Chaleur

        In Togo, when exchanging greetings, it’s customary to ask a series of questions about your respective lives. A typical example would be, “How are you?” or “How’d you sleep?” chased by at least two of the following: “And your health?”, “And the work?”, “How’s the family?”, etc. Unless it’s someone you know well, you always say everything’s fine. To speak candidly with acquaintances can lead to awkward moments; I once described my health as terrible during an exchange and several locals erupted in laughter believing it was a joke. For the past few months however, another question has entered salutations to which I cannot lie: “And the heat?” or “Et le chaleur?” in French. From late February to May the cooling rains and wind stop in Northern Togo, leading to a season of pronounced dry heat. Most plants die. Life seeks shade to recover from even short times in the sun. Water can become scarce. And, like a bothersome uncle paying an annual visit, le chaleur becomes part of most personal exchanges. Tandjoare quickly learned my feelings regarding it as well, with my sweat - soaked disdain spilling over the asker each time.

        By chaleur’s second week, life had noticeably changed: my sweat glands, overactive in even the mildest Montana summers, began an unceasing deluge. Morning to night, inside or out, resting or moving, nothing mattered as far as the soaring temperature and my skin were concerned. Simple activities I’d enjoyed before, such as writing, reading, or yoga, became as much chores as washing my laundry. When you’re perpetually sticky and smell like a gym, simply being awake is unappealing. That fact is especially problematic considering how difficult it is to sleep: after a week of waking up at two or three in the morning on saturated sheets, I moved outside to catch our miniscule breezes. I now attribute this move with my continued sanity, as the local work situation offered little comfort. 

        During most of the year, people in rural Togo are busy with what’s necessary to survive. From managing their farms and households to keeping active in the community, they've an overabundance of work. As such, it can be difficult to hold meetings, encourage behavior change, and demonstrate new practices. Chaleur seems to offer a golden opportunity then, a time when people are at least free of the farm and its requisite tasks. Unfortunately, with the heat, everyone’s energy and motivation withers. My ambition was no different soon into the season. When my farming group’s attendance first plummeted, I was disappointed and hoped to reenergize the members. After several attempts and sweltering rides to our meeting spot, I’ve put our sessions on indefinite hiatus. It's hard to fault people with such full schedules for wanting to rest when they can, especially when their freest times are spent in an oven. I’ve yet to meet any local whom, after hearing my feelings about the heat, didn't agree. 

        Walking through the village, our land is barren, broken, yellow - brown. The dried remnants of brush crunch with each footstep, as foraging livestock scratch and scour the dirt for anything edible. Insects, so omnipresent before, are largely dead or gone, a rare blessing. People move slower and less intently, nowhere to go save the markets and alcohol stands with other idle farmers. Standing on a rocky hillside, my view is of a dead land, once fecund, awaiting its revival. Clouds are on the horizon, carrying a nascent hope. Chaleur is only a season after all, and each does give way to another. 

Grip

I love yoga’s tree pose. From the clear mind it requires to its hip stretching potential, holding tree connects me to my practice more deeply. It involves: choosing a non moving focal point and concentrating your gaze there, placing the sole of one foot on the thigh of the other leg so that you’re balancing with the grounded foot, and pressing the knee of the elevated leg back such that your hip opens without your torso turning. Also, you should be able to lift the toes of both feet from their respective positions to prevent yourself from gripping instead of balancing. That last bit is what still throws me off sometimes, turning my graceful tree into a timber pile. It seems so much easier to grab hold than to trust clarity to come, to exert energy versus letting go. I’m learning more and more though, that when one relaxes, opens their mind, and becomes fully present, balance comes.

           

For my first few months in Tandjouare, I clung to what I perceived as my identity like a scared child would to their security blanket. If I relented, and changed who I was to fit in, I thought I'd be sacrificing some essential part of who I am. As though the man I’d become could be erased and replaced with someone I no longer knew. I introduced myself as Matthew to everyone I met and treated the local name I’d chosen, Kombat, as a joke. I refused to wear pagne, the brightly colored and patterned local fabric popular among Togolese, and rocked my American clothing at local functions. I preferred speaking in broken French for all interactions, despite it being their colonial language and one I barely felt comfortable in, instead of even attempting Moba. It felt as though I was still the same American me, albeit a much less satisfied version. The work required to copy and paste Minneapolis Matt onto Togo was taking its toil and I was often unhappy, grasping at every chance for a taste of my America. Misery made me grip memories so hard, they began to lose their meaning. And then, I let go.

