New Years in Europe...?

Happy New Year! In the past 2 days I have received some messages concerning my blog, so I guess that means there are still people paying attention to it. I've written 2 entries back to back so as not to scare too many of you away with an enormous NEW YEARS CHRISTMAS entry.

Well I’ll just start off with some awesome news: I moved! I’m still in my village, but in a more central location, in a much bigger apartment with electricity and….RUNNING WATER. I know this is hardly the Peace Corps experience that all of you may have imagined, I’m with you on that too. But seriously, this place is awesome. Not only did the owner, pretty much completely remodel the place for me (and I’m talking about knocking out walls, installing sinks, shower, and toilet), but he’s also well connected with a lot of community members I know and is incredibly nice. He’s a far leap from my last landlady, who spent most of my time there trying to trick me into paying her more money for the electricity and rent. Just to sweeten the deal, he threw in 4 pLEATHER CHAIRS. I was thinking of buying a furniture set, but instead the guy saved me probably the equivalent of 200 bucks. I have asked him why he did all this several times (because I’m half expecting to get a bill for all the construction after my last owner), but the only reason that he told me was “Well, because you are American, I know how you live there, and I want you to be comfortable when you come to my place”. In effect I think that he’s just a bored, relatively wealthy old man and it was the last apartment without a bathroom. I also think that he takes pride in the fact that I’m here, which will further motivate me to do well in my work. This is a far leap from my last house that felt more like a sweltering prison (my true feelings come out now that I’m not there anymore). For instance, this afternoon was the first time that I’ve cooked lunch and was not only dry when it was done, but also ate in my dining room. Not to mention that I have a real kitchen now…with a sink! Put simply, I feel like I’m back in Europe (maybe with more bugs). Needless to say, this guy is going to be getting a really sweet present from me…I have yet to decide what that is going to be. (ideas?)

New Years in Benin makes what we do in the states look trivial, as we only party for the eve before. In Benin, they party for New Year’s eve and all of New Years Day, and even the night after. I think it has to do with how mixed the religions of the population are; they can all land on New Year’s being good. I was told that “Christmas is for kids”. New Years was spent at village for me. A few weeks earlier when I was in Cotonou, I had promised Charles, my tailor friend, that I would but us tissue if he made us the clothes. The term for this is “meme tissue” or “same tissue”. Typically when there are festivals, families and friends will get their festival uniforms, so that’s what we decided to do.

I showed up at Charles’ house around 6 PM as instructed, thinking we would immediately go to dinner or a buvette to get the night started. Instead, Charles had work to do, so I just kind of hung out for 3 hours watching dubbed-to-French Spanish soap operas. I was actually happy to find that I understood most of what they were saying.

Eventually a friend of mine, Abdel, who works at a lending institution in town, gave me a call and picked me up to go to have a drink. We got to the bar that my friend Mr. Urbaine owns. Sitting there for a while, having a coke to hopefully wake me up a bit, I saw a small band of men come around the corner following a guy in a mickey mouse mask and one of those horned ski hats that we used to wear as kids. What they do is go around to each table at the buvettes and hit the drums as the guy in the goofy costume dances. Really, you don’t pay them to dance, you pay them to leave. The more you wait to pay them, the longer they stay banging these loud drums in your ears, not letting you talk to your friends. After a friend of mind slipped them a 100 cent piece, they took off. After stopping at one more buvette, I headed off to church at 11pm to find a mass that was already in progress. I didn’t feel that bad though because it was in Nagot, so I wouldn’t have understood anything anyways. As it was completely jammed, I just sat on my moto helmet outside, trying to stay awake. I failed misrebly and actually slept through the countdown to midnight (which would have consisted of me watching my watch turn from 11:59 to 12:00). Waking up at 12:03, I grumbled a bit and stumbled to a latrine to get out what I had put in an hour before.

When mass ended, the real party began and went on until about 6am. There were performances in the form of dance, song, and acting, but all of them had a bit of a hard time starting. It was strange though as seemingly every Catholic in town was at church that night, with the crowds literally pouring onto the street from the courtyard of the church. I managed to get some pictures of this. I ended up making it until 430 am but decided that I needed to turn in as I had already at this point fallen asleep at the party numerous times. The next morning, my bread lady woke me up at 8am, per usual. She’s like an alarm clock that gives you bread, and she even followed me to my other house. It is a sweet setup. New years day, I chose to get my house in order a bit. It still needs work, but until I get more paint on the walls and maybe some sort of tile on the floor, I don’t think it will ever look “proper”. Either way I’m still pleased as punch with it. Anyways, that’s all that’s going on.

