its been awhile since i've updated my blog. i haven't felt like writing.
i am sitting on karen's porch. she is playing guitar and singing. Jen is reading a Joe Abercrombie novel. i am blogging.
i just got a togocell USB modem that makes this possible. it is really cool cause it connects over the cellular network. too bad i dont any togocell reseau in village. or electricity.
karen made some kind of soup today with butternut squash and carrots from my garden. it was delicious. i think it was like cream of butternut squash soup or something like that.
i also ate iguana, or some other comparable large lizard today. it tasted like a cross between pork and chicken. togolese love it.
i woke up one morning last week and staggered out of my my bedroom in my usual morning fog. i had to dance around the pieces of a bat that nigarmi left in the middle of my floor. he looked at me and went "meow."
the next morning i got outside before i saw anything weird. then it was little David beating a knife blade against a metal basin and cooing. until he saw me and started screaming.
Last week was post visit week. this is when new trainees leave training, or stage, and go spend a week at their new posts. This was kind of a bittersweet week. it's always really fun, if somewhat nerve wracking, to meet new people. but this means that karen has about 3 weeks before she leaves. Her replacement seems pretty cool. we had a post-visit party on friday night for the new people in west Kara. then, on saturday, we had a big party in Kara for all the new people in our region. it was a fun weekend.
Saturday was also really cool because the Guerin-Kouka girls football team went to play the Kara girls football team. Karen and i went to watch the match before the post-visit party. Kouka tied Kara 1-1! Kara scored in the first half, then Kouka scored the equalizer on what was easily the prettiest goal i've seen in girls football here. Kouka's goalie had several spectacular saves too.
It was really awesome because Kouka is out in the sticks of west Kara; they were easily the underdogs. The fact that they could come in and tie Kara is pretty cool and goes a long way to promoting girls football in the region.
it was cool enough that i forgave Kouka for beating Nampoch 1-0 on Wednesday in their warm-up match.
the weather here is changing. i noticed it when i got back up from Atakpame a couple weeks ago. the rains have stopped for the most part, to the detriment of my garden. there is a haze in the sky during the day now; everything looks dustier. it gets cold(er) at nights. the plants have that spicy smell they get when they are about done growing. everything is dustier now that the rains have stopped. harmattan is coming . . . and then hot season.