To go to Togo...

the beginning of the end

2010-09-28T07:33:00.000-07:00

So I haven’t updated this in a while. There are two reasons for this. One is that I was genuinely busy and the other is that I just didn’t feel like it. Honestly, I don’t even really feel like it right now, so this post isn’t going to be the most well-written you’ve ever read. The three biggest things that have been keeping me busy were Camp Informatique, building latrines, and Camp UNITE.

Camp Informatique was awesome. I want to thank everyone who donated money. The kids had a great time and they learned a lot. A few of them went back to villages with volunteers posted there, and the volunteers told me that they were all pumped up about computers. But I think the best part of this project was the organizers. They did most of the organizing themselves and I have a lot of confidence for next year. If they can find a source of funding, I whole-heartedly believe that they could organize the camp totally on their own, and wouldn’t need a volunteer what-so-ever.

And the latrine project. With the help of some very motivated young guys, we built 10 latrines in the section of town called Watuwa. I took a big leap of faith and just deposited 2,500,000 cfa ($5000) and said “ok, show me receipts for everything you buy” and they did an excellent job. They built all ten latrines in only a few weeks and the receipts they gave me added up exactly to the amount of money I gave them. In addition to the actual construction they taught each family who received a latrine how to properly clean it, what can and cannot be put down it, and proper hygiene practices such as washing your hands with soap every time.

Camp UNITE was as awesome as ever. We had a great time learning Life Skills and doing the challenges and winning our planks back from Paggi. It was pretty much the same as last year, so just go ahead and check out that post. I’m sure I wrote about it.

And so this is the beginning of the end. As of today, I only have 43 days of Peace Corps service left. Emily left just over a week ago, although it feels like a lot longer, and now I’m really anxious to get back. The last month in village is going to be weird. I’m not gonna do a bunch of “work” but I do have to fill out a bunch of final reports and get my house ready for my replacement, and figure out what I’m taking with me and what I’m leaving.

So, if you really want to send me something, now is your chance. If you wait too much longer, you risk it getting here after I leave. If I were you, I wouldn’t send any packages; I won’t even have enough time to eat/use whatever is in it. But I’ll tell you what I can do. If I get a letter from you before I leave, I’ll let you buy me a beer when I get back. Deal?

Im fine. Im just in Ghana.

2010-04-27T12:07:00.000-07:00

I'll be here for... well, i havent decided how long yet, but maybe until the first. you can reach me at (+233) 548039036 and if that doesnt work, I'm back in Togo. I lost my phone but I'll try to get the same number back as soon as i can. the number is (+228) 986 1792. until i get that one back, i dont know what number i'll have, maybe Emily's: (+228) 938 5229. I'm fine though. Don't worry about anything.

Anasara, il faut me donner vingt-cinq

2010-04-15T03:22:00.002-07:00

You’re on the internet; obviously, you know how to use a computer. Why not help a kid in Togo learn how to do the same?

Katy, the volunteer in Sokode, and I have organized a camp for high school students called Camp Informatique. It’s a weeklong formation for the #1 ranked student in their junior year of higschool from private and public schools located all over the Centrale Region of Togo. Because we’ve selected the top-ranking student from each school, they have the best chance of going to university in the years to come. Unfortunately, many of these students have never used a computer before. Writing a term paper would be slightly more difficult if you don’t even know what Microsoft Word is, let alone how to use it.

We are funding this project by means of a Peace Corps Partnership. This program provides a means through which friends and family in America (or anywhere, really) can donate money. One rule of this program states that, to show motivation, the community has to contribute at least 25% of the cost. In our case, the community is donating well over the required percentage. After all of the money has been donated, only then will Katy and I receive the funds. The camp is scheduled for the second week of June, so if you are interested in helping out, it would be much better to do so sooner, rather than later.

This will be the third year this camp has taken place, and every year the organizers from Sokode are one step closer to being fully self-sufficient. Obtaining the funds is the most difficult part. But this should be the last year a Peace Corps Partnership will be necessary.

The students who attend this camp are wonderful. There are a thousand reasons why a Togolese student won’t make it to high school. Not only have our students made it there, they are the #1 student in their class. These kids are brilliant and really motivated, but one of the biggest factors holding them back from a successful completion of university is a sheer lack of computer skills.

If you’d like to donate some money, you would really be giving these kids an opportunity that they otherwise won’t have. Please, check out our proposal, and instead of going to the movies this weekend, put the 10 bucks toward our project. Of you know, if you have a few hundred lying around, we’ll gladly accept. Thanks.

Wash, Rinse, Repeat

2010-04-10T06:21:00.000-07:00

Life is full of ups and downs, arrivals and departures, sines and cosines. Even fire (dry season), rain (rainy), and sunny days that you swear to god will never ever end (any time of year, really). Since I’ve experienced- nay, endured one rainy and two dry seasons, I decided to make a “pros & cons” list for both. If you ever want to visit West Africa, feel free to use this list as a guide when choosing which personality of the region you’d like to “experience” (ou bein, endure). But keep in mind that the best current feature of West Africa (me) won’t be around for too much longer.
(Note: This was formatted in a nice little chart before I had to edit it because Blogger screwed it up)

Rainy Season
(April-September)

Pros
· Built-in excuse not to have to be anywhere
· Can wear a hoodie, drink tea, and watch the rain on the front porch
· Everything is green and alive Much better selection of produce au marché

Cons
· Rivers are now where the roads used to be. Good luck getting around.
· Laundry takes two days to dry; clothes grow mold if you go too long without wearing them
· Instead of evaporating, sweat likes to stick around and keep you company
· Tons of mosquitoes! (and bugs in general) Mud everywhere (on feet, pant cuffs, splattered up back of pant legs, in house, etc)

Dry Season
(October-March)

Pros
· Cool enough at night to sleep
· Roads aren’t laced with canyons and riverbeds (still though, good luck getting around)
· Don’t have to bring rain jacket absolutely everywhere
· Can put off doing laundry till last possible minute cause clothes dry in about 30 seconds (read: can wear last pair of underwear while washing all of the others)

Cons

· Everything is dry, brown, and dead
· Nose constantly feels like it would be clogged or runny if it could only muster enough moisture to produce some snot
· Lips crackle like Rice Crispies
· Feet are constantly dirty from walking through dust all day
· Have to dust and sweep the whole house daily

Although it’s nice to be able to see kilometer after kilometer unobstructed by plant life during dry season, I personally prefer rainy season. The ubiquitous millet and tall grasses that tower overhead make me feel more like I’m “in” someplace and less like I’m “on” someplace. This opinion may have roots in the streets Philly or the Pine Barrens of South Jersey, but I prefer jungle (concrete or otherwise) to desert.

Ca fait longtemps, non?

2010-01-18T06:04:00.000-08:00

Yeah, I know it's been a while since the last post. I'm not going to apologize. I don't know, the internet just means less and less to me anymore. Sometimes I go a month or two without ever thinking "Hey, I wonder what's waiting for me in my email?" If I'm going to sit down and write something, I'd rather write a letter to someone than a blog post. Is this a good thing or a bad thing? I don't know. I'll let you decide.

So some things work out and some things don't. The science club was definitely my most successful project last semester. The World AIDS Day thing worked out, but not as well as I had hoped. And the Camp UNITE kids hardly even got off the ground.

-Science Club-

The physics professor I was working with (Djeri) is a rockstar. That's one of the big reasons the science club worked out so well. The kids were all really motivated and genuinely interested in the activities we were doing. We kicked the year off by building an electrolyzer and then using it to do things like separate water into hydrogen and oxygen and make bleach. We also did an activity where we measured the volume and mass of different materials to figure out their density. But then toward the end of the semester, we started to run out of activities to do. We did math and logic puzzles one day, and the kids seemed to like that. But the biggest problem with this club is just a sheer lack of resources. It's not like Djeri can go home and look up activities on the internet. Even when I get a chance to use the internet, it's hard for me to find things to do. So Sekou, a volunteer in the Maritime Region, has a book full of science activities. The only problem is that it's in English. So he said that one day he's gonna come up to Tchamba, sit down with Djeri and explain the experiments to him. Then we can re-write the activities in French, and make a document to send to volunteers and high school teachers all over the country. And that's the best part about Djeri- he's brilliant. If I explain the general concept of an activity I read about on the internet, he'll understand and can stand up in front of the class room and just rock the session like he'd been doing it for years. So this semester, we're going to keep the club going but I think we might just meet every other week instead of every week.

-World AIDS Day-

The idea was great in theory. In practice, it didn't really work out the way we had expected. Heather and I organized a group of middle-school kids to have an event for World AIDS Day on December first. In theory, it was supposed to work like this: The latter half of September and all of October was to be spent on teaching our kids all about AIDS. All the stuff they normally don't get to learn about. How the immune system works, what a virus is and how they work, the life-cycle of the AIDS virus, and what makes AIDS different from other viruses. And the kids loved it. They don't usually get a chance to ask a lot of questions (the school system here isn't the most interactive of media through which to learn), and with us they got to, and Heather and I were really responsive, which I think the kids really appreciated.

