Books and Broken Bikes (by Charles)

Post visit week, a little joke or even a test that the Peace Corps plays on trainees. After ten or so weeks of training they drive you up to your post with your homologue and tell you to make it back to the training sight by next Sunday. They do give you money to get a bush taxi back, a kerosene stove, and a food box of rice, pasta, sugar, and some powdered milk. All that plus a hey mattress where all that was in my home for that week. My French was pretty poor at that point and I had a lot of down time that week. I took time to catch up on two books I wanted to read: Deep Survival and Village of Waiting. Deep Survival chronicles survivors and non-survivors stories about getting lost in the woods or in other extreme situations. The moral of most the stories were that people held on too tightly to their plans and that is how things went wrong. The other book Village of Waiting is a chronicle of on PCVs service in Togo and it is pretty negative and covers some dangers that exist in Togo. These two books where stewing around in my head when I left on my bicycle with my over sized bag. I only had to go 9 kilometers to Dapong transit house. Right when I go onto the road my tire popped. I would pass people and they would say
things to me in Moba or French both incomprehensible to me. I thought of the line that they would right about me, "Charles held to rigidly to walking his bike and would not allow anyone to help him and then…"

Well as I got into Dapong I took a look at the map that was much more figurative than literal and did not even have the transit house on it. I walked down this street that I hoped was the right one. Then it happened a kid came running out after me, grabbed my bike and made off with it. I am done this kid just took my bike and all my stuff. I ran after him and grabbed him right then he said "Chez Paul." Chez Paul? Oh! Chez Paul, Paul the bike guy who fixes all the Peace Corps bikes. Paul and I had cookies together while his apprentice fixed my flat tire.

I ended up making it back safe and sound to my host Mother's house that Sunday and by the next Monday and told my got to tell everyone this story in French.