Recap: (almost) 3 years in Benin

I would love to tell you that Benin stole my heart like some other countries have done in the past, but it unfortunately is not the case.

After the initial settling in period, I felt like I had a solid routine, a great social circle and that the next few years would be quite chill. However, as I described at the end of my latest post, when the “honeymoon period” ended, the realization that this new life was going to be my life, not just for a few months but for a few YEARS, hit me really hard. It hit me even harder as by that point, I already knew that I wasn’t in love with this country and so the years to come became a bit daunting. Nonetheless, I was committed to keeping a positive mindset and make the most out of our time here. Unfortunately, life (mostly a lot of bad luck!) made it difficult for me to do so on most days.

The House Problems

As you know from my latest post, the house we got was very problematic. By the end of our first six months, we were still dealing with constant repairs. The repairs themselves were not that big of a deal, but what got to me was really the workers’ attitude and their way of working.

If you know me, you know that I’m a perfectionist and that I am demanding when it comes to work well done. What was driving me crazy was therefore to see that the people sent by the house owner’s management company didn’t apply themselves when doing something. I asked some of the workers that came why they just didn’t just do it well the first time. They answered me that they don’t need to do it perfectly, as how they do it is “good enough for now”.

Quick, short-term fixes were the way to go and it was difficult for me to accept. It meant that things would break again the next week and that I needed to deal with it again, and again, and AGAIN. Plus, the other thing that really annoyed me was that they never took any responsibility for anything they did. If it was broken again, it wasn’t because they hadn’t fixed it properly before, no. It was the wind. Or the sand. Or the rain. Riiiiiiiiight….

This mentality, which I was faced with on a daily basis at that point, unfortunately really turned me off about the country in general. It might seem unfair, but dealing with these frustrating situations was how I was spending the majority of my time, so unfortunately it’s also what contributed the most to the opinion I made about my experience here.

What usually makes me fall in love with a place are the people and the culture. But here, I was having such a hard time with the mentality (which was just a big clash with mine) that it unfortunately didn’t become a love story. Every interaction I had felt draining as I was just noticing a lack of accountability, long-term vision, and efficiency. The whole logic here seemed to be the complete opposite of mine and it was incredibly challenging.

I want to make it clear that I’m not saying that the way of doing things here is wrong. What I am saying is that it was simply not aligned with what I like and am used to and so it was just hard for me personally to live within this different culture everyday. It’s a personal preference, that’s it.

What is funny though, is to also hear other Beninese (mostly those who went to study and live in France or elsewhere for a while) also complain about the way things are done here. I guess this proves that living abroad can indeed change your perception about your own country! Just like how I now get annoyed at doing any government paperwork in Canada after having experienced the digital, efficient and straightforward Dutch system. Everything is relative. There are pros and cons everywhere.

Water cuts

That being said, back to our house problems. After the first few months fixing everything in our house, the water problems intensified. We started having water cuts every other week for the next year.

We do have a big water tank to supply our house in case of water cuts, but at this point the tank was not enough. There was so little water coming our way that the tank would last us a week and then we would be out of water again. Imagine that on repeat for a year.

We kept being told by the plumber that these were general cuts in the whole neighbourhood, as the city was doing major roadworks and hitting pipes by mistake during the process. We therefore had to call the firefighters at least once a month to come fill our tank with their water truck.

That part of our daily life really hit me hard. Half the time, we couldn’t shower, we couldn’t do the dishes and, most importantly, we couldn’t flush the toilet. The latest, I’ll tell you, makes you feel real close to your partner. Maybe a bit TOO close!

Every day was a guessing game to see if we would have water or not. The first few times that we had to wash ourselves with water bottles, it felt exciting and funny. It made me feel adventurous. But, as you can imagine, after a whole year it’s not fun anymore.

For our second Christmas in Benin, we decided to stay in Cotonou and to not go abroad. Daniël’s parents came to visit and we were glad that they made the trip to be here with us. However, on Christmas Eve, the same thing happened again: no running water.

So, as usual, I called the SONEB (city water company) and asked them to come check why we were not getting water yet again. He came and confirmed that we were getting water, but that it was a problem with our suppressor not bringing the water to the tank. So I called the plumber to come fix that.

He arrived, crossed his arms, and simply said “I did my job correctly, there is no problem”. I asked him if he could please take a look since water is coming from the city supply, so there must be a reason why it doesn’t reach our house. He simply said “no”.

