...Back to October

back to top

I went over to the "ecole evangelique", the evangelistic school, and the school team was playing, but they will let anybody play with them! So first we did some drills, then I played in the "newbies" match for beginners. After that the good players came on the court to play, and they could tell that I knew how to play volleyball, asked me to join in! I was so happy!

If you are familiar with some of my past journal entries you will be able to understand why. First, I had sought these people out, it wasn't some random person coming after me to get something from me. Secondly, they asked me to participate because I merited it from my skills. So, I became just another African playing in the game. What a great feeling.

Now, I most of the other players were good, much better than me, which was great because I haven't played a good game of volleyball in a looooong time, and it felt good to be pushed. There was the coach there giving us tips all the time. I scored the winning point off of this petty little standing overhand attack that just fell nicely into a hole, and my team all rushed me, and surrounded me cheering! The spirit of the play was very positive.

Strangely enough, I didn't bring with me any running shoes or shorts to Africa. Furthermore I wasn't wearing my contact lenses at the time, so I had no peripheral vision because my glasses are tiny, I was wearing airwalks, and my toenails were jamming painfully into my toes because they were so long since I have been wearing sandals for the past month! I plan to rectify all of that for the next time I play.

It's amazing how good sports make me feel, the camaraderie, the challenge, and thhe exercise are all very good for the soul.

When I came back for breakfast Amedjie had this beaming smile, and told me that he had made two pieces of French toast that morning already, and then cooked up 4 pieces for me! I could only eat three, but they were yummy! I have been told that there is a jam here called Guame Jan, or something like that which resembles syrup. However, it’s made only by the Nuns up in the mountains, so it’s quite the journey to get it! I was visiting some local missionaries on Sunday, and asked them where I could find cinnamon, and they gave me two cans of it! Soon we will have perfected French toast.

Spider dogs are next.

Monday November 10 2003
March to a different drummer
It is time for me to talk about my new toy. I bought a Djimbe (pronounced JEEM-BAE). A Djimbe is a wooden African drum, with a lamb skin pad tied down by many strings. My Djimbe is huge; it goes almost up to my waist (no back with me on the plane ride home, that's my carry-on). Mine is beautiful, it has carvings of African plants on the side, and is stained brown and black.

But before I talk about the Djimbe, I have to talk about buying the Djimbe. That was a true African experience.

The process began my first day in Kpalimé, even before I knew that I wanted one. Kathleen and I were walking through the market, and passed by these Djimbe vendors. Of course they insisted that we come over and take a look at their drums. So, over we went. I didn't want to get suckered into any sales because at that point I had no idea what the relative value of a franc was. But Kathleen was chatting enthusiastically and got me a little worried that she would get suckered in, because she wanted one at that time. But, we left it as "we're here for 6 months, and we'll look into it later.

As the next few weeks went on, we were invited to a Djimbe drumming show at a local bar along with some other tourists. We knew the tour guide, Kudjo, as he had met us at the airport, and he invited us over. So they played and played, and it was awesome. It was then that I knew I needed one.

So, I started trying to figure out what the price should be before I got swindled, because it was no longer a question of "if" I was going to buy a Djimbe, it was a question of "for how much".

Kudjo had told me that you could get one for 15-20 thousand francs if you bartered well. Amedjie started giving me some tips on bartering skills and what good prices might be. He told me to go in with a ridiculously low price, stick to it, and then if they didn't take it, walk away and let them think about it. He ALSO told me to go and buy both drums for Kathleen and me, because he would give us higher prices if a woman was there.

So off I went; getting a good price was to become my little game.

I arrived and admired the various drums for a while, built a little bit of a relationship with the vendors, had them explain a little bit about Djimbes. I did this for maybe half an hour. He told me to come back next Tuesday, which was in a week, because he would have a new batch of Djimbes.

I came back in two weeks, alone. "Where's Kathleen?" they asked. "Oh, she's really busy right now." We chatted for another half an hour, he tried to sell one to me, but I said I had to look at my finances more closely before I even considered (which was true, any thing over 5000 francs is a pretty big in my pocket on the money I'm given, and I wasn't quite up to speed with where I stood in my account).

So I came back the next day, alone. Again, "where's Kathleen", and they seemed a little flustered that she wasn't there. "She went home lunch today." Then, we each proceeded to butter each other up for about 40 minutes before we even mentioned price. First, he told me to select the Djimbes. I picked the two biggest, nicest Djimbes there. He told me to give a price, I said 20000 for the two, and he shook his head in disgust, and said, "Let’s talk about these little ones over here." "No" I said, "I'm only interested in these two. He proceeded to tell me about the quality of the Djimbes, that just the string costs 9000 francs. They came back and said 25000 for one. This process of back and forth went on until I stated 32000 for both, and 4000 a month for lessons for both Kathleen and I. They held at 40000 for both, and 10000 per month for lessons. To get to this point, I had been there for about 2 hours.

Then I left.

