Hey everyone. Before I start writing I want to wish everyone a happy holiday season. I will miss you all but I will be celebrating over here, Africa is not that far away lol. Things have been super busy here recently. I have had several meetings to go to for peace corps and I also visited some friends for thansgiving. First right now I am in Porto Novo again for a two week workshop. We are learning about HIV/AIDS education and how to start malnutrition programs in our community. The guy I am working with from my village and I are very excited to go back and start working because we found many things that we can do in my village. This is going to take me off topic but I must discuss something before I tell you all of my work plans for my village.
Over here in Africa many of the charties dont work very well. I am talking about charties such as Christian Childrens Fund (which actually is a decent one), and many religious organizations. First one of the reasons that many of these charities dont work is that they are corrupt. The people that run them over here keep the money they get for themselves and only help people of there choosing. Also many of them dont help the poorest people who actually need the help. Let me give you an example. In my town there is an ONG much like CCF, that opperates from France. People adopt a family and send money to help them. Well first of all for the families to be chosen they cant be polygamist, which is highly prevelent over here and is a stupid reason not to help poor children; and they also have to have some money because they have to go to the health center and get examinations and shots. I think this is absolutley rediculous. The people who need the help are the ones that cant go to the health center for shots and can barely feed themselves; Now I am not saying the ones that can pay for this dont need the help to, but the ones that really need it are turned down. These are the people I am going to to try and help though because no one is telling them the things they need to know to stay healthy and feed there children well. There are a lot of them though and it is going to be hard but I hope I can make some sort of difference. When I am older maybe I can start a charity that doesnt discriminate due to religious prefrenences and helps the people who cant afford things instead of the ones that can. That is just my opinion
Oh and also many of the World organizations are corrupt as well. For example the World Health Organization donates food to people all over the world. Well how they do this is to have a person in a community that they communicate with and they give all of the food for one community to that person. Well as you can imagine many of these people dont give the food out for free like they are suppose to but keep it for themselves and then sell it at the same price as everything else. It really floors me that the WOLRD HEALTH ORGANIZATION cant get their shit together and have a better system of checks and balances. Also a lot of times the world health organzatin has to pull food out of countries and stop helping them. Then the people that had come to rely on the food, because they just gave it to them instead of trying to start a stustainable food project, starve to death. Ugh it is just so damn frusterating because so many things over here dont work like everybody believes.
Sorry I just ranted on for ever but being over here has changed many of my views on things and really opened my eyes to the corrupt and ignorant giants of the world.
On a lighter note as I stated above I have found lots of work that I think I can do in my community that I am very excited about. So hopefully I can at least help one person while I am over here.
I have been hanging out with my friend for about a week now. We have had lots of fun going out and just takling english together lol. Oh and I kind of have a boyfriend over here. He is Nigerian and very sweet to me so far but it is not going to be serious anytime soon because I am over here to work and not to play. Well that is all I know for now I should be able to write again soon because I have internet for the next week. KODO BADA
Friday, December 12, 2008
Saturday, November 22, 2008
Sorry for not writing
Hey everyone sorry I havent written in a while. I have shockingly actually been quite busy. Lately at work I have been doing baby weighings in smaller villages and visiting hanidcapped children. I have really enjoyed the baby weighings because I have gotten meet a lot of women and there children and we havent had any really underwieght kids so that is a blessing. It has been difficult however visiting the handicapped children because many of them have cerebral paulsy, sorry about the bad spelling, and there is hardly anything you can do for children with that even in America.
Other than that I have also been traveling a lot. I went up to a northern village for a meeting and got to hang out with many of my friends for an entrie weekend. In this village there is a peace corps house for us to stay in with many bedrooms, a kitchen and lots of lounging space. It was very relaxing and very fun. The first night we went to a beer fest and after words played beer pong and slip n slide, just as if we were at a frat it America haha. The next two nights we took it pretty easy.
