Lying For the Shorties

THIS POST IS EXTREMELY CRASS, PLEASE (GRANDMA) DO NOT READ THIS ONE. MAY I SUGGEST YOU GO HERE --> WWW.WEATHER.COM

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SERIOUSLY, PLEASE DONT DO THIS

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NO, REALLY, GO AWAY. IM NOT KIDDING. I MEAN, I KNOW YOULL STILL LOVE ME AND ALL, BUT REALLY.

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ACTUALLY, ANYTHING BAD HERE WAS MY FRIEND'S FAULT. I HAD NOTHING TO DO WITH IT. BLAME HIM. HE DOESN'T GO TO CHURCH.

I get thousands of emails a day. Thousands of adoring readers showing their appreciation for the bright spot this blog has become in their lives, a few (unoriginal) vitrulent attacks spawned from a seething jealously at my effortless badassery, and, not altogether unexpected, demands for the film production rights to my life. These are not new and are normally brushed aside with the flood of marriage offers, but one caught my eye today --- here, in unabridged form, is the request for your perusal --

"Matthew! Baby! Your blogs got that certain something! Gold, baby. Gold! Here in Hollywood, California that's what we've been looking for for a long time, my boy. The kids here? No talent. It's always the same rippling six packs and desperate sexual propositions on the road to fame... It's worn out, kid. But you?! You got something special. Hell, for a movie deal, I'd sleep with you and, kid, I don't often say that. But for you? I'll make an exception. The studio will literally throw any figure at you for the chance to produce your life in movie form. Money's not an object. Drugs? Women? What's your poison, Matt? Badda-bing I can make it happen. The only thing I don't get is what you actually do, kid? I mean, trust me, I know a quality package when I see it *softly pats you on the ass*, but who's the man behind the legend?"

Now, as you can imagine, yours truly is accustomed to habitual displays of genuflection, but this request had that certain balance between obsequiousness and offers of gratuitous amounts of money that so many young, nubile tarts don't yet understand. Also, he emoted a gentle pat upon my ass within the email which threw me for a loop, but I just figured it was the Hollywood in him. Hell, from all I've heard about that place Im sure he was surrounded by midgets serving lines of coke off of mirrors balanced on their heads and he was so hopped up on Red Bull and Quaaludes he actually thought he was cupping one of my supple cheeks. Beats me.

Anyway, I sent a email back to Mr. Happy-Hands telling him about my day jobs as an adventure ice climber/contract astronaut with forays into moonlighting as a lunar cartographer and heres the cheek I get in response--

"Matthew...Matthew... that's great and all. Rock climbing on Mars or whatever. Believe me, I'm impressed. But we're selling to the everyman here. Here in Hollywood, California our job is to trick these peons into thinking that they have a fucking thing in common with superstars and model goddesses who wouldn't even look that trailer trash in the eye. We need something a little more down to Earth. Stuff those red-state fucks are gonna eat out of the palm of my fucking hand. Badda-bing. God, I love my life. You like brandy, kid? I'll send you over a bottle. Anyway, point is, we need something more in tune with the common man. Whatcha got for me, baby?"

I feel the need to translate for you, so here it is -- he wanted me to lie. TO LIE. A large part of my appeal is the fact that its all happening (er, baby)! Its all in real time!!! So what can one do? I told him the truth - Im too noble to lie. Its true.

"Can't lie? ...*laughs for several minutes*... Listen, kid. I get what you're saying. It's real honorable. We can definitely spin that into a nod from the Academy later on. But let's cut the shit for a minute. We're just guys talking here. Two average Joes. And what I'm telling you is this... the movie business is about giving people a dream -- the will to keep going. Honesty doesn't sell. You think good ever triumphs over evil? You think the guy gets the girl? That ain't life, baby. But people don't want the truth. John Q. Jackass would take one look at your life and go shoot himself. What we're doing here is bigger than just you and me. It's for the kids, man. The cancer patients. And for them? Yeah, here in Hollywood, we lie. For the kids. I tell 'em Santa Claus is real and named Tim Allen. So, don't do it for me, babe. Do for those cancer wards. The ones with clowns and balloons and Playstations. Yeah... Yeah... That's right."

