parades and futbol

Since I wrote last, much has happened and I’m happy to report that most is good news ;-)

I celebrated my birthday this past Monday, which was not a big deal over here really. Some volunteers made a pineapple upside down cake, which was amazing. I went out with some friends to a local hangout and we chatted a few hours. Overall, it was a fine birthday. Curfew is around 8 pm, when it's dark. That is for the best probably.

Tuesday was Benin's Independence Day so we had a free day. We went to the local parade that was like any back home but with more dancing perhaps. They LOVE to dance, and dance well they do. Speaking of that, Wednesday we had a "dance party" for one of our afternoon sessions. It was for learning the traditional dances by region and also to observe different types of dress that we will eventually be buying and wearing. The dancers each took one of us yovos (whities) and pulled us out there on the dance floor to let us make fools of ourselves. LOL. My partner was the youngest in the group, a timid 3 year-old, and boy did we have a grand time!

This week we finally went to play sports, which were great especially since the weather hasn’t been too hot lately. All 15 of us played with our Beninois facilitators for two hours, mostly futbol (soccer) in the dirt, which was a whole other thing. Talk about no traction! Oh and if anyone is worried about diseases, no worries. A wild dog is hanging out here in the internet café, but I just received my rabies shot! Woo hhooo. One of about 10 during the first three weeks here.

People are friendly and help us out a lot, however there is soooo much unwanted attention all around. I can deal with the constant staring, but when people yell out YOVO and hiss at you to get you to look at them it's hard to stay patient. Yes, people HISS in Benin. That's also how they call moto taxis. Yeah, it's a bit interesting to get hissed at. But with all this, I just remind myself that its only because they are curious.
We saw our first funeral procession which consists of a big group of people literally running down the street with the men carrying the body over their head wrapped in cloth. They are singing about and celebrating the life of the deceased. It is quite interesting to witness and imagine I will be seeing this quite often unfortunately.

I just got done doing laundry and that equals a good hour of hard work! I only have three outfits here but my host mom watches me like a hawk, coaching me to get it perfect-- which is washing each article in bucket three times, and then rinsing twice. I like to get her laughing by telling her how tired and sore I am afterwards!

The food is good so far, but it's a lot the same stuff. It's tons of carbs and usually goat meat or fish. Some random fruits and veggies on the side makes for a nice meal. PC told our hosts hat most Americans cannot handle spices so they weren’t making the food spicy at all. I caught on to it and told them I LOVE spicy food. Now every meal is almost TOO spicy, but I suppose it's better this way. ;-) Breakfast is the same everyday-tea and biscuits (crackers) and some good days a chunk of baguette bread. I continue to enjoy my family. I have fun with Nadya and my hosts are so patient and help me with my French when I'm studying at home. The language is going OK--without doubt it is frustrating, but that's a given. It will get easier as time goes on. I had a start and that definitely put me at an advantage. Yesterday we went on our first work outing. We went in pairs to different small shops and asked them questions about their business. We took brief notes and when our French was exhausted all met up at the bar for FAB. ;-)
I have my interview with the PC placement officer later today. In a few weeks I may know better what I'll be doing the next two years and perhaps even where I will be living. Until then, we work full time on language, culture, and technical training. What I can tell you is that I will most likely be in a mid-sized city doing small-scale consulting and holding business classes for local artisans. There is a lot of observation and then offering advice on better business practices and holding classes after a simple needs assessment. Things are going to be EXTREMELY basic. For example, we teach people how to save money when they make a profit, how to record expenses, how to market a product, retain customers, and what will be really interesting - teaching accounting for illiterates via symbols. There will be other projects with the people we work with, as well as side projects we want to work on such as HIV/AIDS awareness, environment, business clubs in schools, etc. It's going to be a pretty flexible work schedule but I will make myself stay busy.

I don't want to scare you off - my posts won't always be this long. This is a general overview, and things aren't going to change much the next two months. During training, I don't have much Internet time at all, and when I do it's frustrating. I am now using my friend's laptop and will transfer this text to the cyber cafe to save time. So I'm sorry if I don’t respond to emails individually. But I am reading them all, and thanks to those of you who sent e cards for my b-day. As I have said before, please write general comments on this site so it's easier for me to read all at once. Otherwise, you can still send emails to me. I hope you are all doing well-much love