Alia's Peace Corps Adventure to Togo

Updates and end of service

2008-09-05T05:12:00.009-05:00

Hey everyone, hope all is going well back in the US. Considering I haven't updated this thing since May, it is in much need of an update. So here goes...

In early June, I finished the Plan of Action for the village. It took a few more weeks of typing and trying to get the workers to actually finish it but it is finally done and printed. It was a big load off my mind to be finished with that since it had been such an overwhelming process.

Also in early June, the new training group of health volunteers arrived to Togo. The person who replaced me was in that group. I came down to Lome for a party that a bunch of older volunteers threw for them. It was a lot of fun and it was nice to see some fresh faces.

On June 24Th the funding for the health clinic project finally arrived in my bank account. It was down to the wire but it finally came in. THANK YOU SO MUCH TO EVERYONE WHO DONATED!!!! Between that day and July 25Th, all of purchases were made and most of the work was finished. I didn't really understand what it would be like handling a project like that but it turned into me being a contractor. Not exactly what I signed up for when I joined the Peace Corps. I literally had to run around every day to several stores and even go multiple times into Kara to get all of the construction supplies. One cost I did not consider was transport of supplies which ended up being really expensive. It was difficult trying to handle all aspects of the project including the carpenters, the masons, the painters, the plumbers, the water company, the development committee... I did not get much sleep that month. But I am very proud of the work everyone in my village did. I am sure they have never worked so hard in their lives considering I was forcing them to do three months worth of work in two weeks. It was more about efficiency than anything. Togolese are not very good about time management and getting things done quickly. But they did it!

Another thing that was really stressful was having to get all the paperwork done and making sure that all the money being spent was being accounted for. People in my village didn't really understand that concept and the fact that I wasn't going to bed until 11 to 12 at night every night because I was staying up working on paperwork. They had no concept of money management for a large budget project. I could have made sure that someone else in the village understood what I was doing to learn but because I was on such a tight time frame, I just didn't have the energy.

One July 19Th my replacement arrived to post for the week. Her name is Brittany and she is from Texas. She is great. She was really excited to start work and was really happy that I had a lot of work already ready for her to do from day one. I introduced her to everyone in village who I worked with or who I am friends with so she will know people in town. Everyone was excited to meet her but also said to learn that I was leaving soon. On that Friday, all of the new trainees and old volunteers from my region got together and had a party. We had a pig roast. It was really good. And it was nice to meet the new people.

The night after the party, I took the bus down to Lome and that night I flew to Morocco to meet my dad for vacation. I lost my cell phone the night before I left which was annoying. But Morocco was AMAZING!!!! We both arrived at the Casablanca Airport around the same time and went to get our rental car. My dad was nervous about the heat so he wanted to have a car with A/C. But in the end it was so nice to have because we got to see a lot more and I didn't mind have a car all to ourselves. I am used having to share an overloaded car everywhere I go so a car with just to two of use and with A/C was just heaven. So the first daywe drove down to El Jadida. It is a beach town for Moroccans and there were tons of people there. It was a bit strange seeing so many Moroccans walking around in bathing suits and shorts. When I picture a Muslim country I don't think swim wear. But the beach was really nice. There was even a fair with rides and a bandstand with musicians performing. It honestly looked like Coney Island. We were both really tired from the trip so we went to bed early the first night.

The next morning we drove down to Agidir which is like a French resort town. My dad booked us to stay at the Club Med because he felt that I needed to be pampered, which I really did need. Well anyways, it was amazing. Our room literally had rose petals everywhere. Even in the toilet. It was beautiful! When you stay at a Club Med, everything is included, food, drinks, tips everything. There was a huge buffet at every meal full of food I haven't been able to eat for two years. I especially liked the bacon at breakfast and the cheese buffet. It was so yummy. The resort was right on the beach and there was a pool. The whole beach had a wide boardwalk going down the beach so locals and tourist could walk on the beach. While I was there I also got a massage to top it off. It was a little awkward to stay there though because it seemed like all of the other guests had received information before they arrived telling them about all the events going on and the attire they needed to bring. Every night was a different theme and you were supposed to dress according to the color scheme. So one night was black and white night but Pop and I had absolutely nothing of those colors. I mean white is not the color you think to bring when going to Africa. We both stuck out a bit not dressing the way we supposed to. It was nice to here proper french to be spoken instead of 'pied noir'. It was also strange having staff be so helpful and polite. Serving a guest is not one of the high points of Togo. They don't understand than the client is always correct and making a stay as pleasant as possible. Togolese are always right even when they are dead wrong. But Club Med people, perky as hell and always ready to help.

We also went to McDonald's one night that was located on the boardwalk. We both got McFlurrys which were amazing. There were so many locals just hanging out there which was interesting to see. There was also a fair with rides but they weren't running. It was strange to see garbage cans and people cleaning up the streets after being in Togo. There is no such thing concept in Togo. People just throw garbage on the ground and is never cleaned up so there are just piles of garbage everywhere and then people go to bathroom on those piles of garbage. Really gross. So Morocco was a breath of fresh air, literally.

We stayed in Agidir for two nights. We continued on to Marrakesh. That was a long drive. We drove through the mountains which was really pretty. But it was interesting to see that everywhere we went the road was paved and there was electricity everywhere and there were lots of western supplies available in every small town. You have to go all the way to the capital to get anything in Togo. I did keep saying to my dad that I couldn't really understand why Peace Corps was still in Morocco when it is so developed. But then again, we didn't go into the really small towns where I am sure there are still problems. Pop said it was nothing like it was when he was a volunteer there in 1973 to 1976.

So we got to Marrakesh in the afternoon and we checked into the Club Med there. We stayed there because when my dad was a volunteer in Marrakesh, he and his fellow volunteers had always said they wanted to stay there and swim in the pool. He finally got the opportunity 32 years later. It was not as nice as the prior resort but it was still nice. Some how it ended up being the same price to have two rooms instead one so we each had our own rooms. My room was on the top floor of the hotel and looked out over the Ja maal fina, the market place. It was interesting to see how it changes throughout the day as more people arrive and vendors set up. We did a lot of exploring of the medina. It was much cleaner than it had been when I was there in 2001. But more pleasant. Pop went back to his house where he used to live which he was really excited about. He didn't see anyone he used to know but he did go to the bakery where he used to get his bread every day. We did a lot of shopping while we were there. I got some gifts for people and I got a lot of pretty jewelry for myself. I convinced Pop he needed to get some jeans while they were there because they had such a large selection of jeans in his size and the style that he likes that it would be a waste to not get some. So we got him some very nice looking jeans as well as some nice shoes and a pair of purple converse shoes. And all of it was quite cheap. I got henna done on my hand which was really pretty but we got really ripped off when we paid.

One night we went to this restaurant where they films an Alfred Hitchcock film back in the 60s. It was a really fancy restaurant with pretty tiling and cushions. It was a four course meals that was delicious. A band came out later in the evening followed by two belly dancers. Considering I have studied belly dancing, the two women that performed were terrible. The first woman had a tray of candles on her head and was doing a very slight hip movement, nothing a like a hip shake. Then the second woman came out. She was a little bit better. She came around to all of the tables and pulled someone up to dance with her. Considering the restaurant is geared towards tourists, no one could really tell the difference that she wasn't good. So when she got to our table I got up to dance with her. Well she was just not ready for me and I was just dancing up a storm. She pulled me up onto to the raised platform in the middle of the room and danced for everyone to see. She wasn't even trying to dance along with the drummers like I was trying to, she was just moving around. I was really exciting to be dancing again. When the song finished I got down and the waiters and the band complemented me. It was nice. It was a really fun night.

The next day we drove to Fez. We drove through the mountains where there are ski resorts. It as really pretty. We had reserved a room at a riad in Fez, which is an old palace that had been transformed into a bed and breakfast. It was gorgeous. Beautiful tiling and arch ways. It was really nice. I had been sick with a head cold the whole trip so it was nice to relax there. Fez was a lot of fun. We walked a lot through the medina and did more shopping. Again, it was much cleaner than when I was there the last time. One thing was really happy to get was Arabic music to bring home. We stayed there for three days and then drove out to Casa and flew back to Togo.

Pop visited me in Togo for two and a half weeks. While we were in Morocco, 9 bridges in southern Togo feel down due to the excess rain. One was on the main road going north so all transport went to hell. Goods and fuels is very difficult to get north and passenger cars jumped up in price due to the lack of gas up north. We stayed in Lome for a day then went to visit my host family at my training village. It was really good to see my host mom since I hadn't seen her in over a year. She was really excited to meet my dad. He wasn't too keen on the latrine with thousands of bugs that we had to use but I couldn't really do anything about that. While we were there we hiked up to the waterfalls near the village and went to the monastery that is on top of the mountain behind the village. It was really fun. My dad really enjoyed his stay there. While we were there, we did get to watch the opening ceremony's for the Olympics. We were both really happy that we did have to miss them. The day after, we got on the Peace Corps car going north. The road where my host village is located on is the secondary road t get north but was not in a very good state before the bridges went out. So the rain and the poor conditions caused a lot of accidents on the road, making the trip very long. It increased about 4 hours to any trip. We made it up to my village my around 7pm and all of my host family and my counterpart were at my house to welcome him. They even did the ceremony they do when a new person comes to lives in a household and they throw water on their feet in the doorway and say a prayer or something. We sent four days at my post. I took him to the big weekly market on Sunday. We went to visit the Tatas which is a World Heritage Site for the way the tribe constructs their house. We were really close to the border so we jumped over the border and had lunch at this really good restaurant in Benin. The next day we took a ride out to my neighbor Alex's village for lunch. Pop tried Tchouck for the first time. He said he liked it. We hung out a lot with my counterpart, Faustin. My parents had sent over a bag of reading glasses for me to give out because Faustin had asked for a pair. They don't exist in Togo. So he brought a bunch over and he gave them out to people I knew needed them. Everyone was so excited to finally be able to read with ease.

We made the trip back down to Lome again getting stopped on the muddy road because a truck had gotten stuck in the mud. Technically they were not supposed to be driven on that road but they still kept doing it, causing at least one accident a day. Drivers also didn't bother so slow down with all of the pot holes and everything. Logic!

I took Pop to Ghana for five days as well. I wanted him to see the difference between Togo and Ghana, which I see as being very vast. He felt the same way. Ghana is far more developed than Togo. They have electricity just about everywhere we went. There are law for driving that people actually follow. People care about pollution and there is a public works system in place. None of these are common in Togo.

We stay in Elmina which is near Cape Coast. We stayed at this beach resort right on the beach where Will Smith stayed when he visited Ghana during the filming of "Ali". This area has several slave castles. This is where Africans were taken and kept in dungeons until they were placed on boats to the Americas and Europe. We went to two castles. They were both very moving. It was incredible how small the dungeons were and the fact that above both of them, there was a church. We were told that over a million slaves passed through each of the castles during their time of usage.

The next day we went to the Kakum National Park where their is a canopy walk over the rain forest. I was pretty sick that day so I wasn't too excited about it but it was cool. Some of the bridges were pretty high above the ground.

We headed back to Accra the next day just for a stop over and then continued on to Lome the day after. Pop fly out on the 21st at 2am and I headed back to post on the bus.

I was at post for the weekend before my replacement arrived as a real volunteer. She swore-in as a volunteer the night of the 21st. We spent the whole week together. She met more people from village I thought were important for her to know. It was nice to get to know her before I went home. By getting to know her better, I am more certain that she is going to do great in Koka.

The last Saturday before I left, we had the symbolic inauguration for the health clinic. We couldn't have the official inauguration because we have to wait for the Ministry of Health to send a nurse to work there. They just had a test for nurses and they will be sending someone for sure by November or December. But the rest of the staff are all trained to start work. Tons of people from the village came. They even invited the folklore dances and drummers to perform. The new chief and the old chief spoke, as did I. This was the chiefs first official appearance as chief so he made this big speech about all the changes he wants to make in the village. For example he is going to enforce that all children must go to school and if he hears that a husband is hitting his wife, he is going to send the husband to jail. All of the women cheered about that one. We cut a ribbon to make it official then gave a tour of the building. The building looks great with the new paint job and with all of the new furniture inside. I am very proud of it.

I left my village three days later to come down to Lome. I had a lot of sad goodbyes with people I had come to think of has family. I cried a lot when I finally left. My counterparts wife cried literally for a whole day. Many people gave me going away gifts that I didn't even though would ever give me a gift so I was very surprised.

I have been down in the capital now for three days and I fly out tonight at 4am. I official became a Returned Peace Corps Volunteer at 10am. I am all DONE!!! It is so hard to believe that two years have already gone by. When I was a new volunteer, I was so looking forward to having my replacement come a live at my house. That is already in the past and I am going home. It has been a wonderful and challenging adventure but I am so glad I actually did it. I am moving back to Saranac Lake, New York for now and living with my dad while I take pre-req classes for nursing school. I will be applying for schools this fall and hopefully by next fall I will be starting school. I am applying to programs where I can get my bachelor's and master's all together. Three years max. I am concentrating in nurse/midwifery. Very excited about it.

So feel free to call me at my dad's when I get back home later this weekend.

I will post new photos of all my travels once I get home and actually have a good internet connection to use.

Love everyone and hope to see you all again soon!!!

Alia

Lots of projects

2008-05-22T13:05:00.005-05:00

Hey everyone, hope things are going well stateside. I am still over here in Togo for only a few more months. But work at the moment is busy as ever.

A few weeks ago, my village had a large meeting with all of the the important people in village and from the regional capital, to talk about the plan of action for the village. Not everyone came who we invited but a lot did and a lot of ground was covered. Several changes were made to the plan of action that I had typed and hopefully in the coming week or so, it will be complete. This project was started last June so I am really glad it will soon be finished.

Two weeks ago I also made a tour of the seven villages of Koka to tell villagers they need to start putting in their contribution towards the clinic project. The village is required to pay 25% of the total cost of the project. This came out to be around 1,400,000 CFA or $2000. Based on the number of adults living in Koka, the chiefs and I decided that every adult is required to give 500CFA or about $1.25. A reasonable amount. Some people are finding this is a bit much due to the low season for crops and because of the food crisis. But everyone said they would find a way to get the money.

As far as my portion of the project, there is still $1,900 left to fund the project. So PLEASE DONATE!!!! We are almost there!!!!

We started work today on fixing to roof. Cement has been scarce in Togo, so when we found that it was available I fronted the money to get the cement and other supplies needed. The masons finished a portion of the roof today and they will finish the rest on Sunday, as long as it doesn't rain. But until the money comes in, I am quite broke, so again PLEASE HELP ME FINISH THIS PROJECT!!!!!

The website is
https://www.peacecorps.gov/index.cfm?shell=resources.donors.contribute.projDetail&projdesc=693-298

Help the village of Koka, Togo finally have a health clinic. You will be saving lives!!!

Miss everyone back home!!! Email or write soon!!!

Alia

Thoughts on development work...