I also recently got to go to Cotonou for a meeting. My two friends and I stayed in a hotel a we ended up going to a real club and danced all night. I also got like a million packages from my mother while I was there and I barely made it back to my village.
Lets see what else, I think I am going to get a dog, I found dog food and I really think it would be nice to have somone to come home to. I am really starting to like my village though and I am beginning to feel very comfortable there. Oh yesterday I had an ant and mouse invasion in my house, my neighbors had to come over and pour petrol all over my house to get ride of the ants, and they caught the mouse and let him go outside. Apparently when it doesnt rain here and around this time of year the ants are everywhere and get into everything. Did I mention how much I love my mesquito net because if for anything I can at least hide undert there forever. In two weeks I will be done with my first three months at post which means I can travel and do what I want. I will also be heading back to porto novo for two weeks for another training session. Well thats all I know now. KWABO
Other than that I have also been traveling a lot. I went up to a northern village for a meeting and got to hang out with many of my friends for an entrie weekend. In this village there is a peace corps house for us to stay in with many bedrooms, a kitchen and lots of lounging space. It was very relaxing and very fun. The first night we went to a beer fest and after words played beer pong and slip n slide, just as if we were at a frat it America haha. The next two nights we took it pretty easy.
I also recently got to go to Cotonou for a meeting. My two friends and I stayed in a hotel a we ended up going to a real club and danced all night. I also got like a million packages from my mother while I was there and I barely made it back to my village.
Lets see what else, I think I am going to get a dog, I found dog food and I really think it would be nice to have somone to come home to. I am really starting to like my village though and I am beginning to feel very comfortable there. Oh yesterday I had an ant and mouse invasion in my house, my neighbors had to come over and pour petrol all over my house to get ride of the ants, and they caught the mouse and let him go outside. Apparently when it doesnt rain here and around this time of year the ants are everywhere and get into everything. Did I mention how much I love my mesquito net because if for anything I can at least hide undert there forever. In two weeks I will be done with my first three months at post which means I can travel and do what I want. I will also be heading back to porto novo for two weeks for another training session. Well thats all I know now. KWABO
Tuesday, October 21, 2008
October 20
So I have come to the conclusion that I think I am becoming mean over here in Africa. Not something you would have thought huh. Well as I said before I used to love children and now I am starting to hate them. I can not stand to here the Yovo song one more time and I here it at least a million times a day. So therefore I have started to be mean. To the children who sing the Yovo song I give them mean looks and ignore them, and then when a child says my name, I smile and praise them and am very nice to them. So I suppose I am in turn teaching these children through some sort of positive deviance not to sing the Yovo song. I feel bad being so mean but it is like nails on a chalk board to me now.
On a more fun note coming up soon is my big regional meeting for Peace Corps. I am super siked for many reasons. First it is on Halloween so I will some form be able to celebrate my favorite holiday with friends. Also the meeting was originally going to be in Bohicon, the town that I go to all the time, but now they have moved it to Parakou, a bigger city up north that I haven’t been to yet so that will be super cool. And lastly our regional meeting is at the same time as the people that live in the Parakou region which means I will get to hang out with twice as many of my friends and my good friends Nora and John Mark will be there. This could definitely not have come sooner. I can’t wait. After that I also have only 1 more month of “grounding” here in Djidja and then I can travel and do what I want. YAY
I also wanted to inform everyone that I have finally conformed to the African dress code. When I first got to Benin I was told I could not wear speghetti straps and that I most definitely had to have straps. Well that is really only for business purposes and ridiculous considering how freaking hot it is over here. So I have branched out and I now wear spaghetti straps with my Pagnes or I just wrap a pagne around my chest like a towel and just wear that. I am pretty proud of myself if I do say so and it is soooo much cooler. It is what all of the African women wear who have lived here for centuries so why should I fight it. I do still wear the occasional American clothes and I definitely still indulge myself and wear jeans because as we all now I am a fashion loving, girly girl at heart. Oh and did I mention I still haven’t given up mascara and I don’t think that I ever will. I look deranged without it. Oh and I almost forgot, I will NEVER not shave my legs.
