February and March passed by in a blur! Although, much time was spent in transit from one place to another. I traveled a lot, and between transit, sickness, trainings, I had little time in Kante. However, this Kante time suddenly became extra-packed with small projects and new work things, I went on an amazing vacation to Tanzania, and went to Lome.
SCHOOLS
My high school english club is going great! We prepared skits about HIV/AIDS and they performed them for cultural week! They also were really into reading poems. Now, they *really* want penpals. So, if you or anyone you know wants a penpal or knows of a US high school class who want penpals, let me know! I'm also hoping to start working with the girls at the CEG (middle school). Most girls who begin school drop out sometime during the CEG level, so many peace corps people focus on this education level of girls, so give them support so that they continue school. I showed up one day with my friend Akanto to introduce myself to the girls and see who would be interested in starting a club. I had envisioned myself, standing and speaking to a classroom of girls; we would talk about ideas for teh club: health, sports, science. Anyway, like most of my idealistic plans, the first meeting did not go exactly as I had imagined. When I showed up with Akanto, we were told to go wait outside under the mango tree and the girls will come to us. So, we went out and waited. Soon, girls started to arrive. More and more arrived... it was like a never ending group of girls; There were like at least 200 girls, ranging in age from about 10 years old to 20 years old. I was thinking, how are all these girls going to hear me? Luckily, my new best friend Pauline (I know like 4 Paulines here, all of whom are saving graces; they seem to be there and help out write when I need it), got the girls under control by singing songs and soon they were silent and staring at me. After some introdutions, and brief discussion, I decided to leave a paper for Pauline, who would get the names of the girls and types of clubs that had the most interest.
VACATION
In early March, I went to Tanzania and met up with my two sisters, Caity and Rachael. We all met up in the commercial capital of Dar es Salaam (which is different than the actual capital), and then took a ferry to Zanzibar Island. It was gorgeous. We spent time relaxing on the white sand and surreal beaches of Zanzibar, drinking beer, pina coladas, and wine at the pool bar you swim up to, and exploring the huge ocean floor that is left in the open air during low tide. After spending time at the beaches, we went to Stone Town, which reminded me of Europe with its maze of narrow alleyways and small stores and cafes. I was so happy to find a coffee shop here, and we spent a few hours just drinking amazing frozen cappuccino (except Caity) and talking, and then we found an amazing restaurant. At first I tried to try the local food, which mainly consisted of seafood and rice, but then I just gave up and had hamburger and french fries. After spending some days here, we went back to Dar es Salaam, spent some time exploring and getting lost in this chaotic city, and then finally found, and settled down in a fancy hotel with an amazing cafe with ice cream and cake and real cappunccinos and mmmmm (sigh). (If you can't tell, coffee shops and book stores are probably the things i miss most). Anyway, much too soon, Caity and Rachael had to leave, and I was left with a day to explore Dar on my own. I ended up walking around a lot, found a real bookstore, real ice cream, had my last assortment of good American-type food (pizza, beer, hamburger, triple layer chocolate cake with thick dark chocolate ganache and a cafe latte, and gummy bears) and then flew back to Lome. I was such a great trip.
