Timbuktu

Dogon country

Camel, Timbuktu

Dogon country

Mali 2006

Mopti port

Three days ago I had heat rash.

I wrote a post last night in which I complained about how the evil computer in Accra ate my last entry, but then I found the other entry, so given as bitching was no longer justified, and I mostly repeated myself (and as dinner was ready) I abandoned it, and now can't remember anything I said, except that I am slightly disorientated and very cold. Yes, I arrived in Oxford yesterday. Yes, I know, I apologise, and I promise to never do anything so nauseating again.

This country is weird. You get off the plane and walk into the coach park, and instead of being mobbed by touts who take your luggage and guide you towards the next bus, you have to manoeuvre your trolley to the board that tells you where your coach goes from, then find the stand yourself... Though you do get an entire seat to yourself. Oxford is full of glamorous-looking people in scarves. I'd forgotten about the scarves. I have a scarf too, a Tuareg scarf, but according to the advert in Milan airport a Tuareg is actually a kind of car, not a nomadic people who live in the Sahara.

I almost asked the taxi driver how much the fare would be, and then remembered that bargaining was not the done thing, for there are wee meter thingies that set the price at £2.50 before you've even gone anywhere.

So I have been mostly sheltering under a duvet.

I don't think I'm a student any more, cos I did the washing up before I checked my email.

"Every time you get off the plane it's like a slap in the face. It's the same when you come back."

Those were the words of the Swiss guy who took me to get take-away food on the back of his motorbike last night. How long is it going to be before I get to write another sentence like that? It turns out the Kokomlemle Guest House is actually about 5 minutes away from a really good restaurant, which makes me laugh, because when the boy was here we spent many evenings wandering around this area trying to find somewhere to eat. Still, the ridiculously spicey kebabs were probably more economical, though thanks to my appetite going AWOL when I got back to my room, I have the rest of my beef and fried rice for lunch.

Yes, I know, I know. That mings.

Well, it's been a while since I last updated. "I'm also ill and not feeling like getting buses" was rather prophetic. Immediately after the internet cafe that day I went back to Julia and Benoit's and started running a temperature of 39C and simultaneously shivering, which turned out to be malaria, so I spent most of last week lying in an extremely green room with a quinine drip in my arm, reading all my books and using up my last walkman batteries. However I have now had another blood test and I am all clean - hurrah!

So, on Friday, I left to find the nuns. They weren't expecting me. I think they were slightly baffled, but they were very nice to me, and gave me toast and marmalade for breakfast, and the parents will be happy. Their church has links with the church in Bolgatanga so I was sent as a sort of ambassador with strict instructions not to make snide comments about 'charity with strings attached' or 'the opium of the poor' and suchlike. I was very well-behaved, and they were all lovely and though I couldn't see much (weekends are not good times to visit schools) I still had a lovely day touring the region getting sunburnt on the back of a moped and saw lots of photos of people doing worthwhile things. Incidentally, one worthwhile thing was distributing lots of old Central High uniforms to local kids when we changed from brown to purple, so I saw all these pictures of people wearing my old gym kit - so surreal. Also, I stayed with some Canadian students, who were from the same town in Ontario where we went on a Pongos tour in 99. The world feels very small. The Canadians were also lovely, and told me that as alcohol was an antiseptic, 50% proof vodka would actually help to get rid of the parasites that were in my liver. I'm not convinced this was a good idea. I felt very sick.

Yesterday I came back to Accra. The driver was the only person in Ghana with a sense of urgency, and I was SCARED! Everyone I met at the hotel said, "You came from Bolga today?" with varying degrees of incredulity. I ended up paying loads more for my room cos the single room I reserved in December had been given to someone else. Turning up as a woman on your own at 9.30 at night is a sure way of getting a room, but does not put you in a good position to argue a cheap deal. And the restaurant was closed, so I had to go off with the Swiss guy. The room is cavernous though. I am currently sorting through my stuff. Even binning all the clothes and shower gel, I have too much.

Will save this and post it tomorrow when I am in Oxford. Weird thought.

