Light of Togo

What do you get when you combine a broken bridge, 200 semi trucks, angry taxi drivers, and four tired missionaries?  A big adventure!

After a few days in Lomé, Jim and I started heading back for Kara around 11 am, which normally means arriving home around 5 pm.  Around the half way point, however, things started to get interesting.  We came up on a 4 mile-long line of semi trucks that had been building up since at least Monday.  It was at this point that we just “happened” to run into a couple other missionary friends from Kara who were only two cars ahead of us.  They had a map, and we had no clue, so we decided to follow them.

We got turned around, drove back to the last village, and asked about a road on the map that could have brought us out north of the bridge.  The locals, however, told us that the road is impassable.  So at this point we had two options: sit in traffic, going nowhere; or sit on the side of the road drinking Coke, going nowhere.  The decision was unanimous.

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Once we started seeing vehicles coming from towards the bridge, we figured it was time to move out.  Our progress was stopped short, though, by all the traffic trying to go north. After two hours of stop and go, we were diverted off the main road and onto a narrow dirt road.  This road wasn’t at all a problem for our 4×4 vehicles, but there were all kinds of small cars, overloaded taxi vans, and huge semi trucks trying to make one lane into two.  As night fell we slowly crept along, hopping out of the vehicles from time to time in order to direct traffic, push vehicles out of the mud, or just to find out why we weren’t moving.

A couple hours later, we were past all the traffic and on our way to wherever that road would take us.  Five and a half hours after starting into the traffic jam, we came out a whopping 7 miles north of where we started!

Now it’s late, we’re tired, we’re hungry, but at least we’re past all that mess…right?  Let me interrupt my own story here and explain something.  I have learned two things about frustrating circumstances in Africa: first, that you don’t get too excited about a bad situation getting better because it’s usually not over; and second, that you don’t get too worked up about it because it just makes everything worse.  Just take a deep breath, say “WAWA” (West Africa Wins Again), and go with the flow.

So, not even an hour of driving on the main road brought us to the toll booth where we would normally pay 300 francs and pass right through.  But not tonight!  A line of taxi vans was blocking up both lanes of the road, making it impossible to pass.  Walking up to the booths, we saw a group of about 150 people standing around, some talking, some arguing, and some shouting loudly at nobody in particular, and some just watching the whole scene like a movie that you don’t want to be in.

We eventually found out that several taxi van drivers wanted to protest the bridge situation by blocking the road and refusing to pay their toll.  We soon realized that there was nothing we were going to do or say to fix the problem.  They wanted to voice their complaint to the local authorities, so until they showed up nothing was going to change.  We had the idea of just jumping the curb with our vehicles, and going around everyone, but we seriously felt like it wouldn’t have been the smartest move at that point.

We felt like the best place to be at this time was back at our vehicles, which is where we stayed until everything settled down.  Once the local “préfet” arrived, they came to an agreement that those who wanted to pay their toll and leave could do so, and those who didn’t could stay as long as they wanted.  The only problem is that the people blocking the road were the ones staying and they had no desire to move so that everyone else could leave.

With the situation having settled down a bit, and us getting more tired by the minute, we went back to the curb-jumping idea.  We moved several small concrete barricades out of the way, payed our toll, jumped the curb, and drove off into the sunset.  Well, the sunset part isn’t exactly true since we missed it by several hours.

In all, the 6 hour trip took 12.  A 12 hour trip doesn’t sound that bad, but I’m sure you’ve heard this phrase before: “You just had to be there.”  Honestly though, I wouldn’t have traded it for anything!  It was a great adventure and something that we’ll remember for the rest of our lives.  I can imagine us missionaries sitting around 20 years from now laughing about the “good ‘ole days.”  Just do me a favor and please tell me if 20 years from now I’m repeating this story over and over again as if it’s the first time you’ve heard it.

The other night as I was moving all our boxes from upstairs to downstairs where they’d be loaded on the truck the following day, I thought to myself, “Hey, why not have some fun while I’m giving myself a ruptured tendon?” So, I did. I set up my camera and took a shot or two after moving each box, then I later put them together to make a time-lapse video. Enjoy!