If everything in the present is constantly compared with the past, especially that which has passed under very different circumstances, it may never measure up. If you live in the moment however, relax and let the new introduce you to unexpected people and places, I think you’ll find joy in what comes your way. It took me four months to realize that my Togolese life will never equal my American existence by the standards I carried over, but that, when taken on its own with an open perspective, it offers as much or more fulfillment than anything else I’ve experienced. By waking up every day and truly trying to integrate, be it through language, clothes, or deed, I haven’t lost anything about who I was. Instead, I’ve become someone better: more adaptable, more empathetic, more pragmatic, stronger. As I’ve opened up, the world’s reacted in turn. My first few outreach projects have been successful, and more work opportunities are presenting themselves. I’ve become closer friends with other volunteers and people in my community, so I’m never without someone local to share experiences with. The days are passing much faster, and I often recall a favorite saying of my first grade teacher, "Little by little the days go by, short if you sing through them, long if you sigh." I’m delighted to be here, and excited to see what the next year and a half will bring.

Focus straight ahead, through the window and on the cement courtyard outside. Left leg lifted and pressing into right thigh, hip open without a torso shift. Morning sunlight bathing the room and sweat, glistening, drops from body to floor. Finally, no toes touching Earth, hands at heart center, and balance on the ball of the right. There’s no wind today and my tree could stand for ages if allowed. It’s growing, enriched by each African day’s unknown potential.

Day Dreams

Under trucks parked on the highway. Sprawled across benches lining city streets. Face first in merch bowls and boxes. Regardless of the location, many Togolese enjoy taking an afternoon nap. The practice forms an inescapable part of life in their West African nation: many businesses incorporate an afternoon closure into their operations, students receive several hours to return home in between morning and afternoon classes, and farmers come in from the fields to eat, drink, and doze. Commonly called siesta in much of the world, after Spain’s traditional daytime sleep, the practice of napping around midday is prominent in many tropical countries like Togo. Culturally, it offers a chance to relax, reconnect with family over a meal, and avoid the sun’s hottest peak. Physically, research has shown that napping is an innate response to internal pressure and has health benefits. As mainstream American culture begins to adopt its own version of the siesta, Togo may be a dream example of repose done right.

Morning’s well underway, but you’re still lying in bed wearing last night’s clothes. There’s obviously been little reason to move and you’ve no intentions of letting another sunny metropolitan day rush past. Your best friend walks in the room, gives you a push, and announces that more productive people need to get moving. Breakfast is ready before you are. You yell at him to save some eggs, and he takes off mocking you as you throw a pillow and leap up in pursuit. It’s the beginning of a youthful day in the city, with no plans, but brimming with the energy of the streets you hear outside.

          A person’s sleep timing is governed by two biological factors: homeostatic sleep propensity and the circadian rhythms. The former is the need for sleep as dictated by the time passed since one’s last rest, and its pressure begins to build after waking. The latter determines the best time for restorative rest based on an individual’s average sleep schedule, thereby creating an awakening drive to negate homeostatic pressure. In most adults, the circadian system sends out wakefulness signals from the late afternoon to a few hours before their typical evening bedtime. Because there’s a gap with pent up pressure prior to the circadian override arriving, the body’s response is to sleep the strain away. That early afternoon imbalance, coupled with the fluctuating levels of glucose brought on by lunch, helps to explain how effortless it can be to nod off in the middle of a busy day. And the intelligence of establishing the early afternoon hours as a cultural repose, a la Togo.

           It’s pouring rain and all you can think is, “why on Earth did I decide to go for a drive?” The streets of your college town are familiar but, in this deluge, they become an alien blur behind the smeared windshield. Whatever day was breaking through the clouds has since waned; the world surrounding you is deep blue, black, and grey.  You advance through a stoplight sitting close to the wheel, as though proximity will help the situation. Suddenly, your world and the water slow to a crawl: the wiper’s stroke brings brief clarity and the image of a bulldozer parked dead ahead. It’s too late to brake completely and buildings block a swerve, all you can do is move back in the seat, cross your arms over your face, and begin to mouth a scream that never quite escapes.

           Faced with natural pressure and modern stress, many Americans are discovering afternoon sleep’s value. Their common version, termed the “power nap” by Cornell social psychologist James Maas, typically lasts between five and thirty minutes and is aimed at maximizing sleep’s benefits when time is scarce. Because starting a full sleep cycle and leaving it incomplete can cause disorientation and further fatigue, the power nap ends before the average person would enter deeper rest. This approach’s advantages include improved vigor, focus, and learning ability after the nap, all without the initial grogginess a longer siesta can encourage. Though, studies show, napping for one to two hours often creates more long lasting improvements following the initial confusion. In the end, whether one is able to power nap the American way or leisurely repose like the Togolese, naps, both short and long, can be revitalizing. With scientists from NASA to Harvard publishing on daytime sleep’s benefits, there’s little reason not to curl up midday and drift away.