Then every Wednesday in November, it was their turn. They had four weeks to organize an event for December first. We reviewed all the information they learned and we showed them games they could play and skits to help them illustrate the different concepts pertaining to how AIDS affects the immune system, etc. They broke themselves into groups and assigned themselves to different subjects. Then each group practiced teaching the stuff they learned to the rest of the groups to prepare for World AIDS Day (which we moved to December second for logistic reasons).

December second was the beginning of the end. First of all, we were going to have teachers from the middle school policing the kids to help keep them in order. Heather and I knew we didn't have enough authority to keep a crowd of middle school kids under control. But then the morning of the event, we were informed that there was a big school board meeting that all of the teachers had to attend, and that they wouldn't be available to come to our event. Great. And we got a DJ to come so we'd have a microphone to help us organize and music to play during the games and stuff. Then there were no plugs close enough to where we were to plug anything in. It took us a while to find an extension cord to run all the way across the school grounds so we could start the event.

We had been working with our friend Moctar, who had helpfully written a proposal to PSI to give us some stuff to give out. We got T-shirts, condoms, pamphlets, and stuff like that in addition to a huge box full of toys that my third grade teach, Mrs. Schilling and her class had donated (Thank you Cathy!). Little did we know that this would be our downfall.

The kids did a great job leading their classrooms. They taught their classmates all of the stuff that we had taught them the month before. They asked questions and wrote stuff on the blackboard. Each group of our kids had their own classroom, each dedicated to a different subject (immune system, prevention, stigmatization, etc). Heather and I devised a system to verify which kids had visited which (and how many) of the four rooms. We gave stickers to our student-teachers to put next to the subject they were teaching on a piece of paper given to each participant. But what ended up happening was that the kids went berserk about the stickers and didn't even really care about what they were being taught, they just wanted a sticker next to every subject.

Then after the formations were over, our goal was to ask the kids questions about the information that they learned, and to give out prizes if they got the answers right. This is about the time that the earth split open to release all of the deamons from hell. Their animal instintinct kicked in and they went clinically insane for the rest of the afternoon. Nobody cared about the questions we were asking, they just wanted a football or a box of condoms or whatever was on the table to be given away. We got swarmed and lost control pretty quickly. This was one of the reasons we wanted the teachers present. I felt like I was in a cartoon, like I had just crawled out of a dust-cloud with tattered clothing and two black eyes only to be grabbed by the ankle and dragged back in.

After the event, Heather, Emily (who came to help out), Moctar, and I went to the bar to have a beer or three and to reflect. It wasn't a lost cause. I'm sure some of the participants learned some useful information and I know that our student-teachers got a lot out of it. Not only did they learn a bunch of stuff about AIDS, they also got to experience what it's like to run a classroom. Maybe now they'll have a little more empathy for their teachers.

-The UNITE Kids-

The wings fell off of this one before it even got the runway. We got a good number of Camp UNITE participants from the area together for one meeting at the begining of the year. We talked about some possible projects we could do and they wanted to do a sensibilization in a nearby village on the subject of gender equity. We got as far as actually going out to the village (Alibi I) to talk to the director about when we could do it, and that's about when the kids stopped showing up for meetings. The only time during the week they had free was Wednesday afternoons, and neither Heather nor I could come because that's when our World AIDS Day class was. I don't blame the kids for not coming, I mean, I'd rather play football with my friends than organize a sensibilization too. And I can't really blame myself, cause it's not like I wasn't doing anything- I was busy at the middle school every wednesday. So, I don't feel too bad about losing that one. I think the lesson here is that if you're going to organize kids as peer-educators, you need to give them a ton of structure and just have them fill in the gaps.

That's what I spent most of my time doing last semester. I'm sure I did a lot of other stuff that classified as "work" as far as Peace Corps is concerned (like building a school in a little village 40 kilometers away), but none of them are big, long-term(ish) projects like the aforementioned.
I had my 12-year-old host-brother from training come live with me for a good two weeks. It was tough. I felt like he was bored the whole time, but I'm sure he had a good time. He had keys to the house, I let him come and go as he pleased. We had a good time cooking together and listening to music. But I think the most important thing he got out of the trip was experience. He's never traveled more than a few kilometers from his village, so there were a lot of things up here that he'd never seen before. He speaks Ewe in an Ewe-speaking village, so for him to hear people speaking Tchamba and Kotokoli was something completely new. He asked me "Why do you keep saying 'aieeyo'?". "That's how you say 'no' in Tchamba". And it gets cold up here at night- well, reletively cold. I shiver if I don't wear a hoodie after the sun goes down (not until after my grandmom sent me a thermometer did I realize that it only goes down to 72 at the absolute coldest). So that was new for him too. And he asked a lot of questions about Islam: the writing, the calls to prair, the washing, etc. He wasn't entertained every minute of every day, but I'm sure when he got back to Agou, he wouldn't shut up about all the stuff we did and how different every thing is.

And that's about it. After a fun-filled (yet tiring) break between semesters, I'm winding back up for the second half of the school year. I just got back from teaching some women how to make liquid soap and tomorrow I'm going to start making phonecalls about Camp Informatique. Emily and I are taking a trip up to Ouagadougou in the begining of February and then were on stand-fast (we're not allowed to leave post) for a couple of weeks in March for the election. That's about all I have on the agenda. Keep sending letters, I appreciate every one that I get. You'll hear from me the next time I feel like typing up a post.

Some random things that have happened that I don't feel like writing out:
My cat died mysteriously and I bought a new one.
Spent a week in the Med-unit.
Organized a girls' soccer tournament in Wassarabo.
Published an issue of The Griot.
Took a trip to Ghana with Emily.
Had a phone pick-pocketed, then a really nice woman named Paulina gave me hers.
Biked a good 10 or 15 kilometers at night with no flashlight.
Biked to Sokode and back in the same day (70 kilometers).

48 hours

2009-11-19T12:59:00.000-08:00

I want to go home. Not that I want to ET or anything, I just really miss America and I need a break. I played a game with myself the other day, and I called it "48 hours in America". So the premise is that if I were to be instantly teleported home at 12:01am Saturday morning to be instantly teleported back at 12:01am Monday morning, what would I do with my 48 hours in America? It's tricky cause I would want to do things like sleep in a comfortable bed, but I don't know if that time would be better spent doing something more fun. Also, there are about 5 thousand different things I would want to eat, but how much can one really eat in only 48 hours? Oh, and everything but by body would be disintegrated in the teleportation process, so I'd come out naked on the other end -Terminator stye- thus preventing me from bringing anything home or back. So, this is the list I came up with.

Have a donut (or five) and a coffee at Dunkin Donuts
Go to the movies
Go to a bar and have a delicious beer on tap and maybe flirt with some girls (in English, obviously)
Eat at a diner
Go to a Reggae show
Take the subway somewhere (speedline counts)
Eat a cheesesteak
Drive a car
Play around on the internet (but just for a bit, I could easily get carried away)
Eat a Philly soft pretzel
Take as many hot showers as I can
Eat Chinese food

...And then I would undoubtedly fill the remaining time with whatever came up. Oh, and here's the thing, everyone is invited to do all of this stuff with me, but I'm not going out of my way to see anyone; you're going to have to come to me. I mean, come on, I only have 48 hours. I may be teleported at any moment, so if I show up at your door at midnight some Saturday in the future, have a pile of clothes waiting for me and 100 bucks in cash, and be ready to have an awesome weekend.

Vacance (pt.2)

2009-10-03T01:19:00.000-07:00

-science formation-

I spent a solid two weeks at the Peace Corps training camp in Pagala. The first few days were for a formation on how to promote math and science to girls in highschool. There were two volunteers from each region and each volunteer brought a homologue with him or her. I brought the physics teacher from the public highschool in Tchamba.

The formation was cool. It was basically like a very mini PST. Rose (the APCD for the GEE program) talked about why girls' education is important and how girls get the short end of the education stick here in Togo and why it is important to promote math and science. We also learned how to do some simple experiments in village that don't need a lot of technical equipment. And we talked about possible project ideas we could get started in village such as science clubs, camps, or fairs. We also did fun stuff like exchange brain-teasers (ok, you have a 5 liter jug and a 3 liter jug, you need 1 liter of water. go.) And at the end of the formation, we broke up into teams and played a quiz game. We got asked science/math questions but also cultural stuff so that the Togolese formateurs and the volunteers had a little exchange. I remember one of the answers was "Harriet Beacher Stowe", but another one was "Albert Camus".

