12/10/07 through 12/16/07

12/10/07



It is hard to believe that it is almost Christmas. It sure doesn't feel like it, although I did hear some familiar Christmas tunes on the radio in French when I went into the boutique today. My friends – the other volunteers from my stage – are planning Christmas at one of the volunteer's houses in Vogan. I really want to spend Christmas with them because I think it will distract me more from missing my family terribly, but I know that people in my village really want me to spend Christmas in village and I feel a little bit badly about running off to spend it with other Americans. On the other hand, though, I am afraid of deciding to stay in village and then sitting in my house feeling sad and alone.



Today I got up early and went to see the DPS (Prefectural Director of Health). I wanted to talk to him about how to motivate the COGES (village health committee) and about acquiring a suspended scale for baby weighing. I had to wait for half an hour, but he received me warmly and openly. Then I went to buy pineapples, to the internet (for fear the power would cut and I wouldn't get a chance later in the day) and then Ashley and I hit the market. Three of Ashley's friends are arriving a week from tomorrow and staying for Christmas, so she is trying to get her house all ready. I bought fruits and vegetables and she bought fabric for curtains, some plastics, some woven grass baskets etc.



We made fried rice for lunch and then chatted until 3:00 when Ashley accompanied me to the taxi stand. She would have waited with me except it seemed as though we were ready to go. We piled seven people into a five passenger car and drove off only to switch cars and drivers and return five minutes later to the exact spot we had just left. I ended up waiting almost an hour for the car to fill up. The whole time a young man was trying to get me to tell him my name, my phone number, where I lived and he just couldn't seem to understand why I would refuse. Men here see white skin on a female body and they immediately go after it. It is ridiculous and the polar opposite of flattering because you know they can't tell you apart from any other white girl and that the yare just attracted like moths to the glowing brightness of your skin.



I finally arrived in Agbatitoe and left some of my excess baggage with a moto driver I know while I went to get my bike chez Mana. I left my new pagne with her to make into a skirt and top. I explained what I wanted for the top, but I am afraid she will just do whatever she wants to it. It worries me that she didn't even take my measurements . . . we will see.



In the evening I made oatmeal cookies – I was searching for some recipe that takes three eggs because I broke three on my trip back. My egg carrier works great to protect eggs, but only really small eggs fit in it and if you try to put bigger ones in they inevitably crack.



I am pooped – it is 8:30, past my bed-time. Good night!



12/11/07



Today was a busy, productive and good day and I am happy for it. I think another part of my frustration last week was that I was feeling guilty for having been gone for so long. I think I will try to avoid leaving village for long periods of time in the future.



This morning I got up, ate oatmeal and bananas for breakfast and organized some of the things that I had brought with me form Notse. Then I went to the dispensaire, discovered that Lili had gone to Notse and so I took my bike and my big plastic yellow canteen and went to the marigot, the water hole. Tomorrow I am going to go and I will take pictures because you should see where they are getting their drinking water from. It is disgusting and green. I really need to remember to look into filters. I need to see if there is someone in Togo making filters that could be marketed at not too high of a price and, if not, I should think about a filter project. Dad, any suggestions? Do you market filters anywhere? How hard are they to manufacture? How much do they cost? I think that people would buy them if they weren't too expensive. Someone at the dispensaire today randomly asked me about ways to clean water and make it potable.



Of course, I had many little helpers when I went to the marigot. I never have to get in the water or fill up my own canteen because someone always does it for me. I prefer going to the water source now, when there is less water than before because I can avoid actually touching the water. I took the full canteen to the garden and watered my morninga trees. I counted about twenty that still look like they might survive the dry season, so that isn't too bad. I am watering the wilting ones anyway, just in case they can be revived. I will try to water them every day I am in village.



Afterwards I went back to the dispensaire, took out the "pavilion" Mana made out of six big sheets and measured it with my new tape measure to get an idea of where I would need to dig holes for posts. I spent the rest of the morning, until 11:00, digging eight holes in the ground for my supports. On my way home, I stopped by to greet Tsevi at his gas station – he sells gas to moto drivers and he asked me what I was doing and when I told him he wondered aloud why I hadn't asked for help. So I did. I asked him to help me get posts (He probably wished that he had never opened his mouth =0). The men here can chop down eight small trees in an hour, a task which would take me eight hours. I was very relieved when he said he would help me.



I went home, showered, ran to say hi to Lili, now back from Notse, and then to the school to be there at 11:30 when class gets out. I wanted to speak to the director about the Lève-toi Jeune Fille magazines (a short 4-6 page publication encouraging Togolese girls to succeed in school, work and life and providing them with a place to voice their ideas, experiences and concerns. I am hoping that the teachers of the two highest classes will incorporate the reading into their class. It would be a good way to exercise the students' French with an interesting and important topic. I also spoke with him about teaching health classes after Christmas. He didn't seem to object to the idea of alternating health and art classes (the art classes have as their objective both amusement and the development and exercise of a new sort of motor skill, but also reflection and interpretation, through drawing, of the health lesson from the week before). I think creativity is not really one of the priorities at school, but I am happy that the director is at least open to the idea and I am excited to try it out. I think drawings can be like essays in the sense that they force you to assimilate, process and then reproduce information. I am not sure how the students will respond to the task, but I will give it a try. Finally, I also spoke with the director about the possibility of collaboration between the dispensaire and the school. Essentially I would like for the students to weed the dispensaire and bring water so that Lili doesn't have to pay someone to do those tasks. I am not sure (aside from me teaching classes at the school) how the dispensaire can collaborate with the school, but the director seemed to think that Lili wouldn't want the students to do those jobs (but when I spoke with her about it she said that she had asked and he had flatly refused) and so we didn't conclude anything except that we will discuss it further with Lili and the COGES present as well.



After speaking with the director, I came home and was making a lunch of rice, lentils and ademan (a green leafy vegetable) when I got a lovely surprise phone call from my parents. It was so wonderful and such an unexpected treat to hear their voices for a few minutes. I felt like I was glowing with happiness after their call and my excitement seemed to be contagious. The children had been attracted by the English emanating from under my paillote. For some reason, whenever I get a phone call in village I rush outside, as if the connection will be better if uninhibited by wood and metal roofing.



Following that pick-me-up, I finished cooking and ate my very delicious lunch and then I puttered around doing random things (like putting wall putty on my maps so the wind doesn't blow them all over the place and roasting peanuts, fixing students' torn notebooks, and giving a little boy a pair of tweezers (a pair I don't' use) to pick something out of his feet with. Around 1:45 I went out to play UNO with the children and saw that Efo was in village. He had come back just for a couple of hours to get money and I guess some food supply as well (he left with a bag full of beans). Yawovi was also in village today – I saw him in the morning. I don't know why they chose to come back on a school day and not a weekend – probably to avoid having to help in the fields. Efo told me that some of the people who were supposed to be at our meeting on Sunday had confused the place and others the time – hopefully next weekend we can really get it together.



After playing UNO I went to see if Tsevi had been serious about helping me and when he would be available to go get the posts. He seemed to want to go immediately and, of course, I didn't argue. It was a little awkward because he was evidently taking time away from his income generating activity (selling petrol) and even though I brought a coupcoup, it was just ornamental – I was no help at all. Once again, he is the one person who really pulls through for me (Lili too). He cut down eight or nine posts for me in under an hour and then carried a bundle of them (that I could barely lift) back to village for me on his head. I carried a bundle of four of the smaller trees – switching the load from shoulder to shoulder because I had forgotten something to cushion my head with. I am pretty sure my shoulders will be visibly bruised tomorrow, but I am extremely happy to have posts!



Once back in village, I dumped my load and went to help Lili with the budget summaries that she is still working on. She needs to present the information at a meeting in Notse on Monday.



In the evening, as it was getting dark, I sat with DaJulie and her mom whom I call "Mama." I managed to express, in Ewe, that I had watered my trees in the morning and that I was making something to shade the women from the sun on Friday, the vaccination day. When I was about to get up and go they said why? Are you going to prepare dinner? Are you going to shower? No, no. I told them I only shower once a day unless I go to the fields or do a lot of work. They laughed. We talked about New Years and when my parents and grandmother will be coming (yay! April! Four months!) I asked what they will do in the fields tomorrow (something with corn) and commented on how tired they must be after working so hard every day. All in all I was pleased with how much we could communicate. It wasn't perfect, of course, but we were communicating nonetheless.



12/12/07



I have been forgetting to metion that every evening now they light huge brush fires in different sections surrounding the village. I am guessing that the idea is to burn it in a controlled manner so that it isn't as likely to catch on fire and burn in an uncontrollable manner.



I also forgot to mention yesterday that I saw that Lili gets paid only 20,000 cFA a month (around $40.00 – I don't know what the exchange rate is now – I always use 500 cFA = $1.00, but I know that the dollar has fallen). Compared to people who don't earn any money that is a lot, though, I guess, and I think she also got a 120,000 cFA bonus. If that is true (it was on the budget under motivation of the staff and she is the only one on the staff) then it was a pretty sweet bonus – half of her yearly salary.



Today has had its ups and downs and I can't really say whether it was productive or not, but in either case it was busy. I forgot my camera again when I went to the marigot – the water source. That is too bad because the water source we were using before is all used up and the new one is a ways from the path and I am not too keen on the idea of trekking out to it with my huge canteen. Maybe I will just go to take pictures and not bring back any water. The water we collected today was grey – it seemed to have a high clay content, I certainly hope that they don't drink this water, but I fear that they do. I really need to get on a filter initiative. A teenage girl filled my canteen for me and so again I escaped wading into the murky water, but then I had to carry it out to where I had left my bicycle and that was painful. The path was just trodden grass and it was wet with the morning dew and so were my flip-flops. I envisioned myself slipping on my flip-flops, the grass or the slope itself and so I decided it would be best to remove my sandals and brave the grass barefoot than break an ankle. I made it, but I am already very sore. I wish I knew how much the full canteen weighs because then I could impress you all with my strength =0).



Barteleme, one of DaJulie's boys, likes to take advantage of my trips to the marigot to put his canteen on top of mine and we precariously wheel my bicycle back to village. I watered my moringa trees. Lili says that if I start watering them every day and then stop they will die. I don't know enough about trees and gardening to know if she is right or not. I guess I need to check and see if the pump is open and decide whether to commit to watering them or not. The problem is that I'm not here all the time and sometimes even when I am, I am lazy.



After watering my trees, I tried to put the posts in the ground and test out my pavilion for the vaccination day on Friday. Several of the older boys, whom I know through the soccer ball business, didn't go to school today (something about work they hadn't finished . . . ) and so they came to my aid and I was thankful for their help. The problem is that unless the roof of the pavilion (made, if you recall out of sheets I bought and had sewn together) is sharply inclined, the sun just shines in underneath. I knew that would be the case, but I didn't realize to what extent. The great thing about natural shade, a tree for example, is that there is always shade on some side or directly beneath at noon. We played around with it and I argued with spectators about how best to make it work. We eventually reached an acceptable arrangement, but I am beginning to doubt the intelligence of my idea. I think I chose to make a tent like pavilion rather than a paillote (using sheets instead of grass) because I thought it was something I could do without too much help and also that it would be cheaper. Now I am not convinced. I spend 6,000 cFA on the sheets – my paillote only cost 10,000 cFA. Also, a real paillote would last longer and protect from rain whereas, come rainy season, my cloth contraption is going to be just about useless. To look for the bright side, however, perhaps someone will see, notice and appreciate the effort I have made and will take the initiative to make a more permanent shady area. Or perhaps that is just wishful thinking.



