https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=ide5YjD6AhI&feature=youtu.be

Pretty much grumpys life.

1/31/2015 12:12:58 PM

There have been these South African guys hanging around the past couple of weeks. Afrikaner guys who are up here on some mission to "buy gold." They're always very cagey about the details, so none of us believe that it's legal. Most fall on the side of "these guys are getting scammed," as they keep getting strung along by unseen partners in Togo and Ghana. Others think they're doing something more illegal than mere gold smuggling. I don't know. They're fun to talk to, and they're aggressively generous with the drinks.

They consider a "springbok" to be the official shooter of South Africa. It tastes like a thin mint, if girl scout cookies went about 180 proof.

These guys may be mum about the nature of their business but they're all in agreement about why they're in it: this is supposed to be the big score that lets them get out of South Africa. To hear them talk, all the whites in that country want out. Surprisingly they've not said anything particularly racist to me; it's just that they think South African politics have disenfranchised them as various tribal interests compete for power, which probably has at least some element of truth to it. That said, these guys were all in the SA army in the late 80s/early 90s, which means even odds they were into some fucked up shit.

The last time I saw them was Saturday, at Livingstone, the main expat hangout. We were there celebrating my 30th birthday with a game of bar trivia orchestrated by my girlfriend, who knows that this was one of my favorite activities in America. The trivia went great. The couple of hours after it were a lot of fun, too. I am told that I had a lot of fun the rest of the night and we'll just have to believe that, because unfortunately at my advanced age I can no longer process an unlimited quantity of alcohol. I love that my friends all wanted to buy me a drink, but it would appear that having more than about ten friends is a liability in certain contexts.

Anyway, we're hoping that the massive turnout convinces the British-and-Rwandan couple that runs Livingstone to make trivia a regular thing. Preferably with me running it, to be paid in chicken and beer.

2/3/2015 6:06:26 AM

sounds like the South Africans have watched blood diamond a few to many times

2/3/2015 7:14:40 AM

Next thing you know bar trivia will be sweeping Africa. This will inadvertently lead to an uptick in cell phone internet usage as africans compete to cheat by googling answers. This will create a culture of looking things up online in Africa, raising educational standards.

It could happen...

2/3/2015 7:45:06 AM

People with smart phones are already keen to look things up, when they can afford the internet credit. But it's interesting the stuff they look up. I was sitting on a bus one time next to a kid who searched, "Who is Yayi Boni?" (he's the president of Benin) and "What is love?"

---

City life is starting to wear me down. There's a lot to be said for the village. I knew my neighbors. Walking sufficed to get anywhere. There wasn't as much food variety, but what there was was cheaper. But then, it's hard for me to be sure how much of this is "i miss village" and how much is "i hate my 8-5 job"

The social scene in the city is exciting but it's also kind of relentless. This is a case of "Be careful what you wish for." When we first arrived, the girlfriend and I resented that we didn't get invited to most things. Now -- Jesus. Tuesday night, dinner with CDC ebola team. Wednesday night, poker. Thursday night, our security chief and his wife want beers, and Christ, can they drink. Friday night, wine tasting party. Saturday, ambassador's pool and happy hour. Sunday, pot luck dinner. There's a reason for all this activity, of course: there's not a goddamn thing else to do in Cotonou besides socialize and drink. No parks, no theaters, the good beach got taken over by Nigerians...

I've decided to try to slow down and dry out for a few weeks. No drinking for a while, take stock of my life. That kind of bullshit. Then, of course, more drinking.

2/4/2015 4:52:24 AM

Quote :

"What is love?"

2/4/2015 8:38:28 AM

I hate my current job, so I'm applying for a USAID job running ebola programs in Benin. Advantages:

-They want an American who is already in Benin, so the competition is pretty slim -- even though I come in just under some of the supposed job requirements I still have a chance.
-It's only a six month contract, so I'd still be coming home at around the same time.
-Major resume boost (maybe it wouldn't be for some of you people but I'm a thirty year old whose never had a "real job" and this would be my first, contract or no)
-I'd be the motherfucking ebola czar of Benin

Disadvantages:

-As mentioned, I come in under some of the requirements (3 years experience instead of 5, my French is perfect for village but will come off as rustic in a professional environment)
-I do not have luck with employment and so will not get the job on general principle
-If a miracle happens and I do get it, I'd have to quit Peace Corps, which would be awkward and expensive (though possible)
-USAID works their people like slaves

We'll see what happens...

2/11/2015 2:38:29 AM

Sounds like a good thing to go for, but you're well off either way. Win/win.

2/11/2015 9:40:10 AM

On Friday my girlfriend was sent on a trip to the north of the country to manage a training. About four hours out of Cotonou, the rear driver's side tire blew out. The driver lost control, swerved into the other lane (where there was, for a wonder, no oncoming traffic), overcorrected, and drove the car off the road.