As all of you can see (if I was able to upload the photos, I am writing these blogs from my laptop) I put up some photos. All of the people in the pictures are my neighbors who have really been great to me and helped me out a lot. The young boy eating is the one who is teaching how to cook Beninese food. I bought a ecraser the other day. This is a stone slab, that is probably 8 by 12 inches, that comes with a stone where you grind things down. Usually you will use it too make pepper sauce, tomatoes sauce, and making you garlic very fine. I now have the hang of it and I can now make many more Beninese dishes because of it. The other people are just more of the neighbors that I have.
So that’s pretty much all I have for now, oh I can’t believe MU has lost the past two football games, but I will say it does kind of make me happy because I know I was there for the best and exciting year of football we have had in years. Au revoir
On a more fun note coming up soon is my big regional meeting for Peace Corps. I am super siked for many reasons. First it is on Halloween so I will some form be able to celebrate my favorite holiday with friends. Also the meeting was originally going to be in Bohicon, the town that I go to all the time, but now they have moved it to Parakou, a bigger city up north that I haven’t been to yet so that will be super cool. And lastly our regional meeting is at the same time as the people that live in the Parakou region which means I will get to hang out with twice as many of my friends and my good friends Nora and John Mark will be there. This could definitely not have come sooner. I can’t wait. After that I also have only 1 more month of “grounding” here in Djidja and then I can travel and do what I want. YAY
I also wanted to inform everyone that I have finally conformed to the African dress code. When I first got to Benin I was told I could not wear speghetti straps and that I most definitely had to have straps. Well that is really only for business purposes and ridiculous considering how freaking hot it is over here. So I have branched out and I now wear spaghetti straps with my Pagnes or I just wrap a pagne around my chest like a towel and just wear that. I am pretty proud of myself if I do say so and it is soooo much cooler. It is what all of the African women wear who have lived here for centuries so why should I fight it. I do still wear the occasional American clothes and I definitely still indulge myself and wear jeans because as we all now I am a fashion loving, girly girl at heart. Oh and did I mention I still haven’t given up mascara and I don’t think that I ever will. I look deranged without it. Oh and I almost forgot, I will NEVER not shave my legs.
As all of you can see (if I was able to upload the photos, I am writing these blogs from my laptop) I put up some photos. All of the people in the pictures are my neighbors who have really been great to me and helped me out a lot. The young boy eating is the one who is teaching how to cook Beninese food. I bought a ecraser the other day. This is a stone slab, that is probably 8 by 12 inches, that comes with a stone where you grind things down. Usually you will use it too make pepper sauce, tomatoes sauce, and making you garlic very fine. I now have the hang of it and I can now make many more Beninese dishes because of it. The other people are just more of the neighbors that I have.
So that’s pretty much all I have for now, oh I can’t believe MU has lost the past two football games, but I will say it does kind of make me happy because I know I was there for the best and exciting year of football we have had in years. Au revoir
October 15
Hello all, hope everyone is good I am doing pretty well over here. I just got over a cold and am feeling much better now. Things are going well, even though my boss has been gone all week, she is “sick”, I haven’t done heardly anything new at work just the same old nothing lol.
Today was rather interesting though. I asked my neighbor if she would teach me how to make “pate” and sauce legumes. And she said she would, and told me what to by at the marche. Well it tuned into the biggest ordeal ever. Me and the young boy who helps me, went to the marche and bought lots of stuff. When we got back he probably made 5 more trips to get things that we needed again, which needless to say got very expensive. Well the girl asked another girl to help to me, her, the other girl and the young boy were all in my living room cooking ( I didn’t end up doing very much). They used tons of crap in my kitchen and we also had probably 10 children at any given time running in and out of my house. In the end it took about 3 hours to do all together, I spent quite a bit of money, and I ended up feeding half my neighbors. But that’s all ok I guessm it was really good food and I have plenty left over for dinner. So today was pretty fulfilling I guess.