I finished testing out my tent around 10:00, showered, ate a pineapple and then went back to help Lili with the budget presentation. We worked from 10:30 until 2:00 – I was trying to make small outlines of our presentation before taking the time to copy it onto large sheets of paper – a fruitless effort because later in the afternoon, after I had copied the in-miniature onto the display sheet, Lili said we would have to do it over again because I had included an item that is never included in the summary of the budget. I got really frustrated because I had asked her if she wanted to look at the miniature copy before I wrote it all out on flip-chart paper and she said no, just write it out. I got extremely frustrated after that because I found that she didn't listen to what I was saying, she just kept repeating that we never include that item. Fine, but I had finally gotten the math to work out and I was trying to tell her that if we were going to eliminate an item, we would have to add its cost to another of the items so that the math would remain accurate. She didn't listen and just stubbornly kept repeating that we don't include and never have (showing me the flip chart presentations from past years to emphasize her point) that certain item. I understand the value of knowing how to follow directions but you have to know how to think too. And you wonder why this was about the fourth time she had filled out the chart and each and every time she gets the whole presentation filled out on flip-chart paper (more time and resource consuming than with a regular pen and paper) and then realizes that the math doesn't work out and that there must be an error somewhere. I realize that it isn't purely her fault – I don't think the educational system here teaches students to think outside the box, but it seems that, if they don't have step-by-step instructions to follow robotically then the task is rendered impossible. I was too frustrated to be of much help afterwards, but I sat and watched and sure enough they filled out the chart and once again realized that the math doesn't check out. I am pretty sure I know exactly where their mistake is, but they are too stubborn to listen.



To skip back to lunch time – around 2:00 I made myself a wonderful lunch of pasta with onions, garlic, olive oil, tomatoes, ademan (green leafy vegetable) and basil. It was yummy. I also made two banana cakes. One is for Tsevi in thanks for the help cutting down trees and the other maybe I will bring to Ashley's house tomorrow. I still have four rotting bananas to use up though.



12/13/07 and 12/14/07



I was hoping to write yesterday and maybe even get a head start typing up my letters from the past couple of days, but it didn't work out. Jerome was late for my Ewe lesson, again, but I can't really blame him because he had two flat tires. In any case, his tardiness gave me time to make curried rice and chick peas for our lunch, banana doughnuts to get rid of the too ripe bananas and clean my house. I committed a huge stupidity when I was burning my garbage. There were ants in the garbage – thanks to my chocolate wrappers and when they started to scramble all over my latrine and shower (where I burn garbage) I picked up the insecticide I keep in my latrine and sprayed them. Luckily, I stepped before I made the fire really angry. I succeeded in killing the ants though.



I also had time to go with Nazir (I think his name is actually Ignace, but sometimes it is hard to distinguish exactly what they are saying and if I have never heard or seen the name before your guess is as good as mine as how to spell it) to see the carpenter. I had drawn out the dimensions of the shelf I want built for my kitchen area and the carpenter wanted 15,000 cFA to build it. We went around and around trying to agree on a price. Eventually I told him to make it with a cheaper, worse quality wood for 8,000 cFA. I don't need something that will last a life time, just two years. I came home and took a shower and brought Lili some banana doughnuts. Early that morning I had brought Tsevi one of the banana cakes as a little "thank you" for having helped me cut down trees. He wasn't there, but I got a chance to thank him personally later as we were walking to the carpenters.



Jerome finally arrived around 11:30. I wasn't too antsy because I had been busy almost the whole morning. What I hate is sitting around doing nothing except waiting. Our lesson was short, sweet and to the point, just how I like it. We did the colors in Ewe and I also learned that "yovo" doesn't mean white, but rather is a term uniquely employed to designate non-black foreigners. It can't be used for animals or anything but non-African people. African-Americans might be called "yovo" or "ameyibo-yovo." Ameyibo is the words for black person and it literally means just that. Ame is person and yiboo is black. My questions lead us into a discussion of "race and African American Peace Corps Volunteers. It was an interesting conversation which just emphasizes that skin-color is still very much an issue. Jerome said that from his experience interacting with one African American PCV, he felt that the African American PCV alienated the Togolese more than the non-African American volunteers. That perhaps reflects the African American volunteer's desire to distinguish himself from the Togolese – perhaps as a result of a deeply lodged insecurity in the color of his skin. On the other hand, it is just as possible that Jerome perceived a sort of discrimination on the part of this African American volunteer precisely because he himself discriminates between skin colors and expects the African American volunteer to be even more friendly, welcoming, humble than a non-African volunteer. He himself said that it was jarring to feel as though this PCV who is exactly like them (the Togolese) was acting as he were somehow different or better. The catch, though, is that had it been a white volunteer who was distancing himself a little, his behavior would not have been as highly criticized as this African American volunteer's behavior was. Ultimately, even among the educated, forward thinking Togolese, there is still an almost unconscious conviction that white people are somehow better.



After the conversation on the implications of skin color we got into an interesting conversation about women. Jerome said he had reprimanded Ignace (Nazir?) because he would tell his wife to do this, do that, when she was evidently busy attending to their child and he could just as well have done the things himself. I thing that is great. If there are enough people out there sensibilizing others on a day to day, informal basis, perhaps little by little the position of women here will change for the better. Jerome said that sometimes women perpetuate the servile role by trying to compete with their co-wives to see who can best anticipate the husband's needs and desires and thereby gain favor.



I also asked Jerome about the photos of the murdered woman and he said that often people will take photos of horrific incidents and sell them as proof that the incident, which otherwise might be shrugged off as rumor, actually took place. He didn't seem to think that it is objectionable o like profiting off someone's tragedy, but more like a way of legitimizing news in the absence of television and widely circulating newspapers.



I think he enjoyed my lunch, but he thought it strange that I would mix chickpeas and rice. Apparently they eat chickpeas with gari (dried, shaved manioc) and not rice.



As he was leaving to give Ignace his Ewe lesson, his moto got another flat tire. I had asked him to take me to Agbatit on his moto and was selfishly a little worried about how that would work out. It eventually did work out as most things do, but it took its jolly good time. While he was instructing Ignace, the mechanic pumped up the tire. We didn't get one kilometer out of village (thankfully, because he pushed the moto back) before it was flat again. Jerome had just bought a new inner tube that morning, but evidently they didn't identify all the sources of puncture because the mechanic pulled three metal pins out of the tire. Unfortunately, his new inner tube had to be replaced.



We arrived in Agbatit around 5:00. I was supposed to drop the buget summary off at the hospital for Lili but it was already too late. We went to say hi to Nicolas and then I went to see the priest and Mana. Normally I would just go to see Mana, but the priest had asked me to help him with a letter he needs to write in English. He had given me the impression that he would write it out in English and I would proof-read it. Turns out that he wants me to translate a letter he wrote in French. I don't really mind, it is just a more time consuming task. It is a Christmas letter to people in Europe and the United States who help fund his work – building churches, schools, sensibilizing etc. He is also hoping that I can take some pictures and help him send it electronically via email. Oh well, it won't hurt to be on good terms with him and as of now I don't mind the task. We will see how I feel when I really get busy on it.



Unfortunately, my short visit with Mana was tainted by my undeniable disappointment with the top she made out of my lovely new pagne. I knew I should have told her not to do anything with the rest of the material if there wasn't enough to make the top I had described. The top she made isn't hideous; it just isn't anything special or different. It is the most mainstream of tops and that makes me sad because it was an exceptional pagne and I wanted an exceptional outfit. If I can find another pagne of it I might buy it, but I have conflicting feelings about having Mana make my clothes. She is my friend, so it would be little rude to go to anyone else. She also makes me things for very little money (the whole outfit was 1,000 cFA – the girls in Notse paid that for just the skirt), but if she ruins the pagne that I buy because she insists on thinking that she knows what I want better than I do (something my parents will agree is impossible), then she might end up costing me money. I just have to be very very specific and insist that if she doesn't have enough pagne to do what I have asked that she just wait to talk to me about options before doing anything. I still feel all disappointed when I think of what she did with my beautiful pagne. I wonder how many tries I should give her; how many times do I have to be disappointed by the results before I find myself a new seamstress? On the other hand, it is a pretty good fit considering she never measured me.



Leaving Agbatit I got lucky and hopped in a car that left immediately. I arrived in Notse after six and went to join Ashley, Heather and Jake (a new GEE volunteer posted out by the border with Benin) at Hotel Dunya (the hotel behind Ashley's house).



In the meandering conversations that followed, Heather told me that her Ewe teacher had independently suggested Avassikpe as the place to go for "authentic" (whatever that means) voudou ceremonies. He then turned around, however, and suggested that she could buy beer and they would hold a voudou ceremony for her. She wasn't keen on the idea to begin with, but I was quick to make it clear that that wouldn't be ok with me at all. I would be extremely upset if she were to come into my village, buy a whole bunch of beer and have a voudou ceremony staged for her. I have to live there and it would be a total invasion of my territory if I can be so possessive. Luckily, she is cool and understands completely and I don't think would have gone about it that way anyway and yet I am tempted to say, "find yourself another village to go voudou hunting in." It is neat, though, to know that Avassikpe has a reputation for practicing voudou and Heather also told me that owls are the birds that sorcerers most often take the form of and so perhaps Efo will show me an owl over Christmas and tell me that it is a sorcerer in disguise.



I left the bar to go to internet, but Jorge and I weren't able to connect through chat and so I soon returned. We left shortly thereafter and Ashley and I just chatted, showered and went to bed.



12/14/07



I was trying not to stress myself out today even though I knew that it probably wasn't wise to experiment with the rural Togolese transportation system on a day when I needed to be in village to help with the monthly vaccination day.



To cut out some of the monotony – Ashley helped me get a car around 6:00 – it wasn't hard to find a car to Agbatit, but they tried to over charge me for my stuff – two tables, a mortar and pestle, a back pack with a rock in it and a big bag full of toilet paper and styrofoam (to make my latrine less mosquito friendly). I got them down to what I thought was a fair price and I am glad that I insisted because I know I got taken advantage of on the Agbatit-Avassikpe leg of the trip. After sitting around waiting for over an hour and a half without even finding a car headed towards Avassikpe, I wasn't about to miss my chance. I sent my things wit ha car and I took a moto (probably just a ploy to wring more money out of me, but I wasn't in the mood to argue). I am happy to have my things in village with me and even though it is just more clutter or the time being, I hope that soon it will all be arranged and I will feel more or less settled. Knowing, me, though (thanks Dad – I am sure I inherited this trait from you!) I will be adjusting and tweaking my living arrangements for my whole two years here.



[As a side note whoever bought all the kids in the village noise makers (like the party kind that you blow into and they make an obnoxious cross between a trumpet and a whistle) should be forced to spend a night in a sound-proof room with them all. And I though goats made an unpleasant sound.]



