August 13th
Swear-in was this past Thursday, August 8th. So,
I’m now a real PCV (Peace Corps Volunteer) instead of a PCT (Peace Corps
Trainee).
We had a ceremony at the Country Director’s house that
included many Togolese officials, the U.S. ambassador, the entire Peace Corps
Togo staff, our host families, and many of the old volunteers. Those of us who
have been taking classes in local language got to give short speeches and we
ended with taking an oath.
I guess I should cover the few important events leading up
to the event:
We had our
final language test. I needed to achieve intermediate-mid level French on the
language test or else I’d have to stay for an additional week. Not sure how,
but I got it!
I had to say goodbye to my wonderful host family. It was
much harder than I could have ever imagined when first arriving in Davie. During
my last night they had a small “fete” for me and my maman cooked my favorite
meal for us to eat as a family. They also had a guy come over and take our
“family portrait”. I took this opportunity to give them a small cadeau (gift)
that I had brought with me from home. It was a ceramic Texas ornament with
“Someone in Texas is Thinking of You” written on it. I told them it meant I
would always remember them. They loved it, hugged me, and we spent the
remainder of the evening dancing to Michael Jackson one last time. The next
morning, I woke up to one of our goats screaming and when I went outside, my
sister said that the goat had a present for me too. First thought, “Oh shit,
they slaughtered the goat and are giving me meat to take with me.”… turns out,
one was giving birth!! They had told me it’d be a few more weeks until she was
ready! The goats here are miniature already, so miniature miniature goats are
almost as cute as puppies. Even covered in blood and placenta.. After that
interesting hour of my life, I met the other volunteers at the tech house and
we were off to Lome.
We returned back to Amy’s Hotel, the place we stayed for our
first three nights in Togo. We would spend the next couple days shopping and
exploring Lome. I was able to buy a mattress, gas tank, and groceries
(including an emergency bottle of wine) to take to post. We also found time to
check out the beach and eat pizza and hamburgers! They weren’t exactly as I
remembered them, but delicious all the same.
. . .
Now I’m back at post.
We had a slight issue during the evening of my arrival.
Driving up to Ketao (the city between Kara and my village) a
large crowd of men carrying hoes and machetes had blocked off the road. When we
reached the barrier, they picked up the road blocks and let the Peace Corps
Vehicle through. My driver proceeded slowly while they pressed their faces to
the windows and yelled at us. Once we were through the crowd, we could see that
the city was being occupied by military and there were fires being put out. My
driver pulled over and decided we should call the Peace Corps’ safety officer
to determine how to proceed. They said they’d call us back, but in the
meantime, to leave the city. So… we went directly back through the angry mob we
passed at the entrance and parked a mile or so up the road. My driver got out
of the car briefly to determine what was going on. There apparently was an
ethnic battle between the Kabiye and the Kotikole muslims concerning which
mosque they prayed at on the final day of Ramadan. After waiting it out for a
bit, the person in touch with my driver called and said I needed to contact my
homologue and determine how safe Kemerida was. After learning there was no
threat there, the Peace Corps suggested he meet me and we continue through
Ketao because they’d prefer if I made it to village that same day. It turned
out that while we were passing time up the road, the mob had subsided and the
city had become slightly more peaceful. We were able to meet my homologue and
proceed with no further issues. When we arrived, my neighbors helped me unpack
and set up my new mattress. Soon after, I was off to bed.
After surviving the first night, I’m now a few days in to my
two years of service! And so far, things are really good!
For the first three months here, I have a lot of free time.
I can’t go straight to work until I know the community and what their needs
are. Therefore, I’m supposed to spend my days trying to integrate… and speak
better French.
I try to get out of my house at least once a day. I visited
the church on Sunday, have taken a couple walks around the village, and today
am planning on going back to the Benin marche. I feel sort of useless, but I
know it will all come in due time.
In the meantime, I have a lot of things to keep me busy:
I’ve started doing a more thorough job cleaning. Right now,
my living room is completely in order and I’ve moved the table and chairs out
of the spare room and into the front room to create a dining space. In the now
empty room, I have only my grass yoga mat and mirrors. I plan to build a
bookshelf and buy a comfy chair for this room as well. I also want to paint a
mural on the wall eventually. I still have the kitchen and bedroom to go. I
need to fix the armoire (wardrobe) I have so that I can finally unpack my
suitcases. I’ve also talked with a carpenter about cutting the pieces I need to
fix my bed.
I’ve started teaching myself guitar.
I’m almost finished with my 4th book – The
Brothers Karamazov. After Into the Wild, I conquered War and Peace, and quickly
read through Sex, Drugs, and Cocoa Puffs.
I’ve used my empty room for yoga and random dancing so far
and plan to keep it up almost daily.
I’m experimenting with cooking. I’m still not as good as my
host mom, but I’ll get there.
I study French. Not as much as I should, but hey, it’s only
day 4! Before the end of stage, Mark installed Rosetta Stone on my laptop
(Thanks again, Mark!). After I feel comfortable with my French level, I have
Latin America Spanish, German, and Italian at my disposal. Although, I have to learn
Kabiye too, so those may just be wishful thinking.
Besides a dirty house, the old volunteer left me a few
things to keep me busy, including movies and books to study for the GRE (which
I’ve learned you can take in Ghana!)
I’ve also been trying to start on my list of promised post
cards and letters. If you’d like
to be included, shoot me an email: shea_flynn@utexas.edu.
I’ll get it and send you one eventually.
Finally, it’s been just over 2 months here in Togo. Some of
the random things I miss the most (besides family and friends because that’s to
be expected):
-Mexican
food (QUESOOOO)
-And not just
queso. All cheese. All of it.
-Dominoes pizza
-Chai Tea
Lattes (especially from Tazza Fresca)
-Good beer
(particularly 512 IPA and drinking it at Spider House)
-My favorite
pair of high-waisted shorts (or really just shorts in general)
-SWEET ICE
TEA (emphasis on the ice)
-Whole Foods
-Juiceland
(I would commit terrible crimes for a smoothie right now)
-Internet
Radio (my iTunes has not be updated enough over the last 2 years...)
-Record
Player (and spending an afternoon at a record store)
-Zilker Park
-Photography
(more specifically having a good camera that I’m not afraid to take out in
public)
-Town Lake
trail (still working up the courage to run around alone in my village)
-Water that
doesn’t taste like bleach
-Mostly just
having options.. options for food, music, activities, people to spend time
with, etc.
These were all things I expected to miss. What will be more
interesting is to see how this changes and gets more specific as the months go
by…
Well, that’s all I’ve got for now. I hope you don’t feel
you’ve wasted your time learning how I am spending mine. I just felt that after
reading about my first post visit experience, you all deserved an update to
know that things are going well!
Also, I will be getting a new mailing address soon. Look for
it as my next blog post! Other than that, I plan to blog again after my first
full month at post.
Unless anything truly thrilling happens before that, talk to
you all then!
Koumealo
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