2008-04-10T12:14:00.002-05:00

I haven't posted in a while so I thought I would talk a little bit about my thoughts on development work here in Togo.

Most Peace Corps volunteers come into their service thinking they are going to make great strides in the development world. But for the most part, at least in Togo that is, most volunteer never do any work that would be considered traditional development work. Sure we do lots of training’s on topics ranging from how to make a natural compost, to why you should wash your hands after going to the bathroom, to how to improve ones small business. But are these ever really making the impact in development that we had hoped for? Probably not. There are the occational volunteers who get things built like school buildings or water pumps or health clincs but there are even more volunteers who do not. Personally, I think I am the exception to this idea. In my village of Koka, there were very few trained development workers. All villages in Togo have a committee called the C.V.D or the community development committee in English. Four years ago, my village separated from its neighbor, Niamtougou. It was consider one of the ‘suburbs’ of the larger town. Because of this separation, very few trained development workers were left after the separation. Since that day, it has caused many problems within the village. A make-shift committee was thrown together out of necessity but no one is really qualified for the job. The certain members of the board are have caused me much stress and annoyance due to their need to be the head of everything, even when not warranted. This has also caused clashes with other members of the committee to the point where meetings have not been held in a month because of their inability to get along. As of this week however, the specific members has been asked to leave and he is making a lot of noise against it, but really has no say in the matter.

As one of my goals in my service, I wanted to be able to leave my village knowing that a properly trained and qualified development committee was put in place and trained. So for the past few weeks I have been working with an individual from my village but who lives in Kara, who is going to do the training for free because he too wants to see his village develop. With all hopes this will make great improvements in the development of the village of Koka.

As volunteers we are not given money directly to do projects in our village. We can write grants to several funding sources through the Peace Corps network. There are a few places in Togo where a village can also go in search of financing. One of these is called PLAN. This is a branch of UNDP here in Togo. They receive their funding through the UN. Last year I spoke to the director in Kara about what I can do in order to get water pumps built in my village. He told me there were several places that I could go to get pumps built. My village simply had to make an official request in writing and in person with important people from the village like the Chief and the president of the C.V.D. We also had to give a copy of the villages Plan of Action. He told me that probably someone in my village had a copy of it lying around and I could just make a copy. Well it turns out that because of the village separation, Koka did not have a Plan of Action. So I went to a friend of mine that own a development NGO to ask if he could help me out and get one written up quickly. Well, it is now almost a year later and I am still working on getting this document written. It’s a lot longer process than I had originally thought. It took several months of getting people finally to agree to do the job without the big bucks they usually get when foreign NGO fund the project. (They wanted to be paid on an American scale and get almost $3000 out of me, assuming I was the one personally paying. It is generally assumed that because we are white, we are therefore loaded). So after many tearful breakdowns in front of my homologue, they agreed to do it for a very small cost. It took about 3 months to do the meetings with all of the villagers to get information on the issues in the village and how they foresee going about improving them. That has been finished since around the beginning of February. Since then, I have been given the unlucky task of typing the whole damn document because I type faster than anyone else working on the project. They are still at the hunt-and-peck stages of typing abilities. At first I didn’t mind it that much but I really didn’t think I would be spending so much of my time in Peace Corps, sitting behind a computer, pretty much being a secretary. But we hopefully will be done with the document by next week and can then send it off to all of the places it needs to go to.

A colleague of mine recently went back to PLAN to talk to the same director I had spoken to a year prior. She is doing a similar project, but has had some up hiccup[s in the process. The director told her that the format of the program was changing in the near future. They were going to have teams move into different villages for about 5 years at a time and remodel the village in a sense. They are going to bring in tons money on various issues in the village. This includes even bringing in electricity to villages that would cost tens of thousands of dollars to electrify. I checked on getting it connected in my village at it was $40,000 just to extend the line, not including the cost to individual families to equipped their houses with sockets and light fixtures and such. Very much out of my price range, but I guess PLAN is going to be able to try and do it.

Part of me thinks this is a great idea and makes me really want them to come to Koka. But the other part of me thinks this is the worst idea for development. Where is the sustainability? Where is the involvement of the community in the development of the village? Many people in my village like in many others, think that some foreigner is always going to sweep in a save them with gifts and money. That’s was what their colonial powers did years ago, it surely will happen again. But this practice has made the Togolese lazy and not motivated to do things for themselves. The concept of pulling oneself up from their bootstraps doesn’t really correlate here. I think that having organizations like PLAN or other development groups come in a ‘’save the day’’ reinforces this terrible idea. For my clinic project, it is required that the village pays 25% of the total cost of the project. This is to enhance one the idea of sustainability and two the idea that they (the people of Koka) had a hand in opening the clinic. They will be more likely to respect the clinic and be proud of it existence. I hope my village will learn from this practice to know that they can do things on their own.

Back in the swing of things

2008-02-06T03:44:00.000-05:00

Hey everyone,

Its been a few weeks since I last posted so I thought I would get on that.

I am back in Togo now. After a wonderful almost 4 week stay in the US, visiting my parents on both coasts and some friends, I flew back to Togo on January 9th. I was happy to be coming back because I thought I had all of this work to do. Well really, I don’t. I have been doing very little technical work since I got back. My village is still in the holiday mode since they have national holidays up until now. So no one has buckled down and gotten back to work yet. But things are picking up in the next few weeks. I am mostly playing the waiting game on getting the funding for my clinic project. Then I will have lots of work to be do. So PLEASE DONATE!!! Info in previous post.

My host family and my friends in village were very excited to see me when I got back. They all said I had a glow and that it looked like I had a really good vacation. It was much needed. Everyone really liked the small gifts that I got them. My real mom got my host mom a nice top and when my host mom tried it on she was like, "it’s like she has met me and could see me wearing this." She is so cute.

My family did keep my house well guarded while I was gone. No break ins! Just a lot of dust and bugs. It took a few days to finally clean everything of the layer of dust that covered everything. Harmatton started while I was away, which is the season where strong winds blow down from the Sahara, bringing cooler air but lots of dust. It has been in the 60s most morning with really gusty winds all morning long. It makes it hard to shower in the morning in my outdoor shower since it is so cold and then the wind just makes it that much more intolerable. But at least I have not sweating buckets like the rest of the year. The dust, however, makes everyone sick with sinus problems. Last year I had a really bad sinus infection but this year I have been taking good care of my nose so (knock-on-wood) I have been healthy. In the past week, it has started getting warmer. I am not ready for it to be hot season. And people have been saying that it is going to be hotter than last year. So maybe the 145 degrees is in my future. Oh Boy!

Well that is it for now. Please donate to my project!!!

Hope everyone is going well at home and is enjoying the cold weather! Send some of it my way!

Write or email soon!
Love Always, Alia

Holidays in the states

2008-01-03T15:01:00.000-05:00

Hey everyone. Sorry it has been so long since my last post. Things have been pretty crazy. I hope everyone had a very happy holiday season!!

I flew back to the states on the 17th. I was so excited to be coming home. I was one the same flight as my friend Kate. We had both been counting down the days and then the minutes until we arriving home. Kate had some problems with her ticket and it took a while to get her on the flight but she made it with time to spare.

I flew into JFK and my old college roommate Jenna was picking me up at the airport. It was freezing cold for me with only a fleece on. She was running a bit late and I didn't really know where I was supposed to be meeting here so I was running around trying to find a pay phone to call her. But none of the pay phones were working. So with all of my fatigue and coldness, I started crying. But I ended up finding her and everything was fine.

We then drove up to New Paltz where she lives and I went to college for the night. We went to eat at this restaurant where I used to eat a lot. I got spinach/artichoke dip and New England Clam chowder. It was SOOOOO good! Then we went back to her house and we crashed. I was so tired from the jet lag. The nest morning, she had to go to work so I drove around New Paltz. Got a yummy Dunkin Donuts coffee and bagel. Then I got a much needed haircut. It might have been more than I wanted to pay, but my hair was a mess and really needed it ASAP.

My dad picked me up in New Paltz a bit later and we drove up to Saranac Lake. He got a new Hybrid car which was really nice. We got home pretty late and we had dinner and went to bed. I was a bit sad because my dog didn't remember who I was.

During the week I was crazy busy. I went to the Cottage where I used to work to say Hi to people. I spoke at the high school for some global classes. We went skiing at Whiteface one day with my brother and dad. It was nice but I was still a bit jet lagged and my stomach was still upset from adjusting to the food so I wasn't in the best of shape. But of the skiing that I did do, it was really nice. Pop and I went up to Montreal one day to get some french books that I am bringing back to Togo as gifts for friends. It was nice to get to speak french with my dad but the french up there was so different and fast, I had a very hard time understanding what anyone was saying. I like my slow African french.

I flew out to Tahoe on Christmas day. Mom and her boyfriend Neal picked me at the airport and we went to this nice buffet dinner at one of the casinos in Reno. It was really good food and lots of desserts. Food I hadn't been able to eat in months. Then we drove up to where they live in Lake Tahoe. It is not on the lake but it is still nice. We did a lot of shopping during the week. My mom ski pass didn't work during the holiday period so we didn't ski until after New Years. They had a party at the house while I was here. I met all of her friends from the area. They have some pretty big name friends up here, so that was interesting.

We have been skiing the past two days. It was pretty cold for me but it was really pretty. We had a friend of my mom's skiing with us yesterday and she took a really bad fall around mid morning and had to be taken down on a sled with ski patrol. We drove her to the chiropractor where she found out only her neck was out and after it was adjusted she was doing 100% better. But since we had to leave early due to her injury, I got a free ticket for today to make up for the time I lost the first day. So we went skiing today and we had the first tracks. It was really windy so we left around 10am. There is a really big snow storm, or blizzard as the TV is saying, coming in tonight. I was hoping to switch my flight to tonight instead of Friday night but I don't think that is going to happen.

So we are just waiting out the storm until we have to drive down the mountain to the airport. I am staying with friends from college in New York City for a few days until I fly home. I haven't seen then yet since I got back so I am really excited to see them and I hope I don't get snowed in. I am keeping my fingers crossed.

I posted a lot of new pictures so check those out too!!

On the road again

2007-11-11T12:57:00.000-05:00

Hello everyone! Hope everything is going well for everyone back home. Things are going well here. I just got back from a week-long bike ride across part of my region of Kara. It was called AIDS RIDE and each region of Togo puts on a separate ride each fall. We stopped at 22 different villages and in each we put on AIDS education programs to groups ranging from 100 to 2000. There were 8 Peace Corps volunteers that went as well as 4 Togolese counterparts. My counterpart, Boudema came with us. During each of the programs we would perform some of several skits about HIV transmission, prevention, stigmatization, and a typical story about a Togolese girl who become infected with HIV. We changed each program based on their amount of French and knowledge level. If a village didn’t speak much French we had some non verbal games to play that got the same message as the sketches in French. We would also demonstrate proper condom usage and disposal. This always got lots of laughs and some crude comments from the men in the audience. I didn’t like doing these demonstrations very much. We would finish each session with a question and answer period. We got some really weird questions during the week. One man asked if you have sex with a young girl, is it turn you can’t get infected with HIV. A student asked if you could use a plastic bag instead of a condom as protection. Lot of people asked what the origin of AIDS was and why we didn’t just bring the cure for AIDS with us to give them. But all we could do was provide information and some people got free condoms.
We started out in a village called Guerin Kouka on the western side of Togo. From there we looped north and east and finished in Kanté. Each day we biked between 25 and 35km a day. This was far more than I had ever done before. I was a bit nervous about it before I left but I was determined to be able to finish it all. But in case I wasn’t, there was a chase car that followed us the entire time and brought along our supplies. That made it a lot easier because we didn’t need to carry all the stuff we needed for the week on our bikes. The route for the most parts was not too bad of a ride. Lots of it was pretty flat and some ups and downs. On the first and second days though, we had quite a few adventures. At one point we had to go down this very washed out steep hill and then land n a narrow bridge that crossed the Kara River. There was a also a guy on a bike who kept trying to talk to me, telling me I should give him money to fix the road. I was nervous about falling in that water and just wanted him to shut up. Then later that day, there was one point in the road that was totally covered with a foot of water. It was thought it would be dry already after rainy season, but it was still there and about 30 yards to get across. I don’t know what kind of creatures or feces were in that water, but I just kept on peddling and made it across without falling. That night we stayed at chief’s house of the village we did a program in. It ended up being two quiet small rooms with several large bags full of corn or millet. These tend to be home to tons of mice and rats and bugs. So, for the most part, none of us got much sleep that night. There were four girls who just swore-in in August with us who I don’t think had quite gotten used to the bush life of Togo and were not too thrilled with the accommodations. They screamed quite a bit and eventually moved outside and slept on a bench. I was fine since I brought my bug net and Tylenol PM with me. It wasn’t the most comfortable floor but it was fine.
The programs we did that day were pretty good. The first one was at an elementary school so most of the audience did not speak French, so everything had to be translated into local language. We were also still nervous about our skits and what we should talk about. The second village was at a middle school. By that level students tend to be pretty fluent in French so it went much better. There were about 300 people from the schools and the village in attendance. They asked a lot questions and it went really well. The third program was with a bunch of older men and women. Not many spoke French but there was a woman there who was trained by an NGO somewhere to be a HIV peer educator so she was able to ad lib a lot of the information because we knew what we were talking about.
The next morning we started off early at 7. Right away we came to another river. This time there was no bridge so we had to walk through the river. Not as gross as the first one, thankfully. The road the rest of that day was rather washed out but it made for an exciting off-roading type experience. We stopped for lunch in one of the only villages on the route that had electricity so we enjoyed some ice cold beverages. Truly hit the spot! That night we stayed in the most in the bush villages I have yet been to in Togo. First they forgot we were coming to stay the night so the chief didn’t really know where we were going to be sleeping. It also took about an hour for them to decide which person’s wife was allowed to cook for us. We ended up staying at the chief’s house. He had tons of kids around. I counted around 20. And because he was probably the richest person in the village he had tons of animals running around, pooping everywhere. Pigs, ducks, chickens, goats, sheep, turkeys, dogs…. Lots. Same as the night before, we were given a small room to sleep in with several bags of corn. So the room smelled like mouse. I slept inside under my bug net and I was fine but everyone else slept outside. I was fine except for the few minutes in the early morning when a rat started screaming. The next morning I was very eager to get out of there. They were just a little too villageois for me. If anything they really need a volunteer to be posted there because they didn’t even think that bugs could possibly bit a person when you were inside a house, even when the windows and doors were open.
The first program was at a small elementary school. Very few people there spoke French but they were still very interested in the information. They thought that the condom demonstrations were the funniest thing. Wooden penises can be funny I guess. I don’t think that any of the kids really understood what we were talking about. The second program was at another elementary school about 20km down the road. There were also a lot of towns people that came. About 300 people crammed into a small school room for the program. We did the usual activities and then questions and answer. There was one little boy who was sitting in the front row who looked about 9 years old who knew the answer to just about every question we asked. It was amazing. He also spoke beautiful French. For as in the bush we were, that is a very uncommon thing to find, especially with such a young child. We gave him some free pens at the end for giving so many answers. From there we went into the larger town that had electricity for lunch. I rested for a little while before our next program by climbing up into a tree with the rest of my group. The Togolese kids that came to look at us thought we were the weirdest thing. After lunch, we did a program at a large middle school. There were about 500 people there for the presentation. It went really well. It was all in French and people asked lots of questions. That was the program where a guy asked if you could sleep with a young girl and not get HIV. Other than that it went really well.
Third day was quite a challenge because a lot of the roads were really gravelly making it difficult to bike; also the fact that my body was starting to get really tired and from sleeping on the floor for two nights. That night we stayed at an elementary school. I much preferred this because we could spread out a lot and it was not hot to sleep inside. The only problem was that the house that we were supposed to go to for showering had a really gross shower. It was just a grass hut with mud and rocks on the floor. It was also used as a bathroom so there was poop all over the floor. Even the Togolese people wouldn’t use it so that says how gross it was. So, we just set up a makeshift shower stall behind the school using our sleeping mats, and then after it got dark just showered without them. It worked fine.
Our first program was about 15km away from where we spent the night. We had run out of breakfast food by that point so we had to bike for a bit on an empty stomach. The ride to the village was really long and up hill for a lot of it. I was so tired by the time I got the site. We did the program at a mixed school so there were young and older kids. They thought that our skits were really funny. Togolese people LOVE skits. One of our homologues was really good at improving and made everything so funny. I got quite a few gross comments from men at that site. We stayed for lunch at the chief’s house and rested afterwards. I was finally able to wash my pants which I had been wearing for 3 days. They were gross. But they made us really yummy guinea foul that was really huge, nothing like I had ever seen in Togo. After lunch we biked on to a village 2km past. The chief had forgotten to announce the program and wasn’t even in village so we just went to the march and called people over. There were only around 50 people that came but they were really interested in the information. They were some gross guys there though who were being obnoxious. At the end of most programs we hand out condoms but in this village we had a huge problem. We ended up getting bum rushed for the condoms and even after we ran out, but no one believed us. We ended up having to leave that village in a rush because they wouldn’t leave us alone and were getting angry. It was sad that it happened. The ride to the next village was really hard. I almost got in the car at that point. It was all gravelly and soft. I really wanted to collapse once I finally arrived.
The fourth day we only had one program in the morning and then biked to Kanté. The first program was in this really small village that had never really heard of HIV. There were a lot of little kids and some adults. We were all exhausted and didn’t really put a lot of energy into the program but the people seemed to like it. The bike part was really hilly and we were all exhausted. I had to get off and walk up this one big hill, but it was the only time I had to walk. At the top of the hill the driver of the car saw me breathing really hard and asked if I wanted to just get in the car the rest of the way. I told him no, that I was going to finish the rest of it on my own even if I had to go really slowly. But I ended up making it the whole way to Kanté on my bike. When we got there, I showered off at the volunteer’s house who is posted there and got lunch. That afternoon there was a large program being put on by that volunteer in conjunction with an AIDS association that he works with. We thought that we were going to have more involvement in the program there but it ended up being pretty much all about the association. That was a bit annoying because we had put a lot of work in and people kept talking about AIDS Ride but it totally got overlooked. We were able to perform on skit but they didn’t give us time to do the question and answer afterwards to the skit didn’t really make much sense.
On the fifth day we only had one program in the morning. My village was not informed about a schedule change so only about 100 elementary school kids came. But we played some HIV education games with them. They had fun and hopefully got something out of it.
I am really glad that the I participated in the event but I do not want to do it again next year if I am still here.