It was fun to hang out with a bunch of people who get excited about science and math. I was happy to have a long discussion with Katrina about Avogadro's number and carbon-12. The hardest part was (still) the language aspect. Although my French has improved considerably since I've arrived, I'm really used to conversing in a non-formal style (maybe over some tchouck). So when it came down to a technical discussion, I was lacking a lot of vocabulary. Like what are the French words for "radius" or "nucleus" or "square root"? (The answers are rayon, noyau, and racine carre, respectively). It was hard to kind of re-learn a bunch of science material in another language, just to have a discussion about why you think a specific experiment could/couldn't work in your village. I kind of felt like the Togolese science teachers thought I didn't know what I was talking about, but I think I held my own during the quiz-game.

-Camp UNITE-

Camp UNITE was AWESOME! It was a total of four weeks long, broken up into one week for boy apprentices, one for girl apprentices, and one each for boy/girl students from villages all over the country. I was a camp councilor for the week of boy students. The camp kind of has a little plot to it. The first day, the kids learn about the "bridge model" which is a go-to lesson-plan if you ever have to keep a group of kids busy for an hour. The basic idea is that we are on the shore of a river; we are students, brothers, sons, friends, football players, etc. We want to get to the other shore; we want to be doctors, journalists, fathers, husbands, etc. The water represents all of the "traps" in life; we don't want to get pregnant, or sick with AIDS, or drop out of school. So we need to build a healthy lifestyle bridge across the water; we want to manage our time well, have good communication skills, etc. Ok, so after learning this, the kids come out to see the bridge consisting of planks (each one representing an attribute of a positive lifestyle) that stretch across "water", to a pavilion on the other side (that represents a successful life). But after talking about it for a few minutes we're interrupted by Paggi, the antagonist. Paggi was a participant last year, who disguises himself in a ridiculous costume. Paggi comes and steals all of the planks.
To get the planks back, every day the participants have to complete a series of challenges and with every challenge, they win back one board. The challenges encourage working as a team and good communication skills such that every challenge is impossible to complete on your own, forcing you to work with the other members of your group. And to make things harder, the participants are not allowed to talk during the challenge, therefore they have to decide on a plan
of action before starting, and stick to it throughout.

Throughout the week, we teach the kids the benefits of gender equity, family planning, time management skills, etc. All of the participants leave camp at the end of the week ready to change the world. They are all so motivated to go back to their respective villages and teach what they've learned; it's extremely inspiring. The problem is that, since the camps are 4 different weeks, and camp happens every year, that none of the participants know each other (e.g. the boy apprentices don't know the boy students or any of the girl participants). So when they get back to village, every participant is left to change the world on his or her own.

So, since I've been back, I've asked Emily for a list of the participants' names and have done my best to find them all around town (Tchamba is a big place, it's hard to find some of these kids). We've had one meeting for them to get to know each other. We exchanged phone numbers and stuff like that. Now, if any one of these kids has a brilliant idea to change something that they see as a problem in Tchamba, they have a network of friends to lean on if they need or want help. Right now they're in the middle of planning a sensibilization at a village 7km en brousse called Alibi 1. Why they don't just organize something here in Tchamba, I have no idea. But it's great to see a group of motivated kids who care about their future and the future of their friends and family. These kids are special, and they're all going to do some awesome things.

-Nicole-

In mid-August, Nicole got on a plane in the Land of the Free and the Home of the Brave, and when she got off, she was in the Land of... well... over-crowded bush-taxis and the Home of... food that doesn't quite sit right in your stomach. Regardless, we had a great time. Well, I had a great time with her, you'll have to ask her how great of a time she had. Although it was a bit overwhelming, every moment was something new and I doubt she'll forget any of it anytime soon.

After the long (oh so long) journey from Accra to Tchamba, we spent a week in village. We walked around, I introduced to her to all of the crazy characters in my life these days, and we had more calabashes of tchouck than Nicole could handle. We saw naked children getting scrubbed down by a family member while balancing on a rock just wider than their feet on the side of the road, bush-taxis that look as if there is enough cargo teetering atop that the slightest breeze could send them tumbling down the side of a mountain, and vans with an entire football team AND all of its fans sitting in, standing on, and dangling from the roof-rack, and you know, other stuff that happens here every day. Obviously, we couldn't meet everyone and do everything in only one week, but I'm satisfied with the amount of ground we covered. A lot of people I wanted Nicole to meet were in Nigeria or Lome for the summer vacation or otherwise just not around, but we hit the basics: drinking tchouck, pounding fufu, and rolling up our pants to cross a stream in the woods.

After a week in village, we spent a week traveling around Togo. We went as far north as Kante and made our way back to Lome and then Accra staying at various volunteer's houses, transit houses, and cheap hotels. We saw some Tatas which are two-story mud huts that people live in and used to serve defensive purposes, and climbed up the inside of a huge baobab tree. And we hit the capital of every region with the exception of Dapaong (cause lord knows, that it's a freakin drive and a half to get all the way up there) just for lack of time. I got a nice little case of the worst diarrhea I've ever experienced due to some bacterial dysentery, and got severely dehydrated. So, to say the least, I wasn't bringing my A-game throughout the duration of our Tour-du-Togo, and I feel bad, that I didn't have the energy to really take Nicole all around the different cities we visited. But such is life in the Land of food that doesn't quite sit right in your stomach (or is it Home of...). Anyway, I'm all better now (thanks for asking) and Nicole has returned to the Purple Mountains Majesty and the Amber Waves of Grain. All-in-all it was a great trip, and I'm super thankful that she spent all of the time and money and endured all of the frustrations to come out and visit. It was great to see her again and I felt a level of comfort that I haven't felt in a year. And I did things with her that I probably wouldn't have if she hadn't come to visit.

-back to school-

And now I'm back in village. After a long-ass summer, I am so grateful to be able to just BE here in Tchamba. It's nice to get back into somewhat of a routine, see the same people every day, and to put my laundry back on a shelf instead of back into a backpack. The kids are back to school, and things have definitely settled down. I'm ready to start whatever work awaits me. As I've said, the UNITE kids are organized, and the physics teacher I brought to the science formation is back in town. Heather and I have also taken the first few steps in organizing a group of students to plan an event for World AIDS Day on December first. So, I'll let you know how the next couple of months turns out, what projects make it, which ones (inevitably) fall through, and if I start any new ones.

Oh, and hey, I've officially been in Togo for over a year. YAY!

Also check this out (translated from German). Scroll down to the September 25th entry. Heather and I went to Kaboli with her homologue, and some swiss from the Red Cross came too. They also have an entry about Wasarabo, Emily's village, but she went into Sokodé for the day, so she missed meeting them.

Festivals, Waterfalls, and both kinds of camping (Vacance, Pt. 1)

2009-07-08T03:08:00.000-07:00

=Moringa festival=

So a lot of stuff has happened since the last update. First of all, moringa fest 2009. A volunteer down in a village called Notsé organized a huge festival dedicated to the promotion of this tree called moringa (moringa olifera). It's like a miracle tree. The leaves have a ridiculous amount of vitamins and stuff in it, including protien. You can do all kinds of stuff with the oil extracted from the seeds, and you can even crush them up and filter water through the crushed seeds to make it drinkable. Anyway, at the festival there were little stands spread out on a field and a stage with an MC and music and stuff. We gave out tons of information about the different uses of the tree and it was a great time. So many volunteers came from all over the counrty, and it was nice to see everyone in one spot.

=waterfalls=

And right from Notsé, Heather, Moctar and I went to swim in th waterfalls in Kpalimé. We stayed in a (relatively) nice hotel with air conditioning. I had some time in the afternoon after getting there so I decided to go visit my host family in Agou. It was nice to see Francais again; he's the same happy little kid he was when I last saw him 8 months ago. My host mom and dad were happy to see me too and gave me 5 mangos to take home. But, yeah, the waterfalls were great. Moctar got a couple of guys to hike us through the woods for about 30 minutes to where the waterfalls were and wait for us while we swam. It wasn't really swimming, as much as it was wading waist deep in water. But it felt nice to be able to stand under waterfalls and have freezing cold water come crashing over you. After hiking the 30 minutes back through the woods, we were all nice and sweaty again. That afternoon, Moctar and I caught a taxi down to Lomé becaue I had to print some things for Camp Informatique, and I slept at his house that night.

=campfire=

I was only home for a couple of days before David invited me to a going-away party at his house out by Bassar. He will finish his service on July 30^th and then he's going on a trip around the world before he goes home. The party was awesome. We had a huge bonfire in the middle of a field and we cooked hotdogs and drank beer- it was glorious. Heather found marshmellows in Lomé, so we also made s'mores. We slept out on mats in hoodies or under a light blanket. But then at about 3 in the morning it started raining. Everyone woke up and hiked back to David's house in the dark so they wouldn't have to sleep in the rain, but somebody had to stay with the stuff we were leaving in the field (like benches and mats that were too wet and dirty to carry home just then), so Alisha and I (the two kids from Jersey) took one for the team and slept the rest of the night in the tent in the field. It was great, by the time morning came, it had stopped raining. Some of the other volunteers came back and helped us carry the rest of the stuff back to David's house just as the sun was starting to burn off the morning dew.

