We will, we will, SMASH AIDS!

Yes, that is my attempt to re-write some classic Queen lyrics – but I promise that creativity didn't originate with me (cough Phil cough). Basically, I want to tell you a story about how the Bibemi cluster and Caitlyn battled AIDS one week in September.

This project was born back in March when Caitlyn came to visit Bibemi for the first time. We were sitting at a bar in Bibemi (like you do) and talking about work and Caitlyn's host NGO EFA (Education Fights AIDS for those of you who don't already know – but you should know). Caitlyn mentioned that she had done a VAST (volunteer activities, support, and training) project to train a number of people who were infected or affected by HIV/AIDS to be peer educators. Phil, Mike and I had just completed my one-day AIDS seminar where we had educated about 25 local Bibemians about HIV/AIDS prevention, transmission, and brought in a HIV sero-positive person from Garoua to give a testimonial. So, yes, AIDS were on our minds.

I don't know about where you live but here in Bibemi (as well as in Adoumri) people don't talk about AIDS. There aren't AIDS tests, there aren't organizations of people who are willing to admit they are sero-positive, there are basically no resources or information about AIDS whatsoever. I assume that is fairly similar to other volunteer posts in Cameroon. Back to that day in March at the bar, Phil and Caitlyn (with a little help from Mike and I) came to the brilliant conclusion that we should bring Caitltyn's trained peer educators to Bibemi and Adourmi to do a door-to-door AIDS education campaign. Thus our VAST project was born. Phil was busy doing his Peace Corps Partnership project and building two classrooms at his local middle school SO I got to be in charge of this project. It isn't too hard to get funding for AIDS related projects and PEPFAR/VAST funded the whole thing.

Just last month, our door-to-door campaign happened. We brought 14 peer educators from the Extreme North to Bibemi and Adourmi and together they talked to circa 4000 people (in a health district of about 20,000) about HIV/AIDS over the course of two days (one in each village). Feel free to be impressed, I sure was. Now don't get me wrong, it didn't just happen like that. We had many different problems we encountered BUT in the end, it was successful.

First, where do you lodge 14 people in a town without an Auberge? Well, Mike and I didn't really know. We came up with literally five different plans and we kept changing our minds about which option we thought was the best – sleeping in a classroom at the Lycee, housing them with members of our tantine (who happen to be professors at the Lycee), house them with COSA members, house them at the Delegate du Elevage's extra room, or try to house them at the vacant house on the hospital grounds. We went with that last option which funnily enough we only learned of during one of our protocol meetings with the doctor. He is corrupt about money BUT he always supports Mike and I in our projects. He got mad that he didn't get to “eat his part of the budget” but we didn't offer us that house free of charge. You win some, you lose some.

Problem two, what do they sleep on? Well, the NGO that basically founded Bibemi left a giant magazine of stuff and in this magazine are a bunch of foam mats. So, we went and counted them – amazingly there were exactly 14! It was meant to be. From there, we collected mats and sheets from us volunteers and community members.

Problem three, we made a protocol faux-paus. Somehow in the confusion of things Mike and I remembered to talk to all the grands in town about our project but we forgot to talk to the little grands. We were literally sitting at the bar (again, like you do in Bibemi) the NIGHT BEFORE the project started and we were drinking and talking about the project with Mike's counterpart and his brother. They asked if we had gone around and talked to all the heads of the neighborhoods about bringing these peer educators to their neighborhoods tomorrow. We hadn't. We had talked to the head of the district, the mayor, the head of the hospital, the head of the health center, the head of the Lycee, etc but we hadn't even thoughts about these neighborhood grands. Woops. So, early the next morning before we started with our peer educators, Mike's counterpart, his brother, and Mike all went around and talked to them. Crisis averted.

Despite all these hurdles we had to jump, we did the door-to-door campaign and 4000 people got talked to about AIDS. Done and done. Our last big project as Peace Corps volunteers was an AIDS smashing success. Man, we rock.

