A Couple More Party Pictures

Here's that little girl in the fashion show I mentioned and another of guys playing the tam tams.

The Hot Season Begins...

Sorry it’s been so long, but we’re still here! First of all, here are some pictures from a party we went to recently. The association of seamstresses and tailors that we’re working with got together for two big parties, on two different Saturdays, with all of the other seamstresses and tailors in the villages in our prefecture. During the parties, the apprentices did sketches (a favorite Togolese pastime!) of dances, songs, and theatre performances. They even had a comedian and a fashion show. All the sketches were in local language, but many of them were acted out so it was easy to figure out what was going on. There were traditional dances, a couple of which there are pictures of here, and then some not so traditional sketches: like a rap song complete with boys in sunglasses and baggy pants, an interpretive dance to show that a boy who helps with the laundry will end up getting the girl, and a girl who lip-synched and danced to a song from a pop culture artist. In another sketch, girls sang songs about being seamstresses and waved around scissors and measuring tapes as props, while in another, a group of men dressed in ridiculous clothes and pretended to play giant fake instruments at the behest of their “conductor.” During the fashion shows, the girls kept completely straight faces despite all of the catcalling and whistling, a behavior we found most impressive in a little girl who was probably no more than six years old and participated with all the teenage girls (see her picture here). To donate to various groups, people would get up and drop coins in a bowl during the performances, or, if the sketch was particularly good, stick the coins on the foreheads of the performers.

After the sketches, people broke off into various groups for picnics, during one of which we got to eat with all the notables in attendance, including the chief of the canton. The fare included two different kinds of rice and sauce, something that resembled stew with lots of vegetables, and pâte rouge (a version of a standard Togolese dish made from pounded corn, except made red from tomato sauce). There were some identifiable pieces of beef in some of the dishes, along with some unidentifiable pieces that were likely organ meat. So much food! After our meal with the notables, we managed to eat a little more with a family we’ve become friends with in our village; they served up standard pâte with fish and peanut sauce.

After the sketches and meals, there were soccer games: one for boys and one for girls on the first Saturday, and girls versus girls from other villages on the second Saturday. Our girls’ team won against another village on that second day because of an opportunity they got to take a penalty shot. Go Team Tabligbo!

So, in addition to work (description coming next!), we’ve also had some time recently to play, occasions I think have helped us with our PC goal of integrating into our communities. It also gave us a chance to dress in traditional Togolese clothes (made by our seamstress friend) in a public setting, a practice that always gets a positive reaction from the locals.

On to work. The catalog for Schalom is finally finished, and although it doesn’t look quite like I pictured it originally, the printer did a pretty good job turning my file into a finished product. Several copies of it are on their way to Rick in the mail, and we’ve asked him to show them around to our friends and families. Let us know what you think! Also with Schalom, I’ve just passed the halfway point in my ten classes with the apprentice peer educators (six classes done, four to go). We’ve done classes on malaria, HIV/AIDS, and family planning so far, and they’ll be performing sketches for the other apprentices to demonstrate what they’ve learned and take their final tests in the next couple of weeks. I’ll post pictures of their sketches and the final day of class in our next blog. My French is still not great, and neither is theirs (kind of like the blind leading the blind!), but we’re muddling through the subjects, and I’ve had a new homologue I’ve been working with to help with the last two classes, so things have been a little clearer for them lately because he translates the more complicated discussions into local language.

Joe has continued his work with elevage (animal breeding) that he’s doing with three different groups now: chickens with one, chickens and turkeys with another, and rabbits and guinea pigs with the last one. For the chicken farm, he facilitated a loan through the local microfinance so the group can buy more eggs and baby chickens to replace the ones they lost to avian flu. 400 baby chickens arrived on February 24! For the chicken and turkey farm, he’s working with a Ghanaian kid and his dad on advertising, accounting and bookkeeping, and the search for an incubator for turkey eggs. Joe spent several Saturdays in a row helping build rabbit cages for the last elevage guy, and those are finally finished. He also created an accounting book for that guy to track his sales, purchases, and costs.

