New Neighborhood

Big changes on the Peace Corps front…. I’ve moved to Parakou – metropolitan heartbeat of the north country.

After months of planning the Moringa Association of Benin, it looks like we’re set to launch the NGO this spring. To facilitate our launch and get started on developing the market for moringa leaves, I need to be centrally located, and able to communicate by phone and email. It wasn’t easy leaving my friends in village, but I’m pleased to be working on something fruitful (er, leaf-full?) and I’ll surely be back up north to help with the plantation and see my village cronies.

Parakou Scenes:

Moto Town

Compared to other West African cities, Parakou is rather pretty. There are quite a few public spaces and socialist-era monuments.

Like this statue of Bio Guera - the great Bariba fighter who resisted the European slave traders.
Don't let the anxious face fool you...

It may be the "second city of Benin" but we keep our rural roots with a healthy downtown goat population.

Parakou has always been a trade junction, and the huge central market sells everything from Obama undies to dried chameleons, and a huge variety of veggies too.


It's like Toys R US...


just a little disturbing.


At dusk each day the sky fills with fruit bats.



the nimble Peugot 505 on moving day

Parakou ain’t bad – veggies all year round, cold beers, and…….. Fyidafrik!

Fidyafrik

Sebastien is the night guard at the Peace Corps work station in Parakou. He’s a quiet guy, always there with a kind greeting and a warm smile. He does his job well, and he’s a friend to all volunteers.


But there’s more to his unassuming smile than meets the eye. Afterhours Sebastien shines as Benin’s emerging cross-dressing pop star : Fidyafrik!

Six years ago, Sebastien’s best friend lost his soul mate to an arranged marriage. She was whisked away overnight to marry a man chosen by her father. Distraught by injustice that tore apart a happy couple, Sebastien vowed to fight for women’s rights and gender equity. The time had come to merge his passion for music with his aspiration to spread a message of hope and justice. Fidyafrik was born.

Sebastien spent the next five years developing his first hit single: Les Femmes au Pouvoir (“Power to the Women”). He recorded the song in a Parakou studio, complete with instrumental backing and a women’s chorus group. Les Femmes au Pouvoir starts with a percussive chant demanding political power for women, before moving into the poppy heart of the song that combines melodic Afro-beat verses with Reggae interludes. At seven minutes and thirty-eight seconds, there’s plenty of time for a VanHalen-esque guitar solo and two spoken word soliloquies. Fidyafrik hits you with a variety of musical styles – you’re sure to get the message.

In January 2010 Fidyafrik approached the Wanderlust Imagery team about producing his music video. It was an easy decision. We started work on the 24th of January. I’ll let the images tell the rest of the story:

The endeavor overcame adversity right from the beginning: the Sony DoDeCaHORN boom box seemed to be busted. Alas, we reversed the polarity of the batteries, and with great relief, proceeded to the first shooting location.





Sebastian metamorphosises into Fidyafrik. He prepared five seperate ladies outifts for the video shoot. When Fidyafrik performs, (s)he says “my heart, my lungs, my lips are feminine.”




Volunteer technical director Old Man Downing prepares the cinematography equipment.


Fidyafrik fires up the DoDeCaHORN,


and lays down the lyrics.


The camera's rolling...


costume change


Fidyafrik!


what, what? quoi, quoi?


Fidyafri and the tech team do business on a termite mound.

We are currently editing the video, aiming to debut on March 8th for International Women's Day. Wanderlust Imagery will be right there - first to deliver the music video to the WWW.

With a little luck, this release shall catapult Fidyafrik towards his dream of becoming the Universal Defender of Rights for Women and Children.

To learn more, or if you want to support Universal Defense of Women and Kids, contact me.

Dogon Country

Vacation! I've been traveling the last few weeks with a couple fellow volunteers. We ventured north, in hopes of reaching Timbuktu.

Our first stop was in the Dogon region of Southern Mali.

mud mosque

To defend themselves from warring tribes and slave traders, the Dogon people built their homes high in the rocky escarpment that rises above the flat Sahel.


Sculptures adorn the mud buildings, telling the tales of a bygone era.



Today, without fear of conflict, the Dogon have opted for to build on the flatlands below, but they maintain thier incredible architectural tradition. Notice the elaborate mosque on the right side.



We enjoyed living as tourists for a change. Here, we slept on the roof of a mud lodge. A long exposure in bright moonlight let me slip ghostly into this shot.

Mopti and Downstream on the Niger

Next we traveled to the bustling port city of Mopti. We were lucky to score a fortuitous spot on a cargo boat that was heading downstream the next morning.

Called pinasses, these handmade wooden vessels chug up and down the Niger river with loads of rice, millet, cement, flour, gasoline, or just about anything that's needed further inland. Yes, the Niger is quite strange, in that it flows over a thousand miles inland towards the Sahara before bending sharply to return towards the Atlantic Ocean.

We got spots on this low-floating beauty, loaded with 80 metric tones of cement (I asked).

The boat was staffed with two drivers, a captain, a handyman, an engine operator, and two cook girls. There were perhaps a half dozen other passengers, most of them accompanying their cargo to market in Timbuktu.

Ibrahim the one-handed handyman spent most of the trip bailing water.


We became buddies.



This little lady cooks rice and fish for breakfast, lunch, and dinner.


En route, we had lots of time to enjoy the quiet scene along the Niger. Life here seems to have changed little in the last hundred years. It's all about fishing and transport.


















where are we?









The ladies cooked on an open fire deep in an empty portion of the hull. Snakes on a plane? That ain't nothing. Try flames on a boat.



super cozy inside. the blue tarps keep splashes off the cargo.



We found a little sleeping niche amidst the cement sacks.



Tea is one of the most important rituals in Islamic sub-Saharan Africa. Three times a day, or perhaps five, or ten.


it's a litte teapot. short and stout.