Playing games

As requested by my brother I finally attended a soccer game (le futbal) played in a village between two school teams.  It was 2 lycees which are comparable to high schools but the students range in age from 15 to well into their twenties.  I guess there's no social promotion here.  The game was arranged by some volunteers and was actually a pretext to promote the use of the moringa tree which is a fast growing tree many parts of which can be used to suppliment the diet which in many parts of Togo consists of little but refined starches.  In the picture below the woman at the left is holding a branch of the moringa tree.  The easiest way to use it is to dry the leaves and then pound them into a powder and add it to a sauce (which is put on the rice, cornmeal and yams that are dietary staples).  Moringa is very high in many vitamins, protein and calcium.  It's pretty much a miracle food for a place like Togo.  I haven't had it myself but I hear it doesn't taste bad and that added to a sauce you hardly know it's there.  So before the game and at half time, a verbal presentation was given in Ewe (the local language) and French on the benefits of moringa to bunches of mostly small children as in the bottom picture. 

These children were standing right in front of me and didn't seem to be paying much attention but I guess you never know what is getting through to people at a presentation like this.

Today, in honor of the Peace Corps's 50th anniversary, the female volunteers and staff members (yes, me too) are playing a soccer game against the English department female students at the University of Lome.  A number of the volunteers have played soccer either in high school and college so we might have a chance against English students!  There will only be one staff member on the field at a time and we don't have to play longer than 5 minutes which is good cause the game is at 3pm and it's going to be hot as usual.

I finally got my car yesterday and actually drove in Lome.  It wasn't as scary as I've been imagining even on a Friday when there tends to be quite a bit of traffic.  I picked up the car at the embassy and drove immediately to the supermarket so I could get some things that need refrigeration like ice cream and butter.  I always forget that everything is closed between about 12 and 3 and I got there at 2 so I had to go back later.  The Super Ramco is the biggest supermarket in Lome but I'm always surprised by what isn't there.  One week you can find something and then you'll never see it again so you need to stock up when you find things you think you might want.  Yesterday there were no eggs.  I can easily get eggs in my neighborhood but I found the lack quite surprising.  They also didn't have the roasted peanuts that are ubiquitous here as a snack.  And they had no Ben and Jerry's vanilla (though they had a bunch of other flavors for $7 + bucks a pop).  I wanted vanilla because my cook made me a delicious apple tart which is actually fine without ice cream but old habits die hard, I guess.  My cook convinced me to buy an ice cream maker which I agreed to do because ice cream is really expensive here (even the less fancy brands) and it's so hot that ice cream just seems like something you must have.  He hasn't used it yet though I guess because I already have a dessert in the house (the tart!).

So one last observation about Lome and maybe this is generally true everywhere but here there is always something not working.  This week my computer didn't work on several days.  When it finally got fixed on Wednesday my office air conditioning was out for 24 hours (it was my first extended experience here without A/C and actually it wasn't so bad since I started the day without it.  I could only open one window though because the ceiling of the balcony outside the other window was being painted and the smell was awful.  I was also a little worried that my lizard friend would get confused and come in the window but that didn't happen).  I was so happy that my A/C got fixed yesterday AND I found out that I could get my car.  I thought everything was finally running smoothly but when I got home with my car I found out that there is a padlock on the gate for the driveway and no one seems to know where the key is so I had to park at the office a few blocks away.  When I got home from the office I discovered that suddenly my TV wasn't working.  Electronic things make me very apprehensive but I pushed every button I could find till I finally got it to work.  Later, when I went to the kitchen to wash my dishes, there was no water (an ongoing problem in this area).  I still have no water today.  I came into the office this morning to find that I had locked the key to the padlock on the outer gate of the office IN the office.  Nice!  I couldn't find anyone to help me so eventually I just took a paperclip to the lock and popped it!  Now I'm going to go home and work on the one that's locking my driveway.  Although I have found people here to be very helpful I'm also becoming a bit more resourceful than I've been before.