Almost one week has passed since I arrived to Togo’s capital Lomé and – simply put – it was superb. Lomé is located at the coast on the Gulf of Guinea and directly next to the Ghana border. The city is rather developed with paved roads and streetlights, and it has a beautiful and surprisingly clean beach. Even if due to a strong undertow it is not advisable to swim in the sea, the beach is a great place to hang on, have a walk or relax. Many locals spend the weekend there, playing soccer or meeting friends, going to some “maquis” and always enjoying their time.

Similar to other African towns, the everyday life happens outside in the streets, mainly at the market area. Lomé’s market is one of the biggest in West Africa and you can find EVERYTHING you think of. The atmosphere is lively, hearty and warm, just like the Togolese. I feel very welcome here, lots of people talk to me in an open and friendly manner, we laugh a lot and almost never they do so because they want to sell you something or beg for money. They are really laid-back and so far it is impossible to feel stressed in Togo (I was soon to adopt this tranquil way of life – including the siesta). This is probably the reason why so many foreigners are happy to live and work here, it does not seem to me that the condition are that hard. Apart from European or French expats, there are a few Indians and quite a lot of Lebanese people who work in the gastronomy business or who own bars and discos. The remarkable exception are the Chinese who are only here to make money. They nearly never mix with other persons and form a strange and slightly inaccessible bubble in their Chinatown, having the most expensive and therefore empty restaurants.

During my stay, I was housed in the Swiss-owned but Marseille-flair spreading “Auberge Le Galion“. It is exactly what you can imagine when thinking of a typical bar in the south of France, they serve pastis, salade niçoise and mousse au chocolat. Every origin and social class meets here, from the tough Belgian welfare case family over the destroyed Italian alcoholic to the blathering French entrepreneur or the loud African playboy. Definitely I spent a great and authentic time at that place and I met many interesting persons, among others a Frenchman who has travelled extensively in Latin America, South-East Asia and Africa.

And best of the best, I am not anymore in an English-perverted but finally in a French-trained country. It might not be the cheapest budget destination, and speaking French is mandatory if you want to visit these areas, but at least you’ll be rewarded with some kind of culture and francophone influences. It feels exactly the same as a summer in France: you search for a place in the shade during the day, but in the evenings everyone is outside, having dinner and socializing with friends or listening to live concerts and street music. And of course, the food is a completely distinct story from the soulless muck you get in Eastern Africa. Here, they skilfully adapt foreign to regional cuisine, you will find anything from Asian over Arab to French and African meals. More important, the cooks try to be creative and have some variety in what will accompany the fish, the meat or the rice. And above all, they have fun and are proud of what they prepare, so I am starving again to go and try out different delicious dishes every day, which is a nice diversion after so much of boring tastes.

Another curiosity here concerns the means of transport: the infamous moto-taxis aka zemidjan, which are more or less the unique cheap possibility to get around. You hire a motorcycle driver, tell him where you want to go, bargain the price and there you drive off. Then you pray to reach your destination safe and sound, because rules and regulations in the traffic appear to be limited to the usage of the horn (which indeed is used and respected with reasonable manner). Traffic lights are considered to be a beautiful way to bring some color on the roads and roundabouts are taken in both directions. Yet, those motorbikes are still a clever method to reduce big traffic jams, annoying noise and to quickly cross the city through secret paths. I had to take these taxis to go to the visa office for extending my stay, and Togo has by far the most agreeable and non-expensive visa policy in the western part of the Black Continent. You hand in your passport and the next day, some calm officer sits down under a tree, just carrying a big box with all the passports. He will quietly call out every name one by one while making jokes and listening to the “Our Father in Heaven”.

I cannot finish without mentioning the omnipresent topic “n’golo n’golo”. Despite being Christian, West-Africans mostly have the opinion that as long as God allows them to use their sexual vigor, there is no good reason why you should not give way to your desires. The consequences are lots of illegitimate children, an incredibly high number of prostitutes (or at least liberal women who do not have any objections against a little extra pocket money), but you will also hear a good bunch of funny stories. The drawback is that Lomé’s night-life is not as good as it could be. There are nice bars and dance clubs but they are usually filled up with 80% males and 20% hookers. So it is a bit difficult if you simply want to go there and have fun on the dancefloor – do you choose a guy or a whore? And it is a bit depressing to see that many white men who come to Africa for desperately finding the woman of their life but in fact end up in such a setting.

At the end, I don’t exactly know why I enjoyed my stay here so much. I think that it is most  likely to be the awkward mix of everything that makes Togo’s capital so honest and friendly. I hope that the following memorable quotations can help having a clearer understanding of my impressions and that they give a better characterization of the general mood in Lomé.

• “Je te souhaite une bonne arrivée.” – such a nice way to welcome you!
• “Tu es beau toi. Tu ressembles à Jésus. Je l’ai vu à la télé.” (regarding my appearance)
• Foreigner: “L’autre jour, je t’ai vu sur la moto, t’as pa-ni-qué….”Local: “Mais si j’ai niqué!” (indignant about how you could possibly doubt on his virility)
• White Guy: “Eh ma belle, tu veux bien me donner ton numéro?” (naturally she gives it to him, he has the right skin color)
  Black Guy (astonished and highly stunned) “Waouh, putain mais tu sais draguer toi?”
• There is a slight, subtle difference between “c’est un peu pas très tellement loin” and “c’est un peu loin pas tellement beaucoup”.
• And the one and only: “Tranquille, t’inquète pas mec, y’a pas de problèmes.”