So apparently I haven't written a blog in ages. Whoops. Sorry. Anyways, life here is going and I suppose that is the reason for the lack of communication. So since I last wrote - I have done a soy training en brousse teaching a group of local women in a village called Deringsing to make tofu and soy milk. It went really well and a number of these womens' husbands have come to me afterward telling me that their wives have successfully made tofu like we taught them - they say it in a way that let's you know they are bragging about their wives, which is cute and doesn't happen all that often. I have also trained two more villages to make lye soap. I will be going to Banyo (which is a few days travel and where one of my friends is posted) to teach women there to make tofu in June.

I successfully completed the AIDS formation - training 25 local women and men on AIDS prevention, transmission, and having them have the opportunity to talk with and ask questions of a person who is currently living with HIV/AIDS. This is probably the most rewarding part of the whole day because most everyone at the conference had never met someone with AIDS who was alive and well and willing to talk with them about it. But, there was a man with HIV and a women with HIV who came from Garoua and spoke with the whole group about what it was like, how they were married with kids and there children where HIV negative and the woman's husband was also HIV negative. These people were healthy and had jobs and family but also were HIV positive. It blew people's minds.

Women's Day came and went. The pagne was really ugly I thought - I have some pics I will try to get up at some point. Also, the pagne had a misspelled word on it in English (all the phrases are written in both French and English and one of the English ones was misspelled - you'd think before you print up thousands of pagne you would check the spelling....). Mike and Phil got to dance with groups of local women at the bars while I took pictures of this and I think a video too. We all wore women's day pagne - even Mike and Phil. I wore green, Mike pink, Phil yellow. It was awesome. People asked them about why men were wearing it and they explained that it was to support the women. Mike talked about how he was going to cook me dinner that night because it was my fete and how they should all go home and cook dinner for their wives. Don't think that happened, but at least people were willing to talk about it - step one.

Now I have a couple of things in the works: I am doing 4 different trainings this coming week teaching people to make oral rehydration solution - it's rainy season and diarrhea is very prevalent. We are teaching them to make it with all local things - salt, sugar, bleach, water, plastic 1.5 liter bottles, and using bottle caps as measurements. I am also planning on painting a world map mural on the wall of the local high school with Courtney while she is here this summer. I have spoken with the director of the school and he gave us the go ahead. Now we are working on finding money! I am also toying with the idea of doing a project with one person in Bibemi and one person in Adoumri where we give people chickens to raise for eggs. This doesn't sound complicated but I promise you would be wrong, it is. The last big thing I am planning will be the first week of August I think. I am planning to, along with Phil and Caitlyn, do a door to door AIDS education campaign where we would bring in peer educators from a provincial capital who are HIV positive where Caitlyn is located to come to Bibemi and Adoumri and go door to door talking with people about HIV/AIDS and living with HIV and the importance of knowing your status and being open about it, etc. Caitlyn has done this is another village with these peer educators and said the results were amazing and at the end of the day 5 people were willing to admit they were HIV positive and they formed a group to support one another. So, we are figuring out logistics and money and everything for that. Again, that doesn't sound all that hard to do but language, culture, and corruption all play big factors in making it more difficult.

Well that is about it here on the Cameroon front. I will try to be better about writing blogs. Hope this finds all of you well!

January

So I had my mid-service medical exams in January. I am totally healthy. AND, when they ordered my new glasses they needed some measurement they didn’t have so I had to go to the optometrist in Yaoundé and my left eye has gotten better! My eye sees better now than it did when I arrived! Who knew!

I got the money from the mayor to do a day long AIDS training of trainers in March and have been working on planning and organizing that with my counterpart. I have been making copies, we have a room at the Lycee reserved for the day, we have a list of invitees, and a list of presenters, and we picked a date – March 13th!