NOTE: If the video seems to play too fast (in just a few seconds) you might have to play it again in order for it to play correctly. This happened to me a couple times so hopefully you don’t have any problem with it.

Never Ending Boxes from Jesse Shanks on Vimeo.

A couple months ago, Tiffany started Kindergarten with Joshua and they have both been working very hard.  One part of the morning routine is to say the Pledge of Allegiance with the small paper crayon-colored American flag hanging on the schoolroom wall.  It was already extremely cute to hear him mispronounce some of the big words which he is incapable of defining, but when he recently lost his first tooth upper tooth (fifth overall) it became even cuter.  Here’s a short video of his Pwedge of Allegianthe.

The Pwedge of Allegianthe from Jesse Shanks on Vimeo.

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How could we possibly describe the desperate situation that Joshua and I found ourselves in during the 14 incredibly long and arduous days without Tiffany?  A few words come to mind: starvation, filth, depression, thai food take-out leftovers…again.

OK, so maybe it wasn’t that bad, but we sure didn’t enjoy being away from the best mother and wife in the world for that long, and miraculously she didn’t either!  I was afraid that she’d enjoy her new-found freedom so much that she’d stay for a couple months!

She arrived back in Quebec exactly one week ago, and this has been one of the best weeks in our lives.  It’s funny how being apart really makes you realize how much you appreciate somebody.  We’ve all had a great time as a family together around the house, not doing anything special in particular, but just goofing around and having fun.

Other than that, Joshua started school again with Tiffany.  He’s doing excellent with his learning to read.  He gets impatient like every kid, but he’s very excited to start reading.

Just as a side note, thank you to those of you who gave me your, uhhh, “recipes” for great dishes such as ramen noodles and PB&J sandwiches.  They were so, uhhh, “helpful” in helping us to survive those darkest days minus Tiffany.

The fact is that I make a very terrible housekeeper.  Some things I can do well, but cooking is not one of them!  After these two weeks, I have definitely decided that I don’t want to be a domestic homemaker when I grow up!

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The day after returning home from Boston, Tiffany flew to the west coast for our very good friend’s wedding (thanks to her mother’s frequent flier miles) and to see her parents. She will be gone for a total of 15 days, which is in my opinion about 15 days too long! Ever since we first planned this trip for her, I have been calling it The Great Abandonment. You see, me and the kitchen don’t get along too well. I am happy to help Tiffany around the house any way I can, but cooking is one thing that I try to avoid at all costs. Rather than resorting to fast food and junk food however, I have brought myself to at least attempt cooking. We have not died or been hospitalized (yet) so I suppose that I’m doing alright, besides Joshua’s crying every time we sit down to eat. He’s also lost about 20 pounds.

We miss Tiffany a bunch, for more reasons than just those that relate to food! She is having a really great time though. She arrived in Portland last night and will be there for the remainder of the time with her family and friends.

Joshua and I are also having a good time. We’re doing several special Joshua & Daddy kind of things. The other day we went down to a park along the river where we rode rollerblades (me) and a scooter (Joshua), then we had a picnic lunch on the grass. Sometime this week, we’ll be taking a short hike through the woods by another river nearby. It’s definitely not all fun and games though, as we are definitely in survival mode around the house!

Read about the return of Tiffany.

Ever since moving to Quebec, we’ve been telling our parents about the city and how much they would enjoy it. Tiffany’s parents were able to come for a visit last October, and my parents have been planning a trip for this summer. Well, the summer has flown by and my parents are here already. They took a red-eye flight on Tuesday night and arrived Wednesday morning. Needless to say, they were VERY tired. After my mom woke from an afternoon nap, my dad said, “I’m feeling pretty good! I thought I’d be more tired, but I’m really not.” This is a photo of him one hour later.

They had a good and long night’s sleep last night, so this evening we are headed to Old Quebec for a tour of the city and to see the Moulin à images, which is a multimedia show that is projected onto a massive building.

We are very happy to have them here, and we’re glad that my dad finally woke up from his not being very tired.

