The Pulaku Project was a huge success. Guida and I had the adventure of a lifetime, motorcycling 7,000 kilometers through seven countries. We stayed with dozens of Fulani groups along the way and published countless stories and videos about this incredible culture.

Check out www.pulaku.com for the full scoop.

After concluding in Senegal, Guida returned to Benin to continue his studies at the University of Abomey-Calavi. I’ve had the last two months to enjoy all that’s wonderful about the USA: it’s been a whirlwind of friends, family, and culinary indulgence throughout this glorious land.

The photos:

I’m back in West Africa for the Pulaku Project, a photo-documetary about the changing lifestyle of nomadic Fulani herders.

For the next three months, I’ll be traversing West Africa by motorcycle with Guida Belco, my close friend and proud Fulani student.

I’ve been plastering this image of the smiling Fulani elder all over the Pulaku website, and I just discovered that it made the shortlist for the 2011 World Photography Organisation  Contest.

This picture made the shortlist from a pool of 51,878 entries.  Pretty neat.

Check it out:

http://www.worldphoto.org/images/image-gallery/4996/?FromImageGalleryCategoryID=33

Although Quiet Griot will be silent while I’m on the Pulaku trail, please follow along as we’ll be posting weekly updates and stories on the project website:

www.pulaku.com

Please don’t hesitate to leave comments and keep in touch, as we’d love to know folks are paying attention. We couldn’t be more excited to hit the trail.

love,

Christoph

“Why yes, I would love some more cheese.”

“Why isn’t everyone looking at me? I am, after all, American. Hello…?”

“More wine? Yes please.”

“What do you mean the train already left? I’m only 5 minutes late?”

“Chocolate? Why thank you…”

Sadly, it’s not possible to negotiate the price of a scarf in a Swiss department store, but I somehow managed my way through Switzerland, Italy, and France without embarrassing myself too much. Now back in Benin, I’m writing this message from inside my mosquito net, and these photos of Europe seem strange, though quite lovely, like a dream:

My final weeks in Benin were a sleep-deprived frenzy. Between final meetings with the moringa association, traveling to Ghana to retrieve cycling team donations (see CyclingNews), and sorting logistics for the Pulaku Project, I didn’t have time to dwell on how much I’ll miss Benin. But I will miss it, especially my friends, both PCVs and Beninese. This has been such a rich chapter, and it’s poised me for new endeavors I never could have imagined a couple years ago.

After my roof-crashing incident in 2008, who woulda’ thunk I’d make it from here:

to here:

This month offers a nice interlude. I just spent three days in Paris, en route to visit my family in Geneva Switzerland. Apart from the COLD, I was mesmerized by the holiday lights, the glamorous people, and the buzzing energy of the city. I spent some time taking photos like the hundreds of holiday tourists:

Notre Dame Cathedral

Outside Notre Dame. (Not in the picture: the dozens of machine gun toting soldiers who are now patrolling Paris on terrorist alert)

Now I’ll be in Geneva for a few weeks, spending the holidays with family, exploring job prospects, and getting ready for the Pulaku Project. Then we’ll hit the road in mid-january. Life ain’t bad.

 He also enjoys long walks on the beach and candlelight dinners…… but I diverge.

I only recently discovered Ibrahim’s love for the guitar, and I really wanted to record his tunes before leaving Parakou.  Using a high-end audio recorder that I’ll be using for the Pulaku Documentary Project (www.pulaku.com), we set up a make-shift studio in his house and layed down a few tracks with his friend Koffi playing backup.

Take a listen:

04 Lyéléme - sung in Lokpa, his mother tongue

05 Enfants de la Rue (Talibé) - sung in French, about the street children of Benin

08 Bonus Track by Koffi Equagoo 

We created a short EP, which Ibrahim named Renaissance.  The name doesn’t refer to himself, but rather to the fact that this is his second life as a musician.  He abandoned the guitar in frustration several years ago, and only recently picked it back up.  Things look promising the second time around.

And because you ain’t a pop star without dreamy album photos, we went outside after recording:

Well last month, 2SkinnyPros collided with QuietGriot, as Ian came to visit Benin for a bike-wranglin, chicken-killing, perspective-changing adventure:

We took our bikes up north to ride with Benin’s young cycling prodigy, Alphonse N’Cha M’Po, in the gorgeous hills of his home village of Boukoumbe.

