[Latan]

Hi everyone,

I've traveled to Togo a few years ago for a humanitary mission, during one month.
This very poor country is one of Africa's smallest (56 785 km²):



Language

French is the official language, locals also speak 2 national ones: "éwé" and "kabiyé".
I don't think english is commonly spoken there.

Upon arriving, the first word you'll learn will be "white": "Yovo".
There are very few white people around, so you'll get easily noticed and looked at.
Kids will often point at you saying "Yovo", as they're not used to see someone who hasn't dark skin.
I've no idea how a black man foreigner would be received, but a black foreigner woman told me she was easily spotted as "non local" by the inhabitants.



To me, it was like experimenting woman's level of getting constant attention.
People randomly coming to talk to me, in a friendly way...but always interested.

Examples:

- Every morning I woke up at sunrise (the house let it enter through the roof so...I didn't have a choice) for my morning jogging.
On my way, people would often call me from afar, to engage conversation, one man even asked me to come having diner with his family (after a 15 seconds talk).

- While taking a cab, a man next to me began a conversation, talking about how he was creating a project to help children, fell asleep midway (wut?), then woke up and asked me when we would meet again so that I'd help him (I denied politely).

White people are seen as very rich, so you'll often receive indirect and polite asks for money.
After 3 weeks this began to get on my nerves: not being able to go anywhere without someone to come to me (and indirectly ask me money) was very irritating.



Want to know why the woman you tried to talk to just blew you in a cuntish way? Live in Togo and you'll know what she experiences.
(Still doesn't excuse her behavior, I always answered politely).



Women

The theme that'll interest most readers here.
Unfortunatly, I won't be able to say much about Togo's women: I was still very beta at this time, and being in a "LTR" I didn't even think about looking at other women (I laugh at you, Past Me! Haha you pussy whipped sucker ).

In a general way, women seemed quite open to chat and I think I'd have been able to easily open them.
Would they have seen me as anything else than a walking wallet? I have no idea.
I didn't see any prostitude, but local men told me that women here often have multiple "boyfriends", which they use to get presents.
I see this as "accepted not openly spoken prostitution".



One of the men of my group (we were something like 7 europeans) even had his own local "girlfriend", for whom he paid expenses (like cabs and food).
As life cost is very low there, it almost didn't cost him anything, to be honest.

One night, our little group of europeans went to a little party with locals.
There were a few young women there, not shy at all, who would directly come dance stuck to me.
I think that the bang would have been possible with very little effort.
(Beta Me didn't go through, so I can't say for sure).



Don't expect women to wear sexy dresses or high heels: there's almost no sidewalk, so walking on dirt and rocks with these clothings/shoes wouldn't be practical.
They often wear colored non revealing clothes.

To me, local women are not feminine at all: I just remembered one who was walking next to me and kept spitting on the ground.
Nobody taught them how to behave like a feminine woman, so don't expect them to (really a boner killer to me).
BTW, I didn't see old people anywhere; I guess medecine's not being wide spread, few people reach old age.
As people tend to have at least 3+ children, young women are easily found.


Corruption

Most locals appeared to have no job and were just hanging around their houses, doing nothing the whole day.
I think most felt that they couldn't change this, couldn't find a job, couldn't get out of their misery.



They blamed rampant corruption (which is indeed very present everywhere):

- The very first day I arrived at the airport, a guard looked into my bag and told me that a random item was not allowed.
He then clearly told me that if I gave him a "present" he'd let this slip.
I gave him a cheap USB key and he let me pass.

- While taking a cab, a police officer stopped us: we were too many inside the car.
(By the way, it's common to be 6 or more in a cab. I even rode a few times in the car trunk, when there was no place elsewhere.)
The driver gave him some money and we continued as if it was totally normal.


Conclusion

I didn't find the local women attractive, so coming back there to get the Togo flag won't cross my mind.
But if you want to, I think it'll be quite easy: just be white.
Otherwise, learning that running water, toilets and electricity are not a common place everywhere in the globe was eye opening and an interesting human experience.



If you have questions, don't hesitate, I'll do my best to answer them.
Have a great day.

[Sonsowey]

Are you a French speaker? Would people speak to you in French or English? How was the food, drink, music?

