Thursday, June 15, 2006 One of those odd things that you don't think you hear quite right happened on the cab ride up to Natitangou. We were talking to one of the passengers after passing through Djougou and he mentioned that in Parakou someone had had their testicles stolen. He also said that 2 young women had their "choses" stolen. This is of course all by magic. Now, we didn't take much stock in his ramblings, but on arrival in Nati we heard the same story from a different village. Testicles are getting stolen left and right here. Naturally it's all because of sorcery.

In any case, this all sounded very bizzare to me... but it turns out it's not a cultural phenomenon that's solely African. It's called Koro. (Katherine found this article after googling "African penis theft"). And it also turns out that it's happened here before. Both of those articles talk about penis theft, and it's true that this time it's testicles. Still, it's interesting.

In the same realm of genital theft.... This morning Seraphine (my kick-ass-secretary-lady that I've no doubt mentioned before) greeted me with a "Jeez, your bag is huge. What do you have in there, mens heads?". I replied that no, I infact had womens heads too. She countered, saying "No, your bag is probably filled with vaginas!". Some white people get accused of being stingy, some of talking funny. I get accused of stealing vaginas.