Benin Republic - Abomey to Grand Popo

We joined a 3 day trip to the Benin Republic - the spiritual home of Voodoo (know as Juju in these parts)- that was organised by the Nigerian Field Society (an anthropological organisation of like minded nerdy-folk)


The organisers, Hans and Maaike, planned an excellent programme with such variety that nobody could have been bored. We began with a travel day and after leaving ikoyi at 7:00am in a convoy with police protection to get to the border. We arrived in Abomey around 4 pm. The border was a bit tedious and took two hours to clear, with Hans and Maaike taking care of officialdom - but as they wouldn't "dash" the border guards they took plenty of time with our papers. Whilst I understand while they didn't do it, it's normal practice to hand over a hundred naira or so ($1) as a sort of tip to each person who needs to stamp your passport - just to get things moving.



ABOMEY

Hotel “Chez Monique” provided an excellent atmosphere to end a day on the bus. We had a large garden to wander around filled with masks, statues, tapestries and beer. There were lots of separate beer corners within the garden and we relaxed and enjoyed each other’s company. Then when we needed a new beer garden we walked a couple of blocks down the wide boulevard to the local beer garden and had a few more..


Francis, the enthusiastic and knowledgeable tour guide, gave us a run down on Benin’s history. There are plenty of historical sites from this once great kingdom.


Beware of the “protector” of one of the sites - the Marlboro man, or so his hat proclaimed! As we took photos of 18th Century palace walls from the street he decided it was his duty to stop us and demand money. Not unusual, but when we paid a nominal fee, he decided to chase our bus through the streets of Abomey for at least half an hour shaking his fist, motioning us to pull over, cutting us off (on an Okada no less!) and then he followed us to Blacksmith Village where he turned our visit to the local blacksmith into a big scene.




We also saw a local voodoo (juju) shrine which was coincidentally in use while we were there so we saw the grisly procedure of chicken sacrifice. This lovely event was followed by a stroll through the local market to watch the humane treatment of the local live produce as it is wrangled with and tied up in order to fit on the back of an okada, bicycle, rooftop, etc





Fuel is expensive in Benin so they sell black Market fuel (often stolen from Nigeria where it's heavily subsidised) by the side of the road in big glass jars

WITCH DOCTOR

Next stop was a trip to the voodoo village and the witch doctor introduced us to fetishes and spitting upon them. When asked if anybody had problems to cure, nobody did. We were a happy healthy group. Or, more likely, everybody was on the verge of passing out from heat exhaustion in the cramped tiny room in which we were viewing the rituals and didn't need to have gin spat on us









The old guy got drunk at talked to this piece of cloth for a while, occasionally laughing - must've been some funny cloth...

This concoction of wax and palm oil and a skull - apart from stinking - is wiped on the little statues (fetishes) to get the gods to help you...

GETTING AROUND



One thing Benin has going for it is the fact that fashionable young ladies like this one can ride okadas (motorbikes) here. In Nigeria that's unheard of (actually a fancy bike like that is too...)

This is the more usual use for an okada - get the whole family and off you go!

TRAIN TO COAST

The next day a train had been arranged especially for our group to take us from a town near Abomey, called Bohicon, to Pahou near the coast. The 3 hour ride seemed short, because it was so enjoyable. The train carriage is 1922 vintage with beautiful hardwood floors and a big back verandah.

The train doesn't run any more - though like everything else around here did once in the "good old days" whenever that was... It's the first train we've been on in Africa






The children who saw this extremely rare sight of a train are so excited that they bounce up and down when they wave at you.










Tanks to Sheryl tank for some of the text :)

Places with cool names... Zanzibar (Pt 1 of 3)

Where do we start... zanzibar... zanzibar... zanzibar...

zanzibah.. ha.. (sung to the tune of van halen's Panama) is a small island off the coast of Tanzania surrounded by warm tropical waters and bleached white sands. Whilst it has it's fare share of million dollar fancy resorts (like anywhere with a stretch of decent coast these days), it also has a myriad of small out of the way places that are full of the most laid back, easy going locals you could find...