Unfortunately, Beninese paved roads tend to have a shoulder about two feet wide, followed by a steep two- to four-foot drop. They went into the drop, with the vehicle (a Range Rover) ending up on its right side. Fortunately my girlfriend was in the middle seat; the guy to her right lost quite a bit of his elbow. (This guy, incidentally, is now officially believed to be cursed -- he still has a cast on his right arm and his left leg from a motorcycle accident last month)

This happened in a village, so the locals dragged everybody out of the car and tried to take care of them. For elbow guy, this was rough -- they immediately set to cleaning out the wound with rubbing alcohol and brute force, trying to get out the bits of glass, dirt, and asphalt. The PC staff in the car were all relatively unhurt, as was my girlfriend -- just a few bruised ribs, a sore neck, and some seatbelt bruises.

She called to tell me what happened shortly after getting extricated from the vehicle, but she was in shock and hung up abruptly to check on everybody else, so naturally I freaked out and went to the PC office, where one of the doctors promptly offered to sedate me. I declined.

Anyway, she's back in Cotonou now, a little bit shaken up and bruised but otherwise no worse for the wear. PC is getting an earful, because the blowout has been blamed on two things:

1) The driver didn't inspect the tires
2) They left several hours late, which put their travel squarely in the hottest part of the day, at which point you could use the pavement to grill steaks.

2/16/2015 3:00:05 AM

damn. glad she's alright dude.

how do you lose part of an elbow?

2/16/2015 7:52:04 AM

Big chunks of meat got ripped out on either side of his elbow. Kinda gross.

---

This country becomes a lot less fun when you're sober all the time, I've found. Fortunately Benin has a surprisingly large array of nonalcoholic beers, and that helps trick me into thinking I'm having fun. They all taste like shit, but that's only slightly worse than the regular beer here.

2/17/2015 8:11:09 AM

Quote :

"one of the doctors promptly offered to sedate me. I declined."

I woulda been like

2/17/2015 10:14:38 AM

I don't think I've posted about this before...

So, here's why I hate my job.

I am still a PCV, but I'm attached to a small American NGO that operates in Cotonou (as well as Nigeria, Tanzania, Cambodia, and Bosnia). I was brought on with the understanding that I'd be designing training materials and shaping the program. Instead, I'm told to do various tasks that all have one goal: getting more grant money.

The organization is just a grant sponge. I'm not sure whether my boss realizes that -- I'll give her the benefit of the doubt, and say that 30+ years in the development field (and African heat) have just warped her brain to the point where she can't even tell anymore. But a sponge it is.

When I came on, all the talk was about renewing our one big project. This operation involved improving access to loans for small farmers, providing technical trainings, and sending out text message updates on market prices. The first two components actually seemed pretty helpful. Properly managed, micro-credit programs can really help people (though as yet there doesn't seem to be much evidence for them lifting whole countries out of poverty). The problem is that once the project ends, so too does the access to loans. So not sustainable, and "sustainability" is the watchword in the development world. The technical trainings, at least, are sustainable -- once a farmer implements a technique you've taught him, he's not liable to forget, and if it's successful the technique will diffuse through the population.

But the pricing text messages? Those are a joke. One, our claims to sustainability are laughable -- the Beninese government is not going to fund this, and Beninese people aren't going to start paying for what they once got for free, so once we start footing the bill it dies. As well it should. Its benefit to actual farmers is negligible, from all the evidence I've seen. It mostly looks good because it ticks off a lot of "attractive to donors" boxes.

Uses mobile technology? Check.
Involves information exchange? Check.
Partnership with private sector (the company who run the SMS platform)? Check.
Doesn't simply give people anything tangible? Check.

Never mind that the interest in the platform has been minimal because people make their trading decisions based on relationships and habit rather than market prices. Never mind that we're basically pressuring farmers into signing up so we can meet our quota with the private company who runs the system.

---

So, OK, the project itself is dumb. But then it gets worse. Then I find out about how it is funded. I knew the grant came from USDA; what I didn't realize that the grant didn't come in the form of money. That would be too easy.

Instead, the USDA gave us rice. They got this rice by buying it from American rice farmers, because American rice is not competitive but American farm policy is idiotic, so if you grow something you have no business growing the government will help prop you up. (Alternatively, they may skip the intermediate step and just pay you not to do anything. My grandfather received $1,000 a year to not grow tobacco. When he died my emphatically non-farming mom started getting the money.)

Having bought up all this idiot American rice and thereby supported the bizarrely influential American rice lobby, what is the USDA to do with it? Well, they give it to organizations like mine as a "grant." Then it is our job to "monetize" the rice, ie, sell it in Benin. So now we're an aid organization but also rice wholesalers.

The problem is that Benin has regions that actually are suitable to rice production, and farmers who are finally starting to employ improved rice production methods. Peace Corps and other groups have been at the forefront in helping with this. But then here my organization comes along and dumps a bunch of cheap American rice on the market, depressing the price and making it less profitable for the very Beninese farmers we intended to help.

--

But this massive rice grant is not enough to feed the beast. Our HQ requires about 15% of any grant money for its operating costs back in Maryland -- and by industry standards, that's quite low. I was in a meeting yesterday with a Dutch organization that wanted 45% for total overhead. And we had a third partner, who presumably wanted rather less than the Dutch or we would be spending 105% of the proposed grant on stuff other than "helping Benin." I'm not a math guy, but that doesn't seem right.

