Happy Valentine's Day!

Hi everyone, don’t worry I’m still here! I’ve been almost ‘busy’ in the American sense these past few weeks, and haven’t had my act together re: the blog. Our GEE stage had In-Service Training for a week, which was really fun, and I think we all left excited to go back to village and get some work done. A lot of the information was repeated from stage, but expanded upon, and now we each had a context to put it in, so it seemed like we learned a lot more. We went on a couple field trips to see a girls science club and a Village Savings and Loans program that PCVs have started, which were cool to see in action.  I want to start a VSL in Mogou, but it’s going to take a lot of organization and enough motivated people… Affaires thinks we’d have to keep the safe at the gendarmerie (police station) in Gando with a couple guard dogs on it. On verra.

On my way back up north after IST, I stayed in Dapaong for a couple days to do some errands and banking and whatnot.  As it turned out I was really glad I went, because I got pulled into some work with SOS Children’s Villages, aka super-awesome NGO. There’s a Village in Dapaong même, and the PCV in Dapaong and I went over to check it out. They want him to come in every week and teach English to the elementary school kids, and I’m going to come once a month to do games, art projects, etc. with the ‘petit petits’ (kindergarteners). The campus is beautiful—the best-looking school I’ve seen in Togo. The teachers seem super motivated and excited to have us work with them, and there’s even electricity and running water. Score.

OH, other news, I got accepted to the Gender and Development Committee (GAD) as one of three editors of ‘Lève-Toi Jeune Fille,’ a Peace Corps newsletter for girls in Togo. I’m super stoked about it! LTJF is like American Girl magazine, Togo-style, only smaller, in French, and released 3 or 4 times a year. But it’s so cool to see how, for example, my girls club reacted to it when I showed them a copy. There are next to no printed materials of any kind in Mogou (even in the schools only the teacher has a copy of the books), so showing them a newsletter geared specifically towards middle and high school girls—rocked their world. And this means I’ll have solid work to do on a regular basis, get to improve my French, and ‘bouge’ (move around) un peu. My PCV neighbor in Gando says she’s turning into a ‘village rat,’ because she stays in village all the time, and I’m turning in to an ‘all of Togo rat.’ What can I say? I like to go with.

But things in Mogou are going really well. I came back from Dapaong last Wednesday at 16:00—already an hour late for girls club. But the girls were all still there, waiting for me! Love that. And I explained everything I learned at IST to Affaires, who can’t wait to get back to work.  We’re in the midst of a ‘tour des villages’ in the canton de Mogou: there are about 30 smaller villages in our, um, county? and Affaires and I are making the rounds, greeting all the chiefs and explaining who we are to everybody. Affaires loves these trips because we usually end up with chickens and yams, and I’m not complaining either. I have a new egg-laying hen, Nelly, so I’ve been making omelets and pancakes… yumm.

Anyways, hope y’all are doing well!! Du courage with all the snow—I have such a hard time picturing that. Harmattan is over, and we’re in hot season now. It’s been 90-95 degrees in my house at night…the electricity should (fingers crossed) be coming soon. I need a fan.

LOVE! xoxox

Ce n’est que le debut de la commencement

There are a few things I’ve wanted to blog but haven’t yet. I spend a lot of time thinking about food… like hamburgers. And pizza. And anything with cheese. I’ve also come up with a couple lists.

Strangest foods I’ve eaten so far in Togo:

- An entire frog. Legs, body, arms, head. Including bones and eyeballs.

- Sheep intestines

- Chicken necks

Strangest foods I’ve been offered but have (politely) declined:

- A monkey

- Pig ears and intestines (this one was disguised under the question “Do you eat pork?”)

- Rooster testicles

- Dog

- Iguana

Another thing I’ve wanted to do is just write what I’ve done in an entire day. Today was marché day, meaning it was about as animated as Mogou gets, so I figure today is as good as any. Here goes:

I woke up at 6:30—kind of on the late side because I didn’t have a morning meeting or déplacement (outing, quoi), which would probably have been at 7 or 7:30. I went outside and hung my phone on the nail on my terrace to get reception, said good morning to my neighbors, and went to my kitchen to put water on the stove to boil for tea and oatmeal. I was majorly bummed to find mouse poop in my box of oatmeal… it might have been old though because I cleaned up a dead mouse last week. Here’s hoping that was him. So, took my oatmeal and tea back to the house and ate breakfast and wrote a letter. I then swept out my house, latrine, and shower and cleared out some wasp nests.  After that, unlike most days, I had written Peace Corps work to do. I filled out an application for a committee position and worked on my shadowing report (from shadowing my neighbor PCV in Mango who’s been here a year already) to present at IST.  At about 9:00, the mason showed up to work on my latrine seat. Yess! He found cement. I explained what I wanted twice more and he had me sit on a few cinder blocks as a height reference. Then he got to work and I went back inside to draw up a visual aid for girls club tomorrow.  I worked on that and ished around the house, packing for IST and whatnot, until around 11, and then headed out for the marché.

My neighbor wanted tomatoes but couldn’t find any, so I told her I’d keep an eye out.  My first stop was the generator guy, where I dropped off my cell phone to charge. I then found tomatoes and carrots (!) and tossed them in my bag along with some string and bread. Looked for ant killer but couldn’t find any. Stopped by the lady who makes salads (She’s new. Comes in from Mango. ) and sat and ate one for lunch. I already have a reputation for liking salad… she knows me by name and scolded me for not telling her I was traveling last marché day. I then took the veggies back to my house and my neighbor was so thrilled she said she’d make me a salad for dinner. Score! Two salads in one day!

Back at the marché, I headed for the Kabyé hangout: the tchuk stand. Beau Père, Affaires, a couple Directeurs, my Gangam teacher… everyone was there. Chatted and drank tchuk for a bit. My Gangam teacher wants to start, ou bien re-start, a girls club at the elementary school, so we hashed that out a bit. Five old, drunk men stumbled in one after the other to ask to marry the white lady. Dèja mariée, dèja mariée, bye bye yo. The tchuk ran out early, so the tchuk mama and my Gangam teacher and I went shopping. They had to get stuff for dinner: yams, dried fish, dried peppers, etc., and I was just happy to be tagging along. Then they showed me the “good pagne” lady. Gangam teacher and I got matching pagne to make dresses like the one tchuk mama was wearing; the three of us are going to wear them to church together when I get back. So stoked!

After making all the rounds, we went to the couturière’s house to order our dresses. I brought along another pagne to make a skirt, as well as a skirt with a hole in the side for her to fix. She said she would have it all done by tomorrow evening for mille cinq cent ($3). Done deal.

Then I headed home for the day. Bought some colico on the way (fried yams) as an appetizer before my salad. You can’t be too healthy, tu vois? I ran into Affaires on the way and we fixed a time to leave for our déplacement tomorrow morning. Got home, put my phone back up on the nail, and mange’ed my colico. My water girl brought a bidon of water for me, which was really awesome because the mason had used up all I had for mixing the cement. And now here I am, sitting at my desk/ table quoi waiting for dinner at 8. After that it’s bucket shower and bed. Day in the life, yo : )