Traffic Accidents, Bandits and Armed Robberies

Today I was in my hometown of about 10,000 people, near the Pennsylvanian capital of Harrisburg. I was a bit surprised to hear that someone was recently robbed at gunpoint just a few blocks from my parents' home. Earlier in the week, similar events were taking place in Alexandria, VA a city of over 120,000 people just across the river from Washington DC. Twice in this past week armed men robbed (or attempted to rob) our local pharmacy in our Del Ray neighborhood with a small-town feel, where it is said that "Main Street still exists." I feel like the bandits followed me home.

Last week I was working in Benin, a country which is about the same size as Pennsylvania. We spent the night in a nice hotel called Les Routiers in Parakou, the largest town in northern Benin, but we worked about a 2-hour drive away in a smaller village. Our long daily commute had to be done during daylight for optimum safety. The thin layer of asphalt on the two-lane road had eroded away in many places, leaving great potholes to swallow up small vehicles and cause many flat tires. And traffic accidents. So between the potholes, cars and trucks passing on your left even when there wasn't sufficient room, and drivers who like to conserve energy by not using headlights at night in the dark, we certainly had enough incentive to travel by day.

For me though, the best reason to be back at the hotel at the end of the day had to do with the local bandits. We noticed some men working on the side of the road, attempting to shovel dirt in to the potholes. The men were really shabby-looking, dirty, and were looking for money from every car that drove past, to pay them for their efforts. At night, this road apparently became a haven for machete-wielding bandits, thus solidifying our desire to commute during the daylight hours. I imagine these shady impromptu road-workers were the bandits of the night.

It just seems very odd that all this banditry in the Benin countryside, in my small Pennsylvania hometown, and here at home in Alexandria should happen in the period of a week. I know the financial crisis has world-wide implications, but should we all prepare for more crime and theft as a result? For now, I'll stick to daytime commutes through the African countryside, and won't frequent the pharmacy in the middle of the night. (I'd prefer to be sleeping at nighttime anyhow!)

Little Bit of India in Benin

Unwittingly, I immersed myself in Indian culture and history yesterday while in Benin. We started the day early in Parakou, the largest city in northern Benin. By 7am we were on the road to the economic capital of this West African nation. The first hour or two of the trip on well-paved road gave me a chance to dive deeper into the book I started a few days earlier, called Red Earth & Pouring Rain by Vikram Chandra. Though the book is set primarily in Hindustan, modern India, and the United States, the title would have been apt for the Beninois countryside in late September. The earth here is quite red, a dark, wet, terracotta red. As it is currently the end of the rainy season, we have seen our share of pouring rain in the last week. Dark clouds above the Parakou-Benin highway threatened rain for hours.



While reading my Indian book, I would look up from time to time to see the villages hugging the two-lane road, and wondering at products for sale as we passed. Homemade charcoal filled bags in one village. The next was filled with enormous dirty brown-skinned manioc, a starchy root vegetable. Green oranges, carefully peeled around and around piled up for sale to refresh the passengers of bush taxis. And later, the manioc flour in clear plastic bags, sold to make what? Our driver explained it would make a paste to eat. Like Cream of Wheat? Like reconstituted mashed potatoes? Fou-fou? We never quite figured it out.

A long seven hours were spent twisting and turning on the straight highway to avoid the goats sauntering across the road, the deep potholes, and swerving to avoid others approaching us, doing the same. Unlike many of the big trucks, we never jack-knifed, nor ended up in a ditch, nor crashed in a head-on collision. And unlike the smaller bush taxis, we never ended up stuck propping up the wheels with crumbling rocks to change a blown-out, flat tire.

Four of us planned to go out to dinner in Cotonou, rather than eating at the Ibis Hotel. We chose the Indian restaurant nearby, just a short drive away. As the first customers, we received the doting attention of our Beninois servers, and the Indian owner as well. Thinking back to all the delicious food I was reading about in my novel, I looked forward to trying some new dishes. The owner did not disappoint us. He gauged our level of tolerance for spicy food, our interest in various meats and fishes, and made excellent suggestions. We all left the restaurant fat and happy.

The French teacher in me wants to also share a little joke from dinner. You need to know that the local beer in Benin is called Beninoise. (Beer is a feminine noun, thus the "e" on the end) So the conversation went as follows:

male American: Je voudrais une Beninoise, s'il vous plait.

male server (from Benin): En bouteille ou en etre humain?

male American (not expecting a follow-up question to his order): Pardon?

male server (said with a coy smile and a laugh): En bouteille ou en etre humain?

male American (smiles, acknowledging the joke, but sticks with his order): La bouteille, s'il vous plait.

Some laughter. Discussion follows about the attractiveness of the female server...

Bathroom in Bohican, Benin - The Cool Place

I have traveled to 12 countries in Africa over the last 11 years...and I can still be slightly startled by one's stance on privacy. I was traveling earlier today from Parakou, in northern Benin, headed south on the main road to Cotonou. We stopped in a town called Bohican, where a fairly modern 4-story hotel faces a self-described bar/restaurant/ice cream/catering service called "Cool Place." Emerging from some rough roads and near head-on collisions with big rigs and goats, we stretched our legs, and trotted over to the bathroom, a one room W.C. with a toilet and a sink. I heard a lot of splashing in there; it sounded like someone was taking a shower. We all stood around our table as cold Coca Cola was served in the old-fashioned glass bottles, anxiously shifting from one foot to the other, to see who would make the nonchalant sprint to the bathroom when it was vacated.

One of the waitresses came over to me, the only woman in our group of nine Americans, and told me to go knock on the door. I did, and a woman in only her panties opened the door and motioned to the toilet. Realizing that the woman was trying to share the only available bathroom with me, and I had already seen her nearly naked, I decided quickly it would probably be rude to turn down her offer. The toilet seat was wet with clear water. I guess while she was getting water from the sink and putting it in a plastic bucket with a plastic cup, she must have splashed a bit while taking her "bucket shower." So I quickly squatted over the toilet, as there was no toilet paper nor towels to wipe off the seat, rinsed my hands in the sink, and vacated the room. It seemed perfectly normal to her to share her space with me, and I guess her sense of privacy is different from mine, although I guess mine has changed a bit over the years as well. I'm not sure I would have been comfortable doing that 10 years ago.

I have a few pictures of the "Cool Place" to share, though not of the bathroom, of course! I just need to wait until I can download the pics on Monday when I'm back in the USA.

And if you're going to Africa soon, consider buying Lonely Planet West Africa. I actually have time to go sight-seeing tomorrow and I can't believe I didn't bring my copy from home! Too bad two-day shipping wouldn't work from the US warehouses to Parakou, Benin!