But even at the 15% end, those numbers add up, in particular because American organizations consider that 15% (which is for the US HQ) as different from the overhead for the Benin office. And you have to have partner organizations to be seriously considered, and those groups also need to take their pound of flesh. And all of these grants are time-bound, so people are constantly searching for the next funding source with more zeal than they are implementing the last project that was funded. It's like your congressperson who is out fundraising five minutes after he's sworn in.

Every time my boss gets wind of a new grant coming down the pipe, I'm told to research it. Whatever I find, we try to squeeze ourselves into. Never mind that we have no experience or expertise in renewable energy, there's a renewable energy grant coming, so we should submit a proposal. So far I've worked on that one, a pineapple grant, a geodata in agriculture grant (this is with the Dutch, and I have no idea what "geodata" is). There are others that my Beninese colleagues are working on, but sooner or later they'll come across my desk, because virtually all grants (even the Dutch one) have to be in English and my colleagues don't speak it. Here, translation monkey! Come here, boy!

More to come as the bile rises again.

2/20/2015 3:18:00 AM

Christ. Republicans were right all along about foreign aid!

2/20/2015 3:27:39 AM

Haha, maybe not quite. There are organizations here that are a lot more efficient, productive, and respected than mine. A big part of the difference seems to be how they get their money.

My group is funded entirely by grants. No grant, no group, we have to close up shop. Hence we're forever looking for the next big score, whether or not we have any business implementing the project involved.

Then you've got government organizations like Peace Corps. Peace Corps uses grants to expand the scope of its projects, but even without grant money the organization keeps plugging along because of you, the taxpayer. We don't have to scramble for increasingly ridiculous projects to stay alive. Same for Catholic Relief Services. They'll take a grant when they can, but ultimately they stay afloat on charity.

And then you've got things like USAID, the government groups that give the grants. My impression is that their bureaucracy has gotten a little bit ossified. Development work absolutely needs monitoring, evaluation, and measurable outcomes -- no denying that. But it also needs a lot of flexibility. The situation on the ground in places like Benin is fluid and it is very, very different from what a bigwig in Washington experiences. Even if they were on the ground themselves, odds are it was a long time ago, and it was in a couple of specific places. If I end up running a section of USAID in twenty years, my Benin experience will be outdated, and useless to somebody working in, say, Morocco. Those guys do good work, but I wish they could buck the trend of increasing rigidity in every aspect of American life and work.

2/20/2015 4:16:56 AM

So the Dutch organization wrote the grant that I'm currently editing, because my organization is partnered with them on this. Their Beninese staff wrote the original in French, then the Dutch outsourced the translation to a local firm (even though the actual Dutch people there swear all their correspondence is in English, none of them speak it worth a damn, and besides, all non-Peace Corps white people consider mere translation to be beneath their station).

Well, the firm they paid to translate the 50-page document proceeded to put the whole thing, paragraph by paragraph, into Google translate. They copy/pasted the result back into the grant. For this, they charged an astronomical fee.

Here are a couple of sentences I've run across:

"The service needs to provide exist."

"This project will have a monitoring based on device of indicators information."

Also, about a page in total just wasn't translated at all. It's still in French.

Later I had to include a note about why I excised a half page of bullshit. Basically they claimed that their project would create a boon to the economy because the project money would allow their office to expand which would require hiring more people.

"You can’t claim that the project will reduce unemployment/poverty because it will “create jobs,” those jobs being part of the project itself. Aside from the fact that 82 low-paying jobs are statistically irrelevant, the claim is dishonest. We could start a project that paid 250,000 people $1 a day to dig a hole, and paid 250,000 more people $1 a day to fill the holes back up, but we’re not “reducing unemployment” or “fighting poverty” in any meaningful, sustainable way."

I hate my job.

2/23/2015 8:51:35 AM

Did people go crazy for the African Cup of Nations last month?

2/23/2015 8:55:35 AM

Oh yeah, they did. Benin didn't make the cut, of course, so everyone had to decide where to pledge their allegiance. For most people, this is the order of preference:

1) Benin
2) Francophone West African Country
3) West African Country that isn't Nigeria
4) Francophone country
5) All other countries
6) Nigeria

Of course, things are different if you're Yoruba, in which case Nigeria moves up a few places.

It was the same thing that happened with the world cup; you could always tell it was on because suddenly there were big crowds at bars and at seemingly random cafes and spots around town. These would be the cafes that have a TV. The rule is basically that you can hang out and watch a cafeteria TV without ordering anything as long as you aren't interfering with business. Things are different at the high-end establishments, of course (like those on the expat road), where standing and gawking will get you chased off by a security guard.

People get pretty loud, though they just have their voices and not vuvuzelas; I could always tell when a match was on because of the periodic cheers or groans coming from the bar down the road.