And you know what? That touchy-feely-sonufabitch had a point. It is my moral obligation - NAY - my patriotic duty as a red-meat-eating-native-born-American to give hope to those who have none. Those little kids in the cancer wards. So I do this for you, wee cancer tots. I lie here so you may relate to my life. I lie to give you hope. I lie to give you happiness. I lie to expand my bank account. God, I love my life.

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I'm whats known here as an informaticien. This means next to nothing in West Africa, seeing as if you can use Word and surf the web you are a West-African-Certified-Informaticien. Its not so hard to be an expert here. I work with principally two organizations here -- The University of Lome and Cafe Informatique. Cafe Info is one of the largest privately owned businesses here and is the largest ISP and the second largest cell provider in country.

Im working on a 5 year "state of technology throughout Togo" action plan to present to the government. I actually have about as much of an idea about what Im doing here as I do about lunar cartography.

At the university Im working to install a cyber cafe using only linux -- this is tougher than it sounds--

See those two black computers? Those are the University web site and email server. High tech here, folks, high tech.

So, my faithful public, thats just about all I do. I look at computer screens all day and work through email in a country where most of my colleagues don't have electricity and pee in dirt holes. I also drink cheap wine and cheese whenever possible. Thats class.

If you know whats going on here, put down the bag of cheetos and go outside and get some sun, NOW.

* with David Newstead contributing. He's originally from Ninety-Six, SC and has never actually been to Hollywood. California. Baby. He will still sleep with you, though.

_________ on the __________

There are certain things that I, being some sort of quasi-employee of the federal government representing the US abroad, am not allowed to post here. Things like exact location (I didn't give GPS coordinates, but if you haven't figured out where I live it means you haven't sent me a package full of peanut butter and swedish fish, and in that case you can just go straight to hell), political preferences (I actually didn't even get to vote because of a lost ballot, but I'm sure we all know of the vast right-wing conspiracy to block votes of PC volunteers. And black people. And most definitely black volunteers. My god, can you imagine what'd happen if those commie bastards got into the white house?), and I most certainly can't write about what PC volunteers actually do with their free time, like when I travelled to _____________________________ with _________ and we ______________ when we _________________ with a _____________________ he borrowed from his _______ who one time actually ______________ but it was cool because _______________ without________________ which was incredible to see, because I didn't actually know someone could bend like that and we only paid her _____ CFA. We almost _______ 5 times, one time when the _________ almost went over the edge of the ___________, not to mention drinking way too much ________________ and _____________ while trying to _________________ and I told him it wouldn't work, but then again he is __________ and we all know how F-ed up THAT religion is, right?

So anyway, here are some only mildly incriminating pictures, you fill in the blanks until next fall, when the book will be published. Talk to me if you want international merchandising rights.

Fierte

I was huddled around the small television in our country director's house with about a dozen other volunteers, waiting for Obama to step out to address the crowd in Chicago, after a night of no sleep, too many beers and a lot of laughter - For years now, I have tried to stay apathetic towards politics, hiding firm behind my mantra that no one man can really change anything. Watching Obama's victory speech, I couldn't help myself from tearing up and hoped and prayed to all that I hold dear that I am wrong. When bush was 'elected' I was a senior in high school, what to me seems like a lifetime ago, and these past 8 years have only turned me sour on the political process that I hear my parents and (maybe especially) my grandparents feel so proudly about.

But seeing Obama give that speech, hearing his strong, tersely metered diction, I actually found hope. It may sound silly, but emotions that I never knew existed welled up inside of me. I was ebullient from the shimmering hope of the next 4 years yet infinitely sad at the same moment -- saddened for all the ways that people are going to try and break Barack Obama, tear him down, destroy not only him, but what he stands for in the eyes of so many people in the US and (again, maybe especially) all those others around the world. Will they succeed? My guess is probably. Will Barack Obama's true colors be many dim shades grayer than we all hope? I say no, but he is only a man. Will he ever rise any higher than that 10ft platform he delivered his victory speech upon to the millions of us who felt the falling of tears and scratching at the backs of our throats?

