Thursday in Benin–Day 4

I can’t believe we’ve been here 4-plus days and I haven’t made a single comment about the driving habits in Benin. They’re still terrible, to be blunt. Even with all of the new traffic signals and improved roads, people here just go where they want, when they want, without much regard for rules of the road or other vehicles. If you have the bigger vehicle, you win. The motorbike crowd weaves in and out of traffic and even goes the wrong way against traffic ….this all happens of course with the motorcyclists carrying everything from mattresses to infants on their bikes.

Speaking of which, we couldn’t go the entire week without Fernando getting involved in a traffic incident. This one happened Wednesday night as we were headed to Fernando’s house he drove our SUV into a parked motorcycle. Of course the motorcycle was stupidly parked in the road, but it took a tumble. The guy came running up to my window…I kept the window shut but Fernando did get out of the car to talk it over. Turns out the motorcyclist was there to apologize and no one got hurt. Conflict averted and we moved on. But literally this kind of thing goes on daily and nobody thinks anything of it. That’s “just the way it is” is how it’s explained. Ugh

After breakfast Gary tells me that Father Gildas from the Don Bosco school has reached out and says that “his” boss wants to meet with us. Bad things are going through my head after we seemingly had a deal cut with the Padre. So we head to Don Bosco where Mr Tomonari has been running an all-day clinic for the kids. About 45 kids on hand doing throwing drills, ground balls and more. Tomonari, who speaks English fairly well, albeit with a heavy (almost comical) Japanese accent, uses Fernando and Fidele to translate his very concise instructions. The kids are receptive and it’s a good day of learning baseball the “Japanese way.”

What I didn’t realize at the time is the Tomonari’s organization J-ABS, sends him around Africa to do clinics, but also to identify talent. J-ABS is basically on the payroll of the Japanese Professional baseball league and they are scouting kids to come play high school baseball in Japan. Mr Tomonari specifically wants 15 year olds since they’re on the cusp of high school. You’d think that MLB might want to do something like this, but to date they haven’t. Not in Africa anyway. We did notice that he took about 20 of the kids for drills in the afternoon and basically left the rest with nothing to do.

So we grabbed the 25 kids that we’re sitting around and put them in a line and hit them groundballs and flyballs. And they had an audience. A group of young soccer players were cheering their every move…and of course laughing every time someone missed a ground ball. It made for an entertaining hour or so of groundball drills.

Then at 3:30pm it was time to meet with the Monsignor (Father Gildas’s boss). As worried as I was, it couldn’t have gone any better. He is a French-speaking older gentleman who is excited to have us do work on the the field and upgrade it so it’s an actual baseball field. Of course we have to make sure that soccer is still in the equation, but he asked all the right questions and apparently we gave all of the right answers. This, to say the least, is a major breakthrough for our efforts. Finally after no less than 7 years of trying to find a place to build a field, we have something. Two backstops, a storage unit, benches and more. Mark down May 18, 2023…it’s the day that we at minimum have an agreement and a place to put our long awaited baseball field. Next up is figuring out the finances, but today is a VERY good day.

Night Life in Benin

After the meeting with the Monignnor we head out for an early dinner at a place called Sprinkles. We have frequented Sprinkles several times this week. Actually we went there on Sunday night right after our arrival in Benin. That night we found out that they don’t take credit card and none of us had cash. But get this, (and this would never happen in the U.S), the owner said “no problem, just pay us next time you’re in”…we came back for lunch the next day and several times after. We made her generosity and understanding worth her while.

After our Thursday evening Sprinkles dinner (great pizza and pasta by the way), we were actually done early and Fernando was anxious to show us some Beninese night life. So he took us to the beach where there are many, many restaurants and bars lined up side by side, all with large outdoor seating areas facing the ocean. No big resort/hotels hogging up the beaches here like they would in Miami.

As the three of us walk the beach loud African music fills the air throughout the area with a party atmosphere. Fernando locates a table at one of the bars where a large group of his friends from college and elsewhere are hanging out…and of course they all know Fernando. We sit for a while when all of a sudden, the lights are dimmed and an announcement interrupts the music saying that a movie is about to start. Sure enough a French action movie is now blaring through the speakers as the movie is shown on a large screen TV about 200 feet from where we’re sitting. No movie theaters in Cotonou, or Benin for that matter…so this is how people get movies other than the internet. A “drive in” outdoor movie, beachside….now we’re talking my language, even if I don’t understand the language. A fun way to end a productive day.