4:30am: I wake up with the same stomachache I went to bed with and run to the latrine.  It’s pretty cold outside – harmattan is here. I go back to bed, wrapped in the fleece blanket I stole from the plane over a year ago.

6:30am: I wake up again to the sound of the ground being swept outside. I know that I should get up soon but instead I lay in bed, debating on whether or not I should stay home from work that day.

7:00am: I decide to go to school but stay in bed longer by skipping the bucket shower, oatmeal, coffee and brushing my teeth. I mentally pick out my clothes: blue tissu pants and the shirt I’m sleeping in. Done.

7:30am: I get out of bed, use the latrine again, put on my predetermined outfit plus a red cardigan – yes it’s cold enough to wear a cardigan! Moon is still sleeping in a chair so I leave her inside and walk to school.

7:45am: I arrive at school as the students are lining up by class for drapeau (flag rising and morning announcements). I make a point to shake hands with a few teachers, the censeur, the director and my homologue (work-partner), Habib. He tells me that there were four students last night who came for running club; I had told him to tell the students I was too tired from traveling to come and to do eight laps around the soccer field. I ended up showing up with Geoff anyway, but apparently I just missed them. We line up for drapeau. The director double checks with me to see if I have any announcements before starting. I tell him I’m tutoring that night from 14H-17H (2pm-5pm). The students of 2nd-D sing the Beninese national anthem. This is the third week in a row they’ve been made to sing at drapeau because the first week of school they did such a terrible job. The director enters the circle and tells them they did a good job and that they don’t have to do it again next week. He then invites two female students to join him in the middle of the circle and tells everyone an awesome story of how they turned in money they found on the road – that turned out to be a student’s missing school fees. The teachers around me seem extremely surprised, murmuring things like, That’s a lot of money for them. The director calls them model students and commends them for their honesty. The two girls look really awkward. Then he announces my tutoring hours which I immediately interrupt because I realize I meant to say 16H-19H (4pm-7pm). He also announces the meeting times for English club and Environmental club – both of which I was asked to assist with but have encouraged other professors to take the lead on this year. Then the surveillant comes forward to threaten a 4eme class, saying that professors have been complaining of their behavior, and gives them a warning. The director releases the students, shakes all the professors’ hands and says something about a doctor coming tomorrow that obviously only applies to Beninese professors. He makes a point to ask me if I’m feeling well. I tell him I’m sick but I’m ok. He asks me if it’s because I went running the night before. I say, No, I have a stomachache.

7:55am: I check my watch as I walk into the classroom. The students of 5eme-A lazily stand at attention when I walk in the room. I send two students to the library for textbooks and start checking homework. Everyone has done it – this is a first. I tell them to clap for themselves. I pick a student at random who needs some participation points to write the date on the board. The responsable (class president) takes it upon himself to come to the board and correct him. I give him a look like, “Did anyone ask you?” until he sits down. I give the students a speaking activity to review how to ask about what we did on vacation, (or “on holiday” as they as learning British English).

9:00am: We start a reading comprehension in their photocopied textbook called, “Back from the Holiday.” As I’m reading out loud, the surveillant, the Physics prof who runs the Environmental club, and two students come in to announce they are putting trash cans all around the school and they are no longer allowed to throw trash on the ground and that they should pick trash up even if it’s not theirs. This is a really big deal.

9:20am: After we finish reading the text and I’ve allowed several students to earn participation points by volunteering to read, we do a fill-in-the-blank activity orally that’s supposed to help them with their skimming skills. It’s rather difficult for them and once we’ve finished, I say to myself in English, “That was pretty painful. Let’s move on.” I ask them to list the words they don’t understand and I add them to a word bank on the board. I write: Lagos –> a city in Nigeria, enjoyed –> aimer/ avoir joie, beautiful –> beau/ belle, attractive –> très jolie, fantastic –> très bien, could/ can –> pouvoir, together –> ensemble. I write “opportunity” but I don’t know the word in French, so I tell them I’ll bring my dictionary next time. I also explain zoo by drawing a lion in a cage on the board and pretend to take a picture of myself in front of it. I realize we are running out of time, so I wrap it up by singing, “Days of the Week,” to the tune of the Addams Family theme song… not that they know what that is.

