Ice cream fantasia

I guess we should begin with the women’s school, to establish continuity and ease you, the reader, into this weeks exciting instalment of the amazing adventures of Jo and Edd. The major reason for this is that we feel discussing a full week of diarrhoea and vomiting (squirting from both ends as Edd likes to say; rather a problem when done concurrently) would put anyone sensible right off. Suffice it to say we didn’t spend much on food…

Well, on Saturday we painted the outside of the women’s school, in the rather fetching shade of white chosen by Dr Dongo (from the Congo) and Edd the week before. We had thought that we were starting at 7.30, with the alarm set for 6.45, only to be awoken by Atticho at 6.30 asking where the paint brushes were! Once again there were so many helpers that there was nothing for us to do, so we played with children and made helpful (irritating) comments… Once we had finished, we enjoyed Chapaleau (the local beer, named after a thirsty Frenchman’s exclamation ‘Ce n’est pas l’eau!!!’), fried dough, and a funky soya bean cheese. Chapaleau tastes much as one imagines silage to taste like, but grows on one with astonishing speed, all I can say is lucky cows, I might have to have a nibble next time I go for a walk in the country…

Once again we have benefited from the kindness and generosity of the locals. Once we finished painting we were invited round to young Marcel’s house to meet his (appropriately named) fiancée, Parfait. Here we enjoyed yam chips with tomato sauce whilst chatting to accountancy students from the local technical college. Parfait was properly (we guess) shy and demure, and sat with her face turned away, not speaking and waiting on us hand and foot. All the students live in one or two room houses (they and their hordes of ankle biters), and Marcel was no exception, except his house has no electricity which apparently makes it difficult to study at night.

Sunday we travelled to Elie’s home village of Mira to see the baptism of his second child, a daughter and a mere two weeks old. Fourteen miles away as the crow flies, we travelled on the back of motos, Joanna insisting on the provision of a helmet. Elie’s village was a traditional village of local houses (much in the layout of a zulu kraal) of mud huts, which are vastly superior to our modern housing as they keep cool. The church service was deafening, they had three western drums and were not scared of hitting them hard, and afterwards we enjoyed a feast of Pate and chicken along with peanut sauce with the congregation before going to Elie’s house to have a feast of chicken, rice and spaghetti with tomato sauce. Our tummies were so full that the ride back was not nearly so fun as the ride there, but we made it in the end.

Once we were home we had an hour to relax, before going to professor Koutia’s house for yet another delicious feast. You may have got the impression that we are just swanning around socialising and having fun, but you would be wrong, having forgotten the afternoon siesta… We sleep lots too.

Okay, we must also make some mention of the heat. Having scoffed a few weeks ago that even though it is incredibly hot here the people still whinge that it is cold, I must utter an unreserved apology. Leaving the house on Wednesday morning, we were immediately shocked by the heat, with one of the students telling us that ‘it’s starting to get hot!’ The temperature is now above forty, and humidity has risen markedly. I can also say that the old song line ‘mad dogs and Englishmen out in the midday sun’ is wrong. Even the dogs find shade. We also have a video player in our house, which seems to work in the evening (when it is cooler) but not in the day. Anyway, we watched ‘Home Alone 2’ (which is either bloody brilliant, or we have not watched enough television for the last few months) where the hero goes all out on room service and orders pot after pot of ice cream. Never has a craving been so strong.

Again on Wednesday, Joanna dressed up in African clothes, to the great delight of everyone at chapel in the morning. Joseph, the most adept student with a paintbrush up a ladder, decided to complete the African outfit by donating his one year old child Jacque, as no African women is seen without this most essential fashion accessory, a child strapped to the back. Jo swiftly proved that she likes the local children more than they like her…

Another amusing thing for Edd was that Dr Dongo (from the Congo)’s daughter, Gloria and friends (Alice and Delores) braided Joanna’s hair so that she now looks like a hippy eco warrior. Not only was this immensely painful at the time, but Joanna was robbed of sleep for days afterwards. Brilliant.

And finally, today’s cultural spot. There is a statue in the centre of Dapaong of (at first sight) a man and a woman (with rather wonderful shadows), arms round each others shoulders, presumably walking together into a bright future of togetherness blah de blah de blah. But then one notices that the woman has a beard, and the mind boggles. What type of women do they have here? I haven’t seen any of them shaving. I haven’t seen anyone here shaving come to that. Do they shave? Are the beards merely aspirations for the future, misguidedly applied to both men and the fairer sex in some sort of communist frenzy?

I have come to the conclusion that the statue represents some future partnership between England and Togo. The guy on the left is Togolese, all skinny and manly, whilst the guy on the right is English, with man boobs and his top off (this is what makes him English, not American).

And finally, the view from our window…

Teaching the Togolese

So, what are we doing in Togo? Well, teaching English dum dum, what else?

We actually quite enjoy teaching English, whilst in the process getting to know the students. Jo does the teaching, whilst Edd stands around like a glamorous version of Carol Vorderman, holding up cards and writing on the board. I have found out that I couldn’t be a teacher as I would get side tracked too easily, although Jo is excellent.