I returned the next day, "where's Kathleen" and they were obviously a little shaken that I had left when they thought they had a sale right in the palm of their hand. I offered 35000 for the Djimbes, and 7000 for the lessons, then he said we have to add a little, then I just sat there for about 2 minutes, thinking, and said that it was hard for me to go any higher because that was what Kathleen had agreed upon, and I wasn't very comfortable making her pay more than she expected. So, I said 38000, and 7500 per month for the lessons. Sold.

From what I gathered afterwards, this is a really good price for these types of drums, that the ones half that size can easily go for just as much.

Sweet.

So now we're going for lessons 2-3 times a week, and it is awesome. My hands hurt like mad after the first day from drumming too hard, but hopefully that'll stop.

Its great fun and Kathleen and I hope to have a big party with the other crossroaders at the end of the term, with us putting on a drumming show with our teachers! I can't wait.

I'm so glad I bought this Djimbe.

So now I’m not even capable of using a computer, typing this message really hurts. There's no way I can do my work. I should have seen this coming, but I just kept working through the pain and now i can barely move the mouse.

I hope it starts to wear off tomorrow, I’m going home early from work today.

I really don’t know what to do about this. Please pray for my wrist.

M onday november 17 2003
11:00 pm in Canadian time...
If I had started writing this almost 4 hours ago, today would have marked the anniversary of my second month here.

It is 3:40 in the morning. I went to bed at 9:30 or so, because I was tired and get up at 6 am. But, I've been tossing and turning in bed since midnight. This is what it's been like for me pretty much since the day I got here. It's pretty frustrating. I'll probably be able to sleep in an hour or so, get one last hour of sleep before I have to wake up again.

The one comforting this about this is now that I'm off Lariam at least I don't remember my dreams anymore, so I'm just tired as a result of not getting any sleep, not tired and delusional.

And yes, the roosters are crowing continuously right now. They have been for the last hour.

I'm not sure exactly why I can't sleep; I haven't had trouble sleeping in years and years. I'm used to conking out pretty much as soon as I hit the pillow. Maybe that's because I always went to bed at midnight. I figure it could be due to any or a combination of the following things;

1. My new malaria drug, Savarine is a chloroquin based drug, and apparently it can have sleep disorder side effects also, but not as sever as Lariam.
2. The heat. You know, the nicest place to fall asleep is under warm covers in a cold room. I'm under no covers in a very hot (getting hotter) country and I can't sleep with the fan on. (I know some of your snow-shovellers are probably scowling at me right now).
3. Maybe I go to bed too early? Because I can fall asleep until midnight or so, then I'm up until sun up.
4. I eat too close to bedtime, usually about an hour to an hour and a half before I go to sleep. More problematic is that I drink allot of water at supper time, because I'm hot and dehydrated by then, but then I have to go to the bathroom at midnight. I've actually already addressed this issue a bit though, as I don't drink much as supper time anymore so I don't have to go to the bathroom at midnight... So maybe I'm dehydrated at night.
5. As Amedjie would put it, "c'est la moteur qui tourne", it's the motor that turns, as in, I'm thinking too much. This probably has some truth to it. I don't find myself thinking any less about home. I still dream in Canada, I'm still trying to figure out what I'm going to do when I get back (i.e. What to do with my life, ha-ha, or simply what to do for the months between getting back and probably going back to school), and every now and then I just want a tub of ice cream, a movie, and a friend to pray with.

Gee, I just blabbered for about 20 minutes about sleep. I think I need to work on bite-sizing my writing up a bit...

In other news, my wrist is feeling considerably better, but still hurts, which is disconcerting. It hurts in both wrists, so that points pretty clearly towards Djimbe as the culprit. Drats.

I got to play Ultimate Frisbee today, with the missionary kids from the centre for the blind, which was great. I was only 4on4, but it was fun nonetheless. I was soaking wet in sweat after half an hour of play. The only time that it's even remotely reasonable to exert yourself physically here is for about the two hours after sunrise and the two hours before sunset.

I visited Tsiko hospital on Friday night. It's a Baptist missionary hospital about half an hour north of Kpalimé. It’s a pretty neat place. Ill talk some more about it when I get to spend a day there, or at least walk around in the daylight. I went there to play ball hockey (the wonderful people from the centre for the blind took me up there, they're pretty active sport wise!), but unfortunately it got rained out. (Rain, there's something I haven't talked about yet... Mental note...). BUT I did have PIZZA!

On Saturday my supervisor Guy invited me to a burial. I'm going to write a little ditty in the things section about that because it deserves its own special attention, so stay tuned.

Next week Elizabeth Dove from CCI is coming to visit, so we'll be preparing for that. I'm hopefully soon going to reveal a new Vivre Mieux website as well as a detailed account of my plans and my work (because I don't just ride moto taxis, watch goofy chickens, and eat big grapefruits all day long, I actually do work too! It's just that writing about underwear is so much more entertaining).

Keep Smilin'
-Tim

P.S. Last minute note, I'm uploading this at the end of my day because the power has been cut all day untill now (4:00pm)! C'est l'Afrique!

Monday November 24 2003
My head is full
If I did a brain dump right now of everything in my head, this page would never end. So, I must in someway create bite-sized chunks of thought that will feel wholly inadequate.

