Adventures with Susie Part 2: Burkina Faso and Mali

After the seemingly interminable bus ride to Burkina, we arrived in Ouagadougou in the afternoon. We found a place to stay for the night and then went looking for food. We made our way to my favorite restaurant from my previous trip to Ouaga… Le Verdoyant where we had brick oven pizza and delicious ice cream. The next morning we headed North to Ouhigouya near the border of Mali. We stayed there that night and the next morning took a mini-bus stuffed with 18 people to Koro in Mali. We ran into two other peace corps volunteers (who serve in Burkina).

Our guide’s brother for Dogon, Oumar Guindo, met us in Koro and then took us to Bankass where we met our guide Mikey and stayed for the night. The next morning we got up early to take a horse and cart 6 miles out to Dogon country. The Dogon are a group of people who have lived very isolated lives. They are famous for having built homes into the cliffsides. A lot of travelers like to hike through the different villages. If you do all of Dogon it can take a month. We decided to do three days and saw 2-3 villages a day. We started in Tely, one of the oldest Dogon villages. Then walked 3 miles to Ende where we visted a waterfall and met some wild young boys. We found the boys on the outside of town watching over sheep. They were running around playing “kung fu”, also known as kicking each other. My friend Susie, took out her camera to get a photo and the mass of boys converged on her screaming, “photo, photo, ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!” She got some good pictures.  Ende is also a good place to buy mali mud cloth, it is cotton fabric that has been died with mud and very beatiful.  We spent the night at Mikey’s house in Ende where we slept on the roof.

We climbed up to the top of the plateau the next day, which was very steep at times. By the time we made it to the top, it started raining, so we didn’t make it to Begnimato that night as planned. Oh well, when we did make it Begnimato, we got to meet two hunters. The first guy, Thomas, was really funny. We got to his house and he started putting on his hunting clothes for us and then made us pose for a photo with him.  We gave him some kola nuts and he seemed satisfied.

All in all, the Dogon people were very friendly and their culture is fascinating. As they open up to outsiders their way of life is changing… we saw many schools being built and the Dogon people are a mixture of catholics, muslims, protestants, and animists. They are also great artists, their wood carvings are beautiful and adorn everything from doors and window shutters to masks. They also make mud cloth and indigo cloth. It was an amazing experience!

Adventures with Susie Part 1: Ghana

Jeff and I were very fortunate to have our good friend (and my maid of honor) come visit us. Susie took the summer off to travel all over the world. Before landing in West Africa, she had traveled to Indonesia, Thailand, Japan, China, Hong Kong, Spain, and England.

Susie arrived in Accra, Ghana on August 4th where Jeff and I picked her up from the airport. We spent the next few days in Accra eating very, very well. We went to sports themed restaurant named Champs that had chili fries, nachos, and milkshakes. So good!!! We also tried to get visas for both Mali and Burkina Faso. Unfortunately, we didn’t have enough time for the Mali visa and when we went to the Burkina Faso embassy, they were closed because it happened to be their indepedence day!  In Accra, we found comfortable and cheap accomodations at the Prison Ministry. Yep, the Prison MInistry. At first I thought it might be the government agency that oversees the prisons, but it is actually a group of protestant ministers who preach and work with people in jails.

We left Accra and headed to Cape Coast where we visited old slave forts. The Portuguese built the forts and then were later taken over by the British. The Africans who went through these forts were sold into slavery in the New World, including the American colonies. We saw the fort at Cape Coast and the fort in Elmina, which is the oldest European structure in West Africa.  From Cape Coast, we took a trip to the Kakum National Park where we got to walk in the canopy of the rainforest on suspension bridges. I was a little nervous to walk on the rope bridges, but I remembered the suspension bridge work we did at the Igo, and tried not to look down.

After two nights and two days in Cape Coast, we headed north to Kumasi, the heart of Ashante land. Kumasi is very developed town and has lots to offer. We visited the Ghana Military Museum, that had lots and lots of guns, including bazookas. We also saw the king’s palace and learned more about the Ashante kingdom.  The kings are picked through matrilineal succession, meaning from the mother’s side. So the king’s son wouldn’t be the next king. It would be his sister’s son. They are very wealthy… Ashante land is famous for its gold.

We decided to take a 24 hour bus to Ouagadougou in Kumasi. It was crowded, hot, and the driver started playing movies and music at 10pm. I didn’t get any sleep and couldn’t wait to get to Burkina Faso.

PSL 21

A year has gone by (and so quickly too!) and a new group of volunteers arrived in Benin on July 4, 2008. We call the training groups PSL. I was in PSL 20 and this group is PSL 21.

I got to work weeks 3 adn 4 of training and met many trainees. I spent most of my time with the new TEFL volunteers. I worked with a volunteer named Carly who is from Kalamazoo, Michigan and is posted in the north of Benin near Bassila. Carly and I shared an apartment of Porto Novo together. Lucky for me she isn’t as squeamish, so when a dead mouse was discovered, she didn’t hesitate to remove it from the premises.