POLIO VACCINE
While I was returning to Kante from Lome after vacation, I received a call from my boss. "Next Tuesday you should come to Lome for a training on the polio vaccination campaign". Damn, I thought, I'm not even back in Kante yet, and I already have to go back to Lome. This is a pain when you consider that its at best a 10.5 hour journey from Kante to Lome, depending on what kind of transportation you take and what kind of luck you have that particular day. On the other hand, yay! I love random last minute plans and health campaigns, especially since I just studied the polio vaccine in a class I took last year. So, soon after arriving in Kante, I turned around and went back to Lome. I had no idea what I was getting myself into. The day of the training, seven of us from the Peace Corps arrived at the World Health Organization's office in Lome. Soon into the training I learned that our job would be to monitor the campaign, to make sure that the vaccine-givers were actually vaccinating people and that all areas and all regions of Togo were covered. I would be working in my prefecture (similar to a county) with two Togolese for six days, three days during the actual vaccination campaign and three days post-campaign. Each day, each person had to visit three different localities (village or neighborhood) and interview ten families in each locality. This sounded like a decent amount on the day of the training, and I returned to Kante, all ready to begin monitoring the polio campaign the next day. But soon we were in the car: the three of us and the chauffeur, careening along the rough roads of the prefecture. And I realized it might be more difficult than I thought. You see, the prefecture is huge, bigger than I thought. It is spread out. Every village is far from the adjacent village and each village is spread out. Just the simple idea of going "house to house" is an effort in itself, let alone trying to find ten houses in a locality with family present. Anyway, we began "house to house"-ing with intensity. We jogged up and down the hills and along the distances that separated the houses so that we could complete the quota for the day. We met so many different people, saw so many different places and medical conditions. There were kids who couldn't speak, a paralyzed kid, many kids with kwashiorkor and countless many more with worms. In some areas, kids cried when they saw me, having never seen a white person before. We saw the tatas and The Tamberma people in the eastern part of the prefecture, the hills of the western prefecture, the forests and old abandoned German buildings of the northern part. There was one area that was inaccessible from where we were; and we had to leave the prefecture and drive two more hours to reach it in the mountains. Anyway, it was incredibly interesting to see every corner of the prefecture, and see how many languages were spoken. Sometimes we would arrive in a village and ask what language was spoken. The reply would be a language I had never even heard of! Needless to say, we often had translators and sometimes had layers of translators, from French to Lamba to another local language like Tamberma or Kotokoli After one day of this, I was tired. After two days, I was exhausted. And after three days, I was just going on adrenaline. I would leave the house at 630 and not return till 8pm. But, like all things, this came to an end. I said goodbye to the two people I had spent countless hours traipsing around the region with, and I went to sleep. I slept for 20 hours (partially due to some benadryl I took for my mango allergy). And then I woke up
MANGOES: A LOVE-HATE RELATIONSHIP
So, its mango season! i have been excited about this season since i moved here. the one ray of sunlight in the midst of the agony of hot season. mangoes are amazing here and mango season means mangoes EVERYWHERE. practically everyone has a mango tree near their house and every tree is just overflowing with mango goodness. super juicy sweet fresh mangoes; the best mangoes on earth. So, of course, I eat the mangoes! Tons of them! as many as I can get! But, soon i get a weird rash on my lips and around my mouth that makes it painful at worst and annoying at best to smile, talk, and eat. I see the med unit, and find out it is the mangoes. An allergic response to mangoes. I cannot eat mangoes unless I cut them up into little pieces and eat them so that they don't touch my lips. but have you ever tried to cut a small juicy fibrous mango into small pieces and eat it so that it doesn't touch your mouth? Have you also tried to walk through town in the harsh sun of hot season when you're covered in sweat and and just see cool refreshing mangoes everywhere? no one seems to be selling anything but mangoes, and there are tons of them! Anyway, needless to say, I tried eating mangoes again, meticulously cutting it into small pieces as instructed, but eventually gave up and just ate it. I washed my face afterwards in hopes that whatever compound caused the rash would be washed away, but soon, the rash appeared again, and I was calling the med unit again, asking for the same allergy medicine again. I guess hot season is difficult for two reasons: the heat, and the temptation of mangoes.
WHO TURNED UP THE HEAT
Hot season has arrived. Togolese are saying that it is hot; people are sleeping outside because it is too hot to sleep inside, I sweat through the night, and it is not because of fever. During the day, I am just drenched in sweat. Today, after I came back home for lunchtime "repos", I was so drenched in sweat, it reminded me of after running the marathon. I basically keep the fan on 24/7 now, and cringe when i think of my friend Travis, who is in a village without electricity, and therefore no fan. I have heat rash all over my head and neck and is spreading to my chest, and looked up what to do to help it. "Keep the area cool and dry", it says.., yea right. I would have to squeeeze into my baby refrigerator for that to happen. Luckily, my friend recommended this mint-infused baby powder that you can find at the market, which is quite the life savor. I rub this baby powder all over my neck and my scalp, and it helps. One other thing that makes me cringe is when the Togolese tell me that this is not comparable to April. April heat is bad. It is very hot, they say. Right now, it is just hot. You have a fan right?, they say. And I think of Travis without a fan. Yes, I have a fan, I say. Ok, that is good, they say. You will use the fan during hot season. " Yes, I will,"; I say, and think again of Travis, without a fan. God help us.... or at least travis.
