Expat Africa: At the Benin Marina Hotel

Sitting by the pool under a palm tree, on a cloudless day, cooled by the ocean breeze, you can't help but think, This is the life. And it is.

In a country where a person is lucky to earn more than $1000 a year, a $200 night stay at Cotonou's Benin Marina Hotel is, generally speaking, more than just a special weekend getaway; it's an impossibility - but for the expats living here the hotel is a weekend hot-spot.

For a surprisingly reasonable annual fee when compared to the room prices (though still much more than the average Beninese could afford), you get access to the most beautiful pool in the country, a small handful of tennis courts and a few other hotel facilities. In addition, circling the hotel is the most compact 9-hole golf course you could ever imagine, saved from it's size only by the fact that it's probably the lone golf course in the country.

Weekends are busy. As long as it's not raining, the kiddie pool is teeming with toddlers; the large, circular, adult pool is overrun by unruly pre-teens; and parents chase their children with bottles of sunscreen. When you arrive at the pool you flash your membership card and you're escorted to the umbrella of your choice (if there are any left to choose from) where you're given a fresh towel and a cushion for your chair. You can buy crêpes, ice cream and cocktails. You can even get a green coconut with a straw inserted for drinking the juice. Every Friday night the hotel hosts a themed buffet dinner by the pool for the outrageous sum of 14500 CFA (~ $30) per person.



For me, the Benin Marina is a great place to swim laps. The pool is round, but on weekday mornings it's deserted and you can swim along the buoy line that floats the diameter. I slather on sunscreen, put on my swimsuit, pack my beach bag, and trot down the "Marina road" to the pool. In less than 10 minutes, I'm in the water. On my way home, I give the same guards I passed earlier another round of hellos, this time with wet hair and goggle-marked, raccoon eyes.

On the weekends, the Marina stands in for the garden T and I don't have. When we're too lazy to drive all the way to the beach we walk to the Marina with our books and bottled water and precede to get sunburned. Once, I tried to write my thesis by the pool, but even under the shadiest umbrella the glare from the sun made it difficult to see the words on my laptop screen and I didn't end up working on much more than my tan.

As much as I'm thankful to have the Marina so close, I always feel as though I've sneaked into someplace I'm not supposed to be when I'm there - like it's a secret club and I'm only pretending to be a member. The excess of such surroundings, of the African expat life in general, is something I'll never quite get used to and somehow I feel thankful for that. A strange mix of awe and guilt sets in as you admire your surroundings and realize how lucky you are. Outside the Marina, construction workers toil in the heat, mixing cement and digging foundations to build government-funded housing units for politicians visiting Benin during an international African conference next year. A little further down the road, children walk through rows of vegetables with metal watering cans that are probably twice their weight. Polio victims hobble between parked cars at traffic lights, tapping on windows for a spare franc. As you float in that giant pool, you know there are people in the north dying from drinking dirty water.

Once, someone asked me if it wasn't hard to live with poverty right outside my door. To be honest, yes, it is. But the reality is that poverty has always been right there, it's just harder to ignore when you're in a place like Benin. And maybe that's a good thing. Maybe everyone who's ever been lucky enough to float in a pool ought to be forced to witness real poverty first-hand. Maybe then at least we would finally realize just how fortunate we really are.

This Is War!

We've been attacked!... by mold. There is mold everywhere - inside the kitchen cabinets, in the closets, on our shoes, growing on our clothes. Yuk! This whole place has smelled musty from day one, particularly the kitchen, but it's easy to ignore such things when you know that closer inspection will only bring unwelcomed news. So the mold made a major mistake when it decided to make an open attack on our clothes. There was a problem and we couldn't deny it any more. I had no choice but to declare war immediately.

The wardrobe was the first casualty. It is now a wardrobe skeleton, with no back panel or doors. All the clothes went straight into the wash and the closets and cupboards were doused with bleach. But this is going to be a on-going battle. Cotonou is extremely humid and consistently warm. It's paradise for mold. Even with the air conditioners running it's always damp and I'm finding mold in new places. Just yesterday I opened the night-stand to discover that the outside of my passport was fuzzy. My passport! I can't exactly soak that in bleach!

But it's not just mold that plagues our Cotonou residence. There are the ants. Tiny little reddish-brown ants by the thousands that go marching one by one, hurrah, hurrah! On Monday the apartment was fumigated with insecticide to kill all the bugs hoping to infest our home. By that evening, the ants were back, marching in their little single file lines across the kitchen counter. I think the only living thing that suffered from the fumes was me.