All I can say is that, for me, gone is the oily slickness I feel when I think of my country, gone are the shadows of nepotism and hypocrisy I've always assumed were prerequisites within the government. Us sitting on the floor, lids glued open against impossible fatigue, Obama standing there 10 shades darker than I'll ever tan, and a million times brighter than I'll ever shine, I watched the man who returned my faith in my home take the weight of the world upon his shoulders and for the first time in my life I felt myself able to say that I am truly proud to be an American.

Orphaned Organs

I don't know what it is inside of me, but just as I try to follow my intuition, that silent urging in situations, there come those times when I feel pushed to move – to go – to see something different. You can call it stir craziness, cabin fever, itchy feet – whatever you name it, it has been a driving force in my life, always leading me to places I've never expected to see. Yesterday the walls were closing in on me. The thought of being here in my house made me feel very tired and my heart race with anxiety at the same moment. Knowing the only thing to do was leave, I threw some odds and ends in a bag and got a taxi out of town. I remember an episode of The X-Files, one where a government-built subterranean antenna broadcasting ultra low frequency waves was causing peoples heads to pop like water balloons. It was actually due to a build-up of pressure behind the ear drums, and Scully and Mulder found that if they traveled west at a quick clip, the pressure would abate for a bit. Yesterday I felt my own bit of pressure here in Lome. Not as if the Togolese government can afford a head-popping secret antenna – there's only enough money in the official coffers here for a crippled infrastructure and the occasional presidential palace. No, I simply mean that as the wind rushed over my face and the landscape faded from sand and concrete to lush rolling hills, I felt the weight of my sedation peeling back and flying off like so many old layers of chipped paint.

I descended back upon Agou-Akoumawou to visit with the stage family and to eventually make my way to Cafe Kuma, a small coffee plantation nestled at the top of one of the mountains circling Kpalime. I needed to find Kujo, the proprietor, whose number went missing with my phone all those weeks ago. True, there were easier ways to find his number, many of which didn't involve leaving my couch, but it was nice to have an over-arching purpose for my impromptu vagabonding. I was at peace last night, relaxing with my surrogate parents and walking the familiar stretch of highway that forms the town. I met with the new stageres this morning and doled out some American sweets I've had stashed – they were all in high spirits, but looked as if their appendages had had a nasty run in with some sort of pox – the heralded akoumawou-tech-house-bugs strike again. Still – an upbeat crowd -

After coming back from the mountain today, Maman had a lunch prepared for me – pate with gbomadetsi (spicy spinach sauce), my favorite – this was interesting, however – now being here has facilitated in my losing any inhibitions I still had about food – granted, there wasn't much I wouldn't eat back in the states (man, you should have seen me at Bray's Island, my last restaurant) – but now be it bones, marrow, skin, fat, organs – bring it on. Hearts? Meaty. Lungs? Spongy. Intestines? If you blur your vision and imagine they are some type of expensive, exotic truffle, they taste just exactly like – you guessed it - intestines. Yum.

Yet today, I ran across a surprise in my gboma – a stray kidney bean. Odd, I thought – Why is there only one bean here? When I remembered there are no kidney beans in Togo, it made much more sense – ah, just a stray kidney. Fine, no problem, I could use the protein. Knowing they come in pairs just added to the excitement – I knew there was one still hiding out. Like finding two temporary tattoos in a box of cracker jacks.

Dear diary – jackpot.

Finding the 3rd kidney a few minutes later was only mildly disconcerting - I was hungry, you see. Truly bothersome, though, wasn't that there were more than one set of kidneys, nor that they were the only bit of meat in my otherwise vegetarian meal. It wasn't even the fact that a small, unsolicited act of poultricide had been commited just to spice up my lunch. No, the truly disturbing fact was the easily overlooked significance of the number of kidneys found in my meal. There were seven kidneys.

Seven.

