Obama in Ghana (and everywhere else)

President Obama arrives in Accra today, so it seems like an appropriate time to post my Obama photo collection. Since his election, I've noticed various businesses have adopted the name "Obama", so I started taking pictures. Here's what I have so far...

A building in Kodjoviakope, Lomé - I'm not sure if it's a hotel or just apartments. They completed construction since I've been here. In case you can't see the "Obama" here's a close up:



Cafeteria Obama in Dapaong

Obama hairdresser, also in Dapaong

A taxi driver in Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso loves Obama, but forgot to spell check.

A sign in the Kokomlemle neighborhood of Accra, Ghana, advertises the Obama Inn, bar and restaurant.

Elom the barber and his barbershop in the Tokoin-Gbonvie neighborhood of Lomé.

Mr. Elom said he changed his barbershop's name eight or nine months ago. Before "Obama", he said he just wrote his own name. Why did he change it?

"Because I love him! I love him too much!"

A sign off the national highway points to Obama village, which is not a village.

Two More Cents on MJ

Because I can only assume that the American media isn't bombarding you with nothing but news on Michael Jackson's death, I just have to add more news from Togo. Actually, I only have this photo* I took of a business in Kodjoviakope, a neighborhood in Lomé


and this link to an article about Faure Gnassingbe's (Togo's president) statement about Michael Jackson's death. For the non-francophones, he's basically saying that MJ was an exceptional singer and dancer who "dug a canal" (my poor, literal translation) between black and white music.

"I've always been one of his fans. What was extraordinary about him was his ability to create bridges between black music, soul, funk and disco, and white music like pop and rock."

Thanks, Faure. And thanks to Melissa for the link.

*The store was closed because it was Sunday, not for mourning.

Back to Work

Vacation is over, Monday was my first day back at work and I have five weeks of work left and about six of Togo - not that I'm counting. Actually I'm really trying not to count, because then I have to think about paperwork and other things I'd rather ignore.

The parking lot at the Burkina-Niger border, where Amanda and I slept on Night One of vacation. See those guys sitting on a rock by the telephone pole? That's about where we put down our mat.

Male giraffes fighting in Koure, outside Niamey. Love that head-butt move.


Our trip was... well, until we arrived at Green Turtle, our last stop, it wasn't very relaxing. We were in a bus almost every day after leaving Niamey, and the one day we didn't have to catch a bus, I was sick and stayed in bed. This was the day we spend in Mole (pronounced Molay) National Park in northern Ghana. We spent the night before in the Peace Corps sub-office in Tamale, and when we left for the bus station to go to Mole, I realized I felt rotten. The ticket vendors told us to arrive at 1:30 for a 3 o'clock departure. We left around 4:30 and spent those three pre-departure hours waiting at the bus station, which doubled as a market. The ride to Mole included two hours on a paved road and then three special hours bumping along on a dirt road, with the latter part of the ride through the dark, African night. This while running a fever and having to pee. I advise travelers to Ghana to take the less frequent, more expensive STC busses when possible. MMT, the bus line we took to Mole and then Kumasi, is basically just a big bush taxi.

Peter and Amanda P. waiting in the Tamale bus station... hour three.

So I didn't go on a guided walking tour the next morning, but I saw elephants, wart hogs and water buck anyway. The lodge in Mole sits on a plateau that overlooks the park, and I saw two elephants at the watering hole. The water buck came out at dusk. The wart hogs like to hang around the lodge, and one elephant wandered up to say hi around lunch time. The roundtrip bus ride to the park was not worth my time in bed there, but the day off got me back in shape for more bus riding. If you're healthy and have more than a day (or a private vehicle), I would recommend Mole. Breakfast is included with the price of the room. That's always exciting, unless the breakfast is no good (my eggs, toast and tea were delicious, especially since I'd eaten next to nothing the day before).