I haven’t been getting much sleep over here recently because for some reason at around 2:00 in the morning, the neighbor hood dogs have decided to get together for choir practice. I sounds to me like 20 dogs are all howling and growling together for about an hour. I never new dogs could be soooo freaking loud. It is also quite scary as well because I have never heard of this before except in some creepy horror film.
On a more interesting note I have been noticeing that guns are a lot more prevelant here in Africa than in America. In America I could probably count the number of times I have see guns, and they were usually before my father went hunting or on an officer of the law. Over any old Joe could be walking by and half a machine gun straped to his back. Needless to say a lot of the time it is the Gendarms (police) who have these giant rifles or machine guns, however the other day I was sitting on my stop and two guys walked by with probably the biggest guns I have ever seen. I think they might be called elephant guns. It is just crazy the stuff you can see over here any old day of the week.
Also as I was sitting on my stoop the other day I started to feel very bad for the dogs that live around me. The reason is that the flys over here are always swarming all over there heads and the dogs have to continueally shake there heads to keep them off. I probably sat and watched this one dog for over 15 minutes and realized that that is probably the most annoying thing in the whole world. I mean the dog couldn’t even take a nap.
Today was rather interesting though. I asked my neighbor if she would teach me how to make “pate” and sauce legumes. And she said she would, and told me what to by at the marche. Well it tuned into the biggest ordeal ever. Me and the young boy who helps me, went to the marche and bought lots of stuff. When we got back he probably made 5 more trips to get things that we needed again, which needless to say got very expensive. Well the girl asked another girl to help to me, her, the other girl and the young boy were all in my living room cooking ( I didn’t end up doing very much). They used tons of crap in my kitchen and we also had probably 10 children at any given time running in and out of my house. In the end it took about 3 hours to do all together, I spent quite a bit of money, and I ended up feeding half my neighbors. But that’s all ok I guessm it was really good food and I have plenty left over for dinner. So today was pretty fulfilling I guess.
I haven’t been getting much sleep over here recently because for some reason at around 2:00 in the morning, the neighbor hood dogs have decided to get together for choir practice. I sounds to me like 20 dogs are all howling and growling together for about an hour. I never new dogs could be soooo freaking loud. It is also quite scary as well because I have never heard of this before except in some creepy horror film.
On a more interesting note I have been noticeing that guns are a lot more prevelant here in Africa than in America. In America I could probably count the number of times I have see guns, and they were usually before my father went hunting or on an officer of the law. Over any old Joe could be walking by and half a machine gun straped to his back. Needless to say a lot of the time it is the Gendarms (police) who have these giant rifles or machine guns, however the other day I was sitting on my stop and two guys walked by with probably the biggest guns I have ever seen. I think they might be called elephant guns. It is just crazy the stuff you can see over here any old day of the week.
Also as I was sitting on my stoop the other day I started to feel very bad for the dogs that live around me. The reason is that the flys over here are always swarming all over there heads and the dogs have to continueally shake there heads to keep them off. I probably sat and watched this one dog for over 15 minutes and realized that that is probably the most annoying thing in the whole world. I mean the dog couldn’t even take a nap.
October 8
October 8,2008
Hello everyone, hope all is well. Things are going pretty well over here in Africa. I have been in my village for over a month now and things are going pretty well. I have started working, even though it is not very much. I have furniture in my house as you can see from my pictures and my house is slowly starting to feel like home and not just some place I come to, to sleep.