The children helped me bring everything to my house and I thanked them with sugar-filled chewing gum (a little contradictory to my mission here considering that dental hygiene and dental care are practically non-existent).



The vaccination day "festivities" hadn't yet started and so I had time to set up my tent and get benches (six benches that belong to the Catholic church). Vaccination day was very tiring and taxing, but there were some satisfactory elements and some "needs improvement" areas.



I was pleased with the tent. It worked to shade the women from the sun, cleared out the dispensaire a little and provided the women with a place to sit. The number system, on the other hand, receives the grade of "N" – needs improvement. Ninety-nine percent of the women don't know their numbers (at all, much less in French) and having the option of comparing their number with a larger number doesn't seem to help. If I can make numbers that are durable, double sided and can hang from a string around their necks, that might help, because then I could see the numbers without constantly asking to see their little papers (I just wonder if it isn't somehow demeaning to have them and numbers around their necks). Secondly, it frustrated me that at a given point Lili gave up on the number system because she said that the women weren't respecting it. She is the one performing the service – if she only attends to people in numerical order, then it doesn't matter if they respect it or not – eventually they will get the idea that it does them no good to stand there holding their health cards out because she isn't going to serve them until it is their turn. I am also going to set up the space better, dividing the inside from the outside and see if that helps. Today matters were not improved by the fact that none of the ASCs, people who usually help with vaccination days, showed. There were only three of us (and my helpfulness is limited due to language barriers and medical inexpertise) to organize everyone, take their information, fill out their cards, register it in the book, give vaccinations and attend to the random sick people. Ideally, one person would be in charge of the numbers, another would fill out the cards, another the registry and the vaccination guy from Notse would just give vaccinations. Next time I plan to keep people outside until their paperwork has been done and place the desk at the door so only those women with completed paperwork are inside. We will see how well I can implement that plan. Sometimes I feel frustrated because I feel as though Lili is not willing to make the effort to improve things. Once we work out a good system and the women understand how it works, I think it will be much easier. Right now we are just suffering the growing pains. Again, though, I can't blame Lili because she pretty much has to do everything herself around here and no one is a truly reliable helper.



120-some women came for vaccinations and we ended up running out of some. Afterwards I escaped quickly, wandered through the market, came home, ate some bread and peanut butter, showered, ate and egg sandwich and now I am writing. My hand hurts

Like it used to after I wrote an exam.



12/15/07



It is seven o'clock in the evening and I am pooped, but it is a good pooped. I spent the whole day, from 9:30 until 5:30 picking cotton. Cotton is easier than beans to harvest because you don't have to bend quite as low, but your back still starts to hurt after a while. Cotton is kind of fun to pick, though, - I like the way it keeps coming and coming when you pull it from the tip, like a magician's ribbon from his had or sleeve. It is amazing how all that cotton can be so compacted. If you grab just right, you can get all the cotton from one bud all at one time – sometimes three, sometimes four, sometimes five tufts. Sometimes they are stubborn and you have to pick them off individually. I think I remember reading somewhere that cotton picking is hard on the hands and so I was expecting it to be quite unpleasant. My hands aren't cut up at all, though. If you pick carefully, you can avoid the sharp tips of the pods that burst open with cotton. I think I read that little tidbit in reference to slave labor in the South. Perhaps the enslaved people were so pressured to pick fast that they couldn't avoid the sharp tips. I picked leisurely, however, with Tseviato (a 12 – give or take a couple years – year old girl) helping me on each row. It was fun; everyone was chatting and joking (all in Ewe, of course) and radio's were playing music. It reminded me of blueberry picking with friends and family, where the work is made lighter by the companionship (only, you can't eat cotton; if only it were cotton candy that we were picking, but even that would get old quickly). We took two decent breaks, the first to drink Tchouk (I drank water) and the second to eat a lunch of beans, gari and oil which was quite yummy. I was hungry. By the end of the day, I was pretty tired and very thirsty. I had again finished all my water (I think I will bring two voltics full ( 1.5L each) next time). My throat was so dry that I contemplated drinking Tchouk in an attempt to quench my thirst. For the sake of my health, Tchouk would be better than mucky swamp water because even though they use the same water to make it, it has been boiled for a very long time. I didn't drink any, but more because that would undermine my refusal to drink in other moments than for any other reason.



I really like going to the field because I have new experiences (I also got to taste the fruit of the baobab tree today – it tastes sort of tangy like tamarind) and I get to spend an extended period of time with my neighbors, which helps me get to know them better and them get to know me better, and I get to help them out a little. I received three ignams for my effort and again I can't help but wonder if they suffered a net loss. Three ignams is worth about 500cFA – I wonder how much cotton goes for. Maybe I will ask Efo tomorrow, if I remember – I was picking cotton in his older brother's field.



Tomorrow I am hoping to leave really early in the morning (around 6:00 or before) to go to Notse. I want to have time to take a shower and make/eat pancakes before my meeting at 9:30.



12/16/07



Today I actually set my alarm to wake me before dawn so that I could be biking out of village by 6:00. I managed to leave almost on schedule, around 6:15, and actually arrived in Notse at 7:20 meaning that I biked the 18 kilometers in just over an hour. I know, I know, you can all do the math, but that is the fastest I have biked it yet and so I wanted to emphasize my record time. I think the thought of pancakes (if I arrived at Ashley's house in time to make them before my meeting) motivated the speed. It was lovely and cool, but there was a dense fog that left my arm hairs white and condensation spraying off my helmet every time I went over a bump. I don't know what about harmattan is conducive to early morning fog – perhaps all the dust in the air – but it is a recent development. The fact that they are burning brush at dusk and dawn just adds to dustiness and perhaps the whiteness on my arms was partly ash. In any case it was a pleasant ride.



Once at Ashley's house I got busy on my top priorities: taking a shower and making pancakes. I had plenty of time to eat seven pancakes with nutella or cinnamon sugar before my meeting with my Children's Rights Club at 9:30. The students weren't quite all on time, but nine of them showed up eventually and they made up an hour long skit on the spot. Efo was on the ball and assumed the role of director which I appreciated, because I didn't want to be the one telling them to do this and do that. This way it belongs to them more and I just gave a suggestion here and there. The skit is in Ewe because most of our target population doesn't speak French, but the basic outline of the sketch is that there are two families in a village that are approached by a women who offers to take their daughters to Lome to work for middle-class families. One family has too many children to support and so the father opts to send his daughter so as to generate a little extra income for the family – he is irresponsible in many ways, wasting his money on tchouk and some sort of drug that is snorted (?). The second family is a model family that values education for their two children and struggles financially but manages to keep their priorities straight and refuse the child traffickers offer. The girl who is trafficked goes to work for a middle class merchant family in Lome and ends up catching the eye of the man of the house and consequently the wrath of the woman of the house. She is also mistreated, underfed, and promises of schooling go unfulfilled. Her father receives a tiny portion of the wad of cash that the trafficker collects every month and he promptly spends it on alcohol and drugs. Finally the girl runs away from Lome and walks back to village, arriving sick and hungry and causing her father to wail with grief and guilt.



The sketch is a little long, but I thought they did a really great job of pulling it together on a first run through. They are all relatively natural actors and actresses and the only problem I foresee is voice projection. I was really pleased, though, with their effort. They want to perform the sketch in Avassikpe at 3:00 on Christmas Eve, though, which puts a wrench in my travel plans. If I am going to be in Avassikpe until 4:00 or 5:00 on Christmas Eve, there is no way I can make it to Vogan that day and I am not sure it is worth it to go at all then because I would be traveling on Christmas day and everyone is leaving Vogan the day after, so I might spend Christmas in village after all. Not sure how I feel about that, but I do feel that if the students are going to put the effort in I should too.



Anyway, the rest of the day was just spent hanging out with the many volunteers from my stage that have descended upon Notse. I think there are ten of us here today. We spent the early afternoon at Ashley's house and the late afternoon/evening at Hotel Dunya.



I was planning to stay the day tomorrow for a microfinance meeting at the hospital, but Lili called to inform me that it has been postponed. I can't say I am disappointed. I think I will aim to head back to village tomorrow evening or perhaps early Tuesday morning. I want to get some internet time in and I also need to go to the market, stock up on food and get a Christmas present for Nadia. We decided to do a "secret santa" exchange for Christmas and even if I don't end up going I can't cop out of the secret santa. I am planning on buying her a pagne and getting her a wrap around skirt made. Wrap around skirts are my answer to everything, I just love them!

11/30/07 through 12/09/07

11/30/07 through 12/2/07



Since I have been in Notse, I have been being lazy and not writing about my day, so today (Sunday) I have to type up the summary of my the last three days while I have electricity and a computer in front of me.



Friday morning we puttered around Ashley's house and then finally got organized enough to take a walk to the post office and the pineapple stand. On the way back to her house we were desperate for FanMilk and the honk honking of the mobile FanMilk venders was no where to be heard. The craving was so strong =0) that we braved the market scene. Actually, for once in my life, I wasn't really in the mood for FanMilk. Ashley asked if I was sick, but I reassured her by having at least a FanJoy (like a flavored ice pop; there are supposedly four flavors – orange, strawberry, mint and pineapple – but I have noticed that the whole country only ever has one flavor at a time. For example, in the past two weeks I have eaten FanJoy in three different cities – Kpalime, Lome and Notse and in all three only one flavor was available: orange. That is fine most of the time, but when it is mint's turn on the market I am out of luck.) I also bought some peanuts and peanut butter in the market to take back to village with me.



For lunch, I made my Mom's spaghetti sauce with crumbled soy (tofu) instead of ground beef. I finally have all the spices (oregano, basil, cumin, cinnamon, mustard, bay leaves) that I need to make it and so I was very excited because I have been craving it for a while now. So simple and yet so good.



Around three we headed over to the building where Ashley's skit competition was to take place. Her organization works with People Living with HIV/AIDS and they had organized a series of activities for the week leading up to World AIDS Day. Students at all the area high schools had been asked to prepare skits with educational messages about HIV/AIDS and they performed them Friday afternoon. The top three groups won small amounts of money ($20 and down). The skits were mostly very well done and topics ranged from fighting against the stigmatization of people living with HIV/AIDS to encouraging people to get tested to deconstructing common misconceptions on how HIV is transmitted. The students did well with getting their facts straight and making the skits short, entertaining and amusing. The funniest part was when a boy played the part of a girl (with a wig, a dress, and heels!). At first I didn't realize that it was a boy dressed up as a girl, but the way he walked gave him away immediately. In another sketch, our jaws dropped simultaneously as a boy (pretending to be a doctor) took "blood" from another boy. We weren't sure whether he had really stuck the boy or not and were about to be thoroughly appalled and go off on a tirade of "reusing dirty needles is one way of transmitting HIV" when someone reassured us that blood drawing had somehow, quite creatively I must say, been faked. The worst and most frustrating part was trying to get the large crowd to be quiet and respect each group's time on the stage. Fortunately, though, we had a sound system; otherwise it would have been utterly impossible to hear.



