From August 7-13 we were in Parakou to help out with another Camp GLOW. We had organized our own camp back in July and had signed on to help with this camp, as well, though this camp in Parakou was slightly different because it was an overnight camp and the girls came from all over the north-east region of Benin. (If you remember, our camp was a day camp and involved just girls from our city of Bohicon.) The girls had sessions during the day where they learned about harassment, the importance of education, HIV/AIDS, malaria, sports, and women’s issues. The girls stayed overnight in dorms while we stayed at the Peace Corps workstation. We were supposed to bring a few girls but were not able to because our mayor refused to contribute money to pay for travel and food expenses. The funding for the camp depended on a certain amount of “community contribution”; each volunteer who brought girls asked their local mayor for a certain amount of money to pay for travel and food expenses for the girls, which was to form part of the community contribution that was factored into the overall budget for the camp.
The camp went well and we had a great time and gave a presentation on malaria as our major contribution to the camp. The rest of the time, we tried to get the girls to participate and to facilitate the learning process.
After the camp was over, we traveled down to Savalou to work a tourism booth (to promote my site) and a moringa booth (to promote moringa—duh) at the annual Igname Fête, which marks the beginning of the igname harvest. There were a lot of booths where we could buy artisanal crafts and trinkets, vendors from Togo and Ghana, and there was even cotton candy, Chilean wine, and soft-serve ice cream! We also ate lots and lots of igname pile, which is my favorite Beninese food. Ignam Pilé (literally, “pounded yams”) is made by boiling gigantic ignames, then placing them in a gigantic mortar and pounding the crap out of them with a huge pestle. When finished, it looks like and has the texture of bread dough, but tastes like mashed potatoes. It is served with a spicy peanut sauce with wagasi (locally produced cheese—also delicious!) and is cheap, normally 500 cfa (about a dollar).
After the 3-day Igname Fête we went to another local volunteer’s post to go for a hike in the beautiful Collines region of Benin. The cities of Savalou and Dassa are well-known for their wonderful hiking, and we had been meaning for a while to visit Tony, the volunteer who lives near Dassa, and go for a hike. We went on a two-hour long hike and the view from the top of the hill was very pretty—pictures to come!
We are in Cotonou now for our mid-service medical appointments, which include samples of certain bodily fluids. I am pretty sure that we are not carrying around any parasites or worms or weird tropical diseases, so this should be short and sweet.
Our Italy/Greece vacation starts begins in less than a month!
Cheers