Other than that some other stuff happened before going on AIDS Ride. I was in Kara the 2 weeks ago for the weekend and when I came back I found that my house had been broken into. The person had broken into my roof which is made of thatch and made quite a bit of a mess. He stole my DVD player, my shower soap, a calculator, my alarm clock, and this sunburn cream. He had had also found my lock box where I keep my money and passport, and had pried it open. But I didn’t have any money in it so they didn’t take anything luckily. They also ripped the screen to my window. However, after talking with my brothers and with the police my suspicions became true. My gardener who I had learned to trust, had broken in. We all went to his house and searched his room and found my soap, so the rest we told him just to give back. I got back but two DVDs that I had borrowed from a friend, which I feel bad about. Also, the week before, he asked me for a loan so he could start an apprenticeship. Turns out that he stole the money and bought drinks with his friends and had no plans to pay me back. He had to go to jail for two days and now has to do manual labor, filling in all of the roads around the village where the rain washed then out. He not longer works for me and really lost out on a good thing. Sucks for him. I am fine now and I am getting my roof fixed to be more permanent. So no worries.
Also that week, my host sister found out if she would be able to go back to school. She transferred from another reason and because last so many students failed the 3rd level and stayed back, there was not enough space for her. She the director of the school did a test for the last remain 6 spaces in the class. He ended up taking 12 instead and left out 4. She was one of them. She was really devastated. 3rd level is the last class before you can go to high school. Although she wasn’t the greatest student in every subject, she is a really good kid and wanted to keep going. The night after she got the results she took so medicine to kid herself and left a note saying if she couldn’t go back to school, she would rather be dead. She didn't die, it just gave her a bad stomach ache. She was in the hospital for a few days but she is doing fine now. My host brothers ended up getting her a place in another middle school in Niamtougou but it is a 30 minute walk each way so she is not too thrilled since she doesn’t have a bike. This event just proved the point of how hard life for girls here is. Not only do they have to do work at home for the family, they also have to struggle with school. They are seldom given the opportunity to solely concentrate on their school work. Boys are allowed to pay sports and work, while girls have to help with cooking and cleaning and the school work is always secondary. Very sad to have to deal with.

But tomorrow, today I am leaving for my very first vacation since arriving to Togo. I am going to Ghana with some of my girl friends here. I am going to eat nachos and sushi, go the beach and just relax. CAN’T WAIT!!!!!

That is all for now. Please write or email again soon!!!

Love and miss you tons

Alia

2007-11-03T10:48:00.000-05:00

Hey everyone, I hope everyone is doing well back is the states or wherever you might be in the world. Below, I have attached information about a project I have been working on for some time. If you could just take a minute to read it over and possibly give a donation, that would be great. Feel free to email me if you would like further information or have any questions about the project. Thanks!!!

Koka, Togo
Community Health Clinic
Restoration and Materials
Alia Rezek, Peace Corps Volunteer

Koka, located in the Kara Region, is in Northeastern Togo. It is comprised of seven smaller villages and is residence to approximately 4000 people. Men, women and children live in cluster housing with extended family and friends. These houses are often constructed out of mud or cement bricks and are covered with thatch or tin roofing. The Nawda culture, known to westerners as Losso, is the predominant cultural group living in Koka. Nawdm is the indigenous language spoken here; however, many speak French, the official language of Togo. Koka follows the norms of Togo with approximately 35% of its population living under the poverty line. Three of the seven villages of Koka have electricity access. Water is supplied through wells and some pumps, but also through rain collection during rainy season.
Three years ago, Koka separated itself from the neighboring town of Niamtougou. Niamtougou, a large commerce center for the Kara region, brings in many visitors to its large weekly market, its various non-governmental organizations and traditional cloth production organization, CODHANI. However, the separation also left the village of Koka at a bit at a standstill. All knowledgeable governing officials remained in Niamtougou, leaving Koka very inexperienced. The village is presently in the process of developing its own resources and become the prosperous village they wanted to be when it separated from Niamtougou. New chiefs and development workers are being trained and are working together on various projects such as this one, opening a health clinic.
In the mid nineties, the community of Koka recognized there was a need for a local health clinic for residents to seek treatment for minor injuries, illnesses and maternity care. For a village the size and population of Koka, lacking of a basic medical care facility in a reasonable distance proves the villages’ pressing need. There are two neighboring hospitals in Niamtougou (3km from center of Koka) and Baga (4km from center of Koka). However, the community of Koka spreads out approximately 5 to 10km in diameter. For those living in the far reaches of Koka, one would have to walk upwards of 15km to seek medical care. This distance often discourages people from seeking medical care that most would consider necessary. This then often leads to further infection and problems, even death. Some of the common diseases that affect the population of Koka included Malaria, Hepatitis A and Typhoid Fever.
Individuals also turn to traditional means which are not always effective and often more expensive than proven western medicines. Women go months without seeking prenatal care or give birth at home, due to the long distances they would have to walk and the time they would waste to get to the hospital.
Community leaders such as development workers, chiefs and notable residents formed committees to search for partners to help finance the construction of a health clinic. They were able to find a family originally from Koka, living in Lomé, willing to donate the money necessary for the construction and to purchase some of the clinic supplies.
In 2000, construction started on the building, which would later be the clinic. With much community contributions and aid from community members living elsewhere, the building was quickly constructed. Community members with the skills donated their services. Skilled laborers of Koka, including carpenters and masons donated all of the labor in the construction. Women helped dig when needed and by carrying in water and sand every day to the site. In addition, many supplies were purchased or constructed such as hospital beds, scales and some other medical equipment.
The community also formed a committee, which would eventually be responsible for the management of the clinic once opened. COGES (Management Committee for Health) is comprised of a diverse group of responsible and respected individuals from the community. This includes a retired state nurse, the former regional chief, the chief of women, and several members from the community development committees who were deemed able to serve on this committee. They are capable of developing a monthly budget, purchasing necessary refills of pharmaceutical supplies, paying for the upkeep and repairs of the clinic and equipment.
The community selected three individuals’ capable and interested individuals in working at the clinic. A birth attendant, a nurse’s aid and a pharmacist were trained at the Niamtougou Hospital to work at the clinic and assist the nurse assigned by the Togolese government. This training was free of charge because of the availability of a government sponsored training program at the hospital. The pharmacist will work with COGES to maintain the budget and make monthly purchases. The community is willing to pay or seek funding to have the three receive a refresher course prior to starting work. The government-training program is no longer in existence at the hospital.
After the construction was completed in 2002, the partner in Lomé was unable to continue his financial assistance. The community did not know where to seek further funding, thus abandoning the building and the project until my arrival in December 2006. This was due in large part because of the lack of knowledge and experience on the part of the community leaders who took over leadership three years ago when Koka became an independent village. However, there are presently many very motivated community members assisting in continuing the process.
In order to maintain long-term sustainability, the community of Koka understands they must provide at least 25% of the total cost to complete the project. Community members will be more likely to use and respect the clinic when they know they had a hand in the completion of the project. Their contribution will be made in the form of financial contributions by all community members as well as manual assistance. Working with each village development committee and chiefs, each village will be responsible for collecting at least 150 mille (approx. $400). Their portion of the total cost to open the clinic will be used to purchase medical supplies and materials and the cost for the construction of several pieces of furniture. Their willingness to see this project completed is evident in the original construction of the clinic and through their ability to collect money for other projects in the community. There is a great desire amongst all of the people of Koka to be able to improve the health and quality of life for all its residents.
Local supplies such as dirt and water will be used in the repair process. A water and septic system will be completed in the already constructed clinic. For patients and families using the clinic, a latrine will be constructed to insure hygienic practices and promoting a positive environmental impact. The latrine we will be installing is a new model being used in Togo and worldwide. It is far more environmentally friendly than the more widely used model. No waste will be able to leak in to the ground, contaminating neighboring water or land. Waste will be made into a compost-like product after being heated in the holding chamber for about a year and can then be used as a natural and safe fertilizer. I will be constructing this model as an example for my village to in the future, build more environmentally friendly latrines.

IV. Budget

Peace Corps Partnership Contribution
Quantity CFA Cost/Unit CFA Total Cost Total Dollars
Water installation 2918.740 $6,304.86
Repairs to building 357.500 $772.44
Painting of building 301.650 $651.78
Latrine construction 1 82.550 82.550 $178.09
Mattresses 4 26.000 104.000 $224.72
Bench 6 10.800 64.800 $140.01
Lab Table 2 12.000 24.000 $51.80 ______________________________________________________________________________
TOTAL 3,853.240 $8,273.27

Community Contribution
Quantity CFA Cost/Unit CFA Total Cost Total Dollars
Pharmaceutical Materials 848.800 $1,834.31
Medicines 348.035 $753.63
Furniture
- Small Table 3 9.000 27.000 $58.34
- Large Table 1 20.000 20.000 $43.20
- Chairs 8 3.500 28.000 $60.48
- Hanger for baby scale 1 13.000 13.000 $28.07
- Adult Height Measurer 1 13.000 13.000 $28.07
- Baby Height Measurer 1 11.000 11.000 $23.75
_________________________________________________________________________________
TOTAL 1,308.035 $2,833.91

Summary Total Cost CFA Cost Dollars Percentage of Total
Peace Corps Partnership Contribution 3,829.240 $8,273.27 74.7%
Community Contribution 1,308.035 $2,833.91 25.3%
TOTAL 5,161.275 $11,107.18 100%

Statement of Project Funding Purpose
The community is fully aware that under no circumstance can changes be made in the budget given below after its submission. They are aware the money requested will not be coming from Peace Corps itself but is in cooperation between the village of the Koka and individual donors in the United States. They also understand financing will only be given one time, regardless of the outcome of project. The community OF Koka is extremely appreciative OF the help from donors and are aware that proposal acceptance, circulation to potential sponsors and funding is at the discretion of the Peace Corps Country Director and all other committee members involved.

If you are interested in making a donation to this project, please go to http://www.peacecorps.gov/. Click on the link Donate now, then contribute now. Once there, go to the list at the bottom and click on Africa. All projects with Peace Corps Partnership are listed here. Search through the list until you find project for Togo and then my name. It may take some time for Peace Corps to put my project on the website so please be patient and check regularly. You can also e-mail me at musicaldiva00@yahoo.com if you have any questions and/or comments (please give me a couple of days or weeks to respond to you, as the Internet is not always easily accessible). I am grateful for your taking the time to read this and I hope it finds you happy and healthy.

