Recipe: Sinri Flower Sauce

Over the past month, I have repeatedly been served a sauce containing sinri flowers. Last week, I asked my friend to come over and teach me how to make the sauce. An illustrated guide is below:

Collect the sinri flowers.

Our flowers are plucked and ready for cooking. If you don't have fresh flowers on hand, you can use dried flowers that you harvested previously.

We washed and boiled the flowers, then drained them and set them aside.

This particular recipe calls for beans. You do not want the skins on your beans, so you must pound them to loosen the skins, then place them in water so that the skins float to the top. These beans have already had the skin removed.

Next, you cook 1/3 cup of beans in water, then add the "sauce ingredients" (pureed garlic, pepper, salt, hot pepper, and special Beninese condiments).

 

When the beans are cooked, you add the flowers back into the pot, and then it is time to eat! This sauce can be enjoyed with pate or akassa.

On the Farm

Now that the rains have stopped, we are nearing the end of our farming season. Most people will finish harvesting over the next few months and will return to Sonsoro in January.

During the farming season, farmers (that is, nearly the entire population of Sonsoro) actually leave town and move into their country homes amidst their fields. Most people only return to town on our market day, which is every fourth day. On Friday, I went to visit my friend's farm, which is about 15 miles from Sonsoro.

My friend has a large farm and hires laborers to help out. He grows cotton, soybeans, corn, manioc, mangoes, edible flowers, millet, and more, and he also raises bees and chickens. Below are some photos from his farm:

A storage container full of millet

I'm very comfortable in this giant pile of cotton.

See how tall the millet grows? The top is eaten, and the stalks are used for construction projects.

The top of the millet can be turned into porridge or mash.

A field of cotton. All the related labor is done by hand. No cotton gin here!

My friend's house, where he lives during the eight or so months he spends every year on his farm.

Snake Oil Salesmen and Traditional Medicine

A few days ago, a traveling salesman arrived at our health center with a briefcase full of traditional medicines. He presented us with a list of 60 different ailments he could cure with his products: hepatitis, malaria, incontinence, etc. While he is from southern Benin, he was trained in traditional medicine at an institute in Mali, and he presented a certification to that effect.

The traveling salesman with his briefcase of medicines and handful of charm necklaces

The pharmacist purchased his hepatitis cure for $2 and was instructed to mix the powder with a cup of honey and to consume one tablespoon every morning and night until the product was finished. I later pointed out to her that the product looked like ash, so she tasted it, declared it tasted like ash, and swore she had been swindled.

The hepatitis cure

The same salesman tried to sell me a powder that he said would ensure that every single person kept every promise to me for the rest of my life. For $10, it sounded like a steal! He instructed me to mix it with lotion and spread it on my skin. He was also selling charm necklaces to put around children to help them with teething and more.

This powder will make everyone I know keep their promises to me for the rest of my life.

Before he left, he made a prophecy to my friend. He said that she was the victim of malicious witchcraft and told her to do kindness to twins in order to set things straight. He himself claimed to be the only surviving brother of a set of triplets, which in the Beninese mindset means that he absorbed the powers of his dead brothers and is now somewhat superhuman.

While some of the products may be legitimate, obviously parts of what the salesman said would raise a red flag to any American. Traditional medicine, however, is very popular with the Beninese, and it is even recognized by the Ministry of Health.

One place I often see sellers of traditional medicine is on the bus to or from Cotonou. A salesman always boards the bus about halfway through the trip, and he hawks his wares to a captive audience for 30 minutes until he can catch a bus in the opposite direction. Like many traditional medicines, some of his products are claimed to have six or more purposes: you can cure cavities and have a memory aid all in one bottle!

However, one need not depend on a traveling salesman for such products. Whenever a Beninese person is sick, his first recourse is generally home-brewed traditional medicine. He will go out and find the necessary roots or leaves to make a cure for his ailment. When my friend's baby was a picky eater, for instance, she prepared a special brew that was to be used in two ways to induce appetite: she bathed her son in it, and she also gave him some to drink.

Our pharmacist prepared this drink to cure an ailment.

Since I work at the health center, I encourage villagers to rely on the proven medicines we sell there, but my advice often falls on deaf ears. Even my colleagues at the health center use traditional medicine. When I described to a school principal the rigorous testing our Western medicine undergoes before being marketed, he dismissed such testing, saying, "In Benin, if you give a medicine to ten people and two get better, we say it's a cure." Given how much cheaper traditional medicine is than Western medicine, it is no surprise that we have a hard time getting sick people to seek treatment at the health center.

At the Pump

Now that the dry season has begun and many wells have nearly dried up, the villagers in Sonsoro are increasingly reliant on the pump. The pump provides cleaner water than the well, but at a price: 5 cents for a six-gallon jug or bowl, whereas the well is free.

There are about 10 faucet pumps in Sonsoro. These pumps receive water from the water tower, which is filled with water using a motorized pump. The water tower empties out very frequently, often within a day of being filled, and the pumps cannot give water again until the water tower has been refilled. For whatever reason, the water tower often remains empty, which is one of the major reasons that water is difficult to acquire during the dry season. When the wells have dried out and the faucet pumps have no water, all of the village depends on our two foot pumps and one hand pump, which work at all times (except when broken!).

Recently, one of my good friends became a pump operator, and he told me more about how the system works. Each faucet pump has a meter that tracks the number of cubic meters of water that have been dispensed. For each cubic meter, the pump operator collects $2, of which he keeps 20%. The remaining 80% is remitted to an agent who collects it on behalf of the village government. From the records, it looked like the pump operator might dispense 4-8 cubic meters of water per day.

