Whew!

Present Time...

So I came in to Kara yesterday hoping to uplode a few more days worth of blogs, but the site I was using wasn't cooperating with me so all I essentially got out of my hour in Kara was two extremely frightening moto rides. Both lasted roughly 30min (time it takes to get here from Agbang), with the second one being at night, in the complete dark, on a pothole and flooded dirt road, haeding straight into one of the most awesome lighting displays I have ever seen! Sweet, but scary. And now on to the continuation of my previous experiences...

Dimanche…
Today we woke up ready to rock and roll! We were stoked (not literally) to see Boniface and figure out when we were going to get a ride up to Kara. As it turned out, he was only here to get a visa to visit China and Germany, but couldn’t leave until he got one so he really had no idea when we would be heading up north. SPOILER ALERT: we’re heading back up on Saturday. And as a side note Boniface said that he would pay for breakfast…. Yeah about that, the little angel just ended up shaking hands and blessing everyone in the restaurant. Colin and I followed him out thinking that we didn’t need to pay only to find out later that evening that we had to front a $20 bill for breakfast for 4 (Jean-Baptiste, un moin d’Agbang a mangé avec nous). Jerks.

Anywho we didn’t find that out until later in the afternoon. After breakfast, we walked with Yves and went to his house to meet his family and friends who lived in the same compound. In Lomé there are multiple families or extended families who live within a walled in compound that is basically a large maze of rooms and walkways. For pictures of his petites soeurs et freres wait about a week and then look to the right of this post!

After meeting his family and receiving a very warm welcome, we took a nice 4 mile stroll in the middle of the day, at the hottest hour, when the sun was out, with close to 80% humidity, to the university (and I thought St. John’s was a little out of date, ha* see pictures), the president’s house and the multitude of embassies around it, including the one modern looking building that was practically built like a fortress. Bet you can’t guess who’s embassy that is! I would show you a picture of it, but every time we tried to take a picture of an embassy or important house we were yelled at by security guards with AK-47s. I’m one who’s known to bend the rules a little bit when I feel that I can, but there isn’t exactly a way to bend a bullet around my head when fired at point blank range…As tempting as it was, I did my best not to take pictures although I still don’t know why once can’t take pictures when there are satellites flying around taking pictures and doing exactly what I would have been doing with probably better quality pictures than I would have been taking…You’re welcome Eric! Oh and by the way, we had to bribe a guard to let us into the compound where all of the embassies were. And the worst part of all is that the American embassy was closed because it was Sunday so I couldn’t even register, which was the main reason for going there in the first place. Thanks Yves, that info would’ve been helpful about 3 hours ago! But it was still worthwhile seeing the difference between the rich and poor side of town* ( I’m getting tired of writing see pictures, so whenever you see a * {c’est un etoile} you’ll know what that there is some kind of picture associated with whatever it is that I am talking about)!

After the embassies we took a moto to the other side of town to go to the beach, see the cinema and visit la place d’Independence et des étades municipals.

The beach was packed with people even though it wasn’t sunny when we got there. But as soon as people started to notice my camera, we commanded a lot of attention, including that of one of the horsemen. So, in return for taking a picture and paying a reduced price, I got to ride a horse on the beach. IT WAS AWESOME! Afterwards we walked around a little bit and managed to make it back to the restaurant in time for dinner and just in time to bid farewell to our wonderful patron, Felix.

After dinner we went back into town to the exact same bar that we were at the night before to try and find the Germans (which was also taken into consideration when we went to the University of Lomé because they worked at the university hospital), and one in particular (btw Colin has a girlfriend, so this was mostly my call), but alas it was to no avail and we ended up teaching Yves et Rauof (Yves cousin) the American bar dances.

Lastly, we had one of the scariest moto rides ever on the way back to the restaurant. Imagine, being drunk ( may be easier for some of you than others). Ok now put yourself on the back of a motorized bicycle that is from the 1970’s and could break down at any moment. Make that bike travel 60 km/h down curvy dirt roads filled with potholes and other motos. And let's just pretend that the drivers are racing back to the hotel…or not pretend, that actually happened. Whew, I’m just happy I made it back in one piece; but the mohawk I had from the wind made making it back safe a close second!