I don't want to go home. Please don't make me go home. I want to stay here.

"So I said 'it'll go to penalties' and he said, 'if it goes to penalties I'll give you a guinea fowl', and now he won't give me my guinea fowl cos he says it wasn't a real bet cos I didn't stake anything on it."

Men, honestly.

I got fed up with being harrassed by people wanting to sell me souvenirs and I ran out of money, so I took an infinite number of dodgy buses and came to sponge off my friends for a few days. My father's nuns have not got in touch with me so this may be indefinite. I'm also ill and not feeling like getting buses. And having people to talk to makes the books last longer.

It's fun. They live in a funky little town and have loads of lovely friends, and I have spent rather more time than I'd like watching football (and rugby, but I mind that less) but there is lots of cheap beer and it's all good. Anyway, seeing as I'm supposed to be rejoining the real world in a few weeks (fat chance) I'd better go and ask the BBC what's going on in it.

Hannah

I wrote an email to my dad last week with the subject header "Mali is bloody cold." Nobody had warned me about this. It's in the desert for god's sake.

Still, I have now revised this to parts of it, at certain times of year. I arrived about two weeks ago, but have spent most of the time in obscure villages on the edges of cliffs, or sleeping in the middle of the Sahara, or lying on the floor of a boat clutching my stomach in agony, in none of which places email was widely available, so all the time I spent on the few available (slow) connections was reserved for things like reassuring my hyperventilating parents and trying to find out about bizarre American passport regulations, but I realised that the longer I put off updating this, the worse it would be.

So, I'll try and keep it brief, cos there's nothing worse than 4 pages of name-dropping when you're trying to revise, but it has all been very random and exciting.

First, I went to the Dogon country, where I met a lovely French couple who allowed me to go with them, and we had a great time, walking between all the little villages and scrambling up and down the stunning escarpment. There was a rather unfortunate incident when I got something in my eye, and no-one could see it, so they told me to get a grip and dragged me up the cliff, and by the time we returned, whatever it was was well and truly embedded in my eye. We got back to the campement and I lay writhing on the bed, unable to open my eye, while five men sat secretly around in a circle, and then they came over, pinned me down and shoved a handful of something in my eye. I spent about five minutes crying and clutching onto Julia and Benoît until it was 'finished' and the men told me to sit up, yanked up my eyelid and wiped about thirty black seeds off my eyeball. Bear in mind that it freaks me out to watch other people put contact lenses in... Anyway, it worked, so I have faith in traditional remedies, but, yeah, it was fairly horrific.

After the Dogon country we came to Mopti, a very touristy town on the Niger, which was very pretty but rather full of people trying to sell us necklaces. I did succumb to the temptation to buy 2.5m of gorgeous purple scarf-ness, which is extremely pretty, but transferred a lot of purple dye onto most of my neck and face the following day. It was nice to see a proper toilet again, but we left for Timbuktu the next day... which was possibly the most horrendous journey I have ever made in my life. Except, perhaps, for the trip back from Timbuktu. Basically, we spent ten hours in the back of a jeep with two more people than there were 'seats' and, well, there isn't really a road...

We were quite glad to get there, and had the amazing good fortune to meet the most interesting guy in the world on our first morning. (The guy you recommended, Sarah. Completely by accident. He's fab.) He lives in the northernmost house in Timbuktu, and you really get the feeling you could walk in a straight line north and not see much more than a few tents and camels till you get, well, to the north of Algeria. His wife is a former Peace Corps volunteer and they looked after us very well. Julia and Benoît went home after 2 nights, cos they had no more money, but I stayed an extra couple of days, went on a camel trip into the desert (it was FREEZING at night) and gatecrashed a guided tour of the town with some kindly Dutch people. He also organised my boat ride back, but that was slightly less magical. Obviously, the scenery was amazing, and looking back it's going to be a good anecdote, but certain aspects of it were rather unpleasant. Namely, it is quite difficult to spend three days on a boat, more so when none of the other passengers speaks French, let alone English. Furthermore, well, I was doing quite well with the whole fish thing (I once ordered tuna on pasta and don't mind barracuda) but, well, being in the middle of the river, there are quite a lot of fish, so three meals a day was rice with slimy fish gravy, and I think we're back to square one. In fact, I'm not sure I even want to eat rice again for some time. Also, I was eating with my hands, and washing in the river, and got covered in grease every time I went to the toilet (it was a hole in the back of the boat and involved climbing over the engine), and, obviously, the more unhygienic it got, the more I needed to go to the toilet (not to be too specific) so it was a sort of vicious cycle and I was kind of glad to disembark and sprinted off the boat before anyone could serve me dinner.

