1/29/08 through 2/3/08

1/29/08 and 1/30/08
Every muscle in my body hurts. Every single one. The past two days have been extraordinarily busy and I am worn out. Yesterday, I meant to leave Notse early, but as I was riding to buy my weekly stash of pineapples, I remembered that my bike isn't working well. When I pedal hard, for example when pedaling up hill, the chain slips and not only makes a terribly grating, grinding noise, but also makes it very difficult to pedal. I asked Ashley to try to fix it. As she was fiddling with it, the wind (the wind during Harmattan is impressive to say the least) blew a grate made of iron rods (used in construction) over and it hit me in the head. Luckily, my head stopped it right before it poked Ashley in the eye, so I was happy to sacrifice a bit of skin and blood. I now have a nice pirate like cut on my forehead and a bruise. Afterwards, I also had a booming headache.
Ashley fiddled with my bike a bit – she said she needed more time to really fix it, but she tried to make it bearable until the next time I come to Notse. I bought a couple more items – onions and some fried soy (tofu) and left Notse around 9:30.
My bike wasn't behaving much better on the ride home – it won't change gears and occasionally slips as if the chain or gears are too worn and it isn't catching correctly.
When I arrived in Avassikpe, I was happy to find that my house did not stink unbearably meaning no mice died in it while I was gone, meaning, no dead, decaying, maggot infested bodies to sniff out and remove. It was unbelievably dusty, though. I swept out my house and my bathroom and then I was going to bathe but I decided to tackle my cistern instead. I filled all my buckets and basins with water from the cistern to empty it as much as possible and then I climbed right in. The cistern is probably about five feet deep (maybe a little less – armpit height for me when I am standing in it) and plenty big around to fit me. I scrubbed the inside and the scooped out the now chocolate brown water (brown from the mud, residue and sediment I had stirred up from the bottom). I handed buckets of water out to Patrovi (my most faithful little helper) who took them around to the side of the house and dumped them. Without him it would have been a much more exhausting task because I would have had to clime in and out of the cistern each time (and by the third time I was feeling weak in the arms and that was only between scrubbings, not for each and every bucket of waste water). After getting as much dirt and water out as possible, I climbed out of the cistern and poured a shower-bucket full of water in. I climbed back in and scrubbed and bailed again and then repeated the process a third time. Then I scrubbed the inside of the cistern with bleach and rinsed, scrubbed and bailed one last time. I could barely pull myself out of my cistern and couldn't help but smile at the idea of getting stuck in it. I wish I had had someone there to take pictures of the whole process.
Immediately afterwards, I went with Tseviato to the barrage. I had asked her to let me know when she was planning to go because I waned to check it out as a water source for my moringa field. It is about a twenty minute walk, but the path is really well worn and might even be car worthy. I am unsure whether the barrage is natural or man made (it looks a bit to rectangular to be natural – I will have to ask Tsevi tomorrow), but it is a relatively big (hard to say exactly how big – soccer field size perhaps) body of water with water lilies floating on the surface. I took some pictures and then transported a 20 liter bidon (canteen) of water back to the village. It doesn't look as if the land around the barrage is currently cultivated and there seems to be a big tract of relatively flat land that might be ideal, so I am excited about that.
After the neck crunching, vertebrae compressing walk back to village (yes, I was in physical pain), I made and ate lunch – pasta pesto (from a packet I took from the maison) and soja. It was very tasty. Then I went to speak with Lili. I shared my idea of having a SED volunteer (particularly Nadia because she is a professional accountant) look over the dispensaire's budget and help us identify problem areas to target. Like I have said before, budgets don't speak to me – they are just a list of numbers to my brain. Then I went to find Bébé to thank her for accompanying me to PDM and to giver her a pineapple. She then went with me to the pump (she is on the pump management committee made up of all women, probably because they are the ones responsible for finding and transporting water for the family's water needs). I was thankful that she came with me because I was unsure how getting water at the pump works. Normally people wait their turn, but my canteen (30L) was filled rigt away. I asked how much it would cost – Bébé insisted that didn't have to pay, but I wanted to know the price anyway and she said 10 francs (because a cuvette is bigger and costs 15 francs to fill). I helped pump the water. At any one time there are between two and seven women pumping the lever up and down. It is difficult, but not impossible, to pump alone; when six women contribute muscle power, though, it makes the task a bit easier. I made four trips to the pump – each time I helped pump the water, but each time my bidon was bumped to the front of the line, eliminating the wait. A woman sits at the pump (the women on the pump committee rotate) all day and manages the water distribution and the payment. After my fourth trip, it was only 5:20ish and still light out, but I was too tired to continue.