=BAC party=

I was home for almost a whole day before I had something else to do. The 4 girls who I studied English with for the BAC, got their scores back, and they all passed. They called me out on my promise. I told them I would have a fête for them if they all passed. So I stepped up to the plate and had a fête for them. I bought a chicken and a bunch of ingredients au marché and some Cokes from the boutique. One night 3 of the girls came over; I killed the chicken, we danced to music as we cooked and ate dinner together. We ended the fête with a viewing of My Girl, and everyone loved it. Salim from next door stopped by just as we were starting and he watched with us. His favorite part was the motor home... it's a car and a house?! He laughed every scene it was in. And the girls were really into it, they were guessing what was going to happen and explaining to each other what they thought the characters were thinking and stuff. It was a good night.

=camp informatique=

And then there was camp informatique. This is a camp that Rebecca in Sokodé organized. This year was the second year. It was a week long- 3 days for boys and 3 days for girls with a day in between to send the boys off in the morning and welcoming the girls in the evening. Rebecca sent letters to public and private schools to in the Centrale Region for them to send their top boy student and top girl student in their “junior” year. These kids were all really sharp, especially the girls. I showed them how to play sudoku, and they understood immediately and continued to solve the rest of the puzzle by themselves. It took both groups a day to warm up, but after playing games and singing and stuff, they started to relax. My role during the week was to just keep the kids entertained while we had down time and to organize 1-hour of sport every afternoon. We played all kinds of little games in circles and we played a match each of ulitimate frizbee and football (soccer).

None of the students had much (if any) experience using a computer. We started off by identifing all of the parts and what role they play in the performance of the computer. Then we went over how to mouse. The difference between a click and a double-click and when to do which (it's neither obvious when to do what nor easy to explain). And after mouse, they played on a type-teaching program for a few hours so they could learn where to place their fingers and how to get all kinds of letters with accents over them and stuff. And after that they learned Microsoft Word (bold, italics, underline, font types/sizes/colors, etc...). and then we did some research on the internet. We talked about how search engines work and what's a good search query (“World Cup 2010”) verses a not so good one (“Soccer”). Then we gave the kids free rein of the internet for a couple of hours and they went nuts. They aboslutely loved it and their eyes sparkled with excitement as they all stared into their monitors.

The kids learned so much so fast, but they still have a looong road ahead of them in the world of computers. It really made me realize how much we take for granted how far we've come in technology. These kids were the smartest in their class, and were just learning to double-click and at home we have little 8-year-olds uploading scandolous photos to myspace. In my opinion, this camp was totally worth the time for these kids. They didn't learn a ton of stuff, but with what they know now, they will definitely be able to learn a lot more, a lot faster the next time they have access to a computer on their own. And in the case of the girls, I think (at least, I hope) that this camp improved their self-confidence and ironed out some of the timidity beaten into them since birth. In fact, they may have been getting a little too confident. After rebecca caught one of them wearing a skirt that was... we'll say “shorter than acceptable”...and trying to get my attention she told her to go change and just reminded me to be careful. Of course I was obvlious to what was going on and was more worried about my current gastro-intestinal problems.

Helping Rebecca run this camp was a big step in getting some kind of computer-training program up and running here in Tchamba. Watching her and her counterparts teach these kids and getting a full understanding of what the average high-school kid knows and doesnt know will be invaluable in helping me get something off of the ground.

=sodabe=

And yesterday was pretty cool. At the tchouck market in Tchamba, Honorine's mom sells sodabe (pronounced “soda-bee”) which is a lovely little distilled beverage with a face-melting amount of alcohol in it. Probably some of the nastiest stuff I've ever drank. I mean, this stuff make you feel like you'd rather be drinking paint thinner. Anyway, the other day I asked Honorine if she could one day take me to the place her mom buys it from. So, that day was yesterday. She took me to this family's compound en brusse (I mean, way en brousse) to where they make the stuff. They start off making the stuff by chopping down a palm tree and extracting the palm wine from it. Then they boil it in a 50-gallon oil drum. And there's a tube coming out of it that they had looped through a couple of successively smaller barrels filled with water to cool the alcohol back into a liquid. And at the end of the pipe, the sodabe drips into a plastic jug. Then they sell it by the litre to people like Honorine's mom who then sell it at a bar or tchouck stand. Honorine and I bought 4 liters for her mom for 4,000 CFA (about 8 bucks?) and a brought a little jug of sweet palm wine home.

Now here I am in Lomé. I'm down here working on an extremely important publication called The Griot, with Emily, Tony, and David. Emily and I are taking over for Tony and David and were doing this issue together to pass the torch. This document they have us working on is indespensible- i'm not sure Peace Corps Togo could function with out it. It's basically a joke news-letter like The Onion, but with jokes about bush taxis and the stupid stuff volunteers have said or done.

Next time: formation on promoting science and math for girls, Camp Unité, and Nicole's visit!! Don't touch that dial.

clubbin in Tchamba

2009-05-06T01:50:00.000-07:00

written 25 April

Since I've been back from Ghana, things have been moving along quite nicely. I've been really busy. Heather and I started two clubs together: and English club for adults who already speak a little bit of English and want to get better, and a club for "4eme" (middle school) students. I've also been helping some HS students study for a big exam.

--Club d'Espérance--

The theme of the club at the middle school is "what do you want to learn about?" We meet every Wednesday in the afternoon. Our first meeting went, as Heather and I agreed, "not bad". I don't think the kids were completely comfortable. Heather and I are trying to run this club very informally and democratically. The students are used to the dictatorship of the Togolese school system, so when we asked them to get into groups and discuss what activities they wanted to do with the club, they didn't really know how to handle it. But we also handed out a little questionnaire to get to know the kids a little better. We asked them things like their age, what section of Tchamba they live in, who they live with, if they have a kid, or a boyfriend, or if they're having sex yet-- stuff like that. I was pleasantly surprised with the results.

The second meeting went even better than the first, and I would say we upgraded from "not bad" to "alright". The theme of the second meeting was "us" (Heather and I). So we brought in pictures of our families and friends. I had a poster of New Jersey (it was a Drew University poster that I found in one of my suitcases; no idea how or when it got there) and Heather had stuff from Texas. We took questions from the kids and they asked stuff like if it was cold in America. I went into a long description of what snow is like and how you have to shovel it from the sidewalks. The explanation was so drawn out because they don't even have sidewalks, let alone snow to cover them. It was exactly like when I'm telling a story to my family or friends at home but in the other direction: "So I stopped by the tchouck market to grab a beignet for lunch and--", "wait, what's tchouck and what's a beignet?"

Anyway, the third meeting was... well, it looked like it was going to both crash and burn, but pulled out of the tailspin at the last minute and made a safe landing at "pretty good". Heather and I talked to our friend Fatao who is a technician at the hospital. He's a great guy and he's successful and young. He'd be a great speaker about "how to win at life", meaning "this is how you get a job at the hospital that requires skill instead of selling soap in the market". Heather was taking a trip up to Dapaong to see some friends, so I was to handle this club meeting Han style...Solo. The day before the club I went to the hospital to help out with vaccinating the mothers and infants and Fatao told me he was going to be busy the following day, but Phillip could cover for him. Phillip is on his way to becoming another Fatao, but he's not quite there yet. He's just an intern at the hospital and he's not nearly as welcoming or friendly as Fatao. I don't know him very well, so I didn't know whether I could trust him to show up to the club. I decided that i'd find a safety net and go talk to my homologue, Affo, who works for an NGO called Plan (www.plan-international.org). He's of the same caliber as Fatao and would have a thing or two to tell the students about how to be successful. He agreed to come talk to the club. Come Wednesday morning, he told me he couldn't make it, he was busy. So an hour before the club was supposed to start, I biked over to my friend Nicole's house. She also works for Plan, but she just moved to Tchamba and I didn't know her nearly as well as I knew Fatao or Affo; we had just met not too long ago. I asked her if she was busy and if she would do me a favor. I asked her if the Phillip guy is a no-show, could I call her and have her come to the middle school. She agreed, and I thanked her dearly.

After giving Phillip more than an hour to come, by having a rock, paper, scissors tournament and then a few rounds of hang-man, I decided to call Nicole. I was really nervous, and when she got there I gave her a few pointers at the last second as to what to talk about. She talked a bit about where she grew up, and what her work is now. I asked the students if they had any questions for her, and they didn't, so I asked her a few to get started. I asked her questions about university and what she studied and stuff. Then the kids started opening up and asking questions. Nicole was awesome! She talked at length about what her life is like working for an NGO as opposed to someone who drives a moto. She talked about how she sold little jewels while she was going to university to help pay for it, and how she wanted to become a director (directrice) of an NGO one day, but not necessarily Plan. She was great, and said everything I dreamed a guest speaker would say. After I told the kids what their little assignment that they had to do before next week was (list the 5 things most important to you, and the 5 things you thing are the most important to the community of Tchamba), I gave them their English phrase for the week ("the future is what you make it") and explained what it means in French. And then the meeting for the day was over. I walked Nicole out to her moto and thanked her dearly. I wish I could speak French better, if only to thank her more sincerely. She told me I was good with the kids. I don't know if that was from the heart or just in response to my pathetic gratitude.