We’re still working with the local village development committee, and after our recent trip to a PC conference up north where our homologues learned about how to create a project plan, we think the committee is ready to write up a proposal to ask for funds from the American embassy in Lomé for the first phase of the project they asked us for help with during our first few weeks in village: latrines at six of the primary schools in Tabligbo, to be followed by two more phases of six each, if all goes well. The committee also recently wrote a proposal to a local NGO to get equipment for the hospital, which is sadly lacking. We’re also working with the small village where the rabbit elevage guy lives to get them to create their own development committee because they want to install a water pump in their village. They recently got electricity wired there, and that was a pretty exciting development. They’re also working on a proposal to the embassy to help fund their water pump project.

The PC Partnership proposal to order supplies and create a health clinic in the village with the chicken farm is partially written; we’re waiting for a list of supplies and prices and also for the group to clean out the remains of baby chickens in the building they’re donating to become the health clinic. If we can submit the proposal in the next couple of months, the actual construction of walls and ordering of supplies might happen this summer. Patience is what I’m learning (or trying to, anyway!).

Another project that Joe started recently is his work with making soy milk. After about six or seven afternoons of trying different recipes and measurements of sugar, he’s finally found what he thinks is the right one to make it taste right. His plan is to teach some local people how to make it and sell it in sachets (little bags), like several other vendors who sell water, juice, and lemonade on market days. His plan is to call it Yovolait (roughly translated, “white person milk”) instead of the standard lait du soja (soy milk). It’s a designation that many people might be familiar with, since the moringa tree that a lot of volunteers work with and promote because of its abundance of vitamins is often called Yovoviti in local language, which translates to something like “white person vitamin tree.”

After about one short week of windy, dusty, non-humid weather (otherwise known as Harmattan), we had one crazy night with a huge thunderstorm to usher in the hot season, which recently started and should last a couple of months before it cools off again in May. Temperatures in the last couple of weeks have been around 100 degrees; in addition to that fact is the fact that water and electricity go out a lot more during the hot season. Sometimes, the electricity will be good for a couple of weeks at a time, and other times it will go out several times in one day and the water will go out for 12-14 hours. We’ve heard that the water can go out for several days, but thankfully, that hasn’t happened to us yet.

In other developments, after eight months in Togo and not liking Togolese food, Joe has finally found two dishes he likes! The first is the aforementioned pâte rouge, and the other is another form of pâte that’s fermented in the corn husk, called something that sounds like “comb,” although we’re not sure how to spell that one. According to Joe, it tastes kind of like a tamale without the meat. Me, I’m still partial to fufu (pounded yams) and plain old rice and beans.

We’re doing fine and feeling healthy, work is going all right, and our cat and dog are getting along quite well. Awooyo is a good watchdog and Elliott is good at catching (if not completely killing) cockroaches, so they’re both earning their keep here. All is well chez nous in Tabligbo, and we’ll be back in touch soon. Hope all is well at home, and that spring comes soon for you! To close out this blog, here’s a Togolese proverb we thought you might like: Nɔvitikplɔ me ŋena o (phonetically, that’s noviteek blow may nyayna o), and in English, “nothing can break family links.” Another is: Edɔ enye ame (phonetically, that’s edoh enyay amay), which in English means “work gives life value.”

More Good Spiders!

Here are a couple shots that we promised awhile ago (sorry it took so long, D!). The first one was the one Joe took out with the machete because he was afraid the broom wouldn't kill him! Pretty, no?

Happy Christmas and New Year!