My friend got his job when the last pump operator was fired for stealing money. While the theft was easy to catch from the pump records, that only applies to the faucet pumps. The foot pumps and hand pump have no meter, so the pump operator simply reports how much money he claimed to take in and gives 80% of the money to the town hall agent. Even my pump operator friend did not know how the village government uses the money.

My friend at his pump

A woman and child at the well

A Peace Corps Volunteer working a foot pump in another village

Yayi Boni Comes to Sonsoro

Last Saturday, the Beninese president, Yayi Boni, came to Sonsoro. He chose my village to celebrate the start of the cotton-selling season. Cotton is one of Benin's top commodities, especially in my region of the country.

The president's visit sparked a festival-like atmosphere, with huge tents, dozens of food vendors, traveling musicians, and horsemen. Road crews even came before the event to level out our pothole-riddled dirt road into town.

Piles of cotton provided decor for the event. This one had a sign for the president.

Trucks full of cotton

Attendees literally came by the truckload.

A traveling band from Parakou

Peulh horsemen

The president arrived in style.

Can you spy the president? He's near the left wearing a grey cowboy hat and white shirt and has his back to the camera.

Beninese Wives

Earlier this week, my best friend in village informed me that her husband had decided that she was no longer allowed to spend time with me. While my conduct in their household has been irreproachable, the husband is merely exercising what he views as his right to control his wife's life.

In Benin, or at least in my region of the country, men and women generally accept that the husband can give orders to his wife. In particular, a woman's movements are dependent on her husband's permission. For instance, when I wanted to invite a colleague to attend a training in Parakou, she agreed but said she needed permission from her husband. Her husband vetoed the idea, so I had to invite someone else to the training.

In another example, twice a month I participate in health education sessions with my Amour et Vie team. When we started, the female member of our team was separated from her husband, so she was free to attend our sessions as she pleased. In the spring, however, she moved back in with her husband, and now she can no longer attend our sessions without permission from her him. Her attendance has thus declined from nearly 100% to now less than 50%.

In the case of my friend I mentioned initially, her husband has long been oppressive. The list of examples could go on and on, but to give one example, her husband does not allow her to leave the house - even to buy food from the market - unless he accompanies her (which he rarely does). She is essentially a prisoner in her own home.

While this post touches on Beninese domestic life (though it barely scratches the surface of wives' suffering), Beninese women live hard lives from birth to death. Another recent example: one of my girls' camp attendees, one of the brightest students in her class, was pulled out of middle school definitively this year because her parents were forcing her into marriage.

For an interesting read on the subject of girls and women in developing countries, I recommend Half the Sky by Sheryl WuDunn and Nicholas Kristof. In particular, I was impressed by the authors' ability to distinguish effective development projects from ineffective/damaging ones. Happy reading!

Mailing Address

Just a quick note...

When I was on vacation in the US, some friends and relatives asked for my mailing address. While this information is buried in my blog somewhere, it requires some patience to find it, so I have added it to a tab at the top of this page to make the information more easily accessible.

Return from Mecca

Last Saturday, I returned to village after my vacation in the US to find 40 people camped out in the courtyard I share with my neighbors. It seems my landlord had just returned from his pilgrimage to Mecca (this pilgrimage, called the "Hajj," is one of the five pillars of Islam), and his family, friends, and fellow villagers dropped by to welcome his return. The Hajj is particularly prestigious in my Muslim community because it is impossible for most local Muslims due to the expenses involved. The trip costs $4000-6000, which is unaffordable for nearly everyone around (the median wage in Benin is $1.25 per day).

My landlord, however, is considered to be the wealthiest man in the village. In fact, he sent his wife on the Hajj last year, and she had a similar homecoming upon her return. The Hajj is timed to the lunar calendar, like all Muslim holidays, and it always falls around Tabaski. The lunar calendar does not quite align with our Western, solar calendar, so the date moves up about 11 days each year.

Having completed the Hajj, my landlord will be held in even greater regard in our community. Instead of being simply referred to by his name, Yacoubou, he will now be addressed as Al Hajj Yacoubou (my spelling of this title is phonetic; please forgive me if it is wrong). To honor his return, hundreds of people came to our courtyard to welcome him, and some of these people, having traveled great distances, stayed overnight or longer. This mass of well-wishers is the scene that I found in my courtyard upon my return from vacation.

The swarms of visitors quickly tried my patience. To make more room for their guests, in my absence, my neighbors cleared all of my belongings off of my porch, and each day the guests spread large plastic mats out on my porch to relax on. My neighbors dumped everything from my porch into a pile on the side of my house, and in the process, some of my belongings disappeared, never to be seen again. After a few days, I returned my remaining belongings to their rightful place on the porch, only to discover the next day that they had been removed again! This game continued several days in a row, until the morning when I awoke to discover that instead of putting my porch things into a neat pile, they had just scattered them about the yard. That was the end of my patience on that matter.

Another point of frustration related to food. For the first few days after my return, my neighbor constantly asked me about what gift I had brought him from the US. I had not brought him anything (he would be about the 50th person on my gift-giving list for Benin), so I initially tried to playfully bat away his question. When he kept insisting, I eventually silenced him by pointing out that in their many days of festivities, they had never offered me any food, which is extremely rude by Beninese standards. I came to regret that because then he did have someone offer me food, and what they brought me looked so revolting that I imagine it must have been the anus of the goat they had slaughtered. I have never seen a more disgusting piece of meat, though as a vegetarian, I admit that my tolerance is low. Worse, they chose to slaughter both goats behind my house - far from the view of their own homes.