After arguing with him for a few hours and begging him to please do something, he still stood there, arms crossed, refusing to do anything. At that point I lost it. A full year of water problems, it’s Christmas Day, the guy came all the way and simply refuses to do anything. I just couldn’t believe it. I started screaming at him. Our security agent also started screaming at him (they also didn’t have water in their guardhouse). Still, he continued saying that it was “not his fault” that we didn’t have water.

At that point, I decided to call the SONEB guy again so that they could argue together about whose fault it was. The guy came, opened the city water tap and told the plumber that he was an imbecile. And then, a miracle happened. After a WHOLE DAY of being at our house with his arms crossed on his chest refusing to do any work, he actually started fixing our plumbing. HALLELUJAH! The SONEB guy told us that it’s also probably our plumbing that prevented us from having water for the past year, since the problems from their side were not THAT frequent. I turned to the plumber (who had come very often to take a look at our plumbing during the past year and always said there was no problem). He looked down to the ground, like a child getting scolded, but still refused to apologize or admit any fault.

I took my phone and sent an angry voice memo to the house owner’s management company. Their “super” plumber (they insisted that we had to work with their plumber to not “make the house worse”) had made us live through a living hell for the past year out of pure ego and laziness. I’ve had had it!

Electricity

You think that’s bad enough? Wait, there’s more. The next day, on Christmas Day, we were out of electricity. Turns out the general breaker of the house was too old and had died. May I remind you that it had been fixed only a few months earlier, when they had redone the whole electrical circuit of the house? When I say that they only do short-term fixes…

Fortunately, the electrician was able to come quickly and actually listened and understood our annoyance that things were always broken. He agreed to work on a more long-term fix, which we really appreciated. He fixed it within 24 hours and we thought ok, now we’ve had enough problems. At least it gave Daniël’s parents a real taste of what we had been dealing with for the past year. Needless to say they understood my despair.

Unfortunately for us, two days later, the neighbour’s gardener cut the WiFi cable, which supplies our whole street, while cutting some branches. It took 2 days to get WiFi again. Less bad than no water and electricity, but at this point we were just pulling our hair out (well mostly me, because Daniel had already lost all his hair due to the past year’s misfortunes).

Since then, things have been better. A lot less water cuts and no electricity problems, so life has finally started feeling a bit less draining here. Unfortunately, it was not all that was happening at the time.

Border Safety

Benin Border

I had never felt targeted because of my citizenship before. Sure, when I lived in the Maldives, a lot of people I worked with had asked me to help them immigrate to Canada. To that, my answer is always the same: I’m no immigration officer. I have absolutely no knowledge of the immigration process to Canada. I haven’t gone through it myself, as I was born in Canada. Visit Canada.ca to find out how it works. Good luck.

In Benin, it doesn’t happen that often. A lot of Beninese people already have family living in Canada and don’t necessarily want to do the same as they don’t like the cold winter (understandable!). However, twice, when I came back from a trip, I encountered some trouble at passport control at the airport.

An officer processed my arrival and then asked me to come see him on the other side of the glass box he’s in, still holding my Canadian passport. When I got to the other side, where no one else could hear, he told me that he would give me back my passport if I helped him immigrate to Canada. I gave him my usual speech, which I had to repeat 2 to 3 times before he gave up.

The feeling that my passport was held “hostage” if I refuse to help when I have no obligation to do so just feels wrong and makes me feel unsafe. And it’s just annoying as well.

Ghana & Togo Border

However, my worst experience happened in October 2024, on the border between Togo and Ghana during a visit to Accra. We were crossing the border by car. Daniël and another guy got their passage approved without any problems. I, however, got targeted.

First, the immigration officer (in army clothing with a gun on his waist) forced me to video call with one of his cousins who lives in Canada. Not sure what the goal of that was, but I just remained cordial. Then, the officer brought me to an office, where there were two other armed officials. He closed the door. Daniël had to wait on the other side.

Already, I was feeling very uncomfortable being in a closed room, as a woman, with three armed men. At first, he just started asking me questions about the purpose of my trip to Ghana and things like that, which was fine. But then, he started asking me about my address in Benin and how exactly he could find my house (since addresses don’t really exist in Benin).

I asked him the purpose of this question and he answered that it’s because he’d like to come visit me. I (as kindly as I could) refused to answer, telling him that, as a diplomatic spouse, the Dutch embassy prohibits me from disclosing that information and that he could call the embassy if he wants to come on an official visit to Benin. It was a lie, but it’s the only thing that I could think of on the spot.