For work so far I have been working with sole hanidcaped childredn trying to help rehabilitate them. We these strange chairs at our office, one is for sitting the other is for standing, that help children learn how to sit and stand correctly. Most of the children that we use the chairs on either can’t sit up my themselves or can’t stand/walk. I play games with them while they sit in these chiars, such as put the shape in the right place and memory games. I have also started looking into this ONG called Mercyship. It is like a cruise ship that has been converted into a traveling hospital. The docotrs who volunteer with the ONG travel around to different countries giving free surgeries and things to that nature. I have a lot of children in my area that are in need of surgery and I am really hopeing, they ship is coming here in February, that I can get some of kids the surgeries that they need. I can’t do much yet because I don’t know much but once I do if I can at least get one child a surgery it would be amazing. My friend Aaron who told me about it said something like that could make your whole Peace Corps experience worth it and mean something. He is completely right and I really want to help these kids. That would just be amazing if it could work out. I am not going to get my hopes up though because many of the things that we try to do here just don’t work a lot of the time do to many factors, which is ok, but you have to learn not to get to excited about stuff because you don’t want to get let down.
On that note I was let down pretty bad today by some of my neighbors. I had been missing some money here and there lately, nothing substantial, but it had always been after I had, had people in my house and I was starting to get suspiscious. I didn’t want to jump to any conclusions and I really wanted to believe in the best in people so I decided that I probably just lost the money. Well today I had two of the neighbor girls in my house, who were my friends until today, and I went back into my room to grab something and when I came back that were kind of hovering in the area of my backpack. Well I told them I wanted to take a nap and they left and as soon as they did I went over to by backpack, found it open and my coin purse was open and empty. It really upset me. I said something to them to the effect of “ I know one of you took my money and I am very upset about it” however there really isn’t much you can do about so I let it go from there. It just means that now I really can’t let people into my house anymore. I talked to one of my friends here about it and she told me when she was living with ther host family one of her sisters was taking money from. We talked about how it really does hurt your feelins and you feel used because for all the good stuff you do for these people, such as giving them food and candy which I did almost on a daily basis, it feels like that didn’t even matter to them and they went and stabed you in the back. You also have to think about like this though, they want nice things and see you with nice things and think that the money they take really won’t be a big deal to you and that you probably won’t even notice. Well I did notice but I am going to try and be understanding about it, I am however not going to be very nice to the two girls as I was but I will still try to keep decent relations with them.
So that was my day today. And tomorrow will be another day, and I will start again fresh with a new day and hopefully things will be good tomorrow. That is usually how I take things here because some days can be just shit, excuse my French lol, and other days can be the best days ever so you really just have to take in one day at a time. I am at the moment really looking forward to my regional meeting that we are having at the end of October. I get to go stay in Bohicon with some of my friends for a night and hang out so that will be a lot of fun. I also got to talk to a couple of my friend who are up north last weekend and that was really nice. One of them I hadn’t heard from at all because he deosn’t have service in his area so if was nice to here that he was alive and kicking.
I was reading somewhere the other day about race in Africa, actually I think it was mentioned a couple of places, and they all kind of consistently said the same thing and that is that there really isn’t a concept about skin color, the concept that we have in America, over here. I think that when many Africans leave Africa and go to America they are very lost because for some reason people group all people with black skin in the same category in America. ( I know this statement is obvious but it needed to be said). And over here your are categorized by you ethinicity, such as Fulani or Yaruba. It also made me think about other things over here that I find interesting. Such as the fact that there are so many different religions in Benin and everyone is so tolerant of one another. People don’t make it an issue over here. To them is as simple as this, you believe what you believe and why would I care that it is different from me. I like that thought process over here, I also think that it has to do with the fact that there are a lot bigger things to worry about over here, such as food. Americans and many other countries are too sheltered. We have to much time on our hands to think about stuff. And I am not saying this is a bad thing, it is just a fact, we have too much time to think. I definitely have a lot of time to think over here and that is probably why I am I rambling on and on right now haha.
So I think Ill end this blog with a good quote from the song I am listening to write now,
“How many years must some people exist before there allowed to be free
and how many times can a man turn his head and pretend that he just doesn’t see, the answer my friend is blowing in the wind , the answer is blowing in the wind.”
