Sick in Benin

Trying to accomplish even the most simple of tasks is quite the ordeal when you don’t speak the native language. The next day, my first day in Benin, I had only two errands I thought I must do: rebook the hotel room and go to immigration to get my visa*.

Trying to explain to the receptionist at the hotel that I wanted to stay an extra night took at least twenty minutes, but eventually I handed over the cash and moved on. I then had to get a zemi to Direction Emigration Immigration I thought I was smart by writing the address down as well as some basic directions in French that I had gotten from my guide book. However after the driver had gotten us totally lost and driven round in circles for half an hour he asked for directions and I realised he couldn’t read. That old familiar friend guilt paid me another visit.

Finally I got to immigration, waited in the long line, filled out the form and was then told that the staff were going on a lunch break - so typical! So I went for a short walk around the cobblestone streets and sat outside on the footpath until their two hour break had finished. I sat comparing Ghana and Benin, or Cotonou the capital at least. Cotonou had no open sewers – that definitely put it ahead of Ghana. It was not as crowded as Accra, and generally not as dirty, a lot less street sellers, more white people – though they all seem to be French, and a hell of a lot of motorcycles. When their lunch break was over I handed in my forms and my money and was told to come back for my passport the next day.

The whole 24 hours I had been in Benin were exhausting: new country, new currency, new language. I hadn’t really eaten, the sun was scorching and I was dying of heat. I drank a watered-down pineapple juice at a café from a man who then claimed to have no change so rather than give him double the money, which I believe was his original scheme, I went from shop to shop looking for someone to break my note. I was exhausted and frustrated and wasn’t feeling crash hot. Finally I found a bank which broke my note but by then I really wasn’t feeling well… by then my tummy had been gurgling for a little while and now there were sharp invisible little knives stabbing at my internal organs. I knew what this meant so I started to brace myself for what was not going to be fun.

I raced back to the café and handed the guy the cash, jumped on a zemi and made it back to the hotel and into my room and on to the toilet just in time. And that is where I spent the rest of the night. Sitting on the toilet bowl which had no seat and no flush.

Just after 10pm I got a call on my hotel room phone. It was Davy, the night-man from the hotel who I had very briefly met the night before. He spoke a tiny bit of English, not enough for much of an interaction. He wanted me to sit with him and talk. I told him I was sick: “malade”.

He called again an hour later to ask me again to go down stairs and sit with him. I yelled “malade!”, slammed down the phone and went back to the bathroom.

The crazy streets of Cotonou

*At the border entering Benin I was only able to get a 48 hour temporary visa to allow me to stay while I get a longer 30 day visa approved at immigration.