Tuesday, July 28, 2009

Fairest of the Seasons

Second only to friends, family, and leather couches, I often pine for the seasons. My seasons.

A spring rain, a summer twilight, a fall wind, and yes, even a dark winter night. But I find not the Midwest seasons in Ogaro. The seasons in our savannah region can be divided roughly into three increments; Harmattan, hot season, and the rainy season. I lament saying that none of these seasons are bliss. Yet each, despite their hardships, brings with them aspects I look forward to and enjoy. Best to commence from the beginning, December 15th, 2007; our first day living in our house. The first day we could, with some reluctance, call Ogaro our home.

By all accounts, December is not a bad month to arrive in Ogaro. Harmattan is under way and the harvest is finished. People are benefiting from a much needed rest from their toil in the fields. Harmattan, while it takes on the name of a season, is actually the name of the winds that blow down from the formidable Sahara Desert. Ironically, these winds, while torrential and relentless, are also cool. When hitting the hay, a sweater and pair of socks are placed next to our bed. Around 3 a.m., giddy with nighttime chill, I wake up, put on my garments, and fall back to sleep. Togolese don’t seem to derive the same pleasure. In the morning, their eyelids caked with sleep, they huddle around the boiling pot making breakfast, shivering all the while. Plan B is to stay curled up in bed until nine. Personally though, an ideal morning I wake-up at 7:30. Crawl out of bed and make a steaming cup of mud. Read, write, or practice French until nine with the blinds shut. This exercise is not to block out anyone outside, but rather is a feeble attempt to fend off the dust.

Unknown quantities of dust are stirred up with the strong winds. There is no hope of stopping it. A hard-nose policy of containment is the only feasible machination. But even this defense is futile. Dust knows no boundaries, finding its way into every nook and crevice. At times, when my broom weaves around the table to hit a hard to reach cranny, I drift off to a season of cleaner times, but these thoughts are short-lived. The ability not to perspire, this is a gift that trumps all others. But there are other advantages as well.

Small scale gardening is done in a nearby village. Small yellow melons, assuming the taste and texture of a muskmelon, and watermelons are brought by the wagon full. Tomatoes, onions, cabbage, and carrots abound. Cassavas, smashed and pounded to make the delicacy fufu, are unearthed and sold like hotcakes in the market. The farmers, having stored and sold their grains are ever ready to instigate good cheer among their neighbors. Building and repairing houses occurs during this time, whether it be cinderblock or mud. The combination of dust and wind however, takes a toll on everyone’s energy. Despite the upbeat mood of the season, fatigue trumps all.

While this is an axiom for humans, animals are another story. All the harmattonic pet sounds are wretched to my ears. Frisky adolescent dogs carouse the fields at night, chase one another, bark, and generally raise hell. Guinea foul and roosters are ever mindful of the impending sunrise. But of all the pet sounds, the donkey is the most heinous. I can say with some certainty that their despondent calls echoing derive from frustrations that only a biological urgency to procreate can generate. The angst propelling their ‘haw’ couldn’t possibly signify anything else. All this animal cacophony, never ceasing completely, leads to a certain frustration among us, particularly when we might be entertaining the idea of (or amid) a romantic act ourselves.

In late January, the winds loose their buoyancy, the coolness fades, and the dust settles. The fate of hot season is palpable. If a can be frank, hot season, spanning from February to the end of April, is the harshest climate I have had to endure. Surely a South Dakota winter, relative to temperatures suitable for humans brings a fury not met by the savannah heat. But I can hardly say I have endured any of these winters against the elements. Snow football, the ensuing hot chocolate, hot shower, and warm bed do not suffice. Too many artificial settings. We endure hot, still days as they are and rejoice the rare days when it is mild, perhaps in the low 100’s. These three months however are not all doom and gloom. Mangos and outdoor sleeping are both thoroughly enjoyable and specific only to hot season.

The mango is surpassed by none. Their sumptuousness, their plentitude, their price, their variety, their impeccable timing, all these factors deserve to be fully explored at a later time. Suffice it to say that mangos are the nectar of the gods, coming down from the heavens only when we need it most, during the entire span of hot season.

If mangos provide solace during the day, the night needs no celestial ambrosia to match up. The night, not having a sun, is enough. During hot season, I never shower before dinner. I would be disgruntled, perspiring mess at the end of it. Showers directly before bed are the only option. The dry heat—or absence of humidity—allows temperatures to dip down into the 80’s at night, just low enough to prevent perspiration. Few things are treasured more than lying down by your loved one under the abundant stars of the African sky. And no water or humidity equates to no bugs. What a blessing.

I recall I once had a similar inclination to sleep outside at Lewis and Clark Lake. How I bristled with excitement as I carried my sleeping bag and pillow to the beach spot of my choosing! The next morning, there I was, ill-tempered after an endless night of tossing and turning and a layer of sand covering my entire body. A swarm of mayflies, after completing their twenty-four hours of existence, lay peacefully at rest on my dry, cracked lips. Outdoor sleeping, romanticized as it is, rarely leads to tranquil mornings. We come pretty close here.

I’ll wake up at night, check the position of Orion’s Belt drifting slowly towards the western horizon and know how many cherished hours I have before daybreak and the wrath the sun will soon bring. At about 5:18 a.m., I awaken to the first barn bees buzzing overhead. I’ll rise out of bed, make some oats, and swiftly take care of anything involving physical labor. Until 7 a.m., the cool air holds its own. From 7 till nine, the cool air and sun do battle, with the sun gradually taking control. At 9 a.m., it’s all over. Temperatures are in the 100’s and rising. The only sanctuary is the shade.