Unfortunately, this celebration has already lasted a week and a half, though I am hopeful that it may end soon. For my sanity, it needs to. Some of the guests are already awake by 4 am and making noise, whereas others are loud until midnight, so the disruption is nearly constant. Another frustration: my neighbors raided and emptied my reserve water supply while I was gone.

As stressful as this has been, it was just one of many challenges upon my return to village. While I was away, many insects took up residence in my unoccupied home, and at least a dozen lizards moved in to eat them. No matter how hard I work to eliminate the insect population, the lizards refuse to move out of their new home. While I was away, one of the lizards drowned himself in my bucket of shower water that I had forgotten to dump out, so I found his decomposing body in my bucket when I got back. It took a lot of bleach to be comfortable using that bucket again. In another assault from the animal kingdom, a wasp has decided to build her nest in my bedroom. I destroyed it as soon as I found it, and by the next day she had already rebuilt it.

As you can imagine, even though I just got back, I think I need another vacation already!

Tabaski

I'm back!

I took a vacation from Benin and a simultaneous vacation from this blog, but now that I am back in the country, I will start updating this blog regularly again.

While I was away, I missed one of the biggest local holidays: Tabaski. Even though it is a Muslim holiday, you may very well know the story on which it is based because Islam shares its roots with Christianity and Judaism. In this case, the shared story is about Abraham.

In Islam as in Christianity, the story goes that God asked Abraham to offer his son as a sacrifice. As a faithful servant of God, Abraham accepted, but at the last moment, God allowed Abraham to sacrifice an animal instead.

To commemorate this event today, devout Muslims slaughter a sheep or ram on the day of Tabaski. Families with sufficient means slaughter at least one animal, and they share with their neighbors and the less fortunate to demonstrate their charity.

This year, Tabaski fell on October 15. However, the date changes every year because Muslims follow a lunar calendar; last year's Tabaski was later in October.

Since rams and sheep are in such demand for Tabaski, they are very expensive as the holiday approaches. In my village, Muslims with foresight buy their animals well in advance when they are cheaper. My neighbors, for instance, bought two sheep in the spring, when they cost about $30 each. They fattened the animals up over the summer, and by Tabaski they had two fat animals for slaughter. If they had purchased the animals in October instead, they would have cost $100 each.

For the meat lovers out there, maybe you should consider a trip to West Africa next fall. You might just need a strong stomach if you are not used to seeing your supper killed in front of you.

And for the Christians out there, did you have any idea that you shared this story with Muslims? You have a lot more in common than you may realize.

A Baptism

Last week, I attended the baptism of my colleague's newborn. In accordance with the local Muslim tradition, the ceremony was performed a week after the child's birth. Hundreds of people attended the event and I saw almost every person I knew there. Even though the mother lives in Kandi, the event was held in Sonsoro, the father's fiefdom. The baby is the father's ninth child but his wife's first. The father is polygamous and had his other children with four other wives, only one of whom is still married to him.

The celebration consisted of at least four components. Early in the morning, the baby was officially named: Rabia. The name was chosen by the father from a choice of three names given to him. Over the few hours that followed, there was an informal receiving line. Each guest popped into the bedroom to take a look at the baby, then congratulated the father and offered him a cash gift as a token of affection. Most gifts ranged from 20 cents to $1, and the amount was intended to reflect the giver's affection for the father. As this process went on, the imam took advantage of the gathered crowd to preach. At the same time, everyone sat around eating a meal offered by the father of the new baby.

In preparation for the ceremony, the family had purchased 100 pounds of rice and unknown quantities of pasta, meat, and eggs. My plate of pasta and sauce was brought to me with five hard-boiled eggs, and I was expected to eat them all. Each guest was also given a soft drink, quite an expense considering that the cost of a single drink is equivalent to half of the median daily pay for a Beninese person.

The baptism prompted a whirlwind of rumor and gossip in the afternoon that followed the event. I got an earful during the hour or two I spent in the village shop. Until the baptism, the father had kept this wife a secret from all but his closest friends, so the unexpected wife and pregnancy set the village abuzz. The fact that the wife was of a different ethnicity and substantially younger than the father (she's still a teenager) made the news juicier yet. There were also rumors flying that the father's other wife had shunned the new mother since the latter arrived for the baptism.

All in all, the event was a major milestone in the week. Since babies are born on a daily basis in Sonsoro and I only occasionally hear of baptisms of much magnitude, I assume that the grandeur of the event is related to the father's social status and wealth. He is, after all, one of the few men in village to draw a salary and he is also a Bariba king. In any case, congratulations to the new father.

Mr. FanMan

Some of the most pleasant snacks on a hot day in Benin come from the FanMilk product line, which is composed of ice cream and frozen treats. FanMilk carts are pushed or pedaled around town, accompanied by the blow of a handheld horn so that passerbys know what's coming. Peace Corps Volunteers have a nickname for the man who pushes the cart: the FanMan.

The name FanMan reminded me of the '50s song "Mr. Sandman" performed by the Chordettes, so I retooled the lyrics from the song to make it a plea to the FanMan instead. So without further ado...


Mr. FanMan
To the tune of "Mr. Sandman" by the Chordettes

Mr. FanMan, bring me ice cream.
Make it the sweetest that I've ever seen.
Give me choco, just like Russell Stover.
Please tell me that my hungry days are over.

