the outlook

i've been here for 5 weeks already, meaning there are only 3 to go! tomorrow evening, like i said, i'm going back to huedogli with cath-enon ('eno' (to my ear 'enu') is the aja word for mother, and here, you call all the adults mom/dad of the firstborn child, making my parents mamacallie and papacallie (or, caleno and caleda)- parental units, be prepared for your new names upon my arrival.) and will stay there for 2 days, long enough to speak some yoruba, work on my aja, and see the village again with fresh eyes. then, back to lokossa for a day or two.

after that, i'm going to take two of the kids up to abomey with me to see the palace of the kings of dahomey, where apparently there'll be a whole lot of skulls and bones and cool old historical stuff from the kingdom of dahomey. after that, i'm headed north with the oldest kid from the orphelinat, marcellin, to see the tata sombas (incredible fortress houses where the betamaribe/somba people live), pendjari national park (elephantsssssss) and life in muslim country, which will be either a four or five day trip.

then, August 1 is independence day, and coincidentally, the president decided that the huge national fete will be in lokossa, so we'll be partying it up around here, and i'll probably be forced to take multiple shots of sodabe (think of the crappiest vodka ever and multiply the intensity by 20. it's horrible and people sometimes offer it to you right when you arrive at their maison. my eyes water for about 10 minutes after every shot. aii..), then, i'm planning on taking 2-3 kids to ouidah, which was the focal point in this area for the slave trade, and also the birthplace of vodoun (voodoo). then, i head to porto novo (yoruba country! and the official capital, though cotonou is far bigger and busier) to see the sights and have an official french language examination with the peace corps language instructor so that i leave with a certificate of fluency (or, more likely, a certificate of dubious fluency), spend my last day in ganvie, a stilt village near cotonou, and fly the looong journey home (coincidentally on the same flight with a peace corps guy i met a few weeks ago). time flies!