I went to a town called Sévaré not too far from Mopti (where the boat went to) and arrived at my hotel, which was run by this American guy, who didn't mind that I hadn't reserved, and I walked into a room full of Canadian medical students eating tortillas, and having people I could talk to (in a choice of languages) and food I could eat was rather a shock to the system, but a very welcome one, and there was even a hot shower. And the next day the medical students were replaced by cynical Americans (who were helpful about visa problems) and Norwegian missionaries. And there was even a pool. And pancakes for breakfast. It was heaven.

And today I am in Djenné, which has a fantastic market and mosque, and I just bought too many blankets, so I now have hardly any money, so am going to hurry along the rest of the trip to get to the bit where I get to stay with people sooner. (Have replanned route to go to stay with new-best-friends, partly cos they're lovely and partly cos they owe me a tenner.) I also had an email from my mum saying 'your father's found you some nuns in Bolgatanga' which is not a sentence you come across very often. (Unless, I suppose, your father has some sort of network of nuns who are prepared to let smelly students crash on their floor. But that is highly unlikely.)

So, yeah, only three weeks to lug my blankets round and then it's back to the boring business of real life and earning money. Meh. And this internet café was quite a trek from town (get 100 m from the market and tourist hotels and this is the most peaceful place in Mali) so I'd better email the boy to tell him when to come and meet me at the airport (armed with warm clothes) and head back hotel-wards before it gets dark and try and find someone to have dinner with. And maybe a beer, if my stomach can tolerate it.

Well, I made it to Saturday 14th in one piece! I did spend, however, approximately 22 hours on a bus, or waiting for the bus at various checkpoints. It was highly unpleasant and I must have managed about 2 hours sleep, not all at once, but once it got light I could look at the countryside, which is very flat, and dusty, and full of donkeys. The Togo-Burkina Faso border crossing, for those who shared that memorable experience with me, bears no little resemblance to the infamous "arsehole of Africa" - except I arrived there just before dawn. This, I will admit in a vain attempt to draw something positive from the experience, avoided some of the problems generally associated with border crossings in Africa, i.e. hundreds of people trying to hustle you everywhere, but did make it all rather surreal. And it was actually cold. COLD. I had been completely unprepared for that and was just wearing a flimsy skirt and top, rather like that bit in A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius where he says he's been living in California so long it never even occurred to him to take a coat when he went to Chicago.

On leaving Lomé I had taken Sarah's advice and decided that wearing my 'wedding ring' as soon as I left the house would be by far the best policy, and despite the fact that it is *blatantly* too big for that finger, and *blatantly* was picked up for about £2.50 in a random shop in Lamu rather than symbolising some lifelong bond of love (well, it may symbolise some lifelong addiction to jewellery shopping in hot countries, but that's a different story), I managed to fool the random Nigerian who sat beside me (which he was very excited about because he didn't speak French and hadn't had much conversation for the past two weeks). What actually ensued was probably still more pleasant than fending off propositions for 22 hours, but the upshot of my brilliant plan was that everyone on the bus thought I was married to the Nigerian (nothing could be further from the truth: he was whiny and stroppy and started to seriously piss me off, and after Atakpamé I spent the journey listening to the much more tranquil Snow Patrol) and he spent two hours asking me questions like, 'What's marriage like?' and 'I once saw a film called Titanic - does love like that really exist?' Which at least made the journey fairly comic...