Work starts again tomorrow; I’ve got to start looking a little harder to organize some formal formations as what I’ve done so far has been much more informal that I’d like. If MTN ever decides they want to work with an American, maybe I’ll be helping them a bit with the launch of their Mobile Money application in Benin, but that seems to be up to fate right now. I’ll let you know what happens.

Prayer requests:

Organization and focus on my work as I try to get my house up to par

Diligence in all that I do

Patience…with everything

A Very Peace Corps Christmas

Christmas quite an adventure. The original plan was to take a bus from Bohicon to Kandi, stay there for about 3 days, then, come back. As is the case with most Beninese trips, the original plan is never what happens. Like any reasonable person would do, I went the bus station in Cotonou 2 weeks in advance to buy my ticket. The bus company, Intercity, is highly regarded by volunteers as it is air conditioned, spacious (you get your own seat), has a TV (even if it is cheesy dubbed Nigerian soap operas), and is faster than pretty much any other mode of transport. 8000 CFA later, I had the ticket in hand and was ready to take my first official vacation in Africa.

Arriving in Bohicon the night before the trip, a few volunteers and I went out for dinner. I have started to notice that the first 1-2 hours of a large gathering of volunteers consists of reporting on how things are going (in the form of complaining). We are told that the first 3 months are always the hardest, but for some of the stories that I’ve heard, I have a feeling that it might be a little more than that. Common complaints for girls concern how rude and insanely determined some of the men are to make them their wife. One story sticks in my memory better than the others.

Hannah was just relaxing at her house enjoying a good book one day when a man came to the door, clapping three times to signal that he was there as is customary. This wasn’t an uncommon experience as men would often come to Hannah’s front door to propose. She didn’t know him so asked what he wanted, at which point he exposed himself to her (yes, his gibblies) with a bit of a surprised expression on his face. He then proceeded to propose marriage to her through her screen door, equipment in hand. I guess you know that a country is poor when a man’s manhood is the thing that is offered as something that he can provide. Luckily the man peaceably walked away and nothing ever came of it, but I’m sure Hannah will have a “Show me your hands” policy if she ever has visitors. Because she was laughing as this story was recounted, the entire table erupted in laughter for a good 2 minutes. Hannah is one of the coolest girls in Benin, I’m convinced, as that would have been taken different ways depending on the person (up to and including leaving the country as a result). I still can’t believe that it actually happened. After a night of chicken, fries, and drinks, we headed back to Jeff’s where I slept in a tent in his courtyard. I get hot here.

The next morning, we packed up and headed to the bus stop. Our bus was supposed to arrive around 9, but arrival times in Africa make about as much sense as tagging a wristwatch on a balloon and letting it sail in the wind while still expecting it to arrive on time. It showed up at 1030, as expected (at least by us). Each bus that stops in Bohicon is typically filled with people who have a bit of cash, so the hawkers literally swarm the busses, making it nearly impossible to get on or off. Jeff, Emily and I were all waiting with loads of baggage, hoping to put them under the bus. We were told that it was full, so we grudgingly made our way to the door. After fighting off a few more meat and pen salesmen, we started to climb the stairs, tickets in hand. As I reached the top of the stairs I was stopped by a man with an Intercity shirt who looked a little confused. He said “The bus is already full”. Hoping that he had just miscounted, I set down my cement sack full of electronics and proceeded to worriedly hand him my ticket. The look on his faced changed to the common Beninese astonishment; a dropped jaw accompanied by jerky, high pitched yelp.

“I’m sorry, but all the seats are taken” he said.