Next, we have the rain. Apparently the late summer dry season lasts less than a month because we're back into the rain again (which probably isn't helping us with the mold situation). Whenever it rains the patio around our building becomes completely flooded and we have to use cinder blocks as stepping stones to get in and out of the front gate. We've got it pretty easy though. Many homes are under water and I've meet at least two Beninese who have had to move because of the flooding. If you've been paying attention to the world news you've probably noticed that massive flooding is widespread in Africa at the moment, especially for our neighbours in Togo and Ghana. Niger and Burkina Faso have also been hit hard. Benin is swamped and has been all summer but according to the BBC news maps of worst affected areas, Benin is one of the only West African countries not in (or almost in) a state of emergency. I can only imagine what it must be like for those around us. A Sunday afternoon drive around the Beninese countryside makes our flooded patio seem like a blessing. Next time I'll bring my camera and try to get some photos.

And then, of course, there are the mosquitoes, which all this standing water isn't helping with either. But we have our defences...

First, there's the trusty mosquito net. This usually works, though sometimes we wake up to find a mosquito in the net. Oh, how irritating! The net is supposed to keep them out, not trap them inside. I think it would would probably work better if we were able to tuck the edges of the net underneath the mattress, but T is too big! His feet stick out over the end of the bed! At least this makes it easier to get in and out of bed in the middle of the night. When you've got to go, you've got to go and trust me, you don't want to be stuck in a net.

Next, there are the bug sprays. I brought my deep-woods-New Hampshire knowledge to this one. We've got Avon Skin So Soft for the low-mosquito evenings when we don't feel like coating ourselves in DEET and showering when we get home. And then there's the high-DEET super spray for the long haul nights outside.

For a long time T was a fan of this insecticide spray. I think he liked that he could chase a mosquito down with the can and watch it meet its end. There was a huge stock of this in the apartment when we moved in. I hate this stuff. It gives me a massive headache. Luckily, we don't need to use it much any more because we've found something better...

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The plug-in, electronic mosquito destroyer. Plug it in at night with a fresh insecticide tablet and you've got up to 12 mosquito free hours. It even smells nice. And the best part, no headaches.

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And last, but certainly not least, is my personal favourite, the POWER RECHARGEABLE MOSQUITO-HITTINGRACKET! All I have to say is Thank you China! A curse upon all those that say you can't innovate, that you only produce cheap knock-off's and total junk. They have clearly never encountered the glory that is the power rechargeable mosquito-hittingracket.

This beauty plugs directly into the wall (with an American prong no less) to charge its internal battery. The instructions indicate that the battery can be recharged over 200 times. It's been two months and we've only charged it once and it's still going strong! Why does it need to be charged? Because the metal strings of the racket are electrified. Yes, you electrocute mosquitoes. You dance around your house swinging and swatting your beautiful racket, sending the little buggers to their the doom with a little spark and a satisfying crackle. This is my new, all-time favourite pastime here in Africa - mosquito hunting. I'm thinking of sending one to everybody for Christmas.

Where did you come from, where did you go?

The street people are gone. They packed up and left. Gone. Just like that.

The dirt road in front of our house is empty - empty but for a few heaps of trash still burning, the only evidence they left behind. Foul-smelling smoke permeates the neighbourhood and forces our windows shut. Even then I can still smell it.

I might not have noticed at all if it wasn't for the smoke. I don't usually walk that way and they moved so quickly. It must have been less than a week before they had disessembled their shabby homes, burned everything, and disappeared. Where did they go? And why? Did the children get to bring their toys? The tires the boys raced, where are they? Burned? Or rolling down another street, someone else's street?

But for that matter, where did they come from? Who were these street people? I never really knew. There is so little I know about this place - this country - its people. They were my reminder of all that I didn't and still don't know. Now their absence is my reminder. I miss them already.

Free as a Bird... with a Broken Wing.

Until very recently, I've had the worst time creating a mental map of Cotonou. This is particularly painful when you consider that city maps are hard to come by - so hard to come by we haven't managed to get one yet- and that there aren't any street names posted on the roads. As a result, I might have been to a particular shop or restaurant 3 or 4 times and still be unable to find it again. There was no point in trying to give me directions because I couldn't get to the landmarks you were naming. And when it came to remembering those names later, I was hopeless as I couldn't even repeat the French when I was hearing it at the time. Until I've navigated a city on my own - by foot, bicycle, car, etc. - I never get the hang of it.

