Saturday, January 28, 2006 Quick update. Not too much time to write. I'm in Cotonou, Karimama was awesome. Mom and Aunt arrived safe, have ridden zemidjans successfully. We're leaving for Parakou tomorrow! Will write more when I have my computer and some down time.

Oh, Hotel du Lac has free DSL for guests. Heck yeah!

Friday, January 20, 2006 The internet hates me. I've really, honestly been trying to upload pictures and the Victory Way Christmas article. I swear. I've been to the cyber twice a day all this week... but the internet hates me right now. So, I'm going to Cotonou next week... and if all goes well I'll have them updates on Friday.

Sorry!!!!

Thursday, January 19, 2006 Yikes, this week is going to kill me. I'm trying to get three sites simultaneously to the point where I can say "I can't do any more until you do something". It's going well, but still I don't like having to rush around like this. Or for that matter, live in the cyber.

The one thing I got really used to in the US was the constant flow of information that the internet provides. Whatever question I had, I could have the answer in seconds. CSS question? Thousands of tutorials. JavaScript, not even a challenge for the power of Google. Even novel things, like what language to they speak in Liberia (English is the official language, but only around 20 percent speak it) were so easy. Here though it's certainly not like that. If I don't know something, or don't have the reference on hand (that is, in digital form)... that means I have to make a plan to head to the cyber. That means 20 minutes each way of bike riding. It's not that bad for things like blogging, emailing and the like, but it doesn't satisfy that instant gratification that we're all becoming so used to in the States.

So yeah, there's that.

Wednesday, January 18, 2006

I've been in country a little longer than six months. Africa changes you man!

Sunday, January 15, 2006 This weekend was a blast. I went down south a little bit to observe the Zou-Collines VAC meeting. VAC meetings always promise to be well attended (as, I believe, they are mandatory for the volunteers in the region). I had planned to go originally to pick up my laptop from Brendan. Seeing though as it was delivered by other hands to my door (thanks Ben!) that reason was out. Thankfully it was Ethan's birthday, so I felt it obligatory to go down and give him a heartfelt "What the hell are you doing here, Ethan?" (A little explanation on that; Ethan has a gift randomly showing up at unexpected times usually promoting exactly that phrase from me.) I did so, read, relaxed and watched as the others attempted to hold their breath longer than the others. Odd, but I did finish reading Howl's Moving Castle, which is what the newest Miyazaki film is based on. My post-mate here said the following after having seen the film "Hmm, I don't recall gigantic flying battleships". The two are excellent works in their own rights, but probably would be best not compared in anyway other than Katherine's observation.

After VAC-ness was over, I went over with Carrie on zemi to her post... which is an absolutely beautiful 30 minute ride. That is, beautiful if you aren't stuck behind a gigantic camion (think semi-truck, only more janky) barreling down what amounts to a dirt trail while your zemi driver pulls directly behind it attempting to pass, but finding the road too narrow and thereby only managing to cover both driver and passenger in copious amounts of dust. Thankfully we did end up passing the truck, and continued on in relative peace.

When we came, a volunteer told us all that "the days go by slowly, but the weeks fly by". No truer words have ever been said (except maybe, "bush taxis suck"). Peace Corps is long weeks of holding your breath, and sudden, sometimes odd, experiences that give a sudden breath of fresh air and resolve to continue. That isn't to say at all that we're all demoralized and disheartened. Far from it in most cases, but even so a whiff of something different steels desire, and reminds us why we're here. Carrie's was just that for me. I don't know exactly why, but it was just awesome. Her house is totally rocking, her community is sweet, and she has a kick-ass hammock AND you can go and hang out on her roof. That combined with a full moon, a cool evening and all the time needed for laying on said roof to watch stars and clouds made for a very refreshing time.

Even leaving went smoothly. Carrie (playing an excellent host) went and found me a taxi this morning, and I was off and back to Parakou with no trouble whatsoever. Of course I was absolutely beat when I returned, but nothing a nice afternoon nap didn't cure. Oh, and we made Phad Thai, which was actually really good!

Sunday, January 08, 2006 This first story is probably boring. Skip down a few paragraphs.