FanMan, I want Coldstone.
What I would give for a waffle cone!
Out here there is no Dairy Queen.
Mr. FanMan, bring me ice cream.

Mr. FanMan, bring me ice cream.
Make it the sweetest that I've ever seen.
Please come to me whenever you rover.
Just tell me that my hungry days are over.

FanMan, I want Coldstone.
What I would give for a waffle cone!
Out here there is no Dairy Queen.
Mr. FanMan, bring me ice cream.

Mr. FanMan, bring us ice cream.
Give me some Fan Yogo, to make true my dream.
And you can warm my heart with some Fan Vanille.
Blend that with mangoes and let's drink a smoothie.

Mr. FanMan, something real cold
Would be so peachy when it's so chaud.
So please turn on your magic beam.
Mr. FanMan, bring us, please, please, please,
Mr. FanMan, bring us ice cream.

Notes:
Fan Choco, Fan Yogo, and Fan Vanille are names of flavors.
The last syllable of 'Vanille' is more or less pronounced like -ee.
'Chaud' rhymes with 'so' and means hot. Peace Corps Volunteers tend to use the French word even when speaking English to each other.


For those of you who don't remember/know the original song, here it is on YouTube:

And finally, some photos of the FanMan and his products:

A volunteer buying a product from the FanMan

Some FanMilk products - rip off a corner with your teeth and enjoy!

How to Speak Beninese French - Part III

Now that we have mastered the grammar of Beninese French and seen some of its vocabulary nuances, it is time to add the twists and turns of language that make Beninese French so distinctly Beninese.

Here are some tricks for transforming standard French into something that is truly Beninese:

Greetings are essential and can be elaborate.
In France: Bonjour. (Hello.)
In Benin: Bonjour. Comment ca va? Et la fatigue d'hier? Et ton mari? Et ton enfant? (Hello. How are you? How is your fatigue from yesterday? How is your husband? How is your child?)
*Note: Some greetings are specific to Benin, such as bonne arrivee (happy arrival). Also, the Beninese switch from bonjour (good morning) to bonsoir (good evening) at noon, whereas the French switch at sunset.

Add extra precision to any statement.
In France: Ta jupe est jolie. (Your skirt is pretty.)
In Benin: La jupe que tu portes la, c'est bien jolie. (The skirt that you're wearing there, it's very pretty.)


Constantly check for comprehension.
In France: Hier je suis allee voir mon pere. (Yesterday I went to see my father.)
In Benin:  Tu vois mon papa, non? Hein? Tu vois qui c'est, non? Ou bien? Hein? Hier la, d'accord, ce que j'ai fait hier la, c'est que je suis allee voir mon papa. Hein? Tu as compris, non? Ou bien? Hier la, je suis allee voir mon papa. C'est ca, hein. (You know who my dad is, don't you? Right? You know who he is, don't you? Or do you? Ok? So yesterday then, ok, what I did yesterday then, it's that I went to see my dad. Ok? You understand, right? Or do you? Yesterday then, I went to see my dad. That's what I did, ok.


Add "la" ("there") wherever necessary to help your listener follow.
In France: J'aime ta chemise. (I like your shirt.)
In Benin: Ta chemise la, ce que tu portes la, j'aime ca trop. (Your shirt there, the one you're wearing there, I love that too much.)

The Beninese are direct. French notions of politeness are unnecessary, meaning there is no need to use the conditional tense, to phrase a request as a question, to use the polite form of you (vous), or to say please.
In France: Pourriez-vous me preter ton stylo, s'il vous plait. (Could you please lend me your pen?)
In Benin: Donne-moi ton bic. (Give me your pen.)


However, to soften the abruptness of a demand, you can add "ou bien".
In Benin: Tu vas me chercher de l'eau. Ou bien? (You're going to go get me water. Or will you)

Another tip: as you speak, roll your r's instead of doing the throaty 'r' you hear in France.

Now, to put it all together, here's an example of how to tell a student to share a lesson we learned in class with his parents.

Tu vas faire quelque chose, d'accord? Ce que tu vas faire, la, tu vas faire ca a la maison. D'accord? Tu as compris? Quand tu vas quitter ici, tu vas a la maison, non? Ou bien? Quand tu vas a la maison, c'est la que tu vas aller faire la chose. D'accord? Ce que tu vas faire, la, tu vas chercher ton papa. D'accord? Et tu vas chercher maman aussi. D'accord? Donc tu vas chercher les deux parents. Tu es bien d'accord? Tu as compris, non? Ou bien? Ah hun. Donc quand tu as papa devant toi et tu as maman devant toi, tu vas leur dire quelque chose. D'accord? Et c'est quoi tu vas leur dire? Ce que tu vas leur dire, la, c'est que a partir de ce soir, ils vont dormir sous moustiquaire. Tu es bien d'accord? Tu as compris? Ou bien tu n'as pas compris? Ce que tu vas leur dire, la, c'est que ce soir la, et demain soir la, et tous les soirs, tes parents la, eux, tes parents la, eux ils vont toujours dormir sous moustiquaire. C'est ca, non? Ils vont toujours dormir sous moustiquaire. C'est bon, non? Tu es d'accord, non? Tu vas le faire, non? Ah hun. C'est bon. C'est bon comme ca.

