Around the Village

Some neighbor kids. This looks out into the courtyard in front of my house. Chicken coop and small lumber pile on left, clothes line for laundry on the right. and a typical mud brick home straight ahead in the background. A typical picture of a compound in Togo.
A spider I found in my shower. The biggest I have ever seen, notice it compared to the other spiders to the left of the pencil. Enormous (leg span about the size of my hand)! This sits directly above my head while I bathe myself, which is a comforting thought.
My village market on a non-market day. Every Tuesday, this is filled with hundreds of people selling goods out of the little grass huts.
A child wanders through the empty market.
The village mosque. While predominantly Christian, there is a good size Muslim population in my village, mostly people who come from Northern Togo, where most of the Muslim people of Togo live.
Village dispensary/medical clinic. Where villagers go for minor medical problems. For serious medical problems, one must go to a city hospital which is a few hours drive from my village. Unfortunately, some people can't afford the city hospitals or the travel away from home.
My next door neighbors, Mathias and Marie-Claire. A school teacher and a seamstress. The coolest Togolese people I know and I eat most of my meals with them.
The dog, Suru. My neighbors bought her a few months ago. (This one isn't for eating, this is for petting)
Felix, the man in the middle, and his family. A man I work with in village and helps me out a lot. His daughter Marina, the one holding the radio, is one of my favorite kids in village. Very adorable.
The Catholic church. Probably the nicest building in village, it was built by Italian missionaries a number of years ago.
The inside of the church.
My neighbor Grace. She is terrified of me.
I'm getting a little closer, she's getting a little nervous.
I get to close and she freaks out and cries.
Some kids at a village funeral. Funerals here are not somber affairs, but rather weekend long celebrations with music and dancing.
An old man banging the drums at the funeral.
Some old women at the funeral who were ecstatic to have their pictures taken, despite their solemn expressions. The fact that they can see the little picture in the camera just moments after I take it blows their minds.

Home Home

If you haven't heard the news (I think it was a sidebar on the front page of The Times), I'm returning to The United States of America for Christmas, New Years, and general shenanigans. December 21st to Jan 13th, I'll be eating nothing but bagels and cream cheese, watching college football, and drinking American microbrews. And seeing all of you course. I'll also have lots of quality internet time to update more photos (including a portfolio of my village and a very disturbing meal) and wax philosphical. Stay tuned and keep your eye out for me, I'll be the guy wearing bright colors, gawking at the flush toilets.

Moringa and More Nature

A Presentation in a neighboring village on Moringa Trees. Moringa is called a miracle tree by volunteers. Its very healthy to eat the leaves, can be easily planted and cared for, and improve the soil. But most people don't know about them so we try to plant many and educate the community as much as possible.

A little rasta kid coming to see our Moringa presentation. Everyone with dread locks in Togo is called a Rasta.

Creating a tree nursery for Moringa

A pretty good turn-out at this presentation

My buddy James on his birthday with a bunch of kids in his village. Like me, James must deal with kids constantly coming into his yard looking through his screen door and windows. I was changing clothes one time in the front room of his house and as buttoned my pants I look over to see a little boy curiously looking through the bars of James window. "Uh James, I think your little neighbor just saw me naked." Lesson Learned.

Some women on their way to the market.

On a hike through the Akebou mountains

A dirty creek, one of many you find out in the bush. Most of the time their are stepping stones or a small plank of wood to cross, sometimes you just gotta get wet and hope the snail fever stays away.

The view by my village

Some Everyday Things

Wake up. Breakfast. Beans. This morning. Every morning. The only food I can still say I enjoy. Not that I dislike anything here. It’s just that after awhile, you become indifferent. Food is sustenance, flavor’s a luxury. The Peace Corps: The only two years of your life when you crave black eyed peas at 6am.

I walk down the street one hundred meters to “the bean lady.” 30 cents worth. If I’m starving, 40 cents. All along the way I greet people walking down the street, sweeping, sitting outside on their step. People bath behind cheaply made outdoor wooden showers. Motorcycles speed by, goats scatter. Bonjour! Ca va? Orou! Kla Kla les? Greetings are important here. When I run to people I have to answer a series of questions. How are you? And the house? And the health? And the maison? And your day? And your trip?

