Meet the Yéo Family (Part Un)

The last few weeks I have had a few technology troubles that have kept me from keeping in touch as much as I’d like. Other more exciting things have happened as well.
I officially passed the one month mark of living with my host family. The entire JourneyCorps team had a one month debrief for 3 days on campus in Bouaké. It was great to have the whole team together, as well as do some seemingly simple yet extremely liberating things, such as wear shorts, speak in English, play soccer, have a second helping of pizza. I also have started helping out at the nearby dispensary as a sort of assistant to the social worker who works with the HIV patients.

Since it has almost been 6 weeks with my family now, I thought you might like to meet a few of them and maybe see a little of where I’m living. Keep in mind that there are 18 people who live here including me, of course there’s usually a visitor staying with us as well. So I haven’t actually gotten pictures of everyone yet. Here’s what I do have

Sara. She is married to Nontonwa, the nephew of my host parents. She has three kids, but also takes care of the other children at the house. For work, she sells different things in a petit marché down the street.

This is Emmanuel, though everyone calls him Emma for short. The political situation as left him without school lately and so he has been a great friend to me. He is the son of Notonwa and Sara and the grand nephew of my host parents.

This is where our meals are prepared. It's amazing what the women can whip up here.

This is Prince or more often 'le chien'. They are much more fond of the cat, but they keep him around because he's a good guard for the house.

Madeline, she's 18. I honestly don't know the specifics of the relation except that she is family. She has spent most of her life in the village of Lamekkaha and so speaks barely any french at all. She spends most of her day preparing meals, but on Mondays and Tuesdays we go to Senoufo class together, where we both learn to read and write.


Maman Tamirigue. Her name means la terre or la pouciere, meaning dirt, earth, or dust. It is customary for parents give a child a name like this when many of their previous children have died. Between her older sister and Tamirigue there were 5 children that passed away, and so her name is Dirt. To me though, she is Maman.