After Mole, we trekked south to Kumasi, home of the largest market in West Africa. Half of our group wanted to spend a full day there, but Amanda and I woke up at 2:20 the next morning to catch the 4 a.m. bus to Takoradi so we could spend more time on the beach. This bus, an STC, was nicer than Greyhounds I've ridden in the States and was so air conditioned I had to thaw out when we arrived in Takoradi. From Takordi, we took tro-tros (Ghanaian bush taxis) to Green Turtle, where we properly relaxed by doing nothing for four days. The ocean was rougher than any other time I've been there, and after my first swim, I decided not to venture out beyond the breakers again (mainly because once I got out there, the only way to get back in was to let the waves do the work, and they treated me like a rag doll). From then on, "swimming" meant standing in the water, getting knocked over by the waves and then getting back up.

A mid-morning walk on the beach with Peter, Amanda P. and Amanda H.

The intrepid bus riders after dinner at Green Turtle.

From Green Turtle, I went to Accra to meet my friend John. Every time I visit Ghana's capital, I'm amazed by how it surpasses Togo. There's a mall! With a movie theater! And a food court! They have fast food establishments and internet businesses - not cafés, Busy Internet on Ring Road is too big to be a mere café - with internet that loads web pages before you age a year. There's also bumper-to-bumper traffic, pot-holed roads and shanty town poverty - it just comes with middle-class entertainment.

We got back to Togo on Thursday, and it's been raining almost non-stop since. That's good for temperatures and farmers but bad for tourism and malaria (and eventually it's bad for the farmers). When I say tourism, I mean it's difficult to show your visitor around town when the roads are full of lakes and mud. And when I say malaria, I mean more rain equals more mosquitoes equals more malaria. I leave you with this Togo Travel Tip: when visiting sub-Saharan Africa, always bring your malaria prophylaxis, especially if you don't plan on staying in air-conditioning all the time (even then). Yovos.

PS - I've been instructed to update more regularly, which I will try to do in my last howevermany weeks. If all the updates start annoying you, send me an email and I'll un-enroll (or whatever) you from the auto-update list. Also, there will be more photos.

Trip Awesome

So it turns out that traveling from Cinkassé (on the border of Togo and Burkina) to Niamey (the capital of Niger) is not really possible in one day - at least not if you take a bush taxi, which we thought would be a good idea.

Amanda and I took a bus to Koupela, which is half way between Cinkassé and Ouagaudougou. We got out here to take a bush taxi to Niamey. Had the taxi gone straight there, we could have arrived around 8 p.m. Instead, the first car dropped us off aboout two hours later in a place called Fada N'Guorma (maybe). Then we had to wait about two hours for the next car to leave. This car's driver was a wonderful man, who thought nothing of cramming about 25 people in his 15-seat car. Amanda and I were on the bench closest to the front, and I was pushed against the door. I spent a good part of the ride hanging out the window, because that was comfortable. Then, at one of our unexplained stops (where the driver picked up MORE people to shove in), the door fell off.

Because we stopped about three times along the way, we didn't even make it to the last town before the Niger border. There, the driver left us to sit while he unloaded all the yams we'd had underfoot before picking us up to take us to the station. I was hoping we could just spend the night in a cheap hostel or something, which another passenger assured me was possible. We got to the station, where someone told us we were going to continue (we had all already paid the full fare to Niamey). We got in another car - also overcrowded - and chugged along in the dark, all the way to the border. The guards collected our passports and identity cards, we pooled money so that they would let us go through with all the baggage on top of the car... and then the border closed. And Amanda and I spent the night at the border. In the parking lot. On a mat that someone lent us. I slept well until 2 or 3 a.m. when a semi pulled through and I decided it must be time to wake up. But no... it was not close to dawn and there were still several hours of tossing and turning and hugging my camera bag to my body left.