(You're going to do something, ok? What you're going to do, there, you are going to do that at home. Ok? You understood? When you are going to leave here, you are going home, aren't you? Aren't you? When you go home, that's where you're going to go do the thing. Ok? What you're going to do, there, you are going to find your dad. Ok? And you are going to find your mom, too. Ok? So you are going to find both parents. Do you agree with that? You understood, didn't you? Don't you? Good. So when you have dad in front of you and you have mom in front of you, you are going to tell them something. Ok? And it's what that you are going to tell them? What you are going to tell them, there, it's that as of tonight, they are going to sleep under mosquito net. You agree with that? You understood? Or you didn't understand? What you're going to tell them, there, is that tonight, there, and tomorrow night, there, and every night, your parents, there, them, your parents, there, them, they're always going to sleep under mosquito net. That's it, isn't it? They're always going to sleep under mosquito net. That's good, isn't it? You agree, don't you? You'll do it, won't you? Good. That's good. It's good like that.

Et voila! There you have it, the three part course to speaking Beninese French. Du courage!

How to Speak Beninese French - Part II

In the last post, I explained how grammar rules differ between Beninese French and the French of France. In this post, I'd like to share how (local) Beninese French uses specific phrasing and vocabulary that is a direct translation of Bariba, hence why it does not align with the French you would hear in France.

Here are some examples:

In France: Il a plu hier. (It rained yesterday.)
In Benin: La pluie est venue hier. (The rain came yesterday. [From Bariba's "Gura ka na", literally, "rain it came".])

In France: Je suis tombe en panne. (I had a breakdown.)
In Benin: J'ai connu une panne sur la voie. OR J'ai trouve une panne sur la voie. (I encountered a [my own] breakdown on the way.)

In France: Je ne veux pas beaucoup. (I don't want very much.)
In Benin: Je veux un peu un peu seulement. (I want a little a little only.)

In France: Je sens l'odeur. (I smell the smell.)
In Benin: J'entends l'odeur. (I hear the smell.)

In France: Je suis a Kandi maintenant. (I am in Kandi now.)
In Benin: Je suis a Kandi d'abord. (I am in Kandi first [meaning now].)

How to Speak Beninese French - Part I (Grammar)

I came to Benin last year as a fluent French speaker, and over the past year, I have become fluent in a new language: Beninese French. Admittedly, linguists would surely classify it as a different dialect, not language, but this dialect of French comes with its own vocabulary, grammatical structures, and rules. More specifically, I should say that I speak the French of northern Benin, which is highly influenced by our local language, Bariba.

Here is a basic primer on Beninese French grammar:

Gender is flexible.
In France: Sara a dit qu'elle va bien. (Sara said she is doing well.)
In Benin: Sara a dit qu'il va bien. (Sara said that he [Sara] is doing well.)

Articles are optional.
In France: Je vais porter une chemise et une jupe. (I'm going to wear a shirt and a skirt.)
In Benin: Je vais porter chemise avec jupe. (I'm going to wear shirt with skirt.)


When ordering something, the quantity is indicated at the end.
In France: Je voudrais 2 bananes et 4 goyaves. (I would like 2 bananas and 4 guavas.
In Benin: Je vais prendre bananes 2 et goyaves 4. (I'll take bananas 2 and guavas 4.)

Some subjects can be replaced with objects.
In France: Il va venir demain. (He is going to come tomorrow.)
In Benin: Lui va venir demain. (Him is going to come tomorrow.)

Subjunctive is rarely (or never?) used.
In France: Il est important qu'il vienne a midi. (It's important that he come at noon.)
In Benin: Il est important qu'il va venir a midi. (It's important that he is going to come at noon.)

Mistakes don't matter! Benin is infinitely easier than France for the non-native French speaker because everyone makes mistakes and no one cares.

Photos: Snot Sauce

Last week, I wrote about okra sauce, whose non-tomato version is known as "snot sauce" amongst volunteers. This week, I took some photos of a friend's okra sauce so that you could see what the basic okra sauce looks like and in doing so, understand how it got its nickname.

The traditional, basic okra sauce

Here, my friend made her okra sauce more sophisticated by adding pureed basil leaves, hence the extra green color.

Recipe: Okra Sauce

 Okra abounds this time of year, including in my own backyard, so I invited a friend over a few weeks ago to teach me how to make okra sauce. Standard okra sauce has a distinctly mucous-like texture and color, which is why it is known amongst Peace Corps Volunteers as "snot sauce", but my friend and I made the more delicious and non-snotty version that calls for tomato paste.

So how do you make non-snotty okra sauce? First, wash your okra and slice them into thin slices.

Next, heat up some palm oil and mix in a can of tomato paste.

Next, add the "sauce ingredients" and salt. Anything that doesn't come in powdered form needs to be pureed in advance.

Top left: hot pepper powder. Top right: garlic. Bottom left: pepper. Bottom right: a mysterious ingredient specific to this region. Not pictured: salt.

Also stir in this ingredient, which the Beninese call "mustard". It in no way resembles the mustard of the Western world, but it adds a unique flavor to the sauce.

Next, toss in your okra and some water. To speed up cooking time, add some potasse, which will make the okra cook faster.

Potasse to reduce cooking time and save on charcoal.

The sauce is almost ready.

When the okra is cooked, it is time to eat. Here in Sonsoro, we eat okra sauce with akassa or pate.

Time to eat! We enjoyed our sauce with some akassa made by my friend's wife.

Bon appetit!

The Rainy Season

After months of waiting, the rainy season has finally begun. I have already written about northern Benin's other two seasons - harmattan, the cool season from December to February, and chaleur, the hot season from March to May - but the rainy season that makes up the rest of the year was very slow to get started. Much to the chagrin of local farmers, plus myself, we experienced a drought for the first few months of rainy season. Now, however, the season has begun in earnest.