Then he started asking me about my parents’ address in Canada, which he justified by saying that my family needed to host him and his family members in Canada. I, again, told him that I refused to disclose that information.

Then, he asked me for my phone number, which he got ready to write on a post-it. I kindly told him that this information was in the official visa application that I had filled online, so that I didn’t understand why he would need to write it down on paper again. He told me that it was because he wanted to stay in touch with me. I, again, kindly refused, telling him that I don’t wish to stay in touch and that I would like to speak to my husband (Daniël and I were not married at that point yet, but in West Africa I was already saying that we were, as it was saving me some trouble).

He let it go and then proceeded with taking my fingerprints. When I placed my hand on the screen, he put his hand on mine and started rubbing it softly while looking at me intensely. I quickly took my hand away and told him that I didn’t wish to be touched. At this point I was sweating like crazy. I was saying no to an armed man in a closed room, with two other armed men behind me watching my every move. Anything could happen. My anxiety was spiking.

In the end, he let me go and I had never been as relieved as when he opened the door and I saw Daniël’s face again. It’s only then that I realized that I had been holding my breath. We quickly went back to the car and resumed our drive. I felt so angry at the whole situation, also since it became clear that I had been singled out, as Daniël and other men did not have to go through the same scary experience. I just hated the whole thing.

On the drive back to Cotonou, we again had some trouble at the Ghana-Togo border, this time on the Togolese side. We were passing the officer in our car who nodded to Daniël, ready to let us pass, but then he spotted me and all of a sudden started shouting at us to stop the car and to go through the vaccine/health check. We didn’t really get why my presence changed anything. I, again, felt very discriminated against. A man could pass without stopping but a woman needed to be checked? We then had to get out of the car and wait to show our vaccine booklets, which they simply took note of in a gigantic paper book. We then resumed our drive without any further issues. It was just all so strange.

What’s funny though is that the border consists of a rope, held by two people, one on each side. They simply lower it to let cars passed once they have passed immigration. You can see the rope on the left picture below.

Health Issues

Within our first few months in Benin, I had already had multiple food poisonings, as well as my arm electrocuted and bad surgery infection misfortunes, as I already told in my previous post. Unfortunately, health issues continued to hit me quite hard after that.

Malaria

Within the first year, I also got malaria for the first time. It was really scary. I woke up all of a sudden with my back completely blocked and a high fever. Fortunately, the treatment it quite straightforward. I called MEDOM (the at-home doctor service) who came to take a blood sample. I got my positive result to the parasite within a few hours and started taking the treatment (3 big pills, 1 per day).

The good thing is that malaria is so common in Benin that they are used to treating it and the medication works quite well. The pills do hit very hard though and at some point I was so weak that it was difficult for me to open my eyes. But, when it’s done, you’re back on your feet within no time!

E.Coli

During our second year, I also unfortunately got a few more cases of food poisoning, but I was getting used to it by now. However, in June 2025, I caught a bacteria that put me in the hospital. I emptied myself completely in the middle of the night and became dehydrated so quickly that Daniel barely had time to get me to the hospital before I passed out on the emergency bed.

I was so dehydrated that my body was cramping in weird positions. I was hospitalized for 3 days, which was an experience in itself. They straight away gave me various antibiotics via IV, as they did not test what I had and wanted to be sure they had every option covered. Turns out I had caught the e.coli bacteria (I learned what it was when I did some tests in Canada a few months later).

At some point, my IV came out of the vein and the liquid started going into my tissues which hurt like hell. Their solution was to start hitting my arm really hard. I was crying in pain. I asked them to just remove it, as I was feeling better already anyways and could continue the antibiotics orally. They said “no, we’ll just put a new IV in your other arm”. I refused. A doctor also came and started talking to me about my treatment, before realizing she had the wrong patient. At that point I started feeling unsafe and asked to leave.

Car Accidents

A month later, we got into a car accident. As I was turning right to go into the street where we live, a motorbike decided to try to pass us on the right side. He was so sure that he could make it that by the time he hit our car, he was driving on the sidewalk. He was nowhere in sight when I had started to turn, so I was confused. But bystanders on the street told me that he had come at around 70 km/h to pass me on the sidewalk like a crazy person.

One thing we learned early in Benin is that it’s almost impossible to leave with an intact car. People here drive as if they are driving bumper cars. They want to pass? They’ll just drive into your car to force you to let them pass. They want to merge on the way? They won’t look if a car is coming. They’ll just go and expect the cars that are coming to break last minute to not crash into them. They firmly believe that God will save them. Well, I must be God cause it’s me who breaks like crazy to not crash into them every time.

