An open letter to Maurieva and the Beresford Middle School Students

Hi, everyone! Well, first off, Katrina and I want to thank you all for the marvelous letters you wrote us. They were all insightful and inquisitive. We hope you don’t consider our responses outdated, given that you all wrote us at the beginning of October. Just imagine the journey all your letters had across the colossal Atlantic Ocean!
We’re glad that you all enjoyed the fall season and all its excitement. We were, however, greatly grieved to hear Beresford lost their Homecoming football game by such a whopping score. Nevertheless, all the festivities sounded like a blast.
Now we’ll try and answer a few questions that everyone seemed burning to find out. First, the weather. The weather here is very hot most days. Other days, you might say it is downright sultry. In Togo, there are not the four seasons like we know so well in South Dakota. There are only two: the dry season and the rainy season. Presently, we are at the very end of the rainy season. During the rainy season, a thunderstorm comes everyday, sometimes just for a few moments. But, as the saying goes, “when it rains, it pours.” The rains were our favorite time of the day, listening to the ‘rat-a-tap-tap’ on the tin roofs and enjoying the brief moments we were able to cool off. As of now, the dry reason is quickly approaching.
The first few months of the dry season does have its perks as well. During the dry season, cool winds called Harmattan blow southward from the great Saharan Dessert. Luckily, Togo is in the wind’s path. So, while the winds do create a significant amount of dust EVERYWHERE, at least we won’t be sweating like dogs all day.
Needless to say, we won’t have the storybook “White Christmas” we’re so fond of…no eggnog nor mistletoe. We will have a replacement for a Christmas tree however. Many, in fact. There is a certain type of tree that has circular green fruit on them. In December, the fruits become ripe and turn a bright red. Although we’ve yet to see a ripe one, we’ve heard they bear a semblance to a Christmas tree decorated with great red ornaments. How sweet is that!
The food here took a little time to get used to, but we like it more and more. During our first month here, we scarcely could eat a meal without reminiscing about some sort of American meal. Now, when hunger strikes, we say, “Oh, how good this fufu or pate (pronounced like “pot”) will be,” both of which are traditional Togolese cuisine. Both have a similar texture to mashed potatoes, just not as gooey. When it’s time to eat, everyone gathers around the table with one big bowl of fufu or pate and a bowl of delicious sauce to accompany it. Then, one just tears off a piece of fufu, dips it in the sauce and voila, a traditional Togolese meal. There best part is there’s no silverware, just hands.
Then there’s the wildlife. Togo doesn’t boast all the exotic wildlife one might see in the Serengeti, where the elephants, lions, and zebras roam freely, but there is a lake with hippopotamuses. We went there a few weeks ago. One even jumped out of the water like a whale and did a tremendous belly flop back into the lake. In addition to the hippos, there are many lizards and snakes, which are pretty cool in their own right. Aside from that, we see many of the same animals you do on a South Dakota farm: chickens, turkeys, goats, cattle, etc.
Finally, many of you asked how our language was coming along. After two months, we can have limited conversations in French, although we still make mistakes quite frequently. Learning a different language is a long and tedious process. For all the Togolese here though, French is also their second language. Everyone learns their native language first, which they had been speaking long before the French came. In our village, everyone speaks Gourma. In most native languages spoken here, one word can mean many different things, depending on the intonation of the word. Learning Gourma, no doubt, will be a great challenge for us.
Tomorrow, we’re having a big party because we will be done with training. All the new volunteers have to get up in front of everyone, including many Togolese men and women, to introduce ourselves in their local language. If we pronounce, “Good evening Ladies and Gentlemen,” incorrectly in Gourma, (which is n namba, n bamba), we’ll tell everyone, “We will make you all rich!” Of course, we plan on doing nothing of the sort. Talk about pressure!
Well, that about wraps things up. If we forgot to answer something, be sure to ask us again in your next correspondence and we’ll be sure to answer thoroughly. Again, thanks so much for the letters. They were great.

Your Pen Pal,

Katmac