In between two of the skits we also heard the testimony of a woman living with HIV/AIDS which I thought was a very valuable addition. Poems, drawing and songs were also collected, but we ran out of time and ended up promising to schedule another afternoon event for the exposition of those creative expression. I was impressed with how smoothly it went considering that it was thrown together sort of last minute (not at all Ashley's fault, but rather the result of big ideas and no funding).



In the evening we went to the internet and literally the second we walked into the internet café, the electricity went out and so of course we received the brunt of some snide comments: "yovo . . .". Oh well. As we were walking back to Ashley's house, though, the electricity came back on and so we got to use internet after all.



Saturday (December 1st) was World AIDS Day and we woke up bright and early because we had promised that we would be at Ashley's organization at six in the morning. A march was planned starting at seven at the high school to the market and the center of town where the winning skits were to be performed. Apparently, ADAC (Ashley's organization) had received some t-shirts and baseball caps from PSI (Population Services International), but they had to set half aside for the "notables," leaving only twenty-five shirts to hand out to the participants in the march. That of course left many unhappy and reluctant participants. Nonetheless, our small parade (complete with a live brass and percussion band) and some energetic high schoolers marched through the streets of Notse for several hours. We marched all over town, which I suppose was good because we at least alerted people to the fact that it was World AIDS Day even if the awareness raising sort of stopped there.



By ten I was hot and tired and ready for, you guessed it . . . FANMILK! We spent the rest of the day recuperating (aka not doing much of anything at all), except for watching movies, puttering around the house, and trying to stay connected to gmail on a spotty internet connection.



On the way back from the internet café, I ran some girls from Avassikpe and shortly afterwards Efo joined us. It was drizzling a bit and so the girl invited us into her house where she and I chatted for a long while about differences between the States and here. One funny thing she said was that even if she ate a ton (literally) of rice, she wouldn't be full – she insists that she always needs to eat a little pâte to be completely satisfied. And here I was thinking that they eat that stuff because it is all they have. No, they really love it.



When it started to get dark I walked home and in the evening we watched a movie.



This morning (Sunday) I got up early, washed the dishes, and made pancakes. I used measuring cups and spoons for the first time (thank you Mom and Dad!) to make my pancakes and they turned out lighter and fluffier than ever. Hooray for exact measurements!



Regina left right after breakfast. I should have gone home today, but Efo informed me that our Children's Rights Club was holding a meeting this afternoon and so I decided to stay. I am always reluctant to go back to village after being away for a while – it is a feeling of nervous anticipation even though I am quite confident that I will be perfectly content once I am there.



Like I do at home (my Mom always says that she knows when I am home because the house is a mess and my stuff is all over the place), I had cluttered up Ashley's house with my things and so after I repacked the big green army duffel bag that Dad brought me and some things (mostly beans) that I bought in Lome, I helped Ashley clean the house. After her, I am the one who spends the most time in this house and so I figure I can at least help out with the maintenance and cleaning; especially since I do tend to be messy and a little dirty to boot. We cleaned all morning. There was a major ant infestation in the kitchen that we exterminated and we organized, neatened and swept out the whole house. It is hard to keep things clean here and with all the sand and walking in and out of the house it gets quite dirty.



We wanted to have egg sandwiches for lunch – something quick, easy and filling, but eggs were no where to be found (for some reason all of Notse runs out of eggs on Sundays; I guess that means that Monday is the best day to buy eggs anyway because they will be the freshest – straight from the farms). We ended up using one of Ashley's emergency meals (a "just add water" pasta alfredo dish). It was pretty good – a different flavor than the ones we get all the time.



At two-thirty we walked over to Efo's house (Ashley accompanied me and I was proud of myself for not getting lost). Of course we had to wait for an hour under the constant gaze of neighborhood children for the other club "members" to arrive, but the meeting itself went well. It is strange, though, because it almost seems as though the meeting is hinged on the arrival of "les blanches" (the whites) because right after we got to his house Efo left to rally the troops. He came back about half an hour later with a couple of girls and boys in tow and these were the never before seen club "members." Sometimes I can't help but wonder if he didn't just pick these people up off the street, bribe them with 50 cFA to attend the meeting and that it is really all an act for my benefit. I am kidding, obviously, but I DO think that if I weren't there to nag and schedule and prod the meetings along they, and consequently the club itself, would never take place.



As I said, the meeting went very well. We talked about the scenario of a girl trafficked in Togo and assigned roles – a mother and a father with many children who send their boys to school and don't know what to do with their girls, contrasted with a family who has only two children, a boy and a girl, and sends them both to school; a woman who comes to traffic one of the large family's girls and take her to Lome to work for a market mama; and, of course, the girl who is trafficked. The students came up with names for their characters that would be humorous or ironic depending on the personality or role of the character (of course they are in Ewe, so I don't fully understand, but I get what they were trying to do). We also set the date, time and place for our next meeting (Sunday mornings at 10:00 at ADAC – Ashley's organization) and there was a motion to come up with a name for the club, but no one had any creative suggestions and so we let it slide for the meantime. I was very pleased with the way the meeting came together, but I did find the persistent bureaucracy of it all amusing. Everything has to be written down, formally and officially, and they want me to type it up =0) and along the same vein, everyone speaks formally and kind of stuffily, not at all like a casual group meeting might be run in the States. It is like everyone is already playing the part of a "club member" or how they imagine one might behave, taking as their model any sort of formal organization that they have come in contact with where the paper trail is of utmost importance. I am surprised they didn't suggest that we come up with membership rules and a constitution or mission statement =0). They probably will next time, I am still waiting for it.



In the evening we stopped over to visit Heather, eat some pineapple and get eaten in turn by the mosquitoes and now I am being a good little girl and catching up on my "devoirs" (homework).



By the way, I changed my cell phone number on Friday to 920-0885 and since then I have received three (yes, THREE!) phone calls from Jorge and it is just heavenly to be able to hear his voice at any and every moment in time. YAY!



12/3/07



Today was a day that was all over the mood map – it had some high points and some low points and some in between points. Like I said last night, I was feeling a little ambivalent about coming back to village especially because I was away for so long. I think in part I was feeling guilty and in part excited and in part just nervous to be back in my village, alone, after two weeks of constant companionship.



This morning I woke up extra early, showered and then started to run around like a chicken with its head cut off and spiral myself into a bad mood. I wasn't well prepared to go back to village – I think my two weeks away has upset my routine. I hadn't bought the necessary fruits and vegetables and I hadn't bought the flour, sugar, butter (margarine), eggs, that are staples for me but difficult to find in village. I especially should have bought the pineapples the day before because the pineapple stands are far away and I was very limited on time. I was scheduled to have an Ewe lesson in the morning and I couldn't get through to Jerome's (my Ewe prof.) cell phone to tell him that I might be delayed a little but that I was in fact coming. I did eventually get through to Lili, though, so that she might pass on the message were he to arrive before me.



In the end it all worked out, but I was feeling stressed for the second time since I've been in Togo. I am beginning to realize that the times I feel most stressed are when I try to pack too many commitments into too little time. It ended up working out wonderfully though because Ashley helped me carry my huge (and very heavy) green duffel bag to the taxi stand – she was heading to Atakpame, our taxi filled up and took off after only about half an hour of waiting, and, then, as I was waiting in Agbatitoe for a zemidjan (moto driver) to take me to Avassikpe, Jerome pulled up. I rode with him and another moto driver that Emmanuelle recommended to me took my duffel bag. It might have been feasible to put it all on the same moto, but I didn't really want to try. Anybody who knows how I pack (especially when I don't have an airline imposed weight limit) can imagine how heavy it was after I had repacked it with all the things Dad brought me plus six varieties of beans, peanuts, pop-corn kernels, flour, sugar, small cans of tomato paste and who knows what else.



And so one of my biggest worries – how I would get my duffel bag to Avassikpe without dishing out a small fortune turned out not to be a problem, but just as I was getting off the moto and unlocking my door, about to breathe a sigh of relief at being "home free" I realized that I had left all my pineapples in the taxi. My pineapples for which I had walked half an hour, bargained hard and endured three fou encounters (one of whom tried to grab me). In the end I think that will work out as well as Ashley kindly took my pineapples and tomorrow, on her way from Atakpame to Notse, she will throw them out the window to me as I stand waiting on the edge of the route nationale. If the driver is nice, maybe he will slow down a bit as they go by. The downside now, though, is that I have nothing for dinner and so I ate candy corn. Lots of it. And now I have a candy corn head ache. Healthy, I know.



I was pretty exhausted when we arrived, but luckily my Ewe lesson wasn't too painful or long. At the end I asked about the local Ewe cry for help which inspired a very theatrical account of a time a couple in Jerome's village was robbed. They sounded the cry for help and everyone came rusting to the spot, coupcoups in hand. The men circled the village and waited until dawn to track the thief. They found him and apprehended him and then beat him thoroughly (apparently the women stripped him naked and spread crushed hot peppers on his penis and apparently up his anus as well – how do you like that for cruel and unusual punishment?) Then, they made him walk to the gendarmerie carrying all of the things he had stolen. Jerome said that sometimes people will take "justice" into their own hands, because of lack of faith in the official and legal system, and they will kill thieves by putting the pesticide for cotton up their anus and leaving them in the woods to die.



Now on to lighter topics – I hadn't thought of anything for lunch, so I brought out some raw peanuts and made some tapioca pudding – it was a strange lunch, but it was food and I think we were both hungry . . .



Afterwards Jerome went to give the other man his lesson and I showered and went to say hello to Lili. On the phone, she had told me that she was "mad" at me for being gone so long, but she received me well. We talked for a while about this and the other and then I went to speak with the director of the school. He wasn't in his office, but one of the teacher's called out to me as I was walking away and told me that he was teaching under the paillote in the far corner and that I should just go interrupt. So I did – we fixed 10 am on Wednesday as my time to talk to the older students about HIV/AIDS. I'm not nervous about it yet, but I think perhaps I should be.



I went home, started to do some laundry and had a visit from Nasir, the catholic catechist who is Jerome's other Ewe student in Avassikpe and the man who helped me cut down trees for garden posts and who is helping me get fencing for my garden. I had been given a heads-up by Jerome (otherwise I might have been completely taken aback by the request) – Nasir would like me to go speak with a man who refuses to send his children to school any longer even though the Catholic catechists and Lili have offered to foot their costs. It is a strange situation but I think the father feels as though is authority is being threatened by the meddling of others. If this is the case, I am not sure that getting me involved will help the situation any, but I am going to speak with him tomorrow afternoon. Hopefully I will think of a convincing argument before then . . .



I received a nice welcome from my favorite families in front and their children, but it was a bad day for wild animals it seems. They boys had killed (I assume with their sling shots) a mouse and a very large lizard (not the normal kind, but the exotic pet kind). And then, as I finished up the laundry, I saw some other small children playing with a baby bird. I don't think they were trying to be mean, but I am sure their clumsy handling of it eventually killed it. It was still alive the last time I saw it, but I don't have much hope for its long-term survival. I think they are more curious than cruel, but their parents don't make any move to save small animals from certain death in the hands of children.



I didn't yet get a chance to unpack. Laundry was a priority and I will unpack and organize tomorrow.