Not surprisingly, we spent plenty of time fix flat tires on the gravely roads.

Alphonse’s family welcomed us into their home, an incredible mud fortress known as a Tata Somba.  We set up our bug nets on the roof and slept under the stars.

Alphonse’s proud father.

Several times he told us how amazed he is that his son, the son of a farmer, was chosen by the national cycling team to race in Burkina Faso.

Mister N’Cha M’Po gave us a rooster – a generous gift from a family of modest means.

Alphonse dressed in traditional attire and asked to have his portrait taken.  This young man lives quite a dichotomy: sometimes he’s a spandex-clad cyclist in international competition, but when he’s home he works the fields and hunts with traditional tools.

With just a couple weeks left in my Peace Corps service, it’s going to be hard to say goodbye to Alphonse.  His determination has humbled me, and it’s been amazing to watch him grow into a proud strong cyclist.  Whether or not he makes it to the Tour de France, the future looks bright for Alphonse.  This kid is going places.

And, completely unrelated to the above, I recently snagged this neat shot of a metalworker and his apprentices in the village of Tchatchou:

They were grinding the roof off an old Land Cruiser (to make a Beninese convertible?)  I found it odd that the two were watching the action within the line of fire, wearing nothing but cheap plastic sunglasses.   When I started taking photos they found it hilarious and two more guys jumped in for the glamor shot.

Check CyclingNews.com for my full race reports and the Benin Team blog:

Race Reports: http://www.cyclingnews.com/races/tour-du-faso-2-2

Racing Squirrels Blog: http://www.cyclingnews.com/blogs/cycling-in-benin

Photo Highlights, Batch 2:

Spectators watch curiously as a breakaway passes through a road cut in the rolling hills of southwestern Burkina Faso.

Belgian Laurent Mars arrives at the tent camp with his local fan club.

The peloton takes on the hills outside of Bobo Dioulasso.

Boukari Kagambega claims Burkina Faso's first TdFaso stage win in three years.

The peloton crosses a dam along the 26km "piste" of stage nine.

A Senegalese rider drives a chase group through the dust of Koudougou.

Team Reine Blanche protects their yellow jersey in the final stage.

Young Burkina star Abdoul Aziz Nikieme shines in the spotlight after his glorious win in Ouagadougou.

Aubierge Soglo has been Benin's most consistent rider in this year's tour.

Bicycles are integral to daily life throughout Burkina Faso. It's no wonder they produce the best cyclists in the region.

Self portrait on the shiny rig of a motorcycle cop.

Red/yellow/green: the colors of the Benin National Team. I spotted this peacock flower (Cæsalpinia pulcherrima) along the race course. This photo is NOT digitally altered! Crazy, huh?

Photo Highlights, Batch 1:

The peloton goes single-file during the first of ten days racing over 1300km.

Aubierge Soglo has proven himself as Benin’s strongest rider in this year’s Tour.

Coach Fernand Gandaho discusses strategy with the team after the first day of racing.

A schoolgirl takes notes for an assignment about the bike race.

The Tour started in central Burkina where the dry season has just started.

Farther north, the dry Sahel scorched riders with heat over 110 degrees Fahrenheit.

The Tour de Faso provides a rare opportunity for the best African cyclists to compete with Europeans on home soil.

Poland’s Zbigniew Gucwa wins the second stage.

A group of Fulani watch the race from the shade of an acacia tree.

A farmer contemplates joining the action.

These Chinese-manufactured bikes are common throughout West Africa.

It’s a long hot road for this group of riders from Benin, Burkina Faso, Cameroon, and Ivory Coast.

The peloton departs from the Sahelian village of Bani.

Spectators are excited to watch the race blur through their village.

Belgian Laurent Mars wins stage five ahead of his elated teammate and the furiously sprinting pack.

Soglo is the Benin national champion.  The toughest squirrel of them all.

Update, October 22: The race is under way!  With limited internet connectivity, I can’t upload much, but I’ll be updating the results and Benin Team blog at www.cyclingnews.com whenever possible.  Thanks for all the encouraging comments!