I went home, showered and prepared my lesson plan for Wednesday's Peer Educator training in Agbatitoe. Exhausted, I went to bed around 8:30.
On one of my trips to the pump, I stopped by to greet Tsevi and ask if he could call a meeting of the CVD for Thursday morning.
Also, as for reactions to my hair – the children noticed and commented, but without an attached value judgment; more of a "you cut your hair" sort of thing. Lili noticed immediately and bluntly told me that I was no longer pretty. She later rescinded her harsh comment and said she was joking and that I am still pretty, even with short hair. Khosoivi (the woman who had a miscarriage a week ago) noticed next. I asked her if it was good or bad. She said good. Yolke also noticed. I tried to explain Locks of Love in Ewe. It went something like this: Deviwo le Amerika. Lame se menyo o. Da ele o. Danye tso deviwo (Children in America. Bad health. No hair. Children take my hair). They seemed to understand and don't seem too upset by my chopped locks. DaJulie also noticed. All in all, though, no one seems phased by it, if anything, they seem only a little regretful, but not particularly bothered by the change. (Richard – one of DaJulie's little boys – later told me that it wasn't good that I had cut my hair =0).
This morning I woke up a bit late (6:00) and Ignace paid me an early morning visit. It was convenient because I had visited his house the night before to ask about the woven paille fencing for my garden. I can already tell that this is going to be a frustrating ordeal akin to the basket fiasco. I think people have a problem here with dealing with bulk orders. Apparently the man Ignace asked to make the fencing has been making strips and selling them out from under our noses and so essentially has made no progress on my order in the last two months. I told him that I am fed-up, that I want the space fenced in soon, that I am willing to up my price and that we should get the fencing from multiple sources and ditch the guy who has been stringing us along. I can't wait until I have the fencing; it will be a huge relief. Unfortunately, I am sure I will soon come up with something else I need that will cause me aggravation, like a gutter system and water harvesting container at the back of my house (water is currently only harvested from the front of my house).
Anyway, after talking with Ignace, I made six trips to the pump (BTW – I am using my bike to transport the water – don't think for a minute that I can transport 30L farther than a couple of meters. The bike makes it 100 times easier). I am counting how many trips to the pump it takes to fill my cistern. I am going to guess 50 trips – I have a long way to go, but if I keep pumping water every day I am going to be buff – it is a great workout for your arm, back and stomach muscles.
On my tenth trip, I paid 100 cFA for all the water I had taken and then went home to work on my lesson plan. The topic for the day was Modes of Transmission of HIV/AIDS and risky behaviors. I finished the prep-work, made lunch – beans! beans! beans! beans and gari! – showered and then biked to Agbatitoe. On the way, I passed lots of children from Avassikpe who were walking to Agbatit for a soccer game: Avassikpé's EPP (primary school) team against Agbatit's team. I would have liked to watch, but my PE class is at exactly the same time. Nevertheless, I made a show of presence to wish them luck and to take pictures of the team – they even have uniforms! – pretty, granny-smith apple green uniforms!