Hiding away at post

2007-10-25T10:45:00.000-05:00

After three weeks being away at post, I have finally been able to get out to Kara. Even though they told me that high speed internet was coming to Niamtougou, it doesn’t work at all, so I have been deprived of the internet for a while. But things are going well. The legislative elections took place on October 14th. The two weeks before that were the campaign weeks. This was the least enjoyable part of it all. There were around 6 parties running for two positions per region. In order to get their name out, each party rented 15- seater vans, large speakers and a generator. The speakers and generator were attached to the roof of the vans and then supporters of the party would pile into and onto the van. Then they would drive around my village and Niamtougou for hours and hours, blaring Togolese music. Some days the opposing parties would meet at the dirt road intersection right outside my bedroom, and have a battle as to who could play music the loudest or honk. It was thoroughly annoying. They even would drive around at night, which drove me crazy. When it got closer to the elections, they decided to stay put for a while, so they took up residence at the market that is 300 yards from my house. They continued with the loud Togolese music, even when no one was there to listen.
Happily, they did promotion on their views and stanch on issues at the community center in Niamtougou. I thought at first that they would only be riding around in vans, hoping people would vote for them based on the music they played or something. Every night for a week, a different party came together with all their supporters. I avoided these meetings. Too many people around, made me nervous. Of course the majority party did everything bigger than any of the other parties but they had a lot more money to work with.
One of my counterparts was running for a position. He didn’t end up winning. I couldn’t outwardly support anyone because of security issues with Peace Corps. It was hard to avoid people that I knew from village who wanted me to support their party. So I ended up just staying at my house for most of the time. But everything went well as far as I know and the elections were successful. Most of the positions were won by the majority party but there were quite a few individuals from the opposition party also won their regional election. As far as I could see, everything went democratically, at least in my region. I listened a lot to the BBC to see what was happening. The EU electoral observers were impressed by the success of the elections. Hopefully that means that in the near future aid will return to Togo. At the moment there is very little aid from the developed world.
It was interesting to watch people I have known for a year, suddenly change their personality because they were supporting a certain party. People I had worked with together separated completely from what I thought were their friends simply because of who they supported. My counterpart, who was running, was getting death threats from people supporting another party, people who a week prior might have been drinking with him at the tchouck stand. This was another reason I stayed at my house so much. I didn’t want to witness these changes in people I had grown to like. But things have calmed down since the 14th and people are starting to get back to normal. I couldn’t do much work during those three weeks because everyone was occupied with the election.
Of the work I did do, it just made me stressed. I still have not finished my project to get a plan of action written for the canton. I started working on this back in July. I approached a friend who works for an NGO that works for development. He said he could help me write it and it would only cost a little bit of money to do and would only take four days. Well, that was four months ago. We started the first two phases of the project, then when I went out of town for a week, they stopped working, saying something else came up. So, the project sat until mid-September. My village needed to have handed this document into a development agency back in June. So we are way behind schedule.
Last week, I met with my friend and his colleague who had worked on the first two phases of the project. Members of the village development committee came to meet with them to sign the contract on payment for work. Turns out, my friend and his colleague couldn’t do the project anymore, at least not right away. I had made a new calendar with them present, so they plenty of time to say they weren’t available. They said some other project came up that would take all of the November and December to do. My project would have finish mid-November, if all went well. I got so mad when they said that. It was their fault that they couldn’t finish the plan of action back in August, and now they were saying that some other project came up. I know that this other project is funded up some external NGO and is going to pay them far more money than my village would ever be able to pay. That is the sole reason they dropped the project for my village. It makes me so mad that this is how development works here. If you can’t hand over the money, you get treated like sh*t. My village is really motivated and eager to develop. They just don’t have money to pay the big bucks like NGOs pay. I really hope that if/when EU restarts aid to Togo, that money is not handled in this fashion. With that, the people and villages that really need the money receive aid, not simply money going into the pockets of development workers. They are already some of the riches people in Togo. They know how to work the ‘system’. Saying they can’t do a project unless you pay an excessive amount of money is ridiculous. They are no where close to being hard pressed for money. I wonder how they can live next to people that are living on less than a dollar a day, barely able to feed their children. IT MAKES ME SO MAD!!!!!!!!!!!

Aside from that, I had a very relaxing three weeks at post. I cooked a lot, read several books, listened to the BBC, a lot and played with my kitten. But I all glad that work is picking up again starting tomorrow. I am doing a training tomorrow with a group of women on how to many enriched porridge for their children. Later in the week, I am helping my neighbor volunteer with one of her women’s groups, training them on family planning. I hope some husbands come to that as well, because they are a big part of the problem as well. School also restarted last week so I will start working again at the school I worked at last year. I am planning a Worlds AIDS day event right now. In two weeks, I am leaving village for a week to do this Peace Corps event called AIDS Ride. Volunteers and some counterparts, bike around their region going to villages that are less likely to receive information about HIV. This will go on for a week, biking at least 30km a day. I hope I can do it. But if not there is a truck that follows us and we can ride if we need to. I have been training a bit so I think I should be fine. I biked 32km in the past two days and I was fine. That is, aside from the lightning that almost hit me.

Alright well, I will let you go for now. I hope everyone is going well at home. The emails and letters have been pretty quiet lately so, please write!!!!

Love always,

Alia

One year down and 15 months to go...

2007-09-27T07:32:00.000-05:00

Well I have officially made it to my one year point!!!!!!!!!!! Saturday marked one year since I arrived on Togo soil. This year has really gone by in a blur. So many things have gone on this year, most of them marked by some sort of illness. Less than 15 months left to go!

I am down in the capital as of right now. Yet again another sickness. This time it was only an allergic reaction and some bad headaches. But I am now on some good meds and the headaches will hopefully be resolved after some dentist visit back in the states.

So two weeks ago I went to this Togolese national party called Igname Fete. This is a party to celebrate this years yam harvest. This year it took place in a village called Guerin Kouka. It is a small town in the Kara region, about 40km from the Ghanaian border. There were so many people there. I would say around 10,000 people. Tons!! Many more than I think the town was about to accommodate. All of the bars would packed every night, running out of cold drinks. But I had an interesting weekend.

About 20 other volunteers met up there. Nine of us from Kara all shared a car in. The road to get there is really bad. Really bumpy, many wash outs from the rain and poor car quality as well. It was a very pleasant trip… But we finally got there Friday night. I stayed with my friend Meghan who is posted there. Her house is very out of the way, very private. It was nice to see other volunteers living situations. She by far, has the nicest latrine I have seen of any volunteer I have visited. I am very jealous of it actually.

Anyways, Saturday was the actual fete. The president was supposed to arrive mid morning. So we waited around for the morning. It started down pouring around nine so we had to wait that out until we could walk to where the dance was taking place. We got the dance when it was almost finished. We thought that they might have waited a little bit of time for people to show up after the rain stopped, but no. They started right away and many people missed the dance. However, we being white decided that we were not going to wait behind the huge crowd of people standing in the way of seeing. So we pushed our way though the crowds, being led by one of the volunteers from the region leading, and made our way to the front. We were not at risk of being whipped like all of the Togolese who were pushing their way forward. No one would think of doing that to us. We just walked right across the field and stood in open area next to the president’s tent. We could see him sitting there will all of us entourage. The dancing was still going on. They were performing the traditional dance for the Guerin Kouka area, so I was told. There were about 100 med dressed in their traditional costumes and women in pretty payne outfits. All of the drummers were standing in the middle near the yam shrine. It was really cool. Then there was this weird elephant thing that walked across. It was just a person in an elephant outfit with stilts as his front legs. It did not really understand what that was about. Shortly there after, the president left with all of his people. He flew off in his personal helicopter. Always in his over-the-top style.

I ended up heading back to Kara that night. I was pretty much done with all the crowds of people around. It needed the calm of Kara. But all in all, it was fun. I got to see a new area of Togo.
Over the weekend, I also found out some interesting news. Because of the upcoming legislative elections in October, the government decided to move back the start of the school year for a month. School was supposed to start September 17 but now it is not starting until October 17. I was a little pissed about that. I was so looking forward to having a schedule and having everyone I work with on a schedule. It makes work in village so much easier when I know they are going to be free to do work. I was going to start a Girls club at the CEG and continue with the Peer Educator group I worked with last year. But I guess that will all just have to wait until after the elections.

Speaking of the elections, it has brought in so many foreign NGOs and groups into Togo. Every time in Kara, I always see tons of white people around. It is normal to see some French and Germans around every so often but now there are tons. There are UN cars and European Community cars driving all over. Someone even heard Yellowcard playing in a bar here. No one in Togo knows who Yellowcard is so it most certainly was coming from one of the visitors. They are all here to make sure that these elections go smoothly. We are all hoping that they do. If this goes smoothly, it is likely that the European Union will start giving more aid for development in Togo. It is much needed and people here really want this election to go with as few problems as possible. However, just as a precaution, all Peace Corps Volunteers in Togo have to go on standfast for two weeks. This means we have to stay in villages, remain in a low profile and do not talk about the elections. I am planning on just staying at home a lot and sending people in to town if I need food or anything. But it will also give me lots of time to catch up on my reading.

Other than that, not much is going on. I just finished my proposal for the health Clinic today so I will be handing that into to my boss next week after I get it signed when I get back to village. I will post information about the project and the website to go to donate money. Every penny helps, so please donate!!! I am going on my first vacation the first week of November to Ghana. I cannot wait to relax and hanging out on the beach and so some sightseeing. The new training group arrived last Saturday. I met them for a little bit on Tuesday night. They are a cool group. I really like them. One of the guys’ families has a house in Lake Placid and went to NSA, which is crazy.

Well I think that all for now. I hope everyone at home is doing well and are healthy. Please write or email me!!! Miss hearing from everyone from home.

Talk to you soon

Love always, Alia

I NEED A VACATION!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

2007-09-05T03:24:00.000-05:00

Hey, well it has been a while since I last posted. Things are going well here in Togo. I have been very busy with several big projects and I am in a desperate need of a vacation. But that of course can not come soon enough. It is still the rainy season here which translates to, avoiding the huge puddles, canceling meetings due to torrential downpours that occur almost every day, but cool nights that require a sweater.

Only 17 days away from my one year arrival mark seems like such a daunting concept. Have I really done anything in the past year? I hope that I have at least had some affect. My day to day activities still remain the same, meetings and planning sessions with village leaders. I am truly grateful for the amount of time and energy they are putting into the projects. Although my life is still terribly stressful, they are very helpful at the end of the day.

Two weeks ago, the group that came in June swore-in as volunteers. They were all dressed in the best looking payne outfits made by their host families. Speeches were made in local languages from every corner of the country, signify where each volunteer will be sent. I too did the same thing back in December. This new group, although there have been several changes in the numbers and a bit of drama, they are a good bunch. I like the new people who are in my region. They will blend well with those of us already here.

At the same time, we had to say goodbyes to several people who we have grown to call family here. It was sad to see them go, but I am sure they are doing great things back at home.

As I said I have been very busy in village with some big projects. I am still working on the project proposal for the health clinic. There have been a few hold ups which are keeping me from finally handing in the application. Every week it is like I make two steps forward but get pushed back one step. But I hope to get it in by October. I just hate that a lot of times I am the only person who thinks about all of the tiny details. It is really wearing to have to be the one thinking about everything all the time.

Another stressful project has to do with getting water pumps built in my village. The village made an official request to have 7 pumps built around the village back in June. We were told; each of the smaller villages had to collect 150.000FCFA. That roughly equates to $300. Each village has been able to come up with the money, even though everyone keeps saying they are SO poor. Truly my village is pretty well off but they don’t want to admit it. So, we were also told we have to hand in a Plan of Action. This is a huge document that lists every single problem in the village and what the solutions are and who is involved. I asked a friend of mine who owns a development NGO to help me. He told me that he could do it and I would only have to pay for supplies like paper and markers. I was fine with that. Turns out, he has never done a Plan of Action, so he asks his friend who runs another development NGO to help him because he has done this type of project before. Once this new guy got involved, everything changed. I was then told that the process that I thought would take a few days is now going to take over 40 days. And now it is going to cost ME 600.000FCA, or around $1200. It was phrased in a way that assumed I personally was going to pay for it. The two men understand that I don’t give money to fund projects personally. They money comes from funding sources. I tried to explain that, so then they said ‘well Peace Corps can pay for it’. Wrong again. I told them I can’t pay that much money but I will see if the village can find it some how. It has been left at that. They started the work but they are getting a little fussy that I can’t pay them. 600.000FCFA is more money than any Togolese person is ever paid. They are thinking on an American pay scale and that never happens in Togo, almost double what I get paid.

The only project that is not stressing me out is this other water project. This guy who used to be a Peace Corps volunteer in my village in the 70s, now owns and NGO in the states that repairs and builds pumps and wells. He married a Togolese women but some of her family is still here and works on this side of things. So his nephew came up to my village last weekend to look at all of the wells and pumps in my village that need to be repaired. There were 71 in total that need some help but we shall see how many they work on. The guy to the GPS location of the wells and he will then send them to his uncle in the states who will put them into some computer program that shows how close the wells are to underground water sources. If a well dries up in the dry season, they can see if they need to dig the well further in order to have water year round. The guy is coming in January to actually do the work so hopefully everything goes smoothly.

Other than that, nothing much else is going on. The school year starts in two weeks so hopefully my schedule will be more regular soon. Hope everything is going well for everyone at home. I miss you all and I hope to hear from you soon. Pleas write or email!!!!!!!!!!

Love and miss you,

Alia

Camp and moving days

2007-07-25T06:32:00.000-05:00

It has been a while since I last posted. I have been bouncing all over the country in the last month. I am wiped out and really glad to be home for a while.

Let's start back at the beginning of the month.

Camp Espoir training of trainers started the 4th. Camp Espoir is a camp that Peace Corps Togo has put on the past few years for kids infected or affected by HIV/AIDS. We work with the associations that already exist in each of the regions and bring kids from each region together for a week-long camp in Pagala at the Peace Corps Training Center. Training kind of put a damper on celebrating Independence Day, cooped up in Peace Corps' idea of a sleep away camp. I wish I could have been at home watching the fireworks over Mirror Lake like I have been doing forever! TOT was torture. It was mostly for the Togolese who were working with us to learn what camp meant and activities that teach kids but not in a school setting. The Togolese think that the only way to learn in sitting in a desk copying notes, word-for-word from the teacher and then memorizing the information. Camp helps teach them that there are other ways to learn and that learning can be fun. By the end, I think some of them got it.

Monday morning when the campers were supposed to arrive I felt really sick. I had had a fever all weekend and bad stomach problems. So I called the Med Unit and they told me I had to come down to Lomé right away. I was a bit concerned that I would be missing camp, that I had spent so much time planning for. But I didn't want to be sick around the kids, with no energy. So I got a car down to Lomé and was in the Med Unit until Wednesday. I ended up having amoebas. Not fun but bound happen with the poor water quality in this country.

So I got back up to camp Wednesday afternoon. I was a counselor in a cabin with girls ages 12 to 15. Two of the girls were taking ARVs. There other 8 were either affected by HIV (orphaned) or they didn't know their HIV status. It was difficult to talk about the disease but not openly talk about ones status. We kind of had to talk around the subject when we were discussing HIV. The two girls that were taking ARVs, we had to watch them take the medicine every morning and evening. We were in a particular situation where we had the ability to monitor their taking of the meds. But at home it is likely that there is no one making sure they are taking them correctly. It is a conflict I often see when working with people living with HIV/AIDS. Everyone who knows their status wants the meds that will help them have healthier lives. But people here don't always understand how they must take the meds. They must be taken every day at the same time, EVERY DAY. If they don't do that, they don't work. Maladherence to the drugs is all too common. I am often conflicted as to whether it is the best things for people to receive free meds for HIV from these associations, even though it is pretty certain they will not be taken the way they need to be.

