Our Mission to Africa: Zimijan

On the Streets of Cotonou (Benin)

Zimijan: (v) in the local dialect (Benin)-- get me there fast; (n) slang for motos, the cheapest and fastest from of public transportation.

Zimijans and our chase car

Cotonou has its own very unique feel and flavor. The most unique thing is the amount of Zimijans on the roads. They outnumber the cars by at least 20 to 1. Driving in Benin is like driving in the middle of a hive of bees. The Zimijans swarm you, at any given instant, there are 20 or 30 in the front of you, 10 or 15 on each side of you and 20 or 30 behind you. They envelop the traffic and move at about twice the speed of any of the cars. They are all buzzing and zipping in and out of cars. It has a mind-numbing effect. Unlike anywhere else we've ever been. You might think that safety is impossible with the reckless abandon that is shown by all of the motos--and you would be correct. In our two days here, we saw but one accident, and it was terrible. Zimijan verses vehicle, and the driver always loses. In this case he lost everything! I needn't say much more without getting into nasty details.

We tavelled to 5 different countries in 10 days and forgot our yellow fever cards. We were stopped at every border, but managed to talk our way through. Benin was a bit more difficult as our French is very poor--perhaps they just got tired of trying to decipher my lousy French and decided to let us in just so we would stop talking.

Cotonou Missionaries

Health Check-Up

As usual, Sister Fife surrounded by children

Cotonou Chapel

This is the first chance we got to really visit with the missionaries. They were great, plus some spoke English. We looked in ears, and listened to hearts and lungs and actually had no responsibilities during the training sessions so we wandered the streets a bit around the chapel area.