Just past 4 weeks...

So, I'm in the office on a Sunday evening trying to call loved ones and no one's answering the phone!  Oh well...That's one really good thing about this position - I can make free phone calls to the States.  But I do have a time difference here so it's challenging to find times to call that aren't my working hours or someone else's.  I had hoped to Skype but the computer at work has no camera and is very slow and I have no internet for my laptop.
My colleague, Aurelia, and I took 2 days this past week and made site visits to volunteers in villages north of Lome.  It was great to be able to see some of Togo that's not this city.  The villages we saw were on the larger side and consisted of many clay and cinderblock houses clustered on dirt roads.  It was very hot and dry and you could see that the residents had to spend a lot of time collecting water from rivers or spigots.  Many people walking around with large metal bowls and huge plastic containers on their heads - both women and children.  The volunteers we saw had it pretty good - cement houses with multiple rooms, nice wooden furniture and even electricity and flush toilets sometimes but they will all have to deal with water issues, too, as the dry season progresses for the next few months.  It was great to meet more volunteers and get to know them a bit.  I also had a chance to sample some Togolese food with Aurelia explaining it all to me - we had some bean beignets (like clam fritters in shape and texture but a different taste) which are called gao in the local language (which I believe was Ewe where we were - there are about 40 local languages in Togo with Ewe being the most common in the south of the country).  For the volunteers the local language becomes increasing important the further they are from Lome.  This coming week I'm taking a  week-long trip to various places ending up in Kara in the northern part of country (where I hear it is mountainous and more scenic - it's very flat down here).  I'm going with the country director who is also making site visits.
I feel like the French is going pretty well considering I haven't had any call to use it in close to 40 years!  Can't speak it too well at this point but I'm understanding more and reading to improve my vocabulary.  I certainly will have time to work on it...
I had bought some fabric at the Grand Marche (the huge outdoor marketplace in Lome) a few weeks ago and one of my coworkers took me to a local tailor to get a dress made - you generally bring a dress you have and they copy it.  Total cost:  $7 for the fabric and $6 for the tailoring (and it only took 2 days)!  I'll post of picture of me in it next time.

Beginning of week 4

I've been here a little over three weeks but it feels much longer - not necessarily in a bad way at all but it's hard to remember my daily life before because my routine here seems so comfortable.  I spent the weekend reading, swimming at the ambassador's pool which makes a nice late afternoon outing.  It was quite hot and humid here this weekend and remains so today so that, not being a hot weather lover, I have to be very motivated to leave my house (which is nice and cool due to being well shaded by vegetation and having ceiling fans in every room).  So I will leave if I know I can be cool at the end of my outing - going to the office to use the computer and phone fits the bill as does going to the pool. 
French is very necessary here - I'm taking lessons twice/week and also trying to study at home but it's been hard to make the leap into speaking French.  I know I'll have to eventually.
Last week I went to the local women's book group which meets once/month at rotating houses.  There were about 15 women there of all ages and several nationalities.  It's mainly a book exchange - you bring a book or two that you've read and talk about them, then people borrow them or not.  You can get your book back eventually or you can donate it to the box of books that the group has.  I borrowed a short novel in French which I'm reading with a "dictionnaire" close by.
I also went to the international dinner which happens every 2 weeks at a different restaurant - a good way to try different places and meet a bunch of people.  We ate at a Lebanese restaurant just around the corner from my house - it was convenient and pretty inexpensive and the food was decent.
The embassy also has social activites - I went to a cookout at the pool there yesterday and ate my first burger since coming to Togo, cooked by Marines who are posted at the embassy.
Tomorrow, I make first site visit to some volunteers so it'll be my first trip out of Lome - looking forward to it!

My street

These are pictures taken by me as I stepped out my gate one morning.  The top is looking left towards my office which is about where that orange spot is near the center of the picture (about 2 1/2 blocks).  The bottom photo is looking right towards one of the main roads in the city though you can't see it in the picture - it's about a half block away.  That's a guard in the right of the picture - there are a rotating series - all very polite!  You can see how my feet are none too clean by the time I get to work!  The street isn't usually this empty looking in the morning - there's more activity.  It's the coolest time of the day, I've realized, so I'm planning get up a bit earlier than I have been so I can take a walk before work or at least a longer route.  My block has mostly houses on it - not the little stores that one sees often mixed in and which are on the intersecting streets as I walk to work.  There's a school right across the street but I think it is for adults.

A technical breakthough!

I've finally figured out how to get my photos onto my computer at work!  I'm very happy about that and really proud since usually I just get my husband or son to do it for me (or at least to hold my hand while I try).  They download really slowly so I'm probably not going to be able to put up much but at least here are some.  The black dots are the bats to which I refered in my previous post. In the top post you can get a sense of the multitudes and in the bottom more clearly see that they are bats.  The middle photo is of the back yard of my house showing the concrete patio where I sometimes sit out in the early evening to watch the bats and drink a soda, the dirt back yard which has since been planted with plugs of grass (at the expense of the Peace Corps since their previous occupant apparently let the yard go to seed such that it all had to be dug up) and a building in the back of the yard which is sort of changing room/bathroom for the guards.  Now that the yard has been planted it has to be watered twice a day for an hour each time.  Needless to say, I don't have time to do it so now I've had to hire a gardener.  Fortunately the wages for gardeners are not prohibitive and he has told me he will keep the whole yard looking nice.  I'm only commited to 2 months at this point so we'll see how it goes.  The rainy season won't start for 3-4 months and it's so hot and dry now it seemed like not a great time to plant but then the dustiness wasn't too appealing either.  So that's the yard...