You see, its not just that 4 chickens died to bring you this journal entry, its that even though 4 died, I only had 3.5 chicken's worth of kidneys. Think about that. I was tackling the idea that I had been served a prime number of kidneys. Where was the orphaned organ? I imagined all the stories I'd ever heard of traveling to Mexico and getting drugged at a club and waking up in an odd hotel room with stitches on my abdomen, only to die a slow death over the next 4 days from a build-up of toxins in my body that my harvested kidneys could no longer filter – except these were chickens, not humans, and they had never been to Mexico, nor ever experimented with psychotropic hallucinogens, and they sure as hell didn't know how to drink too much tequila and dance the meringue at 3am with overweight Mexican prostitutes on their spring break in Tijuana, trying to forget about the girl who dumped them after their senior prom. But I digress... Not to mention, where the hell do you get 7 kidneys from at one time? Is there an organ-lady-stall at the marche? Was I eating a fetisheur's last commission?

The hell if I know – you really think I was thinking that hard about it then and there? I popped those bad boys like popcorn shrimp.

Where Everyone Knows Your Name

If someone were to ask me what I truly loved, a few things would come to mind. There are the bucolic standards – family, life, freedom – but assuming for just a second that I am a healthy, well-adjusted individual we can delve to a much more fun, superficial level. I would say that I love seeing my breath on a cold morning. I love the smell of sun-soaked skin after a day swimming in the river or searching for shark's teeth. I love it when sons show respect to their mothers. I love the exhaustion and relief that come intertwined at the end of a long run. I love the walking stick I had to leave in the states. I love hearing the exact right set of chords at the right time. I love the excitement that comes with taking a huge risk. I love waking up and trading a knowing smile with someone. I love wine. I love cheese danishes (I'm talking, really love cheese danishes).

As I'm sure you can imagine, I could keep going. We all have those little things that make us smile and keep us centered even in unfamiliar environs. My environs are quite unfamiliar to me, so I've had to make a concerted effort to find things that can keep me centered, balanced, focused. When we fall out of sync with ourselves, we end up falling into patterns of extremes – adjectives followed by 'too much' – sleeping too much, reading too much, crying too much, drinking too much. At home, surrounded by family and friends our patterns keep us grounded, if albeit at times, quite bored. At home, I drink lots of hot tea and take long walks in the woods. I find back-alley bars and sit for hours with a bottle of wine and a good book. I hug my parents. Here its a bit different – in such a different environment its much easier to go a little ape-shit from time to time. So, what to do? Well, I've found a new love – everyone, meet tchouk. Tchouk, everyone.

Tchouk is, at its simplest, home-brewed millet beer. Millet is ground in a mill (called a moulin here – a windmill) which produces a red clay-colored powder. This powder is mixed in with a huge pot of water and left to settle for a few hours. When all seems calm, the froth at the top is scraped off and a huge fire is lit underneath. The brew is stirred for many hours and then left to ferment for many days. As a fun bonus, charcoal is thrown in with every batch. When asked why, I received the all-encompassing response that, by the earnest look across Maman Colette's face, settled all further discussion– 'for the ancestors'.

Still, by reducing it to its basic constituents does it a great injustice, for tchouk's meagre means belie its greater purpose as a whole. Tchouk comes originally from the northern parts of Togo, brewed by the Kabye and Kotokoli. I've heard the best of the best can be found near Dapaong and Mango. Brewed every morning and fermented in either 3 or 5 day shifts, a community's morning visit to the tchoukstand (called the 'cafe matinal') is comparable to a morning coffee at Hardee's back in the states. Gossip is traded, stories swapped, the difficulties of the day sloughed off with each calabash. There are two main types of tchouk – the vrai tchouk and tchokpa (I am clueless as to the spelling there). They are fundamentally the same thing, with only a few variations in the brewing originating from their locations up north. Tchouk tends to be a bit sweeter, less fermented, and less alcoholic. Tchokpa on the other hand, is darker, spicier, more fermented, and quite a bit stronger (still, maybe only 5% by volume). I've heard lengthy diatribes from local experts expounding upon even more minute differences between further delineations (loso-micine, kabye-micine, dapaong-micine) but for all intensive purposes, just know that there are a few types and while you aren't expected to drink one exclusively over the others, depending on where you are from you are expected to profess your love for your natal brew, no matter how deferentially you choose to do so.