9:45am: The “bell” rings – meaning a student strikes a metal tire rim with a wrench – and I leave my students with a lethargic, “Goodbye class.” “Goodbye teacher!” they reply in unison. I greet another English prof, Abdou, and ask him if I can observe his class at 8am on Wednesday. He says, “Why not?” which is his go-to response for most things I say to him, whether they make sense or not. I greet two other profs who are eating chunky bouillie (like tapioca) and beignets (savory, greasy fried dough). They invite me to eat – as is customary – and I say, “Merci,” but do not eat their food – as is polite. I greet the secretary and the director in the office. They are working on the computer. They are making a list of all the female students to send to the government of Benin – as they’re supposed to cover their school fees. The director is saying, Why are they asking the nationality? They are all Beninese! I say, It’s the same in the United States. I then remember that I wanted to ask the surveillant the perimeter of the soccer field. He draws me a diagram. Despite the fact that he himself measured the field, four other profs give their input as they walk by. As we are standing there, a moaning boy passes by us being dragged under the arms by an older student and the secretary. He’s been affected by a fétiche (a voodoo spirit or curse). The professors around me seem very upset that it is a boy who is affected, as it is normally female students. I am so ridiculously unfazed by this that the professors seem equally concerned with my lack of interest. They sit the boy down in a chair and bring water over. They need to wash his head, hands, and feet in order to cleanse his body of the spirit. The boy takes off his shoes and throws them. He jumps up suddenly from the chair and runs into the office. The secretary looks concerned and also slightly amused. The surveillant takes matters into his own hands and puts the boy on the back of a moto to be taken to someone who is apparently better qualified than the secretary to handle this particular fétiche.  Meanwhile, I write the measurements for the soccer field on my hand and start walking back to my house.

10:00am: As I’m heading home, I see three women and greet them in Bariba (a local language). They ask me about my home and my work. When I get to my house, I let Moon out, use the latrine again, change into sweatpants and go back to bed. Moon eventually comes to join me.

11:30am: Geoff comes in with a, “Tu est la? Are you sleeping? Are you still sick?” I say, “Yes,” but get up anyway. I feel worse than I did that morning. I sit curled up in a chair and sip water through a straw I saved from my last trip to Starbucks at the Brussels airport. Geoff tells me to take a cipro, the antibiotic we are told to take when we have diarrhea. Then he says, “Do you want some tea? That always makes me feel better when I’m sick.” So he makes me tea but realizes I haven’t done dishes in days so he does all my dishes first. It takes him a really long time, and I fall back asleep in the chair while I wait.

12:00pm: I move to a mat on the floor and drink my tea. I feel a little better and start reading out loud movie reviews from The New Yorker. Then I read commentary about Obama on Syria in a British accent.

1:30pm: I decide I feel good enough to make coffee and oatmeal. Geoff grinds coffee beans with a mortar and pestle because he insists it tastes better this way. I make two bowls of “Good Morning Oats” – mine in a tea cup with peanut butter and honey and a dash of moringa powder; Geoff gets a runny “man-sized” bowl of oats with brown sugar and cinnamon. When I finish my oatmeal, I get my guitar. It’s extremely out of tune. I play the chords for “Wagon Wheel,” “Landslide,” and “Hallelujah.” This starts a conversation about how Geoff wishes he could play piano. Then we take turns playing songs on our I-pods we wish we knew how to play on piano. I tell him, my friend Sisi can play piano and how she always used to play Jewel’s “Foolish Games.” I play it for him. He says he’s never heard that song but it’s really beautiful.

3:00pm: Geoff leaves to go be “a real volunteer” and I lay on the floor and listen to Ella Fitzgerald. I decide to take another nap. My phone goes off 20 minutes in and I can’t go back to sleep.