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year! Joe and I spent Christmas “up north” this year visiting one of our PCV friends and having a little PCV Christmas party, the only version of a white Christmas we can get here in Togo (I know, what a lame joke, right?!). We managed to make it feel like Christmas despite our lack of snow, however. We played Christmas music, made Christmas decorations, and even made homemade egg nog (thanks to M – that was good stuff, man!). The usual Christmas fare was traded in for beef kabobs, chicken, rice, and hummus made from black-eyed beans, all of which turned out really well. Celebrated my dreaded birthday up there, too, and managed not to let it get me down too much. I guess I’m officially on par with the rest of my friends back home now, but feel pretty old sometimes here in Togo with all my 23-year-old PCV friends…

North of Kara, the big city up there, Togo is like a completely different country, at least now, during Harmattan. It’s mountainous, insanely dry (the air dries up your whole head, there’s zero humidity, and everything is brown), and it’s almost like fall weather in Michigan in the mornings and evenings – refreshingly cool. Wore my hair down for the first time in months up there! The dust is pretty crazy, though; there’s a haze over the sky and in the air, which made me think either someone was burning stuff or that my glasses were really dirty when we first got there. Quite a change from the flat, green, comparatively swampy-feeling air we have down in the Maritime region. Come February and March, though, the heat up there is supposed to be much worse than where we live in the south, so we’ll see who really has the best overall post weather-wise when we have to deal with the “real” hot season. Yikes.

Yesterday, on our way home from up north, our bus blew a tire, which also somehow affected the air suspension (brakes) and the battery, so we had to hang out on the side of the road for a couple of hours while they changed the tire, backed the brakes off, and recharged the battery. Might have taken a lot longer, but Joe came to the rescue and helped the bus mechanic with the brakes. Being a mechanic for 15 years paid off yesterday, as we were on our way a lot sooner than we might have been! Here are a couple of photos of Joe saving the day, too!

Things have been kind of slow for the past few weeks in regards to work; everything seems to be shutting down for the holidays: our village development committee meetings, school for the peer educators, etc. I’m supposed to pick up my work with them again January 12, so it looks like they get a little Christmas break from school, same as we do. The catalog for Schalom is almost finished and should be able to be printed very soon. I’ll be sure to send a couple copies home for those who are interested in their products. There are lots of versions of the tote bags now, along with some clothes and household items that I got them to add in (placemats, table cloths, things like that), so hopefully the variety of things will help with their plans for exporting outside of Togo. Joe is still building bunny cages and is now helping a new elevage enterprise with their chickens and turkeys. We’re also moving forward a little with the latrine project; we had the meeting with the school inspector that we’ve been trying to have for months, so that was a step in the right direction. Also, we’ve done a little more on the case de santé (health clinic) project and are writing up the proposal to get that funded through a mechanism called Peace Corps Partnership, where we ask friends and family to donate to our village projects via the Peace Corps web site. This is a pretty small project, compared to many, and we think it’s a good one to start with as far as being the first thing we’re trying to get funding for. The association that has initiated the project has found an infermier (nurse) to come from Lomé and live for two years in Tabligbo to run the clinic and train a woman in the village to become a sage femme (a little lower than a nurse, but higher than a birthing attendant in the health hierarchy here in Togo). The plan is for her to take over the clinic after the two years is up, with help from the association for financial and bookkeeping activities. We’ll keep you updated as this project moves along.

We hope everyone back home had a good Christmas and that you have a great start to 2009. More from Togo soon!

A photo of the "Tabligbo Cluster"

Here is a picture of the six of us in the Tabligbo cluster of Peace Corps volunteers. We all live within 20km of each other, and Joe and I live at the center of the cluster (and are the only ones with running water, electricity, and a pretty big market). The girl on the bottom right just finished her service this month and was replaced by another guy, but this was the cluster up until a couple of weeks ago.

We will be heading up north to celebrate Christmas with some fellow volunteers tomorrow, so will have some pictures of "up country" to post later this week.

Tabligbo Flowers

Here are a few pictures of the plant life (during the wet season!).

More Tabligbo Photos

Here are a few more pictures of our village to give you a better look at where we live.