12/4/07



So I am reading this book called "What Color is Your Parachute?" in hopes of taking advantage of the time I have while in Peace Corps to figure out what I want to do with myself afterwards. I think it is terribly written, but I am trying not to write it off entirely. Just because the guy's way of presenting the information is awful doesn't mean that he has nothing useful to say. So far, though, I have had no epiphanies.



Today was kind of boring and I am in a little bit of a funk so I don't feel like writing in great detail. I did laundry, rode out to Agbatitoe, hung out with Mana and watched her make an outfit after we ran out of conversation topics. I did learn, though, that even though she talks about getting married, she hasn't actually got a guy yet. No biggy. I wonder if she is really pregnant like she told me or not.



I met up with Ashley and got my pineapples (yay!) and then I went back to Mana's lodgings at the priest's house for a lunch of pâte and fishy okra sauce. It wasn't bad – I might start adding little fishies to my food soon! =0) Then I sat there, bored and sleepy while she made the sleeves for an outfit in a criss-cross pattern. It was interesting at first because I like that technique and want to get a top made like that, but I watched the whole process twice and so it got boring quickly. (First she cuts strips of pagne, then she folds them over on themselves and irons them in place. Then she cuts a pattern out of a cement bag and actually sews the strips of pagne to the cement bag pattern, first long-wise and then cross-wise). I was sort of waiting for Lili to arrive, sort of waiting for it not to be too too hot out and sort of waiting for it to be a good time to say "I have to go".



Back in Avassikpe, I showered and was organizing my newly acquired beans in voltic bottles when Nasir came to get me to go talk with a man who had apparently refused to allow his children to go to school even though people had pooled the funds for their school fees. I went and gave this whole long spiel about the importance of taking advantage of the village primary school, of basic reading, writing and arithmetic, of the values of a good education . . . The whole speech turned out to be completely unnecessary, not because it fell on deaf ears, but because the father fully understands the value of education, but he finds himself in a situation in which he needs the two older boys' help in the fields or his family might go hungry. For some reason or another, he and his wife are not on good terms so she is not helping him with the harvest and apparently his corn was ruined . . . plainly stated, he needs the older boys' labor to feed the family as a whole and there is no easy solution to that problem. He isn't being thick-headed; he wants/wishes he could send his sons to school, but securing a food supply takes priority. I couldn't argue with that even though I did my best to make sure that he had weighed out his options as best as possible and thought through all the potential consequences. You can't study if you're hungry, though, and so ultimately, it is a sad situation, but one people deal with all the time here. Now, I am not sure whether this situations advocates smaller or larger families. If there were only two children, the resources wouldn't be spread as thickly, but then there wouldn't be older children who sacrifice their own educations so that their younger brothers and sisters can eat well and go to school. Hm.



It is raining (apparently not great for the beans, soja or cotton harvests) and quite cool. I am going to go to bed and read and hopefully my ideal job/career will come to me in my dreams.



12/5/07



Today I was privy to some juicy village gossip as I helped Lili check and double check the dispensaire's budget report. It is the job of the COGES (village health committee) to help her file the budgets, but they, as usual are shirking their duties and leaving Lili to do everything herself. This raises another topic, but first I will share the gossip. Apparently my evil neighbor lady is no longer my neighbor. Come to think of it, the past two days have been unusually peaceful and quiet. According to Lili, her husband, who is also Yolke's husband (he supposedly has five wives – Lili says that he has that many to help him work the fields) and the son of the proprietor of my house, kicked her out. I can't say that I am particularly sorry – I think this will greatly improve the value of my real estate. Just kidding, but it will be nice not to have those particular children around 24 hours a day. Someone is apt to move in though . . . I also learned that Kassim (Lili's brother who is a nurse and sometimes takes over at the dispensaire in Lili's absence) left Avassikpe because "people were starting to talk" – something about some injection he gave that caused an infection.



The other topic I alluded to before when I made reference to the COGES is that you can't help people help themselves if they are not willing to make a real effort to help themselves and in my very short time here I have decided that most people are not either willing or able (not sure which) to make that extra effort to help themselves or their community. I don't know whether to give them the benefit of the doubt and conclude that their subsistence needs don't allow them to go the extra mile or whether to write them off as unwilling.



As I sit outside taking advantage of the last few rays of sunlight, I notice two things in particular – some of my neighbors are just coming back from the field (it is literally almost dark which confirms my suspicion that the workload in the fields is really heavy right now) and second, the sheep under my paillote. My paillote is essentially an animal shelter and I am not pleased. If it isn't one thing it's another. I don't really want to fence it, but I think I am going to have to look into possible fencing materials. If I'm going to go to the trouble of fencing it, though, I almost want to make it mosquito proof and make a cement floor. We will see.



Today was a busy, productive day. I got up early and ate a quick breakfast of peanut butter and honey on bread and then I went and weeded and mulched around each of my small moringa trees in Lili's garden behind the dispensaire. I know I should probably water them, but I tried to lift the big yellow plastic canteen I have for porting water and I could barely lift it, much less carry it long distances. I don't want to use the dispensaire's water either, though, because we are getting into the dry season and soon Lili will have to pay someone to bring water. I really should water them though because I also transplanted some from the spots where tow or three seeds sprouted to the spots where none sprouted at all. I worked and sweated until 9:00 when I ran home, showered, ate a pineapple, went to a boutique and bought chewing gum, and then went to the school where I was scheduled to give a talk about HIV/AIDS. I think it went pretty well. Again, I have to be thankful for the people who I work with. Amongst the school directors I have come in contact with, I think the one here in Avassikpe is among the best. He is nice, not pretentious or condescending with the students, open, honest, well-informed, frank and seemingly very well-intentioned. The teacher who helped clarify bits and pieces of my talk seemed ok as well. I ran through the whole gamut of topics we covered during AIDS Ride. The students (I was talking to the CM1 and CM2 levels – roughly the equivalent of fifth and sixth grade but with students from ages ten through sixteen or seventeen perhaps) seemed to know very little about HIV/AIDS and I am somewhat doubtful as to how much they retained, but they listened politely and respectfully which is something. I left the classroom feeling good about how it went (even though the question and answer – me asking them questions to recap what we just covered – was like pulling teeth) and interested in doing more classes/activities at the school.



I was afraid that I wouldn't be able to make lunch because the children would be clamoring at my door (especially considering the fact that yesterday I told them we would play UNO today), but they left me pleasantly alone and I made myself a lunch of rice and chili (with just beans, no carne here). IT was very good and I was just finishing when the children arrived so it was perfect timing. We played for about an hour. I think most of the village children went to the field after school as there aren't classes Wednesday afternoons and there is so much work to be done in the fields.



I would like to go to the fields tomorrow with Da Julie, but for some reason every time I try to go the field with her it falls through and I can't help but wonder if she doesn't want me to go from some reason or another and so I am a bit reluctant to ask.



In the afternoon, I helped Lili with the budget and now I am going to work on discovering my dream career before bed. No epiphanies yet.



12/6/07



This morning I made myself a yummy egg sandwich for breakfast and I also made two pineapple upside down cakes to bring to Atakpame for Ashley (not Notse Ashley, Elavagnon Ashley's) birthday and I left them cooking in the dutch ovens (one on each burner) as I went out back to weed my garden. I worked virtually non-stop from 6:30 until 11:30. At first I tried to hoe the weeds out, but then I reverted to pulling them out (I was very thankful for my new gloves because 80% of the weeds are pricker bushes). I feel like pulling out the weeds is just more energy efficient, especially if they are big weeds which they were (waist high). I made a dent, but it isn't neat and tidy as I would like and I won't be able to work on it again until next week and by that time the weeds will probably be pretty near waist high again and I will be back to square one.



I made myself a combination of split pea and lentil soup for lunch and it was very good. Meanwhile, the little boy who often helps me in my garden (and to whom I once gave a pen as thanks) insisted on working in my garden and when I refused to give him the hoe or a coupcoup, he found his own coupcoup and literally weed-whacked my garden. Not particularly helpful considering that I wanted to pull those weeds out) . . . I didn't' give him anything for his effort because I knew that this time he was expecting it and that is probably why he so stubbornly insisted on working in my garden in the first place.



I played UNO after reading bits and pieces of Newsweek and afterwards I cleaned my house and burned garbage (gone is all trace of the candy – mini twix, snickers, milky way and 3 musketeers – the best candy bag mix ever!) that I mauled this week. =0)



I went to the dispensaire, but Lili was in the middle of assisting a birth (which she eventually had to evacuate to Notse because the girl couldn't seem to push the baby out) so I wandered around the village with a trail of little children yelling "run, faster, faster" at them as they held my hands or any part of me they could grab ahold of and their little two-year old legs tried to keep up with my long strides. I went to speak with Tsevi and watched DaJulie winnow the shells off the beans and then I returned to the dispensaire, still faithfully followed by my entourage of toddlers.



After saying hello to Lili, I came home and started to try to hang my hammock, but there were too many little children around and I really don't want their grubby little fingers getting it all dirty. If they were clean, I wouldn't mind so much, but they and especially their hands, are never clean.



Yesterday I forgot to mention that I saw on one of Lili's budget papers that Avassikpe's population (how it was counted or estimated and by whom I don't know) is 1,762 people and that the dispensaire serves nine villages and a total of 7,366 people with distances ranging from 3 km to 12 km from the dispensaire. Interesting. Avassikpe is the largest of these villages followed by Azakpe with 1,556 people, 6 km from the dispensaire; Komla cope (1,092 people, 6 km away); Abourdikpe (787 people, 6 km away); Kpegadja (708 people, 11 km away); Djakpata (696 people, 12 km away); Hake est (391 people; 7 km away); Djato cope (218 people; 3 km away); Kodjovi cope (156 people; 3 km away). I just thought it was interesting to see some figures.



I don't know why but my house seems to be holding more heat at night.



One of Efo's older brothers killed another really large lizard today. I had to get close to reassure myself that it wasn't a small crocodile. I wonder if they eat them. He said he killed it with a coupcoup, not a sling shot. I wonder how he got so close. . .



12/7/07 to 12/8/07



It is now noon on Sunday and I have been lazy again about writing for the past two days. I was in Atakpame celebrating a friend's birthday and as I get nearer to having computer access I am tempted to not write the recap of my day out on paper so as to save myself a step. Lazy, I know.



I had a terrible day on Friday and it seemed like the culmination of a rotten week. I felt as though I had started the week out on the wrong foot, as if I had gotten up on the wrong side of the bed but where the repercussions last a week rather than a day. At least I hope they just last a week because I am getting tired of feeling disoriented and all out of sorts.



I didn't sleep well Thursday evening because I unexpectedly found myself in a disco complete with throbbing African pop music. You ask yourself what on earth was she doing in a disco and where would one find such an establishment in or around Avassikpe? Well the disco came to me and invaded my slumber. At about 4:30 in the morning I finally awoke enough from the fitful sleep that was nevertheless compromising my ability to reason clearly and identified the source of the disturbance. Not too far from my house someone had rigged up lights and was blaring (BLARING) music. I lay in bed for a few more minutes and then I got up, got dressed and ready for the day and then, as the sun's first rays glowed dully on the horizon I went to see what the commotion was all about. At first I thought it was a funeral, but when I arrived in front of the chief's house I saw that there were mostly children and two or three adults dancing wildly to the overbearingly loud music. Tsevie soon appeared and I asked him if it was a funeral and he said no, that it was a celebration of the birth of a baby. It seemed like a very joyful affair and one that particularly involved children which was nice considering that very few events seem to be organized around or for children. The kids were having an absolute ball and I love watching them dance because they are so little but already such great and talented dancers. I watched them until daybreak and then I went to get my camera, but it is almost pointless to try to take pictures in my village because people get so excited by the presence of a camera that I can never get any candid photos. The kids always want to pose as ninjas in mid karate chop. What is up with that anyway?