3:45pm: I put my real pants back on and walk to the school for my “office hours.” I pack my French book to study in case no kids come. I also bring all my materials to work on my English Teacher Workshop – to be held in Kalalé the following Sunday – and my journal. I see Innocent, my Nigerian neighbor, outside. He is speaking French to me, which he never does. His wife is there and she doesn’t understand French so I feel like he is being rude. He asks me why aren’t I wearing shoes. I hold up the shoes in my hand in response. He’s wearing a denim jacket so I ask him if he’s cold. He says, “No.” I say, “Ok whatever,” saluer (or greet) his wife and leave.

4:00pm: At school, I greet four teachers sitting at a table in the shade, calculating the hours for the vacataires (part-time teachers). One of them asks me what I think about the fétiche I saw that morning. I try to get away with shrugging and saying no more than, “C’est bizarre.” But I end up saying, I think la fétiche only exist in Benin and that, if a student in the United States were to act that way, I would think he just wanted to skip class. That or he’s mentally insane – although I actually say he’s “mal de tête” which means he has a headache, but they get my drift. They think my response is amusing but I can tell they don’t have the nerve to agree with me.

4:15pm: I put myself in the salle des profs (teacher’s lounge) and begin journaling the good things that happened that day: the trash cans at school and the girls at drapeau.  Geoff comes in – “Are you just journaling right now?” “Yup.” He wants to meet Saka, the Environmental club prof. We go to the surveillant’s office and look at the chalkboard of schedules. Saka doesn’t have class now. I tell Geoff about the measurements of the soccer field (5 laps= 1km). He doesn’t believe me so he wants to measure it himself by walking toe-heel around the terrain. I leave him to it and go back to journaling.

5:00pm: Geoff and I are discussing what we are going to eat for dinner. I say I have eggplant and that if he buys pasta I can do something with that. Four girls I know fairly well from the year before come in and say they’ve come for English club. I knew they were going to confuse tutoring with club but they’ll get the hint eventually. I tell them to wait for me in the library while I wait for another prof. My second counterpart, Taïrou, is supposed to lesson plan with me on Mondays at 5pm. I go to the office and ask if he’s there. They say they don’t know. I ask the censeur, who knows everything about everything, and he says that Taïrou has 4eme now but he thinks he may have left. I don’t have my phone to call him so I pack up my things and go to the library.

5:15pm: There are two students who actually need help with homework and five students who think this is going to be a club meeting. One 3eme student needs help writing a paragraph on STDs. I ask him who his teacher is and he says the madame.  Since he is obviously not my student, I assume he’s referring to the one other female prof, who comes from Nikki. I think this assignment is stupid – I wonder if he can even talk about STDs in French – but another 3eme student seems to be have a solid grasp on the vocabulary needed to complete this assignment. So together we write on the board: “People get STDs by having unprotected sex with an infected person. You can protect yourself from STDs by having only one partner and using a condom. An infected person may have no symptoms. If a friend has STDs, I would tell them to go to the hospital.” Another student needs help writing a dialogue about emotions. For example, Fatiou has lost all his money. How does he feel? He feels_____. I act out all the emotions in her book and the students guess what I’m feeling. When we can’t figure it out, we look it up in my French-English dictionary. I need to look up dizzy and worried. Nawell – one of the girls I know from last year and also a member of my running club – looks bored. I give her a giant world map and tell her to find the United States. She never does.

6:00pm: I leave the school and sing to myself as I walk. I have a fleeting thought wondering if people think I have a fétiche when I sing for no reason. I pass through Happy Baby Land, (dubbed so by me for the happy babies that roam those parts), but I think they must be traveling – I haven’t seen a happy baby for days. One baby comes out and I hug her and lift her shirt up to inspect a rash she had last time I was there. Her grandmother comes out and says the rash is gone and that she took her to the health centre. This whole interaction is done through charades and broken Bariba – which on my part sounds like, “hmm,” and “ohh.”  I leave them with a “un kua sia,” (See you tomorrow), and go home.