Totally relying on other expats to either drive me around or give directions to the company driver, I wasn't feeling very independent or free. But the prospect of hopping into the company car and driving off into a city of outrageous traffic when I hadn't been driving regularly for over two years was too daunting. And the fact that I hadn't driven stick shift in nearly four years didn't help either, especially after watching T struggle with the car's bad clutch to get it out of our tiny garage full of strange angles. I feel the need to add here that T is a very, very good driver.

But you reach a point where enough is enough and you realise that today's as good a day to dent your boyfriend's company car as ever there will be. I had T get me out of the garage and from there I took it on my own. (I also feel the need to point out that even though T had never seen me drive, he let me, in a twisted knot of nerves, take off on my own with his company-issued car. You be the judge.)

There are some things you never forget. Apparently, driving is one of them. Behind the wheel again, I felt at home in Cotonou like I never expected. Since that night I've been zipping around the city - including in and out of our garage - on my own quite a bit. The other afternoon I went for a drive around some of the busiest parts of the city and encountered some of the worst traffic I have seen here yet. Traffic jams and road construction forced me to take alternative routes, but my mental map of the city must be finally taking shape because I never felt lost or concerned that I wouldn't make it back.

And in Cotonou traffic, you don't have time to be too worried about where you're going. The roads are full of obstacles to avoid: giant potholes and puddles, trash, beggars, people selling odds and ends, old tires, and stray cement blocks. Thousands of mopeds crowd the streets, dashing in and out and around you all the time, often with whole families - including infant babies - piled onto one bike. And of course no one wears a helmet. Zems, or moped taxis, are the craziest. The only thing worse than driving a car surrounded by zems, is being on the back of one.

But all in all, driving in Benin becomes much easier once you completely accept that the only rule of the road here is that there are no rules. If someone were to ask me on which side of the road the Beninese drive I would have to reply, "Well, it depends on the situation." Technically, people are supposed to drive to the right, but this doesn't appear to be as mandatory as it is most elsewhere. Traffic lights are few and far between, and more than half of the existing ones aren't functioning. So intersections operate on the only rule I've been able to identify: the rule of bigger. As in, "I'm bigger than you, so it's in your interest to avoid crashing into me." It seems to work most of the time, though it makes me wish we had a bigger car.

We've currently got a well-worn Peugeot 406 sedan that, in my non-expert opinion, probably needs a new clutch. At the very least I'm quite positive that it needs a new battery. Yesterday morning, I awoke to find that the car wouldn't start. Luckily, or maybe not, the driver was here anyway to clean the car. So he used another company car to jump start it and then he sent me on my way to the horse stables after a short protest from myself. As I hadn't left the lights on or anything like that the night before, and over the past few days I had noticed that the car was suspiciously lacking power in first gear (pedal to the metal and still hardly any movement), I was certain that a new battery was in order. But, as I was already late and I knew there'd be jumper cables in the back, I drove off without much fuss. Good thing I had those cables, because less than two hours later, on my way back from the stables, it wouldn't start again. It took two jump-starts and a friend in pick-up truck following me to get home, but I made it. Needless to say my plans to go to the neighbouring city of Porto-Novo with a friend that afternoon were cancelled.

And just like that, my new-found freedom was gone and I'm back to riding zems for awhile. Boy, do wish I had a helmet.

First Day of School

Volunteering at the children's center was an experience. The children are great and the center itself is new and much nicer than I was expecting. But I won't be starting there any time too soon. I just don't have enough French for it yet. None of the staff there speaks any English, and I'm pathetically behind where I ought to be with my French considering I've been here for a month and a half now.

But all that's about to change as I've started lessons with a teacher today. She's great and her prices are too so I'm able to afford 6 hours of private lessons a week. Getting myself set up with a real teacher hasn't been an easy task and I feel lucky that I happened across her. Another two months down the road and I'll be well on my way. Then maybe I can start helping out with the children.

The center is a temporary stop for kids whose families, for one reason or another, just can't care for them at the moment. Many are refugees whose families are having difficulty getting settled. Some have lost their parents to disease. Others are victims of abuse, and a few were abandoned all together for reasons westerners might find difficult to understand. One boy at the center was expelled from his village because his top baby teeth came through before his lower ones, a very bad sign of misfortune.

Most of the children are between 3 and 10 years old, with a few younger and a few older. The daily schedule consists of two baths, lunch, nap time, afternoon snack, and down time in between. It's up to whoever is helping out that day to fill up all those empty spaces with activities. And that's precisely why I need more French. I'm great at swinging the little ones by their ankles, scooping rice and beans into bowls, painting faces and sculpting little animals from modelling clay (I practically filled Noah's ark with all the requests I got). But if I had to get a kid to follow directions and behave, or if I were left to lead a large activity - as I most certainly would be - I'd be up a creak without a paddle.