I finish breakfast. I return home. Noku Nyaro. Sometimes around mid-morning, a small army of children gather on my porch. If I have forgotten to lock my screen door, sometimes they come inside while I’m laying down. I hear them tip toeing around my front room looking for balloons, milk candy, or magazines. Their favorite activity? Flipping through old Economists and ripping out the little cardboard subscription cards inside. They love them. I can’t explain why. Most of the time I’m happy to have them. They are entertaining. I know some of their names. Maddie. Claire, Adilene. Mostly western names only pronounced with such thick accents you wouldn’t recognize them. (My two year old neighbor’s name is Joshua, pronounced zjay-zjoo-way) Sometimes they want to do laundry for me. I happily oblige to give them my dirty clothes in exchange for a couple cents and a red balloon. But sometimes I have to yell at them to go home. Moku Nyaro!

One recent morning, My friend James and I go on a long hike. We lose ourselves in the mountains. We run into local farmers and women on their way to the nearest market. We drink palm wine from an old oil can given to us by a local hunter. It’s awful. We stumble upon a few creeks, a few fuulani huts (nomadic herdsmen of West Africa), even a few cocoa trees, where we eat the sweet milky colored pulp inside. Everyone wants to know where we are going? Aloku Fin? We tell them no where in particular, just a morning pleasure hike. They look at us strangely. Americans are so bazaar. It starts to get really hot. We take our shirts off. 20 minutes later we are sunburned. Oh yeah, we live on the equator. Whoops.

Lunch. James and I each and some pates with okra sauce, which when prepared becomes the exact consistency of snot (so much so that Peace Corps volunteers around Africa know it simply as “snot sauce”). Pates is corn mush, the most similar in the states would probably be palenta. When I got to Togo I hated it, but lie I said, now I’m just indifferent. We both have about five bananas each. Located about 17 kilometers east of me deeper in the mountains, James’ village is the self-described banana capital of Togo, where forty cents will buy you about thirty bananas. (He once claimed to have eaten 52 bananas in three days).

The afternoon usually is repos, which is like a mexican siesta. Basically the whole country stops working from Noon to 2:30. I often spend this time trying to determine if my house is hotter than my front porch, than lie down on the concrete and sweat through my clothes for about an hour. I might also visit my village boutique which is probably is stocked better than one would think for a small African village. I can buy bungee cords, cookies, laundry detergent, talcum powder, boxed wine, machetes, coffee, batteries, flashlights, noodles, rice, candy, lighters, and even old dusty bottles of champagne which my friends and I regrettably bought on my birthday. Walking home from the boutique I can cut through the market place, which is open every Tuesday, or stick to the roads. The road is raised higher up than the homes, making me feel like a model on a runway, on display to the people of my village as I walk. People call out my name. Well not my name exactly but something like it. Laura, Sara, Ally (the three volunteers before me), Yovo (the Ewe word for white person), Anasara (the Kabye word for white person), Warerani (the Akebou word for white person), le blanche (the French word for white person), L’Americain, Mon frere, mon ami, monsieur, or else something that sounds like it starts with a g that could possibly be my name. Some kids are able to say Grant (remember to roll the r and put a u in between the a and n. Grrrraunt!). Most just say Grraaaaauuuuuuu, holding the u until they run of breath.

If my friend James happens to be in village, we, of course, always remember to play Frisbee out on my village soccer field. We always time it right when school lets out so hundreds of kids trudge home across the field and stop and gape out the mystifying orange disc which seems to hover above the Earth. James and I routinely whip thirty yard tosses to each other while Togolese kids pick it up and, in all throwing manners, like a shot put, like a baseball, like a javelin, chuck it three feet before it tumbles end over end to the ground. Some times in front of them, some times behind them. This would probably go on all night if we don’t eventually confiscate it and tell them they must go home. We yell them we will play the same game tomorrow. Yokou soso!

The evening arrives. I sit outside in my courtyard embracing the cool breeze. I eat with my neighbors, fufu, I’ve talked about this before, negatively. But my hatred again grew to indifference, but has recently grown again to enjoyment. I love it now. Nata fue! This is evidenced by a recent basketball sized- bowl my friends and I finished and swore had to be some kind of a record. It really is pretty good. Which I guess goes to show that the more you eat something, eventually you learn to accept it.

Sometimes after dinner l’infirmiere plays European soccer games on his t.v. out in front of his house. He has a satellite and a generator and charges ten cents entry to watch the match. There I sit huddled under a blue tarp squinting to make out the players on the tiny screen, hearing the steady hum of the generator, cheering for whichever team has an African on it. Although, Peace Corps Volunteers never forget their allegiance to their country, which got us in trouble once in our regional capital, Atakpame. The United States was playing Brazil, and as we walked into the bar chanting, U-S-A, U-S-A, all the Togolese men coincidentally became Brazil fans, cheering for Ronaldo, and shushing us with each goal against The States. After some brief cross-room smack talk, we realized we were on Togolese turf, and exited quietly when the U.S. blew a second half lead.

