The Fortune Teller...and some project info

Now that I am back at Post things are back to normal. Now that the first three months are over, I will be able to do more traveling around Benin, during which we are required to stay at post in order to facilitate community integration.

It wasn’t the easiest to come back here, I will admit. When I was in Kenya I had an extended ‘taste’ of all of the things I am missing back home, partially because Kenya is much more developed than Benin. If colonization is a skill, the French suck at it. But, now that I am back I am moving on many of my projects.

I have started a Women’s group in village to make bread. Well, that is actually giving me more credit than I deserve. My neighbor and two other women, who are probably around 50 years old but look 200, approached me because they want to make and sell bread in village but were denied by the microloan company in our area. It seems the microloan companies in developing Benin can spot a bad investment better than all large financial institutions in the US.

Anyways, they were denied for lack of a business plan and lack of potential ability to repay the loan on time. So, this is where I come in. PC-Benin has given us tons of info on starting small enterprises here to use in circumstances like this and I have solicited the help of another Small Enterprise Development PCV for this project. Since this is a women’s group and it is relatively cheap, PC-Benin gives out small grants for projects exactly like this. All I am doing is coming in to facilitate a feasibility study of the village, the creation of a legit business plan, and a comprehensive budget. I also asked them to bring some new blood in and so they found two young women around 20-years old, which brings the group to five. I did that because younger women here tend to have a bit more free time (might have only one kid as opposed to 5), have more of an education, can speak French, and can help increase the potential longevity of the enterprise. The deal is that they go through the steps to set up a small business as well as invest some of their own money, no matter how little that may be, and I will find the funding, which does not have to be repaid. I think this will be successful because no one here makes bread and the only way to buy it in village is on the back of some motorcycle, who comes in from a bigger town and is as dependable as the weather in Wisconsin. But everyone already eats bread and from my informal conversations with villagers, there is a desire for a dependable provider. There is already a market and the demand is higher than the supply, which is what you want to see.

What else am I doing? The community environmental club, which has a motivated group of six young adults and one village elder, the German volunteer in Camate, and I are planning a village cleanup with the goal to do it monthly. We are starting small but this initiative will hopefully grow into the development of a trash collection infrastructure since none exists right now, which means people burn or just throw their trash outside.

I have also found the funding to fix the broken pumps in my village. There are four pumps and only one works, which means at busy times, people will wait upwards of 1 ½ hours for drinkable water. With this and a later cistern project, I hope to greatly reduce the immense problem of water availability in Camate.

Enough with the boring stuff. I visited a Beninese fortuneteller the other day, who told me how to get everything that I want, kind of. I went with some tourists and the guy leading the tour of the hills to the ‘seer’s’ hut. To make a long story short, I whispered a question (it has to remain a secret or it wont be answered) into my hands holding a large seed and the money I was paying him. He then quietly chanted and played with a metal chain that had bones, seeds, and small shells interspersed between the metal links. At the end of each end of the chain were two spark plugs, yes, spark plugs, like for a car. Even though this ‘skill’ of fortunetelling has probably been passed down for hundreds of years in his family, he has discovered and released the future seeing power of…the spark plug. Basically what he told me is that I will receive what I am looking for in my question if I am patient. I don’t think one could give a more bland, ‘can apply to everything,’ answer. He even compared me to throwing gasoline on a fire. He also said that there were exams (not the metaphorical kind) in my future, meaning that I am not done with school yet. So, that’s it. Now I know my future I can try to be patient, which sucks, because I don’t like being patient. Regardless, it is good advice, despite the fact that it could be applied to any problem.

Christmas, New Years, a trip to Kenya, and a two-week training

(Me on the Indian Ocean...yes I have lost some weight)

(This is a picture of a little girl carrying little rocks in a basin on her head to a dump truck. This is how most people in my village make money; breaking rocks by hand and selling them by the basin. I talked about it in another post, but it probably took her and her family 2-3hrs to fill that basin and they will receive the equivalent of 25 cents.)

(This is me, Brigitte (another PCV), and two Beninese teenagers at the top of the hills behind my village)



Hello everyone,

Sorry it has been so long since my last post. I went on a trip to Kenya for the holidays and then returned to Benin for a two-week training with all of the Environment and Health volunteers. This blog post will not include any interesting anecdotes but just a brief summary of the past month.

So I left post before Christmas to catch my flight to Nairobi, Kenya to visit Karissa. She was studying abroad there for the first semester and I wanted to visit her and see Kenya...we dated before I left, kept dating, and its complicated so I will just leave it at that. Anyways, I did not fly out of Cotonou, Benin since their 'international' airport resembles more of a bus station. Instead I traveled to Accra, Ghana, two countries to the west of Benin. Basically that consisted of standing on the side of the road with my hand out and a huge bag until a guy pulled over and said he was going to Lome, Togo. The only thing that was missing was the "Free Candy" sign on the side of his car. I got in the back seat of a compact car (normally sits 5 right) with 7 other Beninese folks (3 in the front and 4 in the back) and headed off toward Togo. After crossing the border without any problems, I then found another taxi to Accra, Ghana. Ohh, I forgot to mention that in the taxi I met a guy who spoke English who used to live in Accra. He became a huge help later one. So after another taxi ride, which consisted of several naps, annoying border guards and police with big guns who like to give people a hard time, and claustrophobia-inducing company I made it to Accra. The strangest thing about the trip was nearly every African person had to pay a small bribe to the guard in the sketchy way of shaking hands with money or putting it conviently in their passport. They left me alone though.

I went to Accra without any hotel rooms and my only plan was to find a taxi and tell him to take me to a cheap hotel for the night. But, that guy I met on the taxi ride hooked me up with a hotel room, invited me over to his friends house for dinner and beer, and then gave me a tour of the area. He did this for the only reason that I am an American, which you can thank Obama for. Everyone in Africa loves him and I just want to say that had McCain and that thing of a running mate won in 2008, it would be less safe for me to travel across West Africa. Think about that next time you want to vote Republican! :P

I spent the night in Accra, walked around a bit where a 4 year old tried and failed to pickpocket me. I caught her 'red handed'...with her hand in my pocket. The next day I got on a plane and headed to Nairobi, Kenya. I met Karissa at the airport, which started the most amazing vacation ever. Nairobi was a cool city, the slum is huge (but we didnt get to see much of it), and the people don't freak out for seeing an American. I ate cheeseburgers, pizzas, and all other kinds of food I havent seen since I left the US of A. Then we got on an overnight train straight out of Harry Potter for Mombasa. I loved the city of Mombasa. I didn't realize how much I missed diversity until I was there since Mombasa has an Indian influence, Middle Eastern influence, and of course African influence. Benin is pretty homogenous. We stayed in these cabin hotel rooms on the Indian Ocean. Yes, it was gorgeous. It was my first time in the Indian Ocean and now all I have to do is go swimming in the Arctic and I can say I have swam in every major ocean. I rang in the new year with a bottle of champagne, sitting on the beach on the Indian Ocean, looking at the stars, and sitting with awesome company. I was asleep by 12:30. Then after a vacation that was entirely too short I traveled back to Benin for a two-week training.

I wont bore you with those details but I am pretty sure I ate raw chicken on the street yesterday. Damn street food. Don't worry I am paying for it now. I am headed back to post tomorrow morning, which as of right now is bitter sweet. I am looking forward to going back to everyone I know there and sleeping in my bed but in Kenya and somewhat during the training I got a taste of everything that I have been missing. It will take some readjusting, but I will manage.

Ok, now you are all caught up on my life. I hope you had a wonderful holiday season and are freezing your butt off.