I'm staying in Guillaume's office in Ougadougou, which is v central and nice though extremely dusty. I am extremely tired, however, so I don't mind in the slightest, it's just nice to be able to stretch out in a straight line again.

I wanted to end this with some appropriate lyrics, but on googling, I've just discovered that I've been under the impression 'Catch the sun' contains the line 'I miss the way you laugh' (instead of 'lie') for the last five years, and it's no longer appropriate at all, so I'm going to go home and sulk and catch up on some sleep, and then tomorrow I'm going to lie by a pool and recuperate, and on Monday I'm going to get a visa for Mali and look at the market and find a bus, and on Tuesday I'm going to get said bus, go to Mali, and try and find a guide to take me trekking in 35° heat.

How did I get more tanned sitting on a bus than from spending three and a half months virtually on the beach? Truly, life is mysterious.

Well, this may be the last time I am in Lomé without a Lonely Planet. I have a bus ticket booked for Friday (why I am I getting a bus in Africa, after dark, on Friday 13th???) and a putative route round Burkina and Mali for the next month and a half. (Here I will pause briefly to dance around the internet café singing 'my loan has come through, my loan has come through' and generally being jubilant that my bank account is in credit once more... or will be until I transfer lots of money to my offshore bank account (or my Barclays account, something like that) to fund aforementioned exciting travels.) I am alternating between great excitement (rock formations! woo!) and fear (email from Sarah saying, 'make sure you have a wedding ring) but I sort of feel ready to move on.

Those who were aware that the end of last week was 'rather shitty' and who very kindly felt sorry for me, will now be relieved to know that this week is great and I don't want to leave. The reasons it was shitty included:

• my housemates were at each other's throats the whole time
• I had difficulty understanding an article on French syntax
• I passed the scary ex-housemate on my way home and was bizarrely troubled
• some guy grabbed my arse about fifteen mins prior to aforementioned incident
• I had no money
• the French news made Europe look all snowy and pretty
• I was having shirt issues (not my shirt, shirts for my brothers)
• STAESA were ****ing me around about paying me back my tour deposit from, like, three months ago

and various other reasons, the sum total of this all being that I felt like I was a long way away from everyone I liked. I am now upset for a whole host of other reasons, namely Lomé has been my home for ages, I've learned to be independant and self-reliant here, my housemates are no longer arguing and have been lovely to me, I've been to the beach for the last time till god knows when, Guillaume has a friend staying atm who is LOVELY and musical and funny (and 38 and a software salesman, so the boy doesn't need to worry!!).

Last night was wonderful. After the beach in the afternoon we called on some friends and they have a small pool thing (like a children's paddling pool but *just* big enough to swim in) and we splashed around in that despite the weather being freezing (or thereabouts... perhaps not *freezing* but bear in mind I haven't felt cold, bar a tropical storm in the middle of the night in early November, since Estonia) and then the friend threw Maï in, and later threw the dogs in (he has two adorable labrador puppies I want to kidnap) and we ended up staying for a lovely dinner of Lebanese chicken and rice, and extremely strong Camembert. While talking about cheese, some of the assembled company though I said 'prix' when in fact I'd said 'Brie' and (although this was probably due to the fact that I speak rather indistinctly even when speaking English and sober), inspired by the several glasses of wine I had consumed, I launched into a lengthy exposition of partial versus full voicing in English and French (fervently hope Holly is reading this or my entire reading public will have missed the funny side of this), totally undeterred by my imperfect understanding of phonetics, the haziness of my memories of prelims and the fact that I couldn't think of the French for 'vocal folds', 'vibrate' or 'voiced'. And then Guillaume and Philippe started playing chess (which I played for the first time in about 5 years last Sunday) and Guillaume's friend started playing the drum and Maï was dancing and the power went off so this was all candlelit, and, yeah, I'm going to miss this.

