voodoo festival

hey all! sorry i have really been slacking off on my blogging. i can try to claim to have been really busy but it would only be partly true. the truth is that i'm kind of at a loss as to how to explain all i've seen. thursday, the 10th, was the voodoo festival here. voodoo actually began here and although the majority of ppl will usually tell u that they are muslim or christian the truth is that most ppl still believe in, if not practice, voodoo (or voudoun as it is called here). thursday i went to a small village north of cotonou w/ some ppl from the embassy. in the village they greeted us with a song and patiently waited while we pressed coins to their foreheads (which is a sign of appreciation). the ppl were singing and dancing to the music of the drums. this was all in anticipation of the arrival of the chief. we met the lesser chiefs who were in the chiefs of various voodoo gods. one said that he was the chief of 3 gods. there are countless voudoun gods. they showed us the voudoun which looked like a 6-8" thick bundle with horn shaped attachments at each end. they were orange and white and covered with feathers. the feathers were especially valuable as they were parakeet feathers. if one of the feathers came off, they were very careful to pick it up and save it. the voudoun chief came out. he is the chief of the whole area of allada which is where the kingdom of dahomey (benin) started. they sang and danced in front of him then in a kind of parade, we went to the voudoun square where the real festivities were to take place. there was a special section for the head chief with alongside sat the other chiefs. all day long voudons danced and ppl danced and sang praises to them. there were even voudons in costumes that looked almost like birds. they were brightly colored with red, orange, yellow, and green and were formed of many layers. they not only walked on stilts, but they danced, did spins, everything! i really am at a loss as to how to describe everything but i promise to put pics up soon. i recorded a lot of it too so check my facebook for that. on our way back to cotonou we stopped to buy pineapples. in the states it's about $4 for a cut pineapple in the grocery store, we bought 40 for 3,000 cfa or less than 17 cents a pineapple. my host family was a little surprised to see me return home with 10 pineapple but they really didn't mind. i promise to add more about the voodoo fest soon!