here and now

this morning i took a look at the blog and realised that actually there is very little about my life here. so i'll write some more about benin in general soon (yesterday we attended a funeral ceremony in our village - extremely interesting!!!) but for now let me write a few words about what's really going on for me.

i'm happy:) days here are full of tiny events but lazy at the same time. every action requires twice as much time as in europe. if we want to go to cotonou meet somebody or have sth done, we have to count a few hours. we have to walk to the main road, accompanied by our favourite song "yovo, yovo, bonsoir, ça va bien, merci" = "white, white, good evening, i'm fine, thank you" (even though we know more and more of people in ab-calavi and they're getting used to us, there're always some children excited to see white people). then we catch a taxi (there's no public transport in cotonou. everyone takes either taxis or zemijians - motorbike taxis. both are very cheap but produce enormous amounts of smoke). then squeezed on the rear seat with another 3 people, often ladies of respectful size carrying loads of peanuts for sale we'll go to the city center. if we're meeting somebody, we're sure he'll be late. usually by 20-30 min. if we go with a friend to a taylor to have our bombas (traditional robe) sewn for example, it's sure that we'll have to pay a visit to at least one of her relatives or friends living in the area. quite otfen there'll be sodabi (destilated palm wine) circulating around the table. then, when all the visits, business and meetings are over, we'll catch a zemijian, negociate the price, go either to dontokpa (the marketplace) or to the red star square (that's what left from the communist times) where we can take a taxi to iita (even if there're names of the streets in abomey-calavi, nobody uses them. everyone says 'von iita'. von=street /in fon/. iita is a name of sth, don't know what, advertised on a billboard, the most recognisable thing at the crossroad). then we walk home, almost always meeting either a friend or a stranger who wants to be our friend. i'm a little tired of meeting new people all the time. they're all very nice and helpfull but sometimes it's just too much. and often, especially when it's a businessman or a member of local authorities, we have a feeling that he invites us to his place just to show others that he's got yovo friends.

anyway, once we're home, we'll do one of the following: sleep, work in the office (typing or printing thing for the clients, selling ice and bissap), chat with neighbours, play with Marie, wash clothes (with a 2-bowls system and water from the well it takes ages), work on our project (it's going slowly but forward. we're meeting lots of people involved in tourism or some social or ecological actions so we have a lot of contacts and a good view of the status quo. now we're starting to think about the project itself). then we go out to eat something - fried sweet patats, bread tree fruits, manioc or corn donuts, fish, pate (like stiff porridge) from manioc or corn flour with very very spicy sauce (everything is extremely spicy...), sandwitch with avocado or simply spaghetti at a provisoric bar at the corner. for the dessert we'll buy a pineapple (100F=20 cents), agbon glasse (corn flour with sweentend milk and ice) or bananas at maman florian - our favourite commercante (sorry, i've lost the word in english).

then we'll continue what we've been doing, spend some time chatting with clients or guests (people are dropping in all the time, from the early morning to late at night), play some frisbee, go to the cybercafe or go to the bar espoir to take a small beninoise (beer) or fizzy (local fanta). then, late dinner at martial's (usually rice or pate with fish), bucket&bowl shower and we go to sleep.

this week we'll spend a few days at the farm (usually we go there for weekends) and try to get to know more about the people and nature there (for the project). then we'll go to porto novo (the capital) for a day to visit some places and next week we'll go to the center of benin to see the day of yams and pilgrilmage to dassa. /congrats for all who have reached this line:)/