Leaving Lokossa...or really hippos

As the title suggests, I will be leaving Lokossa on Sunday for my post, the tiny Fo-Bourée. I am excited and a wee bit nervous/rather freaked, but I think it's about time for our stage (training) to be over. Anyways, on another note - since I really don't have much more to say about that - Last week me, Rima and Lauren tried to go and see the hippos that live near Lokossa. To do this, we had to first leave around 5:30 and catch Zemis to the tiny village nearby. When we finally managed to find zemis - no one is up at 5:30 - the only ones we could find tried to charge us about ten times the price to get there. They saw of course that we are yovos (foreigners), and that there were clearly no other zems arround, so they figured they'd charge us a crazy price and we'd pay it. We got them don to only double the real price, and settled for that. We finally got to the village, and had to go and find the chief, who in turn had to go and find the person who would take us to see the hippos - all at about 5:45 AM, when it was still mostly dark out.When we were finally ready to get started, our sketchy Zemi drivers decided to follow us and the guide along the path to see the hippos. Ah well. The path was kind of its own little mini advernture. It was maybe three-fourths of a mile long, and was almost entirely made up of mid-calf deep mud, that was covered further by a layer of water from the torrential downpours of the night before - gotta love the rainy season! Not to mention that it is almpost certainly infested with hookworm... Anyways, we got to the lake where the hippos live, and the guide took us out in a dugout canoe, called a pirogue, (not to be confused with a pirogie, though wouldn't that be wonderful right now...). Basically as soon as I sat down, I was bitten by a tiny little bug that hurt more than I could possibly imagined from such a little thing. anyways, my whole knee swelled up, but it didn't spread to the rest of me, so I figured I was good to go. It was a stunning lake,



. we stayed on the lake for about an hour, maybe, didn't see any hippos, though we got to see their various haunts: where they eat at night, where they eat in the morning, and where they eat during the rest of the day. But, although we didn't actually see any hippos, it was still worht the trip, I'd say! Though the walk back through the mud was a bit of a downer, when there was no prospect of hippos to keep us going. But, its ok, since when we got back to the village, the chief brought out a basin of I'm sure pristine water, and our zem drivers washed our feet for us. We werre then treated to a nice early morning pick me up of sodabe (Beninese hard-liquer, think almost everclear. It's that good, and we were on our way home.... Later...

ok, I thought you might like to see me and some of the group in traditional clothing, so enjoy...

Back to work

We've been back in Lokossa for week or so, and have started our model school - basically a free school for stuents so we can practice teaching before we go to post. And I have to say, I am actually liking teaching so far, which is a relief, since if I didn't, I'd be in for a very long couple of years... The classes here are nothing like in the states, though, for example, I have about 50 kids in my class, and somehow it actually works. I'm not saying that kids here are that different from in the US, but put 50 American kids in one class - say about 6th grade, and keep them there for 3 hours teaching one subject, and you would have anarchy. I think. Maybe I'm mistaken, but I just don't see it happening Well, I've got to go, since I have class in a few minutes, but as I'm sure you can tell, my picture didn't load again, so you'll just have to wait to read some more bad English (or just reread some of my entries where I was particularly sloppy with my grammar). - As you can see, I got a few more pictures up, so no more problem....

This, by the way, is from our trip to Ouidah, the home of an infamous slave fort and a center for Voodoo> This is me in the python temple.... I was a wee bit terrified, but I have survived.




Ciao

Post Visit...

I am sitting in the PCV work station (a cool place to sleep, hang out, get fast internet, complete with a guard, fan ice and frozen pizza - not to mention dvds and player.... - and you can do work here- basically I am sitting in mini USA and am loving it)in Parakou right now, waiting with a couple of other stagaires to grab a bus back down to Lokossa. I have to say, I am glad I got to stop here after my post visit for a little break from the whole travel travel thing. It is nice to have seen it for future reference. Oh yeah, the post visit. to start off with, there really is no experience quite like a "bush taxi." You are crammed in a car with at least 8 other people and maybe a goat or duck or something, 18 fulani women,chickens, etc. and travel for hours with no bathroom break (I deffinitely think a kid peed on me to day)And lunch is served now so I may just call it quits for the time being.) But, I'll leave this post with a picture of the back of a CD I saw at my host families. note the english.

