Into Africa

Signe spent Christmas of 2001 with the Nwulus, her Nigerian family, including her second cousin, Karen, and Karen’s husband, Equi, (right) and their children, Chika, 14, and Ifolo, 16 (left).

An intrepid world traveler and Rotary fellow Signe Helgeson ’01 takes us to West Africa through her letters home

Just months after graduating from Wooster with a French major and education minor, Signe Helgeson ’01 traveled to Benin, West Africa, on a Rotary International scholarship to study at the Université Nationale du Benin for a school year.

In late September, weeks after arriving in the city of Cotonou, Signe’s long e-mails, addressed to family and friends back home, began arriving. For sun-starved Ohioans, her tales of visiting the coast and sweating through January and February were a welcome form of vicarious travel. But we also realized soon enough that this young woman has a keen eye for detail, remarkable enthusiasm for new experiences, and a grateful heart. She lived with a host family and helped tutor their two children, taught Sunday school, attended the university, played violin in an ensemble, attended Rotary events, and absorbed as much Beninese culture as she could in her spare time.

>>October 1: Signe in Benin

>>October 9: Making New Friends

>>November 15: Going to Market

>>December 1: How to Smoke a Bush Rat

>>January 23: Christmas in Nigeria

>>Fun in February

>>April 28: In the Wild