Sorry for the that side note. Back to camp. The last two days were the days I planned. The activities I planned were how to succeed in school, planning for the future, human rights, and trust games. I worked with a Togolese counterpart and we planned fun but educational activities for the kids. I think they got a lot out of it and had fun doing it. I must say over all, Togolese kids love putting on skits. They must have put on like 4 just while I was there. And they were funny! It was sad to leave the kids by the end but we were all really tired from the kids high levels of energy all week.

I ended up getting back to village that Sunday. I saw my neighbor Juliette while I was in the market and she told me that she was moving houses that night. She had been having problems with her host family and ended up having to move back to the original house she had been living in. The Togolese custom is that you move at night. This is to hide what belongings you have in your house from all the neighbors. I think this is a really dumb idea, but I am not Togolese. So we started moving around 7 pm. It was already pretty dark out at that point. The first load was easy, just the light stuff and there was still a little bit of sunlight. We had to walk down these tiny footpaths for about ten minutes. I had to follow someone every time because I don't know them like the back of my hand like everyone else in the village. By the time it got dark it was really hard. Anyone who knows me well, know I have terrible night vision. I had my head lamp but the batteries were almost dead so it wasn't much help. Carrying heavy loads on my head, small footpaths and darkness made it almost impossible to get the stuff moved for me. I twisted my ankles several times. But eventually, some local guys showed up and helped Juliette and me with the heavy stuff. They carried everything on their heads and with ease. A whole wardrobe, a couch, tables, chairs, a heavy gas tank, everything. All on their heads. And they did it about 50 times faster that I would have ever been able to do. We ended up finishing around 10 and I waited around on the road to get a ride home. I was so tired by them and was so excited to sleep in my own bed after being away from home for two weeks.

I am glad to finally be back at home and get back to work in my village. I feel like I am a bit cut off from work here because all the work I was doing before camp ended right before I left. So now I am getting back into the grind, doing some trainings, working with the village development committee on the pump project and clinic project. I hope to have the proposal for the clinic done by the end of the month. I will let you know where to go if you want to help donate money! PLEASE HELP!!!

Hope to hear from all of you soon. Love and miss you tons!!! Alia

P.S. While some of you are sweltering in the hot weather, I am over in Africa enjoying the cooler weather. 85 and beautiful. (That is the coldest I have seen it here) I even have to wear a sweater at night!

Soccer anyone?

2007-06-24T14:22:00.000-05:00

I just got back to Kara after a fun day trip up with some volunteers and some Lebanese friends, to a waterfall a little bit south of Kara. It was a very bumpy car ride out to the foot path. The hike was only about a half hour and only steep at the very end. It was really up high and I was a little nervous about falling. But the view was gorgeous. Made me remember that there are actually beautiful places that look like my idea of Africa in Togo.

My soccer tournament is finally finished. After months of trying to put it on, I finally got funding approved from a different source that I originally was working with. The soccer tournament was also a stage for teaching the people of Koka about the prevention HIV/AIDS and STIs. Many people who attended the games were not people that would normally receive the information like moto drivers, young mothers who no longer attend school and apprentices. I think over the week around 2000 people came to see the sensibilization so I was happy with the turn out. But it of course did not go without a hitch.

Of course like Murphy ’s Law, something had to go wrong to stress me out during the week. I have a homologue I do not like working with, who decided the week before the tournament started that he had the right to make certain decisions about planning that were not his to make. So messages were crossed between people involved and it became a problem with who was actually doing the sensibilizations all together. I had been working with peer educators at the CEG since the beginning of my service*. However, this other person also works with another group of peer educators who are adults and have done some sensibilizations in the community, said his group was doing all of the sensibilizations. I, however, had specifically taught the CEG kids a bunch of skits and songs that they could use during programs. This homologue had not included the CEG kids at all in program and I was really pissed about that. He had no right to make that decision. But after a stern talking from my other homologue, the kids got involved.

The week started off slow. People didn’t really show up at the beginning of the first game and the sensibilizations. There was a boys and girls game played each for the first two days. Koka girls KICKED BUTT the second day!!!! I was so proud of them. They were a newly formed team and had never played for a crowd before. But now they are starting their own league.

The third day was just boys teams playing. I got a bit mad that day at that the people doing the sensibilizations. They were making the main aspect of the day the game and not the sensibilization. I thought this was going to happen but didn’t know how to prevent. But it just took a bit of yelling and insistence and they got the idea. They ended up just talking over the game so only the players weren’t watching.

The finals were Saturday. Everyone in village was talking about the match. I knew that a lot of people were planning on coming to the game and sensibilization so I was excited and happy. Things started off late as usual. Can always count on l’heure African. Around 500 people were there for the first sensibilization at the beginning of the games. After that, the girls teams played. Koka vs. Niamtougou. The Koka girls fought their hardest throughout the whole game but ended up losing gracefully in the end. I was still proud of them. After the girls game we did our final sensibilization and did a question game for all of the audience. We gave out prizes like pens, pencils, notebooks, flip flops, and condoms. I was impressed with how much information the audience knew. They were very excited about the prizes. Pens are a hot commodity here!

At the end of the game, I helped hand out prizes to each of the teams and thanked those who helped and were involved. Right about then it started raining. It is amazing how face a crowd will disperse when it starts to rain. I, luckily, had my rain coat so I just walked home but most people sprinted home. Getting wet is like the worst thing that can happy. You can see women with plastic bags on their heads just to avoid a little water. If only they knew… I met up with everyone involved in putting on the event like the referees, the sports director for the region, the peer educators and others at the bar by my house. In the long-winded-ness of the Togolese, everyone went around and said how much they enjoyed the tournament and thanked me for being in the village, bla, bla, bla. It took a while to finally be able to get to drink my soda. But all in all, I am happy with the turn out. But I am really glad the stress is over. I hate having to be the one in charge of all the money. But I know with all of my other projects that I will have to deal with the same thing again some day soon.

Between all of that I also made a tour of my village, taking photos of all of the wells and pumps that need to be refurbished. It is a very vast village. I would say it is around 5km in across. Lots of farm land with lots of hills in the middle. It made biking quite difficult. Footpaths map out the village. They twist and turn all over the place. A friend from village biked around with me, showing me where everything was located. He took me in to some of the most backwoods areas. It was hard to believe that people I work and see every day have to walk so far just to get to the hospital or the store or to a phone. Most of them are only accessible by walking and sometimes biking. Not always. Made me thankful for the centrally located house.

I am heading out of village in about 10 days to spend a week as a camp counselor at a camp that Peace Corps put on every year for kids who are infected or affected by HIV/AIDS. I met some of the kids that are going this morning. From who have met so far, I wouldn’t be surprised with a large portion of the kids have already lost both of their parents to AIDS. It is saddening and humbling at the same time.

Well I think that is it for now. Everyone please keep writing or emailing. It is getting lonely over here not hearing for many of you. Love and miss you all.

Alia

* CEG = middle school. But kids ages can range from 12 to 25
EPP = Elementary school. Kids must finish by age 12, I think. Most kids stop around
here. The final tests are really hard I am told.
Lycee = High school. 3 final years before taking a really hard exam which allows them
to go to university.

And summer begins...

2007-06-09T03:11:00.000-05:00

It is now officially rainy season in northern Togo. It has brought on a coldness that of us have greatly been missing these past few months. I generally have to put on at least a long sleeve shirt at night if not a sweater. I never thought it would be this way in Africa. In the day it only gets up to maybe 85° at the most. Very pleasent. I even have to use a blanket at night. I never thought would think 73° was cold.

Tonight the new training group is arriving from D.C. It seems so strange to think that I am no longer the youngest group of volunteers in-country. It almost feels like there is this pressure being placed on all of us from my training group to actually be doing something productive. Well, at least for me, I think I have being doing plenty and things are only going to get busier this summer. Summer camps are going on, my soccer torunament is next week and the elections are possibly coming up in August which could causes some changes in service for a while. Hopefully somewhere in there I can get out of this county for the first time. I'll have to first pick which side of the country I want to exit from: Ghana, Benin or Burkina Faso. All have many relaxing things to offer.

As I said, my soccer tournament finially got funding and it starts next Tuesday. I am hoping that all things go smoothly. My homologue Faustin and I have put a lot of work into it espically this past week.

Thursday, I spent the entire day run all over Kara trying to find NGO that fund pump construction projects. Finally by around 4pm I found the UNDP office and got the information I wanted to hear. The organization, with funding from the UN will pay for the entire construction of pumps if the village can collect around $300 just to have in account for possible necasssary repairs. But the community does not have to pay anything for the actual construction. I think this will be the easiest route.

Other than that life has been pretty good here. I celebrated with my cluster mates for Alex's birthday. We had a good time. We had no-bake cheesecake, thanks to my mom (THANKS MOM!!!) I am still loving my village and most of the people I work with. The ones can no longer stand working with I am shortly cutting ties with. Africa is still treating me well, other than a few bouts of sickness.

Keep the letters and emails coming. It has been a little quiet lately. Drop me a line, let me know what is going on!

Recent developments

2007-05-22T06:28:00.000-05:00

So I am down in Lomé right now. This wasn't a planned trip but I am staying in the Med Unit for a few days. There are several things wrong with my stomach including giardia. I will know this afternoon what the next step is in my treatment.

Other than that things have been going pretty well. I finished my tour of my village meeting with all the villagers to discuss pooling money on several projects I am working on, such as opening the clinic and building new water pumps. By have the community contribute money into projects, it will bring about an ownership of the project locally and people will be more willing to maintain what they help build. This is my hope.

I had my second women's group and presented on family planning methods. The meeting was split into two meetings so there wouldn't be as many people at one time as last time. The first meeting went fine. The second meeting was pushed back twice, once for a funeral that everyone "had" to go to and the second time because or some random excuse. So when it finally happened I was not very into it. Everything was going fine. I had trained 4 people on the information prior to the meetings and they knew their stuff. Around 2/3 of the way through these three guys come into the meeting and sit right in the front. Normally men don't show up to the meetings so it as a bit of a surprise. But one guy raises his hand, interrupting everything and says if my wife doesn't want to get pregnant then I am just go to go outside of my house and have sex with any woman I want to. I got really mad about this. There are so many men in my village including my host brother who just sleep with women and think nothing of the consequences. They think that it is impossible to go even a day without having sex. I have been asked many times how I am going to go such a long time without having sex, like I will die if I don't. I eventually raised my hand, confronting what the man said. His two buddies were all in the same boat too. I told me that he has no right to sleep with anyone if he is not going to protect the health and safety of his family first. He has no right to bring HIV into his home infecting others and expecting them to take care of his mistakes. Aside for HIV if he can't provide equally and well all of his children, providing proper food, clothing, education and shelter, then he has no right to go and sleep with other women, possibly getting them pregnant and continuing the problem. If he wants to see his village or even the country develop, it needs to start within the home, making the choice on how many children a family is going to have, in order to bring up well educated, healthy children who in the future will be better able to help the country grow.

Well these three men knew exactly what I was saying because they spoke French and all sat there with there heads down like they had their tail caught between their legs. After I said that some other women who had come for the seminar got up and chewed them out as well. I was getting pretty heated by the end. I know that this is a problem that is so easy to solve but men are stuck in such an ancient belief system that they bring down everyone around them. Women get pregnant at age 14 and are forced to live the rest of their lives uneducated and poor. Their children will probably end up the same. It is just a nasty cycle.

After that, I really needed to leave village and luckily I left the next day for a week long training session in Pagala, the Peace Corps training center. There were two topics were discussing during the week: latrine and pump construction and free care for people living with HIV/AIDS. I brought a new homologue to the training. She is the social worker at the hospital in Niamtougou and she wants to start a free services program at the hospital for people living with HIV/AIDS. Her concentration would be in the psycho/social and nutritional aspect of the treatment. One of the medical people would be handling the medicines.

The first two days were about latrine and pump projects. The speaker was not very good. Only wanted to hear himself talk and didn't really give us any answers that we needed. Like how much it costs to build a pump, who do we contact to build one, what is a Togolese organization that could fund a project like he was describing. But no. We just trudged through two days of him talking. We even took a field trip to look at latrines that a volunteer was in the process of building. I personally never want to do a latrine projects because of the lack of success but whatever.

The last two days were about HIV/AIDS. This was helpful for my homologue. Many of the other homologues that came work with organizations throughout the country that help people living with HIV/AIDS so she got to talk a lot with them to get ideas on what the hospital needs to do to start the project. The presentations we sat through were boring for the volunteers because a lot of it was just numbers and stats that we never figured out where they were collected from since this country hasn't done a census in years. There were some helpful aspects. There was one presenter who told everyone that he was living healthily with HIV and had been for 6 years. Many of the homologues had never actually met anyone who would openly admit they were living with HIV. This is unfortunate because there is so much stigma in the country against people living AIDS and if more people would stand up and say they were positive, the situation would be much better.

I was very glad to leave the seminar. It had been a draining week. I went back up to Kara and hung out for the weekend. We had Club Espoir on Saturday which ended up being the most enjoyable club we have all since I got here. There were not as many kids as usual and we just played games and the kids were more relaxed and everyone had a good time.

But then I had to come down to Lomé where I have been since Sunday. Hopefully things turn out okay.

Everyone please write or email! I miss hearing from you all. Love and miss you!!! Alia

The coming of rain

2007-04-20T05:48:00.000-05:00

Yesterday I did something that felt a long time coming. I sent an email to a girl who will be coming in the new CHAP stage in 7 weeks. It seems like only yesterday I was sitting at home emailing a volunteer who was in-country, being nervous about the same things. But 8 months really does go by fast. And to think how much has changed since I got here. I am quite a few shades tanner (not too happy about that) several pounds lighter and far more open minded about what it means to be a Peace Corps volunteer, and that I made the right choice in coming.

I tried to recall back to the questions I had before leaving. What should I bring, what do you miss the most, what stuff can you buy here that I won’t need to bring? Some things now I am really thankful I asked, while others are not so important. Like how much French did you know before you arrived? I could barely speak a word of French comfortably and now I can carry on a fairly intelligent conversation and even flirt! I am far happier now that I am adjusted to living here and have found a place that I consider home. I have people around me I would consider friends and I now know the signs to look for, when it comes to people I do not want to be friends with. Eight months! WOW!

I have been sitting at the computer the past two days trying to type out some project proposals and some reports that have to be in by the end of the month. This week is, and is going to continue to be, crazy. I had a meeting with the chief of the canton, the village chief and the community development committee on Monday. This was the first of many meetings I am going to have with that group over the next year. At the meeting we decided on members from the community that would be members of the health committee responsible for running of the health clinic once it is opened. We chose five of the seven members who will sit on the committee, so we got somewhere. Faustin, my homologue, had to reinforce the point that I, personally, am not going to fund the projects we plan for the village. It is a collective effort of organizations I know, along with friends and family. So when the time comes, donate some money please!!!!!!!! But anyways, they understand that and are very eager to get started on the proposal to open a health clinic.

I had the fence around my garden built last week. I am going to have some kid help me put compost on it and hopefully Juliette can help me plant next week. I am excited to have things growing. Hopefully, I will be lucky and they will grow!