I just got back from church. "How exotic!", you might think, "Church in Benin? It must be totally different!" Different doesn't even begin to describe church, beninese style. First, let me say this isn't my first time to church in country (or in Parakou for that matter) but it did mark my first visit to a church of Christianisme Celeste (pardon the spelling) which is a sect unique only to Benin. From what I'd heard prior to my visit today was that it was an odd mix of voodoo/traditional beliefs and Christianity. It's certainly an odd mix, but I'll have to confess my experience didn't really show that many voodoo elements at all. In fact, a large portion of the sermon today was condemning those who mix voodoo and Christianity. Yeah, it was odd.

The service itself was long. Really, really, really long. Like 5 hours long. Literally. Okay, I'm lying. The actual service itself was only three hours... but then there was a 90 minute meeting, followed by another 20 minutes of service. So yeah. Long.

Upon entering the grounds of a Christian-Celeste Church you're obliged to remove your shoes. Many of the attendees simply walk to service barefoot, pre-clothed in their church attire. Church attire is all white. Men wear long robes somewhat akin to a Jalab (which it turns out is spelled with an 'L') and women a somewhat modified two piece white bhumba, with a mandatory floofy white hat. The hat looks a lot like a deflated chef's hat.

Service itself starts with everyone bowing with heads touching the floor, all facing the central altar which is adorned with a 7-place candelabra and a portrait of Jesus. There was also a painted mural behind with quite a bit of Christian religious symbolism (doves, olive branches, crosses and the like). There was lots of talking while everyone was bowed, in Fon... so I have no idea what it meant. I just know that there was lots of people saying wiwé. I have no idea what that means. After lots of talking there was singing, dancing and music. After one song, everyone went down to their knees and more talking to the altar and wiwé-ing. This was repeated seven times, with each talking section being somewhat different and slowly more directed towards the people in the room. At least three offerings were taken (and tabulated during the service). I'm not sure if I understood, but I think not enough money was collected near the end so they had another offering at the end.

The music was awesome, really, really awesome. So awesome that people went crazy. Literally, they were at least 3 or 4 people that started flailing about and screaming and had to be removed until they could calm down. It was a bit odd, but since no one reacted too strongly I guess stuff like that happens all the time. The element of trances may have been one of the voodoo derived elements... but I'm certainly no expert in that field.

All in all it was interesting, and I'm happy that I went. I don't think I'll likely be going back though... it was a bit too much for me. I just have to figure out a way to tell the guy that took me that it's not for me while remaining culturally sensitive.

If you're still with me (or you skipped down here, for shame!) I do have a funny story too. I started trying to learn a bit of local language with Seraphine, my kick-ass secretary lady at the Mairie... who I unfortunately don't see much of any more. Such as that is, we were going over some simple words and phrases. Things like "good work", "thanks", "good morning", "how are you?" and the like. A common phrase here in French is "bon travail" (good work), which is pretty damn useful. You say it to people who are working, vendors who are bugging you, or to compliment a completed job. Dendi has two ways to say it, one is literally "bon travail", and the other is sort a of a mix between "thanks" and "bon travail". It's something you'd say if someone went and got you something. The complete phrase for the mixed one is "naa gbei". Well, it turns out if you're white like me... the word "gbei" is hard to say. So, trying to say "gbei" I said "bei". After getting a nearly dead from laughing Seraphine back in her chair and breathing I found out that "bei" means "vagina" (literally "womb", but it's everyone uses the word "womb" for vagina here except for doctors). So, while I was trying to say "good work"... yeah, I was saying "good vagina".

Saturday, January 07, 2006 I got a barbecue! Today will be the first official deployment. I can hardly wait to taste that delicious, delicious teriyaki swiss burger. MMmmm. In other news, anyone that wants a teriyaki swiss burger is invited to my place today around 2p.

In the continuing saga of sweet ass stuff, I got a very special care package from Tim. No food, no spices... but around 15GB of delicious, delicious media. Movies, music, programs. It's a beautiful thing. As such, I'm not as behind the times yet. I've seen the Family Guy movie, Serenity, and FFVII: Advent Children.

I've also discovered the joy of headphones. I'd previously thought Michele was crazy for watching movies in her house with headphones on. Actually though, when all you have is a cheapo pair of speakers... but a fairly nice set of headphones the choice is clear. Sure, as was pointed out on the plane ride here, I look like a guy in head-gear. But I'm alone, the volume is loud, and something called bass actually exists.