George and I were hoping for a relaxed easter, and came armed with a stack of books to lie on the beach a read... Flying from Lagos, you have to detour through Nairobi, and although the town had been besieged by riots and a little ethnic cleansing in recent days, we hoped to catch up with journalista extraordinario Katharine for a few days... Turned out she had to hold down the Associated Press fort in Lagos for the exact week we would be in East africa (so we borrowed her key and were allowed to stay at her place anyway...

Zanzibar is a mix of local islanders, mainland swahili and arab and indian traders. This can been seen in the faces of the people, the architecture and the local cuisine. Despite it's bloody past (the locals rose up over the arab, indian and asian oppressors in the late '60s, killing thousands...)

The capital - stone town - is an eclectic mix of old run-down buildings and narrow streets which allows for interesting views (breakfast at the Kiponda above...)

No one seems to be getting around to fixing up the old places and there's plenty of derelict structures in the surprisingly tiny town. Some are just being held in place like this (above)



Buildings are dark and cool inside, housing many families in small spaces, but the entrances to these dives are still some of the most elaborate I've ever seen, with huge carved mahogany doors (i guess that's the Arab influence)



some of the buildings are so close together you can barely get through - it's really easy to get lost, and you often lose sight of the sun (very cooling, but kinda scary when you're lost)


One of the things Zanzibar has been famous for since the earliest traders came through the area (after Vasco de Gama no doubt...) is Spices. And they sure do grow a lot of them.

One of the things that's a "must see" is a spice tour. Being the organised folk that we are, we hadn't set up anything, but this town is so easy going, at 9:00pm on Sunday night we mentioned that we'd like to do one and the next morning we were on a bus for $10 for the day (inc lunch and a trip to the beach...)
here's our very knowledgeable guide with some vanilla pods...

... nutmeg and mace...

...tumeric...

On our little jaunt around the farms of the tiny island (it's only a few kms long) we got to see the locals doing their thing.

As the island is barely able to produce enough food for it's inhabitants, they're reliant on the mainland for everything - which makes consumables like cars and fuel way too expensive for the locals

even the soccer balls are make do



whether swimming or fishing, unlike Nigeria, most people spend a lot of time in the water here...

One interesting by-product of the Arab (Muslim) influence are the bright shawls that locals wear - often adorned with phrases in Swahili. This also means that women sit side saddle on motorbike taxis rather than hiking up their dresses like in Mainland Africa (I guess the traffic so light here you don't need to hold on with both legs like in Lagos!!

Places with cool names... Zanzibar (Pt 2 of 3)

After a few days in the hustle and bustle of stonetown, it was time to jump a taxi to the beach. Again, we hadn't booked anything, but the locals are so easy going, it wasn't a problem just to call ahead and turn up.

we landed at Nyota Beach Bungalows...

man, this place was sooo laid back, you had to remind your haeart to keep beating every now and then as you just lazed around...

nothing to do for a few days but read, swim, eat, read, snorkel, eat.....



our room faced the ocean, and with mozzie mesh on the windows you could wake up each day to a beautiful sunrise

or sunset...

The bunglows were quite isolated, with most of the resort much further north, and so the locals here just got on with their lives and ignored the small number of tourists...

The beach on this part of the island is protected by a barrier reef about 200m off shore. When the tide is low, the reef acts like a dam, keeping a foot or two of water in one huge rockpool. The locals use this area to farm seaweed, and each day at low tide all the women would go out to their particular plot and harvest seaweed and bring it onshore for drying (which they'd then sell for medicine...)


As the tide would come back in, all th little sticks would be covered and you'd never know the farms were there...


...even the kids would be involved...




When to tide was really low, everyone would go out to the barrier reef and search for shellfish and crabs (the pic below is take about 300m offshore - though you woudln't know)

The old italian guy who ran the place (didn't really speak english) had a sea kayak and a bunch of snorkelling gear that you could jsut borrow for free whenever you want, so we spent a lot of time diving on the reefs and generally stuffing around - it was heaps of fun..