Rainy season

It poured rain this morning for about 6 hours - hasn't done that before but rainy season started a few weeks ago and mostly it seems to mean that it's more likely there will be rain (though usually not for very long) and it's noticeable cooler.  My Togolese co-worker recently refered to the weather as being cold and I just stared at her.  I still have worn anything other than short sleeves and I will be surprised if I ever have to here if this is the cooler weather.  But it can be quite pleasant - evenings, in particular, when the sun is down, can be a great time to sit outdoors and have a beer.  This photo is of 4 children walking to church today.  I was coming back from a walk and was nearly home (the man in blue on the right is the guard in front of my door).  Not many people seem to be church goers around here.  I saw large groups of mostly men running when I took my walk this morning before the rain but also saw small family groups dressed up for church.

This photo I took in early February and may have already posted but it fits with the theme of rainy season even though it was actually taken during the dry season as you can see from the brown folliage.  A storm was on the way.  This was in a village about halfway up the country.

This is a particularly cute little restaurant (green on the left) in my neighborhood.  It's just a small freestanding structure (I always wonder about zoning codes in Lome when I see things like this) where someone cooks and serves food.  I like the little half curtain so that the diners have some privacy as they drink their cafe au lait.

This is an amazing outlier of a building near my house.  It's much taller than anything around.  It looks brand new and it's very colorful and, as you can see, it celebrates Obama and even Chicago.  Obama is very popular here - Obama shirts, Obama stores, Obama restaurants.  A few times I've told a Togolese that I'm from America and the next word out of his mouth is Obama.  It makes me wonder what they think he represents or what he is going to do.  Unfortunately our language barrier is too great for a long discussion.

This is a paved road in my neighborhood - not too many of those but this shows actual stores rather than little sidewalk stands which are also very common.  The red store is like a tiny grocery store.  In the green building is a nice little bakery where you can get a baguette for 150 CFA (30 cents).

So why haven't I written is so long?  I don't really know except I haven't had a chance to take many pictures and I don't want to post without them.  I've been pretty busy - a new training group came in a week ago and there was a lot of preparation for that.  The  volunteer group that started in August 2009 is beginning to leave and I have to do all their physical exams - a bit time consuming but now I have the routine of it down pretty well.  I decided to resume my MPH degree program which I was doing on line anyway.  I took a year off when I wasn't sure what my internet would be like in Africa but I've decided I have the time and decent enough service to go back. 

The Peace Corps took back my TV (which was on loan since I arrived) which I had to pay the cable on anyway and I found myself watching a whole lot of junk so now I have a lot more free time which is great so far.  I bought some Seinfeld episodes on DVD at a local tag sale (those happen when expatriates are leaving Lome and they don't want to pack a lot of stuff to take to their next post) so I've been watching those on my laptop (I'm rationing myself).  I've read some great books - I would particularly recommend The House at Sugar Beach by Helene Cooper about growing up privileged in Liberia and then living through the coup in the early 1980's and moving to the US.  I'm still swimming a lot - in fact even more now that I have a car and can get there even if it's going to be dark before I get home. 

I feel pretty comfortable in Lome at this point - it's easy to get around in the car, my French (while deficient) enables me to ask directions and understand the reply, and I really do like my house.  It's comfortable, cool and spacious.  So life is pretty good for me here.  And Patrick (my husband) will be arriving in just a little over 2 weeks so that will be great.

I went to a gathering of Togolese teachers of English this past Friday (I went with a friend who is a trainer of teachers of English as a foreign language) which was really a great experience in that I had the chance to speak at length with local people in English.  It was nice to have the opportunity to talk about things other than Peace Corps work and get the Togolese perspective.  In Togo, English is a required subject in middle school even though there doesn't seem to be much use of it here and I don't get the impression that the Togolese travel much though I guess there is a connection to Ghana.  A fair number of Ghanaians work in Lome and go home every night across the border which is about 1/4 mile away.  And many people here have relatives and other connections with Ghana.