2/23/2015 9:01:06 AM

I haven't had a drink since February 16, and these are the things I have learned:

1) Non-alcoholic beer is ghastly
2) Benin is stupefyingly dull without beer
3) 85% of my friends are insufferable without beer, largely because of #4
4) Peace Corps volunteers time break down: 30%: Currently drunk. 20%: Talking about times they have been drunk in the past. 30%: Planning their next drunk. 20%: Talking about work, which is one of the things that are stupefyingly dull from #2

This sobriety interlude is kind of an experiment to mark ten years since a webcam fiasco, a lunatic, and a libel suit prompted me to pour my first drink (5 o'clock vodka and Mountain Dew, because college). After some thought, I couldn't remember the last time I'd gone a week without drinking something. For the sake of testing myself, I decided to go with two weeks.

Honestly, I thought it would be harder; as things are I just have a bland sense of ennui and mild irritation at social functions. Cravings don't happen, although this exchange happens in my head approximately 500 times a day:

"Ugh, I'm hot and I'm bored."
"Yeah, we need something cold to occupy our time."
"Oh, I know! How about a beer?"
"We're not drinking til March."
"Oh. Right. My bad. Uh...coca cola?"

Which is how I have negated the weight loss potential of this experiment by dramatically increasing my soda intake.

2/26/2015 5:25:15 AM

The organization I'm partnered with is getting audited next week. This doesn't affect me much, because I'm Peace Corps and therefore not really part of the host structure (read: I don't get any money so auditors don't care). But it has been funny watching my boss freak out about it.

The lowest point of my week is generally the interminable Monday staff meeting, but at least this week it was leavened with orders about how we are to behave while the auditors are around. See, the boss wants us to look like an American office, but we're staffed by Africans, so it becomes necessary to say things like:

"You have to wear shoes. Please, it's just three days. Shoes."
"No Christian music. I don't care if it is in Fon; the auditors don't speak it but the Fon word for 'Jesus' is 'Jesus.'"
"No looking up pornography on the office internet. Do that at home."
"No jeans, no T-shirts, and -- did I mention you have to wear shoes?"

3/5/2015 2:57:22 AM

Apparently the Prussian Blue girls aren't neonazis anymore:
http://www.cbs19.tv/story/15107323/change-of-heart-former-nazi-teeny-boppers-are-singing-a-new-tune

3/11/2015 12:58:33 AM

That whole interview came across as resoundingly insincere. Thank God they're crippled by health problems and working as...wait, is "chambermaid" really a thing anymore?

---

The auditors arrived and everything promptly went to shit. Our power was out the last two days, even though the entire reason we put our office in the President's neighborhood was because its power never gets cut. Then the weekly staff meeting went from usual tedium to screaming match for basically no reason.

See, the boss wants a better generator -- the one we've got now can power the lights and not much else. She's wanted one for at least a year, but this outage was so embarrassing she instructed the office manager to take care of it this week. Around this point I tuned out completely, because my brain can only process so much French in a day and none of this had anything to do with me. But then a few seconds later the office manager and the programming director are in each others' faces, screaming at each other, apparently over a disagreement about the best way to buy a generator.

Mind you, Beninese screaming is different from American screaming. The meanest thing anybody said was, "You upset me when you talk like this. It is not normal." But they said it in the same tone and volume that one of us might say, "Shut the fuck up you fucking cocksucker!"

The boss was horrified that this happened in front of the auditors and told both of them to be silent or they'd be sent home. She was also not thrilled with me, because I was laughing my ass off at the whole exchange.

3/11/2015 5:11:10 AM

Quote :

" ten years since a webcam fiasco, a lunatic, and a libel suit prompted me to pour my first drink"

Where is this story?

3/11/2015 10:14:43 AM

Funny you should ask, since you created the thread. It's about 2/3 of the way down, 8/22/2014:

message_topic.aspx?topic=638003&page=2

3/11/2015 10:22:39 AM

^ yeah i figured it was after posting...i'm lazy

3/11/2015 10:58:49 AM

Today is EXTREMELY boring at work. Please, for the love of God, does anybody have any burning questions about Benin or Peace Corps?

--

My girlfriend is going to Latvia next month to visit a friend, so I'm taking the opportunity to finally go over to Ghana and see my dad's old village. Ghana does not make it easy to visit. The visa fees are high and the paperwork requirements onerous, mostly out of reciprocity -- Ghana's way of punishing Americans for making it so damn hard to get into America.

I'm also told that they're assholes about the actual visa form. Haven't done that part yet, but people who have tell me they're even pickier than Africans normally are about paperwork -- so much as a smudge and they'll tell you to take it back. This is most likely in the hope that you will hand them some money to speed things along, but they'll relent if you keep coming back and refusing to pay.

Togo is easier. You just buy that bitch at the border for like $10.

3/18/2015 8:10:02 AM

they have any interesting tv shows over there?

3/18/2015 8:20:33 AM

NCSU is currently doing a recruitment for peace corps, not sure if you're involved in that at all.

Is Boko Haram at all a threat in Benin?

Does Benin have nature reserves like south Africa where you can play with lions and stuff?

Have you yet encountered any local fruits or vegetables that you can't normall buy here?

Have you seen any monster snakes and spiders and stuff?

Whatever happened to that guy that did all the genocide?

3/18/2015 11:15:11 AM

How did the auditors react to the shenanigans at your meeting? Are things like that par for the course for them or were they shocked?

3/18/2015 12:35:54 PM

longest two years ever...