So it's back to the ABC's for me and then, when I'm ready, kindergarten.

Happy in Haie Vive

Last week in Northern Benin was amazing, but after a week of cold showers, bread containing more sand than flour, nights without electricity, and the almost patronizing intensity of Beninese hospitality, I'm so happy to be home. I have a whole new appreciation for our very Western neighbourhood of Haie Vive. It's good to be home.

But before I get into the stories of the North, I've got to finish with the South, and there's so much to tell! I've begun by updating my last post and if you're interested in a little bit of Voodoo magic, it just might be entertaining ;)

GUARD #1: You've got two empty halves of coconut and you're bangin' 'em together. ARTHUR: So?

Yesterday I made what will probably be one of my last big weekly trips to the market with Elisabeth. When we go to Ganhi, the smaller of the city's two big markets, every street vendor carrying sunglasses, flip-flops, desk lamps, kittens, etc. comes running for us. This makes my presence a real burden when we already have to buy a week's worth of food in the crowded stalls. And I have a tendency to inflate prices. Elisabeth is put in the awkward position of negotiating for the best deal with a "rich" person beside her. Plus I feel absolutely awful about haggling in the first place.

In fact, sometimes there's no deal at all. Take, for example, the pineapples. Elisabeth had warned me that the pineapple lady might not want to sell the pineapples to us if she saw me (she's actually a pineapple wholesaler so she sells at a lower price than in the market and she's rather particular about who she sells to). So I tried to duck down in the back seat of the car as we drove up to the stand. It didn't work. Elisabeth had to call the lady's younger sister (I guess they are friends and that is why Elisabeth can buy wholesale pineapples in the first place) and come back by herself today to get them.

For these reasons I've been kindly asked to stay home on market day. I'll still make it out to the markets, just not to do the weekly food stocking. And then there's all the things that we get at the regular supermarkets that I can still buy myself. Cornflakes, milk and that sort of thing. There are a number of small supermarkets in the neighbourhood and everywhere else for that matter. The selection isn't like Whole Foods or Hannaford (USA), or even Bilka or Føtex (DK), but I will say that it's better than your average American "Mom & Pop" grocer, or Netto or Aldi in Denmark. All in all, finding things in Cotonou has been much easier than finding things in Copenhagen. Very counter-intuitive. Oh, another funny thing: yesterday when we were at a rather nice supermarket, we had to wait a little extra longer at the cheese counter. The reason: we were in line behind the Beninese President's wife, and no one rushes her. My first brush with celebrity in Africa.

But we got everything we needed and now we have a nice pile of pineapples to top it off - as you can see above. Now every morning we can rotate between freshly squeezed orange juice and pineapple juice. We also picked up a "green" coconut on the way home so that T and I could try the milk. Very tasty. I wonder about the fat content of that beverage though. Isn't coconut milk supposed to be very fatty and bad for you? Or is that just the milk of the "dry" coconuts? I just learned the difference between the two yesterday so I obviously don't know much, but Elisabeth told me that the milk is supposed to be very good for your stomach. Well, as long as you don't combine it with yoghurt that is. A few minutes after finishing my glass, she came running back to me to say that she forgot to warn me about it's interaction with yoghurt. Apparently the combination leads to frequent and inescapable trips to the loo. So now I'm trying to figure out if we should put coconut milk into our morning rotation (but not on mornings we eat yoghurt!), or avoid it like a heart attack. Are there any health-nuts out there who can help clear up all these coconut rumours and provide some scientifically-based advice? For all I know, the people I'm listening to could be suggesting that coconuts migrate ;) Well, we do have African swallows here...

*Monty Python and the Holy Grail

Ready? Drum Roll Please...

So finally, here they are: the promised photos, sure to disappoint, but posted nevertheless. The movers still haven't shown, but things are nearly in order now because I broke down and moved all the stuff they were supposed to pick up into what we charitably call the dining room. It's not as though we'll be eating there any time soon anyway; we have no table. Maybe, if we're lucky, we can snag one from someone who's leaving in September.