Over the last two weeks, we have been getting near daily rains. On some days, it can rain for ten hours at a time, and on other days, we receive downpours that last several hours (given the metal roof on my house, it is impossible to sleep when the rain is coming down). There is no point in going to the well or pump anymore as you can collect all the water you need from home. Some people, like me, have cisterns, but others just put out large bowls to catch the rainwater off the roof.

Since the rest of the year is dry as a bone, the rainy season is the only time of year for farming. Nearly everyone in my village farms, so during this season, the village is deserted. Most families have country homes that they move to in order to be closer to their fields, and they only come into village on market day (once every four days).

When it is actually raining, even the few people who stay in village during the farming season do not leave their homes. If you have scheduled a meeting, it will not be held until after the rain stops, even if that takes six hours.

While the rain on the whole is welcome, the vast quantities can complicate things, especially transportation. We only have dirt roads in village, and they are cratered with potholes, so the rains turn our roads into a series of lakes. Some of these large puddles can be 20 feet wide and 10 feet across.

I, for one, am glad to have the rains. It has vastly simplified the watering of my garden, and I can finally use as much water as I want at home without worrying about shortages, especially since the pump has no water most of the time. This bliss will be short-lived, unfortunately, since the heavy rains should stop in a few weeks and the rain will stop altogether a month or so after that. Then we will once again go through the dry season...

More on Radio Kandi

A few weeks ago I wrote about the Kandi radio station and my new radio show, but after spending an hour and a half yesterday with one of the radio announcers, I have more information to add.

The radio announcer explained to me in detail the structure of the station. They are only on-air in the morning and evenings. If you tune in to 102.9 in the afternoon or the wee hours of the night, you should just hear static.

Due to the lack of print media and televisions in the region, the radio is the primary source of information for locals. Therefore, the station provides programming and news in the four local languages of their coverage area (Bariba, Dendi, Peulh, and Mokalai), plus French. There are two radio announcers for each language, and the announcer I was speaking to does programming in Dendi. Every morning and every night, the day's news is reported in each local language for 15 minutes each, then for 30 minutes in French. The radio announcers also produce other programming and record paid advertisements in their respective local languages.

Paid programming and advertisements take a variety of forms. Non-governmental organizations can pay to buy a block of time on the radio (eg, 30 minutes), and those in partnership with the station can get discounted rates. Advertisements are recorded by a local language announcer for a $10 fee, and then the advertiser is charged based on the number of times they want the spot to air. A common source of revenue for the station is legal notices and death notices. One foreign aid group has contracted with the station to air a message every evening reminding listeners to get under their mosquito nets.

The radio's range is 30-50 miles, and the radio is the source for all the critical information for the region. Last week, for example, some villagers reported having heard on the radio that any resident of Sonsoro who wants electricity in his home should purchase a meter from the savings institution in Kandi. When the news is reported, the announcers share local news first, then news for all of Benin, then West Africa, then Africa, then the rest of the world. In general, the radio is very popular in Benin and widely listened to.

The radio station in Kandi has a staff of 15-20 people and is under the supervision of the national radio bureau. One responsibility of the national radio bureau, for example, is to approve any changes to the station's programming.

In my last post on the radio station, I wondered how the station could be successful considering that they do not operate a generator and the power is often out in Kandi. I learned yesterday that they used to run a generator when the power went out, but they had to stop when they replaced some of their equipment with more sensitive technology that might blow out if they run the generator. They are working on a solution to this problem so that they can always operate the radio during their regular hours.

As for my show itself, I now have a co-host. Another health volunteer recently transferred to Kandi, so we will now do the show together. We recorded our first joint show on malaria, and we will record the shows together whenever possible. One advantage of a co-host is that if I know I will be absent for a few weeks, I can entrust the show to my partner instead of trying to record multiple shows in advance.

I'm signing off for today. Catch you next time!

Ramadan

Thursday marked the end of Ramadan, the Muslim holy month. Ramadan is a month of fasting and prayer. Since I live in a predominantly Muslim village (at least 80% of the population practices Islam), Ramadan was widely observed.

Muslims fast during Ramadan from sunrise to sunset, which is defined in my village as being from 5:30 am to 7:20 pm. No food or liquid (not even water) can be consumed during those hours, but you can gorge yourself to your heart's delight during the night. Muslims in Sonsoro wake up early to eat before the sun rises. Some wake up as early as 2 am to start cooking, and they eat at 4 am in order to be sure to finish before sunrise.

This year, I fasted for Ramadan in perfect accordance with the rules. I woke up at 4 or 4:30 to eat and drink before the sun rose, and I did not eat or drink again until the sun set at 7:20 pm - even on days when I spent up to 10 hours doing manual labor under the hot sun. I did, however, take advantage of one of the exceptions allowed by Islam: you are not required to fast when traveling.

Islam actually allows many exceptions to fasting. The very young (under 7), the elderly, and the sick do not fast, nor do pregnant women or breastfeeding mothers. A woman also cannot fast when she is menstruating because she is considered unclean. Another exception, as I mentioned, is that you are not required to fast when traveling. However, anyone who misses days of fasting (except children and the elderly) is expected to make up the days at a later time, even if they just make up one day at a time. Another accepted alternative to making up the days is to feed the hungry.

Ramadan is also a month of devotion through prayer. Not unlike Christians who go to church only on Christmas and Easter, Muslims who rarely bother to pray most of the year will make sure to pray the required five times per day during Ramadan. In addition to those five times per day, the faithful do extra praying during the last ten days of Ramadan. This praying, locally called "veillee", starts at midnight each night and continues until 2 or 3 am or even later.