6:15pm: I check my phone when I get home and I have three messages. Habib has sent me this message: “please, tomorrow I’ll not be at school, we have a meeting at kalale with a doctor.” I message him back – saying thank you for letting me know and that I’ll teach the lesson we planned – knowing full well that his absence will definitely factor in when it comes to motivating me out of bed the next day. I call Taïrou to ask him where he was today and if he will be at school the next day. My phone runs out of credit 30 seconds in and he doesn’t call me back so both of these questions go unanswered.

7:00pm: It’s starting to looking dusky when I start chopping eggplant for dinner. I hear Moonpie yelp and stick my head out the door to inquire, “C’est quoi?” Hawoula says Kourabora did it. I call Kourabora over and she runs in her house, laughing. There are no adults around and I’m annoyed that she’s making me look stupid in front of the other kids so I follow her into her house in a small side bedroom I’ve never been in and tell her never to hit my dog again. She giggles, probably because it’s weird that I’m in her room.  This infuriates me though, so I say, Do you want me to hit you? She stops laughing and apologizes. I say, I would never hit you. So please don’t hit Moonpie, because she is like my child. If you have a problem with Moonpie, come talk to me. I know this is a pointless conversation, mainly because my French is horrid when I’m angry and Kourabora is a child who is used to adults treating her like dirt. So I go back in my house and stew about it for a bit. I continue fixing dinner and Geoff comes in with two instant noodle packets. I recruit him to chop onions to which he says, “Is there a technique to this?” His reaction to the potency of the onions is too good not to share so I send the following text to a few other volunteers; Geoff on helping with dinner: Maybe onions aren’t supposed to be cut! Did anyone ever think of that? AH MAN MY WHOLE WORLD’S IN HELL. I release him from kitchen patrol and chop the second onion myself. Then I make a stir-fry-like mixture by sautéing onions, garlic and eggplant and adding soy sauce, honey and red pepper. I toss in the noodles and dinner is served. I try to eat a decent meal on nights before I run but I only eat one small plate because I’m afraid my tummy will reject it. It immediately does.

7:30pm: I text Baug and tell her my stomach is constantly gurgling. She tells me to punch it. Then we have a conversation via text about panic attacks at the auto gare and our Thanksgiving plans.

8:00pm: I’m in a bad place. I’m laying on a mat on the floor trying to do work but my stomach is cramping and it’s really painful and my left eye is extremely irritated for some reason. Innocent’s generator is on and the sound is just loud enough to make me want to pull my hair out. Geoff is playing music over the sound of the generator and I don’t have the heart to tell him that he’s also driving me crazy.

8:45pm: I start crying because I feel pretty sick but I don’t call the doctor because I don’t want to be told to come to Cotonou to Peace Corps headquarters. My English teacher workshop that I’d been planning for a month is the following weekend and an eleven hour trip to Cotonou would definitely put a damper on that. I can tell Geoff is as concerned as he is uncomfortable because he just keeps asking, “Are you alright?” but I just keep ignoring him and crying. He keeps stepping over me to do things that are helpful like carry the dirty dishes out back and fill up my water filter. I sit up because the cramping in my stomach has stopped and the crying made my eye feel better. I say, “I’m going to bed.” Geoff steps outside and pops his head in to say, “You look wildly depressed right now.” I say, “Good night,” and close the door.

9:00pm: I lay in bed and check my phone. My inbox is full so I have to delete messages to receive new ones. I do and see that Geoff had sent me a cartoon picture text of two panda bears hugging. I laugh and send him a message saying, “You’re so stupid. I love you.” He responds, “Haha feel better.” Then I decide to finish writing all the things that happened to me that day and I have to change pens four times. Meanwhile I text Geoff and ask him to tell Innocent to turn his TV down. He does. Then he messages me: bring more tp to the latrine next time. I set my alarm for 5:45am, optimistically thinking I’ll make it to running club in the morning.

11:00pm: Innocent has turned his generator off and my solar lamp is too dim to write anymore. I walk out to use the latrine one last time. It’s really quiet and chilly and the stars are really beautiful. 

Originally written November 4, 2013, during my Peace Corps service, from the Northwest village of Bouca, where I was known as Gannigui, Bariba for White Princess.