So yeah, rock on.

Wednesday, January 04, 2006 It's raining. It's actually odd for me to type that. Not so much because I'm not used to going long periods without rain. Not even because it's really been that long. It's just it isn't supposed to be raining right now. Everyone says that Harmattan lasts until February. It's barely January. First Harmattan arrives late, and now it's over early? What the crap?

I'm not really an expert on Beninese weather, but I can say that they seem to be as scandalized as I am. Still though, it's nice to hear the rain on the tin roof (even though it overrides any other noise-making activity, including talking), to see the lightning light up my curtains and hear the thunder roll in.

Back in California I hated the rain, but here I think I sort of like it. Here, the rain is the American equivalent of snow. People don't do things in the rain; all activity literally stops and you stay where you are. I think that's why I like the rain here. In the States rain was an annoyance. Nothing about your daily activities changed, other than you had to carry extra crap with you, had to be more careful driving, and got wet wherever you went. Here there are none of those problems. During a downpour your schedule changes, and if you're lucky you're caught at home and get one of those days to lie in bed, drink some coffee (or Nescafe here) and watch the rain.

On that note, I hope the rain continues through the night.

Guess what I'm doing right now? Yeah, give up? Well for one I'm not typing very well. Want to know why? It's because I'm at the cyber typing on my laptop! That's right, it's back from the dead!!! Yay Brendan! Yay Apple!

Actually I'm pleased as punch. Apple really did a one-two punch on my last AppleCare warranty repair on this computer ever. They replaced the:
- motherboard
- hard drive
- screen
- hand rests
- touchpad
- usb/firewire/headphone ports
- optical drive (I think... not sure about this one, if nothing else they cleaned it really well!)

I mean, damn. That's the whole freakin' computer! Suffice to say I'm pretty stoked to have it back. The one crappy thing though is that I didn't get any software updates... so my brightness keys still don't work. But it's only 100 MB (oh man, it's going to be such a pain in the ass to download that).

In the meantime project-wise things are going quite a bit more quickly now. Thanks to my laptop I can now be productive (and surprisingly am being) more than 3-4 hours a day. Sweet.

I also have to admit to having started watching the OC. I didn't mean to, but I'm starving for media here! Tim sent me a disc, but it's not here yet... and I was just so weak. It was there, beckoning me with its xvidelicious-ness. I hate to admit this, but it's not actually all that bad of a show. I'm not addicted yet, but if the freaks volunteers that have lived here for a year already are any indication I'll soon be as hopeless as the rest of them.

Almost as good as my laptop was the 500g of parmesean cheese delivered to me by fellow ICT Volunteer Ben. Even after being sick he ventured out in to Cotonou to make sure my pasta would not go un-cheesed. What a guy.

Actually everything is going really well right now, the only bad thing I can even think of that is happening is that I have remained un-successful in getting a set of guitar strings. The word on the street though is that they do infact exist in Parakou. I just have to find out where...

Monday, January 02, 2006 Whew, New Years day is done correctly here. That means I ate lunch twice yesterday. I share a concession with two other apartments and both of them fed me yesterday. First I had tasty pâte rouge and turkey... which was super delicious. I ate until I thought I would burst (out of politeness, not gluttony, really!). Then not more than 40 minutes later my other neighbors showed up with a fancy silver platter on which was a loaf of bread, a bottle of bisap and a huge plate of beans and meat. Oh man, it was too much. I couldn't say no for politeness sake, so I secretely hide most of it in my fridge where it awaits eating later today. Shh. Don't tell.

All in all it was a good day, except Marché Kilombo was all but deserted. Sad, but I did end up meeting the director of the cyber café that I frequent. So that may turn out to be good indeed.

Other updates, Ben called me to tell me that my laptop is in his posession and making its' way north today. That means I'll be able to make serious improvements to the site and blog quite a bit more frequently! Yay.

The Victory Way Christmas text is written, but unfortunately our Parakou computer exploded with sparks and smoke this weekend... and it housed all the pictures of the event... so it may be a little bit before I can recover those. I may post the text and add the pictures later. Not sure yet...

That's about it. This month should be pretty wild.