3/18/2015 3:24:56 PM

You should try to go hunting dangerous game with a very powerful rifle.

I mean something like a huge pest (water buffalo, wildebeest), not something endangered.

Would you have the opportunity to do such a thing?

3/18/2015 5:30:05 PM

Quote :

"they have any interesting tv shows over there?"

There aren't a lot of home-grown shows or networks. Most people that have a TV use a satellite dish. So there's a lot of French/Spanish shows, and stuff from other parts of Africa (mostly Nigeria, some Cote d'Ivoire). Benin has its own news show, and it may do one of the sillier comedy shows, but I can't tell where exactly that originates.

The most popular show by far is the Necrologie. Everyone with a TV watches this. Basically, it's the TV obituaries. They put up a picture of the deceased for thirty seconds or so, along with the dates and maybe a message from the family. The background is just a color and generic music plays the whole time. Sometimes there are voiceovers, but I think these cost extra.

Quote :

"NCSU is currently doing a recruitment for peace corps, not sure if you're involved in that at all. "

No, though the recruiter who interviewed me was at NCSU. Marques, I think was his name. Nice guy.

Quote :

"Is Boko Haram at all a threat in Benin?"

Short answer, no. We're to Nigeria's SW, Bokor Haram is in their NE -- opposite end of the country. There's a rumor going around that Boko Haram has set up recruiting booths in some of the northern markets, but I think it's a misunderstanding. Probably these places are selling movies. Beninese have a morbid fascination with violence in Nigeria -- it allows them to tut, tut their bigger, richer neighbor -- and so I've seen a lot of posters with pictures of something awful and "Boko Haram" written prominently along with some local language stuff. They're ads for videos purporting to document Boko Haram atrocities, not as propaganda but as...not quite "snuff film" but not quite "documentary" either.

Quote :

"Does Benin have nature reserves like south Africa where you can play with lions and stuff?"

Almost exactly two years ago I went to one of the two natural parks in Benin, Pendjari. You don't play with the animals, but there are lions, yeah. I'll talk more about it in anothe rpost.

Quote :

"Have you yet encountered any local fruits or vegetables that you can't normall buy here?"

Sure, mostly leafy greens that look like weeds, but also some really strange fruits with no English name -- often no French name, either. Some of them look pretty alien, purple with huge spikes coming out of the fruit.

In terms of what's eaten, though, it's overwhelmingly oranges (which are green), small bananas, pineapples, papayas, and mangoes (though these, in particular, are quite seasonal)

Quote :

"Have you seen any monster snakes and spiders and stuff?"

The locals kill any snake they find, so there aren't many left. I saw one small, nondescript one. As for spiders, I was pretty lucky -- one thin one with an armspan about the size of my hand, and that's it. People up north have camel spiders, which are fucking nuts.

Quote :

"Whatever happened to that guy that did all the genocide?"

What happened to him? He's still in prison. I need to go talk to him again, but this 9-5, Monday to Friday work schedule doesn't leave a lot of opportunity, and driving a couple of hours to sit in a prison doesn't sound like a fun saturday to me (especially when the alternative is ambassador's swimming pool and happy hour)

Quote :

"How did the auditors react to the shenanigans at your meeting?"

They didn't actually react much at all; my boss was far, far more concerned. They do work like this all over the world, and it's not really their business. I know they left here on Wednesday, flew to the states, and had to be in South Sudan to do the same shit on Friday. Don't know why they even bothered going home.

Quote :

"Would you have the opportunity to do such a thing?"

You can actually pay to hunt in Park Pendjari. It's expensive as hell but it is allowed.

3/19/2015 6:01:05 AM

I normally avoid touristy shit here, not because I disdain it -- tourist attractions attract people for a reason, I figure -- but because it is a real pain in the ass. You're a tourist fresh off the plane, you don't know how much shit should cost. You don't know you're getting ripped off. You have money, and you happily pay. But when I am approached by a "guide" who wants 5,000 francs for a tour that I happen to know is going to last twenty minutes, I know it's a scam, and I know he thinks he can scam me because he thinks I'm the usual dumbass tourist.

The classic example is a couple of my friends who went to Ganvie, the lake village-on-stilts that is called (ironically, I hope) "the Venice of Africa." Big tourist spot, as far as Benin goes. They head out, pay a small fortune for a guided boat tour, and feel the sun beating down on them. The guy produces two straw hats, 5,000 francs ($10) apiece. That's way more than hats like this normally cost, probably five times as much. But they're hot, so they pay. After the tour, the guy snatches the hats back. The 5,000 was a "rental fee."

But I had a friend who wanted to celebrate her 30th by going to Ouidah, the slave port that is one of Benin's biggest attractions. If you're black, and American, and not a recent immigrant, odds are some of your ancestors left through this port. Now it has a whole "slave road" tour you take to "the port of no return," with little sights along the way: the place where new slaves were locked in pitch-black cells to acclimate them to the conditions on slave ships, the tree that slaves ritualistically circled "to make them forget their heritage," the mass grave that constitutes a graveyard.

