

Having my own personal bubble (otherwise known as a Mosquito net)

Bucket baths!!! Quick shout out to my mom here; Thanks for the training with ‘bird baths’ as kids.

Traffic

I will never again be terrified while driving with my family in the states. You all have absolutely nothing on the Beninese drivers. Traffic signs? Don’t need em. Tailgaiting? Its required! Lanes? What lanes? Helmets? Only yovo’s wear helmets.  Street names? Ha, that’s funny, there are no street names.

Imagine trying to find a house when your directions are “turn at the tomatoes, then again at the chicken”. I’m not kidding, this is how I get home, by using something that has legs and can walk away as a landmark. It has gotten better and I am slowly learning how to get around but still . . . no street names in the housing areas . . .

On the plus side, a zemi ride (motorcycle taxi) is about 200-300cfa which is around 45-65 cents US. They normally know where they are going (at least better than I do) but you have to negotiate out of the yovo price (500cfa+ depending).

Medical

I am healthy and feel like Swiss cheese. I have had so many shots and I’m not even close to done. Hep A, Meng, Rabies, Typhoid, and enough Doxy to choke a horse. First aid kits, water filtration systems, mosquito nets, stool and urine sample kits, a doctor’s personal phone on speed dial, and anything else you can think of, I have it. This is the best medical care I’ve had in my life and I’m a volunteer.

My Host Family

The name is Zannou, Josh Zannou. My host family is awesomely spectacular and I love them. My papa is a professor at the local college teaching mathematics, my mamam is a primary school teacher, and my brothers are both college students (though I have only met one). 

There are also a large multitude of children that live next door whose mother runs a boutique out front (and owns the chicken farm I was talking about). The kids refuse to let me carry anything once I am in eyesight and constantly try to sneak up and touch me. They have never touched a white person before and are curious.

If you got this far you probably have some interest in what’s going on over here, so if you want it, I have a cell phone now. See the “contact me” tab above for how this is going to work.

Well, I think that just about covers it for basic info on my life so far in Benin. There have been plenty of more specific stories I could go over, but that can wait

Pockets

It started subtly. It was something small and seemingly slight. Yet it was the beginning of a change that can only be felt as that wonderful mixture of terror, freedom, and excitement all at once in sudden bursts throughout the day. 

First it was a card. My drivers license to be exact. It will expire while I am overseas and I do NOT want to retake my driving test. So in I went to get a new one. Not a big deal, I give one up and another one comes in a few weeks. 

Chug. . . 

Next came a key. Tiny and harmless, I had plenty of them. What was one off of the ring?

Chug, chug. . . 

Then something a bit bigger, my car. Sure it was just a key too, but there was something that belonged to me attached to it. Oh well. No use for a car in Benin.

Chug, chug, chug. . . 

Then goes another key (work)

Chug, chug, chug, chug. . . 

And another (grandparent’s house) and another (bike lock) and another (apartment)

Chug, chug, chug, chug, chug. . . 

Now go the cards; King Soopers, Safeway, Cost-Co, Library, Student ID, Insurance, First Aid, CPR, Scouts, Debit, Credit. Away they go into storage.

Chug, chug, chug, chug, chug, chug, chug, chug, chug, chug, chug, chug, chug, chug, chug, chug, chug, chug, chug, chug, chug, chug, chug, chug, chug, chug, chug, chug, chug, chug, chug, chug, chug, chug. . . 

My Wallet is getting thinner and thinner, my key chain is lighter and lighter till there is nothing left. And that’s when the feeling hits.

I don’t feel scared, worried, excited, nervous or all those things people tell me I should feel (or what they think they would feel in my shoes). I simply notice one seemingly insignificant fact. . . 

My pockets are empty.

Now I’m just excited to find out where this train is going to take me.