Update from Benin
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Matéri,
Benin
Sunday, January 18, 2004
Hey everybody!
Here we are in town again, for a meeting. So don't get used to the weekly updates, we assure you this is an exception. The people in Matéri will think we don't like it there if we continune to travel this much!!!
So about the cat....
She is such a peerfect cat. She loves attention from us, and shes beginning to be more brave outside, chasing after lizards and such. So earlier this week, we awoke to a bang and the cat screaming. We get up and find that a folding chair we had setting up against the wall had fallen on her. So we lifting up the chair and she limps away, in shock. So after a while we realize that both legs are not working, nor is her control of bowel movements or urine. So we know that it's spinal cord related. So now she just drags herself around on her front paws. We weren't sure if she would make it through the first day, she was in a lot of pain. But now she's fine. We keep her outside in the garden, and she hates being away from us. But other than that, she's a perfectly healthy, normal paralysed cat. What bad luck!!! So now we don't know what to do, if we should allow her to continue living a life like this, or let her be, as long as she fairs well outdoors. It's hard with all the traveling that we do, and her not being able to catch her own meals. This time the neightborhood kids are going to kill a lizard each day for her. But its a hard decision for us. She just watches the lizards crawling arounnd in the garden and wants to chase them, but she just sits and cries. And she wants to hop up on our lap to get attention like she used to, but she tries and her hind legs won't work to do this.
Other than this, life is great in Matéri. Our garden is starting to show some sprouts, which is very exciting. We've met with the principal of the high school and will be estabilshing a girls club and an environmental club. We've begun taking Biali lessons from a high school student, in exchange for English lessons, and we seem to be picking up the language fairly well. Its nice because it's a very simple language, verbs are not cunjugated, so it's much easier than French. Everyone is so happy when we say something in Biali. Walking down the street, if we greet someone in Biali, they smile really big and greet us back, very enthusiastically. So we've maded this a goal, to be able to speak fairly well with everyone, especially those who don't know French.
This time when we came to Nati, we decided to bike to Tanguieta, which is about 18 miles frrom Matéri, the town where you switch taxis. We based this decision off of last time on our return; we had to wait 6 hours for a taxi to fill up going back into Matéri. In Benin, when you take a taxi it's not like in the States where you're the only person in the car. Unless you want to pay extra, you are packed into the car with everyone else that wants to go to the town you're going to, or anywhere along the way. Thus, you have to wait for the taxi to be full of passengers before you leave. So, the bike ride was great. It took 2 hours, and it was very pleasant. We left in the morning and the air was cool and the sky was cloudy, so the sun didn't roast us. Along the way, we amazed all the tiny villages we road through with our Biali greetings. Just think if your were an African, living in a tiny town were there are never tourists or other white people, and two of them ride by, decked out in bike gear and fancy bikes, and greet you in your local language, which is only spoken in this area of the world!!! It must have been such a trip for them and it was great to see the smiles on their faces. All this and we arrived probably 2 or 3 hours before we would have if we would have taken the local taxi. So we'll probably be doing this from now on, as long as we don't have a lot of baggage.
So thats about it for this week. Things are really beginning to get started work-wise, so I'm sure we'll have more on this subject next time. We hope everyones doing well and staying warm. The tempertures here remain in the 90s and maybe 70s at night (brrrr...) It gets SO cold that the locals have told us that they heat their water before they take thier showers both in the morning and the evenings. They are shocked and amazed when we tell them that we don't bother doing this and the cool shower is kind of nice.
Talk to you guys hopefully soon,
Love,
Rebecca and Jason