As a tour it couldn't help but be depressing, but it could have been worse. Our guide was actually quite knowledgeable and friendly, which is unusual in a Beninese service provider. There was little or no attempt to lay on the white guilt. That's because Benin's largest ethnic group, the Fon, did most of the slave-selling. The road is as much a Fon mea culpa as anything else.

In addition to slaves, Ouidah is also the spiritual seat of the Vodun religion, and we went to the python temple. The Beninese loathe all serpents except for these sacred pythons, but you wouldn't know it to see their living conditions. The "temple" is a cement pit, maybe ten feet in diameter, with perhaps two dozen pythons. Supposedly, the snakes are released once a month to find food, at which point they return to the temple. This doesn't sound like any snake behavior I've ever heard of, but what do I know.

3/31/2015 6:34:39 AM

I'd be interested to hear more about the cultural differences in interpersonal communication. You have mentioned the arguing styles which I think is fascinating. Please tell more about that. What about their senses of humor, manners of showing affection, sarcasm, etc?

If you had an American visitor come for 24 hours (when you lived in the village), what are the most "authentic" Beninese things you would have them do, eat, and see? Who are the people you would definitely introduce them to?

Have you been to any orphanages? Or known of any American adoptions taking place?

How many ex-pats do you know down there that plan to live there indefinitely?

You never really told us about your trip home. Did you bring much back with you to Benin? Do you regret eating delicious American food because now you have reset the clock on forgetting about it? Did you miss Benin when you were home? How was the culture shock?

3/31/2015 11:11:47 PM

Quote :

"You have mentioned the arguing styles which I think is fascinating. Please tell more about that. What about their senses of humor, manners of showing affection, sarcasm, etc?"

Well, real arguments are rare, though naturally I see more of them in the city. They're usually a weird mix of really loud, angry voices with wild gesticulations on the one hand, and polite phrasing on the other hand. I mentioned above the insults I heard in an office throwdown a few weeks back -- "What you are doing is bothering me" and "What you are doing is not normal." A later argument involved a supplier who came in livid over some point of contention involving what kind of paper to use, and if anything this spat was even worse. But the two sides still took times screaming their points, and would say things like, "If you will excuse me I will tell you one other thing," in a tone that would be familiar to anybody who has ever seen the run-up to a bar fight.

About the meanest things you hear are "Your mother/father did not raise you well" and "You are not good." Only once have I heard somebody swear -- he was yelling "Go fuck yourself" into a phone.

Audiences are desirable and possibly even mandatory for a Beninese argument. If two people start yelling at each other over, say, a moto taxi price, everyone in the vicinity will gather around and generally pick sides. If one side has the overwhelming support of the crowd, the loser usually keeps yelling as he departs from the scene.

Occasionally somebody goes way out there, to universal condemnation. Another volunteer recently had a taxi breakdown. Hours later, it wasn't fixed. She paid the driver the appropriate amount for the distance they had traveled, but he wanted the full fare to the destination. When she got into another taxi he attempted to jump in the window and drag her (or at least her purse) out. For a conflict to get physical like that is very rare, and the story ended with the 1st driver getting chased away by the 2nd, waving a tire iron.

---

Affection between the sexes is very, very restricted. I believe I saw a man kiss his wife exactly one time, in a moment of high excitement over a promotion, and she was so embarrassed you could see her blush through her very dark skin. Between people of the same gender you can get a lot more physical, to an extent that makes Americans (me included) uncomfortable -- holding hands is the prime example, but just in general guys are a lot more touchy with guys here than in the US. With very young kids, adults display forms of affection that would be pretty familiar, but that goes away quickly -- once the kids can contribute something, they become tiny workers rather than cute objects of adoration.

---

Sarcasm is not much of a thing, at least in how people speak French. Maybe it's different in the local languages.

Sense of humor, though, they've got in spades. It doesn't generally line up with mine -- in their comedy videos, for example, they tend to rehash the same jokes ad nauseum, and these rely heavily on slapstick and silly costumes -- but it is a joy to behold, because Beninese people have great laughs. They laugh with their whole bodies, they laugh loud, they laugh long, they laugh often. Usually not over a joke as such, just over some observation. They LOVE things that play on being white or American; the other day I had my office doubled over with a simple imitation of how market women respond to my presence. Wasn't even trying to be funny, just explaining why the market annoyed me.

Beninese people do have jokes, though, and here are a few:

Toto (the generic name given to a Beninese guy in many jokes) is angry because people keep urinating on the wall of his compound. He buys some paint, goes outside his wall, and covers it with warnings that say "Urinating here is prohibited under 5,000 franc penalty." (Signs like this are all over the place) But nothing changes -- if anything, even more people are peeing on his wall. (People ignoring those signs are also all over the place). He goes out, crosses out 5,000, and replaces it with 10,000. Toto says, "Nobody will risk paying 10,000 francs, they will go urinate on my neighbor's wall instead!" But again, it seems like even more people are peeing on his wall!

Frustrated, Toto repaints his wall, covering all of the old signs. Then he buys a different color and puts up a new one saying, "I need all your pee, please pee here all the time." And nobody ever peed on Toto's wall again.