Joan Beaz
Hello everyone, hope all is well. Things are going pretty well over here in Africa. I have been in my village for over a month now and things are going pretty well. I have started working, even though it is not very much. I have furniture in my house as you can see from my pictures and my house is slowly starting to feel like home and not just some place I come to, to sleep.
For work so far I have been working with sole hanidcaped childredn trying to help rehabilitate them. We these strange chairs at our office, one is for sitting the other is for standing, that help children learn how to sit and stand correctly. Most of the children that we use the chairs on either can’t sit up my themselves or can’t stand/walk. I play games with them while they sit in these chiars, such as put the shape in the right place and memory games. I have also started looking into this ONG called Mercyship. It is like a cruise ship that has been converted into a traveling hospital. The docotrs who volunteer with the ONG travel around to different countries giving free surgeries and things to that nature. I have a lot of children in my area that are in need of surgery and I am really hopeing, they ship is coming here in February, that I can get some of kids the surgeries that they need. I can’t do much yet because I don’t know much but once I do if I can at least get one child a surgery it would be amazing. My friend Aaron who told me about it said something like that could make your whole Peace Corps experience worth it and mean something. He is completely right and I really want to help these kids. That would just be amazing if it could work out. I am not going to get my hopes up though because many of the things that we try to do here just don’t work a lot of the time do to many factors, which is ok, but you have to learn not to get to excited about stuff because you don’t want to get let down.
On that note I was let down pretty bad today by some of my neighbors. I had been missing some money here and there lately, nothing substantial, but it had always been after I had, had people in my house and I was starting to get suspiscious. I didn’t want to jump to any conclusions and I really wanted to believe in the best in people so I decided that I probably just lost the money. Well today I had two of the neighbor girls in my house, who were my friends until today, and I went back into my room to grab something and when I came back that were kind of hovering in the area of my backpack. Well I told them I wanted to take a nap and they left and as soon as they did I went over to by backpack, found it open and my coin purse was open and empty. It really upset me. I said something to them to the effect of “ I know one of you took my money and I am very upset about it” however there really isn’t much you can do about so I let it go from there. It just means that now I really can’t let people into my house anymore. I talked to one of my friends here about it and she told me when she was living with ther host family one of her sisters was taking money from. We talked about how it really does hurt your feelins and you feel used because for all the good stuff you do for these people, such as giving them food and candy which I did almost on a daily basis, it feels like that didn’t even matter to them and they went and stabed you in the back. You also have to think about like this though, they want nice things and see you with nice things and think that the money they take really won’t be a big deal to you and that you probably won’t even notice. Well I did notice but I am going to try and be understanding about it, I am however not going to be very nice to the two girls as I was but I will still try to keep decent relations with them.
So that was my day today. And tomorrow will be another day, and I will start again fresh with a new day and hopefully things will be good tomorrow. That is usually how I take things here because some days can be just shit, excuse my French lol, and other days can be the best days ever so you really just have to take in one day at a time. I am at the moment really looking forward to my regional meeting that we are having at the end of October. I get to go stay in Bohicon with some of my friends for a night and hang out so that will be a lot of fun. I also got to talk to a couple of my friend who are up north last weekend and that was really nice. One of them I hadn’t heard from at all because he deosn’t have service in his area so if was nice to here that he was alive and kicking.
I was reading somewhere the other day about race in Africa, actually I think it was mentioned a couple of places, and they all kind of consistently said the same thing and that is that there really isn’t a concept about skin color, the concept that we have in America, over here. I think that when many Africans leave Africa and go to America they are very lost because for some reason people group all people with black skin in the same category in America. ( I know this statement is obvious but it needed to be said). And over here your are categorized by you ethinicity, such as Fulani or Yaruba. It also made me think about other things over here that I find interesting. Such as the fact that there are so many different religions in Benin and everyone is so tolerant of one another. People don’t make it an issue over here. To them is as simple as this, you believe what you believe and why would I care that it is different from me. I like that thought process over here, I also think that it has to do with the fact that there are a lot bigger things to worry about over here, such as food. Americans and many other countries are too sheltered. We have to much time on our hands to think about stuff. And I am not saying this is a bad thing, it is just a fact, we have too much time to think. I definitely have a lot of time to think over here and that is probably why I am I rambling on and on right now haha.