And I probably go to bed earlier than most eight year olds in the States, 8:00 to 8:30, maybe later if in the city. I lay in bed, anxious from my malaria medication, unable to fall asleep. Insomnia. Something I live with most nights here. But it’s better than malaria, most things are, so I continue to take my meds and deal with the side effects. After awhile, I fall asleep.

A Whole Year

I just celebrated my year anniversary in Togo and wow does that seem weird. Time here has flown by, yet I feel like I was last in the states lifetimes ago. Its been an insane year, insane in a good way, mostly. Here some random thoughts and anecdotes from my first year. Plus some words of wisdom I have collected from others along the way which I feel pertain to my ability to stay positive

1. We've lost some good people from my training group. We started with 31 people when we arrived in country. Now we are down to 20. I don't think this is a reflection on Peace Corps or Togo. A variety of factors lead to people goin home. Health issues, long-distance relationships, family emergencies, and some probably just didn't have their heart in this from the beginning. There have been a lot of days when I wanted to go home. I've been taunted, bullied and ripped off. I was sick for my first four months. I've lost 40 pounds (but put 13 back on), I had heat rash for a months straight on my entire body, I sweat constantly during the dry season, I've sunburned, had my pocket picked in a market place (but I caught the guy right afterwards), suffered acne breakouts, a motorcycle crash, hallucinations from my malaria medication, and I suspect something called snail fever. When I see all that written out, it looks pretty bad, but here's the weird thing. I laugh at it and I cherish it, because it's all part of the adventure. If life were easy, we would never learn anything from it. Besides, the great times far outnumber the bad; unfortunately, too many people rarely remember that.

"It's the very struggle of life that makes us who we are. And it is our enemies that test us, provide us with the resistance necessary for growth." -The Dalai Lama

"It is when the ice and snow are on them that we see the strength of the cypress and the pine." -Chuang-tse

2. I once had a five minute conversation with my village boutique owner trying to convince him that I am indeed, a white person, and not a "black american," as he thought. When I told him that black Americans look just like Togolese people, he didn't believe me, and when I told him they live all over, amongst white people, he nearly fainted. Easily the funniest conversation I've had here so far. Togo: where being mistaken for black happens. I have also discussed with this man how kids in America also get dirty sometimes and that we do in fact work with our hands (he was convinced machines do everything).

"If I had been as capable of trust as I am of fear I might of learned something new or some truth so very old we have all forgotten it." -Edward Abbey

"He...changed human beings by regarding them not as what they thought they were but as though they were what they wished to be, and that the good in them was all of them." -Louis Fischer, The Life of Mahatma Gandhi

3. You get a lot of reading done with no electricity to distract you, so here is a brief list of good stuff. We Wish To Inform You That Tomorrow We Will Be Killed With Our Families: Stories from Rwanda by Philip Gourevitch. Completely depressing and violent, but rendered me speechless, an important book. Also check out The Village of Waiting by George Packer, about his Peace Corps service in Togo back in the 80's. Both men write for The New Yorker and are very talented journalists. For Non-Africa related reading: The Omnivore's Dilemma, Mountains Beyond Mountains, The Hobbitt and (two which only get better each time I read them) Desert Solitaire by Edward Abbey and A Separate Peace by John Knowles.

"The strength of a man's virtue should not be measured by his special exertions, but by his habitual acts." -Blaise Pascal

"Acting responsibly is not a matter of strengthening our reason but of deepening our feelings for the welfare of others." -Jostein Gaarder

4. My village is almost inaccessible by car right now because the roads have gotten so bad due to the rainy season. Here are the statistics from my most recent trip to Pagala:

Distance traveled: 54 kilometers (33 miles)
Duration of journey: 5 hours
Number of times stuck in mud which required getting out and pushing: 3
Number of times car wouldn’t start: 4
Number of times stuck tractor trailer blocked the route: 1
Number of car windows broken: 1
Number of times car fish-tailed back and forth through the mud: 23
Number of kilometers walked because car was too heavy to make it through certain sections: 2

Five hours to go 33 miles. I arrived in Pagala sun-burned, dirty and pissed-off, but there were two birthday packages waiting for me from the U.S. The rest of the day I ate Skippy peanut butter while reading Esquire magazine, making the trip totally worth it.