Carly and I did model lessons for the new volunteers, to show them what teaching in Benin might be like. We also tried our best to answer all of their questions. The trainees are living well in Porto Novo, which is the capitol of Benin. Most of them have running water, private showers, and toilets. They’re families are fairly well off. I ate at two families homes and was very well fed.

The trainees are very enthusiastic and working hard.  They have at least 3-4 hours of French language classes, then they also do bike training, cross cultural training, cooking workshops, and of course they study how to be a teacher. Most of them just graduated from college and this will be their first time teaching. During training, they also receive lots and lots of vaccinations or shots. Peace Corps does their best to make sure we don’t get sick!

While I worked, stage, as we call training in French, I got to go on the cultural excursion to Ouidah. This time I put the python on my neck! It slithered around a little but it wasn’t too bad. Unfortunately, I didn’t get a picture of it! I do have a picture of Carly wearing the snake!

Egypt

I am returned from a fabulous vacation in Cairo, Egypt. ! For those of you who don’t know, Jeff studied abroad in Cairo almost ten years ago.  One of his friends, Mike, hosted a party that we decided to attend.  Our first night in Cairo, we spent the evening on a boat that cruised the Nile, while 80s music played. The next day, Jeff’s friend Rainer, our friend Sam, and a new friend Jocelyn visited the Khan… or market in Cairo. Sam haggled away to buy lots of stuff.  On July 6th, we took a short cab ride to Giza and saw the pyramids and the Sphinx. Afterwards, we had a delicious lunch at Pizza Hut (it’s across from the pyramids!).  That evening, about 11 of us took an evening bus ride to Sinai Penninsula where we camped out at an isolated beach… we had to offroad in the back of pick up trucks for two hours to get to this beach! I saw Lionfish, corral, and some gross looking eels. I also saw camels wandering around!

A few days later Jeff and I returned to Cairo so that we could visit more places. We went to the City of the Dead. It is a poor neighborhood that is actually a cememtary, but people have moved into the Mausoleums. One nice family invited us into their “house”. In their leafy courtyard were marble tombs or long dead people. 

We also visted Coptic Cairo, the oldest part of the city and home to Coptic Christians. The streets are narrow and the buildings old. Its a tiny neighborhood. Islamic Cairo is much bigger and also beautiful. The mosques we visited are gorgeous. I love the geometric patterns that are all over the walls and moldings. You can’t go far in Cairo without walking by a mosque.

Camp GLOW (Girls Leading Our World)

Last week (July 22-28) was the annual Camp GLOW in Porto Novo. Camp GLOW is an event organized by Peace Corps volunteers. Since girls have so few opportunities here to succeed and finish school, we hope that Camp GLOW encourages them to work hard and reach their goals. Jeff and I brough four girls from Houegbo, Gilberte, Laetitia, Marceline, and Mireille. During the week the girls were visited by success Beninese woman called “Maman Models” because they are both mothers and successful. The girls got to visit the National Assembly and the Songhai Center (famous for its agricultural work).

For many girls, it was their first time out of their towns or villages and in the capitol of Benin. They got to meet girls who didn’t speak their local language and now understand how speaking French can open opportunities for them. French is the national language but people learn it at school, so if a girl doesn’t go to school she might not learn French, which means she can’t communicate to people outside of her language group. I hope they will go back to school and study more!

It was also there first time using indoor plumbing. We had to explain how to use a toilet… as in sit on the seat, DON’T stand! We also explained to put the toilet paper in the toilet and how to pull the cord to flush it. I also showed some girls how to turn a faucet to get water.  Where most of these girls live there is no running water… only wells. I learned how much I take for granted. I for one enjoyed having  a toilet, it was like a vacation from the latrine.

The girls also got to play soccer and do arts and crafts. A woman taught them how to use old plastic bags to crochet purses and necklaces. I sent an example of a sachet bag to the Igo, maybe you’ve seen it and knows what one looks like! Jeff made himself a beaded bracelet during the beading session. It’s very pretty. My necklace feel off the string because I got distracted while talking to one of the girls. Oops!

Each evening, we had fun activities. One night we played captured the volunteer. Each volunteer hid somewhere on the campus and then the girls had to find us. It was dark so I was a little scared to hide, but the girls were having so much fun. Another evening, we had a dance party (I took some video footage, so I will try to upload it!). These girls can dance!!! They knew the words to every song and they danced continuously for at least two hours. My moves were not nearly as good as theirs,  but they were encouraging. THe last night of Camp Glow was the talent show and camp fire. The girls prepared skits and sang songs. My team, the blue team, made a skit about a litle girl who wants to go to school but her father says no because she has to work at home instead, so the girl gets some woman to come in and convince her father that she should go to school. 

At the end of the week I was so tired.