Oh, last weekend was this huge fete for the Doufelgou prefecture and the Nawdm tribe. It was a very fancy event. I was told it was a celebration of the coming of rain. It was thought the president might have even showed because he did last year, but he didn’t. Three ministers of something from Lomé came up though. And all of the village chiefs were dressed to the nines. It was quite the fashion event. I got to wear my new dress I had made. Each of the villages that make up my prefecture represented themselves in a dance specific to their village. Koka’s dance was, of course, the butt shaking dance I see them do at every fete. And the women wear these noise makers around their legs that are made out of some kind of reed and a seed is placed into these small spaces to shake around. Some of the dances were pretty impressive. And it was also interesting to see maybe 100 people all wearing the exact same payne. There were like 20 different seas of matching people. I posted some pictures of the event for you all to enjoy.

The rainy season started here last week. We had a really big rain storm about a week ago that caused the power to go out for about 36 hours. A huge tree fell on top of the power line in Niamtougou and all of the poles had to be replaced. A lot of the smaller marché stands were destroyed in the high winds and some metal roofs were ripped off. I didn’t have much damage in my village luckily. The roof to my new kitchen, which I got totally ripped off on, leaks. Great job host brother o’ mine! He said if it rains in during the second rain that he would fix it.

The rain that night started around 4 in the afternoon, so I just stayed around my house and cooked an early dinner. By around 6, I was ready to lock the door to my house and stay in for the night. So I ran to the latrine, in the rain, and it was fairly dark with only my lamp. So I unlocked the door to my latrine and turned to shut the door. And as I turn back towards the latrine I saw something on the side of the wall of the room to my latrine. I leaned in a little and sitting there on the wall was a SNAKE!!! I didn’t see how big it actually was. I freaked out and ran back into the house. I just held it until morning. I could have asked one of my brothers to go in and kill it but I was too scared to leave my house. They could have just been lying in the puddles outside my house and I didn’t want to risk getting bitten. He wasn’t there in the morning. I was warned by Peace Corps that snakes sometimes like to hide near latrine during or after rain because they are covered and are sort of warm, I guess. From now on I will have my brother check the latrine after a rainfall just to be sure.

So some funny things I have witnessed lately…

There is a moto driver I see quite often driving around Niamtougou. And it never fails to make me chuckle when I see him wearing his "I AM A SEX MACHINE" t-shirt and I know he has no idea what it means. Not quite as funny as the elementary school aged girl I worked with in training who had a t-shirt that said "Clitoris. Not a Greek Island but still worth exploring". Ah dead yovo clothes.

There were two motos driving past me yesterday with 6 bikes strapped onto the back. One guy tipped over once when he had to stop. They just don’t understand the lack of logic behind that. Hope they made it to wherever they were going.

At a folklore dance in Alex’s village (I posted pictures of it) there was one dance that was about putting down men who sleep with their sisters. In good reason, but it gets worse. There was a group of guys dancing around and a guy dressed as a girl in a dress came out. Then, the group proceeds to pretty much act out that they are gang raping the girl. There were small children watching this and their parents thought nothing of it. Alex and I were quite shocked while everyone else watching just thought it was funny. Must have a cultural joke that I totally don’t want to understand.

My brother fixed the roof to my new kitchen, which leaked during the first rain storm, with, what else…Duck tape.

I always enjoying the goats behind my house play king of the sand hill and watch the loser fall off.

Well that is all I can think of for now.

Letters and emails have been rather quiet lately. So drop me a line and let me know what is going on.

Love and miss you all, Alia

All-Volunteer Conference, Weather, and Cooking

2007-03-24T20:19:00.000-05:00

I just spent the past week with everyone I went through training with. It was so good to see everyone and to catch up. I also got to meet just about all of the other volunteers in-country for an All-Volunteer conference over the weekend. It was a much needed break from Togo. I really needed some "yovo" time. We had an auction of stuff from the US that people brought back with them when they went home. I won a box of Thin Mint Girl Scout cookies. I won't say how much I bid on them though. I went a little crazy when I saw they were being auctioned.

When I was down in Pagala for the volunteer conference, I got to meet the four volunteers who were evacuated from Guinea. They were all at different points in their service. One girl arrived in country around the same time I did and others had already been in country a year and a half. I think if Togo were to be evacuated I would just go home. I would have made the most of it and being evacuated is out of my control. But I don’t think that day is ever going to come so doesn’t really matter that much.
I had a training session with my homologue, Faustin right after the All-Vol conference. He loved every minute of it. He has also made a complete 180 in how he wants to work with me and is becoming much more involved and active. Let's hope that it stays this way. He has a lot of projects he wants to get started on. Like he wants to get several public latrines built around the village. He also wants me to research funding to get water pumps built or repaired. I am still researching finding meds and supplies for the clinic. I learned this week that a lot of the money for projects PCV put on comes from their friends and families and organizations I know back home donating money to the cause. But those will all take a long time. So I am continuing with the women’s health groups, the peer educators and I am starting a health class at one of the middle schools. It rained yesterday in Kara for the first time since October. It was quite a refreshing escape from the dryness and the heat. Right now it is around 100 and somewhat humid but not very. Unfortunately that is only marking the beginning of the real hot season. That is when it gets up to 130 at mid day. Then in early May the rainy season should start and it will cool off a little. I can't wait for that day. Down south the weather is totally different. The training site where I was all last week is in the south. It rained really hard one night while I was there. It is much more humid and not as hot. In the south there are two rainy seasons and two hot seasons. But up north where I live, there is just one hot season and one rainy season. Rainy season is May to October and hot, dry season is November to April. I much prefer the northern climate. I sweat so much when I was down south. It was gross. A lot of us from up north got heat rash because we weren't used to sweating so much. So some people asked me to describe what I eat here and what kinds of foods I can find here. Well, because I don't know how to cook the African way, I have been eating a lot of food I know how to make. For example I make home fries and scrambled eggs all the time. Also tomato sauce with pasta. The one thing African that I make a lot is peanut sauce. It is made with peanut butter and veggies and I put it over pasta or rice. I make it just about every other day, it is so good. Other than that I eat a lot of the same things over and over again. I can get some veggies in my marche, but not a lot. I can get things like green peppers, carrots, lettuce, cabbage, tomatoes, onions and garlic. I have also taken to eating this African cheese called wagash. A tribal group called the fulanies, who come from Mali, migrate all over Western Africa with their herds of cows. They then make this cheese that is sold all over. It is not pasteurized so it has to be boiled first but it still tastes really good. But it is nothing like cheese at home. Just a good filler for my lack of protein. Real cheese is one thing that I really miss. I can get good cheese in Lomé but I am down there so seldom that it doesn’t really help me. The other thing I really miss is being able to go out to eat if I want to. I can only do that when I am in Kara and there is not that much of a selection. I also really miss home cooked family meals.

Alright, well, I think that is it for now. I hope everything is going well at home and abroad. Love and miss you all!!!

I've passed the three month mark!!!

2007-03-15T15:36:00.000-05:00

March 11th marks three months at post. I feel it is quite an accomplishment considering I wasn't’t even sure at times I was going to make it through training. It has been a while since I last posted and a lot of things have been going on. So I guess I will start back in January.
Since my village celebrates New Years on January 24th I didn’t get much work done during the entire month. Everyone was feting, not really taking life to seriously so I didn’t put too much effort into work either. But I started working with my peer educators. They are a good group of kids. Some of them are eager to learn, others are there just to pass the time. But, whatever, they are learning something in the process.

I also started a monthly women’s health group. We are going to meet once a month (or more often if time permits) to discuss different health topics. During the month of February I visited the 8 villages that make up the village of Koka, explaining what I was planning and letting the village women know that it was going to be occuring. Also, it helped to get a better idea of the needs of the community. Of course, like I knew I would hear, every village said they needed a closer water source. Some said they had mosquito problems, and others said they wanted to learn about family planning. But I hope in due time I will be able to help at least in some way.

On March 10th I had the first women's meeting. Almost 100 women came with well over 100 children. I ended up doing two sessions to reach all of the women who came. I did a presentation on basic nutrition and types of foods that are good to give to children and foods that are needed during pregnancy. I hope the women got something out of it. I’ll see in due time if the villages childrens’ hair starts to turn orange when they are not getting enough nutrition in the hot season.

Baby vaccinations and weighing is still going on. I gave an information session on why it is important to wash your hands with soap after you go to the bathroom. Toilet paper is not really used here by most people, so scraps of paper make due. Hopefully the women understood what I was saying, considering it had to be translated into four different local languages. It was a busy day! I also started helping with prenatal appointments. It was interesting to see that women here generally don’t start getting prenatal exams until they are already 6 or 7 months pregnant. So once they start showing. This made me a little nervous with some of the women because they only gained like 2 kilos between the months. Definitely not enough. But just getting the women into the hospital is a big step, so at least they are getting medical care for the end of the pregnancy. I was however happy to see quite a few women come in with their husbands and decided TOGETHER to start using family planning methods. Even in this backwards, sexist society, there is some light at the end of the tunnel!

On February 27Th I celebrated my 23rd birthday. It was spent in village with the volunteers in my cluster. My neighbor, Todd, made Mexican food. It was really yummy! And afterward we all ate chocolate cake!!! It was a fun birthday until around 6PM when I started getting really sick. The night ended with me having a 103° fever most of the night and having to run to the latrine every half hour. Not very fun. But luckily my neighbor, Alex, was there to help. The next morning my fever had broken and I was feeling much better but I still went into Kara that afternoon to get some medicine. The Peace Corps medical officer said that there has been a bug going around so it is not surprising that I got it. But I am feeling fine now!!

My new kitchen has been built and I have been moved in for two weeks now. It took a lot of nagging to get my Togolese brother to finally put the door on, but now I can’t imagine not having it. I now have a nice cemented courtyard, too,which I soon hope to decorate by planting some potted flowers and some furniture.

Tomorrow I am leaving for Pagala, a village in central Togo where Peace Corps has a camp. Most of the volunteers will be there this weekend. I am really excited to see some of the people I trained with. I haven’t seen most of them since December. We will also be meeting 4 volunteers who were transferred from Guinea after all of Peace Corps was evacuated from the country a few weeks ago. And next week I have a training with my homologue (Togolese counterpart) on how to apply for Peace Corps funding sources. I know my homologue is going to really enjoy hanging out with the other homologues.

Other than that I have been trying to take time for myself. After all, when else am I going to get the chance to live in AFRICA! I visit my neighbors a lot and play with the kids in my quartier. They know my name but they still call me Sama (Nawdm for white person). I don’t really mind it when it is these specific kids. I also have been reading a lot and biking a lot more. I have already lost 25lbs since arriving in country. I got a fridge which was a big splurge but it is so worth it! I love having cold water whenever I want it. And even though the power has been going out more often, it is still really nice to have. I enjoyed the lunar eclipse last week when the power was out. It makes the stars seem so much brighter when there is no artificial light getting in the way. I am also learning to be a little more creative with my cooking. Some things have come out alright.

Sometimes I wonder why I came here. Like when I get 10 marriage proposal in one day. I didn’t come here to get harassed and bothered by any man who thinks that because I am a woman and white. Or my numerous days when I am frustrated with my homologues inability to grasp things that I say to him, but he can't really help because he is from a different culture. But then there are the good days. Like when I see my language tutor washing her kids hands WITH soap without my guidance. Little by little I think things are starting to stick. I hope in two years to be able to look back at this slow period and see that I made a big difference.

Alright well I hope everyone is doing well back in the states and around the world!!! Keep the emails and letters coming!!!

End to Harmaton

2007-01-28T06:04:00.001-05:00

So the harmaton cold has finally departed and Togo has entered into the hot season. It hasn’t gotten below 85, even at night, for the past week. It is only going to get hotter and then humid come March and April. It is back to the three showers a day and jumping between shaded areas to stay cool. But on the bright side, there aren’t that many bugs and the dryness makes biking much easier.

Work has been getting busier. I am now helping at the Niamtougou hospital every Thursday morning with vaccinations and baby weighing. It is a hectic four hours of crying babies. Three members of the Koka Red Cross have been going with me. Eventually, we are going to visit the Baga hospital for their weekly baby weighing and vaccinations, and compare how the two villages run things. This will hopefully give us a better idea of how to run the clinic whenever it opens in Koka. I am also working every week with a group of Peer Educators at the CEG near my house.

Also starting in February, I will be starting a women’s health group. I will first be visiting all of the seven villages that make up Koka and explain to the women of the villages why I am starting the group and how they can benefit for coming to the meetings every month. The first actual meeting will be at the beginning of March. I am really glad I am now getting a lot of supported for my Red Cross group. They are helping me a lot with projects I want to do and they are very accommodating with their time.

This past Friday, the business center where my brother works had the ribbon cutting ceremony for the new clinic that was built for the center. Some French students paid for its construction and stocking of the pharmacy, but there is no one at the moment to staff the clinic. In French it is called a Case de Sante, which pretty much just means a health hut. It is not funded by the government only by private donors, mostly religious groups. So I hope this new clinic is going to be able to stay open. For now the business center includes a carpenters shop (where my brother is the head carpenter), a metal-works shop, a seamstress shop, a bike mechanic, a library and now the clinic. I am still working on finding a funding source to open the actual clinic that was built in my village a few years ago, but has yet to open because of funding issues. But I do have two years to work on that. So if anyone has any ideas, let me know.

So that is about it for now. The mail has been kind of quiet lately so keep writing and emailing!!!! Oh and I posted some more pictures so check them out! Miss everyone tons!!!

Adjusting...

2007-01-14T07:04:00.000-05:00

So I have been at post for about a month now and things are finally starting to feel normal. I moved all of my cooking stuff into this spare room across my compound, which I will be using as a kitchen until my brother finishes building my new kitchen. He said it should be finished in March.

Work has started picking up. I met with teachers at the local schools, stating my interest in starting peer educator groups. One of the schools already has a group but we are going to expand the group. The second school is a private Catholic school and there is only one class of students so I am going to just teach a class for all of them. The third school didn’t seem too interested so I am not sure I am going to work with them.

As far as my work with Red Cross, it went from having nothing to do to ten projects all in a week. The president of the group doesn’t really understand that I am not here to be their boss. I am just here to aid them in expanding the already existing organization. But he wants me to start all of these clubs, for women, for orphans, for men, for apprentices, etc. And on top of that train this whole new group of AIDS educators. It is all a little daunting but with time I will do something with all of these groups. For the moment, I am just going to concentrate on the women’s group. There is a woman in Red Cross named Natalie who already has a women group in place in the village so I am going to work with her. I don’t really like the president of the Red Cross so any work I can do without him, the better. He is just very pushy and wants me to do everything for him. But that is not what I am here for. We are supposed to be working together not me working for him.

He also has this project he wants to attach my name to that I am not too keen on. He is applying for funding through some sponsorship through Johns Hopkins that will build a building for the Red Cross group to be able to do Family Planning and HIV Education programs. I am all for him having this center. I think it is a great idea. However, since there is not even a clinic in my village, I think it is wiser to put my attention towards establishing a medical clinic in the village of Koka, which would also have space to do education programs. There already exists a building that a rich doctor built to have a clinic. There just isn’t any money at the money to get supplies. I don’t want to force me agenda on the community but having talked to other people in the community, they want a clinic more than an education center.