[w00t]

cheers for the info
I actually got the Togo flag and she had a pretty face and big booty

that was outside of africa though... had no idea her homecountry was such a shithole

I believe getting africans outside of africa is best you dont have to deal with shitty infrastructure, diseases and all that stuff

africans have arguably the hottest bodies in the world IMO (though often not very beautiful faces)

too bad most of africa is a complete dump

[Global Entry]

Here we go again with the broad generalizations. Which parts of Africa have you visited. It's bigger than Europe and South America combined, so when you say most of it is a complete dump, you must have spent a lot of time there, surveying the hottest bodies and the not-very-beautiful faces, which of course, is just an opinion anyway.

(10-22-2014 10:47 AM)w00t Wrote:  

I believe getting africans outside of africa is best you dont have to deal with shitty infrastructure, diseases and all that stuff

africans have arguably the hottest bodies in the world IMO (though often not very beautiful faces)

too bad most of africa is a complete dump

[w00t]

lol I shouldve known that was coming... Ive never been there and of course using broad generalizations. Im not claiming any expertise at all and all of my opinions have been pulled out of thin air

of course there is nice parts but lettuce be real here large parts seem like a complete shithole with no infrastructure whatsoever. feel free to enlighten me about all the metropolitan areas with western standard of living and moderate cost of living that you know about.

opinions on african beauty are of course 100% subjective and your penis might agree or disagree with my assesment

[Hedonistic Traveler]

(10-22-2014 09:07 AM)Latan Wrote:  

To me, it was like experimenting woman's level of getting constant attention.
People randomly coming to talk to me, in a friendly way...but always interested.

Examples:

- Every morning I woke up at sunrise (the house let it enter through the roof so...I didn't have a choice) for my morning jogging.
On my way, people would often call me from afar, to engage conversation, one man even asked me to come having diner with his family (after a 15 seconds talk).

- While taking a cab, a man next to me began a conversation, talking about how he was creating a project to help children, fell asleep midway (wut?), then woke up and asked me when we would meet again so that I'd help him (I denied politely).

White people are seen as very rich, so you'll often receive indirect and polite asks for money.
After 3 weeks this began to get on my nerves: not being able to go anywhere without someone to come to me (and indirectly ask me money) was very irritating.

Great datasheet, I love reading ones that take you off the normal travel circuit.

This trend of "friendliness" seems really common in super-poor or under-traveled countries. I was in Liberia this Summer for a few weeks and saw a similar trend. I'd go for a jog and people would stop me to talk for a few seconds. Overtime I'm sure you could turn this exotic appeal into a ton of bangs.

It does become a bother though. Most of the expats I met that were working there said they barely went out anymore. Too many people hitting them up for cash.

Was this a one-time aid mission you did? Or are you with US-Aid or something?

[Basement Dweller]

All blacks in post-colonial africa have an enormous sense of entitlement and impose white guilt every chance they get which is why small black children will run alongside cars screaming 'sweets sweets!'

They basically want everything handed to them for nothing.

[Hedonistic Traveler]

(10-22-2014 12:16 PM)Basement Dweller Wrote:  

All blacks in post-colonial africa have an enormous sense of entitlement and impose white guilt every chance they get which is why small black children will run alongside cars screaming 'sweets sweets!'

They basically want everything handed to them for nothing.

So every African country except for Ethiopia? Kinda crazy to write off over a billion people like that. You can't really compare countries like Liberia and Togo with Ghana and Nigeria. Or even compare the upper-class populations in these countries with the lower-classes.

I think if I lived in a country with a per capita gdp in the $500-$1000 range I'd probably hit up strangers for cash too. Especially when that person is driving a car worth more than my expected lifetime earnings.

And that sense of entitlement you mention goes both ways. The majority of the expats in poor African countries are there to gouge the countries for everything they have, before heading back to the US.

The continent has spent the past 150 years getting fucked on a monumental scale, and they still get shit for trying to get something out of the situation.

[Basement Dweller]

The map you posted with the flags illustrates my point.

The whites came to Africa and extracted the resources to build the infrastructure that the blacks now benefit from.

Since they've taken control of these countries everything has gone to shit. It's that simple.

[britchard]

Without sounding like an SJW, the whites did extract a hell of a lot of natural resources and basically ran the countries through force. So when they left, did you expect there to be a smooth transition? I thought not. Remember, it has been less than 100 years since they were de-colonised. Most of the countries are very nice, just imagine 18th century Britain in terms of disease, corruption and violence.