Lets begin with a mere “journal” account of events. Last week was spent trying to put together a brand spankin’ new website for Vivre Mieux. The one I made at the start of my stay here is not so good at really giving an impression of “what is Vivre-Mieux”. The new one hopefully will make everything that goes on here crystal clear to all of you who are curious (and at the end of the day, international funders for our projects).

You may remember my last entry where I talked about how I didn’t get any sleep on Sunday. I slept well on Monday night, but Tuesday and Wednesday nights I got just about zero sleep each night, and couldn’t really even walk on Thursday because I was so tired. To make things worse I had diarrhoea so became rather dehydrated, which made me even more tired. Fortunately my boss gave me some medicine that fixed me right up, and I laid down for a little while which helped. I took a sleeping pill for the first time on Thursday night because Friday and Saturday were going to be big days with the arrival of Elizabeth Dove, the Ontario regional director of CCI (Canadian Crossroads International).

Thursday evening Robin and Oddette (fellow crossroaders) arrived from Vogan, which they call the armpit of Togo, and stayed in an air-conditioned room at Hotel Agbeviade, with a bed that was not made of straw, had flush toilets, and hot water. They then had supper which was not small sardine like fish-heads, but rather a yummy pasta meal. They were totally ecstatic.

Friday Elizabeth arrived and Vivre-Mieux did a presentation on what we about. She seemed happy with the work we were doing. Unfortunately Guy (our supervisor) couldn’t be there in the morning because he was called the day before to be at some United Nations thingy in Lomé!

Friday night everybody stayed at the Hotel 30 Aout, which is a rather gross hotel that feels like the hotel from “The Shining”. It is a very large hotel, and since the tourist market in Togo has almost disappeared in the last few years, the hotel has fallen into disrepair.

That night there was a little surprise planned for us. We went outside, and up pulled a van FULL of people. Now, you have to understand, the Canadian meaning of full is nothing at all like the Togo word full. You know how people will often try and see how many people can fit into a car just for fun at some party? So, think about a van, what do you think would be a totally ridiculous amount of people?

No really, think about it, place people in a van in your head, and count them.

Remember, this vehicle has to be driven over many kilometres with these people inside…

On with the story… A van pulls up with Africans inside. First out comes a dancing troup. These are all women, I would say about 12-15 of them. Then came about 4 men who were singers. Then came another 5-6 men who were instrumentalists, with 4 Djimbe’s and a trumpet. (Take a look at the size of a Djimbé here).

In total that’s about 25 people, a trumpet and 4 Djimbes. You do not ride in a vehicle here, you are packed into a vehicle.

This is what we like to call “the sense of the ridiculous”.

Anyway, Friday night was spent at a very nice restaurant called Chez Fanny. I wasn’t hungry due to my illness from the day before, but everyone else’s food looked super yummy. One of us got Shrimp Pasta!

Saturday was a meeting with all of the crossroaders and the heads of their respective NGOs. It was basically a day for everyone to relate what had been going on as well as their frustrations. It was mostly pretty good, except that as with most meetings, the real point of a discussion seems to get missed at times as people generate nonsensical excuses for their incompetence.

That evening A few of us hung out at the closest thing they’ve got to a coffee shop here in Kpalimé and just chatted about everything until 11pm. It was our first real chance to all be together and just let everything out. It was really good to share each others experiences and see how things were both the same and different for everybody.

Sunday, Guy took us to the waterfalls at Kpimé, which unfortunately were not flowing at all because there was not much rain this year. But the cliffs over which they fall are humungous. We took a crazy car ride up a mountain trail to the top on a ridiculously bumpy and twisty dirt road right beside a cliff edge. It was more fun than a roller coaster, and could be described as a truck drivers dream road. Fortunately Guy’s car has 4-wheel drive. At the top was a large dam found where three rivers connect.

Despite what may be called better judgement, I have to confess that when I say the body of water that I jumped right in. I figured that the water was mountain water (we were at the top of a mountain) from three rivers that was flowing out of a dam… and I AM ALWAYS SO HOT THAT MY JUMP IN A LAKE WHEN I’M HOT CANADIAN INSTINCTS TOOK OVER! Apparently the people who live in the mountain bath in the water everyday too, and they still has the standard number of limbs and proper skin tone, so I crossed my fingers.

We had a picnic there with food that Guy had prepared for us. Liver and beans with a sweet mustard sauce. I know it sounds bizarre, but it was actually quite good. We just kind of sat back and relaxed for a while after that, then headed back into town to see the people from Vogan off because they had about a 4 ½ hour trip to get back.

That night I found a DVD player and a copy of the Matrix I and II. I showed the first one to Guy. When we got to the end of it he said, “can we watch the second one right now?” I laughed. Unfortunately the disc for the second one didn’t work, so I’m going to go find another copy today.

And now were at today. Whew, lengthy brain dump for today now terminated, and I haven’t even gotten around to saying anything introspective yet!

Keep Smilin’
-Tim

On to December...