PREKETE here I come...

I got my post this week!! I’ll be living in the village/town of Prekete in the Donga department (Benin’s word for state). It is a NEW POST so I’m the first Peace Corps volunteer Prekete will have. The town is right on the border with Togo, about half-way up the country. I really wasn’t sure what kind of post I wanted, but I definitely wanted to be away from the southern part (ie Cotonou and Porto-Novo). I don’t have too much info but the activities/work in this town are gardening with woman’s groups, environmental education, forestry stuff, and I’m sure tons of other projects. The town is right by a huge forest so I’m hoping to do some work with the protection of the forests as well and there is a Forestry office and and Agriculture office! I have “post-mates” in the towns above (Bassila) and below (Pante ?) me and there are many other volunteers who are just an hour taxi-ride away. There is internet in Bassila too! There are 4 Peace Corps workstations throughout the country that are for volunteers; they are in Kandi, Parakou, Cotonou, and Natitingou. I’ll be using the Natintingou station most! Its supposedly the nicest and is along a main paved road that passes through my village. There is soo much I could say about my post and my feelings…the gist of it is that I’m excited to finally know where I’ll be living and working. I don’t know what local language I may have to learn, probably Anaga (sp?). My host Mama knows it so I might start getting the salutations down J. As soon as I know more about my post I’ll pass on the info.

What else…oh I went to church on Sunday. We put on our finest tissue (yes, I got my first African shirt made!) and headed around the corner for church. My host family is Evangelical and the service was not so different than what I’ve seen before…besides the fact that it was in both French and Fon, and just about every child that saw me didn’t stop staring throughout the 2 hours. Good thing I’m getting used to seeing people’s jaws drop when they see me; too bad they look like they’ve just seen a ghost too J. Everyday has its challenges, that’s for sure, but with the support of fellow stagiere’s (we are not considered volunteers til after we swear-in) I think we will all make it through training. Actually, 2 guys have already “ETed” (early terminated). A bunch of current volunteers are also in the process of leaving because their service is over; its weird because we get to know them and then they’re gone! They serve as our main “teachers” during training. The training has been going really well too!

This week we, the EA (environmental action) group, went to a nearby village and built some mudstoves for a few Mama’s. So far the mudstove building has been my favorite technical part. It was so funny cause the Mama’s were getting jealous of each other because some stoves had just one place for a pot and others had two…let me explain the construction a bit. First, you have to dig for “terre rouge” or red dirt, add some dry grass and water, and then you mix it all with your feet! A great African pedicure I might add… then you ball-up the mixture and move it to the location of the stove. You have to find out what kind of pot the Mama uses most so that the stove can be built around that exact pot for size. You place the pot on some bricks and start throwing the mud from the bottom up…its kind of hard to explain so I’m going to try to put some pictures up of the first one I built J. Anyway, it was really cool and very functional and economic too. It save time cause the water will boil faster and money cause it uses less wood, which means it is environmentally friendly, yay. I think it’ll be one of the first things I do at post!

Well, that seems to be all for now. Hope all is well in the U.S. of A.

Au revoir!