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But back to the stuff you really want to know. We'll start with the view from the balcony:

As you can see, we've got lots of palm trees. The thing about palm trees is that even when the wind is hardly blowing their tops swing back and forth outside your bedroom window with such ferocity that it gives you the impression that there's a hurricane in the making. I suspect this might just be my personal bias though, as most of the palm trees I've seen in my life, until now, have been on Weather Channel special news reports. Now, if you look closely you can make out a few of our neighbours in between the palm trees (click on the photos to get to larger versions).

This is the living room, followed by the bedroom and the study. Got to love the bars on the windows. If the wall surrounding the building (can be seen in views from balcony) complete with guards didn't already do it, this last finishing touch really drives home the prison analogy. The really funny thing though, is that none of those windows or the sliding door are ever locked. Ah, the appearance of safety. I also like how the bars reflect onto the framed lion photograph hanging above the bed to make it look like a zoo animal.

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As you can see, our place is a bit empty at the moment and would benefit greatly from some real artwork. Not that I don't love the lion (a leftover from the former tenant), I just think he's better suited for a game room or a bar than above my bed. I'm hoping that maybe I can convince my artist sister to send me some of her paintings. I'll have to do it fast though. Judging by the way her work is starting to sell I won't be able to afford it before long.

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Well, I should go now. The water isn't working so I've got to call the plombier. Too bad that's the only plumbing-related word of French I know. This should be interesting...

Happy 4th on the 3rd! and the Fine Art of Schmoozing

Just got back from a 4th of July celebration at the American Embassy. Do I need to explain the significance of the 4th of July for my non-American readers? American Independence Day. Usually involves BBQ, fireworks, loud music (preferably country-western if you can handle it), parades, and all things stereotypically American. In the words of a long-time family friend, "A great day to be an American".

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Yes, I am very aware that it's not the 4th today, but the 3rd of July. I guess the people at the embassy wanted the whole day off, and who can blame them. But I have to say no Independence Day celebration has ever crept up on me quite like this one did. Someone at T's office had mentioned it to me last week and said that he might be able to get me an invitation; I guess the event is rather limited in number. It didn't seem likely and when I didn't hear anything more about it I assumed that he wasn't able to work it out. But then, around quarter to six tonight I got a phone call informing me that someone would be by to pick me up at half past six to take me to the event. Oops.

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With no plans about what to wear, no running water, greasy hair, and a bad case of garlic breath, I was feeling rather short on time. Now, dressing for such an event is always a tricky business - unless you're male, naturally, in which case 1: you probably don't really care that much how you look, and 2: you can just throw on a suit and look acceptable for nearly all occasions. But dressing for such an event when you're female and you've just moved to Africa and left a fair deal of your clothes behind is particularly difficult. And to top it off, you're in Africa. Even if you had all of your clothes you still couldn't find anything resembling what most everyone else will be wearing. So, to recap: short on time and no idea what to wear. Solution: basic black dress. Too bad mine was freshly wrinkled, straight from the suitcase.

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Luckily, Elisabeth saved my rear by ironing the dress for me (I would do it myself but I have no idea where the ironing board is and I think she wants to keep it that way... ) and the water magically turned back on just in time for me to brush my teeth six times and take a quick shower. I swear I have an angel.

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The reception was nice enough. Most of the people there were not American, though. In fact, the majority were local, which, I think, is a good thing, even if it did mean that my black dress was a little out of place in the sea of bright-coloured, wrap-around prints. There was a live band playing a rather odd selection of music, but decent nevertheless. No dancing, though. Red, white and blue everything, of course. Burgers, hot dogs, corn on the cob, baked beans, chicken wings and a flag cake. Oh, and ice cream. And mosquitoes. Lots of mosquitoes. In my rush to get out the door, bug-spray didn't factor in. Itch, scratch, itch, scratch. Good thing I'm still taking the malaria meds.

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In terms of networking, it was the place for me to be. I'm sure I would have met all these people at one point or another, but in this case sooner is better than later. Whether or not some form of interesting employment here is in my future remains to be seen, but at least my network of friends is sure to benefit from tonight's appearance. One thing is for certain, though. I need to work on my schmoozing skills.

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Schmoozing: v. int. To converse casually, especially in order to gain an advantage or make a social connection. Don't believe me? http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/schmooze. So now that we've cleared that up, any suggestions on how to improve my skills? How about significant schmoozing stories of your own? Anyone? Please? Desperately seeking help here.

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In other news, I haven't forgotten about the photos of the flat. It's still not put together because the movers never came. They were supposed to come on Friday afternoon. And then it was moved to sometime yesterday when they failed to show. And now another day has passed and I've given up hope. The rumour here is that if you need something done you need to know the people personally or it takes forever. Seems right so far.