   Work is manageable at this point - only a few volunteers to see each day.  Soon we'll begin making site visits to their villages starting with day trips to the closer ones.  But eventually we'll be going only trips of up to a week at a time visiting in the rest of the country.  Only one of us medical officers will go at a time with Aurelia going first, I believe.  She was going to do all the trips this spring but I really want to see the country so I think I'm going to get to go too.  We'll have a driver and car from the Peace Corps and stay in hotels so it won't be roughing it.

  I've seen a bit more Lome since we've been visiting local doctors and clinics so I become familiar with the resources in Togo.  This is a very interesting place. Considering the obvious lack of infrastructure there is quite sophisticated medical care available.  I met a physician yesterday who trained in France and does hip and knee replacements (in addition to regular othropedic care).  Considering there is no such thing as health insurance here it surprised me that there would be elective surgery done like that here. 

  I've also bought a small SUV so that I can get out of Lome - I'll drive in Lome as little as possible as the motos and roads make the driving too exciting. 

  Today is a holiday here and I have a 3 day weekend coming up - so I'm not working too hard yet.

End of week 1

Still no pictures cause I can't seem to figure out how to get the office computer to recognize my camera (stuff I'd usually ask my husband to figure out for me!).  I may get internet at home....In any event, I've survived the first week and not gone into any major culture shock yet.  I'm sleeping better.  The food my cook is making for me is wonderful and I don't have to shop!  The fruits here are particularly good - delicious papaya, mango and pineapple.  My back yard, which was all pretty much dirt, is getting planted with grass by 2 men today - I think I'll just have to water it in the future to keep it from dying out.  The dry season is now - it extends from November through at least February which is why the streets are so dusty.  I learned that the rainy season of 2010 was unusually  persistent and led to flooding here in Lome.  Usually it rains from May through July and then from September through October (the latter is the "small" rainy season) but last year it never really stopped in between.  May be global warming.
I've thought about getting a car - I'd like to travel within the country and to Benin at some point and it sounds easier with your own vehicle - but the roads here are challenging to say the least.  The motorcycle drivers are kind of oblivious and the roads themselves here in Lome are very potholed even on main routes that are paved.  So I'm not rushing in to anything. 
I was able to walk to the house of the American ambassador - anyone who works for the embassy or the Peace Corps can just go and use her pool or tennis court whenever.  I used the pool for laps with no one else around - at least I've found a cool (I don't really like to sweat) way to get some exercise.
Work this week was slow - just a few volunteers in each day for their midservice (1 year) exams and a few minor illnesses.  Many are just returning from their leaves.  Aurelia (the Togolese PCMO) and I will be starting to visit them at their sites in early February which I'm very excited about.  Unfortunately, I'll only be seeing the ones who are fairly close by this year since I'm too new and inexperienced to send out alone up north in Togo but that's something I'll get to do at the end of this year.  This coming week we will be visiting local physicians and hospitals in Lome so I'll have some knowledge of the resources available in Lome.  Aurelia is slowly feeding me the information I need so I don't get overwhelmed.
One really neat thing about Lome (at least I think it's neat) - at dusk huge numbers of bats (I'd guess in the hundreds of thousands) fly from south of the city (I guess near the beaches) to somewhere up north to feed.  I can stand in my backyard and watch them going for 1/2 hour.  They're quite a bit bigger than the bats I've seen in the states.  I'm sure they have plenty of bugs and hopefully mosquitos to eat here.

Well, I made it!

1/4/11  I arrived in Togo without incident 3 days ago but only now have internet access and it's only at work cause it's really expensive and complicated seeming to get it at home for now.  Also, I have no pictures as I've taken none at this point.  However, I will say that I'm enjoying things so far but have a lot to take in.  The house I'm living in is huge - every room has a high ceiling, a tile floor and white stuccoed walls.  I'm living in the smaller of 3 bedrooms.  The largest one I could fit my kitchen, dining and living rooms in!  There is a wall all around the house with a guard posted outside (they're all very nice and hold the door for me).  But for all the grandeur of the house it is on a dusty dirt road that all kinds of local people live and work on.  So on my 5 minute walk to the Peace Corps offices I pass school children, many men on motos (little motorcycles which I discovered today are often the taxis and will frequently have 3 people on them)and little stands of goods for sale.  A big white wall runs down each side of the street punctuated by guarded doors like mine but also little shops and yards.  The weather is hot but tolerable (I'm not really a hot weather person) and it's the dry season.  I guess it gets really messy in the rainy season...but that's not till May or so.
Work is starting slowly because many volunteers are currently on their vacation.  Our office gets very busy in the second half of the year so now we've have time for orientation for me which I certainly need.  I've met 4 volunteers so far and a few more will be coming in the midservice exams this week. Next week we will be visiting local resources (labs, physicians).  In early February, we'll start make trips up country to see the volunteers in their sites.  Looking forward to that!
I went to the embassy today for a talk on security in Togo and I met the ambassador who seems very nice.  It's a very small operation, I gather.