Photos (and lots of them!) of this trip can be found at the normal link!
[Note: Because I have already spent two days in Grand Popo and Ouidah, I do not talk very much about them here. This is not to say that we did not have a great time relaxing on the beach!]
The last night in Grand Popo, Benin, we lit them on the beach, watching the lights flicker and running away from the fuses laughing. Huddled on the dune in the darkness we fought the ocean wind and talked about Togo, about Peace Corps, about Life. Some of us were continuing on the voyage. Others were not even close to COSing. Others were COSing but returning to Lome the next day.
And then we noticed something. One of us, running down to the water’s edge , began to cry out : “Look! What is it ?”
Underneath our feet , where the sand was damp from the outgoing tide, exploded thousands of tiny stars, sparkles that marked where our sandals trod and lingered there for merely a second before fading. We ran backwards to see the miniscule explosions on the sand, and walked forward bent over to examine the sand, to try to see what was happening.
“Sand fairies,” said some.
“Fallen stars,” said others.
No, just phytoplankton. But it was enough for us that night, a lovely , smug reminder by nature that while we had been amusing ourselves with sparklers and firecrackers , she had been putting on her own show all along.
The next day we traveled to Cotonou… A city far more developed than Lome. The others laughed at my subdued expression. “I don’t understand. Why are there dividers? Where are the sandy roads?” And finally : “Wait a second… WHY is Togo far behind its neighbors?” (The ensuing discussion will have to wait until I am not longer representing the US Govt.)
Zemi-jans are everywhere in Cotonou, much more than in Lome. In Lome, you can always find a taxi vehicle to take you where you want to do, in addition to being hassled by moto drivers. In Cotonou, cars are next to impossible to find. Even PCVs in Cotonou have universal moto privileges, unlike us PCVs in Togo.
For this reason, we asked the driver who had brought us from Grand Popo to Cotonou, if, since the other passengers were all getting off, he wanted to take us to a bus station and we would pay the extra. It seemed like a good idea at the time; I have often employed this strategy in Lome and chauffeurs jump at the chance to pick up extra fares.
“What station do you want to go to ?”
“We think it’s called SMTB – we have to go make reservations for our trip to Niger tomorrow.”
“Well,” he replied thoughtfully, “I don’t know where it is, but we’ll ask. We’ll give it a try.”
This is where the plan severely deviated from the normal strategy. In Lome, asking around generally tends to get you results pretty quickly, and both the passenger and the driver are happy. This time in Cotonou however was another story…..
First the driver asked a couple people on the street who spoke in local language and pointed in various directions. Each time he stopped to ask, he was told different instructions. We were finally directed to Zongo, the Muslim quartier. (All Muslim quartiers, it seems, are called Zongo.) We pulled into the taxi station there and asked again. The drivers there nodded their heads. “Oh yes – for Niger? That bus station is in Zongo, all right. But it’s a little hard to find. Here – I’ll jump in with you.”
We were now 3 American girls, one driver, and an unasked-for “guide” who was clearly expecting a tip at the end of the trip. Resigned to the situation we continued on . The “guide” did not seem to be very confident. He directed us to a remote part of the city, then started to say “Oh, that’s right, they’ve moved offices. That’s why I can’t find it.”
We pulled up in front of a bus station – but it wasn’t the right one. This bus also went to Niger, true, but it was notorious for safety violations and discomfort; rumor had it that Benin PCVs weren’t even allowed to take this bus. We hesitated. Time was ticking against us – we didn’t even know if this SMTB bus existed any more, and we need to make a decision soon. We decided to keep going though.
The second station grudgingly told us where SMTB was, and we started off again. It was “just around the corner”. We let out a cheer when we saw the bus parked in an alley.
“You guys start unloading the bags — I’ll run in and see if there’re tickets!” A. said . She left at a happy pace. Minutes later, she returned , laughing, and following another man somewhat helplessly.
“No, this isn’t the station,” she said. “It’s the garage for repairing the bus.”
The man that she had been following confirmed this. “But the real station office is around here. I’ll show you.” And with that he seated himself in our taxi.
“No! Now WAIT a minute,” said N. “Why are there now THREE of them and three of us to find this stupid station? Why do we need three guides? Let’s get rid of the second one, he’s creepy and annoying.”
