 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
|
|
...back to the people of Hotel Agbeviade People - Vivre Mieux Vivre Mieux is the NGO (Non Government Organization) with which I work here in Kpalimé Togo. I interact with the people here on a regular basis, and so of course they are an important part of my experience here. Monday Decembe 1 2003 Guy Aheliagbedji (a.k.a. Superman)
Guy works as a medical assistant here in Kpalimé Togo. A medical assistant is the closest thing to a doctor here in Togo. Guy is the head of Vivre-Mieux. Vivre-Mieux is his baby and his brainchild. He is the president of numerous NGO (Non Governmental [aid] Organizations) committees related to the development of Togo, including a united council of NGOs in the plateau region (south) of Togo. He participates actively with the local Rotary club, and maintains connections with Rotary organizations in other countries. He runs a mall technology business called PRECODE that is used to generate revenue for Vivre-Mieux's activities. He also seems to know and be on good terms with just about everybody in Kpalimé. How does he do it? He gets up in the morning at about 4 or 5 and works on Vivre Mieux projects. He then goes to the hospital at about 8 to work at the hospital in the morning to support his family (as well as VM activities), then comes home for lunch and sleeps for an hour or so. In the afternoon he is often attending various committee meetings, or travelling to Lomé, and then works in the evening until about 1 in the morning. Every day. Through all of this he manages to keep a hearty laugh, and uses a good dose of African proverbs on a regular basis which I enjoy hearing. He has taken us on a few tours of various villages, mountains and sights. His home village is maybe an hour north of Kpalimé. Most of my work here will be directly with Guy, training him in Web design, graphics editing and multimedia so that PRECODE, his technology business can fully support Vivre-Mieux's day-to-day activities. Superman. Tuesday December 2 2003 Dotsè Agbobli  Dotsè
is the secretary here at Vivre-Mieux. He manages much of the paperwork
that needs to be done, various secretarial tasks, and gets assigned
various odd jobs. I have taken some time to try and teach web design
to him, but he seems convinced that the subject is way over his head.
It's not over his head; it's just an issue of confidence. Whenever
I do something new on the computer, he tells me "tu es fort!"
meaning "you are strong!". When I showed him how to play
minesweeper in windows, and won on my first try, he was totally amazed
and said that "it like you have computers living in your gut".
Of course, this is just a matter of confidence. He has since learned to win minesweeper on the intermediate level difficulty, but I would like to direct those energies back into doing some web design. In the first days at work (and still today), Dotsè would say to me when I arrived, as I was standing in front of him, "Tim, tu es la?". Now, the translation of this requires a little bit of explanation. It had been my impression that the word "la" meant "over there". So, his question was "Tim, you are over there?" At this question I was rather confused and answered, "Non, je suis ici", "No, I am here!" This seemed like such a ridiculous greeting to me, especially considering that I was standing right in front of him as he asked the question. I have since discovered that "la" not only means "there", but also "here". So Dotsè would be asking me, "Tim, you're here?" which still seemed like a totally ridiculous question because we were standing face to face with each other. What makes it even more ridiculous as I think about it is that it is impossible to NOT be "la", ever. Let us say that I am near, then I am "la" because I am "here". Let's say I'm far away in Brazil or something, then I am still "la" because I am "there". Therefore, it is impossible to NOT be "la" because you're not "la - here", then by default you are "la - there"! Guy got a kick out of this when I explained my confusion to him, so now we have this little ongoing joke... whenever one of us arrives we ask the other "Tim/Guy, tu es icie?", which can ONLY mean, "you are HERE?".
back to top
One of the first impressions that I had of Timothée was before I was used to the prevelance of scooters and motorbikes here, he was leaving Vivre-Mieux on a big, mean looking motorbike! Here was an older retired African with a colourful African shirt, wearing dark sunglasses and looking like a bike gang member! back to topThursday December 4 2003 Rudy  Rudy
is an English teaching advisor in Kpalimé, and has been involved
with Vivre Mieux in various forms almost from its inception. He is
almost ready to retire. He worked in Ghana (English country) for a
while, and used to teach English in classes, so his speaks English
very well. His wife is Ghanaian, and his daughter goes to school in
Ghana.
Rudy is somewhat of my "Togo Tutor". So he teaches me about Togo, then in turn I teach him about Canada. He is especially fascinated with the "wasteland" aspects of some of Canada's terrain. Thursday December 11 2003 Jessica - Peace Corps Volunteer Jessica asked me to put up the above picture, she is the one in the middle. While not actually part of Vivre-Mieux, Jessica is a Peace Corps volunteer who has been housed with Guy's family (i.e. in the same house as my office) for the past three months. As such, I see alot of her when I'm at work. I asked her to write a few words, and here they are: "Hello Tim’s friends and family "My name is Jessica, and I am an American volunteer with the Peace Corps. I am involved with the Girl’s education and Empowerment Program. Fun Fun!" " Actually, more like work work, because in the worst situations girls are treated as property, sold into marriage and such. But let’s focus on the good. Fortunately, I’ve met some women who are considerable successes despite all the traditional & social blockades." "Tim is cool, by the way. He has enlightened me on the art of “discute-ing” – bargaining price. According to Tim “discute-ing is supposed to be fun!” And there you have it folks, my break through! Life in Togo is all about these types of moments." *Note from Tim: Apparently I haven’t quite enlightened her enough
on “discute-ing” which mean “discussing” the prices. The term is
actually “debattre” which means “to barter”. But, some crazy dude
in the Peace Corps has convinced them all that you “discute” the
price, so we’ll roll with that. Return to People Introduction...
|
We
call him Tim-Gan (with me being Tim-Vit) because he is the older (much
older) of the two of us. He is a retired medical assistant, and so
works directly with the health related projects of Vivre-Mieux. He
too is learning to use the computer.