The music stopped around dawn and I went back to my house and began to prepare a lunch of sweet potato koliko (fries) and fried plantains for my Ewe teacher. I then packed my bag for my weekend in Atakpame and puttered around the house. Jerome was supposed to arrive early, but he didn't and so I wandered back and forth between the dispensaire and my house. On one of those trips I decided to check on my moringa plants and to my great disappointment (it just goes to show how little I know about gardening, especially in Togo – live and learn) all the plants I had transplanted were wilting. Lili wasn't surprised. She said I should have waited until rainy season to transplant the trees because I disturbed their root systems and now, unless I water them every day they will surely die. She seemed pretty sure that they would die regardless, but I was determined to make every effort to keep them alive (do your best, that is my motto) and so I went home, changed into my dirty garden clothes and made a trip to the marigot (the swampy water source that is now a quarter of the size it was a few weeks ago). For purely selfish reasons, I prefer the marigot when it is mostly dried up because it means that I don't have to wade through nasty (and probably snake infested) water to fill my canteen. Thankfully, a neighbor woman accompanied me and filled my canteen for me and helped me lift it to my head where it promptly began to compress my spine. The good thing about a bidon (canteen), though, is that it has a cap and so the water can't spill out. The bad thing is that it can hold an awful lot of water and you can't fill it while it is on your head and so, unless you have crazily strong fufu pounding arm muscles like the women here you can't possibly lift a full bidon onto your head by yourself. I mean, I can barely lift it period and so I asked the woman to stop filling it at the two-thirds point. And even so I could literally feel it compressing my spine. I wonder if that has anything to do with why a lot of people are short here? But they aren't particularly bent over . . .



I carried my water the field behind the dispensaire and watered my dying moringa plants. I think they will probably die anyway, but I just had to try to save them. Maybe if I could be there to water them every day . . . I was really sad about my plants because I had worked hard to transplant them, but I am trying to focus on the fact that I still have some healthy looking seedlings that will hopefully make it through the dry season. If they die as well I will be REALLY sad.



Jerome arrived around 10:30. I wasn't in the mood for either him or the lesson – I was bummed about my plants – but in any case the lesson didn't require a great deal of attention because it was mostly a review of the greetings that I already know. It was short, sweet and to the point which matched my restlessness and momentary lack of tolerance. We then ate a feast of sweet potato fries, fried plantain, fried eggs and an onion and tomato sauce – I can feel my arteries clogging up as I write.



After he had left, I cut up the two small pineapples I had left and put the juicy chunks in a ziplock for a snack later and then started to close up my house. On my way to dump out my compost bucket (including a whole gallon ziplock bag worth of fermented (ruined) corn, I was intercepted by Yolke who, at my faltering attempts to explain what I was doing demanded to look in my bucket. I felt very embarrassed by the fact that I had wasted so much of the staple food source because I hadn't stored it properly. To distract them from my faux-pas, I ran back inside and brought them a plate full of left over sweet potato fries which they accepted and seemed to greatly appreciate. They said that it was tasty, "c'est doux," and laughed when I thanked them as if they found it odd that I should thank them for telling me that the food I had prepared was good. I am just now thinking that perhaps men don't comment on the taste of food because they take the cooking process for granted, but women, who are more familiar with the art of cooking, might know how to appreciate one another's efforts.



I closed up my house and biked off and that is where the little things started to pile up. I just feel like I don't have my head screwed on straight lately and that I am not my usual on-the-ball self. I forgot to fix my hair so that I could wear my helmet so I just braided it quickly (a really little thing, I know), but then I had also forgotten to fill my water bottles with drinkable water (a not so little thing) and then the children had changed the gears on my bicycle while it was stationary and so it was all out of whack not to mention the front tire was a little flat and my back pack on the back had upset the balance and airflow. Nonetheless, I biked to Agbatitoe and to the priest's house without incident. When I arrived and greeted Mana, she showed me the wrap-around skirt she had made me with the Peace Corps pagne Sue brought me from Niger. She said that there wasn't enough material and so she added a random pagne frill to the bottom. To give her some credit, she tried to find pagne pieces that matched vaguely in color, but I still wasn't pleased. And then I saw that she had put white buttons on my pants (where there was already one black button) which stuck out obnoxiously on the green and brown fabric. Again, anyone who knows me knows that I am not good at hiding my feelings, particularly my disappointment and so while I accepted the frill (I didn't see an alternative because if she removed it the skirt would simply be too short), I asked that she change the buttons to black. I think that for some reason I had expected her intuition to match my tastes – next time I will have to be more specific when I ask her to do work for me. After those two disappointments, the priest came and asked me about my talk with the "father who refuses to allow his children to go to school." I had already had a lengthy talk with Jerome about it that morning (in which he had concluded that I should become marriage counselor to this couple ?!?!) and wasn't in the mood to thrash the whole thing out again and so I gave him the abbreviated version which only resulted in him criticizing my acceptance of the father's reasons for keeping the children out of school. I got a bit annoyed and let my tongue run on a long leash. I told him that perhaps he or someone who is actually a member of Togolese society and could give context appropriate advice/suggestions/alternatives should go talk to the man instead of sending me, an outsider who has no idea how people here who feel as though they are torn between sending their children to school and profiting from their labor in the fields resolve that dilemma? I also told him that perhaps he shouldn't judge the man or the situation until he had talked with him himself. Then he went off on how it isn't the parents' right to decide whether or not to send a child to school, that the child has the right to go to school and that parents should think about the number of children they can support before having a whole pack of them. At that point he was just preaching to the choir and I was fed-up because in an ideal world it would be like that, but that doesn't help resolve this particular man's problem in that he already has more children then he can support and no one can come up with a practical suggestion for how he might both send his children to school and feed them. Although I know it wasn't the priest's intention, I felt attacked for not having come up with a neater solution to a problem that every average family in Togo struggles with. Most families rely on subsistence agriculture. When they have children, those children help in the fields. When the older children start school, the younger children help in the fields to help support the younger children. But then what to do when your youngest children reach school-age? Have more children? If even Jerome struggles with this with his own children, how am I supposed to come up with a concrete quick-fix solution?



Fortunately the priest left soon afterwards and Mana and I walked down to the market at the side of the road where she waited with me for a taxi. I got into a very full van and waved good-bye. First on my list of bush-taxi woes for the day was the fact that we got into a very near accident as the driver tried to pass a car and was confronted by a very quickly approaching on-coming car. I was sure that we were going to collide with one or the other of the cars and was literally bracing myself for the impact and wondering if the fact that I was in the middle of the car would cushion me and somehow protect me. The fleeting image of me wearing my motorcycle helmet in bush-taxis also flickered across my mental screen. I have no idea how we avoided a nasty crash and seconds afterwards I realized that I had been holding my breath.



A ways down the road, we picked up two passengers and for some reason they started passing around pictures of a young Togolese woman whose body had been found on Monday (I am not sure where). My understanding of the case is splotchy at best because most of the conversation was in Ewe, but from what I understood, someone took the girl from Lome, cut off her head and removed her heart through her back. Of course the passengers were blaming the Beninois (people from Benin), but it was just really surreal. The man had snapshots of this young woman's headless corpse sprawled out on the grass wearing only black lace panties. I have only ever seen images of brutal killings in magazines like Time or Newsweek or in movies and it was extremely disturbing to see a Polaroid-like photo of a body that had been hacked to pieces. It felt like the very picture that was in the car, the physical thing itself, was somehow tainted by the grotesque horror of it all. The pictures were passed all around the vehicle and the passengers were obviously outraged by the killing, but I couldn't understand the specifics.



A little later they made me and a couple other people get out of the one bush-taxi-van and get into another less crowded one. I was told to pay the first driver and he would "strike a deal" with the second driver. He tried to make me pay 1500 cFA, but I told him that I would only pay 1000 francs. I paid and got in the other car. It was stupid of me and I should have known better because once you pay the driver you lose all leverage. When we reached a small market on the outskirts of Atakpame, a half an hour's walk from the Atakpame station and the usual drop-off point, the driver stopped the car and told everyone to get out. I refused. I told him that I had paid to go to Atakpame and that I wouldn't get out there unless he gave me back 200cFA. At first he seemed amused, but he just kept telling me to get out of the van. It frustrated me that all the other passengers were meekly climbing out of the car (including a woman on crutches!) when essentially he should have brought us all the few remaining kilometers to the station. I kept insisting that I wouldn't get out of the van unless they gave me my money back, but I roundly lost the battle of the wills because he finally said "je m'en fou" (essentially, I don't give a damn) and started to drive north, away from Atakpame and towards Kara. I said, "what, you're just going to take me to Kara?" and he pretty much said, "yup." And so I had to back down and get out of the van because I was just getting further and further away from my destination. I was extremely frustrated, more because of the injustice of it, because of my own impotence and stupidity for getting myself into that situation in the first place, and bruised pride, that because I would have to walk for half an hour. Luckily I wasn't carrying a lot of baggage. As icing on the cake, though, the ziplock full of pineapple chunks that I was carrying leaked all over my bag and my pants and so I took it out and chowed down as I walked, earning me several snide "mangeons" 's from the passing students who had just been let out of class. Great timing. I wasn't in the mood. (It is custom here to invite people to share your food even if the offer isn't sincere and so the high school students were calling attention to the fact that I was eating and not offering to share). Like I said, I wasn't in the mood.



When I finally got to the maison I was pleasantly greeted by silence and darkness. I was able to get settled and shower and try to wash away my bad mood before seeing my friends. I took advantage of the lull to go to internet and I got a chance to chat with Jorge and unload some of my accumulated frustrations to a sympathetic listener. After our time ran out, he called my cell phone for a minute and it is just inexplicably special and lovely to be able to hear his voice at random intervals even if it literally just for a minute. My new cell phone number and server sometimes make it difficult for me to receive text messages from my friends, but I can receive phone calls and texts from Jorge and that makes all the difference.



When I finally did see my friends, my claws had retracted a bit and I was at least able to assume a mildly jovial mood fitting of the occasion. In the evening we watched episodes of Sex in the City and even though I had seen them all before, it lifted my spirits.



Saturday morning I woke up early as usual and had a nice long talk with Alicia, one of my CHAP stage-mates. It was nice to have a little quiet time before everyone woke up.



Saturday was Ashley's (Elavagnon Ashley, and not Notse Ashley) birthday and so we made banana walnut pancakes for breakfast. They were heavenly – a real treat. We even made our own syrup.