Even though fasting and losing sleep may sound arduous, my Muslim friends are happy to observe Ramadan. They consider the sacrifice worthwhile because they believe that they can expect divine reward in return for their devotion. One friend told me that during Ramadan, God will grant you anything that you desire.

While this year's Ramadan fell from mid-July to mid-August, the same will not be true next year. The dates are based on the lunar calendar, so they advance by roughly ten days every year. Local imams determine the precise dates based on the moon cycle, so the dates may vary across the globe by a day or so based on the local imam's interpretation of the moon cycle. Even within my village, there was disagreement about which day Ramadan should officially start, so some Muslims started fasting a day sooner than others.

Now that Ramadan is over, many local Muslims will go back to skipping their daily prayers and drinking alcohol, despite Islamic teachings to the contrary. As is true for all religions, Islam has a wide spectrum of religious practices and devotion, ranging from ultraconservative to ultraliberal. Here in northern Benin, the practice of Islam tends to be quite relaxed.

Photos: My Garden

As requested, here are some photos of my garden.

Can you spy at least one green bean?

This okra plant sprouted entirely on its own, presumably from an old okra pod discarded by my neighbors.

Radio Kandi

One of my latest projects here is my very own radio show. The Kandi volunteer left Benin a few weeks ago, so I took over her radio show upon her departure. Every Sunday at 10 am, my pre-recorded radio show airs in my region. Like the previous volunteer, my topics vary between health and American culture. I have recorded seven shows so far on topics like good nutrition, pre-natal care, breastfeeding, the 4th of July, and Barack Obama. I divide my lessons into three segments that total about ten minutes, and the rest of my half hour is filled with music.

I record my shows on a nifty handheld record left to me by the previous volunteer, then I transfer them to my computer. Once all the audio and music segments are organized on my computer, I put them on a USB stick, which I later drop off at the radio station.

One curious thing about the radio station is that it does not use a generator. The station only operates when Kandi has power, which is generally less than 50% of the time. That means that on some Sundays, my show must not air because of a power outage. I wonder how that can be a successful business model. The city is supposed to upgrade the electrical grid so that there will be fewer outages, but on a Beninese timeline, that could take years.

Gandos

In a previous post, I wrote that there are predominantly two ethnic groups in Sonsoro: the Baribas and the Peulhs. I neglected to mention a third group that is quite numerous: the Gandos.

Many locals describe Gandos as the slaves of the Peulhs, but it is more complicated than that. In Sonsoro, Gandos are a group of people who are culturally Peulh but ethnically Bariba. Long ago, other tribes would trade prisoners of war to the Peulh in exchange for horses or cattle. These prisoners of war (of Bariba origin in my region) became the slaves of the Peulh - Gandos - and they took on a Peulh cultural identity by wearing Peulh clothing and speaking the Peulh language.

Peulhs no longer accept prisoners of war as slaves, but the Gando tradition continues. Generally, Gandos only marry other Gandos, so a child can be Gando by birth if both of his parents are Gando.

This is not the only way to become a Gando today. A second tradition continues to this day that if a Bariba child is rejected by his parents, he can be adopted by a Peulh family and raised to become a Gando. Often it is babies who are rejected. There is a local superstition against breech birth, so such babies may be abandoned to become Gandos. Another superstition is that if a baby's top front teeth grow in before the bottom front teeth, the child will bring bad luck, so he may be abandoned to be raised by a Peulh family and become a Gando.

I have been told that Gando communities (of various ethnic origins) exist wherever there are Peulhs. The Peulh population itself stretches across all of West Africa, so there may be quite the diversity of Gandos indeed.

Beninese Health and Demographics

I recently came across the results of Benin's 2006 Demographic and Health Survey. Many of the findings were fascinating. Several support my contention that the most important thing Benin can do to promote development is to send children – especially girls – to school.

Here are some of the more interesting findings:

Fertility

Average number of children per woman: 5.7

     If the mother is uneducated: 6.4

     If the mother attended secondary school: 3.4

Marriage

Median marriage age for women: 18.6 years

     If the woman is uneducated: 18.1 years

     If the woman attended secondary school: 22.2 years

Median marriage age for men: 24.5 years

Percentage of men who marry under age 21: 16%

Percentage of women who marry under age 21: 64%

Percentage of women ages 15-49 in polygamous marriages: 43%

Family Planning

Married women using a modern form of contraceptive: 7%

     If the woman is uneducated: 4%

     If the woman attended secondary school: 19%

Reproductive Health

Babies delivered with the assistance of a health professional: 78%

     Babies delivered by a nurse or midwife: 69%

     Babies delivered by a doctor: 5%

     Babies delivered by a nursing assistant: 4%*

(*In my health center, half or more of babies are delivered by the nursing assistant. The others are delivered by the midwife or occasionally the pharmacist. There is no doctor on staff. Perhaps half of births, however, happen at home, even though delivering at home is illegal and subject to a fine.)

Child Health

Children having received all their vaccinations as babies: 47%

     If the mother has no education: 43%

     If the mother has a secondary school education: 80%

Breastfeeding and Nutrition

Children who were breastfed: 95%

Median length of breastfeeding: 21.4 months

Median length of exclusive breastfeeding: 1.7 months*

(*The national recommendation is 6 months. International recommendations range from 4-6 months.)