I sort of wish I'd just gone somewhere in October and stayed there all year. I feel like I've been leaving places and people I've grown attached to since the end of Trinity and will keep doing this until the summer. I find it hard to believe that this time last year I was sitting on a train watching 'Bowling for Columbine' with Thomas (we went first class, don'cha know!), and frantically reading Duras books, and getting horrifically drunk on a semi-regular basis, cos that was a brilliant way to cope with the fact that I was feeling unhappy, and that all seems like a very, very long time ago. Tomorrow is exactly three years since I first set off for Africa. How much I've changed since then.

Sorry for the self-analysis. I promise this will soon get back to showing off about how fantastic my life is. I was once told that Christmas could be seen as a time to reflect on how your life compared with the same time last year, and being a long way from home and the library being closed, I spent a lot of time reflecting. Hence pensiveness, nostalgia etc.

Anyway, articles on diglossia and language policy beckon. No rest for the wicked or chronically masochistic. Hope they've fixed the aircon in the library, all my clothes are in the wash, pending imminent departure.

HAPPY NEW YEAR!!

Hope you all spent it in a more riotous fashion than I did. I have now been to an office Christmas party and watched TV on New Year's instead of going out - feel very old. I was also sober enough to remember midnight, which hasn't happened for several years. We didn't spend all night in front of the telly, but went out just after they celebrated the New Year in France (11p.m. here) to try and find some fireworks. There weren't any but we had one of our own that we lef off in the street. Then we went home and had champagne in plastic cups in the car en route. It was still pleasant, if rather peaceful, and the office party was fun, if rather surreal: kind of like a cross between a black tie dinner and a children's party (lots of people dancing round in a circle in between courses). Said goodbye to all my friends and was given a lift home by the ex-husband of the previous inhabitant of my house, who happens to now be married to my colleague Arlette. Small world.

I have now left work. For a variety of reasons, not least that I've finished my stint as a data entry clerk/emergency receptionist (when everyone else is in a meeting) and need time to learn things about African linguistics. I'm not sure what it says about me as a person that when faced with a choice between helping out in a vibrant, friendly NGO that is doing great things to help needy people and sitting in a library selfishly reading about Kabye morphology I choose the latter. I remember writing a letter to Livvy when I was in Paris saying I felt that at some point I'd have to choose between academic/literary introspection and actively trying to better the world, and I fear the former is gaining the upper hand. I am a geek, I may as well embrace the fact. It just makes me feel like I'm putting myself above everyone else, doing something that is of no benefit to anyone, just because I enjoy it, or I'd like to think I'm good at it. Or maybe it's just that the library has really good air-con.

So, as of tomorrow I will be a full-time geek for two weeks before heading off to the desert. And then I come home and my life gets considerably less interesting as I actually become engaged in the business of earning money. This will be rather a shock to the system, I fear.

Keep emailing!

Hannah xx

Hmm. Appear to have just managed to post the message I wrote in Accra last week. I am, to bring you up to speed, no longer in Accra, nor is the hole in my foot as much of a problem any more.

I suppose I should give some account of the boy's visit, as this is meant to be a record of my life, not a forum for extensive Alitalia-bitching. We spent the first ten days sitting around in front of the fan playing cards, and the last week on a mad dash to see half of West Africa, which in retrospect seems slightly imbalanced, but it was fun. He also brought me epic quantities of Dairy Milk and a supply of books (chosen, I am obliged to add, by Livvy, not by him) both of which I am trying to stop myself devouring before New Year. We did a bit of sightseeing, including some really interesting castles and forts in Ghana and spend rather more time drinking the extremely cheap beer. (Yes, Si, there will be a veritable collection of labels for you when I get back.)

Then he went home and it was Christmas, except it was sunny, and I had a traveller's cheque stolen, which mings somewhat. Christmas was very surreal, though my mother tried her best to make it homely for me by sending (yes, really) and actual stocking, filled with a bizarre assortment of presents: stollen, a gingerbread snowman, hand cream, a foot scrub and, most excitingly, a tape of Christmas carols, so my room has been resounding to 'Bethlehem Down' and 'I look from afar' and the usual favourites.

No plans for New Year yet but my housemate threatened disguises.....