We went en brousse to a small town called Adi and taught a group of 30 people – about 10 men and 20 women, to make soap out of Lye and peanut oil. They had asked us to come and teach them to make soap before Christmas and Mike and I were both finally in Bibemi together in January. We set a date and then the day before Mike is told he has to go to Garoua to get a swine flu shot (I got mine in Yaoundé) and so I went with his counterpart myself. It was a great success and they seemed so enthusiastic. I got an interesting question – so we had been teaching people that you have to have vinegar on hand when using Lye but vinegar is slightly expensive for people in villages and only available in boutiques – which the villages often don’t have. I had a women ask me why she couldn’t use citrons instead. I thought about it and told her I didn’t know – but I would find out. It takes 3 weeks for the soap to be usable and so we promised Mike and I would come back in February with the answer. My mom asked the chemistry teacher at her school and I think you can use citrons – citrons grow everywhere here and are basically free soooo it is much easier for people to have available. We are going to test it on me at home here – I have vinegar so if it doesn’t work for some reason I can stop the lye from burning me. I will keep you all posted.

February

This week Mike and I are also doing a soy animation. We are going to teach women at the pre-natal consultations to make soy milk and tofu. We bought the soy this past week and have to get it ground into powder. We are hoping today to find a women who is willing to do the animation with us and actually be the one who makes the foods. One of my friends is coming to help us, she does this all the time in her village so she is sharing her expertise on the matter. I won’t get this posted until it is done so I will be able to let you all know how that goes.

Tofu and soy milk were a success!!! The women all really liked it and seemed really into the whole experience and paid close attention. We blew peoples’ minds when we stopped the process before the frying step (the tofu they sell in village is fried) and made everyone try raw tofu. The didn’t really care for it but thought it was funny we ate it like that. Then, Tuesday, Kauleen and I tried to make it at my house! It is kind of a long process and involves going to get the soy nuts ground up after soaking them for an hour. We were successful in making tofu but it wasn’t quite as good as the lady’s. I think we added too much vinegar in the process – the women making it at the health center had used tamarind which is much less acidic than vinegar so our frame of reference was off. But, we did make it – it just didn’t stick together as well as hers. So, Tuesday for dinner we had tofu stir fry MADE FROM HOMEMADE TOFU. Well done us.

Wednesday, Mike and I taught an hour of English at the CETIC (local technical high school) and we taught them to play telephone. We worked all day on making sentences and I realized how poor my knowledge of English grammar terms is and then we played telephone, starting with small sentences of three of four words and ending in this one “Yesterday, Mike smelled like feet”. The kids thought it was hilarious that this was the sentence I made up. It’s the little things people, honestly 

Youth day was the 11th of February. The two nights preceding it there were cultural soirees put on by the local schools. The kids prepared sketches and dances and poems and everything to present at the Sous Prefecture. I cannot describe how hilarious these events are – with the awful sound systems making so much static you cannot understand a word they are saying, the bass of the music making your body shake it is so strong, grands in town (and Mike and I) sitting in plastic chairs in front of the stage while the whole rest of the town circles around us in a horseshoe formation to view the stage and when they get to close to some grands they are chased off with reeds. Honestly, you have to be there. But, I have lots of pictures of the day and the 2 preceding evenings. The night of youth day we spent at the bar with the teachers from the bilingual school (some of them Anglophones) and some of our friends in village drinking and talking and it was great. I have some funny funny pictures of us all together at the bar after. Nothing like drinking, switching between French and English every other sentence or so, and sweating because of yes – THE HEAT IS BACK! Fun times had by all!

World AIDS Day

So, I realize it has been months since I wrote on this blog and I could go on with a list of reasons why but I won’t. I will just do my best to fill you in on the happenings here since November.

Basically all of November was spent preparing for World AIDS Day (December 1st). I will preface this by saying – it got out of control. So, Mike and I got a little ambitious and planned a few too many activities. Then, we also let everyone else add in their two cents about what we should do. Phil wasn’t able to help out because his mother was going to be visiting Cameroon during World AIDS Day. Every week in November, Mike and I met with both the health club and the English club at the Lycee (the local high school) – most weeks we had 2 or 3 meetings. I met multiple times with my counterpart to plan the exact schedule of events for World AIDS Day and the 4 days leading up to it. Mike and I met with the mayor about 5 times trying to get the money situation worked out. The commune of Bibemi was paying for our World AIDS Day activities but actually getting the money takes multi visits and protocol. We had to go into Garoua twice to get supplies – we were making posters, t-shirts, and we were making 700 AIDS ribbons.