Passing the bulk of our days in the shade, we nonetheless still sweat all day. Or at least we lose water rapidly. The dry heat plays a nasty trick. Our sweat evaporates without a trace so that we often become dehydrated without knowing it. We have learned to perpetually, habitually drink water no matter if our body “tells” us to or not.

Inevitably though, even if it is for an increment of time as little as fifteen minutes, we have to step out in the direct sunlight. I, more so than Katrina, do not handle it well. A primordial panic takes hold as I feel myself literally being baked by the sun. This fact has caused a problem; I simply can’t do the work Togolese do because I cannot stick it out in the sun. I throw the blame on my skin, my superb ability to absorb vitamin D, evolution and all that gibberish, but deep down I may just be a wimp. Much to my chagrin, this fact manifested itself quite clearly during the construction of our gardening center. Luckily, the hottest days of the year are confined only to little more than two months.

Before the swollen clouds spit their first excess to the parched earth, something very peculiar occurs: A wind rolls through the savannah like a hurricane. You can hear the palms slapping against each other as the wind approaches. You can see the thick cloud of dust and debris drawing nearer every second. There is a mad dash to gather all belongings outside to put them in safe storage. The moment the fierce current hits, everyone settles inside. For half an hour, the wind produces deafening noises. Tin roofs are banging up and down, animals are whimpering, branches are rattling. It’s the dry season’s last stand. When Judgment Day is upon us, I imagine it will be set in motion with such a wind.

And then it rains.

The first rain sparks a flurry of activity. Men, women, and children alike begin tilling the soil to prepare for planting. This is accomplished in one of two ways. The first method is done all by hand, using only an enlarged hoe to turn the soil into rows. One could say this is the traditional way. The second, more modern technique is to harness the energy of two oxen to plow the land. One person is in front, guiding the oxen with the rings in their nostrils. Another is in back, guiding the plow. For two adults, this is a manageable task. But almost without exception, kids are involved. Six (or more) kids under the age of ten trying to keep two ornery oxen in line are quite a spectacle. Inevitably, the youngest will be no more than the age of two, trying to keep pace. A cornstalk will be in hand, ready to put all his might into a whack, should the need arise.

So goes the toil of the rainy season, a livelihood that won’t offer repose until the later months of the year. When the picturesque fields are tilled, planting begins. Women walk with a small branch, poke a hole in the ground, drop the seeds in the hole, cover it up with their feet, take a step, and repeat the process. Corn, millet, sorghum, black-eyed peas, cotton, peanuts, and soy are all planted in varying degrees.

As May, June, and July drift on by, weeding fills the time. The same two aforementioned techniques are employed with this task as well. Typically, two or three rounds of weeding are completed before harvesting, depending on the amount of manpower available. (Without the presence of farm machinery, farmers argue that the extra labor—multiple wives, myriad children—is essential for a bountiful crop.)


The rain itself differs little from those on the Great Plains. Warm drizzles, cold sheets, and everything in between nourish the earth. Flies flourish exponentially with each new rain. The flies, not yet lulled by suburban complacency endemic in the States, buzz about with guerilla-like intensity. Stinkbugs, preying mantises, grasshoppers, moths, and various other bugs share space with the flies. Then there are the mosquitoes, a most unfortunate product of the rains.

Mosquitoes bring malaria and all its wrath. In fact, Volunteers dub these months “malaria season.” A child’s first bout is the toughest to ward off. Infants lack a strong immune system to fight off the nefarious disease. Adolescents struggle to build up resistance. Adults are also inflicted, but after having malaria for a –teenth time, mortality is no longer a threat. Malaria—like a host of other problems—is just one more thing that the Togolese deal with. But the work must go on.

August brings the first wave of harvests. The rains recede. Scores of corn, millet, and peanuts are laid out to dry in each compound. After the corn is sufficiently dried, branches roughly equivalent to a baseball bat are used as devices to smack the kernels off the husk. Large groups are involved, often singing songs or sharing a laugh. The kernels are then put in giant sacs and stored for the rest of the year. I similar process is done to all other crops. (The cotton is especially fulfilling for the kids, having enormous piles of fluff to prance on.)

Harvesting continues in the following months. Again, all harvesting is done by hand, taking extensive amounts of time. Ideally, harvesting is finished by the time kids end their summer break in mid-September. October and November slowly transition into dry season. The heat soars once again, but not to the degree of March and April. Then one unsuspecting night, I’ll awake. Are those goosebumps on my body? Harmattan is near.

Perhaps savannah seasons aren’t as magical as the ones back home. I say magical because inextricably tied to the seasons are past memories. All nostalgia associated with weather is still in its formative stages here. A nighttime harmattonic chill doesn’t incite the rush I feel, say, on a brisk September evening back home. September evenings brings floods of memories from running around as a little kid at football games, to country drives, late night college drives, studying or otherwise. Harmattan reminds me of just one year ago, arriving in an empty house where I knew no one. When I return home, I’ll miss the seasons here to an extent; they’ll forever be tied to my life as a Peace Corps Volunteer. But I haven’t fallen for them. After all, these are not my seasons.