Fashion Show

Trip Start Jul 05, 2005

178

Trip End Ongoing

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Flag of Benin Azove, Benin
Thursday, July 21, 2005

We had a "Fashion Show" today for our cultural training. I volunteered (can you believe that??) to be one of the models. There are 4 different types of "typical" African dress for females: boom-bas, bou-bous, jupes, and pangnes. I don't know which is which for sure, but I think a Boom-ba is a shirt, a bou-bou is a one piece dress, a jupe is a skirt, and a pangne is a piece of fabric that is wrapped around the waist.

At the end of the fashion show, we did a skit about how to greet a king or a chief of a village. The king/chief has 3 wifes (Queens). One gets to walk beside him and the other two behind them. I was one walking behind him. The Queen in the front just stands by him and looks pretty. The Queens in the back have jobs; one waves a fan on him and the other holds a spit cup for when he needs to spit. Lovely huh? Guess what job I got.....

When the King is greeted, people take their shoes off and kneel down before him. They touch their foreheads to the ground or kiss the ground.

Yummy salad for dinner again...this time it had lettuce, tomatoes, cucumber, carrots, onion, eggs, fries, noodles, vinaigrette dressing, with bread and pineapple again.

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