A Walker in the Suburbs

We woke early, jumped on motorcycle taxis in the dark and by daybreak were cruising east and south on the ATT Busline. This bus had air conditioning and loud Beninese music — which I stopped hearing after a couple of hours.

“You’ve been in every region of Benin, Mom,” Suzanne said as we drew closer to Cotonou. And I have to say, I feel like it. Traveling cross-country here is not for the faint of heart. Come to think of it nothing much here  is.

It will take me days, weeks, probably months to digest the last seven days — and I had time to start digesting before we got home since we sat for more than 45 minutes in a traffic jam. Yep, they have ’em here, too.

It’s as close to these animals as I’ll ever be — or want to be! At Parc Pendjari we saw antelope, bison, baboons, hippos, warthogs, a small leopard and lots of elephants — some of them close enough that we prepared for a quick getaway in case they charged.

For the last few hours, Suzanne and I rode on the top of the van, where, with a little imagination, you could be flying over those waving grasses, those acrid plains. The antelope bounding, the elephants spraying their backs with the fine red dust that has made its way into my pores. The baobab trees with baboons munching their fruit.

Finally, I couldn’t resist. The tune had been in my head all day, so I fished the iPod out of my purse, found the theme song for “Out of Africa” and pushed play. I stuck one bud in my ear and the other in Suzanne’s. It was hokey but it was also perfect. It was a soundtrack for the moment, for the sights and sounds and smells of Africa.

I’ve learned something new: If you’re taking three bush taxis in a day, it’s wise to ride shotgun. Luckily, Suzanne already knew this, so she made sure I was sitting up next to the driver in the ancient Peugots.

There were five people crammed in the back seat and three in the far back. In the front, there was just the driver and me until the last leg when Suzanne joined us — and, for the last few miles, also a petite young woman with ceremonial scars on her face who was none too happy to be crammed into our group.

About five miles from our destination the car broke down. Everyone waited patiently for an hour or so, when a replacement car came zooming up to take us away.

We started and finished the day with motorcycle taxis and are now preparing to visit Parc Pendjari, in hopes of seeing elephants and rhinos if not lions and tigers and bears.

But for now, a day to recuperate. Riding shotgun makes it better, but a bush taxi is a bush taxi!

(Luckily, most of our roads were paved.) 

To spend two days in Toura is to go back in time and forward in time, is to meet at least a hundred people, none of whom speak English.

It’s to wander through a village on the edge of the Sahel under a full moon.

It’s to drink Beninoise beer, eat a freshly killed and grilled guinea fowl and learn two Bariba words: abwado and alafiya (both spelled phonetically here!).

It’s to go to Sunday mass and hear Ibo songs accompanied by hand claps, dancing children and an earnest drummer who looks up to heaven in rapture as he pounds out the ancient rhythm.

It’s to wonder what we lost when stopped living together in community.

Twelve hours on a bus has taken us to the north of Benin, where the call to prayer echoes from one mosque to another, where French and Bariba are spoken in one breath. So many impressions, so little time. Best today to capture it in pictures.

The first post of 2015 finds me sitting on a stool in Suzanne’s little living room. A ceiling fan whirrs above and traffic noise filters in from the street. The new year is getting lost in the shuffle for me, since I’m getting to know a new country, a new continent.

Take last night, for instance. In retrospect New Year’s Eve seemed a good day to arrive. There was a festive atmosphere abroad in the land, people preparing for the celebration. “Bonne Fete!” they said. Have a good holiday. (There’s another phrase specifically for Happy New Year but I’ve already forgotten it.)

What I hadn’t accounted for — but should have — was the racket that lasted past 1 a.m. Firecrackers that seemed to be exploding right outside the window, the high-pitched voices of Beninese women singing. Dogs parking, horns honking. And then, just as I was drifting off, roosters crowing.

It certainly was a memorable New Year’s Eve; I doubt I’ll have another like it. As for resolutions, mine so far are simple. Eat right, drink only bottled water and work up enough courage to ride a motorcycle taxi. I’m almost there!

I woke up this morning with that familiar jump start. I ran through the possibilities: Is someone I love sick or in need? Is there a work deadline? Something else I have to do?

Oh, that’s right. I’m flying to Africa today.

While the exquisite shorthand of modern travel means this requires very little effort on my part (I live less than 15 minutes from Dulles International Airport), the decisions, postponements and preparation it took to get here have occupied me for more than two years.

This journey, then, begins not just with a single step but with a series of partings, reunions and reflections. They have brought me here, to this point of departure, to this familiar action, boarding a plane. But the plane will take me to another continent, one I’ve never visited before. A universe of its own with customs, climates, peoples, beliefs and practices I can barely begin to fathom.

Travel is, at best, about possibilities. I begin at home. I will land, God willing, in a faraway place, a continent so vast that our country would be swallowed up by it. It’s a place my daughter has come to love. I go there to see her world.


(Photo: Katie Esselburn)

A trip to Africa requires not just one packing list but several. There’s the electronic one I’ve been tapping on my phone whenever I think of something on the run — ear plugs, a headlamp, the Kindle! 

There’s the scribbled one upstairs near the brand new suitcase — kitchen towels for Biba, a book for Apollinaire, candy, gum and pens for other friends I’m about to meet. 

And then there’s the carefully typed list Suzanne sent me a couple weeks ago — her attempt to rein in her mother’s (ahem) over-packing tendencies. After all, she took only two suitcases and a carry-on for two years.

So my new motto is travel light, take only what I need, nothing “just in case.” Let’s see how long it lasts!