Yesterday was another festive day. It was a Togolese holiday called 13 Janvier. It was commemorating political independence in Togo. I didn’t really get a straight answer what that means, but there was a party just like any other fete with dancing and drinking. It was fun! I visited two of the village chief, both of which told me I was to marry them before I left Togo. Nothing unusual. My village is celebrating New Years on the 24th so there will be another fete coming up!!

It is funny how things I thought were so strange when I first got here are now seeming so normal. Like the fact that I see men all the time wearing womens clothing and they think nothing of it. Or the fact that children run around in just a pair of underware. Or that reguraly have to stop in the middle of the road to let a herd of pigs walk across. But things are just becoming my normal life here in Togo.

I received many letters and packages for Christmas. It was great to hear from all of you!!! Keep em coming. Letters at least!

One reason I don't like to travel in Togo

2006-12-28T13:25:00.000-05:00

So here is one big reason I don't like having to travel in this country. I think any other volunteer can attest to this as well. The roads are terrible. Think of the biggest pot hole you have ever seen and multiply that by 10. That is the condition of most of the roads in this country. If you are on the Route National (the main high way that goes north to south, through the country), you are likely to have better road conditions but a lot more traffic. And the bush taxis here are not in that great of condition either. They all have some sort of damage, some more than others, but they are still apparently fine to be driven. The tires are used over and over until they burst (I have seen and heard about many accidents caused by this). Add about 10 feet high worth of cargo to the top of the car and some in the back, hanging out the back door. Also add in the fact that the driver might have been sampling one of the local drinks , Tchouck or Sodabi, and might not be that capable of driving. Then add in 6 to 10 people over the legal American limit and you have a normal car ride. I guess I am lucky that in order to get to my regional capital I only have to travel around 30 minutes in this way. I am always white-knuckled whenever I am in a car. Larger trucks carrying cargo scare me even more. I have never been in one but just being near one when they are driving down the road will scare the crap out of you. Those too are always over loaded to the point that tires bursting are a very common occurrence. They also have a tendency to tip over quite frequently.

In order for me to travel down to Lome, I have to take the Route National through one area of mountains. Someone had the brilliant idea of putting the road there even though almost everywhere else is flat. Years ago construction was done on the road and at one point the road splits. One side goes in-between two rock walls where a space was made with dynamite and the other side goes on the outside of the rock close to a cliff. The picture above is a picture of this rock.

The space in the rock just barely fits the large trucks that go through and the trucks are driven far too fast for the conditions. The four or five times that I have traveled this road, there has always been at least two large cargo trucks tipped over or crashed in the road or on the side. Some of these accidents were so bad I would be amazed if anyone survived them. The destroyed trucks just sit in the road or on the side, until someone actually takes the time to have them removed. But that takes a few weeks. So traffic through the mountains is always slow or stopped.

Luckily when I came down here to Lomé, I took the bus. They only have one bus company in all of Togo. It keeps a schedule, takes reservations and is well kept. It was a quick and easy trip down to Lome, for the same price I would have paid for a bush taxi ride.

The only other mode of transportation here is Motos and those are just about as safe as the cars. You will see upwards of 4 people on one moto. For some reason, near my post a lot of people wear helmets. But that is not the case for most of the rest of Togo. I am also not allowed to ride them so it doesn't really matter. I just try to avoid them, having already been hit by one.

So for the most part, I stick to riding my bike or walking. Everything else just seems too dangerous. And I avoid riding anywhere near the Route National. I don't want to have the same outcome as the 4 people killed on the Route just in the 2 weeks at post.

Happy Holidays

2006-12-26T11:57:00.000-05:00

Merry Christmas !!! So I made it through two weeks of post with only a few bumps in the road. I had my first meeting last week with the Red Cross group that I will be working with in my village. Everyone seems very eager to started on work. I am as well. I need something to fill my time with other than reading and language tutoring. My house is getting much more in order. My pantry should be done by the time I get back from post and I have the plans to have some other furniture made in the near future. Once my house is more in order, I will feel much more willing to start work.

Christmas was fun. I spent the holiday with some friends in Kara. I made Apple Pie and helped make a large brunch for everyone. It was really good! We also did a secret Santa gift exchange. Alex was my secret Santa. She gave me a pretty necklace and some earrings. I was Liz’s secret Santa. I gave her this cool back pack from CODANI. I think she really liked it.

I got to talk to both of my parents and my brother and grandma. It was really good to talk to them. I started crying when I was talking to my mom. I had been crying most of the night before. There is a volunteer here whose mom is staying here for the month. Seeing her around the maison made me miss my mom that much more. Everyone was at the point of tears at that point, I was just the only one to let it out. This Christmas was much harder than when I was away from my family the year I lived in Germany. The circumstances are far different. I have a less stable living situation and I am just dealing with so many things at the same time, so being away from my family during the holidays just made my emotions that much more fragile.

Other than that, I am still sick but I am going down to the med unit tomorrow morning. The Harmatton is really kicking my ass. After two weeks of a sinus infections I really just need to go to the med unit and get better. I know I wouldn’t be able to take care of myself very well.

Hopefully by next post I will be feeling better. Miss everyone back home!!!! Happy Holidays

Harmaton hell

2006-12-14T05:22:00.000-05:00

So I have been at post now for three days. After a 7 hour bush taxi ride here, it was nice to arrive at my house. My bed was finished and I bought a mattress in Lomé so I had a wonderful nights' rest in my house. On Tuesday I woke up to be very overwhelmed with how much unpacking I had to do. I don't have any other furniture other than my bed and a table my homologue is letting me use, so I didn't really have any place to put my stuff. I at least took all out all of my clothes and made my room have some semblance of a bed room. It is tiny but nice. I also cooked a nice breakfast for myself.

I met with my homologue and I biked around Niamtougou. After lunch I decided I was going to start decorating my house. The walls to that point were just this baby blue color with lots of bumps and holes in it. I brought an old day planner with me that had a bunch of nature pictures in it, so I cut all of them out and put them on the wall. I also put up the glow-in-the-dark stars my mom gave me before I left. Makes it look just like home!

Yesterday, I really had nothing to do. I was having some electrical work done on my house, so I just had to wait around until the electrician came. This was the first real day that I got the idea that other volunteers had been saying all along. That I really need to change my idea of what is work. If I do just one thing during the day, it should be concerned an accomplishing day. Just a lot of down time that I need to get used to having.

This morning I decided I was going to bike the 20 miles out to visit my neighbor Alex. So I got around mile 17 and I see Alex biking towards me. She had the same thought as I did. So we turned around and biked the 17 miles back to my town. We are spending the day in Niamtougou. We are going to try out our cooking skills.

So one thing I hadn't been missing since last winter was the dryness. The harmaton has made everything really dry and dusty. My nosebleeds hopefully won't get any worse. The air is this gray color and you can't really see that far in the distance. But I will take this dryness any day over the humidity in Lomé.

I hope everyone is getting in the Christmas spirit. The bar next to my hose has been playing traditional Christmas music and really loud levels so I can sit in my house and hear it. It is making it feel more like Christmas, considering there is no snow or anything that looks like Christmas. I think I might put up the Christmas decoration my mom sent me!

Well I hope everyone is doing well back home. Please keep writing!

I am a volunteer!!!

2006-12-10T10:02:00.000-05:00

Last Thursday, I officially became a Peace Corps volunteer. We had the official signing of papers on Wednesday but we had the ceremony at the ambassador’s house on Thursday. My two host moms and one of my host dads came down for the ceremony. I was so happy they came. I almost started crying after we took the oath. It was just the culmination of years of thinking I wanted to do Peace Corps then actually filling out the application and following through with the process. Not to mention the three months of training that I have been doing since September. I had to call my dad afterwards because I left like I had finally followed in his footsteps and was finally in the same shoes he was in when he served.

I am relieved that I am finished with training and I am looking forward to moving to post tomorrow. I am been doing a lot of shopping in Lomé for all the things I need for my house as well as food you can't get anywhere else in the country. Like cheese. I bought a small block of feta cheese the other day and boy was it good!!!! Some of the others went out to eat Chinese food but I went to get Lebanese food, which was very good. There is a large Lebanese population here so I think I will be hitting up the Middle Eastern food places often when I am Lomé.

Training ended well. We had a large World AIDS Day celebration. We had a march the night before with torches and chants. It was mostly kids but it was a lot of fun. Only problem was that the kids were having a little too much fun playing with the fire and so brush on the side of the road near village caught on fire and got quite large. But it was put out quickly. We then showed a short film on STIs. The sound was really bad so the message of the film didn't really carry. On the actual World AIDS day, we had another march with all of the school children from Primary school to high school. There ended up being a lot of people. After the march, the morning was filled with speakers and sketches and music. Everyone really enjoyed it. In the afternoon, all of the trainees played soccer against a team from the middle school. In Middle school here, ages can range from 12 to 25 depending on when people started attending school. SO the team we played against were around 15 or 16 years old. Some were even playing barefoot which made the game all the more interesting. Most of the trainees, myself included, had never played soccer before in their life. So it made for an interesting game. We ended up tying. It was a great ending to a lot of planning and preparation. Everyone in the village really enjoyed the day’s events. There were only a few problems that came up but nothing too bad.

I passed my language test so I guess my French is good enough to go to post. I am still going to do tutoring in French and Nawdoum, but just speaking every day in French will help it improve.

Thank you to everyone who has written to me. Internet will be much more reliable when I am at post so I will be able to email people back in a more timely fashion. But letters and packages are still welcome. But now you can write PCV instead of PCT! Very exciting!

Oh I guess I didn't talk about what we did here for Thanksgiving. We had the day off from training so some people did a Turkey Trot in the morning. I slept in. Bt in the afternoon we all went to Adeta for Thanksgiving dinner. The Peace Corps cooks all came up from Lomé to cook the meal. I wasn't exactly like home but it was good regardless. I didn't get that homesick, which is good. I might around Christmas though.

Care Package Ideas

2006-11-18T10:30:00.000-05:00

For everyone back home who wanted ideas of stuff to send me. Here is a list of ideas.

Care Package Ideas:

Spices – commonly used American spices. Oregano, Italian seasoning, etc.
Reef or Teva flip flops size 8 1/2
Candy that wont melt under extreme heat
Granola bars
Any good DVDs (without the case, just put in something else. Cases take up too much space)
CDs mixes of anything good/new
Magazines
Books
Easy to make meals (like things you only add water to or basic ingredients to)
Gravy mixes
Berts bees anything- esp; chap stick
Postcards of any places you visit (but send them inside an envelope because it might end up on the postman’s wall if sent as a postcard)
Drink mixes – Raspberry and Peach are my favorite
Echinacea
Vacuum packs of ground coffee – the square ones that don’t weight that much
Seeds

But send in a paded envelope or I might never get it or I might ave to pay a lot of duty on this end. Boxes cost more.

First week at post

2006-11-10T07:53:00.000-05:00

So I survived my first week at post. I must say that I am living in one of the prettiest areas of Togo. On Tuesday I biked 14KM out to a volunteers village and the views on the way were beautiful. There are mountains an both sides of the plateau that I live on. All the farms now are ready for harvest but once they get cut down I will be able to see for miles. The view made the fact that I was totally exausted and that my chain fell off for less annoying. It is interesting going 20 minutes and not passing a single person. It made me feel like I was really in Africa. I live in a cluster of 4 volunteers one of which is my good friend Alex, as well as Todd, a Small Business Management volunteer and Juliette, a Natural Resource Management volunteer. They are all really cool. Juliette is my closest neighbor, only about a 10 minute bike ride away.

My host family is really cool. I live within a compound with an older woman and her two sons who are in thier thirties. ALso in the compound is the woman's niece and 4 students that rent out rooms. There are always a lot of people over and they are all very excited for me to be there. They really want me to learn Naudoum.

There is a woman living in my town that is from France but lives in my town for 5 months every year and studies the local language. I was told she is almost fluent. I guess she is working with a local person to translate the Bible into Naudoum. I am going to try to work with her, see if she can tutor me in French and Naudoum.

My counterpart is cool. He had Polio as a child so he uses a wheel chain. He is really motivated to get started. The Red Cross group I will be working with is also very motivited.

The agency that my counterpart works for is one of the most forward thinking agencies I have seen in Togo. The agency makes batik fabric and designs to sell. They only employ people with a disability and they are given medical insurance, a pension and a salery. Jobs like that don't really exist for people in Togo unless they have gone to university. It is not very common because of the cost. I am so happy I am goingto be working so close to this agency and I am sure by the end of my two years I will have spent a fortune there. I will get pictures up soon so keep checking my photo page. Love and miss everyone at home!!! If you are planning on sending things for christmas send them now, it takes a while.

Finially made it home

2006-11-05T07:49:00.001-05:00

Yesterday I arrived at the town which will be home for the next two years. I had a grand welcomiong from the chief and a few of his notables. They even whipped out a camera to take a picture of me with the chief and in front of my house. There is another volunteer living about 3KM away from me who came over to greet me as well. She told me that I should feel honored because she never got a welcming like I did. But I am the first voluteer for my village.

My house is quite African. It has a thatched roof and cement walls. It is round and is divided into two with a cement wall. It is quite small but it will do. The thatched roof keeps in much cooler than tin roof which is nice but it also attracts more bugs and mice. I have already seen three really big spiders. I am getting used to them being around. My family is building me another stucture which will be my kitchen. The way it is set up now I have little to no way to prevent bugs and mice that might be attracted to my food from getting into to my sleeping area. So maybe by the time I get back to post in Decemeber it will be done.

After speaking to my counterpart, it looks like I am going to have a lot of work to do for the next two years. He wants me to do a lot with HIV/AIDS but he said there are also a lot of problems with the other areas of my job like malnurtition, malaria and sanitation. My counterpart also works for an organization for people who have amputated limbs. They do also do work within the arts to gain profit. I was told they make clothing and bags, so I might be buying a lot from them.

Health is still fine. The heat up here isnt as bad as in the south because there is less humidity. There is an internet cafe with a fast connection only ten minutes away. Market is close by as well. I think I am going to be set. To quote the movie Annie, I think Im gonna like it here!

Three weeks and counting

2006-10-14T09:27:00.000-05:00

So I have been in Togo for around 3 weeks. I can't believe how fast time has gone by. Our days are always packed full of training that the days have just turned into weeks. Us Yovos (what everyone here calls us. It means white man) over here are very hot and sweaty but eager to get through training and on to our posts. I am finding a lot of the things I felt like I totally needed to bring with me I really didn't need. Like lotion, so much clothing, etc. The one thing I am really glad I brought was my card games. They have been a good way to get to know my host family and a good way to pass the time with the other trainees.