           You’re lying in bed with your first love, their arm wrapped around your body as a warm light envelopes the room. You both look older than when you were last together, time never lets either ex – lover go, but the flush colors of a freshman summer seem rekindled on your faces. Their embrace firms and a whisper dances across your heart, “All those days apart, I never stopped needing you.” You reply that those days, our days as they were then, are still the best you’ve ever known. Tearing up, blissfully, your eyes and theirs close, in sync.

          A loud alarm and you’re awake: alone in bed, wrapped in sheets and sweating through. You shut your eyes and longingly reach for the unreal. For that time, in that bed, with them. Animal sounds outside the window cement you in the now. There’s only this moment, with its sticky heat and pigs rooting through dry fields. You stumble out of bed and open the door: afternoon light rushes in to fill the emptiness. Neighbors amble past on the trail outside, likely in the same half awake state. It’s dusty and relentlessly hot; another Togo day is half done and calling its Americans. You’re increasingly put together, undeniably restored post – repose, but you can’t help feeling wistful for what you never had. You look forward to tomorrow, when you’ll steal time after lunch to slip into subconsciousness. There’s no map to where dreams may lead then.

Rain and Time

        When it rains, the snails surround my house. They scale the thatch and concrete walls, traverse the mud, and brave the pelting storm in search of food, friends, life, etc? Unfortunately, my knowledge of snails is limited to fragmented memories from a biology class years ago, little of substance. Fortunately, however, a lack of knowledge means a blank slate to observe and learn. The snails of Tandjoare keep shells in a variety of arresting colors: swirled mahogany browns blended with a creamy white, dreamsicle oranges giving way to deeper reds, and dusky blacks meeting gray. Some are as big my palm, while others remain petite. There’s a measured grace to the snails movements as they glide across soaked terrain, slow but almost effortless. It’s as if they have all the time in the world to find their destination and simply live, there, complete. My life flows similarly now, amidst the rain and settling in, with time moving mere inches while watched, but still somehow slipping away.

        Wake up, clean (the compound and myself), and prepare / eat breakfast. Walk outside with a simple goal, such as greeting potential work partners or buying produce, and hope to discover more along the way. Some days, my excursions end early: the sun and heat being too intense, the sociable people being too few, and / or meeting only Moba, the local language, speakers. Other times, a string of events falls into place and I return home near dusk, tired but satisfied. Maybe my meeting leads to drinks afterwards, or one person I’ve met has a lot on their mind. Conversations and happenings are never too involved, if only for my French’s weakness to penetrate deeper subject matter, but anything that makes me feel integrated or more at home seems worth celebrating. Each befuddled conversation may lay the foundation for future camaraderie and work.

        One afternoon, while wandering through our small market, an old woman gets my attention. Waving me over, she’s wearing a satin pink nightie, with white lace frill to match her cloudy eyes. Her near toothless smile spouting Moba, she seems unsatisfied with my basic greeting and thanks. Gesturing towards the nearby drink vendor, she becomes more and more serious. Apparently, I’m thirsty and now’s the time. I follow and sit beside her while two bowls of Tchapa, a frothy local beer made from sorghum, are passed our way.  She continues talking, pausing only to drink and make sure my bowl is emptying, with others nearby laugh at our odd couple. A few men alternate sitting next to me and practice their best-intoxicated French. Where are you from? Why are you here? How’s the Tchapa? We talk as best we can and laugh, with my older companion nodding at my social and boozy progress. Tchapa stands dominate the markets of my small village and are an essential means of socializing in the community. Young, old, male, or female, everyone’s drinking there at some point. Until that moment, I’d been naively reserving my first visit for a stand that seemed unique. I hadn’t taken the time to notice that each drinking crowd, despite enjoying the same thing and similar scenery, is made unique by the people involved. Every frothy gourd carries the potential to connect with someone new, preliminary integration by the gulp.

        Returning home, I dread and look forward to night as a time to reflect. The cool quiet offers peace, just as my thoughts move to end it. It often feels like I’ve done very little with each day, moved mere inches with miles left to go. I try to remain hopeful about the future and optimistic that, with each little encounter, I’m laying the foundation for something great. I try to channel those rain soaked snails in my insecure moments; gliding, naturally, as if an eternity’s offered for wherever they choose to go.  

