the begging begins

Hello again friends. The disadvantage to my being in Dapaong is I start clogging your inboxes with my incessant rambling. However, I'll try to keep this short and toss in some photos for your enjoyment.

Next week, I'm participating in AIDS ride, in which volunteers spend the week biking
around region doing presentations on AIDS in different villages. About two weeks later, with more volunteers, I will bike the length of Togo, from Cinkasse to Lome to raise funds for the Karren Waid Foundation, a Peace Corps fund that supports girls' education. All participating volunteers find sponsors for the ride (it's like those walks where you pay five cents for every mile I walk). My target is a total of $100 for the whole ride (school fees for a year of middle school are about 5,000 CFA, which is roughly $10, not including books and uniforms). So basically, if five people want to give $20, I would reach my goal. Or 20 people could give $5.00 and fund about six girls' scholarships (each scholarship is around 15,000 CFA).

Please email me at ljgolden@gmail.com if you're interested. At this point, I just need you to pledge - the details of how we will actually get this money will come later. I think what will happen is when the tour organizer, Dun Grover, goes home for Christmas, he will collect checks, so you would mail them to him. Again, more details to come.

Thanks ahead of time, and enjoy the photos (if I succeed in uploading them).










The Oti River and oncoming storm (which totally soaked me). Now that rainy season is over, this river is significantly smaller.














The women's side of the Ramadan prayer service at the elementary school.



















My wonderful neighbor girls, Izafot (4) and Hanatou (2). They're fun, but a little too much at times (the baby hasn't quite learned how to share yet).