This is the second time I have been in an internet cafe in Accra and the second time I have used one to bitch about Alitalia.

I have an exciting, shiny STA Travel ticket which says on it that I can change it at any Alitalia office for the fee of 40Euros. Brilliant, I thought, I can change it at the office in Lome, where I live - that will be convenient. So, one lunchtime, I sauntered into the Alitalia office in Lome where the sulky man behind the desk informed me it would cost me $100. Now, unless the global economy has *seriously* changed since I left in October, $100 does not equal 40 Euros. On further questioning the sulky man refused to show me any official tarriffs, and told me I could only pay cash. Wanting to investigate this further before parting with my little cash, I emailed STA saying 'does this sound a bit dodgy to you?' and got an email from a friendly sounding bloke called Greg (or Mike, or something monosyllabic) saying 'I don't know, what's your booking reference?' Several emails later, we established that the Student Travel Services office in Accra was the best place to sort it out, because, apparently, I have a blue ticket. Well, there you go. So, being in Accra, this seemed like a good time to change the date so I can, like, get back to Europe before me TEFL course starts. The staff there, I would like to say, were brilliant and helpful and I have no complaints. But did Alitalia *really* need to drag me all the way to their office to see the 'rules' governing my ticket and try to get 27GBP out of me, only to send me back to the studenty place when I asked if I could change it there (for 15GBP) saying it was no problem?

I think not.

Maybe they were just making my life difficult because I have dirty trousers.

Anyway I am now definitely coming home. Hurrah.

Sorry for being generally incommunicado for the last few weeks. The boy has been so I've been busy showing him the sights of Lome and eating the Dairy Milk he brought me and suchlike. The boy has now departed. And I have discovered that waving a broken shoe is a brilliant way to get a taxi. Also, that sterilising tweezers, digging bits of gravel out of your foot (embedded there by dramatic fall caused by aforementioned breaking of shoe) and waving antiseptic wipes around all over the place is a good way to take your mind off feeling sorry for yourself. It hurts to walk and I have no smart shoes at all now.

Anyway I have to catch a bus, so I'll apologise for ranting and also for missing three birthdays (or two if Sarah's is today instead of yesterday and she happens to read this in time). Also, happy Christmas and New Year and suchlike. It's all very surreal here.

Things that happened to me yesterday:

• saw a mouse in my room
• witnessed a road accident
• got pissed off at STAESA for ruining my evening
• was assertive twice in the space of an hour (yes - me -really)
• had a woman come up to me, rub my stomach and ask me how the baby was doing
• got trapped in conversation with some guy who thought he had a right to be my best friend just cos he had an MBA from America... reminded me of those MBA people who were randomly in Queen's bar one time... maybe one of the requirements is to pass an exam in being a git
• convinced STAESA I needed my deposit back and persuaded them to book me a hotel in Accra for next week and come to the airport in the middle of the night, hence no longer pissed off with them
• found a restaurant serving bacon sandwiches to rival Harvey's
• ate ice cream in the same restaurant
• felt much happier, once devoid of extraneous wildlife, pissed-off-ness and phantom pregnancy
• had catastrophic nose-bleed and had to go home

I need to name the lizards that sleep on the outside of my mosquito screen. One is named Larry in homage to the one in our bathroom in Kenya. Any suggestions for the other?

I wrote myself a list of things to do on the internet, which read somthing like this:

• email Holly for her address to apologise for not writing yet - also to see if she knows anything about extended essays
• email every tutor I've ever had to find out what the hell to do about extended essays
• find some way of contacting the linguistics department at Université de Lomé
• email booking ref to STA travel to stop evil Alitalia man trying to screw me over
• harrass STAESA for the $150 they owe me
• reassure parents am still alive
• ask the boy to bring Marmite and chocolate

I also had four missed calls this morning, and a text from the boy, so I feel very popular. Am still working as general admin bitch which is more useful and less traumatic than trying to give legal advice and went to a funky party on Friday. I am also currently using the best computer in the whole of Africa, rather excitingly, and it's also right by the door, giving a much needed breeze. Not quite sure how I'm going to cope with the climate in Burkina and Mali. It is very, very hot, with no wind at all. *fear* Otherwise I'm just being a geek - finished Germinal (something I've been trying to achieve for over a year now) and making occasional notes on diglossia in the hope that this will somehow lead on to getting onto that Linguistics and Development MA course at SOAS, should several thousand pounds just drop out of the sky to fund it. Actually really enjoyed Germinal - Karen Blixen was right: in Africa, you read books as the author intended them to be read.

