Tous mes meilleurs vœux de bonne et heureuse année!

When I first arrived to Togo, I strongly disliked two of the most common phrases spoken in French: "du courage" and "ça va aller", translating directly to "with/of courage" and "it will go".

They are used in any and all situations from a stubbed toe to a death in the family to being used in lieu of "I'm sorry". At first, to me, they seemed to minimize pain and problems and excuse bad behavior.

After many months, I grew to love these phrases and even started using them. I learned how to say them in Ikposo and got asked how to say it in English.

Now, over two years later, I can't seem to find more sincere words when trying to express my wishes to friends in certain situations.And all of that preface was written so that I could say: BONNE ANNEE!!!

The title of this post translates to: "My very best wishes for a good and happy new year" which was a common text message I'd get from my Togolese friends during the upcoming weeks.

I cannot believe that I am going to miss that there won't be children running around for the next two months screaming happy new year over and over and over again. I despised it in 2010, laughed at it in 2011 and now I'm just telling myself "du courage, ça va aller".