My PE class went really well again. I am very pleased. It was a bit of a difficult class to teach because it dealt with sensitive vocabulary such as vagina, penis and anus, but the students absorbed it all in a mature fashion with minimal snickering. We went over the three standard modes of transmission and then delved deeper into the entry portals and fluids that can transmit the virus. Then we went through a series of thirty or so activities and placed them on a scale of 0 to 10 – 0 being no risk of infection with HIV and 10 being high risk of infection. What I learned from this activity is that dry sex is heard of, the students don't know what masturbation is and after I explained it, they thought it would be a high risk behavior, that oral sex is somewhat rare/unusual and almost exclusively female to male (when I suggested that vaginal secretions might be involved in certain cases in addition to semen in other cases, they seemed confused). My activity card: "Having sex with an animal" got the most laughs; I couldn't keep a straight face either. Oral sex also caused a bit of laughter, but the suggestion of anal sex didn't cause too much of a stir. I tried to speak matter of factly and repeat sensitive words over and over so as to break down resistance to them. All in all, I am very pleased by the mature way in which the students reacted; they could have just deteriorated into silly-ness. After we went through all my activity cards, I handed out blank pieces of paper and asked them to write down activities not yet mentioned that we would then discuss and place on the scale of risk. I was hopint to discover sexual habits (things that people do in Togo that I might not know of), but most of the activities were cop-outs; repeats of something we had already discussed or somewhat silly things like a snake-bike, a fly, etc. Some of the more creative ones include: a woman who has HIV and makes and sells juice, a pregnant woman who discovers she has HIV, swimming/bathing with an infected person, eating from the same dish, having a boyfriend/girlfriend who has HIV, etc. Finally, I had them write the scale from 0 to 10 on a piece of scrap paper and put Xs for each activity they had participated in at least once in their life-time so as to assess their own risk level for having contracted HIV. I wanted it to be anonymous and just for themselves as a personal reality check and so I am not completely sure that they did the task correctly. I didn't want to look at their papers, but the next time I might walk them through the activity card by card. The problem with that is that people can see who makes an X after each card is read. I shared my card with them and said that if they have any Xs in the 5-10 range that they have a possibility of being infected with HIV/AIDS and should consider testing. Some students surprised me by saying that they have been tested. None of the students seemed particularly disturbed by the exercise, so either they didn't do the exercise properly or they aren't at risk (hopefully the latter). Before dismissing class, I asked for four volunteers to come on Friday to prepare little skits for next Wednesday's class. Luckily I got my volunteers – two girls and two boys.
I went to see Mana briefly after class – she also noticed my hair right away. I showed her my pagnes and we realized that they aren't a full two pagnes and that the material isn't enough for a complet. Disappointing.
I learned that Avassikpe beat Agbatitoe 3-0 and I passed the kids as I biked back to village.
Tomorrow morning I have a meeting with the CVD. I am a little nervous because I am going to present my idea for a communal moringa field . . .

1/31/08
If it is possible for my body to hurt more today than it did yesterday, well, then, it does. I made ten trips to the pump today and pumped each and every time and my body is begging me for mercy, but tomorrow I will do it again if time allows before my Ewe lesson.
Before going to the pump, I met with the CVD. My presentation was a bit more bumbling than I would have liked. I talked about the year and a half I have left here and taking advantage of it to work together to improve the community and about the project ideas we had discussed at the last meeting (in September!!!) and then I asked about available funds. The president responded that there-in lies the problem and he set me up perfectly for my moringa pitch. I tried to convince them of the multiple benefits of moringa – generate funds, improve health, etch. Even though there is a moringa tree right in front of the president's house, the woman who planted it didn't know the nutritional value of the leaves (right after the meeting I saw her harvesting the leaves to make a fish sauce, so that was gratifying). They seemed interested and willing, if not bubbling over with enthousiasm (maybe that just isn't their style). I am a little worried about finding a large-enough tract of land near a water source because Tsevi says that all the land near the barrage is already in use, but we are calling a village-wide meeting for Saturday morning (how do you like that speedy turn of events? I'm impressed!) to present the idea to the whole community and ask the elders for land. Interesting. All in all, the meeting went well – I need to improve my pitch (make it a little more organized – work on my sales-person skills) for the community; I will work on it when I finish writing. . .
The meeting ended around 8:30 (Tsevi had come to get me at 6:30 in the morning) and then I came home, ate breakfast and started my trips to the pump. I went back and forth, sometimes wit ha pack of small children in tow, ten times non-stop between 9:00 and noon. I was so anticipating the tenth trip that I might have only made nine trips. I don't know. I lost count. =0)
Exhausted, I came home, made lunch – beans and gari! – and then showered. I started to prepare my PE lesson plans for next week and then I lay in my hammock reading an old Newsweek from November.