So I think Ill end this blog with a good quote from the song I am listening to write now,
“How many years must some people exist before there allowed to be free
and how many times can a man turn his head and pretend that he just doesn’t see, the answer my friend is blowing in the wind , the answer is blowing in the wind.”
Joan Beaz
Friday, October 3, 2008
October 3
So everyone i finally got the blogs on here that I had written on my laptop a really long time ago. I finally found a cyber near me that would work fast enough for me to actually do some things one it. LOL
All in all I am doing really well I think. I really like my house, I have great neighbors, and I finally got some furniture in my house (look at the photos for sept. 18 that is my bedroom)
I have done lots since I have been at post. Last weekend I went to a huge party in another town for the re opening of a palace. It wad really fun and if i can ever get the pictures on here you will get to see some of the really cool voodoo rituals I got to watch.
I have also started doing some more work. My homologue came to town Monday and Teusday and a news crew came to shoot some stories on the womens cooking groups my NGO started. So if any of you are over in Africa you can look for me on ORTB.
Other than that I dont know too much else i have really just been hanging out with my neighbors and not much else. So I hope everyone is well and hopefully I can write more soon.
September 14 i know i put them on backwards
Well, it looks like I officially live in Djidja now. I guess it is still somewhat unofficial however since I still have not moved into my house yet, oh had I mentioned that I have been here over a week now. And yes to answer the question I know you all were already thinking my house was suppose to be finished way before I even got here. On the Brightside however a nice family, actually I would say a man since his wife and children live in a house near by, has allowed me to stay in a small apartment they have in their concession. I am pretty sure I kicked the older son out of the place he sleeps but what can I do.
On a lighter note I would say I am doing as well as can be expected. The first night was tough I was actually very upset to leave my family here and I was also missing my family and friends at home quite a lot. I got through it though and am still here. It has been quite a trip to move somewhere, where you know not one person, you are very unfamiliar with the culture, and yes I am going to say it, the only white person for 40 miles. It is not as hard as I thought though, people are genuinely a kind race and I have found that the people here are kind as well. I would say the hardest thing here is that I have absolutely, positively NOTHING to do.
I am not sure I have explained this yet but for the first three months of peace corps service you are suppose to just asses your community. That doesn’t mean that you can’t begin some projects, but you are really just suppose to get to know your community. Which is a good idea however in the long run it means I sit around a lot with nothing to do. Also my homologue is out of town for the next month and I can’t really start anything without her. I am in contact with some other NGO’s however that I am hoping I can start doing some things with. I am very excited to be here and I know that in the long run it is going to be good it is just hard to get through this slow, transitional period. I also don’t like always looking towards the future but I feel that is all I am really doing right now, just playing the waiting game. Waiting to know people and my community better, waiting for my homologue to come back, and waiting for the these three months to be over with so that I will have something to do and can start something.
So I guess I could some up my first week for you. The first couple of days I went to the CPS ( centre de promotion social) where I will be working and sat around while my bosses assistant did some things. He also took me to the mayor’s office several times to see people, most of who I had met on my post visit. We also went to the NGO Bonde Fondle which is an affiliate of Child Fund International, where people from other countries sponsor children here in Africa. I think I will be doing a lot of work with them actually. I was also taken to several tailors, mechanics, and hair tressors to see the AIDS orphans that are doing apprenticeships there. Some how we do stuff with them but I am not sure yet what that is, my French still isn’t up to par. I also biked out to two villages to see them doing cooking demonstrations on healthy porridge to feed 6 month to two year old children. That was a very interesting experience. The one village that we went to was very small and poor, many of the children were malnourished and had been for a while, that made me very sad. This job is going to be hard at times. It was also difficult for me because there was this dog there that was clearly on the brink of death, its ribs were protruding dramatically and it had soars all over its body and ears which is a sign bad nutrition and starvation. That hard thing was that I felt horrible for this animal but the people in this village for very obviously not even feed their own children so how was could they possibly take care of a dog. It was just something that really made me think. It also made me really happy that I am here so that maybe I can help do something about one of the too. It is amazing all the work there is to do here, it is just difficult to know what to do exactly and where to start.