Now there are much more efficient vessels for inebriation in country. A 50cfa (a dime's-worth) shot of sodobe will buddy you up much faster than 5 or 6 calabashes. But tchouk isn't drank here as we would drink it in the states. Tchouk is used primarily to escape from the heat of the day and relax with conversation. There was tchouk stand a stone's throw away from my house in Agou-Akoumawou, which I used almost daily as an impromptu Ewe lesson. It didn't take long before I was known throughout my stage as Mattchouk. I've continued the tradition here in Lome, and truly enjoy my daily excursions. As a happy side effect, my Ewe has become relatively passable --- and I owe it all to those dirty calabashes of tropical swill. So, in the effort to better integrate, learn some local language and stay centered, anytime I see my local maman's drapeau sitting out front of the tchoukoutchounuƒe I always make sure to sidle up and enjoy a few quiet minutes with friendly smiles where everyone knows my name. And, hey, here its not a bad thing that me tro va egbe sia egbe. If I come back every day, it just makes me one of the locals.

AIDS ride blues

Awoke from the concrete this morning to another breakfast of Ablo and gboma (sweet, moist corn cakes and spicy spinach sauce). Sitting across from everyone, shared happiness and exhaustion passing between smiles and looks throughout the room, it was hard for me to be down on my luck -- still, as I shoveled the congealed spiciness into my gaping maw, the slightest urge to retch tickled the back of my throat and made me yearn for home in a way Ive never really felt before. Maybe it was the Ablo (which I love, actually), maybe it was the soiled biking clothes I had been wearing for 4 days that lent me a wonderful musk of a middle school gym locker room, maybe it was the heat and humidity that, even at 6AM, was already laying heavy on the landscape like a quilt thrown across a freshly made bed. Maybe it was simple exhaustion, or the simple quiet of the morning that left me to my thoughts that tickled at the shadow of loneliness that had been spreading from the back of my mind for a few days, but I would have slapped someone's mother for a 5 am trip to Bojangles on a cold morning for boberry biscuits and shitty coffee. And just because I could, I would have smoked a cigarette and listened to an epic song while gazing at the sun coming up to make it more like a movie.

This is all coming from the last full day of AIDS Ride, a yearly event here where I met with a group of 10 or so other volunteers from Maritime (our region here in the south) and we embarked on a 5 day bike tour through nigh-impassable reaches of the interior to sensibilize small villages and schools about AIDS and preventative measures. We covered beween 40 - 60k a day in about 130 degree temps, over an amazing array of sandy impasses, sandy hills, sandy paths, sand covered slopes, sand filled pits, and through sandy villages. I was up until now unaware of the charms of biking long distances in the dead heat of the day, but let me tell you, its quite invigorating in a what-in-the-hell-have-I-done-to-deserve-this sorta way. Also if there are any questions, or anyone needs a quick condom demo, Im your man to come to.

Dont you be talkin bout no AIDS...

On a related note, I have decided that my Peace Corps project will be to pave the entire country of Togo. Asphalt for all.

No, hon, you can keep the shoes on...

Being from the south, I know a little something about wearing sandals. I have worn beat-up, run-down petite thongs of cow's hide in almost every situation imaginable, save maybe funerals and marathons. I have graduated college,

ridden horse-back through the deserts of Giza,

hiked mountains on the dead sea, sold out medium-sized coffee joints in very small towns,

had run-ins with a few metal poles,

became a Peace Corps volunteer,

been to weddings and actually just solved the Rhiemann-Zeta hypothesis, all while porting some slick John Kerry namesakes. Now, granted, at this point, I have some pretty interesting-looking feet (just check out that big toenail), but like my buddy Rayan says, “this guy's feet tell stories.” You could surmise I wear sandals so much because I've lived on the beach for half my life now, but I'm leaning more towards airport security -

Security guard: Sir, I'll need you to remove your shoes, plea-
MT: *slides backwards out of sandals and pirouettes with Michael Jackson crotch-grab*
Security guard: Wow. That was actually pretty cool. Damn, how much do you fly, son?