While we all agreed on the creepiness and annoyingness of the second man we were obliged to cram back in our (by now crowded taxi) and keep going.
We arrived at yet another bus station where they were loading the bus….. only to find out that this wasn’t the right station either. Tempers were starting to grow short, frustrations rising.
Finally, finally, we arrived at the SMTB station, where we found out there were indeed spots left on tonight’s bus that would leave at 2am. We bought our tickets, and with some hesitation left our bags in the office till that evening. We then were informed that the Benin Peace Corps office was also located in Zongo.
“This is perfect! Can you just drop us off there?” we demanded our patient and long suffering driver. He nodded. The third man left us but the second one came along for the ride again.
“I remember where it is,” said A. “Ok, here’s good, we can get out here.”
We paid our driver, giving him extra for all his work and patience (whereupon the second “guide” began to demand his present too). He took the money with thanks and drove off. We rounded the corner to the Peace Corps building….
“Wouldn’t it be the end to a ridiculous morning if the PC headquarters had moved?” one of us said.
Which it had. We stared at the empty building. Peace Corps Headquarters should not, in our opinion, be allowed to change locations. It’s highly inconvenient.
In short, several hours after arriving in Cotonou, hot, tired, incredibly thirsty, and definitely hungry, three dusty and mildly vagabond-ish PCVs arrived at the PC office to say hello to our former Togo country director, who is now country director of Benin. She very graciously allowed us to stay at her house until midnight that evening , giving us a delicious dinner and a precious opportunity to nap and shower. Thanks Brownie!
That night around midnight we arrived back at the station in Zongo with our tickets in hand. We had been told to show up before 12am although the bus wasn’t schedule to leave until 2am.
The station consisted of an outdoor courtyard with a bus idling in a corner and mattresses in a corner for general use. For a while, we were the only women, and the object of some speculative looks. We took two mattresses between the three of us and dragged them to a quiet corner to get comfortable.
N. immediately lay down to sleep and covered herself from head to toe with her pagne, like an Egyptian mummy. “I’m telling you guys, COVER UP,” she insisted. “This isn’t Lome anymore.”
An unexpected weight caused our heads to swivel to the side, to behold a (somewhat idiotically) grinning young man who had appeared from nowhere and had plopped down on his knees on the edge of our mattress , appearing very much like a Jack-in-the-box. Obsessed with this simile , I began to giggle and became quite useless in the situation.
“Bon soir—“ the intruder began.
A. has no problem telling people when she is uncomfortable. “Bon soir. Attendez . Wait. What are you doing on our mattress ? Please get off.”
“My friends and I wanted to say hello—“
“You can say hello standing up. Please leave. Goodbye. I don’t like you here. Bye bye.”
“Maybe you’re married—“
“No—“
“Oh – nuns, maybe?”
I muttered: “Yes! Nuns! Perfect excuse! Let’s leave it at that.”
But by now A. wasn’t necessarily paying attention to what she was saying. Agitated, she replied, “No, I’m not a nun. I’m single – but I’m still for God. Je suis celebataire mais je suis pour Dieu. OK au revoir ! »
I was in hysterics as the quite baffled and confused Jack-in-the-box stumbled to his feet and left.
“What does that even mean?!? ‘I’m single but I’m for God’?”
“I don’t know , I panicked.”
N. roused herself enough to say , “I told you guys to cover up. I’m blaming it all on Anna,” pointedly looking at my V-neck tshirt. And prompty went back to sleep.
We lay back and stared at the stars. Sounds of the Muslim quartier drifted over to us. We waited for 2am to arrive.
Finally, we were allowed to board the bus. We promptly claimed seats in the back and stretched out across their length under our pagne and went back to sleep…
…Till about four hours later when we noticed the bus had stopped so we descended for a potty stop. There followed an unfortunately incident of having to poop in a deserted public marketplace that hadn’t yet woken up, the less said about this the better.
The rest of the day passed with making friends with women on the bus (the bus was about the size of a Greyhound bus, but probably about fifteen passengers were on board) , trying to nap, timing our intake of water with the next scheduled stop (becoming masters of relieving ourselves behind random objects ), playing cars, and staring out the window….. We were traveling all the way up into northern Benin, and the trip to Niamey the capital of Niger was scheduled to be about 20 hours. Scheduled to be, that is.