Spine

        Nights in Gpatope are incredibly rich. Sans moon and streetlight, one can wander into areas of perfect, deep darkness. It’s easy to let the moment consume you then, lost in the sea of stars overhead and the aural euphoria of insects singing in the brush. Breathing slowly, in sympathy with the plants savoring a photosynthetic break, you can become the darkness: absent body, fading into humid, thick air. As the moon returns, building to a luminous crescendo, its creamy light chases black to shadow and carves a silhouette world echoing the day. Nature and construction are soft in such light, as if the sun’s pass eroded any jagged edges.  My nightlife shifting to soft focus, my host family’s many palms, sharp, surprised me one evening: cutting the haze, it seemed they could peel back the night itself, could crack open the cosmos. Their expanse of shadows, like so much of this new culture, an ocean I admire. Waiting to dive in.

        Training speeds past with hours immersed in French, cultural, and safety / security related lessons everyday. Time off just usually means practicing what we learned in real world settings at our training sites. Every trip to the market, a boutique, or a bar becomes a lesson in and of itself: vendors don’t like giving change, speaking local language always earns a smile, being out alone after dark isn’t wise, etc. Our group of almost forty Americans band together in the face of new surroundings and everyone becomes closer; our excited English conversations often drown out the first few attempts to start each lesson.  After visiting our posts, these group sessions take on a sense of urgency as, apart, there will be no regular English escapes. Preparing for independence and savoring time with friends, moments with my host family become harder. I’m ready for independence, as they seem ready for me to go. These problems are compounded one afternoon.

        

        Returning home for lunch, I noticed many men surrounding the palm trees in our compound. They appeared to be sizing each up and surveying the surrounding land, a noteworthy sight but one that delayed my room bound retreat only momentarily. My afternoon rest ended shortly thereafter with several successive thuds, and I walked outside to see the last palm, nearest my room, having it’s roots ripped before being pushed to the ground. Moving through the compound, all of the trees lay dying on the ground. A taller man, shirt half buttoned with a decaying smile, asked if I wanted to take photos and show Americans what they do. I struggled to respond, politely smiled, and slipped away. It was hard to imagine it being more difficult for them to push the trees than it was for me to watch them fall.

        Avoiding the topic and the same men who hovered around the palms during the week, I tried unsuccessfully to forget the occurrence. Stepping over and around the trees, I noticed yellow jugs placed beneath the sheared crest of each and fluids leaking out. A parade of goats continually made rounds to eat the browning foliage of their suddenly accessible smorgasbord. Finally, I asked my host brother why they’d been felled. He explained each would provide the family with money via the palm wine draining out, and that the visiting men are community members who sell it at bars and boutiques. Each tree had been planted to eventually generate money the family needed. I’d been ignorantly sentimental and blind to the truth; they were planted with a more important purpose than landscaping lovely nightscapes. Without it, they never would have known life at all. 

        At night, I walk among the dead. I wonder if the palms knew only a half – life before and, with their cause bubbling to the surface, they rest in triumph. Broken open, their truth spilled forth. Training is over soon and I’ll be moving to the far North, away from my host family and these trees. Lying down, I imagine myself like the palms. Doubt and hope are swelling inside and, broken open, I wonder if both will seep out in equal measure. Empty, this new world could rush in and make me something more for my service, my community, myself. Maybe I’ll cut through the night sky one day, touching stars to cast a shadow sea uncharted. 

Benediction

        Trying, on my porch and for the third time, to boil water with a gracelessly aging camping stove, I go through my alternatives. Starving seems the easiest option effort wise, but the least desirable in other ways. I could also walk back into my village, I’m comfortable with the route now, and purchase quick calories from a vendor, but cookies and deep fried dough are only appetizing in moderation. Instead, I resign myself to sitting and reasoning out what could impede my simple goal: really hot water. My pot may be too large and thick; I could be attempting too much water; there may not be enough fuel; the stove’s heat could be too weak to handle any one or combination of the aforementioned. Devoted to making a simple dinner, I ignore the sound of small footfalls in my compound. An audible breath shakes me from absence and I turn to see a small child nearby. His clothes are stained with dirt, fresh or the kind that eventually fails to fade away, and he’s wrapped, just as I must have been, in the dusky leftovers of daylight.