Now I am eating pineapple and writing and I just received a twenty-minute phone call from Jorge. It is interesting how everything is relative. At one time a twenty-minute phone call between us would have been a short communication and now it is an almost unbelievable luxury. Every time I receive a phone call from him while I am sitting in my little house, I can't help but marvel at the fact that I can hear his voice, actually converse with him, from a tiny village that doesn't even have electricity. It is truly amazing. I am so lucky, so fortunate.

2/1/08
Recently, I end every day exhausted. What happened to my lazy, lie in my hammock days? Who ever said Peace Corps Volunteers don't work? Living here is work! Even though I got out of my ten trips to the pump today and gave my body a tiny bit of respite from that grueling task (they locked up the pump today because people have been refusing to pay for the water), I didn't take it easy. I decided to clean my house. Cleaning a house in Togo during Harmattan is like swimming upstream – practically futile. As soon as you dust or sweep, it is dirty again. Mom, I don't know how you tolerated Niger. My guess is that Harmattan is twenty times worse there; I'm not even a clean freak and I can hardly stand the dust!
I cleaned all day – didn't even stop for lunch – and only tore myself away from the riveting task to shower and bike to Agbatitoe to meet with four of my Peer Educators to prepare skits for the next class. All four arrived and it was another gratifying session. The students quickly and easily improvised the mini-skits, ate the popcorn I had made for them and within an hour we were done. I would have gotten home early except I met Komi, Lili's younger brother, just outside of Agbatit and walked the 6km back to Avassikpe with him. Like most CEG and Lycee students, he was only returning to Avassikpe because he needs supplies – charcoal, corn, beans, ignams, etc. As long as they have food, the students seem to prefer to stay in the "grande ville." We talked about the animals that men hunt at this time of year – different sorts of rodents and reptiles. Komi says that he likes the meat of Agouti (bushrat) more than any other meat, so I guess I will have to try it sometime . . .
I stopped at Chalimpota for a second time on the way back to make sure that they are informed of the meeting tomorrow. Tsevi just gongonned here in Avassikpe for which I am glad because it was getting late and I was getting worried that he wasn't going to gongonne and the meeting wouldn't take place.
Once home I finished cleaning the main room of my house and then sat down to recopy my "speech" for tomorrow. I am a little nervous – I hope a lot of people show and that I am able to present a convincing argument. We will see.
I was writing letters when Effoh stopped by to visit. I guess he too has run out of supplies. We chatted for a bit and he just left – he knows 8:00 is my bed time . . . I kind of wanted to figure out how to use my video camera. If this moringa project develops into a real all-out project, I would like to document its progress on video – like a real life example of what moringa can do, but I don't know how to work my video camera yet and am not sure that its battery is charged although I think I might have charged it before leaving the States. After writing to Jorge, I will fiddle around with it a bit; if he were here, he would take care of it all for me . . .

2/2/07
This morning I had my meeting with the village which really translates into the village elders and some random passers-by. Of course, I got there at the appointed time (around 6:00) and waited for an hour for everyone else (including Tsevi and the other members of the CVD) to show up. I'm never sure whether to stick it out and try to be a good example of punctuality or to give in to the relaxed attitude about time. Anyway, I sat on a bench and waited for an hour until most of the important people were present. Only two people from Chalimpota came (the little village 1km away that for some reason is like a neighborhood of Avassikpe even though they have their own chief) and I later learned that they didn't even gongonne in Midijicope (Avassikpe's other neighborhood, on the other side of the soccer field, church and pump), not that anyone would have come anyway . . . At the beginning of the meeting I make a joke that was meant to scare Avassikpe into taking me seriously. When Tsevi asked me « Ça va? » I responded « Ça va un peu ». He asked me why things were only okay and I said because not a lot of people had shown up for the meeting. He asked if I wanted him to gongonne again and I said yes and that he should tell everyone that if the people of Avassikpe don't want to work with me, I will pack my bags and find a village that IS willing to make the effort. He communicated my message to the people who were already gathered and then went off to gongonne again. I don't think he repeated the threat as he gongonned though.