"The one great glory of traveling is that hardship is always redeemed by commotion recollected in tranquility." -Pico Iyer

"The only aspect of our travel that is guaranteed to hold an audience is disaster." -Martha Gellhorn

5. Work update: I recently planted a bunch of tomatoes in anticipation of the end of rainy season. Overall, I give my garden a grade of a C for this year. It was a bit of a learning experience but I had some success. I got some people interested in planting new vegetables and next year hope to go even bigger, planting more and showing more modernized farming techniques with a demonstration field. I just distributed all my moringa trees to people in my village. Hopefully, by the time I leave, most of the village will have the trees in their compounds. Their leaves are great for infants fighting malnourishment and their seeds can be used to purify water. It's a bit of a miracle tree. My sunflower campaign was semi-successful. I wasn't able to harvest the seeds very well. Their was way too much rain. I'm going to try again though this fall when the rain lets up. And some people are interested in planting them next year.

"To him who dwells not in himself, the forms of things reveal themselves as they are. He moves like water, reflects like a mirror, responds like an echo. His lightness makes him seem to disappear. Still as a clear lake, he his harmonious in his relations with those around him, and remains so through profit and loss. He does not precede others, but follows them instead." Chuang-tse

5. Many people I have met here, American and Togolese, have been nothing short of amazing. I am lucky to have met all of them. While everyone's service is different, sometimes drastically, we volunteers all share many of the same moments, highs and lows, language and cultural barriers and many times we can't get through it without eachother. Often, we only need someone to laugh with, or complain to, and for that they have quickly become like family, and I will be perpetually thankful. I also get through tough times in village with the generosity of my Togolese neighbors. Whether it be when they give me hearty servings of watchee or koliko, or when they take me on a trip across the village because they know I like to see dead snakes, their hospitality is truly under-rated.

"I have three treasures,which I guard and keep. The first is compassion. The second is economy. The third is humility. From compassion comes courage. From economy comes the means to be generous. From humility comes responsible leadership." -Lao-Tse

And finally thank you to the readers who follow my adventures. I have had comments written from friends, family and complete strangers all across the country. So Thank You Portland, Missoula, Tacoma, Seattle, Sacramento, Fort Collins, St James Hospital in Chicago Illinois, and to all the rest. It's comforting to know you are all thinking of me. At night when I lay on my bench and look up at the Milky Way streaking across the sky and disappearing behind my house, I think of all of you too.

"If it's a clear night, we can see millions, even billions of years back into the history of the universe. So in a way, we are going home.....we are trying to find the way back to ourselves." Jostein Gaarder

"Then along comes the journalist who has a license to explain things he doesn't understand." Bill Moyers

My Still Life

I'm here in Lome for a week. Hope you enjoy the pictures. I'll try to post again before the end of the week. Peace.


The big brown thing is snake liver. It was pretty tasty, but I don't recommend snake skin. A little chewy, yet crunchy at the same time, plus the smell was pretty repulsive

Koliko: Togolese french fries, served best with a hot pepper sauce.

Watch your step!

Another enormously thick snake caught near my village.

Remember: Don't stray from trails.

Picture doesn't do this view justice, but Northern Togo is beautifully expansive with green grassy rolling hills for miles in every direction.

My friends and I celebrating a little. We had three birthdays in a one week so we had a joint celebration.

Fufu with peanut sauce

Kids here go crazy for balloons. (note to mom: please send more balloons)

My 25th birthday. Despite the smile, reaching a quarter century was depressing. My quarter life crisis was pretty brutal, but I got through it with boxed red wine and a few good friends.

I am getting doused with baby powder. They cake it all over themselves and then dance. At one point a group of Togolese men lifted me up on their shoulders and danced around. My friends didn't get a picture of this because they were "laughing too damn hard."

Persed lips, hunched back, the dorky thumbs up: That is the official lame white man dance.

Wrestling at the Evela Festival

Evela Wrestling Festival. They hang dogs from trees and then eat them later.

Picking insects off my leg

He's searching for bananas down my shirt.

He was adorable, but a little scary. They got some sharp teeth.

I fulfilled one of my main PC goals: Befriend a monkey.

Some young campers selling goods they made at the market.

My cabin. The Lionkillers!

Jake and James hanging out watching the campers at the market.

My cabin's banner they made. We were known as the Lionkillers!

Camp Espoir 2009: The Camp we run for AIDS orphans. It was an awesome week. Here is everyone dancing around a campfire.