--English Club--

Today was our second meeting, and I also conducted this one Han style. I am not nervous in the least at English Club because I can always say, "Hey! All the people in this room who are from an English-speaking country, please raise your hand... that's what I thought." Luckily, it hasn't come to that yet, and I don't think it will because it's only adults and they won't give me any bullshit like the middle-school kids do. The biggest issue with this club is the timing. Before the first meeting the librarian agreed we could use the library and said 9am would be a good time, cause he wanted to be in the club too, and that's when he's there. So at the end of the first meeting we asked how everything was, and he suggested we move it to 10am instead. Oh, and also, could we move it to a different location with a chalkboard? Gah! So, this morning, I showed up to the new location at the new time, 10. At 10:15, one guy showed up, Mr. Missih, who is one of my favorite people in Tchamba-- his whole family is awesome, one of his daughters is in Club d'Espérance. He told me that the Minister of Security was in town and there was a meeting or something, so everyone was busy. He asked if we could all meet this afternoon, and said he would tell everyone at the meeting about the change. So I went about my day and showed up later in the afternoon. After waiting only a half an hour, Mr. Missih was again the only one to come. He and I waited for about another hour, shooting the shit, and then some more people showed up (none of whom were the library guy). When we were about four people deep, we decided to get started.

This week's topic was "Family". We talked about mothers and brothers, in-laws and steps. It was fun and I was only nervous once when I forgot how to spell niece for a few seconds. At the end of the club we changed the time back to the original 9am, but kept the new location. Mr. Missih assured me that he would get more people to come next week.

--Study Group--

So we are less than a month away from the BAC exam. Yeah, Nolan, it's the same Baccalaureate as in France, I looked into it. The exam is extremely difficult and it's what prevents a lot of students from graduating high school. You have to take the BAC your "junior" year and the BAC II your "senior" year. Two other volunteers put together a study guide specifically for the English section of the exam. I went and found two girls who I knew were in their "junior" year and would be taking the exam next month. I asked them if they were interested in having me help them with the English section. They said yes, and I told them to find some friends who were also interested. They each found another, bringing the grand total to four.

So the other day, three of them (one was sick or something) came over my house and we studied English using the document that that other volunteers drew up. After studying for about an hour, I had to cut the lesson a little bit short, cause I promised a guy I would eat dinner with him. The girls were a bit bummed, and I was extremely impressed with how dedicated they were. They told me that next week, if I bought some ingredients, they would cook me dinner, and we could study late into the night. I told them, hey, if you want to study that much, I'll be right there with you; I'll deprive myself of sleep if need be. This is the kind of stuff they're up against, here are a few examples from the study guide, and keep in mind that English is at least their third language, after French and at least one, but sometimes up to like four local languages:

"In 1519, Ferdinand Magellan, five ships, and more than two hundred ___1___ set sail from Spain to find a water ___2___ to the Spice Islands. Despite suffering starvation, ___3___, torture and death, they discovered the passageway known today as the Strait of Magellan.
Magellan left the Spanish ___4___ of Seville in 1519 with a group of five ___5___ to circumnavigate the world. Although the captain general of the trip was Portuguese, he sought support from the ___6___ King Charles because King Manuel of Portugal refused all help for Magellan. Due to his Portuguese nationality, Magellan had a lot of difficulty controlling the sailors of his group and frequently had to stop rebellions, or mutinies. He even responded by ___7___ many sailors to show his strength to the others who might oppose him."

"The United States is a very unique country because its population is ___1___ diverse. After declaring independence from England in 1776, immigrants have continued to ___2___ from Europe, Asia, and more recently Africa. Because it is a “melting pot” of culture, the ___3___ States have many different ethnicities. For ___4___, about 40 million of 300 ___5___ Americans are African Americans; mostly decedents of slaves.
Most ___6___ left impoverished and difficult situations to seek the “American Dream” of earning good money, supporting a ___7___, and owning a home. Despite such diversity, immigrants united using the English ___8___ in pursuit of their goals."

And that's basically my life in a nutshell (or blog post). How bout a big round of applause for those who have been keeping in contact by calling me regularly and sending letters, it helps a lot. And it's not just the content of the letters that keeps me going, it's knowing that you thought about me and took some time out of your busy day to drop me a line and let me know what's going on in your life. And for anyone who hasn't written or called, well...

I'm gonna wrap this post up with a few fun facts:
I saw a scorpion the other day in my front yard.

My poop was green yesterday.
I ran 8 km this morning.
Emily got me smoking cigarettes, but I only let myself smoke half of one at a time, and only on days with prime dates.
I'm currently reading both "Infinite Jest" and "The End of Poverty".
I saw a scorpion the other day

aller revenir

2009-03-24T08:04:00.000-07:00

I just got back from a mini-vacation to Ghana, aka the land of plenty. It was seriously awesome. Emily and I went for a few days to pick up her friends at the airport. At some points I could have sworn I was in the United States. We went to a mall and watched a movie (The International, it wasn't that great) and we went to a sports bar and i drank a margarita! And although I had to slow myself down, and put on a bit of an accent, it was nice to speak comfortably to complete strangers. But at some points, i kind of missed speaking french, and i dont know why, but i missed Togo a little bit too.

This little trip really put things in perspective for me. My sympathy for Togo as a country has vanished, but my sympathy for the people living here has never been stronger. I understand I only saw one part of one city in Ghana, therefore i cannot judge the entire country on what i saw. that being said, in terms of development, the basement may be just as deep as Togo's, but the ceiling is much much higher. I saw things that i would never imagine seeing even in the wealthiest sections of Lome. Which makes me wonder what Ghana is doing right, and what Togo is doing wrong. They're right next door, and yet the standard of living is so much higher. Anyway enough about that.

Check out these youtube videos from my friend David. He was walking through village one day and came across a blind kid banging on a bucket and singing his heart out. So David became friends with this 10 year old boy named Zoglo and now they play music together. Zoglo comes to David's house and they kick out the jams, or they go to the market and play for money and they make enough for Zoglo to buy food until the next week. As I've said, Zoglo is 10 years old, and blind. He doesnt speak any french, and he write all of the songs himself. Here are two of them.

pictures!

2009-03-11T02:30:00.000-07:00

I'm in Lome and i get to use the awesome internet at the Peace Corps bureau so i've uploaded all of my pictures. i'm in Lome to buy a visa for Ghana, which I did this morning. and i'm going to kill a few days down here while Emily and Jillian sort out some stuff for Camp Unite. Then i have a big meeting in Pagala for 4 or 5 days. After that, Emily and I are off to Ghana for 3 days. Her friends are coming in from Scotland, and were picking them up at the airport and making a little vacation out of it. After that, i have to hurry up and get back to village to organize a club.

anyway, the stuff you really care about... http://picasaweb.google.com/drew.quinton

bookmark it. i'll let you know when the next time i upload pictures will be, but i know it wont be for a long time.

reverse chronology

2009-02-28T00:01:00.000-08:00

It's thursday, 26 February at 11:26 and I'm writing this on my laptop in my house. First of all, I'd like to point out the change of my mailing address on the right. I bought a postbox at the post office in Tchamba, and suposedly my mail will get to that one much faster.

Anyway, the last week or two in general, and today specifically has been extremely productive. This morning I went to a middle school called Tchamba CEG Ville II on the outskirts of town to ask about doing a map project. This is a project wherein you have a map of the world on a sheet of paper divided up into a ton of little boxes, like graph paper. Then you draw a much bigger grid on the wall, and copy the map box by box up on the wall. At CEG Ville II, they didn't have a one big wall uninterupted by windows, except for on a new building currently under construction that hasn't been painted yet. So they asked me if I would come back in September.

Then Heather and I went to the library to ask if we started an English club for adults, could we hold it there. The guy working there gladly agreed and actually wants to be in the club. A lot of people have asked Heather and me if they can practice speaking English with us. They would like to get better at speaking English, but don't have anyone to talk to. So if we get everyone in the same place at the same time, we can have conversations in English, and they can practice.

From the library, I went to the highschool to ask if I could do a world map there. The director was really enthusiastic about it, and I asked if I could work with a teacher, like a geography or math teacher. The geography teacher was in the office when I asked, and he was excited too. And the highschool has a huge, smooth, blank wall that would be perfect. This map is gonna be huge.

After the highschool, I went to the hardware store to inquire about the price of paint. It turns out that it's not too much, I may even pay for all of it myself. But after you count buying brushes and stuff, it could get expensive, and I don't know yet how I can subsidize the cost. Maybe I could ask the school if they could help or even ask the students to each chip in a bit. Ironically, at the hardware store I met the guy who helped a previous volunteer paint a world map on an elementary school a few years ago. I asked him where he lived and he said “do you know where EPP Watuwa is?” It's an elementary school in town, yeah, I know where it is. “Just go around there and ask where the rasta mon lives, they'll tell you.” So I'm gonna try to be friends with that guy.

