Nov 6

**I wrote this on Tuesday November 6**

Hello Everyone!

Can you believe Halloween is already behind us? Time certainly does keep moving right along. Still, I am missing you guys back east! I hope everything is going well. Life stays interesting here.

The weekend before Halloween I went to the Peace Corps Workstation in Parakou, one of the bigger cities in Benin. (On my way south to Parakou I spent two hours in the workstation in Kandi, and that was how I was able to update the blog the last time). I knew that I would need to travel to Parakou sometime this fall, since that is where the closest branch of my bank is, so I budgeted out money so I could be in Parakou the weekend of the Halloween party.

The Halloween Party was a lot of fun. I made a ballerina tutu by re-using small black trash bags that are everywhere here. People thought that was clever, and very ‘environmental action’! I also got to carve a watermelon-jack-o-lantern. Apparently papayas had been tried in the past, but watermelon really does make for a better pumpkin proxy. It was nice to catch up with so many people that I haven’t see since Swear-In, and it’s always nice to get to chat, dance, and eat some delicious food!

While I was in Parakou, I also got to do some shopping. Since it is a larger city, there is a greater selection of goods for sale. While I was in a grocery store, I actually met a Bible Translator, and she told me that there was a Christian Book Store, with copies of the Bible in various local languages, just a few blocks away! It’s hard to explain how excited I was to hear that. Bookstores are pretty rare in Benin. Previously, I had really only heard about them existing in Cotonou, the biggest city. Printed material in local languages like Bariba, is even more rare. The Peace Corps has been able to give most volunteers basic workbooks in local language, and when we show them to our neighbors they are usually amazed and demand where we got them.

            I put away the things I had been gathering at the grocery store and darted to the bookstore before it closed. I was lucky to be shopping with Bethany, another Peace Corps Volunteer and Bible-enthusiast. And yes, I was able to purchase a real, live, printed Bible in Bariba. The euphoria was significant. It’s been amusing to look through familiar passages with good agro-pastoral vocabulary “Jacob, son of Isaac, son of Abraham..” and “And he called the light day, and the darkness night…” Getting that Bariba Bible was one of those moments where I felt so proud of Benin. I love it  when something is created that is both of reputable quality, and distinctly Beninese culture. Hooray for Benin.

After the excitement of Bible-buying and Halloween party-ing, life went into low gear for a few days /because/, when I returned home to Founougo, I pretty promptly got food poisoning. I hadn’t been very careful about making sure my water was clean and there you go. Fortunately, I did get to chat on the phone a bit with my friend and fellow volunteer, Amber, who was also enjoying a bout of food poisoning. With a little rest, and an aggressive cleaning of the filter, I recovered pretty quickly. I had told the two principals, or directors, of the primary schools that I was sick, and they actually came by my house to wish me well! That meant a lot to me. They are good guys. My homologue Baron also came by for a meeting, so we were able to at least plan forward a little bit, even while I mostly wanted to sleep most of the time.

In the second half of the week I was feeling much better, and was able to get some good work done. Baron and I planted some cuttings at the primary school, hoping to make a hedge fence. We also had the help of about 100 little kids, that got out of classes about half way through the endeavor. We had hoped they would be able to participate a little, and many hands make light work! We will see how the fence does, it certainly gets a lot of wear from animals that want to browse around for a snack. I am glad we tried moving forward with it, but I think that is all that I will be able to do with the school garden until December when we can better protect the plants from grazing animals.

In anecdotal news, I have come to realize that in the afternoon it usually hits 105 degrees Fahrenheit here. That was a little intimidating to realize, but mostly encouraging. I have been running around getting my work done in some noteworthy heat. It’s gonna get hotter in January through March, but I think this is a good start for toughing out some high temperatures!

Alright friends. I hope you are doing well. I think of you often, and I can’t wait to share this post and here how things are.

Oh! And happy Election Day! I hope you are out voting! J

With Love,

Lauren