I got my post assignment today. I am really happy about it. I will be moving to a small town in the northern half of the country called Koka. You won't be able to find it on a map. It is around 30KM northeast of Kara. I will be working with the Togo branch of the Red Cross. I will be the first volunteer in the town so I imagine I will be doing a fair amount of explaining what Peace Corps is, why I am there, what I can do, etc. I know I will be working on the HIV/AIDS problem in the town. The people who I will be working with want to develop a community level health group as well as develop health programs in the schools. This post was my first choice so I am really excited about it. I will have electricity and running water and descent cell phone reception (once I get a cell phone). The one thing that I was adamant about when interviewing for posts was that I wanted to be close to other volunteers. There are at least 10 volunteers in the 30KM radius of my town and some are only a few km away. I am really happy about that!!!

Last Sunday a bunch of us went hiking up to a waterfall near our training site. It took about an hour and half to get there, hiking through a jungle like setting. We had to walk through the river on four occasions, which I wasn't too thrilled about because of the risk of contracting a parasite from the water. That would not have been too fun. But so far, nothing strange has developed on my legs so I guess I am good for now. The waterfall was really pretty and for the short time we were there, we actually felt cold. Doesn't come often here. On the way back down there was this guy that was hassling us in the usual Togolese way of asking for money for using the path. He was only bothering us because we are white and the local people that took us up to the waterfalls were children. We didnÂt end up paying him money and my host dad ended up talking to him about it, telling him to stop harassing us.

So I have only been having a few problems with bugs or critters. They are mostly in my latrine/shower. There had been the spider the size of my hand, the snail as big as a small cell phone and the huge frog that scared the crap out of me yesterday. I have learned to get along with them and when I can't I have my host mom kill them. She thinks it is really funny that I am afraid of them.

My host mom is quite the character. She is a really small lady but she can yell. Both her and my host dad are retired teachers. She was in the hospital all summer for something, I have yet to learn what. And my host dad owns a small store in the next town over and sells this local liquor called Sodabee. It comes from Palm trees and the sap is then fermented. He made me try some yesterday because we had a guest for dinner. I drank less than a teaspoon full, but it was still the most disgusting stuff I have ever tried. My host father of course, laughed. I am under the impression that I only have 3 host brothers and one host sister, but someone told me that my host dad has 13 children from one of his two wives. He was married to another woman but they got divorced a few years ago. But from hearing rumors, the children are not just from those two wives. But I will never ask him the truth.

We met the chief of my host village yesterday. There is a chief of the town and then underneath him is the chief of the women and the chief of the youth. I still donÂt really understand what their purpose is but they said they help deal with local crime and cleaning up the village. Whenever I want to do a project in my village I will have to get permission from the chief. SO I guess I will have to learn to be on his good side. I will have help from my co worker so I am not too worried.

Most of the CHAP trainees are going to Kpalime today to use the pool. I am so excited to not be sweating, at least for a little while. I also need to start buying things for my post. I am going to be bringing the bulk of my stuff up to post and leaving it there until swearing-in in December because I don't want to have to bringing it back down to LomÃ© and then back up to my post. Too much hauling of stuff.

We went to visit a hospital last week which proved to be quite disturbing. It was more so because I know that only a small portion of the entire population of Togo are able to afford to receive services from a hospital. Most other people have to rely on traditional medicine or the little medical expertise that from a local doctor. People can also buy drugs that would typically be prescription medications at the local store, but not really know for sure what it does. Today on our way to Kpalime, we passed what seemed like a car accident. There was a young boy laying on the road bleeding quite badly. The people standing around him did not hesitate to move him out of the way just so we could get by. The idea of internal medicine is very foreign to most people here. It truly was an eye opening experience for what I am going to come across at my post.

On a lighter note, I have received some mail from a some people already. But keep in coming! We get mail is lumps and not very often. It is truly the best part of the day when I get mail. So please send some!!!

Alia Rezek, PSV
Corps de la Paix
B.P. 3194
Lome, Togo
West Africa

If anyone has and recent magazines that they are finished reading, send them over. We are desperate for the American gossip. We feel very out of the loop and what is going on and only get a little bit of information when we talk to people on the phone.

Hope everything is good back home. Enjoy the fall!!! We are heading into the cool, dry season. There is a wind system that blows down from the Sahara every December that is cool but very sandy. And come March I will be extremely hot! One of the volunteers that just finished her service said that during the hot season, it can get up to 130F in the sun. We'll see how I manage with that.

Au revoir l'Amérique

2006-09-18T22:26:00.000-05:00

Well I finished work last Sunday. I went to visit the Cottage for their end of the summer party and also a good bye for me. One of my favorite bands performed, The Phil Henry Band!!! and they dragged me up to sing with them. I knew they were going to but it was fun. And now my co-workers have heard me sing like I told them I would all summer.

Here is most of the staff of the Cottage. I will miss all of you!!!

Other than that I did a lot of the things I had put off all summer, like hiking Baker Mountain and canoeing more than once. I went done to New York City to visit my friends, Carli, Jenna and Bonnie. The plan was to stay at Carli's dorm at Hunter College where she is in grad school. However, my train got into the city about 5 hours after it was supposed to. So, I didn't get into the city until 10pm. We ate dinner and quickly walked across Manhattan to her dorm. When we walked in, we were told that she was only allowed one guest after 11pm, even though she previously had been told she could have 2. We had no where else to go, so we decided to take an hour train to Long Island and stayed at Bonnie's house. So even though it was not on the agenda, I achieved my goal of going to Long Island sometime in my life. It's been achieved, I don't intend to return.

I finially finished my packing, weighing a total of 100lbs, 20lbs over what Peace Corps requires but not the airlines. So it will just make my job more difficult to carry them but I couldn't downsize anymore. I am sure in a month or two I will realize that most of the stuff I think I will need, I actually didn't need.

So for now, in 12 hours I will be boarding a plane to Philadelphia for two days of training and shots. Thursday I will be flying out and leaving the country for the next two years. The past two weeks have gone by incredibly slow. But the 19th is finally here.

I can't believe a year has gone by since I first thought about applying. Thank you to everyone who has made my last summer in the US a memorable one. Please send mail, it will truly brighten my day to get a note or letter in the mail. And just a tip, internet in Togo is a slow dial up, so short emails simply saying hi, what's up? will be quite annoying. SO instead write a long email, print it, put it in an envelope and mail it the old fashion way. Hope to hear for all of you soon!!!

Soon to be home in only a few short days

2006-09-07T00:51:00.000-05:00

For those of you who don't have a clue where I am moving in just a few short days or what I will doing for the next two years, I thought I would fill you in.

Here is Togo. It is about twice the size of Maryland. It only has 32 miles of coast line and one port at its capital, Lome.The languages spoken in Togo are French (official, commerce); Ewa, Mina (south); Kabya, Dagomba (north); and many dialects. Its religious makeup is 51% Indigenous beliefs, 29% Christian, and Islam 20%.

Compared to my highly mountainous home in the Adirondacks, the highest point in all of Togo is Mont Agou at only 986 m.

Average life expectancy for people in Togo is 55.02 years for men 59.06 years for women. HIV is at a low rate of 4.1% in 2003 but I heard that it has gone down to 3%. There have only been about 10,00 deaths caused by the virus, which is promising.

Togo has a pretty steady government. It is currently a republic under transition to multiparty democratic rule. There were some issues during the last election but nothing since then. Its economy is mostly based on commercial and subsistence agriculture. Cocoa, coffee and cotton provide a large portion of its economy.

I will have internet and a phone there once I buy a cell phone. Cell phones are quite prevalent and reception works fairly well.

My biggest worry about leaving is getting sick. Some of the diseases that are prevalent in Togo are Yellow Fever, Cholera, Malaria, Schistosomiasis. Malaria and Yellow fever are spread through bugs. Cholera is spread through person to person contact. Schistosomiasis is carried in freshwater by worms that enter the skin and attach to the intestines and bladder. This is probably the worst one because it is hard to get rid of. So I guess no swimming for me :(

As far as my job goes, I will be working in the Community Health Expansion and AIDS prevention program (CHAP). I will be working under a member of a village-based health team, working closely with a nurse, midwife, sanitation agent, social or member of a local NGO.

"Your duties are responsibilities will fit into five main components, including and not necessarily limited to:

Health services management improvement-- Organizing regular meetings for communications and problem solving; improving costs recovery management system; forming and training health committees; planning, implementing and evaluating annual/periodic action plans; periodically carrying out knowledge-attitude-practice(KAP) survey and focus group discussions; and carrying occasional studies on the quality of service delivery.

Community Health Promotion--Identifying and selecting village volunteers (men and women, young and old) to serve a Community Health Workers (CHWs); training the CHWs other roles and responsibilities and IEC techniques; ensuring a regular system of supervision and coordination of CHWs activities.

Health Education--Initiating and regularly conducting Information-Education-Communication IEC) activities (health talks, home visit, counseling) and integrating them into daily and monthly activity calendars as important components of primary health care; Creating and facilitating drama groups (with folk tales, stories and songs); ensuring a regular system of supervision and coordination of CHWs; organizing IEC activities at sports events; organizing IEC activities for groups such as drivers, hairdressers, tailors/seamstresses, and prostitutes.

Youth Education on Population Issues and AIDS/STI Prevention-- Forming school health clubs and peer education groups and training members on roles and responsibilities and IEC techniques; ensuring a regular system of supervision and coordination of school health clubs' activities; organizing IEC activities at sports events organizing IEC activities for English clubs at the primary, secondary and high schools and for other groups such as drivers, hairdressers, tailors/seamstresses, and prostitutes.

Community Development - Organizing and working with various committees, such as village development committees, health committees, water committees, and cooperatives; helping the committees in their efforts to initiate development activities; creating, planning, implementing and evaluating community development projects with financial and/or material support from various funding sources; collaborating with village chiefs, social workers, agricultural agents and rural water supply agents.

I will also have secondary projects within my community or with other Peace Corps volunteers and are determined based on what is felt to be needed.

So now you know a bit more about where I am going. I am getting really excited about leaving and to finally be in Togo. Please send me letters and mail. It will be greatly appreciated!!!! Alia

Counting down the days

2006-08-24T22:09:00.000-05:00

Well I am almost ready to leave for Togo. Part of me wishes the 19th was already here because it feels like I am just waiting around until then. But I am trying to do as much as a can and see everyone before I leave.

I received an email from Peace Corps explaining how the mail sytem works so I thought I was attach the message so you all know how it works incase you want to send me someting while I am away. Here it is:

Dear Families,
Greetings from the Togo Desk in Washington, D.C.

2. Telephone Calls. The telephone system in Togo has fairly reliable service to the United States. In the interior of the country, where most of our Volunteers are located, the system is less reliable. Most Volunteers have access to a telephone in or nearby their post

When dialing direct to Togo from the U.S., dial 011 (the international access code) + 228 (the country code) + the number. Volunteers generally set up phone calls with people in the U.S. in advance, and have the distant party call them, which is much less expensive than calling the U.S. from Togo. Many volunteers decide to purchase cell phones once they arrive in Togo, but they may not always have regular reception at their site.
The Togo Desk in Washington, D.C. usually calls the Peace Corps office in Lomé once every two weeks. However, these calls are reserved for business only and we cannot relay personal messages over the phone. If you have an urgent message, however, and have exhausted your other means (regarding travel plans, etc.), you can call the Desk, and the message will be relayed.

3. Sending Packages. Parents and Volunteers like to send and receive care packages through the mail. Unfortunately, sending packages can be a frustrating experience for all involved due the high incidence of theft and heavy customs taxes. You may want to send inexpensive items through the mail, but there is no guarantee that these items will arrive. We do not recommend, however, that costly items be sent through the mail. Even though many Volunteers sometimes choose to get local post office boxes, you may always use the following address to send letters and/or packages to your family member:
John Doe, PCV
Corps de la Paix
B.P. 3194
Lomé, Togo
West Africa
It is recommended that packages be sent in padded envelopes if possible, as boxes tend to be taxed more frequently. Packages can be sent via surface mail (2-3 weeks arrival time) or by ship (4-6 months). The difference in cost can be a factor in deciding which method to utilize. For lightweight but important items (e.g. airline tickets), DHL (an express mail service) does operate in Lomé, but costs are very expensive. If you choose to send items through DHL, you must address the package to the Country Director, s/c Corps de la Paix, 48 Rue de Rossignols, Quartier Kodjoviakopé, Lomé, Togo. The telephone number for the Peace Corps office in Togo is (228) 221-0614, should DHL need this information. If you send the item to the Country Director, no liability can be assumed. For more information about DHL, please call their toll free number, 1-800-CALL-DHL, or visit their web site at www.dhl.com. Please be aware that there is a customs fee for all DHL packages sent to Volunteers. For each DHL package, the Volunteer will be taxed 10,000 cfa (roughly US$20).
Trying to send cash or airline tickets is very risky and is discouraged. If your Volunteer family member requests money from you, it is his/her responsibility to arrange receipt of it. Some Volunteers use Western Union, and they have an office in Lomé. Volunteers will also be aware of people visiting the States and can request that they call his/her family when they arrive in the States should airline tickets need to be sent back to Togo.

4. E-mail. There is fairly reliable e-mail service in Togo with cyber cafes in most large towns. Connections can be very slow and time consuming as well as costly. E-mail, however, may become the preferred method of communication between you and your family member in Togo. Not all Volunteers have access to e-mail on a daily basis but they should be able to read and send messages at least once a month. As with other means of communication, do not be alarmed if you do not receive daily or weekly messages. Unless in Lomé at the office, Volunteers have to pay for internet time at cyber cafes and this can be a slow or expensive process depending on the connection at the café.

I also checked on USPS and it was pretty cheap to send things and took between 4 to 6 weeks to arrive. Proces go up with weight. Care packages are always welcome!!!

33 days and counting!!!!

2006-08-18T16:07:00.000-05:00

I can't believe that a whole year has gone by since I was first started my Peace Corps application. The time to leave is almost hear and I getting soooo excited. I can't wait to see what is like and meet the other peace corps people who I will be living and working with for the next two years. Part of me is also realizing that there is so much I am leaving behind. My dog has been sick the past few weeks so that made me think that after I leave I might never see him again. I am going to be most sad to leave my mom and dad and my friends. I am glad I have gotten to spend one last summer at home. It seems like I have done a lot of things I have wanted to do for the past few years. I have gone camping tons of times and I have spent a lot more time outside.

As for packing, I think I have gotten just about everything thing I will need. I don't want to bring that much clothing because I know I can get a lot of the stuff I might need over there. But this new airline crisis is making me a little concerned about packing. So airlines are not allowing any carry-on luggage. I have quite a bit of electronics that I want to bring with me like my new camera and a solar charger for my Ipod. If I put them in my checked luggage, there is a good chance they will get broken or stolen. Maybe Peace Corps gets special clearance on luggage because we already had to go through a huge FBI clearance just to get accepted. I don't really mind not being able to bring any liquids in my carry on. I can survive without that.

Only a few more weeks in the US so if anyone ways to come visit me up in SL, you are more than welcome.