**

Not so much a joke but an apocryphal story: In French, when you toast something, you say "Chin, chin," approximating the sound glasses make when tapped together. Well, a Chinese ambassador came to Togo, and at his first state dinner there was a toast. All the Togolese said, "Chin, chin." The ambassador shrugged and said, "Togo, Togo." (Chin is also the French word for China)

**

Francoise Hollande comes to visit Benin, and Yayi Boni (president of Benin) takes him around to show him the sights. At the end of his trip he asks Hollande, "What do you think of Benin?"

"Well, Yayi, I will be honest, the people were very nice, but this country is very dirty. There is garbage and dirt everywhere."

Yayi Boni is steamed, but he plays it cool and vows to get revenge a few months later on his state visit to Paris. Hollande shows him all the sights of Paris, taking him to the top of the Eiffel Tower so he can see the whole city at once. Yayi looks all around for something to criticize, but everything seems so clean and orderly. Finally, he finds a compound in the city that is in total disrepair -- garbage and dirt that can even be seen from the tower.

"Francoise, you have a lovely city, but the whole thing is blighted by that hideous compound over there. It is so dirty. What building is it?"

"The Beninese Embassy."

4/1/2015 5:29:31 AM

Quote :

"If you had an American visitor come for 24 hours (when you lived in the village), what are the most "authentic" Beninese things you would have them do, eat, and see? Who are the people you would definitely introduce them to?"

They would have to eat pate with fish jerky and red sauce, since that's the number-one Beninese meal; but then I would make it up to them by going to my favorite place in village, which sold rice with goat meat in spicy sauce. A pineapple would be mandatory -- any day spent in Benin when you don't eat a pineapple is a wasted day. I'd introduce them to my boss and my neighbors, because they're nice, they're smart/educated enough to relate to an American, but they're still real village folk. Mostly we would walk around to get a feel for the town, but I would make sure we went to my preferred bar at sunset, for three reasons: the bar is right next to the school, so they could see the chaos when school lets out. La Beninoise beer is a necessary component of experiencing Benin. And sunset is this country's perfect time, the one part of the day when the whole place seems exotic and even beautiful rather than just kind of garbage-y.

Quote :

"Have you been to any orphanages? Or known of any American adoptions taking place?"

I haven't been to any, though they do exist. The only American adoption I know of was a strange case. Before my time, there was a PCV here who really got along well with his host family. Then the parents in that family both died in a car crash, leaving their 4-5 kids with no support whatsoever. The PCV decided to hang out here and care for them full time. I'm not sure what he did for work, but he sent all the kids to school and has hopes of eventually getting them to America.

There was a hiccup, though; the PCV is gay. The authorities found out and went to great lengths to accuse him of molesting the kids, but of course the kids were consistent in saying, "Feed, clothe, house, and educate us? Yes. Molest us? Not so much." In the end the cops gave up. I don't know what's happened with this guy in the last couple of years, but I always thought it was a heartwarming story.

Quote :

"How many ex-pats do you know down there that plan to live there indefinitely? "

I know a few who plan to live here "indefinitely" in the sense that they don't have a fixed date to go home, but none that plan on residing here permanently. Though I know of a few who do that; there was the one other white guy in my village, a Frenchman who rarely left the house. Everyone assumes he's a wanted man in France and fled here; at any rate, he now has a local wife and shows no signs of wanting to leave.

Quote :

"You never really told us about your trip home. Did you bring much back with you to Benin? Do you regret eating delicious American food because now you have reset the clock on forgetting about it? Did you miss Benin when you were home? How was the culture shock?"

I brought back a duffel full of food and another with food, clothes, and electronics.

I regret nothing; it really didn't reset the clock for me in a bad way. For one thing, I live in Cotonou now, so I can get a lot of things. For another, this time around I know there are plenty of foods here I actually like, so it doesn't look like a bleak 27 months of pate and fish jerky. And lastly, as an extension of that, I really only had 10 months to go at that point (7 months now).

I wouldn't say I missed Benin, no. Part of that is I don't like my job now, and returning to Benin meant returning to this drudgery. But even removing that from the equation, it was only a 6 week trip, a vacation. I don't miss home when I'm on vacation. Getting away from home is why I take vacations. I did miss a couple of food items, and of course my girlfriend (who at the time was on her own trip home -- to San Diego).

***

I honestly expected more from the culture shock; God knows we were warned enough about the difficulties of "readjustment." For the most part I fell right back into the old life. There were a few things that tripped me up a little bit, though...

Right after I got off the plane, we went to a Mexican restaurant, and American portion sizes hit me pretty hard. We put a LOT onto our plates. I had forgotten; ended up taking half of it home in a box. I gained a lot of weight back home, not just through my own food choices but because everybody wanted to feed me, and I felt obligated to eat as much as I could hold and then a few bites. Otherwise, what does it say? "Even though I haven't eaten a casserole in 3 years, yours is so shitty I can only eat a couple of spoonfulls?"

Everybody was glued to a screen, to an even greater extent than I remember -- and I speak as a guy who likes screens just fine. Suddenly everyone had a tablet -- even my mom, who is no tech person, and she would be playing on it while watching TV. My brother was always on his smart phone. My friends got smart phones for their infant children -- they're so cheap it's no big deal, and they can use it to play games without risking mommy and daddy's more expensive devices.