Well, we’re just a couple days out from the biggest race in Africa: the Tour du Faso. I just visited the Beninese Team’s preparation camp in the village of Comé, situated in the rolling hills of Southwestern Benin. Ten athletes were invited for a week of training and racing drills with Coach Gandaho.

The team slept on straw mats during the 10-day camp.

A small concrete building with a tin roof served as the team’s base camp for the week. Squeezed into a small room full of bikes, thread-bare tires, drying jerseys, and tired athletes, the mood felt much like any training camp I experienced with my teams in the US. Weary from long days on the bike, the athletes joked and laughed as they prepared dinner over a charcoal stove. Doing their best with meager means, the team seems determined and excited to be training together.

Alphonse leads the team on a training ride.

I rode along on their last day, and I was impressed with the cohesiveness and fitness of the team. They’ve come a long way since they got smoked by the Burkina team at the Independence Day race in August. It’s obvious they’re taking the Tour de Faso very seriously, and they’ve prepared to face off against top riders from across Africa and Europe. Nonetheless, we’ve got to set realistic expectations, and Coach Gandaho encouraged the team to focus on finishing as many riders as possible, rather than chasing individual glory.

At the end of the week, Gandaho announced the final roster with a mix of established talents and eager youngsters. I was excited that my buddy Alphonse was chosen. He’s been training with a vengeance since the Independence Race, literally wearing the teeth off his chainrings. Fortunately the team lent him one of their aluminum Giant racing bikes with downtube shifters, and he’s rearing to go to Faso. Alphonse is the first cyclist from northern Benin ever to be selected for the national team. In a country dominated by the wealthier and better-educated southerners, it’s quite an accomplishment for this kid who hadn’t ridden on pavement until 6 months ago. In addition to Alphonse, the coach selected:

Augustin – Benin’s best sprinter

Soglo – national road race champion

Cackpo – a tough, cocky all-rounder

Arnauld #1 – a quiet rouleur

Arnauld #2 – a young newbie, just discovered at the training camp in Comé

Augustin Amoussouvi

The second Arnauld was quite a discovery. When the team arrived in Comé, locals told the coach about a supposedly unbeatable cyclist from the village. Gandaho invited this local phenom to come train with the team. Arnauld showed up to the first ride on a modified touring bike with cyclocross tires and a fixed-gear 52×14 drivetrain. Despite having never ridden in a paceline before, he held with the team all week, and the coach lent him his own bike to join the team at the Tour du Faso.

Arnauld is the latest addition to the Squirrels’ roster.

Much like any team, there was great disappointment amongst the riders who didn’t make the cut, but the chosen athletes decided they’re going to contribute a portion of any winnings to those who must stay home.

We’re planning on leaving from the capital on Tuesday morning in a minivan. It should take two days to get up to Ouagadougou, the capital of Burkina Faso. The race is scheduled to start on Thursday. I’m excited to follow along with the boys, and share these stories with CyclingNews whenever I find an internet connection.

If you want to send words of encouragement to the team, you can leave comments right here on QuietGriot.

I also want to take another opportunity to thank everyone who sent equipment donations to the team. The Village Bicycle Project loaded everything into a shipping container in Seattle two weeks ago, and the equipment should arrive in Africa sometime in December.

cheers from Benin!

p.s. Congratulations to my hometown friend Ben King on his US National Championship! Now I forgive you for whipping me at the Wintergreen Hill Climb. The Beninese Team wants to know if you’ll come ride with them here.

We’ve just returned from Ouessè and Goro-Gah, where they celebrated differing variations of Goja.

Check out the Pulaku site to see the photos, along with video clips of incredible acrobatics and flagellation:

www.pulaku.com

Moringa is a fast growing tree that is causing a stir in the development world for its potential to alleviate malnutrition in tropical countries. Moringa leaves can be consumed fresh or transformed into a dry powder for distribution as a health supplement.  Like much of West Africa, Benin faces high rates of infant mortality because of malnutrition.  In Benin, 12.5 percent of children will die before reaching their fifth birthday, with 53% of these deaths related to malnutrition. Food itself is not scarce, but families often subsist on grains like corn and millet that lack adequate protein and vitamins.  Moringa is rich in protein, calcium, vitamin A, vitamin C, potassium, and iron, and these leaves offer a local solution to this serious problem.