Then I headed off to the market and was content for the opportunity to wander around alone, following no one's agenda but my own. I asked about screen for my paillote and discovered that it is not as expensive as I was lead to believe (metal screen with small squares – not small enough to keep out mosquitoes, but small enough not to make my paillote look like a chicken coup or a jail cell is about 700 cFA per meter. Add to that 300 for the mosquito netting that I would probably want as well and I'm at about 1000 francs a meter. I don't know what the exact diameter of my paillote is, but it definitely wouldn't add up to the 80,000 cFA that Jerome had given me as an estimate. There is, of course, the cement to think about though and also what message all this would send to my village. . .). I found a pagne that I really love, a green-based version of a pagne that Ashley bought in red and that I have been admiring for weeks. I think I will get a wrap-around skirt and a top made out of it, but not a full on complet because the two complet designs that I want are a little elaborate and require a fabric that is less busy to begin with. In addition, I was only able to buy two pagne's worth of fabric and when I get my complets made I want to get three set complets again – a top, a skirt, and pants. Then I bought rice, milk powder, peanuts, tapioca, a grain called fonyo that is apparently good as a whole grain bouillie (cream of wheat like breakfast cereal), eggs, a tape-measure and hot-dogs. Yup, frozen hot-dogs. I have had a craving for hot dogs ever since the new stage's post visit party when we had hot dogs and I only had one and was left wanting more. And so I bought frozen hot dogs at a yovo store (store that caters to foreigners) and brought them back to the maison. We have a refrigerator with a freezer now and so I can leave what I didn't eat for the next time I am in Atakpame. Hopefully no one will eat them . . . I put my name on the bag, but as my block mates in Brooker know, putting your name on something and leaving it in a communal fridge doesn't always keep it safe.



I hung around the house and read trashy magazines for most of the afternoon while I baked a Dunken-Heinz yellow box cake. Not to brag or anything, but it came out perfectly – two beautiful layers that I later decorated with chocolate icing in the middle, vanilla icing on the top and sides and rainbow sprinkles. All the ingredients were contributed by Alicia from care-packages her parents sent – I just put them together.



In the evening we went out to a bar to watch the sunset. It was fun, but I started to get a little annoyed as my friends started to drink and that annoyance just blossomed as the night went on because, although you should spend your birthday the way you want to (and by no means all my friends were drinking or drunk), I hate it when people drink just to get drunk and lately I think my tolerance level is particularly low for that sort of thing.

When we got back to the maison, we started making calzone stuffed with tomato sauce cheese, pepperoni, onions and green peppers. Alicia insisted that they wouldn't take long to bake, but apparently she likes her calzone raw. They did of course take forever and I became responsible for monitoring their baking. By the time I actually ate one, I wasn't really hungry for it anymore and the crust was too salty anyway (it kind of tasted like play dough) so I might as well have just skipped the whole dough and baking process entirely. However the huge piece of cake I ate (we seriously split a whole cake into six humungous chunks) made me forget it all. It was delicious. More episodes of Sex in the City also helped dispel my annoyance. We stayed up until 12:30, way past my bed-time and I had to get up at 5:00 the next morning to shower and make my Children's Rights club meeting in Notse at 10:00.



12/9/07



This morning I got up, showered and packed up my things and then Ashley and I waited for the taxi driver to come and pick us up. It all worked out quite well – he picked us up at the maison, loaded the small wooden tables that Emmanuelle had left me into the car along with all our other stuff, and drove us pretty much non-stop to Notse. By 8:30 we were sitting in Ashley's house in Notse drinking blackberry tea. We went to say hello to Heather and to pick up some packages Ashley's mother had sent and then we went to the meeting. Efo and two girls were already there when we arrived, but although we waited around for over an hour and a half, Yawovi was the only other person to eventually show up. As a result, we weren't able to advance in any way, shape or form except to decide that we will try to sensibilize three villages – Avassikpe, Komla cope, and Hake – over their ten day long Christmas break. We spent the time chatting about different things – goats, lizards, cell phones, customs here and in the States, etc. – and then we all went our separate ways.



Oh, I forgot – (Dad, you'll be interested in this) – for some reason we got on the subject today with the three students from Avassikpe of the night when Dad was here and the villagers were circling the village and drumming, chanting, singing from 3:30 until 5:30 in the morning. The students said that it is believed that evil people who are involved in voudou take on the shapes of animals, most frequently birds, and they come out at night and terrorize the villagers. They insisted that the chanting was probably supplications to God to chase away the evil spirits/people in the form of birds. They thought I must have heard the word "yovo" when they were really saying something else. I asked how you can tell the difference between a regular bird and a bird that is a voudou practitioner in disguise and Efo told me that over the Christmas holiday he will point the evil birds out to me. I must admit, I am excited about that prospect.



I have spent the rest of the day typing and eating chocolate from Ashley's care package. In a few minutes we are going to go have a drink with Heather at the hotel behind Ashley's house and in the evening I will continue writing because I haven't even begun to type my emails up from the week yet.

11/23/07 through 11/29/07

11/23/07 and 11/24/07

I am sitting on Tig's screened in porch in her village on Sunday morning and marveling at how green it is here! It is truly beautiful. Her village is very unique in that it is tiny, but at the same time it seems a bit more worldly perhaps than other tiny villages. For example, ther is a small group of vegetarian Buddhists and Belgian volunteers are constantly filtering through for a couple months at a time.

On Friday morning I went to the med unit and got some pills and ointment for my finger which the PCMO diagnosed as creeping eruption – the larvae of dog and cat hookworm. Yay. I also got my MIF Kit analyzed and they didn't find anything which is both good and unsettling. I know something is making me recurringly sick and I would like to identify it ASAP so that I can start treating it.

I spendt a bit of time in the PCV lounge on internet finishing typing up my emails from the week before and around 9:30 I left – catching a ride with Regina, Ashley and Kate. Regina had rented a car because she bought a fridge and needed to transport it back to her village. I contributed a mille (1,000cFA) because they were also taking my big green duffel bag to Ashley's house in Notse which will save me a lot of hassle

They dropped me at the Kpalime gare (station) where I sat in a bush taxi van in the hot mid-day sun for over an hour waiting for the car to fill. There were some apples and grapes for sale and they just looked so tempting, but they were really expensive because they are imported. I might have splurged except for the fact that I would want to eat them right then and there, but had no way of washing them.

The ride to Kpalime, once we got under way, was uneventful. Once in Kpalime, I kept asking people for directions to Tristan and Nadia's quartier. I think I might have gotten lost except for a small boy (10? 12?) who ran after me and accompanied me almost all the way to their house. It was lovely to see them considering I hadn't seen them since swear in. We spent a couple house just getting caught up on each others news.

They seem to be doing really well and they are pretty happy with their location and jobs which I am very glad for because I know that originally they weren't pleased with being posted in Kpalime. They are both already working pretty much five days a week – Nadia works with a microfinance organization and a coffee production company and Tristan works with an internet café. They have also made friends with the Baptist missionaries in the area (who work at a school for blind children) and the next day were planning to go decorate a Christmas tree (!) at the house of one of the missionary women. So they seem to be doing really well and that makes me happy.

Tristan made us a lovely dinner of pasta with a cheese sauce and then they talked about their plan to take a road trip around the U.S. after COS-ing (close of service) and showed me the plans they had drawn for their dream house. The funniest thing was that their bedroom was about the farthest thing from their childrens' bedrooms and they planned it that way on purpose.

Saturday morning we left the house around 8:00 – Nadia and Tristan biked off to the missionary lady's house and I ran a couple of errands – I needed oatmeal, eggs, carrots, and onions to bring to Tig's house. Then I sat at the gare for over an hour and watched some men spit petrol out of their mouths onto parts of a tree and light it on fire. Apparently they were trying to kill some bugs.

It took a long time to fill up the car to Agou Nyogbo even though it was market day. When we finally got under way, I realized how nervous I was to be seeing my host family again (and I hadn't warned them) and when I got out of the taxi right in front of their house I was shaking I was so nervous (strange, I know). My host Dad was sitting outside the house and Felicite was standing in the doorway of what used to be her mom's boutique and is now a phone calling place. At first – as I was paying and getting my luggage, it seemed as though they were looking right at me, but not seeing me, but then they recognized me and seemed very happy to see me. I got the best welcome reaction from my host mom who screamed, ran over and gave me two huge hugs (breaking some of my eggs in the process) – which was surprising because she isn't usually demonstratively affectionate. My host mom immediately rushed off to prepare me something to eat and I was left with Felicite and eventually Fidele. I don't know whether it is because I am used to seeing malnourished children or if Felicite really did put on weight, but she looked a bit chunkier to me. Fidele's little brother was also in her care and he is a big roly poly baby.

I was happy to learn that my family did get a stagiare again, but I didn't get to meet her because they were off on a field trip to Dapaong. I learned a bit about her though – for example she doesn't eat meat or jam, bread, oatmeal, peanut butter or milo. Just black coffee and omelets. My host mom commented on all the differences between what we like and don't like to eat.

I played UNO with Felicite, Fidele and Valerie for a bit. Valerie brought me a present of four pieces of soja. It was a little awkward and uncomfortable and I was hoping for the time to pass quickly. I ate a lunch (specially prepared for me) of rice wit ha vegetable, peanut, soja sauce. It was very good except for the soja. I am not a fan anymore. It is funny how your tastes can change because of an association of a specific food with stomach problems.

I ate with Felicite while my host mom prepared pâte for my host Dad. Afterwards we took a walk to greet some of the other host families of my friends. We walked all the way down to the tech house – which was quiet and empty – but where I filled up my water bottle and made use of the toilets.

Back at the house I sat wit hmy host family a bit longer and tried to chat and then they helped me find a car to take me to the intersection where I would hop on a moto to Tig's house. My host Dad stood out in the hot sun for quite a while before finding a car.

The rest of the trip to Tig's house was uneventful. I took the taxi and then the moto to Tig's village.

Tig's village is lovely and green and at the base of Mount Agou. It's layout is very different from mine and it is difficult to judge its size because the houses are hidden by vegetation.

The village shares a well as its primary water source and so Tig and I made five or so trips to the well to carry buckets of water back to the house and fill up the big trash bin by the door while Natasha made dinner.

I think I have less patience for people and kids when it isn't in my own village. Perhaps it is because when I am out of village I want a break, but I have to keep in mind that it is someone else's village and they are still "working."

After we filled up the water bucket, one of Tig's friends – a Belgian volunteer who has been living/working in her village for the past three months – came by. We chatted and then ate a dinner of Spanish style rice – rice with tomato sauce, veggies and a hard boiled egg cut up on top. We then just talked for the rest of the evening until bedtime.

11/25/07

We woke up, had oatmeal for breakfast and then we took a walk out to the filed wit ha woman whom Tig is organizing a women's growing cooperative. They had planted some okra and apparently we were going to have pick brush off the other half of the field but whoever was supposed to clean it hadn't done it and so we had no work to do. I wasn't disappointed because I was feeling a little nauseous and completely without energy. When we got back to Tig's house she started doing laundry and Natasha and I started making lunch. As usual, our proportions need a little work. We cut up four and a half ignams (small ones, but nonetheless 4 ½ (!!!) What were we thinking?!?!). All the while there were kids around criticizing how we were doing it. Eventually Tig sent them away and I was thankful for it because I was looking forward to trying to make fufu ourselves without criticism or too eager and over bearing helpers.