So! Lessons learned: if you don't want to go to Ouaga from Cinkassé to travel to Niamey, the Koupela bus leaves on Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday at 8 a.m. To get this bus, you'd have to spend the night in Koupela, because I don't think the Burkina border opens before six. Bush taxis are a really rotten idea and bush taxi drivers are the same, it seems, in all francophone West African countries (in Ghana, everyone gets their own seat in the bush taxis). Finally, there is no where to sleep at the border of Burkina and Niger except the ground.

But when we finally arrived, we had showers, some beers, lunch, naps and then more beers at a bar overlooking the Niger River. Today we paid about $80 to drive out to see the last herd of giraffes in West Africa - very touristy, but very cool AND there was a baby AND two of them were fighting. Then we went to a mosque whose building was funded by the Libyan government and next we're going on canoe rides on the river.

We leave for Ouaga tomorrow morning on a bus. No more bush taxis for this trip.

Candles and Trees

Last weekend, I attended two large events, one for PSI and one for Peace Corps.

On Friday, PSI held its annual Candlelight Memorial ceremony, honoring those who have died of HIV/AIDS. Candlelight is an international event that has apparently been happening since 1983, on the third Sunday of May (visit the International AIDS Candlelight Memorial page for more information). We were a little late, with ours happening the last Friday of May at the Congressional Palace. PSI invited the organizations we work with to invite people to the event, which started with a march that I missed, because my duty was handing out condoms inside the venue.

As we've learned from previous events, freebies draw crowds (all invited participants received tshirts) and mobs. Condom distribution went fine until everyone arrived at once, pushed through the two entrances and decided they really wanted to get to their seats but also really wanted condoms. Security decided they should help me distribute from the middle of the stairs rather than at the bottom of the stairs, where I was getting smushed. Then a PSI employee started yelling at them, which started a shouting match with me still trying to hand out condoms between the two shouting parties. I hope this is the last time I ever get mobbed for free stuff in Togo.

I'd never been to an event like this in Togo (except for maybe that cryfest at camp last year), but as an American, "Candlelight Mermorial for Victims of HIV/AIDS" led me to expect a somber evening, despite the two musical guests. But people talked and cheered throughout the speeches and the moment of silence, and I felt it was all kind of a joke. Co-workers said it was an improvement from last year and generally thought it went well, though, so I guess I can only blame my Western expectations.

On Saturday, I went to Notsé, a town in the Plateaux region, to attend Moringa Fest. Two volunteers from my training group, Ashley and Danielle (remember Danielle from the last post, when she got married?) have worked with the moringa tree for most of their service. Moringa Fest was the culminating event of two years' of moringa-educating and promoting. Volunteers and Togolese counterparts ran stations that explained different benefits of the moringa tree: nutritional information, how to plant and care for the tree, how to dry the leaves and make powder, how to cook with the leaves, and how to use the seeds to purify water and make oil. There was a rowdy kids' section where volunteers (including roommate JT) tried to corral 50 children and keep them out of the adults' way. Throughout the day, on the main stage, volunteers presented their stations' lessons, and during breaks, people could visit the stations and get more information. There were also games like musical chairs and a moringa-themed song and poem competition to keep the mood festive. The moringa tree is called the "miracle tree" for all its uses and its leaves' high nutritional value. If Ashley and Danielle could just reproduce their event all over Togo, malnutrition might drop immensely.

Next Wednesday, I start my West Africa tour: Niger, Burkina Faso (we're really just crossing it) and Ghana. It's impossible to just get the Niger visa in Togo and you can't buy it at the Burkina-Niger border, so I bought the Visa Entente. This gets you a one-time entry visa for Benin, Niger, Burkina Faso, Togo and Côte d'Ivoire, which is valid for two months. Obviously, I don't need Togo, I already have a five-year Burkina visa, I don't really plan on going to Benin and U.S. citizens don't need a visa for Côte d'Ivoire. So I spent $50 for Niger, mainly because I want to see giraffes. But if anyone ever plans to travel to those countries, keep the Visa Entente in mind.