Cooking in Agon

You may all remember how much I liked to cook… Well, Jeff has me teaching cooking classes to the woman artisans in Agon, a village near Houegbo. We’ve had two classes so far… both on cake. At the first class, we made pineapple upside cake since many people her grow pineapples. One of the challenges has been trying to figure out how these woman can measure ingredients at home. I brought measuring cups and spoons with me to Benin and you can buy them in Cotonou, but they are much too expensive for these woman to purchase. So I have had to translate our 1 cup, ½ cups, etc into standards that they have. I am using recycled tomato paste cans and Nescafé cans. The medium sized tin can is the same as 1 cup, so it is working well. We use a spoon for teaspoon. The other challenge is some of the ingredients. They can get white flour in the market, but chemical leaveners such as baking powder and baking soda are hard to find. Although yeast is readily available at the Houegbo market.
It took so long to bake our cake in the dutch oven we set up over a charcoal fire… everyone was getting so impatient. When we took the cake out we tried to flip it too soon and it stuck! I was a little embarrassed, but the ladies were nice and told me it was good. they liked how sweet the pineapples got.
At the second class, I decided to make cornbread, because corn flour is more readily available. they make their staple meal pate from corn flour. Well cornbread isn’t sweet as cake, so they didn’t like it as much. This time we got our fire going really well and the bread baked quickly, but it also burned on the edges. They were charred black. Luckily, I had made one in advance that was better, although they still devoured the burnt loaf, one man claimed to like the burned part. Sadly, we seemed to also have burned a hole through the bottom of my giant aluminum pot. I’m not quite sure how, but maybe someone can tell me?
For the next class, they want to learn to make appetizers. I am not sure exactly what kind of appetizers to make and they didn’t get specific. Maybe some deviled eggs or little toasts with spreads. let me know if you have any ideas!!! oh, and eat well!

Community Radio

This week I returned to Lokossa to participate in a training session on working with Community Radio Stations. Peace Corps wants us to help the radio stations start Listening Clubs. These clubs are comprised of a group of people from the community who listen to radio shows and then give feedback to the radio station, telling them what they still want to learn and what they should change about the radio program. This a really grreat way to get the community and the radio station working together to teach people about different topics, such as, AIDS, girls in school, etc.

On the last evening, I was walking around the market with my friend Sarah H., and a guy from the local radio station approached us and asked us if he could record our voices for his radio show, Musique Tropical. So off we went to the radio station and he gave us several lines to read in French. I guess they think our accents our amusing because it was cracking him up. Mostly we were just saying welcome to the show in French, we added some English lines like Rock it! It was kinda of fun and would probably never happen to me in the states. It is a little weird be treating like a celebrity at times just because I look different from everyone else.

 

A Long Day

My normally hour and a half trip to Cotonou took three hours this morning. Argh. It was going fine. Jeff and I were sharing the passenger seat up front (that is normal here! and very unsafe!!!) and we seemed to be making good time. Then our driver turned off the road onto a dirt path and proceeded to drop off two passengers. Instead of turning around to go back to the highway, he seemed to be trying to make a loop back. Unfortunately we got stuck in local traffic and every time he tried to drive around the traffic we got stuck in even more traffic. An hour later we finally made it back to the highway.

When I finally arrived at the Peace Corps office, I soon learned that the government has extended the school year until the end of June. I was disappointed. I’ve been looking forward to the end of the school year so much. I understand that they want to extend the school year because there have been a lot of strikes, but no one went on strike at my school in Houegbo. I am curious how the teachers and students will react.

So now I am in the air conditioned computer room, eating ice cream, and missing you all.

Weather in Benin

The weather in Benin is very different from Massachusetts. There are two seasons:  dry season and rainy season. During the dry season it doesn’t rain and the landscape becomes brown and there is a lot of dust everywhere. At the end of dry season it gets really, really hot. In Northern Benin, dry season lasts much longer than in the South. In the south, it is also more humid (like Boston!). Right now we are at the beginning of rainy season. It is super humid out (I feel gross and sticky a lot) and then it will rain. The rain is such a relief. The air is less thick and humid and the temperature cools down.

 

When the kids were reading the pen pal letters they received they were very confused about winter. They’ve never seen snow and to them cold is when it is 75 degrees outside. In fact, they will wear winter coats when it is that cool! I showed them some picture books, Mike sent, to give them an idea of winter and snow. They think the world is covered in ice during the winter. They never heard of sledding, skiing, or making snowmen.

 

Personally, I miss the seasons, especially Autumn, which is my favorite. I look forward to seeing the leaves change colors when I get back home!

Back at school

School started up again on April 3^rd and will be done on June 7^th. I’ve got a lot of curriculum to finish and not a lot of time left. The students are definitely ready for summer vacation, but then again so am I!

 

The school had a party this weekend called Journees Culturelles. It started Thursday evening with a Catholic mass on the school courtyard. Unfotunately for me, I was teaching while they were getting ready. It is hard to keep 56 students focused when there is a choir singing outside your window.

 

The kids love to sing!! I’ve taught them a few songs, but I believe their favorites are the chicken dance, Head Shoulders Knees and Toes, and Now it’s time to say goodbye. In Benin, they believe that everyone can sing and has a beautiful voice!

 

The kids came over two weeks ago write their pen pal letters and I dropped them in the post this week so hopefully they arrive at the Igo soon. It was hard to explain winter to them!