I wanted to make an "authentic" fufu sauce which is really liquidy – no chunky vegetables, and so we tried mashing tomatoes, onions and garlic on the cutting board. They use rocks on a cement or stone slab, so why shouldn't I? I later got some skewed looks from a bossy little girl who told me that I shouldn't have done it like that. Anyway, the sauce turned out like I wanted it to and as it simmered we started to pound the fufu. We disagreed amongst ourselves to the exact fufu-pounding technique – such as whether or not to add water directly to the mortar and the fufu or whether just to wet the pestles. It seemed to be going alright – it is just an awful lot of work and we had boiled an awful lot of ignam. Eventually the woman who accompanied us to the field came ot help us, but by that time we had had our fill of doing it ourselves and were ready for a bit of Togolese woman power.

We didn't' pound all the ignams – we gave away probably a third in their boiled unpounded state (to the woman who helped us and to some children) and then we ate the other third. It was really good, but almost immediately I began to feel nauseous and bloated and not half an hour afterwards I vomited and then again four times afterwards until it was just dry heaves and/or whatever water/pepto I had tried to swallow. No one else got sick so I think it is my stomach acting up again. I really wish the Med Unit could figure out what is wrong with me so I could get treated already. I was in serious pain all afternoon and evening – just uncontrollably nauseous. It was not fun. I lay out on the screened in back porch intermittently dosing. I was also listening to a beautiful choir practice at the church across the way which made the evening more pleasant. The music was different that the pulsating, percussion-packed church music I am used to. It seemed acapella and with multiple harmony parts. It was beautiful choir music – something I'd want a CD of.

11/26/07

I am feeling a little better today. Not nauseous so much as sore and tentative with what I want to put into my system and lacking in energy. And so Natasha and I went on a hunt for bisquits (little cookies) and eggs to make pancakes. We found some cookies, but no eggs, so after she got back from her run, Tig went on another egg hunt. To make a long story short we found someone who would go get us eggs for really cheap but we had to buy thirty of them. So we did. I will take a dozen back to village, so that is fine.

We were hanging around the house, trying to figure out what to do with ourselves when we decided to go to Kpalime. I wasn't really feeling energetic, but it was a good decision because it wouldn't have been relaxing in any way shape or form to stay in the house because they started doing work on the other half of the house. Poor Tig. Her compound, her haven, is soon to be invaded by a Togolese woman. Her neighbor, the woman who will share her compound, is going to move in soon and she will no longer be the sole owner of her space. That is a bummer and will take some adjustment.

We just walked around Kpalime doing nothing in particular. Natasha bought a boubou (sp?) – just a big bag-like dress – and Tig bought some plastics and then we walked out towards a bar (a little outside of Kpalime) for a drink. On the way, a group of Peace Corps Volunteers who were biking from Cinkasse (on the Burkina Faso border in the very north of Togo) to Lome in the very south (900 kilometers!!!), passed us. They stopped to give us sweaty hugs and it was very exciting because there were four girls from my stage (two CHAPers and two SEDers) that I hadn't seen since swear-in. They had a schedule to keep, so of course they couldn't hang out, but it was still wonderful to see them and cheer them on their way.

After that, though, I had two huge disappointments with the bar that put me in a bad mood. I wanted mango ice cream (watering at the mouth at the memory of the mango ice cream Dad made me when I got my wisdom teeth taken out), but of course they were out (it isn't the right season) and then I ended up ordering a grapefruit soda which I assumed (stupid, I know) would cost 350cFA like always and it ended up costing 500 which just pissed me off. Everyone knows how cheap I am and how much I hate spending money. Well I hate it even more when I know I am getting totally over charged and can't do anything about it because I have already consumed the drink. Great. Anyway, afterwards we went to the bank and then to village (none of which was as simple as it sounds, but then again, it never is).

In the evening we made omelet sandwiches and chatted over the blaring racket of a motorized saw (for some very odd reason they were sawing planks in the dark; we didn't hear any screams though, so I guess they got the job done with their fingers still in tact).

11/27/07

Today we got up early, made pancakes and were planning to be on the road early, but as always, the departure got delayed by little things. Tig sold me her mortar and pestle because she can easily get another and so we hauled that down to the road and were going to take motos (with the mortar and pestle!) but we got lucky and a car came along. The Belgian volunteer was with us and so we were four people and we quickly got a car to Lome. It was a pretty straightforward trip – no mishaps.

Regina, another one of my stage-mates, but a SED volunteer, had gotten us a hotel room which I am very thankful for because there are lots of volunteers in Lome this week and the cheaper hostels in and around the Peace Corps Bureau are filling up fast. It is now 5:00 in the afternoon and I haven't been very productive, but I did shower, get money out of the bank, get a ham and cheese sandwich (an expensive, but good one – cheese here is a rare treat), and I got some reimbursement papers signed by my APCD.

I spent the afternoon in the PCV lounge and in the evening we went out for dinner at a Lebanese restaurant (there is quite a large Lebanese population in Togo) and then back to the hotel for bed.

11/28/07

This morning I went to the MedUnit with Regina and Tig around 7:30 in the morning. Ideally I would have produced a stool sample, but my poo window is 5:15-5:30 in the morning and the MedUnit isn't open at that time – it just isn't convenient. The PCMO now thinks that perhaps I have an overpopulation of yeast in my intestines. Hm, we will see.

We walked over to the Peace Corps Bureau where the inauguration of some new buildings was to take place. I met up with Sue Rosenfeld (a family friend from Niger who is in town for the 45th Anniversary Celebration). She gave me a really nice Niger Peace Corps pagne that I think I will make into a wrap-around skirt – we didn't get much of a chance to catch up because the ceremony was starting, but hopefully we will get a chance to go out to lunch tomorrow. Sue says that her favorite restaurant in all of West Africa is in Lome and she wants to take me there for lunch tomorrow, so that is very exciting. Apparently it is a German restaurant. I don't think I have ever been to a specifically German restaurant.

The new buildings are going to be a new MedUnit (the current one is eight blocks from the Bureau) and more space for administrative offices. The ceremony was pretty much just a speech by our Country Director, then a long prayer to the ancestors by the spokesperson of the chief of the quartier (neighborhood) with offerings of tchouk, some brief singing and dancing and then they cut the ribbon and we got to walk around the buildings and eat some croissants and drink orange juice.

Now I would like to continue doing internet until this afternoon when we are apparently all invited to a sit-down dinner at Brownie's house, but the internet just cut out and so I might go out to lunch with the girls if it doesn't come back on soon because the PCV lounge quickly loses its appeal when there is no electricity.

The electricity came back on and so I grabbed a quick and unhealthy lunch and then chatted with Jorge for a while. However, I kept getting kicked off gmail chat and so it was a little frustrating.

At three I went to shower and get ready for the 45th Anniversary Celebration – the celebration itself was rather boring and tiring. I think I went mostly for the food. We had been told to get there at 4:30 and that it was going to be a sit down dinner (!). I think that was a purposeful trick, but it was mean because not only was it NOT a sit down dinner, but there wasn't any place to sit at all and so we had to stand for the hour and half long ceremony full of speeches and testimonies before any food was served. The food was good, but it was just finger foods – luckily I found the right place to stand right at the beginning and so I ate plenty. There was a live jazz band and after the ceremony and eating people danced and chatted. I talked with Sue for a while and then got myself a big piece of cake (even though the PCMO told me to lay off the sweets in case I really do have an overgrowth of yeast in my intestines), but who can pass up cake? It was worth it too. Anyway, anyone who knows me knows that I have a terrible sweet tooth and asking me to stop eating sweets is like asking me to stop drinking water – I hope I don't develop diabetes.

My friends were getting roaring drunk (they had started in the early afternoon) and so I opted out of the evening entertainment (going to a bar and drinking more) and went to the bureau where Regina and I had internet all to ourselves and I got to skype with Jorge and see him through the webcam!! It was amazing.

11/29/07

In the morning I went to give a stool sample at the MedUnit only to have them send it to the wrong lab (one of my PCMO's had plans for my poop that she didn't share with the other PCMO who sent it to the normal lab). Apparently they still didn't check for yeast, and didn't find anything else that might be causing my stomach upsets. Two of my friends who have similar symptoms DO have an overgrowth of yeast, though, and so they are giving me some sort of vitamin pill (Acidophilus Dietary Supplement) to help regulate the balance in my intestines. We will see if it does any good.

I went to a new grocery store in the morning and I didn't realize that the restaurant I would go to with Sue a little later in the day was right in front. I bought three new varieties of beans (yay! – white beans, kidney beans (or something like it) and fava beans, which I don't recall ever eating before) and some generic Nutella (1/3 of the price but just as good!).

Lunch was amazing – a huge treat. The restaurant is really nice, a place I would want to go with my parents and grandmother when they come to visit or with Jorge for a special occasion. It is a German restaurant called Marox and it is a little pricey for the Peace Corps budget but not hugely unreasonable for what you get and the quality of the food. I ordered the same thing as Sue which perhaps isn't what I would order the next time I go, but she said that she had been dreaming about it for ten years (since the last time she had been to this restaurant which she ranks as the best in West Africa and she has been AROUND) and so I figured that it was worth trying if it was worth salivating over for ten years. We had an avocado and shrimp salad. This will surprise everyone who knows that I am not a huge fan of either avocado or shrimp, but it was very good and I am expanding my taste horizons to include smoked fish so why not shrimp? =0) Then as the entrée we had breaded pork and mashed potatoes with a side salad. The piece of breaded pork (a little like a classy milanesa) was gigantic, but guess what? I ate it ALL and it was the most tender meat I have had since I got here – I hardly had to chew. It was also probably the biggest protein intake I have had since I got here as it was the reverse of my normal tiny bit of protein and huge amounts of carbs. It was a lovely meal and I really enjoyed just chatting with Sue about Peace Corps (she was a Peace Corps Volunteer in Senegal).

Afterwards we waited for about 45 minutes for my Country Director's driver to come pick us up which was unfortunate because Regina was waiting for me so that we could travel together to Notse. We got a late start on our travels and it ended up being the first time that I have been in a bush taxi after dark. It wasn't a particularly pleasant trip, but it wasn't terrible either. Our bush taxi was a cargo van that had been transformed (by throwing unbolted down seats into the back) into a passenger van, so it was a very jolting ride. And the driver kept stopping to buy cell phone credit, to buy bread for (according to Regina) his mother, sister, aunt, wife, mother in law. We were so fed up that we absolutely insisted being taken to Ashley's road once we arrived in Notse. Normally we would have to get out at the station and walk, but we asked them to take us and they did. They asked for us to "ajouter un peu" (pay them a little more), but I said no. They were good humored about it and took us anyway which is a good thing because I had my mortar and pestle and after just carrying it the three blocks to Ashley's house I thought my arm was going to fall off (of course I also had a big backpack, my computer backpack and my little blue over the shoulder backpack).
We made pancakes for dinner and ate them with cinnamon sugar, syrup Regina had bought in Lome and generic nutella. Yummy.