So, anyway, as I was saying, flip-flops and I get on well enough. Here in Togo, the chaussure of choice for the paysans are Nigerian made plastic shower sandals, called 'tapettes'. Now, to be fair, I was even a little cautious of them when I first arrived. I had my leather deals and didn't feel like changing. But, as things tend to do, they broke and all I had to fall back on was a blue and white spotted pair of taps that my host brother Tikwi had given me during stage. Begrudgingly, I put them on, but quickly found out why everyone here wears them. First, they're only slightly more expensive than going barefoot, and secondly, they are actually pretty damn comfortable. And Togolese can do ANYTHING in tapettes – play football, ride motorcycles, carry pounds and pounds of yams on their heads – I began to feel a bit more integrated the day I started biking through Lome traffic in a wife-beater and tapettes.

So, where am I going with all of this, eh? Well, I've recently found out that there seems to be one thing Togolese don't do wearing tapettes. Togolese do not rob people while wearing sandals. They don some off brand sneakers (adimas, punas) to hop 10ft. compound walls and slither through kitchen windows. We found the tracks, we have the proof (well, that and all our shit is gone). Now I've been robbed before, quite a number of times, but I think we met the ballsiest (read: hungriest) thief in Togo. Me and 9 others were sleeping at a transit house in Lome after a night of festivities and awoke to find a few articles missing. Turns out that after our sneakered perp crept into the house, he deftly pilfered our precious gadgets from besides our sleeping heads. Seriously, props to you, ballsy thief. There were 10 of us in the house, 7 of us large yovo men. Why, oh why, couldn't he just have made a little bit of noise? Because he wasn't wearing tapettes, thats why. Or he was a ninja. Either way, I made out alright, though – he only made off with my phone - I didn't even have my wallet with me.

It had actually been stolen earlier in the day.

10 bucks says that guy wasn't wearing sandals, either.

The Dangers of Tawuk

I often find myself sitting around, staring out the window or looking down at maps, wondering what somewhere new looks and smells like. As my eyes draw their imaginary line from point A to wherever my itch can get scratched, they invariably run through a few of Rome's enduring legacies. Seeing that I need to get to the other side of them, I do as any well-bred farm animal knows how to do and I cross the frigging road. This, like each and every day for all of you, never has really mattered too much for me, even in some of the odder places I've seen. I'm American, so lots of things that are common place in most of the world are supposed to scare me and offend my egalitarian sensibilities, so just in case there are any of my compatriots reading this, I'll take the time to explain. I'm wont to avoid cliched descriptions filled with twenty-something catch-phrases and buzz-words (it was like, CRAZY last night, you have no idea) so I'll try my best to avoid using overly abused adjectives when trying to describe something as mundane as local traffic. Take Paris, for example – running around the l'Arc de Triomph is a large round-about with 6 lanes of cars and motos zigging where others had zagged a moment before. They work it out, no stop signs, no painted lines. In Athens, taxi drivers go fast, something along the lines of Le Mans fast, down streets hardly wide enough for a horse cart. It works itself out, too – either all those roads are one way, or Greek taxi drivers are privy to unstoppable bouts of preventative premonition. Growing up back home in Laurens, we had folks like Moffett Caine, who, regardless of circumstances, drove 25 mph. When you saw a row of traffic 20 cars deep in my home town you knew there was either a funeral or Moffett was going down to Hickory Point for his daily coffee – either was an acceptable excuse for being late to work. Crossing the street in Cairo is either a feat of unsurmountable faith in God, or one of the world's most competitive bouts of active natural selection. It helps if you stand beside someone and cross with them - they'll get hit first. The Germans have their spiffy Autobahn where you can go as fast as you want, but, lets get real here Germany, just because all your citizens are androids with superhuman reflexes who can drive at those ridiculous speeds in their creepy 'German-engineered' automobiles doesn't make me jealous. It didn't help you in WWII, so eat me (in your FACE, krauts).