“That can’t be possible, I reserved this seat two weeks ago”

“Well as you can see, everyone is in their seats and the only empty ones are for the employees who are riding the bus”

“As you can see, sir, I have tickets for seats 3,4 and 5 for this bus on this date at this time”

At this point, I was starting to get heated, a state of conversation that I’ve grown accustomed to. Whether it’s arguing over this, taxi fares, my electricity, or the cost of a mango, I find myself letting loose some verbal rage at least once a week. He pulled out his cell phone and explained to me that he’d call his boss to see what he could do, but in the meantime I’d have to wait outside the bus as my 3 enormous bags were blocking the isle. Jeff and Emily had been behind me but hadn’t heard any of the conversation, and upon hearing the news, Jeff’s fuse short circuited and he responded screaming at the manager of the bus, setting his things and himself down in the doorway and bringing Rosa Park’s memory to life, but this time in Benin. After the bus manager had spoke with his boss, he handed the phone to me. I’m sure whatever I said must have been a bit hard to understand, but I don’t know if I have every spoke another language so quickly and furiously in my life. The boss told me that we would have to wait until that evening at which point there would be another bus. As Peace Corps volunteers are not allowed to travel at night (for good reason), I told him how this wasn’t possible. I then demanded that our money be returned, at which point he told us that “it’s difficult”. The reasoning for this was that they do accounting…well finally this came in handy. I told him that if that’s the case, the accountants would probably be wondering why there was an extra 24,000 CFA in the bank than there should be.

At this point people on the bus were starting to get agitated, which worked to our advantage, because it started putting pressure on the employees on the bus. The driver threatened to physically push Jeff off the bus, to which he replied, “Are you going to kill a Yovo? Do you know what would happen to you if you killed a Yovo?” Meanwhile I was still on the phone using the same techniques to get our money back that I had to buy my fan.

The whole “if you give me a good price, I can promise my friends will come here” technique. But in this case, it was more of a “if you don’t give me my money back, I promise you that no Peace Corps volunteer will ever travel with you again”;both are empty promises but they are worth giving a shot. The manager just kind of laughed at me and apologized, saying that it was not possible. He promised that he’d make the problem better, but at this point, I couldn’t see how.

I handed the phone back to the bus manager completely fumed. After delaying another 5 minutes, Jeff still holding strong and Emily guarding our luggage, the bus manager told us that he’d stay in Bohicon with us, refund the money, and find us a taxi to Parakou for the night. After realizing that there was absolutely no way we were going to get a ride from the bus, this didn’t seem like such a terrible idea, especially because Parakou was famed to have a really good workstation. Thus we conceded and waited another hour before taking a sweltering taxi to the North.

Upon arriving at Parakou, I immediately noticed two things; one, that the city was very well organized (even by Italian standards), and two, that the people were much more cordial. For instance, you don’t negotiate with moto drivers before hopping on, you just get on and pay them when you arrive. This gives you the power as the customer and makes it possible for them not to rip you off. Getting to the Parakou workstation, I was reminded a little of college, as I was greeted by leather couches sitting outside on the porch and in the courtyard. In addition, a few of my friends from stage were waiting there until the next day to head up to Kandi as well, so it wasn’t too bad of a decision. The workstation has dorms as well as a bungalow with 5 beds outside. As I wanted a chance to experience the famed Harmattan cold, I chose the bungalow. After throwing down my things, we headed to the “Fresh Air” buvette which is famed for its fries and chicken, the staple of any Peace Corps volunteer on vacation in Benin. The hype was definitely worth it as the chicken was juicy, huge, and had a familiar barbecue taste that I miss so much from the states. Yum. That night we chilled (literally, for once) and had a few drinks before heading to bed.

The next morning we headed to Kandi, packing what I thought at the time was too many people (9) into a 6 person taxi. The road to Kandi is scenic, with some dried plains of tall grass and other “African” looking landscapes that we’re meant to imagine from watching the Lion King. Because Kandi isn’t a tourist destination, the road had no reason to be repaired. As a result, you’re left to drive through a mine field of potholes that swallow tires whole. It’s a little like getting punched in the butt by a very big man with enormous boxing gloves. After being tenderized for about 4 hours, we finally got to Kandi. Thank God.

After greeting our long lost friends and checking out the workstation, we “did what SED volunteers do best” and headed to the buvette for dinner and merriment. This was Christmas Eve, so everyone was in a relatively good mood. We were warned that our chicken and fries would take a while to show up, so we thought the usual hour wait wouldn’t be too bad. 2 .5 hours later, the food finally arrived. Whatever! It’s Christmas! Plus we had beer. The night proceeded into a manly songfest of Christmas carols. As we were all sitting around the table bellowing in our lowest voices possible, I realized how sad it was that, besides my singing Christmas tree lights, this was the first time that I had heard Christmas carols this year. Regardless, we belted everything at the top of our lungs, worried that we’d upset the locals and get a bad reputation for the Peace Corps. Most of us had forgotten a lot of the words, so there was a lot of mumbling going on. Each song would be carefully recited, for example:

Oh Christmas tree, oh Christmas tree, blah blah blah blahh blahh blahh blahh!