Children ages 6-59 months with anemia: 78%

Children under age 5 with retarded growth: 43%

Child Mortality

Under 5 mortality rate: 12.5%

     If the mother is uneducated: 14.3%

     If the mother attended secondary school: 8.4%

Female Genital Mutilation

National rate: 13%

Rate in Alibori (my region): 48%

Rate amongst Baribas: 74%

Rate amongst Peulhs: 72%

HIV/AIDS

Prevalence of HIV: 1.2%

Status of Women

Percentage of women who work: 88%

Percentage of these women who decide themselves what to do with their earnings: 87%

Percentage of women who believe a man can beat his wife for a particular reason: 47%

Percentage of women who believe a woman can refuse sexual relations with her husband: 50%

What Is Your Name in Bariba?

For this post, let's play a game. Let's figure out what your name would be in Bariba.

Here are a few principles to help us figure out your name:

1. Your last name is your father's first name, even after marriage.

2. When stating your full name, you say your last name first and your first name last.

3. A child may be given a Muslim or Christian first name, like Mohammed or Thomas, if the family is religious. Otherwise, the parents will give the child a name based on his/her rank in the family (or, as you saw  in an earlier post, based on the child's twin status, if applicable). Even if the child has a Muslim or Christian name, he/she may still be called by his/her rank-based name.

The rank-based names are as follows:

Oldest son: Woru

Second son: Sabi

Third son: Bio

Fourth son: Gouda (yes, that's right, your child could be named Gouda!)

Fifth son: Sanni

Oldest daughter: Gnon

Second daughter: Bana

Third daughter: Bake

Fourth daughter: Bignon

So have you figured out your name? To give you an example, let's take Obama's oldest daughter, Malia. In the simplest sense, her full name would be Barack Malia because her father's first name is her last name and the last name goes first.

But if we want to make her more Bariba yet, we could call her Barack Gnon because she is the first daughter. Since Barack himself is his mother's oldest son, he would be Woru. If you want to take Malia's name a step further, we could pretend that Barack's parents never named him Barack and only called him Woru, in which case Malia's name would be Woru Gnon. Obama's second daughter, Sasha, would be Woru Bana.

And you? What would your name be?

Bariba Bread

One remnant of French colonization in Benin is bread. There are multiple kinds of bread available in the north, but there is one that predominates in Sonsoro. We call it Bariba bread because it is found in Bariba villages. It is baked in large mud ovens and sold for for 20 cents per loaf. Loaves are small, usually 4"x4"x3". When you get Bariba bread fresh, it is delicious. Below are a few pictures.

A bread oven (it's taller than me!)

A few loaves of bread

Girls of the Future, the Kandi Girls' Camp

Today concluded a week-long regional girls' camp organized by local Peace Corps volunteers. We called the camp "Girls of the Future" because that is what we were training the girls to be. We motivated them stay in school in order to fulfill their career dreams, and we also taught them about how to stay healthy, be good shepherds of the environment, and more. We are hoping that they will apply the lessons learned to their own lives and also be models for their communities.

Nine volunteers ran the camp and we invited girls from nine villages, for a grand total of 28 girls. Each volunteer invited the top 3-6 girls from his/her local middle school. During camp, I led or facilitated sessions on puberty, reproductive health, pregnancy, nutrition, diarrhea, potable water, hygiene, malaria, the importance of education, careers, sexual harassment, and more. Since it was a residential camp, the girls stayed in dorms and ate all their meals on site.

Overall, I was very impressed with the girls. As corny as it may sound, they made me feel very hopeful for Benin's future.

Here are some photos:

These girls are performing a skit on sanitation practices. The girl on the right is pretending to defecate in a pond from which many others get drinking water, and the girl on the left is explaining to her why she should not do that.

Group photo at the end of camp

My Gardening Adventure

I decided last year that I wanted to have a garden in Benin, and now my plans are finally coming to fruition. With the help of a Peace Corps volunteer and a local teacher who loves gardening but has no room for one at his house, I now have this lovely garden in my backyard:

My garden! The man in the picture is my gardening friend. And see those two six-gallon yellow jugs? That's what I use to fetch water (50 lbs when full).

As you can see, there are about a dozen garden beds, including two nurseries. One nursery is covered with leaves, and the other with a white cloth, to reduce the intensity of the sun and to help keep the plants moist all day. When the plants in the nursery grow larger, they will be transplanted to some of my empty garden beds.

My major problem for the moment is water. The rainy season has not really started yet, so we are only getting once-a-week rains. My garden, however, needs to be watered twice a day. That means that for the most part, I have to fetch all the water to water my garden from a local pond or pump. Each water run takes 15-20 minutes, and some days I do eight water runs or more. Ultimately, I have been dedicating 2-4 hours each day to the garden. Here's hoping I get some good eating out of it!


Most gardening work is done with a short hoe. Every Beninese person owns one of these because nearly every Beninese person works in the fields during the rainy season, and all such work is done by hand (no tractors!). The hoe is good for digging, weeding, and most everything else. I have personally found the club-like part that holds the blade to be useful for clubbing scorpions.

As for other pests, look closely in the first picture and you can see the fence we built to keep my neighbors' chickens out.  Snails are also a pest here, so whenever I see one, I chuck it over the wall. If snails really become a problem, I have been advised to set up a beer trap for them: stick a bowl of beer in your garden to attract the snails, and the next day you will have collected a bowl of snails who were attracted to the beer, climbed in, then got too drunk to climb out.

As for whether this garden is successful, only time will tell. I am also working on spin-offs to make this garden relevant to my work in my community. In the meantime, pray for rain, but not too much!