We eventually started the meeting with some twenty men in attendance. I gave the whole spiel I had prepared. The nice thing about having a translator is that it gives you time to read over the next point you want to make so you don't have to literally read off a piece of paper to get your ideas out in an organized fashion. My message was received as well as I could have hoped for. The elders listened attentively and then asked me questions like: Will I help them market the moringa powder? Where will we find a market? How can you use the moringa powder? Are other parts of the tree edible/useful? I felt that the questions indicated that they had paid attention, that the idea had caught their interest and that they were taking it seriously enough to at least think about the possible pros and cons. They decided that the elders would meet after the village meeting to try to find an acceptable piece of land for the moringa field. I haven't heard yet if they came to agreement, but I really hope they can find me a large tract of land with a year-round water source nearby (by the way, I learned that the barrage was dug out by machines).
After I had had my say and it had been agreed that the elders would find a "terrain" a piece of land, they took advantage of the assembly to discuss other important matters, namely the market. I just sat there and looked at people and I saw a man do the thing where they blow their nose with there hand and flick the snot away and then he wiped his hands against each other as if he were massaging hand lotion into them. Snot – hand lotion, same difference, right? I made a mental note not to shake the guy's hand.
After the meeting, I made fried rice for Jerome (my Ewe prof) and I for lunch and then I went and sat with DaJulie and learned how to make pâte and okra sauce. My big problem with the pâte is that I can't figure out the measurements because they don't measure, they just do it and know what amounts of water and corn flour will produce the desired consistency. The okra sauce is made with okra, onion, piment, palm oil, salt, little fishies, and some mystery ingredient.
I was eating pâte with DaJulie when Jerome arrived with my six baskets. I don't know why Jerome can get someone to "get it done" in a little over a week and people in Avassikpe just can't get their act together. Our Ewe lesson was short and sweet. The lessons seem to be getting shorter and shorter – I might have to address that sometime soon because I am still paying him 3 mille for each lesson, but what used to be a four hour lesson is now more like a half an hour or forty minute lesson. I don't think he liked my fried rice . . . he ate it anyway, of course. I think it is just strange to him because later I gave the rest of the fried rice to DaJulie in thanks for the cooking lesson and the pâte and she and the children devoured it.
Jerome went with me to deal with my fencing problem. The man gets things done. Even though it gave me a booming headache (I have actually have had a headache, to different degrees, all week long), by the evening I had four of the estimated six woven straw mats that I will need to fence in my garden. It turned into a big circus with Tsevi, a man Jerome knows and got involved named Nkuvi (little eyes), three men who make the mats, the director of the school (who, by the way, told me that he couldn't allow me to continue to get water by myself – apparently I look as though I am exerting too much effort in the process – and that he will have the students bring me water) and other men who happened to be passing by and wanted to add their two-cents to the mix. Anyway, I got for pretty long mats for 4 mille, so that seems ok. At least we are making progress now, but I skipped the whole afternoon. It wasn't that interesting. I played UNO with the children, Effoh and DaJulie and then I brought out some magazines. I read a Newsweek while DaJulie looked at OK! (a trashy celebrity magazine) and Tseviato read from a Jehovah's Witness publication that someone in Agbatitoe gave me once – a strange combination, eh? After DaJulie finished with the OK! magazine, Tseviato was flipping through it. She said "pas bon" ("not good") to all the girls wearing short dresses. Jeans seemed acceptable, though, and she just laughed and laughed at the picture of a woman in a swimsuit.
I think Tseviato is super smart and if she has the opportunity to continue her studies I think she will do really well. I am glad her Dad is sending her to school, but I am a little worried he might not continue to support her studies once she finishes primary school especially because she has three younger brothers.
In the evening, after the garden-fence fiasco, I ate a pineapple and then I went to sit with DaJulie, Effoh, their mom and the children. We were just chatting when Ignace stopped by (I had gone to find him earlier and he wasn't around and so he was returning the visit). I asked him to tell the guy who was supposed to have made my fencing to either give me the fencing or give me back the 1,000 cFA I already paid him. Ignace had been out hunting all day and he brought me a little present: three dead mice. Fantastic. As if I don't have enough mice. I keep telling them all to come hunt the mice in my house. Why bother with burning the fields and chasing out the mice? In my house they are all nicely contained for easy hunting. Maybe that would take all the fun out of the sport because they keep insisting that they don't eat house mice and that house mice are different than field mice. House mice are just field mice that found their way into my house and they are probably fatter and meatier because they feast on my beans every night. The mouse that rotted on my floor was definitely bigger than any of the mice that Ignace brought me. I refused the gift (can't do mice, sorry – earlier that day I unintentionally saw some teenage boys roasting mice in a fire and scraping their fur off – I'm sorry, but it grosses me out) and so Ignace gave the three little mice to Effoh who gave them to Richard (DaJulie's youngest son) who then roasted them on the fire. Let me just say that roasted mouse has a particular and disgusting smell. Perhaps it has something to do with the burning fur. Yucky.