Oh Christmas tree, oh Christmas tree, blah blah blah blahh blahh blahh blahh!

Blah blah blah blah, blah blah blah blah, blah blah blah blah, blah blah blah blah!

Oh Christmas tree, oh Christmas tree, blah blah blah blahh blahh blahh blahh!

We were among friends, and by the end of the night, even there was no snow on the ground, the moon shone cool white on the burning plains, and the cold Harmattan air made me happily reminisce a bit about the freezing winters that I had endured the previous 22 years in Illinois.

Apparently, after we got back and I fell asleep in hopes to make church the next day, there was a crazy party that happened. Luckily, I was safely tucked away in my tent, so nobody tried to write anything on me. Details are a bit to silly for this blog, so I’ll just have to save those for another day.

I woke up the next morning to a silent workstation. I had gone to bed at midnight, and apparently everyone had stayed up until about 4am, so my good friend Sarah, who had graciously asked me to wake her up just gave a groaning “nooooo” and rolled over. Doug, my best friend from stage, also asked me to wake him up, but in the form of relentless slaps to the head. I was happy to oblige and laugh as he frantically waved his arms, yelling and trying to defend himself from some eight armed monster attacking him in his sleep. When he finally came to, he gave me a “ehhhhhh! You guy you….”. What can I say, I’m happy to be a man of my word… especially if it means that I get to slap someone around a little bit.

Church was quick, especially for Christmas. 2 hours 15 minutes, with 15 baptisms included. I think you’d be pressed to make that happen in the states too! When we got back around 1130, everyone was getting Christmas lunch/dinner ready. The Peace Corps Liason, Chadsey, was working on about 30 kilos of beef product, trying to separate out the edible parts from the fat and bones and brains. I immediately jumped into the butcher role as I had a little experience preparing meet back at my village. For about and hour and a half, me and 3 other guys pruned our fingers with cows blood as we removed fat and skin from these sad excuses for fillets. This was all in preparation to grind it up to make burgers. I for some reason got stuck in the meat mixing role, so I had no way of holding my beer. My friends were happy to help a volunteer in need.

Linner was delicious: Cheeseburgers (real cheese), poached eggs, salad, fresh chilled pineapple, and apple crisp. The rest of the day was spent just hanging out. Eventually I decided to stay another day. The next day was just like Christmas. Just spending time with friends and speaking English can really do wonders for your state of mind. Before leaving my village before, I actually started to think that I was losing my mind a little bit. I had a run in with a man speaking Nagot to me. He was just saying “it’s been 3 days” which means “I haven’t seen you in a while”, but when I realized what it meant I pointed at his face and started laughing hysterically… I think he was a little insulted. Luckily, I was back to my good old self. Later during the day, Rohan, one of the older volunteers, asked me if I wanted to go for a bike ride. I was happy to get away from my smoker friends, who seem to light up the instant they see each other.

The girl whose bike I took is probably just at 5’, so her mountain bike felt more like a BMX. As Rohan I were riding down a nicely paved road, we looked left towards a big hill we thought would be great to check out, so we used the mountain ability of our bikes. We ended up finding a quarry that they had apparently used to construct the road that went west from Kandi. It was nice, but what was nicer was that it gave us a way to get to the top of the hill via bike. The hole time going up I was on the lookout for snakes, but as I remembered from my camping days in the Carolinas (literally like 6 days total), snakes normally only strike when cornered and run away from noise, so I trusted that the rumbling of our tires would do the job. Getting to the top of the hill, we were met with an incredible view, and decided it was time to take my “sitting in a tree” photo that you all can look at and be jealous. I’ll let the pictures do the talking.

So that was about the extent of extremely eventful things that happened. The next day we ended up jamming 11 people into that same 6 seat cab, but this time with the back two seats having one person reclined on the laps of the other people. This experience was preceded by another heated yelling match between me and the taxi manager who was again trying to rip off the Yovos. So that is all.

Overall, it a wonderful trip filled with ridiculous and increasingly predictable hardships, but it was good to see my friends again.