Since starting a small moringa plantation last year in my rural village, I’ve been collaborating with other moringa producers, health workers, and NGOs to pull together a national moringa association.  ABM will offer technical assistance to producers while facilitating a national market for moringa products.  We’re want to make it easier for farmers to produce moringa, and easier for people to find the stuff in rural villages.

The moringa plantation I helped started in Goumori.

I’m proud to work with a talented, motivated group of Beninese nationals who’ve been sweating to get this thing organized.  Here are some shots from the big day:

Like most Beninese events, this meeting kicked off with speeches and formalities.  We invited the national television to share in the fun.

Professor Houndji (left) has been one of the driving forces behind the project.  He’s shaking hands with the Bob Friedman, the new director of Peace Corps Benin.

Bob and a moringa branch in the limelight.

Kodjo is the organization’s action man.  He masterminded the logistics for our general assembly.

Several other volunteers came to Parakou to help out on the big day.  Thanks ya’ll!

Giddy-up.

Don’t let the stern faces fool you.  We’re a giddy bunch.

Davide is one of the country’s biggest moringa producers – here he discusses the health virtues of these tiny leaves.

Yours truly, with our newly-elected president and the Peace Corps country director.

ABM’s president, Saturnin Houndji is a researcher in human nutrition at the University of Abomey-Calavi in Cotonou.

I was quite happy to stay behind the scenes all day – this has truly become an organization run by, and for, the people of Benin.

Our pretty new logo.

Davide and Yacobou – two of the enthusiastic guys behind this project.  Great work partners.

The newly-elected board of ABM.

I owe a special THANK YOU to the good folks behind the United Nations Staff 1% for Development Fund (New York).  They usually fund concrete projects like schools and health centers, but they saw the potential in this project and helped us finance the launch of ABM.  Now that we’re off the ground, we can get started in with the fun stuff:

-providing technical assistance to new plantations

-establishing a seed bank

-developing promotional materials

-structuring a pricing model to facilitate a wholesale market and to assure growers a fair income

-implementing production standards and hygiene requirements

-creating a contact directory to facilitate commerce

With my Peace Corps service coming to a close in December, I’m excited to be passing this project on to an enthusiastic new volunteer:

I know Patrick’s going to do a great job, and I’m looking forward to watching ABM take off in the next couple years.

I finally had the opportunity to visit these amazing creatures a few weeks ago:

Rain clouds approached as we ventured across the scrubby savanna.  With soft light and dramatic skies, the day presented an awesome opportunity for photos.

The giraffes were incredibly calm and approachable. They almost seemed like fashion models posing for the camera.  Perhaps they realize tourism offers their best hope for a brighter future.

Unlike their cousins in East Africa, the peralta giraffes have not done well in reintroduction programs.  Nearby conservation parks have tried introducing them, but the giraffes refuse to eat in their new neighborhood and quickly perish.  They love their current home.

With their numbers dwindling perilously, these giraffes present a strong case for land conservation and better resource management.  Unfortunately the giraffes compete for land with local farmers and cattle herders, and Niger’s tumultuous government doesn’t seem to make wildlife a priority.  If it weren’t for tourist dollars, these giraffes would probably have already disappeared.

This issue shines an interesting light on my work with the Fulani, as the nomadic Fulani depend on land like this for their herding livelihood.  Recently, the wildlife guides have succeeded in paying the local Fulani to keep off this land so the giraffes can roam undisturbed.  As long as the tourists keep coming, this delicate balance may last.

They hire local villagers to help pull the nets.  Each helper receive four fish for a morning’s work.

The fishermen cast massive net in a U-shape hundreds of meters along the shore.

Teams pull the net towards the beach at both ends, gradually moving together until the net encloses the trapped fish.

The fish are channeled into a big tube-shaped net and dragged onto the beach.

This technique catches mostly small fish, but this unlucky sea bass also found his way into the trap.

The enormous net is crafted from numerous small nets sewn together.

The catch is sorted and sold right on the beach.

An impromptu market forms, and the fish are still flopping as they’re sold off to restaurants and vendors from nearby villages.