All of this stuff happened today, and it's not even noon yet. Life out here is completely unpredictable.

Also, earlier this week Heather and I went to CEG Ville I (the other middle school) and asked about starting a club. We asked the director to get together 40 of his most motivated kids, 20 girls and 20 boys. We don't really know what direction this club is going in, but she's a health volunteer, and I'm a Girls Education volunteer, so health, nutrition, etc and gender equity will definitely be on the agenda. And we figure if we get 40 motivated students in the same room and ask them “What do you want to learn about?” we'll get somewhere. Ask them what projects they're interested in, what problems they're having, and what they want more of that they're not getting enough of and we can supplement that.

And last week a guy from an NGO called ADIFF, whose goals are exactly the same as the Peace Corps GEE program, came from Sokodé to visit me in Tchamba. He took me around to the 4 different elementary schools that his NGO sponsors and introduced me to all the kiddies. Sometimes when people introduce me, I feel like they slightly misrepresent me, but I don't have the french to correct them in their subtleties. But Français introduced me to the kids exactly as I would have, had I the ability. And he made sure to tell them to call me “Akilou” instead of “anasara”or “blanc”. ADIFF sponsors certain kids who wouldn't otherwise be able to afford school dues, notebooks, or uniforms. And they hold extra study sessions two days a week for the kids that they sponsor. So I think tomorrow (which will be yesterday by the time I post this) I will go to one of the schools and greet the kids again and sit in on one of the study sessions.

And Milo is doing well. I can tell he's getting bigger because he can't hide in the little places he used to be able to. And he spends a lot of time in my mango tree out front. He hasn't killed any vertibrates yet (mice, lizards, birds) but he's been feasting on insects and spiders. I guess he'll just have to hunt the little stuff until he levels up and can kill bigger, faster things.

So things have been going well, but that's not to say I'm not missing America a ton. The other day I realized how invaluable drive-thrus are. Not that I even used them that often, but just the idea of getting absolutely anything you want, steaming hot or freezing cold, without having to cook it, or go find someone selling it, or waiting for it to be in season made me long to be in the United States. Then I tell myself stuff like, people have lived this way for all of human existance save for the last century or so; I don't need a drive-thru. Aw, but man, they're so nice to have...

The answer to life, the universe, and everything

2009-02-09T04:26:00.000-08:00

I believe that the key to life is moderation in all things, even moderation itself. Without the harsh bite of a winter wind biting your ears and nose, you could never appreciate a soft breeze in May. Without ever having your heart broken, you can never truly fall in love. If you've never been hungry, you don't really know what a full belly is. Without pain there is no pleasure.

I believe that the key to life is finding a balance. A balance between being extremely rich and poverty stricken, between being over-stressed and over-relaxed, too connected and too isolated.

I believe that every aspect of life can be set at a perfect value called “enough”. It's located precisely between “too much” and “not enough”. But therein lies the trick. Without ever fiinding yourself surrounded by too much or not enough you don't know where to find that happy spot in the middle. And even if you do find that spot perchance, you wouldn't know how to appreciate it, not fully at least.

This is where finding moderation within moderation comes in. Without ever pushing the limits, you don't know where the middle is. If you only stay in the middle your whole life, you'll miss the point. It's necessary to first find the extremes, then happily settle in the middle. It's necessary to experience extreme loniness and to feel over-crowded. It's necessary to be dirt-broke and to have more money than you know what to do with before you can appreciate and be happy with having exactly “enough”.

I do concede that there are no constants when it comes to that perfect value somewhere in the middle. The perfect value undoubetedly varies from person to person, and I hold that that perfect place can even vary within one individual over time.

So I guess there's nothing left to do but get on with it. I'm off to find every extreme in every facet of life, and then to settle down happily in the middle. It's going to be an adventure. I'll let you know how it turns out.

i couldn't make this stuff up

2009-02-09T04:23:00.001-08:00

4 February

So over the last couple of days people have been saying some great stuff to me. Here are some clips.

While eating lunch. Enter two girls wearing some nice dresses. One of the guys I'm eating with says to me (in English): “Ah, yes. The African girls. You are wanting to send one home?”

In a tchouck stand (think grass hut with people drinking beer-ish stuff [tchouck] out of half-cocoanuts [calabashes]) Monsieur Walla, as he told me to call him, and I are discussing life in general. After a long conversation and two calabashes of tchouck he concludes with: “Les belles femmes sont tres dangereus”

And last but far from least. This one goes out to Dave, Eric, and those Canadian kids we met in Prague.

Guy: “Tu viens de où?”
me: “America”
guy: “you are coming from America?”
me: “yes”
guy: “you are an American man?”
me: “yes”
guy: “you are coming from Washington?”
me: “no”
guy: “Chicago?”
me: “no”
guy: “Los Angeles?”
me: “no”
guy: “Canada?”

Yep... America's hat.

Et le travail?

2009-02-09T04:16:00.000-08:00

Written 1 February

Last week was my best week at post to-date. I was busy every day and now I have three different project ideas.

The first project idea came about after talking to a guy who stopped by my house. He has worked with Peace Corps volunteers in the past and wanted to meet me and see if he could help with any projects I wanted to do. But through talking with him I realized that I have no idea what kinds of problems the girls of Tchamba actually face. I went to the highschool a few weeks back and asked for the enrollment breakdown: how many girls/guys are in each class. I found out that only 14% of the highschool students are girls and there are only 11 in their final year out of 91 total.

So my idea (well, I can hardly call it my idea because it's nothing new) is to start a girls' club. I figure I would invite some or all (haven't decided yet) of the girls enrolled in highschool to come hang out for a bit one day a week. We can play games, or they can bring homework, maybe I could teach a life skills lesson or two. I'll just ask them “hey, what do you you wanna do for the afternoon?” But through this club I can get to know them individually and start to ask questions that get at why there are only 11 girls about to graduate. After the problems are diagnosed, I can then start to take the necessary steps to alleviate said problems. Then, I took it a step further. Maybe in a year or two I can get the girls from my club to go back to whatever elementary school they attended and start their own girls' club as kind of a role model. This may not end up working out anything like this, but it's a spark, and it's exactly what I needed to get some stuff started.

Also, Emily, who lives in Wasarabo about 35 kilometers away, and I were talking about doing a project together. We both want to get some kids to paint a world map on the side of a building. The way it works is you take a map of the world printed on graph paper, and transfer each square individually onto a much bigger graph on a wall. And there are a ton of ways to spin it: I could illustrate the math behind it: longitude, latitude, the difference in scale between the paper, the wall, and the actual planet; or I could talk about the different geographical regions meteorologically or politically or whatever. Anyway, Emily and I figured we'd buy a bunch of paint together and I'd visit her village to help her get this project off the ground, and then she'd visit here and we'd do the same, learning from our mistakes the first time around.

And this last project idea is not my idea at all, but it's the one I'm the most excited about. Last week I met a guy at the internet cafe, and then earlier this week, he called me and invited me over his house. He said that he talked about this with a previous volunteer, but his service ended before they could get it off the ground. This guy, Kougbada, is a teacher at an elementary school. He wants to start a computer lab. He has a room, kind of like a shed in his compound but with an external door. He wants to try to get 10 computers to get students to learn how to use them. What he doesn't know is where to get funding or where to buy them and the technical stuff like that, which is what I can help him with. I figured if we get a computer lab up and running within a year, I can spend a second year teaching a computer literacy course. Stuff like how to type, how to use a word processor (bold, italics, indenting, fonts and sizes, etc...), how to do a google search or if I'm feeling really ambitious how to use stuff like excel. I know some other volunteers who have done computer literacy courses and they said you have to start at the beginning. The very beginning. Things like how to double click, what a folder is, what “delete” means.

Kougbada is a really intelligent guy. He invited me back to his house for lunch to which I went earlier this afternoon. He speaks really good English, and our conversation was about the American credit crisis and how much change I thought Obama is really going to bring. And stuff like how the grammar structure of English is Germanic but the vocabulary is very Latin-based. It was really nice to not only be able to speak English past “How are you? I am going to the market.” but to be intellectually stimulated and challenged. Hell, even if this computer lab thing falls through, at least I have a guy I can hang out with and talk about some stuff I normally can't talk about.

On a completely different note, I've been feeling great. I'm not sick or losing a ton of weight or anything like that. Although, my left big-toe nail has turned black for some reason... Meh... C'est comme ca.

a cat, a disease, and 130 girls...

