Craig's Technical Visit

My Technical Visit took me to Boukoumbe, a small city 45k west of Nattitangou, neatly nestled up next to the Togo border in the Northwest of Benin. Our bus ride was about 8 hours long and we arrived in Nati around 5:30pm, just in time to jump into a bush taxi for the hour-long ride to Boukoumbe. Boukoumbe is beautiful. The Northwest of the country is home to lush green forest, Baobob trees, farmland, rolling hills, and Tata Sambas, which are traditional homes that look like little mud castles. Togo is only 4k away, and the nearest volunteer is actually 7k away and lives in Togo. The volunteer that we visited is finishing up service at the time that we swear in and my traveling companion, Josh, will take up her post when she leaves. Tata Sambas On the way from Nati to Boukoumbe

We met the mayor and all of Josh's future work partners, who are all really fun to be around. The main project that he will be working on involves the manufacture of "essential oils" from Morenga and Baobab which can be used in cosmetics or as food additives. We visited the marche and drank chouk (sp?) which is homemade beer made from sorghum (similar to Peruvian chicha). Josh learned a little bit of local language and is basically ready to start working right away, which is pretty exciting. Drinking chouk with Carlan and Josh at the marche

After leaving Boukoumbe, we spent the night at the Nati workstation, then got up early the next day to catch the 10-hour bus back to Cotonou. The bus broke down (or ran out of gas, I'm not sure) a few times and the last time that it broke down, this time in Cotonou, Josh and I just got off and paid for a Zem to get back to the Bureau to meet Heather and go back to Porto-Novo. Below are pictures of Heather and I in our new tissue! Look closely, mine is a koi fish pattern. Sweet! Bien integre! My "fish tish"