Here, however, is different. Chickens do not cross the road here. No, chicken, just stay – stay! Stay back! Its not worth it, chicken! Think of your unhatched chicks! What would they do without a mamma to run after! You don't have to prove anything to me! Don't be a hero! - Take away the semblance of laws, and you get a system that works with utmost efficiency, but only for those who can take advantage of the efficiency. Say that it rains for two days straight and a large portion of the paved roads in Lome are flooded. If you are one of the lucky few to have a car, you will be zipping along, minding your own bees wax, until you come to an impassable part of your road. But, wait, whats this? The opposite lane of traffic looks drivable! Well let me just hop this concrete median and drive the exact same speed I was going, in the wrong direction! No, hun, its all good – look, Im just going to honk a whole lot and let everyone else swerve to avoid me. Car breaks down in the middle of the road and there is no where you can take it? Don't worry, everyone will swerve to avoid it as well, until it gets completely dismantled overnight as it sits. Are there ever accidents, you ask? Well, yeah, I'm sure there are, but, c'mon, you wanna make an omelet, you gotta crack a few eggs, right! Am I right? Better yet, you wanna make it to the yam festival on time you gotta crack a few side-view mirrors, eh? You feel me? No, Matt, we don't follow.

Sometimes, when a car swerves to avoid a stalled taxi or hops a curb to get somewhere a bit faster, things get hit. Trash cans, signs, chickens, motos, people. It happens. Sometimes, just sometimes, when white Toyota SUVs barrel around large trucks on the right side of the lane going 40 kph, their side view mirrors connect with unsuspecting pedestrians on their way to a quiet night of hot tea and rooftop reading at their favorite Lebanese restaurant. Were you aware that when the side-view mirror of a white Toyota SUV connects with a human body at 40 kph, it shatters like the dreams of a child sitcom star? The words 'pipe bomb' come to mind.

You might be surprised, but theres a certain level of pride that comes with inflicting that much damage to someone's vehicle. I suppose in the future if I really need a rush I'll go club a few windshields, maybe steal some lug nuts or something, but for now I'll just stick to being the passive hit-and-run victim – it makes for a better story.

Could I commute to Accra from here?

Its been a few days now, and I feel that I've gotten settled in a bit. I live in a quartier called Avenoue, which is on the outskirts of Lome. Lome itself is separated by a long...(erm, maybe 'lagoonish-thing' describes it) 'lagoonish-thing' that divides it into basically downtown and the suburbs. Something near 900,000 people call this place home and like it or not, it is where the vast majority of business is done in Togo. Compared to Accra in Ghana (the "Golden City" as Ive heard it called), or even Coutenou in Benin, Lome is (so I hear) not as beautiful or developed, but is still not without its own charms. It smells like salt water and motor oil and even has a cool night every now and again. If Accra is NYC, then Lome is kinda like the Trenton of West Africa.





Here Is my house. I live in a compound with another family, who stay in the larger house across from mine. I have, by all accounts, a huge house for a volunteer and it has been a task trying to furnish it.

Lookit that porch - PC must have known I was southern -- When I buy some rocking chairs, it is ON.

There are lots of other rooms, but they're boring and empty. Can anyone fit a few mattresses into a flat rate box?




This is Sami. Hes 4, from visiting from Burkina. I have never heard a kid who talked so much. I have never met a kid I wanted to hear talk so much, at that - his French is immaculate.


The main avenue of Avenoue (ha).

Well, there ya go. I promise to return with something that will incite a little more emotion, but until then, welcome to my home.

Capital Calculus

Being that I have been posted and already spent a week in the grand city of Lomé, I have taken it upon myself to find the hangouts, the best stores, the marché mamas with the best deals, the coldest beers and the best restaurants throughout the city. Our entire stage has been here since Wednesday morning and I have diligently given the low down on the happening locales. For 5 days now I have been batting .1000, giving excellent directions, haggling taxi prices and pegging the best hookah and schwarma in the Maritime region. For our last night here, I felt that I should take a few folks out to one of the busier parts of town, to sit outside, sip some drinks and enjoy a few fire roasted brochettes (skewered meat – don't ask what kind of meat, I don't know, nor do I want to know). It was a perfect night, clear sky, bright stars, crisp and breezy, the glowing avenues full of potential. We embarked after a moderate dinner at the flophouse, renting a taxi to the center of town to a little etablissment know around here as Capital Brochettes. The restaurant sits across from a hopping night club and the flickering neon and staccato rhythms of bad Nigerian hip-hop were floating their way across the divided highway to the plastic lawn furniture holding the dozens of locals all enjoying a similar evening. We rolled up like hollywood, grabbing a table at the back corner of the sandy pavilion and ordered a round of drinks and a few brochettes for the group to munch on. It didn't take long before we were trading quips and stories and having quite a grand time.