There is a long-running story about missionaries and used tea bags.  It comes from many years ago when people had the mentality of “well, we can’t use this junk, so let’s give it to a missionary!”  Occasionally, missionaries would actually receive tea bags that had already been used.  Thankfully that mentality is long gone…well, almost.  A couple weeks ago, we received a package from the States with a few goodies in it, and to our surprise some used tea bags as well.  Yes, that’s right, used tea bags.  What made it even worse is that it came from our home church! However, if you knew the people who sent it to us, you would immediately know, as we did, that it was completely a joke.  It was from our great friends Mark and Tami Norwood.  We have told them that story and they have often joked around with us that when we are gone they will send us some.  I never thought that they would really do it though!  Just in case you’re wondering, they did send some other, more useful things too!

ow, I can’t believe it’s been a week since Joshua’s and my camping trip. I really wanted to have the video done and this entry written right after we returned last Saturday, but between lots of work to catch up on, taking longer on the video than expected, and incredibly annoying frustrations with uploading it to Google Video, I have just now got around to it. I know that since last weekend you’ve all been sitting at your computers in anxious expectation of this moment, so I do apologize for keeping you from your TV and other important things.  I hope you do know that I’m just kidding about TV being an important thing.  Of course, everyone knows that video games are much more important.

The camping was really a blast.  Although the mosquitoes were almost unbearable - we couldn’t even sit down long enough to eat - we really enjoyed ourselves and had a great time.  I asked Joshua what the funnest thing is that he’s ever done in his extremely long life, and he said it was this camping trip.  That right there made all the mosquito bites worth it!

OK, enough babbling.  You probably just want to watch the video.  It is really quite a lot longer (13 minutes!) than I wanted it to be, but when putting it together I just couldn’t cut out so many of the cute things that Joshua did or said, so 13 minutes it is!  Because of the aforementioned problem with Google, I am trying a different video hosting service called Vimeo.  Hopefully I’ll have better luck with it than I have with Google.

You can watch it in full screen by clicking the squarish-looking arrows just to the right of the volume.

Jesse and Joshua’s Camping Trip from Jesse Shanks on Vimeo.

And here’s some photos:

Created with Admarket’s flickrSLiDR.

Just a little background first:  Joshua is five years old now, has a mind of his own, and is constantly saying things that seem to come out of nowhere.  He has been saving every bit of his own money - from his birthday, from grandparents on holidays, and from his occasional “jobs” around the house - for more than six months because he has been wanting to get his very own little camera.  He talks often about it, but this time it completely caught us off guard.

Sitting at the dinner table last night, I asked Joshua if he would like to pray to thank God for the food before we ate.  He quickly agreed and began praying, but not for the food.  He said, “God, can you please help me not to spend any money…long pause…and help me to get more jobs…long pause…and help me to do my schoolwork slowly…amen.”  We managed to hold back our chuckles, and Joshua just began eating like nothing out of the ordinary happened.  It’s amazing how cute kids can be and be entirely clueless to it.

By the way, the reference to the schoolwork was because Tiffany has been working with him lately and she’s often telling him to slow down and do the work correctly rather than quickly.

You just never know what will come out of the mind of a kid!

Following the ancient Scottish traditions of our Shanks forefathers, Joshua and I constructed quite a handsome snowman a little over a week ago. We had been waiting all winter for the perfect snowman conditions, since they are very picky as to the type of snow that they like to be made of. Every time it snows here in Quebec, it is very dry and powdery snow that is impossible to make anything with. However, after a recent rain the top 3 inches of snow became optimal snowman material. Once he was finished, we enjoyed seeing his smiling face from our back window for a few days, but then disaster struck. Watch the video below to see how the saga unfolded.

When I showed up to class yesterday morning, I was surprised to find a man waiting there to talk to me. He told me that a reporter from Radio Canada wanted to interview me for a news story that he is preparing for the radio. The story has to do with the recent grossly inflated tuition prices in Quebec for foreign students, and the reporter wanted to interview somebody who could have been affected by this.

Now at this point in my very brief French experience, I do not feel like I’m ready to do a radio interview answering complex questions! So, I told the guy that I’d love to do it, but that my French is not great. He said that this wouldn’t be a problem and that I could answer in English if I wanted and that they could just translate it when it’s broadcasted. This sounded like a much better arrangement, so I agreed and he said that he would put me in touch with the reporter. Now keep in mind that this man with whom I was talking works for the university, not the radio station.