WATER PRECIOUS WATER
Its dry season. Its been dry season since October. Rivers are dry; people have dug holes in river basin in search of water. Wells are dry or almost dry. Water has been shut off in places that use water pumps. My compound uses one of these pumps, and it has been cut for a week. People in the morning and the evening go to the well or the few pumps that are open and wait in line to get water, then carry it all the way back home. I went through all my storage water, and my neighbor showed up with a basin full of water on her head for me. I have changed small things to conserve my water. I eat street food more often instead of preparing food, so I dont have to use water to wash dishes. I buy bags of drinking water instead of filtering my own. And when I take a bucket shower, I try to catch the waste water in another bucket to use for keeping the toilet clean. You never know how important water is until its not so easily accessible!
LETS WALK TO DEFALE!!!
The day after the polio campaign monitoring ended, a few of my cluster mates had planned to walk to Defale, the little town on the other side of the mountain from Kante. After having seen it in passing from various squished positions in the numerous bush taxis I've taken to/from Kara, I decided I wanted to walk to Defale too!. How hard could it be? Just over the mountain. So, that morning as we were leaving, we started guessing about how long it would take. 2 hours, 2.5 hours maybe? We walked and walked, and reached the mountain and walked some more... Walking up a mountain in hot season with no shade is not a good combination. 3 hours later we arrived! We were all completely exhausted, got some food, and then found a place to sit ...and sit..and sit. We ended up finding taxis back to Kante. The mountain top did provide an excellent photo opportunity! However, my host brother accidentally deleted all but one of the photos. Oh well, c'est la vie.
THE ANISARA SONG
In many places, people have a word/a label, for a foreigner. In southern Togo, they call foreigners and white people "Yovo". In my area, they call white people "Anisara". There is even a song/chant that children sing when they see a white person. "Anisara Yovo Yovo Bonsoir!". It is a very popular song, and when one child starts singing, all the children within hearing distance run towards the white person and sing. This may seem cute or funny the first couple times, but after a few months, it gets annoying and sometimes offensive (depending on your mood). It is a constant topic of conversation among peace corps volunteers on the best strategies to stop this song and to have people call you by name instead of "Yovo" or "Anisara". Anyway, my strategy has been to ask the children (in Lamba, the local language), what their names are and then tell them my name in Lamba. I just always try to use Lamba so they think of me more as a local than a foreigner. So for the past eight months, I have been trying this again and again, as well as responding very enthusiastically when people use my name "Mafisa". Last week, as I was walking along one of my standard pathways, I heard the beginnings of the Anisara song. "Oh man, not the Anisara song again" I think "I hope there aren't too many kids around.". But, in the midst of my negative thoughts, the song changed. "Anisara Yovo Yovo gentile! Mafisa Mafisa Mafisa!" They continued chanting my name until I walked away with a smile on my face. I guess I will never get rid of the Anisara song. But at least now I have my own personalized version!
FORGET BAR HOPPING- LET'S GO FUNERAL HOPPING!!!
Funeral season has arrived! This means dancing, eating, and drinking. I was walking through town one day, and saw a huge crowd of people off in the distance, and heard drums playing. I walked over and ran into my friend from AED, who explained what was happening. Someone's father had died awhile ago, and this is the season when they celebrate the funeral. Men were adorned with feathers and had noise-maker things attached to their legs, so that when they stepped and danced, the noise would go with the beat of their feet. Suddenly, someone grabbed my arm and brought me into the dancing circle. My AED friend followed and we began dancing with the celebrators. Soon, the dust became bad (everyone dancing during dry season means lots of dust in the air from feet stomping), and my friend pulled me away, saying there was another funeral a little ways away. So, I grabbed Maxime and Blaise, who had come with me, and she grabbed her little daughter, and we marched off to the next funeral. We caught this funeral just in time for the meal! We danced a little, and then were told to sit down, where we were given some tchouk to drink and rice and meat to eat. Soon, a van load of people left this funeral (they were family who had traveled from far away), and we decided to go to another funeral that we heard about. So, we walked to the school, where we saw a lot of people in white drumming and singing and dancing. The guys were in white spandex shorts with bands of tassels and shells. they had white socks that soon became brown with all the dust. They danced to the road with some musicians and then started dancing down the road towards a central dancing area. We became part of a huge crowd of neighborhood women who joined in their parade. We arrived at the central dancing area and the outfitted people formed a circle and started dancing. everyone else watched and slowly began to become part of the dancing circle. I joined in too, and then they brought a huge container of tchouk for everyone to share. I sat with my friend from AED for awhile and as it began to get dark, we decided to head home, exhausted from a day of funerals.
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