With the motorbikes (locally called zems) it’s even worse, as not only do they not look, but they’ll sometimes use their feet to push on your car to pass in a tight space. It’s quite entertaining actually, keeps you sharp! They also carry a wide range of things on their zems, which I find quite impressive.

But this time, it hit hard. He hit us on our front wheel and tore out our side mirror. It really scared me and made me feel unsafe. Sure, a car accident can happen anywhere. But the fear here is that if it’s really bad, their limited medical capabilities might very well not be able to save you. And that’s impossible for me to not think about.

I went ballistic. The driver admitted that he had seen my blinker and that I had started to turn, but that he thought he had enough time. I simply couldn’t believe that he had made the decision to put our (and his!) lives in danger so stupidly. Fortunately, no one got hurt. Fortunately also, there were a lot of witnesses and everyone confirmed that he was responsible and so the police came and confiscated his motorbike.

Dealing with the police was another quite funny experience. The policeman made a drawing of the scene by hand, taking measurements and all. And then I simply had to let them know when they could release the guy’s motorbike, as it was apparently up to me since I was the victim of the accident. I thought it was very strange, but ultimately I told them to release the bike after one week.

Less than a week later, I was in a car with a chauffeur bringing me to the insurance company (to claim the damage from my recent accident), when a motorbike hit us. The car was a huge SUV and a security agent was blocking the road for us to pass. The motorbike driver said he never saw us. He then pretended to be very hurt (they always do that to try to get money), but when he understood that he wouldn’t win his case as a victim, his pain suddenly magically disappeared. Two accidents in a week, it was a bit much for me though.

Malaria (again!) & repatriation

In November 2025, I got malaria for the second time. This time, it was less scary as I had gone through it before. I did the blood test. I took the pills. I redid a blood test to confirm the parasite was gone. Simple enough.

However, right after I finished my malaria treatment, I started emptying myself again at the speed of light and feeling dizzy. This time, whatever I caught was accompanied by these huge stomach cramps that made me twist myself in weird positions. I was crying in pain, so we rushed to the hospital, where they urgently gave me something to calm the cramps.

Turns out I had caught a viral stomach infection the same week as having malaria. Bad luck! I was hospitalized for a few hours, but at that point my nervous system was panicking. A hospital in Benin is the last place on earth I wanted to return to. The doctors here do their best, but unfortunately Benin is not known for its medical care. It was too much. The last few months had been too much. Too many stressful things had happened.

That same week, I had also done a CT scan, as there seemed to be a problem with my kidneys, so I needed to see a specialist (turns out everything’s fine!). But with the kidneys, the infection and the recent malaria, it was a bit much and I didn’t feel safe health wise to get to the bottom of it here in Benin. We therefore made the decision to repatriate me to the Netherlands.

In less than 24 hours I was on a plane and back in a country where I felt medically safe. I cried a lot when I arrived. I felt like my nervous system was finally calming down.

In the end, it actually turned out to be very good timing for me to have all those health issues and to have been repatriated, because the following week, while Daniël and I were still in the Netherlands, there was an attempted coup in Cotonou. Part of the army tried to overthrow the government, and in response, the government called on neighboring countries for military support. They ended up, among other things, bombing the military base located just a few streets from our house. All our friends in Cotonou told us it was a very good thing we weren’t home, because it hit hard in our neighborhood. Proof that sometimes, everything really does happen for a reason!

Survival Mode

With everything that happened during the summer of 2025, my body went into full survival mode. I felt like I could barely function anymore. I had to start therapy again, as I just felt miserable living in Benin, but at the same time I had to find a way to push through as we couldn’t just pick up and leave.

Until that point it had been a lot of ups and downs, with a few emotional breakdowns when things got hard, but I was always able to work on my mindset and push through. This time though, after a hospitalization and two car accidents back-to-back, it was too much. I didn’t feel safe anymore in this country. Mostly because I didn’t trust the medical care if something even worse were to happen. And with everything that had already happened, I saw the probability of things happening again as high.

So I was scared. All the time. Always on high-alert. I didn’t want to be here anymore. I was done with this country, I was done feeling unsafe. That’s when my therapist explained to me that I was in survival mode and that my nervous system was overstimulated, being constantly on alert mode, looking out for any potential danger. I was exhausted.