After school I called the reporter without really knowing what to expect. My assumption was that he would set up a time when we could meet or something. So after a few “preliminaries,” all in French, he said that he would transfer the phone to another line for the interview. “OK, no problem,” I thought, “I would have preferred to have some preparation first, but that’s a problem. After all, I can respond in English, right?”

When the reporter picked up the other line and asked the first question I started to answer in English when he stopped me and said, “No, in French please.” Doh! This is exactly what I feared.

Now, I think it’s necessary for me to explain something about myself to you at this point. I am NOT good at just coming up with things off the top of my head without any preparation. I just don’t do well at all in those situations. I’m the type of person who likes to know what I’m getting into so I can plan and prepare accordingly, and that’s even when speaking English! Throw in the French factor and now I’m sure to make a fool of myself. Well I thought, “OK, I’m just going to do the best I can and hope that he doesn’t ask anything too difficult.”

The first two questions were relatively easy and I felt like I didn’t butcher the responses too bad, but then came the third. He asked something about if I had known what was going to happen with the tuition prices before I came, would I have still come and if the tuition is higher this summer will I be able to continue. Without getting into all the complexities of French grammar, I’ll just say this: Have you ever posed a question to a young child, then realized that they might have understood you, but they had no earthly idea how to correctly answer the question? Got the mental picture now? OK, well that was me! As I hacked my way through the response, I can just imagine what the reporter was thinking, “Man, is THIS the best student they could find for me?” “Maybe they accidentally got me somebody from the Antarctican language program.” or “This guy has been studying French for HOW long?” Well, whatever it was he was thinking, he evidently came to the conclusion that he wasn’t getting much helpful information because after this question he said, in English, “OK, well thank you for the interview, have a nice day.” And that was that.

So, as I think back on my 15 minutes of fame (more like 3), I have decided two things: first, I don’t want to be a celebrity anymore so I’m officially retiring and telling all news agencies, tabloids, and the paparazzi that I “have no further comments.” (don’t you just love it when they say that? I wonder if that would have worked with my parents when I was growing up: “Jesse, did you tell your little brother to do a back flip off of the trampoline into the rose bushes?” “Dad, Mom…I have no further comments.” haha!) Second, I have decided that I really hope that they don’t air this story, or at least my interview. I have also learned that, when necessary, it’s better just to ask for some time to prepare rather than slaughtering a very beautiful language!

Just a minute ago, as Joshua was getting ready to head out the door to a friend’s birthday party, he told Tiffany, “I’m going to wash my teeth so they are nice and clean for when we sing the birthday song!”  HAHA!!  Where does he come up with this?

Somebody sent this to me quite a while ago, and I just found it again on my computer. I thought it was so funny that I had to show all of you.

Last Saturday we all bundled up and headed to vieux-Québec (Old Quebec) where the 2008 winter carnaval is being held. We went with our co-workers, the Huffs (Jon, Heidi, and Abby). We had a really great time, as there were lots of great family activities. I think the most amazing thing to me was the snow and ice carvings/scultures. Some of these were intricately detailed, and each one left me thinking, “I wonder if that’s just Styrofoam. Hmm.”

I think we would all agree that our favorite thing was “the typhoon,” which was a giant round inter-tube which held all seven of us. It was placed at the top of a steep hill and pushed off, but not before giving it a good spin. Everyone really enjoyed this, except for Abby. At only two years old, I don’t think she had any idea of what was going on. All she knew is that suddenly everything was spinning around her and she didn’t like it one bit!

Here’s some photos from our excursion.

Created with Admarket’s flickrSLiDR.

As we were preparing to leave for the winter carnival with the Huffs, Tiffany said to Joshua, “Grab an extra pair of your wool socks for Abby (the Huff’s daughter) in case she doesn’t have very warm socks.”  Out of nowhere he says, “Man!  I’m just so famous because everybody wants to wear my socks!”  HAHA!  Where does he come up with this stuff?  The funny thing is that he’s so serious when he says it.

If you’d like to become a member of Joshua’s fan club, send a check for $19.95 and you’ll receive an autographed crayola picture and a thread from his famous socks.