I feel confident here that you have the clairvoyance to divine that something was soon to happen to shake things up a bit. I have had 3 of the greatest days of my life back-to-back-to-back, but I shant be writing about those here. Believe me when I say that no one likes to hear about your successes, so grab a snack, turn up the Metallica and come on back for a petite rant on customer service Africaine.
The first portent to send things amiss was the manifestation of a platter of an odd creamy salad, with two small pieces of baguette. Granted, I had ordered 'salade' when I could've ordered 'legumes' but considering I ordered 4 brochettes avec salade et baguette, along with some plantains frites, I figured it was pretty self-explanatory.

30 brochettes later, I am now confident in saying that it was not, in fact, self explanatory.



I was, at one time a comp sci major down in sunny Charleston. I'm pretty good with computers, but when sitting beside cute girls in calculus class, I am incredibly bad at calculus. As it turns out, you need to pass the calculus classes to then take more calculus classes so you can get a piece of paper that permits you to be an even bigger nerd, so, knowing when to bow out gracefully, I became a business major. That being said, I am no math whiz. So when we were given 30 brochettes, I figured, hey, I must have ordered something like 4 plates of brochettes as opposed to 4 brochettes. We laugh, shake heads begrudgingly and loosen our belts. It has since occurred to me that even at 4 plates of brochettes, 30 is only divisible by 4 if fractions are involved, and, after double checking, I'm positive we had no fractional skewers.

Also of interest was the platter of soggy, fat, sweet bananas that seemed to have fallen in a vat of grease and been taken out almost immediately. I may not have been born a francophone, but I know what a 'plantain frite' is, and soggy they are not.

Still, as I alluded to, my week has been phenomenal, I have just gotten paid and I am feeling generous. Bring it on, universe, pile on the soggy fruit, you can't ruin my evening.

Even if the bill is for over 15,000 CFA. 15 thousand CFA.

I could buy quite a few plantain trees for quite a bit less than that.

...Touché, universe, touché.

Aching Uterii

I would rather like to avoid most cliches of the blogging culture. I know that no one really cares what I had for breakfast or what happened between David and Sally or my top-ten-lists-of-anything-whatsoever-at-ALL. Seriously, if this ever regresses to the point that I am writing about anything at all remotely related to fashion, politics, or entertainment, I want you to invite me out to lunch and then run me down with your car.

To make sure I don't spend anytime near any of your vehicle's grills anytime soon, I've made it a point to find interesting things to write about. Today, its kids. The Togolese are an absolutely gorgeous bunch of folks and the kids are something altogether spectacular. I don't know if I find most babies ugly, or if its just white American kids who are so hideous, but, in the inimitable words of a good friend, "my uterus aches every time I see a Togolese child."





I won't even go into the women here. My grandparents could be reading this, yeah?

Angry Woodlands Creatures

He spoke first, without looking up.

"You know, I remember the last time I was treated like an eight year old. I didn't appreciate it then, either."

"Yeah, and when was that?" She asked.

He took a quick pull from his cigarette and blew the smoke to the side. He turned and met her gaze with a cocksure grin.

"When I was eight."


...and there is about everything I need to write about our pre-service training (we call that 'stage', pronounced 'stahj'). As of last Thursday, I and the other 30 or so folks I flew out with 3 months ago are now official volunteers. Yippee. Festivities were held at our country director's house, (dressing to the 9's, speaking local language for the ceremony on Togolese national TV, eating brochettes and drinking beer) which was followed by festivities at large in Lome (less ceremony, more beer and stripper pole dancing). So, in a few photos, we had --

The look of success

Ethnic deversity and incredible tailoring

Dancing, dancing, dancing

Funny Faces

Sexy Faces


Asian Faces


More Dancing

And in a stunning surprise appearance, we even had a celebrity or two crash the party --





I think Qaddafi was celebrating the re-establishment of political ties, but hey, I'll take what we get.


Also of interest, the following morning I learned what it feels like to have a pissed-off badger trying to claw its way out of your head through your eyeballs.

And yeah, absolutely, I'd do it all again.


Off to my new home now--