I stayed chatting about all sorts of things until I was tired and then I went home to bed. Lately I haven't been sleeping well. Even though I am almost always exhausted by the time I go to bed, I can't seem to sleep because my house seems to trap the heat of the day and also my neck is stiff and sore for some reason and I can't find a comfortable sleeping position. And then, there are the mice . . .
2/3/08
I was going to leave village this morning around 7:00 to bike to Notse but I was waiting for Effoh. Long story short: he was going to bring Adjo's bike back to Notse for her, but her father was using it to deliver invitations to a celebration for her younger sister's graduation from seamstress school and so we had to wait for him to hand over the bike. Then I had to wait for Effoh to collect money from the various family members who help support him in his educational endeavors. Finally we were on our way and we biked to Notse without incident. I couldn't help to laugh to myself on the way, though, because here I was on a big trekking dirt bike and Effoh was riding on a dinky wobbly girls bike. It amused me in light of all our conversations in which he insists that women aren't equal to men.
Once in Notse, I went to Ashley's house and showered and Effoh went to find the other members of the club. The meeting wasn't super productive because not all of the students came, but we talked about the banana bread idea and the girls seemed particularly enthusiastic. They took the list of ingredients and they are going to check out the prices.
After the meeting I went to find Ashley at ADAC. She was working (on a Sunday!) to prepare an Action Plan and all sorts of other documents in an effort to help ADAC (her nascent organization for people living with HIV/AIDS) find funding. I wanted her to come with me and Effoh and Yawovi to the "barrage" (a huge man-made water source outside of Notse), but she had too much work to do. Yawovi has wanted me to "connaître" (meaning learn the location of) his house for a while now, but I have never had time. It is kind of far and so Effoh kept Adjo's bike so we could bike out there together and then the three of us biked to the "lake". It wasn't particularly interesting. There were some people doing laundry and a bunch of Peul people herding cattle and that was about it. We walked around for a while and as we were about to leave a man (who called himself the "guard" of the barrage) had to ruin the otherwise pleasant time we had had by deciding to try to take advantage of the white person and make a buck. He told us that we had to pay to visit the barrage (PLEASE! Do the people doing laundry and herding cattle pay?!?!?! Of course not! So why should I have to pay to look at the ugly thing and take a couple of pictures? Oh, yeah, now I remember, because I'm white. It all makes sense now). And of course both Yawovi and Effoh crumbled in the face of the tiniest bit of authority as people here often do. The guard said he was going to keep our bikes until we paid. It was an obvious scam. He didn't even specify how much we were to pay and so when he got in a pirogue and went out into the middle of the lake to lay some fishing nets, I unlocked our bikes and said "what is he going to do if I get on my bike and ride away?" Effoh said that he had told a man nearby not to let us take the bikes, but I got on my bike and pedaled off anyway and nothing, absolutely nothing, happened. Incidents like that really annoy me. Does the man think I am stupid and that I am really going to cave and say "sure, I'll pay you for something no one else pays for just because I am white" ?!?!? Granted, sometimes it would be easier to pay than to make a stink about it, but I choose to make a stink on the basis of principle.
We biked back and the boys went off to watch the Ghana-Nigeria Africa Cup game and I went to Ashley's house. Together we went to Heather's to borrow some movies, out to the road to buy some water and then back to the house where I started typing up emails. Right before dark, Ashley had a sudden craving for popcorn (and I had been dying for a FanMilk) and so we biked to the market. Unfortunately, we didn't find popcorn, but FanMilk is always there. Now I am typing up emails again. Maybe we will watch a movie a bit later.
I have decided that short hair (especially short hair that you can't tie back) is actually hotter than long hair. It is like wearing a winter hat all the time.