About 3pm , twelve hours after leaving Cotonou, we were minding our own business when the ground suddenly seemed to spring up at us. We watched, frozen, as the bus tipped onto its left wheel for a few frightening minutes, and we realized that the bus was about to tip over completely. Then, miraculously, it rightened and did not fall, and veered off the road across the ditch and into a cornfield, coming to a stop firmly entrenched in the mud.
We descended warily. The drivers (there were two, or maybe it was one and his apprentice) began to work on the wheel. The five or six women on the bus (plus 2 infants) crossed the road to shelter from the sun under a tree. There were one or two farmers nearby who gave us mats to sit on.
And so we waited.
And waited.
Obsessed by the memory of my trip to the States when my luggage was delayed and I had been without underwear or clean clothes for two days, I had insisted on bringing a small backpack on the bus with me ; we ended up being extremely grateful for my supply of toilet paper, toothpaste, face wash, deodorant, and other small comforts that help one feel somewhat decent after spending the night on a bus, which is what we ended up doing. We sat on the mats under the tree for several hours; we watched the first truck come and try and drag the bus out (it was no longer “broken down”, it was fixed, they just couldn’t get it out of the mud!); then several hours later we watched the second truck come and the chain break ! The second truck left, and the driver of the bus said, “He’ll be back, he’s going to repair the chain.” We were still holding out hope that the bus would on the road again that night but as darkness fell we began to see that this would not come to pass. A family of farmers took pity on us and brought us a small amount of food, enough to keep the hunger pangs away and more than enough to make us grateful for the kindness of strangers. The men kept their distance from us, sitting calmly on the side of the road, or saying their evening prayers, or looking glumly at the bus. We began to fall asleep outside, but some of the Muslim women began to complain and insisted we all enter the bus to be safer. So we found ourselves once again stretching out on the seats; but the night was not so comfortable, because even though the night air was cool under the stars, inside the bus which had been in the heat all day it was stifling and uncomfortable. I tried to sleep with my head hanging out the window the bus.
The next morning we woke up, hungry, thirsty, sore. N. stayed behind and A. and I started to walk to the nearest town a few kilometers away. We stocked up on drinking water and found breakfast (and brought some back for N of course).
At about 10am, eighteen hours after the bus had its accident, a truck finally succeeded in pulling it out of the ditch onto the road and we were off again! An entire day behind schedule, but grateful for the cheerful and helpful attitudes of all the passengers, the driver, and passers-by…
Niger and Niamey were still so far away….
Finally, Wednesday evening (we had left Grand Popo on Monday night!), we arrived in Niamey. Where I was ecstatic to see camels carrying loads of straw or other material in the streets !
Our first day in Niamey we got Malian visas for A and N and went to a museum and we also went silver shopping. Silver is AMAZING in Niger. I spent a lot of money and yet, back in Togo, I’m regretting I didn’t buy more, because it is so beautiful. We also saw the Grand Mosque and other sights. The second day we went to Kouré and found giraffes!!! WALKING AMONGST GIRAFFES was so surreal ; we were so lucky too to see as many as 17.
On Saturday we took an early bus to leave Niger for Burkina Faso. Yet another bus journey… By now traveling seemed so routine….
Arriving in Ouaga, the capital of Burkina, we visited some artisanal centers, but I was quite preoccupied with the problem of how to get back to Togo. My COS Conference was scheduled to start the 1st. But it was only upon getting to Ouaga that we found out that the bus leaving for Lome direct had already left and wouldn’t leave again till Thursday.
This left one alternative: Take a small bus to the Burkina-Togo border, and then bush taxi it all the way down to Lome by myself (A and N were continuing on to Mali and Morocco) .
Which is what I did. A terrifying, sometimes amusing experience, never ever to be repeated if I can help it. I left Ouga at 7am and arrived in Lome at 8am the next day, traveling nonstop through the night (idiotic) in a taxi crammed with 20 people, half of whom were part of the Rael cult (Google it) and perhaps the next blog post will have further details of this harrowing journey…
For now, have a great weekend everyone – I’m off to a PCV gathering in Kpalime. Monday through Friday I will helping at a seminar called “Take Our Daughters To Work” that PCVs have organized for girls in the Maritime region to encourage the girls to stay in school…
Posted by togolesejourney 
Posted by togolesejourney 
