The Last Month in Photos

Howdy All,

Life is going well. Not much time for many words. Life here comes in goes in cycles that seem in constant change and flux yet at the same time seem timeless and static. Drought, heat, rain, cold, dust, water, seas, deserts, moutains, plains, birth, death, happiness, sadness, safety, danger, joy, sorrow, frustration, exultation, profound lonelieness and the constant presence of others.  It's a hyperbolic life filled with extremes all of which seem to entirely define the experience when you're feeling them.  With all these things, it is an honor and privelage to be here and learn so much. With that, I'll end with words and just post some pictuures.  I'd like to give credit Ga Ga-Gaelle, a number of whose pictures from my village I am reposting. They are just too good to pass up.

Staring at the Barrel of a Gun

*Vroom!*

A bounce in the road and I come floating off the moto for an instant only to slam back down an moment later provoking an uncomfortable bray from the hogtied goat resting confusedly in my lap. The peak of the dry season has transformed the once high grass, lush green landscape to a brown dust bowl--each passing car, overloaded with people, goods, and livestock precariously protruding from every open window; perilously perched on every available surface, they emit half kilometer long tails of dust that consume you eyes, nose and mouth as they pass bye. Like the castle from "Howle's Moving Castle," they remind me more of transportable homes than of vehicles of transport.

*Vroom!*

We clear the dust field of a passing vehicle, regaining our view of the road and my gendarme friend, Prosper, revs our moto's undersized Chinese engine, slowly coming back to the speed that will again send me bouncing off the seat with each bump in the road. We pass some villagers selling mangoes on the side of the, leaving them in a cloud of dust. "John, John! And the dust? It goes a little, no?" Prosper laughs over his shoulder, his voice almost drowned out by the moto's whining engine. Our progress down the red earth colored road is marked by our own peacock plume of dust. I can't help but feel like a little fly buzzing down the dry landscape. Bump.

*VROOM*

Another bump elicits another cry from the goat in my lap and the engine beneath me. I glance down at the animal with it tongue hanging out, wind ripping through its hair, a vacant but uncomfortable look in its eyes. Mwaahhhhhhh!!! That sound gave me nightmares when I first came to my village. The sound of a crying goat is disturbing similar to the sound of a human baby crying. I glance to my side where two roosters strapped to one side, two pentards another (a chicken like bird that I swear screams "Pourquoi? Pourquoi?") to the other flutter like a banners in the wind. In front of me is Prosper, in camouflage fatigues, a beret on his head and an AK-47 strapped over his back and my weekly ride to the closest village with electricity. Staring at the barrel of his gun, I wonder, how this scenario become normal?

More to come later. I apologize for my lack of updates. All is well!

Tree Photo Project

There is a tree behind my house that I find myself constantly photographing. Every time I walk by it looks a little different but very striking.  Its a nice view to come back to at the end of my day and be reminded about the beauty of this place.  I thought I'd post a few of my favorite photos of it around sunset, at night and in lightning storms. Enjoy.

The First Day of School

Conversation with my school Director:

“You need a book?”

“Yes, more specifically the textbook—the currculum.”

--silence--

“You don’t have the text book?”

“No I was told my school will give me a curriculum.”

--Gives me a book--

--silence--

“...This is a dictionary.”

And so begins my second day at school. The resources are constantly a problem.  I arrived at school on a hot day jumping off my bike—which is just is just barely too big for me so that I always end of half-falling off of it—sweat liberally pouring off my brow, to the gaping of a surprisingly small number of students. After socializing with the other professors for a while, I asked my professor if there was any chalk.  He gaped, “you don’t have chalk?” Every time I ask for something, chalk, the curriculum, an eraser I’m met with a pause followed a long explanation that ends with me not getting said object.  It’s a good exercise in learning to just take one day at a time, one conversation at a time and one task at a time.  This is Africa!

Yesterday I came to school to check out my classrooms that I’d been teaching in. They’re pretty bare, dirt floors, rocks strewn about, unfinished walls and ceilings with cinder blocks exposed. The blackboard is a just the concrete wall with some blackboard like materials painted on top. In the middle scattered about in various levels of disrepair was a pile (no joke—a tall pile) of desks, not stacked neatly but as if I giant had come along and pick them up haphazardly and thrown them down in a pile in a juevenile fit of rage and stomped off without cleaning up.  I half imagine that the last time these desks had been touched was the last day of school when the excited storm of departing students had somehow created this pile of dilapidation.  What are these kids like, I thought?  Some of the desks were split in half with shards of wood on the floor all covered a very very thick layer of Sahara-blown dust. I live in the Savana but sometimes the winds blows out of the north and bring big clouds of dust with it covering everything with a thick film.  I turned to the member of the school administration next to me and asked him if it was my responsibility to organize the students to clean the classroom on the first day.  “No! It’ll be all cleaned up by tomorrow!”

Alas, the next day I arrived and it looked as if the giant had come again during the night and smashed the pile flat. It was no longer 8 feet tall but now flat, evenly spread around the classroom, though there was a greater number of broken desks than the day before.  I wiped a spot of dust away on one desk and waited for my students to arrive.  About ten minutes later three students and I began class. 

“Where are the others,” I asked? After much cajoling they told me that normally the first week or two is like this with few students present and even some of the teachers not arriving.  As they told me this, I look up to the classroom next door, which is this case was very easy because the wall between the two adjoining classrooms has not yet been built.  From that classroom a group of about twenty students stared in to our class watching and I realized that there teacher didn’t come to school and they were just sitting there because, well I’m not sure but they were just sitting there.  Eventually, I invited them in and talked to both classes for a while about rules, introducing ourselves and discussing the coming year.  Towards the ends I brought a map out that I brought with me from the states and asked if anyone could find Benin on the map.  I was met by 25 students staring at the ground and not answering.  As you can see there is such a dearth of materials and/or visual aids, that students and just as rarely the population at large ever looks at maps. I once asked my host father in Porto-Novo to point out where he lived on a map and he couldn’t do it.  There’s lots of work to do. I really want to try to incorporate visual aids in to my teaching and try to get students to think more visually and critically.  A big criticism of the Beninese system is that the best students it produces rarely seek to be anything more than bureaucrats. There is a lack of creative thinking. 

Anyway, I had a similar experience of my next two classes and the same thing occurred of a class without a teacher watching me and inviting them in to join us once it was evident that their teacher wasn’t coming. Afterwards, I had a meeting with my school’s director and president of the Parent Teacher’s Association to form a selection committee for a girls scholarship program that I hope to start as soon as I can. There is funding available and I plan to take advantage of whatever I can find, wherever I can find it. 

The level of girls education is in even more dire straits than education in general. By the end of high school fewer than 10 girls out of an initial 300-400 will pass the final high school barrier test.  All the these things make me feel at once excited by the number of opportunities but at the same time daunted by the scaled of what needs to be done. I think one has to just tackle one small problem one at a time or else be overwhelmed by the magnitude of the challenge.  Other than that I feel actually quite relieved that school is starting. The first few weeks in village without anything to do have been really lonely!  My  village is really really small so there is little to buy and even less to do.  But things are going well. Please keep writing emails! It’s been great to hear from so many people back home! Your letters help more than you’ll ever know!

J'arrive

New Address

It's official. I'm finally sworn in as a volunteer. Tomorrow I move to my post.  Here is my new address below:

John Bohman PCV
B.P. 168
Natitingou, Benin
Afrique de l'ouest

Best Translation Ever

Thought you might like this charming translation on the back of the door at a local hotel.  This is babelfish circa 1995.