Well that is most of it so far, I am sure you will be getting more blog entries because I have nothing to do so I will be writing more blogs on my laptop and then putting on my website when I can get internet. I might have it in my town in the near future, but they say that about everything so we shall see. Hope all is well with everyone.
PS I almost forgot on weekends here people play music all night long until the sun comes up, it is almost so loud that it shakes my bed with the bass, so needless to say I sleep very late on weekends here because there is not much sleeping going on at night. I think I might just have to start partying with them through the night because I’m not getting anything else done.
On a lighter note I would say I am doing as well as can be expected. The first night was tough I was actually very upset to leave my family here and I was also missing my family and friends at home quite a lot. I got through it though and am still here. It has been quite a trip to move somewhere, where you know not one person, you are very unfamiliar with the culture, and yes I am going to say it, the only white person for 40 miles. It is not as hard as I thought though, people are genuinely a kind race and I have found that the people here are kind as well. I would say the hardest thing here is that I have absolutely, positively NOTHING to do.
I am not sure I have explained this yet but for the first three months of peace corps service you are suppose to just asses your community. That doesn’t mean that you can’t begin some projects, but you are really just suppose to get to know your community. Which is a good idea however in the long run it means I sit around a lot with nothing to do. Also my homologue is out of town for the next month and I can’t really start anything without her. I am in contact with some other NGO’s however that I am hoping I can start doing some things with. I am very excited to be here and I know that in the long run it is going to be good it is just hard to get through this slow, transitional period. I also don’t like always looking towards the future but I feel that is all I am really doing right now, just playing the waiting game. Waiting to know people and my community better, waiting for my homologue to come back, and waiting for the these three months to be over with so that I will have something to do and can start something.
So I guess I could some up my first week for you. The first couple of days I went to the CPS ( centre de promotion social) where I will be working and sat around while my bosses assistant did some things. He also took me to the mayor’s office several times to see people, most of who I had met on my post visit. We also went to the NGO Bonde Fondle which is an affiliate of Child Fund International, where people from other countries sponsor children here in Africa. I think I will be doing a lot of work with them actually. I was also taken to several tailors, mechanics, and hair tressors to see the AIDS orphans that are doing apprenticeships there. Some how we do stuff with them but I am not sure yet what that is, my French still isn’t up to par. I also biked out to two villages to see them doing cooking demonstrations on healthy porridge to feed 6 month to two year old children. That was a very interesting experience. The one village that we went to was very small and poor, many of the children were malnourished and had been for a while, that made me very sad. This job is going to be hard at times. It was also difficult for me because there was this dog there that was clearly on the brink of death, its ribs were protruding dramatically and it had soars all over its body and ears which is a sign bad nutrition and starvation. That hard thing was that I felt horrible for this animal but the people in this village for very obviously not even feed their own children so how was could they possibly take care of a dog. It was just something that really made me think. It also made me really happy that I am here so that maybe I can help do something about one of the too. It is amazing all the work there is to do here, it is just difficult to know what to do exactly and where to start.
Well that is most of it so far, I am sure you will be getting more blog entries because I have nothing to do so I will be writing more blogs on my laptop and then putting on my website when I can get internet. I might have it in my town in the near future, but they say that about everything so we shall see. Hope all is well with everyone.
PS I almost forgot on weekends here people play music all night long until the sun comes up, it is almost so loud that it shakes my bed with the bass, so needless to say I sleep very late on weekends here because there is not much sleeping going on at night. I think I might just have to start partying with them through the night because I’m not getting anything else done.
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