Having shown off about my organised list-making I ought to go and cross some stuff off it. 'Waffle on blog' was not an item.

13 days, not that I'm counting.........

Dear people of France,

1) I know Britain is not in the Euro. I'm very sorry, but it is not my personal responsibility to make this sort of economic and political decision.

2) I don't really eat that much jam. Nor do we eat cake all the time. Really. Also, green beans are not a meal. Not on their own. Not even with lots of garlic.

3) Most of the world's immigrants actually end up in places like Tanzania and Pakistan. It's only about 1% that make it to Europe.

4) Comic books are for children.

That is all. Thankyou.

________________

PS - Would everyone who got all worried about me going to politically unstable countries like Togo and begged me to go and get a nice job in Paris like to apologise now?

Well, I haven't updated properly for quite some time, but as I am now in an internet café that hates gmail and no-one is talking to me on MSN, I have 20 minutes to waffle about palm trees and caffeine and then 10 to sit biting my nails, hoping it posts before my time runs out. Ah, it's fun.

Well, I started work on Monday, but I won't go on about it. Suffice to say I've seen a lot of people in awful situations in the last three days, and there's not a whole lot I can do for them, which is rather difficult at times. I'm helping a paralegal (an amazing woman who can make even the most distressed client laugh), so sitting in on consultations and mediations. The consultations are okay, as they tend to be more relaxed and there's time for people to explain to me what's going on, but the mediations tend to take upwards of two hours and there's all sorts of tension flying around. I've been writing lots of reports, but often people speak Ewe or Mina (a lot of women haven't been to school for very long so don't speak much French) and I don't really know what's going on, as my language skills are still limited to greeting people and hailing taxis, and a lot of the problems are very bound up with cultural issues and traditions that still seem quite strange to me. In a way I'm quite glad I didn't start straight away, as it would probably all have been a bit much in the early stages of culture shock.

It's very rewarding though, and this sort of thing always makes you bond with your co-workers very strongly, so I feel very welcome in the organisation. I go to the little restaurant round the corner and buy lunch for 40p every day - plantains, rice, beans, meat, all freshly cooked and yummy. They've adopted the continental working day which means I leave the house at 7.40 and get home about 6, but have 2 1/2 hours for lunch. I'm skiving rather, as I should be back now, but I didn't finish till 13.30 and feel justified in using my full hour here. Have also succesfully bargained myself a bitrhday present for my housemate (earrings in a wooden box) and she's having a big party tomorrow, with some Germans she knows. Went to the 'cinema' with them (Star Wars 3, no better the second time around) on Tuesday and they were very nice - always fun meeting other volunteers.

Anyhow, had better post this in good time! Hope you're all well!

Hannah x

Right, the last time I publicly announced I was happy on this blog everything went rather pear-shaped almost instantly, so I won't make a similar mistake again.

Suffice to say I have finally started work and everyone there is lovely, and I have been living in the same place for 9 days and nobody has sexually harrassed me yet! I also have a phone - a lovely Nokia 5110 (remember them?) like my first ever phone. It cost me £15 and it's got primitive Snake and no predictive text and it's my new favourite toy.

I also have a new address, which I will email you if you want it. Not sure there's any reason not to post it on here, as it's only a PO Box so no-one can stalk me, but that's not a chance I'm willing to take!!

About to get kicked off the computer, but just wanted to say hi to everyone (if anyone reads this) and will try and email people in a responsible and loving manner, as you deserve, for bothering to email me!

My brain is linguistic soup. It's weird.