Finishing up, Peace Corps Style

So, approximately three months before our official Close of Service date (August 22nd, calculated by Peace Corps from our swearing-in date), we have a Close of Service (COS) conference. This involves going to a hotel by the beach and learning about all the medical and administrative things we have to do before we can get on the plane.

When I heard about COS conference two years ago from the volunteers that were leaving around the time I arrived, my reaction was, "Hotel by the beach? Food? Pool? I'm totally staying for that!" I realize that's not really great motivation for two years' service, and had I been utterly miserable in Togo, the idea of Hotel Novella Star certainly wouldn't have kept me here. But, I made it. And so did all these people:

That's 14 less people than we started with (we lost 15 from the original group and gained one transfer from Kenya):

For more comparisons, here's the original group of health (CHAP) volunteers at our swearing-in:

And now:

I had a great time hanging out with everyone one last time. We ended the week by celebrating a fellow CHAP volunteer's wedding. Danielle and Jorge met in Bolivia about seven years ago and have been carrying on long-distance since then. He joined her here in Togo in January, they got officially married in Ghana, and we had a ceremony on the beach in Togo (the first of many ceremonies? I think they're planning more in the States and Bolivia). Anyway, I took most of the wedding photos and you can see them in all their un-Photoshopped glory on Facebook, here, here, and here. Yes, there are three albums, and about a hundred variations of the following photo (that I obviously didn't take).


And that's about all that's new. I have some West African travels planned for June and a ticket out of here for August 11th. So... see you soon.

What Happened in April

I know, I know - another month has passed with only one blog update. Here's a summary of April:

Easter weekend, I went to Agou Nyogbo for two volunteers' "fake wedding." They celebrated Togolese style, with heavy American influences (bridesmaids and groomsmen, shoving cake in each others' faces, etc.) Now they are recognized as married in the eyes of Agou Nyogbo, but nowhere else. You can see photos on Facebook .

That week, Togo made it into the international news (BBC) when Kpatcha Gnassingbe, the president's brother, became the victim of an assassination attempt. Actually, he was plotting a coup, and two days later, he ran to the US embassy, seeking refuge to avoid arrest. They got him anyway (read about it at the BBC ) and THEN found a bunch of weapons at his house ( article ). You would think this would all be very exciting or scary, but everyone carried on like nothing had happened. Just another day in Togo.

I finally, finally put out the second (and my last) issue of Perspectives. Here in Togo, we have many volunteer-published newsletters: Farm to Market for the Natural Resource Management and small business volunteers, the CHAP Newsletter for health volunteers, the the Griot an Onion-style satirical newsletter, and then, Perspectives. Perspectives prints volunteers' essays, poems, recipes - basically, whatever they want to submit. I became editor of the gender and development newsletter last March, and the Perspectives editor and I decided to combine our publications because neither ever had many contributions. We put out one issue in July, then procrastinated, and then she got medically separated right around the time we planned to work on the next issue (late October). Then it took me another four months to put the newsletter together, but it's finally out and it looks quite nice. If you'd like to see a copy, I'd love to send it to you, but I've had no success emailing it, because the file's too big. I'll take suggestions on what to do about that.

This week is our COS conference (Close of Service). It's from Tuesday afternoon to Friday at the Hotel Novella Star, which is outside of Lomé towards Benin. For three days, Peace Corps will tell us all about the things we have to do so we can leave Togo. This is the last time that everyone who's left from my training group will be together in one place. I think we're all having some issues realizing that our two years are almost over. I'll try to be better blogger and at least send some pictures out next week.

Finally, news from Sagbiebou: Zaratou's husband (I don't know husbands' names - my male neighbor is STILL "Alima's husband") called me on Friday to tell me that my friend Maïmouna had her baby. It's a boy, and since I've had no news since Friday, I guess everyone's still healthy.

I apologize for the lack of news and will try to do better in my last three months. I have an official COS date - August 10th. Now I just need a plane ticket.