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And sorry for all the "-"s between paragraphs. Something's up with the formatting on blogger. Can't get it to work right any other way.

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*Photo from: http://www.flickr.com/photos/barrypeterson/181644402/

A Dazzling Ride

It's Saturday evening and I've just returned home from the horse club. I still smell like a barn animal, but I've decided to write a little before I take a long, well-earned bath. I need to tell you about the horses. For those uninterested in these, the most beautiful animals in the world, don't waste your time reading any further.

The stable is, essentially, right on the beach. A 5 minute ride and you've got your hooves in waves. Last Tuesday I had a more formal lesson and we stayed within the boundaries of the makeshift, beach football field near the stable. Today, we rode along the shore. A game was on.

It was beautiful and strange. The section of beach just in front of the stable is, coincidently, also just in front of a hotel and therefore clean and clear of debris. Ride a little further in either direction and the same cannot be said. Plastic bottles, tiny pieces of plastic bottles, syringes, flip-flops, and trash, trash, trash litter the sand. Some areas are more polluted than others, but it was a disturbing sight nevertheless as I thought about our horses' unshod feet kicking up sand and whatever happened to be in it. Near one particularly dirty area, we had to turn back and change direction because a man up ahead was burning a pile of trash. Horses don't like flames, and I got to see how skill full my fellow riders are. Impressive. Yet, somehow, it was all still beautiful. Truth be told, much of the beach is mostly clean and undisturbed.

I've never really ridden in a straight line before. I'm sure this seems very silly to those who don't ride horses, but those that do, or have, will probably understand what I mean by this. Let me explain: a large part of the riding done in the equestrian world is confined to circular or oval shaped arenas where horse and rider go around, and around, and around. There are those lucky enough to ride trails regularly or go on "hunts". For the most part, I didn't fall into this second category, and even when I did, the narrow and windy dirt roads/trails that run through New England forests don't provide great opportunities for long, hard gallops.

But today, there was just sand and water. And a non-stop gallop along the shore. I'm hooked.

On My Own... Well, Almost

T and his colleague left for a trip through Niger this morning. They'll be gone until Sunday evening, so I thought I'd be on my own for the next few days, something I felt both sad and a little relieved about. Now I'd be able to really focus on learning French without the mandatory 2 hour lunch break from 13.00 to 15.00 when the guys come home, a relic from Benin's communist past. And I'd have the flat totally to myself in the evenings, a welcomed opportunity to get comfortable here and start feeling at home by sprawling out on the living room couch and watching chick flicks.

But it turns out that this isn't exactly the case. Instead, I spent the day with the wife of another man at the office, C. Actually, she works there too but has taken the next few days as holiday. C and her husband ate dinner with us last night (we had the Danish-style roast pork Elisabeth makes and that we've been hearing so much about), and she invited me to spend today with her. First we took a walk around the neighbourhood. After having lunch at her place we went for a drive around the city and she took me to two of the best stores in town for getting general household items. I got myself a pillow. This was the triumph of the day. The pillows we've been using are overstuffed so that they are at least twice as full as they should be and as dense and hard as a sack of pebbles. And C knows a man who makes shoes. Custom. She's clearly a good person to know ;)

Elisabeth is also still here. She is wonderful. It's very, very strange having someone wait on you and clean the house while you're still there. I don't like it at all. But I'm doing my best to get used to it and we're working out a good friendship/business balance in our relationship. And I know at least one French lady who will be very happy to know that she's helping me learn French. As soon as I have enough of the basics down (hopefully about 2 weeks from now) she will speak only French to me as often as we can afford to not totally understand one another. She helped the man who lived here before us in this way and is very enthusiastic about it. And she's given me some educational materials and has offered to help read them to me so that I get the pronunciation down. If I manage to pull off a life down here, it will be in large part due to her.

I've been plugging away at the few Pimsleur tapes I bought and I know enough now to say hello, thank you, goodbye and tell people that I can't understand them. Hardly enough to really even get by, but I've just found another good resource, free FSI French developed by the U.S. government from http://www.fsi-language-courses.com/French.aspx. They also have courses for a whole bunch of other languages if you're interested and I've heard they are really effective, if a little dry. I plan to finish the Pimsleur introduction and then combine the FSI course and the free online Rosetta Stone course offered by the Keene Public Library for my self study. Four to six hours of that every day combined with practising with Elisabeth and maybe two hours of private lessons a week with a qualified teacher here and I ought to be able to do this. I will do this.