[pitt]

(10-22-2014 03:32 PM)Basement Dweller Wrote:  

The map you posted with the flags illustrates my point.

The whites came to Africa and extracted the resources to build the infrastructure that the blacks now benefit from.

Since they've taken control of these countries everything has gone to shit. It's that simple.

Oh really Mr history?

You saying this as if colonization was meant to benefit Africans when the goal of colonialists was totally different. The resources exploration done by the colonialists was to benefit their own countries, they didn't go to Africa with their families to help Africa develop, so you probably need to tell me why were they taking gold and other resources from Africa to Europe.

Sure, they went there to build infrastructure and they ended up enslaving black people in their own land, well, maybe this was something related to the infrastructure work, right?

You are seriously trolling dude.

[Hedonistic Traveler]

(10-22-2014 03:32 PM)Basement Dweller Wrote:  

The map you posted with the flags illustrates my point.

The whites came to Africa and extracted the resources to build the infrastructure that the blacks now benefit from.

Dude, you can’t really believe that.

African labor wasn't used for production; the only infrastructure Europeans built was the bare-minimum used to funnel out the raw materials they wanted. Materials they extracted through forced labor at the expense of the local population.

A lot of the conflict in Africa post-liberation can be traced back to the Scramble for Africa and the fact that European powers didn’t give a shit about existing tribal culture. They forced tribes into pseudo-nations, knowing that they would collapse when the European armies left.

The Nigerian genocide and the Rwandan genocide are two examples of Europeans creating these arbitrary state lines and then leaving the locals to deal with it when they left. The colonizing powers had no concern for the future beyond their next dollar, knowing they could just leave when things got too difficult.

(10-22-2014 03:32 PM)Basement Dweller Wrote:  

Since they've taken control of these countries everything has gone to shit. It's that simple.

Were things really good for the Congo under Leopold? Or for Nambia under Germany? Or South Africa and Rhodesia under foreign rule?

I'm guessing you're a troll or just really uneducated. These countries were taken advantage of and then left to fail when the previous system became impractical.

[nomadicdude]

I just like to send a big thank you out to the valiant white colonists who ventured all the way to Africa risking death and hardship in order to build infrastructure for the African people! What a selfless thing to do!

But seriously, some of the highest GDP growth rates in the world today are in African countries. Comparing a place like Botswana that has done very well to Mali is like comparing Alabama to Silicon Valley.

The problem with colonialism is that it is inherently explotive. Its sole purpose is to steal a country's resources. So to suggest that hundreds of years of European colonialism is no big deal is pretty outrageous. If China went and colonized Europe for 300 years and then left, Europe would be third world too and take hundreds of years to develop.

[Biologist]

Awesome datasheet!

I love the datasheets on the less-explored locations, especially Africa.

(10-22-2014 09:07 AM)Latan Wrote:  

The very first day I arrived at the airport, a guard looked into my bag and told me that a random item was not allowed.
He then clearly told me that if I gave him a "present" he'd let this slip.
I gave him a cheap USB key and he let me pass.

[Latan]

(10-22-2014 09:48 AM)Sonsowey Wrote:  

Are you a French speaker? Would people speak to you in French or English? How was the food, drink, music?

I'm a french speaker, locals speak very fluid french.
I don't think they speak english.

About the food:
No supermarket obviously.
Locals sell cooked and raw stuff directly on the side of the road.
I'd say my classic meals had rice and fish, cow meat, corn or eggs.
They also really liked to put A LOT of salt (to my taste) in all cooked meals.

They had a local alcoholic drink which made me vomit after 2 cups.
Don't know if it's because it was inside an old oil container, but it stinked hard.
(Not much of a drinker, couldn't tell more)

(10-22-2014 10:47 AM)w00t Wrote:  

africans have arguably the hottest bodies in the world IMO (though often not very beautiful faces)

Accurately describes my current "gf". I agree with you .

(10-22-2014 11:54 AM)Hedonistic Traveler Wrote:  

Was this a one-time aid mission you did? Or are you with US-Aid or something?

It was a one-time mission, with a local organisation.
To be honest, my engineer school asked us to do either a 2 months placement in a foreign country or 1 month of humanitary help.
Lazy me didn't think twice (no regret).

(10-23-2014 05:04 AM)Biologist Wrote:  

Awesome datasheet!
I love the datasheets on the less-explored locations, especially Africa.

You're welcome.