        “Bienvenue a Tandjouare!”,  my welcome party exclaimed, each member seated along the edge of the porch. Everyone there, from my work partner in the local NGO to a high school teacher, seemed eager and kind. Eating a delicious mixture of pate and green sauce with my new colleagues, I fumble through their questions and give a million “mercis”. My own questions, nervous, build and sit mentally: How long and how much have they been anticipating my arrival? What can I do to assist them and their (my?) community? Where can I get water? The previous few hours dropping off friends haven’t done my French any favors and I’m often distracted by a huge tree near my compound. Set against the stormy sky, it’s massive grey trunk and green splayed branches look as though they’re the essence of Tandjouare. As if all the corn and clearings around it, my house and the nearby compounds, the village and our impermanent lives, exist to make it that much grander by comparison. My fixation on the tree, attempts to listen, awkward responses, and the meal itself mélange until, breathing out, we hear rain against the tin roof. Then, like every coloring mixing to make white, verbal and mental silence. There is only the rain, the tree, and us, drenched by the clacks of a deluge deferred. After several minutes, the NGO’s director, a graying, older gentleman in white with a deep voice offset by still innocent eyes, explains that rain is a benediction and bodes well for my service. I thank him and smile, sincerely, with great hope.   

        Our eyes remain fixated on one another for several, prolonged seconds. He seems to be studying me before, slowly, dropping to one knee. His yellow gaze glistens as he asks, with the conviction one expects in church and private prayer, for money. I sit silently; giving it would be easy, kind, and, perhaps, offer temporary relief from the hardships in his life. He’s a silver screen in my head, and I readily project every starving African child ad from home. But, reality returns: I can give assistance, information, and connections, but I’m neither millionaire philanthropist nor voluntourist. He asks again; I respond that I don’t have money (while hoping that I can help his community). He asks again; I respond that I don’t have money (while hoping that, somehow, I can help him in the future).  He leaves, and I’m alone on the porch with an overused camping stove and barely boiling water. I imagine his perspective, with a white man from America, “the land of dreams”, suddenly living in a house next door. He’s preparing nice food, in nice clothes, with a personal stove. He can take hours, three times a day to sit, cook, and admire an old tree. He has family and friends somewhere with houses, cars, and bountiful food.

Wind rustles high leaves in the bluish twilight and I eat. A benediction. 

Awake

        Sunlight streams through my purple pagne curtains as I try to rise. Streaking across the cold cement floor, it makes the mosquito net surrounding me glow like an afternoon shroud. Outside, amidst a gentle wind rustling the palm and teak trees, a chorus of voices begins building harmony. They start low, two or three unsure chanteuses breathing out, before reaching a symphony exalting their lord in ewe. African drums and handclaps join the chorus while I lay, post repo comatose. Save the “Amen!” conclusion, I understood nothing of their song. And yet, the purity, light, and love inspiring it bridged our void perfectly. I sometimes feel like I’m on vacation, acting a delusion far from my real life, but more days are starting to translate.

            

        Africa is similar and different from each expection I carried abroad. Most roads are unpaved and drivers / motorcyclists take close calls speeding past, though many wave or honk to greet pedestrians and each other. Trash collects in communal spaces, like a “Tragedy of the Commons” lesson piling to life, but smoke and smoldering embers mark where villagers have meticulously cleaned their compounds and lit the rubbish. The sun is high, hot, and unrelenting, but deep, ominous clouds block it almost daily with a seldom - kept promise of rain. In the same breath villagers yell “yovo”, the colloquial term for foreigner, some wish me “Bonne journee” with a wave and radiant smile. These situations keep my mind in a tug of war between wistfully romanticizing my American life and hopefully envisioning the African one. A floodgate’s been opened, and its deluge of promise, difficulty, dejection, and ambition shows no signs of slowing as the days wear / speed past. 

            

        Mornings and evenings begin and end early in Gbatope, a small village north of the national capital. When I’m collected enough to first leave my room, my family’s already swept our large compound and collected water. When I wander in for lunch, mentally full from the first round of lessons or lectures, my family’s often eaten, worked on the farm, and begun making manioc flour for the market. When dusk and I creep in every evening, my family is usually socializing after a full day. By the time I’m sweaty, spent, and fumbling through French notes, they’re relaxing with the radio. I sometimes wonder who’s condensed days would make a more fulfilling soup: theirs, rich in hearty work, community, and family ties, or mine, loaded with enriching information and the pursuit of heady notions like cross – cultural integration and trilingual thought.

“Thanks” is “merci” in French and “akpe” in ewe.

“How are you?” is “Comment allez vous?” and “Efwan?” respectively.

My host mother smiles at me in the lantern light as I eat dinner, present physically but lost in the darkness outside our straw payotte. I return the favor, hoping my gesture and glance translate.

“Ma yi mava” - “I will come back soon.”