So I took a pause from my daily activities and just focused on feeling safe again. I wrapped myself up in a blanket and binge-watched old TV series that make me feel good (hello Gilmore Girls), listened to Hz music, meditated, journaled, etc.

Then we left for a long holiday in August and another one in September, so these breaks from life in Benin helped a lot as well.

The good parts

I have now talked a lot about the various challenges that I have faced during my time here in Benin. To be honest, these aspects have taken most of my mental space during that time and that’s unfortunate, as a lot of these things are simply due to bad luck.

I know and hang out with a lot of other expats that have a completely different experience here: no house problems, no health issues, no car accident (yet!). When I try to imagine how things would have been without these overbearing problems, I think I would have enjoyed my time here a lot more and that the good things about living here would not have been as overshadowed by all this negativity.

Because yes, there are good things about living here.

The first one is the relaxed lifestyle. Things are so chill in Cotonou. During the weekends, you can go read or hang out with friends at one of the beach restaurants, feet in the sand and take in all the vitamin D. We also play tennis and padel and the courts are actually really nice and well maintained. During the week I go to the gym and the coaches are really nice and competent. I love it!

The other thing I like is how helpful and resourceful people are (when they want to…)! For instance, we got a flat tire from rolling on a screw in our street and a friend of a friend of our security agent came to us, lifted our car, took the wheel with him, had it repaired at his cousin’s garage, brought back the wheel to us and reinstalled it. All of that within an hour and for 10.000 FCFA (around 15 euros). I was quite impressed! At home it would have been a much longer and costly process.

You can also see some very creative inventions, for instance with toys for children made of recycled materials. People in Benin make use of things that would simply be thrown away in other countries. Sure, part of it is because they don’t have the financial means to buy something, but still, I think there is beauty in their creativity.

I also like how people are generally so warm and kind-hearted at the first approach. It creates a very welcoming feeling which is nice to be surrounded with on a daily basis.

Some people have become part of my daily life, like my favourite cashier at Super U (the French supermarket) and the lady that sells me my fruits and veggies at the local market. There’s also the security agents, who ensure our security at home 24/7, and our cleaning lady, who have all become part of our Benin family. These people and their kindness definitely made a positive difference in my experience in their country and for that I’m very grateful to them.

Our last few months in Benin

And just like that… We now have less than 5 months left in Benin before moving on to our next diplomatic posting (NYC here we come!). The fact that we have so little time left here and that we finally know what’s coming next for us really lifted all the stress from my shoulders and I feel light and relaxed again, which feels so good after such a long time living on survival mode.

During the past year, with bad things constantly happening, I felt like I couldn’t catch a break and I couldn’t see the light at the end of the tunnel. I was starting to resent the country I was living in. It felt like I was stuck in this place I didn’t want to be in and that there was nothing I could do about it. The time we had left felt never ending.

But now that we only have a few months left, I feel the same way as when we first got here: excited. Suddenly, the annoyances of daily life don’t annoy me as much and I can just let it go. Want to be an asshole on the road? No problem, go ahead! Want to repair something bad and come back 4 times in the same week to fix it? Be my guest. Life just feels lighter because I know it’s over soon. And I’m excited about what’s coming next and the new chapter of our lives that we’ll build in New York. And so I feel like nothing can disturb my peace of mind and light-hearted feeling at the moment.

I wish my experience in Benin would have been more positive. I envy the expats who are sad at the idea of leaving soon. I wish I could have fallen in love with this place. Also because some people made me feel guilty about the fact that I was having a hard time living here, which just made it worse. I felt invalidated in my personal experience here.

Could I have handled the challenges we faced better? Probably! But I honestly feel like I did the best I could in every situation. I did learn, through it all, that I am a hyper-sensitive, hyper-aware person who is very analytical. That aspect of my personality of course also played a great role in my various experiences here.

My dentist here (local Beninese) recently told me that she knows a lot of expats who have left Benin after a lot less time here than me, because they were finding it too difficult and that she too, even though she is from Benin, would have had a hard time in my shoes given everything that happened. That made me feel better.

All in all, I’m still happy that we said yes to this adventure. It turned out to be more challenging than I expected, but I’m grateful for everything it taught me and it also turned out to be a good move for the next step of our diplomatic career (a.k.a. getting NYC!).

It also made me realize that at this point in my life, I don’t crave the same adrenaline as when I lived abroad 10 years ago and that maybe I’m not as adventurous as I once was anymore. And that’s ok. I’m at a different place in life and I simply crave a different type of adventure. I can’t wait to see what life brings our way next! Stay tuned…