Cotonou update (September 2008)
100 euros = 65000 CFA. (CFA = Communauté Financière Africaine, I think). You can pay everywhere in euros and you get the change in CFA, provided the euro denominations are neither less than 20 nor more than 100. It's a set exchange rate give or take 1%, so don't accept anything substantially less than the above rate.
This time I was at New York New York later into the night (1 o'clock) on a Thursday. Shortly after one the girls starting streaming in. Female/male ratio about 10/1. As I wrote before though, the quality of the girls is nowhere near what I experienced in the Cameroons of the Ivory Coast. Unless you like chubbier, bigger-breasted girls. Chubby girls always turn out bigger-breasted on average. My type is "as tall as possible and with an apple-butt". Not at all the type here. I didn't even inquire about the going rate since I had my own girl for the whole duration of my stay but it must be around 20-30 CFA (25-35 euros).
If you are in Cotonou a visit to the lacustrian town of Ganvié is a must. Taxi return trip on the same day from Cotonou = 20000 CFA. Price for the boat + guide on the lake 11000 CFA. In Ganvié I was shown around one of the "hotels" on the lake. Astonishingly clean and with toilet and electricity. Price 5000 CFA a night (15 euros). The guide only smiled when I inquired but the taxi driver told me it was definitely possible to have girls brought to your room on by the lake-dwellers. Sex among the Ganvié lake-dwellers, that must be fun! Best tried out with a buddy for shared fun.
The previous poster mentioned Croix du Sud as a good hotel. Alas it is no more. Like Hôtel de la Plage, it is one of the old-style hotels that vanish without being replaced by anything really like it. There's a new Ibis right next to Novotel. Clean but cramped rooms, no atmosphere. I heard Omar Ghadaffi has invested heavily in hotels and real estate in Cotonou. He apparently owns Benin Marina (former Sheraton). Benin is one of the non-predominantly Muslim African countries he has tried to buy off, with some but not unlimited success.
Regarding hotels the pattern of one hotel being built only at the cost of two older one disappearing is typical of Africa. The overall supply of hotel accommodation doesn't increase so prices are those of major European cities. Cheap and safe transportation is absent (see my previous post). The lucky people are usually those working for ONGs, they have all they need (vehicles, hotels) paid for them.
The Beninese are gentle and welcoming. For a group of hard trekkers who pool resources to hire a vehicle and go inland such a country mus be a bonanza of experiences, including mongering ones. For the typical hotel-bound monger like me, not much of a destination.
Late afternoon in Jonquet
Sometimes I like to go for a beer or two to one of the main bars in Jonquet: Soweto and another further down direction Pattaya. The last one opens only in the evening and is expensive. Before arriving at the Jonquet pharmacy coming from Steinmetz, there is a side road along a stinking canal where women are sitting already late afternoons. I did not yet try any of these, maybe one day in a dirty mood. Last time I sat at Soweto Bar, only slightly bothered by some fat, ugly Nigerian prostitutes who have rooms upsairs, in case someone were interested. Anyway this time I slim girl was sitting with a group drinking heavily, and after some time there was eye contact encouraging me to take a second Beninoise beer waiting how things would develop. The men of the group left and she came over, telling she was visiting her bar servant friend. Since I was occupied in the evening, I made appointment for the next day and she came over to my hotel. Was a GFE and PSE, she is Togolese and we will meet up in Lome in one week. So, even at Jonquet you can find some gems sometimes.