Posts

Yaka Yele - Just come to the Farm

Image
We took the car and drove for 2 hours outside Lomé. Heading to the mountains and the waterfalls of Togo, in the region of Kpallime. The kids were excited, my parents were eager to discover outside the capital but I was quickly heavy-hearted when the rural views started filling the car window. For all the years I have been living in West Africa...seeing poverty in the villages still has the same impact on me that it had that first day I put one foot in Benin to visit Boyfriend Husband years back. Poverty of everything. Water, electricity, connectivity, food scarcity. The distance between the have's (I) and have nots scarring your heart. I am not the only one feeling that way, my team in Togo spent the week in Northern Togo (up to Kara) visiting projects and they have all came back in a state of shock and incredulity. The have nots are so many, so clearly lacking everything. They even lack the rain, so venerated in these lands, making Togo extremely dry this time of the year, the exp...

Reconnecting

Once upon a time there was a merigoesaround wonderwoman who travelled the world as hungry as a wolf. Well advised by her boyfriend-husband at the time, who today is her husband, she started blogging. Blogging was the 'it' thing to do at the time. No Twitter, no LinkedIn during those days. She blogged about her thoughts, ruminations, impressions on things, her tribulations.... Always a bit worried whether she was opening her heart too much. Not always knowing what she would write about. And then she stopped blogging, and blogs themselves became uncool. But 2023 is the year we all back to our keyboards to write blogs says Lilah Raptopoulos, my favorite journalist. And I think so too. A lot has happened since my last blog. A lot as in I have now 2 children and I have moved to two new countries since. But I hope that not a lot of that wonderwoman has changed and that I am still hungry for adventure. 

I am back

 What if this would be the day that I start blogging again? It just was.

The building blocks of life

Wael talked with the frankness of a good man: "in Egypt you can have food or freedom, but not both. With Moubarak we had food, with Mosi we had some freedom and with the current President, Sisi, we have again something to eat, but we better don't talk". His law degree at Al-Azhar university got him a job as a driver for a development organization, he seemed happy but I thought a good thinker was fighting against traffic instead of fighting injustices at trials. The walk through Khan Al Khalili market was very pleasant, despite the corporate look, including heels, that my friend and I were sporting.  The best was yet to come. Friends for life know you and share the need for memorable moments that keep bonding you to each other: watching the pyramid of Giza at night from the Carter suite at Mena House Hotel was one. We could barely see it but my imagination and google did the rest. Suddenly, that moment and our laughs counted more than the centuries of history hidden in...

Taxi ride

Image
My daily taxi rides are full of discoveries. I love negotiating the price, listening to the news and exchanging views with my rudimentary wolof. Telling the drivers to go 'ndank ndank' when they speed and to increase the volume when Youssou N'dour is on. This morning the taxi man was shaving while driving and sharing his views on the ban to distribute Charlie Hebdos in Senegal. What a multitasker. YouTube Video - Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone Location: Rue Aime Cesaire,Dakar,Senegal

Dusty everything

Image
For some weeks every year Dakar is an extremely dusty place. The air and the sand of the Sahara reach the peninsula of Cape Vert covering all surfaces with zillions of dust particles. - Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone Location: Avenue Du PR. L. Sedar Senghor,Dakar,Senegal

Detox or how to make your life miserable

Image
New Year, new experimenting...I am learning that detoxifying on a liquid-only diet might not be for me. This week I ate baby food for 36 hours and I craved the crunchiest thing you could imagine, from chips to a 'pain au raisins' from our local bakery. There are two camps, or multiple, but at least at my office women in camp 1 swear that drinking water only and doing internal cleansing with enemas (aaaargh) works wonders, and camp 2 believes is all fad. This  article  claims that diet and sports, not detox, is what one should do. - Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone Location: Rue Aime Cesaire,Dakar,Senegal

Grigri

Image
Boyfriend Husband (BH) pampered me with a little grigri from the Souk that subtlety adorns my wrist and gives me extra powers. Wohoo. - Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone Location: Marrakech Médina,Morocco

2000 + 15

Image
The year starts with bad news, big dreams and lots of planning. Bad news in France and in the world, where the extremism of some destroy the peacefulness of all. Big dreams as we start a new year full of adventures in Dakar and beyond. And lots of planning to keep living life fully. - Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone Location: Marrakech Médina,Morocco