2009-01-07T02:53:00.000-08:00

So i woke up one morning with a scrape on my forehead. I thought it was weird because i didnt remember falling or hidding my head on anything the night before, but oh well. it took a long time to heal and when it scabbed over, it was kind of yellow and crusty. Then a few days later i had another one on my chin and a day after that i had a big one on my cheek. they were all crusting over with this yellow junk, like something you'd find oozing out of your eye after getting pink eye. gross. so i called the med unit and Paula told me i had impetigo. she told me the name of an antibiotic, so i rode my bike over the the hospital and bought 40 pills for the equivilent of about a buck fifty. The gross sores went away after a few days and i look normal again. well, as normal as i've ever looked.

Also, there are now two of us living in my house. i got a little kitty. he is so cute: mostly white with a brown patch on his head and back, and he has three black stripes at the end of his tail. i named him Milo, and i informed him that it is his duty to catch any and all mice that come into the house, also, if he feels like eating a spider or cricket along the way, i wont mind at all.

And here is a story from yesterday morning. So my homologue has been MIA for the last couple of weeks. so i went to his house and told him i was bored and needed something to do, could i go do something with him. he said that he was going into Sokodé tomorrow and he will not be back for a week. he said that he had meetings to attend with the NGO that he works for, PLAN. i asked if i could go to one of his meetings and he said that i wouldnt be interested and that it would be just a bunch of other NGOs talking about boring stuff.

So i decided, fine, i need something to do this week, i cant just sit around and do nothing. so the next morning i went to a school and asked to meet the director (think principal). I chatted with a math teacher for a bit and he told me that the director wasnt in, that i should come back tomorrow morning.

so, yesterday morning, i returned to the school and introduced myself to the director. i told him that i work for the Peace Corps and i told him about the GEE program. he must have had stuff to do, because he directed me to talk to the woman standing next to him. she is the french teacher at the school. so i had the same conversation with her: name, Peace Corps, GEE, etc. She asked me if i wanted to talk to the girls, i said "sure" not fully understanding the question. so she told me to sit in this chair, and that she would be back. i waited in the room for about 10 or 15 minutes while the director and a few of the teachers had what looked like a daily meeting, going over paperwork and stuff. after a bit, the french teacher came back in and said "follow me". so i followed her across campus into another room empty, aside from 30 desks (i counted, 5 rows back, 6 columns across). i didnt really know what was about to happen, but all of a sudden a bunch of girls started coming through the door.

They filed in and started sitting three to a desk, and after the desks filled (5 rows, 6 columns, 3 girls each...90), they started lining up against the back wall (i counted 2, 4, 6... 40-- that's 130, every girl in the school). after everyone was in the room, the teacher turned to me and said "ok, what do you have to tell them?" oh, geeze, i thought, i started to panic. but then i collected myself and started to introduce myself. i said my name, that i worked with the Peace Corps and i started to tell them about the GEE program. When i finished my little soliloquy, i was somewhat proud of myself. yeah, that's right, i just said all of that in French. i had just enough time to reflect before the room erupted in laughter.

i looked at the French teacher, somewhat confused. She had a "dont worry about it" expression on her face and turned to the class and started to say exactly what i had just said. it took me until about half way through listening to my own impromptu speach before i figured it out. The french teacher was translating from an American trying to speak bad African French, to an African speaking good African French. after she finished the class was much more receptive and she turned to me and asked if i had anyting else to say. I told them that if they had any problems, or if they wanted to start a club or activity, to come talk to me. i live over in the Medina section of town, just ask where the Anasara (white guy) lives, and someone will show you to my house. they liked that little joke, and this time they were laughing with me instead of at me.

So the teacher dismissed them all back to their respective classrooms, and walked with me back to the director. This is actually when i found out she taught french, and i promptly apologized for slaughtering the language. When we got back, we met with the director, and i told him if he wanted me to help out with anything at the school, just let me know. i left them with a phone number and a hand shake, and rode my bike home pretty proud of myself.

on a completely different note, because i've had very little to do, i have been reading a lot. i'm about 150 pages into Obama's "Dreams from my father" and so far i think that im well on my way to becoming the president of the United States of America. let's see, i will be 35 in 2020 and i think that's an election year. i guess i should start campaigning as soon as i get back :-)

2008-12-31T06:20:00.000-08:00

i want to update my blog, but i want to put a ton on energy into it and i dont have the time to right now. AND the internet in tchamba stopped working indefinitely, so i dont know when the next time i will be able to use the internet will be. but im keeping a list of things i want to include and when i get around to it? i will edit this post and replace it with all of the wonderful things i have to say about Togo. until then.

oh also, i want to see how many cities in Togo i can update my blog from. so far i have Kpalimé, Lomé, Tchamba, and right now im in Sokodé. thats 4 cities in 3 regions, hopefully i will be able to hit all 5 regions.

always, sometimes, never

2008-12-15T07:18:00.001-08:00

so to help give you a sense of what a slice of life is like in this place, i've compiled a list of things that i see every day, once a week, and things i've yet to see in Togo.

everyday:

somebody peeing (male of female)
a naked kid
a child bathing from a bucket, usually with assistance from at least one other person. family member? who knows.
somebody breastfeeding
an entire family on a moto (i've seen as many as 5 people)
a child - who in the united states would not be trusted with a pair of scissors - with a machete
somebody carrying something that would otherwise be transported in the back of a pickup truck on their head. including but not limited to: a mattress, a chainsaw, a bench, a large bag (100 pounds) of charcoal

weekly

somebody pooping (usually only men)
many goats strapped to the roofrack of a bush taxi
three or more people on a bike
rocks in my food
somebody come within inches of an accident, usually involving a car, moto, bike, or all three
an todler with an infant strapped to her (always her) back
a child walking down the middle of the street crying as hard as s/he can with no adults in sight

things i've never seen

someone wearing a seatbelt
a working speedometer
someone with a bike helmet... actually anything safety related
a dog on a leash
a trashcan (everything is literally just thrown on the ground)

i can tell that my time here is going to be an eternity within a heartbeat - bigger on the inside than it is on the outside (see Danielwski 2002). Every day here i am going to think things like "it's only noon?! ive been up for hours and hours" or "that happened this morning? i thought that was last week". but at the same time i know i will sometimes thing "oh geeze, it's march already" or "wow. i COS next week. where did the last two years go?". time on a small scale is giong to drag along, but time on a larger scale is going to fly by. i am giong to try to appreciate every second spent here, no matter how lonely, painful, or boring it may be because i know one day i will miss it. it reminds me of the inscription on the clock in the court at King's "days can be long, but life can be short..."

every new begining comes from some other begining's end

2008-12-03T02:36:00.000-08:00

...and I am officially done with Peace Corps training. Here I am in Lomé, tomorrow i will be swearing-in and i will be an official PCV. Training was great, but at the same time i am kind of sad to be leaving. my host family was so welcoming and i am really going to miss my host brother François. But i will be nice to live on my own and cook my own food and go wherever i want without having to explain what i'm doing in broken french.

so according to the language evaluations i am no better at french than when i got off the plane. but i know this is not true because i can express myself way better than when i first met my host family. This can only mean that the way in which they measure our progress is flawed in some way.

so much has happened since the last time i was around a computer. first of all, a new restaurant opened up in our training village. a few of us went to the grand opening. they had people dancing and lip-synching and stuff like that. then out of no where they asked all of the peace corps people to come up on stage. they thanked us and said that they appreciated the work that we are doing for Togo and stuff. Before we knew it, we were naming the new restaurant. "Obamania". for real. The guy is not even president yet and they're already naming restraunts after him... in OTHER countries. There is one little caveat to this story though. we didnt just pick this name out of thin air. they gave us two choices and we got to vote on which one we liked better. our choices were the one we picked, or just "Obama"... I think we made the right decision.

Also, since post visit training has been really relaxed. we've done stuff like "soy transformation" which is making tofu from soy beans. we did everything- soaked them, took them to the miller to be milled, boiled the stuff, skimmed stuff off of the top, strained it.... it's a much more complicated process than i thought. we also learned how to make soap and lotion. the purpose of learning this stuff is so we can teach our villagers and they can use this as an income generating activity. so if a girl doesnt have the money to pay for school, during breaks and stuff she can make lotion and sell it at the market.

we also went on a field trip up to the Kara region of Togo. it was a three day trip and we stopped at various places along the way to see some of the projects that previous volunteers have started. we also visited a few NGOs and got to ask them about their work and stuff. It was a great trip, but honestly the best part was kickin out the jams on my ipod and cruising down the route nationale. on top of that, we got to sleep on some real mattresses that were more than a few inches thick and we could actually take hot showers!

i think about everyone all the time, so many things happen here that reminds me of someone at home. i seriously think about you guys many times a day... here are some "for instance"s off the top of my head.

Rich and Sean- you guys have never seen a game of Hoop-n-Stick played until you've seen a togolese kid play. They are amazing at it. although they don't play the colonial version of a wooden hoop, they play the post industrial version which includes a moto tire. i've seen kids sprint up a bumpy hill and make a 90 degree turn to cross a little bridge less than a foot wide over a ditch on the side of the road and through a shop door.... what!?