The other day we were doing the family, about the only thing I remember in French being ‘Je suis un fils unique’. As we went round the class, we found that we were unusual in that we had only one brother and sister apiece, many of the Africans having 10 brothers! And six sisters!!! Everyone enjoyed watching Joanna’s jaw slowly descending to the floor. We didn’t bother with ‘I am an only child’ in the end. They also have small armies of children, and the statement ‘we have no children’ provoked immediate concern – ‘Why? Why do you have no children? How old are you? How long have you been married?’ etc.

It must be said though that the knowledge of English here varies wildly, with some speaking excellent English (and liking to show off), and others knowing incredibly little, but there have been many encouraging signs that people are learning faster than we can teach. Last lesson, we were doing where people live. For example, my sister lives in England. One of our pupils (not until that point noted for his lucidity in English) said ‘my mother and father are dead’, at which there was a brief, shocked pause, on account of us not having taught them the word dead! Fancy that.

Okay, another question. What is the funniest thing in the world? Answer, two white people painting.

There is a women’s school on the compound, where the wives of the students gather a couple of times a week to learn, essentially, reading, writing and arithmetic. I have to say, I wouldn’t want to teach maths as the introduction of the CFA (the currency here) has been done in ways that would lead to a mental breakdown in anyone with OCD. Essentially, there are 750 to the pound, and it works like normal money with the smallest unit when the currency was introduced being 5 CFA. Now it is essentially 25 CFA, which means that many of the market women, who have learned to count on the job are essentially using two counting systems concurrently. Best not to think about it too much – it leads to weird twitches. Oops, see what I mean about side tracked.

Anyway, the ecole de femme has been newly constructed and consists of two concrete rooms, undecorated, and with very small windows (if you think this doesn’t sound great you are missing the point, as it doesn’t get up to a million degrees, like everywhere else here, although it does look quite bleak). So Jo and I decided to paint it. This consisted of Doctor Dongo (from the Congo) and I hopping on his moto to buy paint. The question then arose, what colour should we get. Having overlooked to get instructions from any women, and being two men, we decided to reconvene the next day, and we would buy the paint then (the guy in the shop was no help, he said we should ask the painter for advice, as he would know, but couldn’t believe that a white person would stoop so low as to painting a room themselves – or maybe my French really is that bad). Unfortunately, we both forgot to get instructions, and so we found ourselves the next day back in the shop, still none the wiser. In the end we plumped for white (you mix your own paint here using little bottles of dye) – rather brilliantly when you consider the clouds of dust that appear whenever there is a gust of wind. We have also brought water soluble paint which is apparently made for the outside of houses! I am not too sure, but what can you do… We’ll be gone by the time it rains.

But anyway, undaunted, Jo and I started to paint these two rooms at the rate of a wall a day, with people sticking their heads round the door and giggling, before saying ‘very pretty’ and giggling again. Eventually, Atticho and Basile said that they would help us at the weekend, welcome news. So Saturday came, and after about 5 minutes we were joined by the guard, who painted like a dervish, covering walls (and floor – or so we thought) in record time, whilst Doctor Dongo (from the Congo) looked on, giving helpful suggestions. Not long after, a whole hoard of students turned up to help. We dished out the spare paint brushes (about 6 of them), arranged some sheets to protect the floor (we were learning) and carried on, only to find that the moment one put ones own brush down it disappeared, snaffled by an eager helper desperate to paint! Pretty soon, we were relegated to the role of watcher, giving helpful suggestions with Doctor Dongo (from the Congo). Unfortunately the enthusiasm was such that the floor soon got really covered in paint (the sheets were moved, but not very far…), so we  spent another half hour scrubbing (when I say we, I mean the students, because they are far too helpful to let us do anything. I found myself quoting Ali G in ghastly parody – is it because I am white?).

This has raised a problem. What am I going to do? I had planned that the painting would keep me busy for a few weeks, and efforts to find ceiling fans have been contorted in the extreme – several trips, cheapest identified, checked, checked again, then not brought as they are the wrong type… Ah, I know, maybe relax with some ice cold water (heaven here) whilst reading trashy American literature.

Another thing that amuses me greatly is that I have made almost no impact on life here, whereas Joanna, being the teacher, has made a lot. We have small services every morning, and quite often the prayers go along the following lines. ‘Thank you for our visitors from England, Joanna, who is teaching us English, and…’ pause ‘Thank you for the Passmore’s coming to visit us’.

Anyway, I feel that that’s enough for now. Suffice it to say it is still hot here, pintards (guinea fowl) are yummy, people are incredibly friendly - we get a small posse round our house every evening and go to someone else’s house nearly every night, the children have a rhyme that they chant as we go past, (which we now know be to Volar, Volar, bonsoir, ca va bien, merci – ie the equivalent of nigger, nigger, good evening, I am well, thanks – although it is hard to get offended at a three year old even though we know we should be…) and people have started lending Joanna their clothes. Ah yes, and French keyboards are gay, you have to press shift to get numbers or full stops! I realise that I have left out nearly everything about the food (we have a maid who cooks) and the people, but that will have to wait for another time.