3 weeks down, 2 years 5 weeks to go

A couple of nights ago,I was greeted with a scene that, had it happened in the US, would have left me more than a little panicked. I had gotten up in the middle of the night to go to the latrine (which is outside, of course), and when I gt ouside, litterally the enitre ground was covered with cockaroches. There were hundreds of them, just covering the ground and all over the inside of the latrine as well. Considering that until that moment I had only seen one or 2 at a time here, I was rather taken aback, but somehow it wasn't quite as shocking as I would have expected. I asked my host-sister about it the next day and she said they had put poison out, so they were all dead by morning, but they were cretainly very much alive when I went out... Other than that, things qre going well here. I went to the marché with one of my other host-sisters on saturday, and bought a pagne and another good bit of fabric, which I al getting madeinto a shirt and a couple of skirts (all for about 10 US dollars. Class is long, but I'm sure it will all be proven useful whe I get to post... speaking of which, I'll find out where I'll be posted for the next 2 years sometime this week, so wish me luck...

a bunch of TEFL stagaires at a buvette

à Lokossa

ok, so my group, TEFL, is in Lokossa now, which is a lorge town of about 40,000 people near the southern border of Togo - I think we're only 7 miles away. I've been living with my host family, who are all really nice. We have basically been kept really busy here, and will be for the next 9 weeks or so of stage. Not much else to report, except I handwashed my cothes for the first time, which was really tiring, but worth it. My host family was excited it was the first time I hqd done this, so they offered to take a picture for me...but as it doesn't seem to be working with this internet connection, I guess you'll just have to wait. I hope you're not too dissappointed. It was a pretty awesome picture...

Je m’appelle Yovo

We’ve been in Cotonou for two days day now, and there is certainly one new word we all have down now – “yovo,” or foreigner. Whether we are taking our busses to another location, or walking down the street normally, everyone, men, women, children call out to us Yovo! I think the youngest one we got was maybe just 2 years old… It is not always a negative thing either. I mean, that little boy was incredibly adorable. He just kept waving to us and yelling yovo over and over again.

We’ve been meeting a lot of current volunteers, all of whom so far seem to really love their posts, and really love what they do. Granted they probably wouldn’t have volunteered to meet us new trainees or (“stagaires”) here in Cotonou if they were miserable in the Peace Corps, but still their enthusiasm for what they do really does make me feel much more confident in my decision. They all say their location is the best, whether they are in the north or south, urban or rural, which makes me less nervous about where I get placed. It seems work out for most, which is all I need to know. All the volunteers and other trainees I have met have been really cool and nice, and I think this will be a great 2 years… easy to say when you’re being pampered and living in a sort of hotel. Ciao!

Last night in the US...

Tonight I went out to dinner with some fellow trainees - I may or may not start calling them PCTs (Peace Corps Trainees) soon. One of the first things you learn about the Peace Corps during training, by the way, is that they LOVE to abbreviate everything! And for some reason, everything practically starts off with PC. You'd think they would be able to drop the PC since everything has it...but no. (after another long day of vaccinations and staging stuff - which basically consists of sitting in a conference room going over logistics and the like) We went out to a wonderful dinner at a Cuban restaurant, complete with ceviche, which was served on a plate with dry ice, and squash ravioli, and white pear sangria. Basically I was in heaven. Umm, so its late and we will be traveling for about 14.5 hours tomorrow, with about 9 hours in the airport (we totally win, though because the group from Mali that staying in our hotel has a 14 hour layover in Paris, where we have only 5. Anyways, good night!