Nolan- dude, british english makes so much more sense if you look at it from the perspective of french. things like the word torch (the french word for flashlight is torche) and the word queue, and all of those extra "u"s stuck all over the place like colour or flavour. there are many more examples but i just cant think of them right now.

Nicole- you'll never guess what grows all over the place down here. mimosa. i blew everyone's mind (a bit of an over statement) when i touched the leaves and made it close up. the next time i find one around, i'm going to put it in a pot and keep it in my house and raise it in the memory of the one you bought me...rest in peace.

my next post will be from Tchamba. thank you all for commenting on this thing, i love knowing that youre reading this. also, thank you to EVERYONE who has sent me mail. i'm many weeks behind, so the stuff you sent many weeks ago, i should be getting soon. thank you all for your support. i'm out.

Bienvenue a Tchamba

2008-11-03T03:04:00.000-08:00

Yesterday was my first day at my post. This week is post visit. Tami, who is the volunteer i am replacing, just left this morning. Now the only two white people in the city are me and Heather who is a CHAP (community health and aids prevention) volunteer.

my opinion of this place? awesome. i am very happy with this small city. my house is georgous and i have a little court yard and a front porch and stuff. i have a huge living room, a huge bedroom, a huge bedroom with a proper shower and a flush toilet, i even have a guest bedroom. how friggen sweet is that? i cannot wait to have visitors, whether they are from the US or from other villages.

Affo is the name of my homologue. his role is to help me get stuff done. if i want to start a club or something, i talk to my boy Affo and he helps sort me out. yesterday he took me all around the city to meet different people such as the gendarmes, the police, the chief etc. This morning, before tami left, she took me to the big school (seriously, its huge) and introduced me to some important people. word is going around the village that i am replacing tami and that she is skipping town back to the US.

i am so friggen excited to start my service. at the end of this week i have to get myself back to the training village, Agou, which is about 4 or 5 hours away for the last 5 weeks of training. honestly, i dont want to. i want to stay here and start making friends around the village and hang out in the bar and go to the school and talk to the kids and chill in my belle maison.

i will take pictures of my house and around town and maybe they will make it to the internet. but it is extremely slow and they may never make it onto the internet. the internet cafe i am in right now is about a 5 minute walk from my house and its pretty cheap, so i will definitely have regular internet access.

also, i talked to nicole on the phone yesterday and she has not recieved the letter that i sent a while ago, nor any letter since then. ive written many letters since ive been here and one might be on its way to you, just be patient. yesterday i got a letter from sarah which she sent on september 9th.

i cant tell myself this enough: this is going to be a 27 month lesson in patience.

also:
"In the Harry Potter universe this is the hometown of the Quidditch team the Tchamba Charmers" -wikipedia... really?
and you can bet that i will be all over this wiki page by the time i leave...

Togo: where everyone's second language is French

2008-10-18T02:44:00.002-07:00

whovever said everything is bigger in Texas has never been to Africa. this keyboard is different and really hard to type on...excuse the typos.

first of all; i have had to redefine so many things here. the whole concept of a "household" has been completely thrown out the window. i have people walking through my compound who i have never seen before and my host brother tries to tell me that theyre related to him somehow. i would love to describe my living conditions vividly but alas; this keyboard is killing me.

the biggest adjustment is definitely the language. i'm used to learning things pretty quickly but it feels like i've been here forever already, which makes it feel like i'm learning very slowly. i have good days and bad days. some mornings i wake up and dont feel like going to class, but after i get there, my mood flips right around and i feel great. other days the opposite is true. peaks and valleys. that's what i keep telling myself. today is a valley, but tomorrow will be a peak.

another adjustment is the time. it moves so differently here. some weeks creep by and others are gone before i know it. also, the days feel longer than the weeks sometimes. it's hard to explain.

2 of the GEE volunteers have ETed already. it was kind of a downer as far as the morale of the group goes but weve bounced back since then. one of the two who left was sanjay who was one of my favorite people here, it was great having him around and he will be missed.

please take some time out of your day and send some mail. you have no idea how much one little letter can make my day. send a newspaper or a newsweek or something because is sparse out here. were lucky if we can find a radio station in english with the news.

and i officially know where i will be living for the next two years. the "city" is called Tchamba. it is described as a big village or a very small city. apparently my house is really nice too. the week after next is our post visit so i will be living in Tchamba for that week. if there is internet there, which i heard there is, maybe my next post will be from my there.

some personal shout-outs:

Nicole: i get your skype texts so keep sending them, i reply but i'm assuming im wasting my money and youre not getting them.

Rich: the computers in the internet cafe use ubuntu

sean and nicole: i have been thinking about the sapir-wharf hypothesis a lot lately. how about this, in French, "again", "still", and "yet" are the same word - "encore" which is very frustrating.

Staging

2008-09-18T13:52:00.001-07:00

As I was reading about all of the things I should expect from the Peace Corps, details about staging were something I haven't read much about. Staging is a seminar-like event. There are two groups here at the Hotel in Philly. One group is going to Cameroon and the other to Togo. Cameroon group is rolling about 30 deep, and there are 31 of us Togolese volunteers. Within the Togo group are those of us doing Girls' Education and Empowerment and others doing Natural Resource Management. Everyone is about the same age, 23 +/- a year or two, and it seems to be split pretty evenly between men and women. We've played games and did little skits after learning all of the rules of the Peace Corps and learning about what we should expect and how to handle certain situations. I feel like I've really gotten to know a few of the other people... more so than I thought I would. People are literally from all over the country and even the world. Just about all of us have at least traveled to other countries, some people have lived elsewhere for long periods of time.

Tonight most of us are going out to dinner at a restraunt here in center city. Everyone seems to be on the same page and I can tell that we will all support each other through some of the tough experiences we will find ourselves in.

Tomorrow we get to be stuck with needles, eat lunch, and then we get shuttled off to the airport. Tomorrow will be a long day. This may be one of the last times I have both access to the internet and freetime to write in the blog so you may not hear from me for a while.

The Ship's Manifest

2008-09-09T16:31:00.000-07:00

Nolan was telling me about when he was doing research for a class on Jamaica during its colonization. He said that he was reading the manifests of the ships that were sailing across the Atlantic and that the settlers brought some of the most ridiculous things with them to the Caribbean. Things such as wool coats and church pews were all included in the manifests. This is a little bit like how I feel right now. I'm packing my bags to journey across the Atlantic and I don't know if what I'm bringing is appropriate. I guess this is as close to feeling like I'm going to settle a new world as anyone ever gets these days. I have no idea if I am over or under-packing. Here is everything that I've packed so far and I shouldn't be be adding too much more to this list. In no particular order:

stuff:
pens, 2 notebooks, envelopes, 3 books of stamps, scotch tape, scissors, journal, 1 combo and 1 key lock, "where there is no doctor" a medical field guide (thanks Nolan), "Moby Dick", 3 bars of soap, 3 sticks of deodorant, 3 toothbrushes, toothpaste, razor and a dozen disposable blades, shaving cream, hand sanitizer, 10 rolls of film, batteries - 10AAA - 16AA, crank flashlight, battery flashlight, book light, twine, clothes pins, seeds (tomato, cucumber, radish, etc..), duct tape, safety pins, sewing kit, 2 Nalgene bottles, french press coffee maker, sunscreen, daily vitamins, bugspray, ibproffin, sunglasses, mess kit, binoculars (not forgetting these like I did going to Scotland), day pack, crank radio, weekly planner, address book, extra watch, stationary (thanks Katelynn), backgammon (thanks Kevin), cameras (35mm and digital), sleeping bag, pillow case, bed sheets, calculator, 4 bandanas, pictures of loved ones, photoalbum/scrapbook (thanks Nicole), international power adaptor, iPod charger (wall and car), tons of bubble gum and blowing bubbles (to give to my host family's kids), a mirror, shampoo, small first aid kit, multi-tool, penknife, koolaid, oldbay seasoning

clothing:
underwear (all of them), socks (all of them), pajama pants, undershirts (6), waterproof trousers, bathing suit, polo shirts (4), button down shirts (4), one tie, waterproof "yacket" (thanks again Nolan), 4 pair of pants (three of which zip off giving me...), 3 pair of shorts, dress shoes, boot-ish type shoes, sandals, light blanket, towel, hoodie

This packing list seems completely reasonable to me now, but in hindsight it may seem somewhat ridiculous. Ideally I should have a use for everything on the list and never have to think "Ah, you know what I should have brought..." I guess I'll let you know when I think to myself "Why did I pack this?". We're down to only 8 days until I leave.

the next chapter

2008-08-14T08:04:00.000-07:00

So, I should be leaving for Togo in just over a month. I'll be going with the Peace Corps to work in a Girls' Education and Empowerment program, but if you're reading this, you probably already know that. The reason I'm starting this blog is to document my life while i'm living there. Hopefully, i'll have internet access from time to time, like when (if) i get to travel into lome every once in a while, but i honestly have no idea what to expect.