Cell phones seemed to dominate conversation in a way that surprised, irritated, and ultimately disappointed me. Here's some culture shock for you -- one day, your topics of discussion are whether or not there's going to be a coup, ancient Yoruba fetishes that trap you in your house, the steady approach of ebola, and the already well-established arrival of amoebas in your gut. The next day, all of your friends are talking about their respective cellular service plans. "I get this many minutes and unlimited data for X." "Oh, well I get unlimited nights and weekends and Y data for Z money." How can you people possibly talk about this with such interest for so long?

People in general (not my friends and family in particular) seemed dumber and fatter. They haven't gotten dumber, sure, but for the last 2.5 years my American circle of friends was necessarily college-educated, well-traveled, and reasonably progressive. They kept informed about world events because they lived very much in the world. They were not too fat because good luck getting/staying too fat on pate and fish jerky. The news I got had a mostly international bent, because BBC broadcasts here and CNN don't. So I slowly forgot that many Americans are mouth-breathing, slack-jawed, obese dimwits who wanted to ban all flights from "the country of Africa" because they were scared of the big bad ebola.

So those things affected me, but the typical readjustment stuff wasn't much. The first time I walked into a Harris Teeter I looked around with awe for about five minutes, then got down to business. I didn't have the proverbial breakdown in front of the cereal aisle, paralyzed by the sheer number of options. It's not like I'd forgotten what kind of cereal I like. Getting behind the wheel was second nature; my friends, aside from a couple of new offspring here and there, were much as I remembered them. I had retained the basics of using a remote control and DVR (though I do maintain that television programming has gone downhill fast in my absence).

4/1/2015 6:13:39 AM

Quote :

"People in general (not my friends and family in particular) seemed dumber and fatter. They haven't gotten dumber, sure, but for the last 2.5 years my American circle of friends was necessarily college-educated, well-traveled, and reasonably progressive."

Ah now he goes into the "Fat Dumb American" ideology.

Yes, people are shitty, yes you are superior for having traveled, yes the Africans thank their gods every day that the redneck white boy came to their village and tried to play his guitar for them.

4/1/2015 9:29:28 AM

heres a shocker

stategrad100 is a fat dumb american

4/1/2015 10:08:38 AM

Sorry I was at McDonald's and watching Netflix on my iPhone. I was far too concerned with that instead of worrying about exploits in the Country of Africa.

I am very happy that this thread is here to pierce a shining light of truth into the dark ignorance of American society.

4/1/2015 10:18:17 AM

It isn't an "ideology" to say that Americans, taken as a whole, are pretty fat. We're right near the top in lists of nations with the highest rates of obesity and highest average weights. And maybe I should have clarified that I don't attach much judgment to the fact that we're fat; I'm not exactly a rail myself, and probably tip the scales at 10-20 pounds more than I should. But it was a shock to come home and see every public space so full of round people after years of seeing mostly fit (or just thin) folks over here.

I have no idea what the guitar thing was all about.

4/1/2015 10:24:01 AM

My bad. You're right. Americans are sadly behind the fitness curve.
Now please tell me a story about how you helped them discover fire and invent the wheel.

4/1/2015 10:26:09 AM

And I don't think traveling made me "superior." It did provide a lot of distance from people who think that vaccines cause autism, or who want to impeach Obama because they think he was born in Kenya, or who think that all Africans dress like Masai warriors and live in thatch huts.

Then suddenly, I'm back in America and here are all these people again. For a while you think, "Jesus, what a bunch of morons." Then you readjust, realize that America is about as smart as it ever was. Which is to say, still pretty stupid, but less stupid than most of the rest of the world.

4/1/2015 10:28:41 AM

Quote :

"America is about as smart as it ever was. Which is to say, still pretty stupid, "

The bold part is where you continue to lose me.

Carry on.

4/1/2015 10:30:47 AM

Look at this conversation we're having. One of us has to be pretty goddamn stupid. You could probably make a case that, since we're arguing on the internet, we're both pretty goddamn stupid. That doesn't exactly bode well.

4/1/2015 10:33:11 AM

Quote :

"(though I do maintain that television programming has gone downhill fast in my absence)"

Naw there's plenty of good shows on (premium channels at least, and AMC)

All this fat and screens talk and makes me think of:

4/1/2015 10:43:32 AM

all this fat talk and terrible tv talk makes me think of mike & molly.

4/1/2015 10:45:48 AM

https://unseenbenin.wordpress.com/2014/03/22/the-temple-of-python-in-ouidah/

ball pythons it appears

4/1/2015 11:04:46 AM

stategrad100 is angry that america isnt the best at everything

if he wasnt already back in benin he would cleverly tell grumpygop to "gtfo if you dont like it"

4/1/2015 11:08:29 AM

America is the best at one thing:

sending privileged suburban white boys around the world to show off their iPhones to starving & war-torn countries in hopes of mending relations with Western society

4/1/2015 11:27:21 AM

yeah that doesnt describe grumpygop at all

but youre good at being a dumbass

please continue

4/1/2015 11:44:48 AM