THE PLAN: With the English club we planned to do one sketch (short play) in English at the Sous Prefecture (a government official building in town) on World AIDS Day – that was it. But, with the health club we planned to do about 5 sketches and pass out lots of information about HIV/AIDS in French around the schools. The health club wrote all 5 of these sketches. We made 10 posters that got put up around town reminding people that December 1st was World AIDS Day and with AIDS prevention messages written on them. We were planning a round table discussion at the Sous Prefecture on AIDS with the doctor from the hospital, the chef of the health center, and the nurse from the Lycee as well as interested teachers, students, and community members. We also planned to have a question and answer game played at the Sous Prefecture before the discussion. The week leading up to World AIDS Day we planned on having a girls cross country race, and boys cross country race, a soccer tournament, and a handball tournament. Then, at the Sous Prefecture on World AIDS Day we planned to give out prizes and trophies to the winners.

WHAT HAPPENED: Well, it didn’t go as planned. There was no girls cross country race. The boys cross country race literally involved Mike and my counterpart going around town on a motto convincing people to run in the race. We got 10 people to run, including Mike. Mike placed 7th (and he is a good runner!) and was beat by a man with no shoes. The soccer tournament went well – Mike’s team, the Kapsiki neighborhood team, won!!! The handball tournament was really just the two Lycee girls’ teams playing against each other, but handball was played. The night before, my counterpart and I got in a huge fight about trophies, he had his friend making them and was charging us 10 dollars each for the CHEAPEST trophies I’d ever seen. I said we weren’t going to pay and that his friend could give them to us at a reasonable price or keep them, I didn’t care. We went back and forth arguing about this and Mike finally asked me whether I thought it was worth fighting – I wasn’t our money, we were under budget, we should just pay and let it go. I said, NO to me it was worth fighting just on principle, but that if he wanted to pay I would take one of the team and let it go. And so I did. Day of, Mike and I had made tons of World AIDS Day ribbons – we ran out of safety pins so we got creative with ways to attach them. Pens in the pockets to hold them together, paper clips, etc. Those were gone by 8am. We had 30 shirts made to give out to the key players in World AIDS Day – but that didn’t stop EVERYONE in town from asking us for one. Literally, everyone. Mike and I showed up at the Lycee to run over the agenda for the day. But, we ended up with an impromptu addition to the agenda – we went around to EVERY class at the Lycee (like 10 total) and did a talk about World AIDS Day and HIV/AIDS in general. It was great. We had blown up condoms we threw around the rooms. We had packets of info about AIDS that the health club students prepared questions from. It was great. One of the classes was being taught by a nun from the local Catholic mission and she was so cool about it as well – she simply left the room for the 15 minutes we presented. In the younger classes the health club students told the kids they were too young to be having sex. It was hilarious. The Lycee is interesting because the kids range in age from about 9 or 10 to 25. That is a big age range! Mike and I finished this and then started running around setting up the Sous Prefecture. The communes chairs were at the mayor’s office – about a 10 / 15 minute walk from the Sous Prefecture – and we had to find carts to move them. The sound system needed to be set up but it wasn’t working with the CD player they had – so we ran to my house and got my old DVD player that didn’t read DVDs well and it worked just fine. It was around this point that Mike and I both took a shot of tequila. We hadn’t had time to eat or think or breathe yet. I think we might have split a bag of peanuts around 8am. Once we had the sound system set up, Mike and I started blasting music and basically dancing around outside to attract people to our event. NOTHING runs on time and so we weren’t sure when people would show up or even WHO would show up. So, around 2 the Lycee health club were there and we started the French sketches. The kids did GREAT. They were all different, funny, but with good messages – I was so proud. At the point where the president of the English club showed up he and I did the English sketch together. The question and answer session got out of hand because we were giving out prizes and a fight broke out over who got to answer one of the questions – so we ended that. Mike and I had decided that the actors in the sketches got shirts – but handing them out wasn’t possible because the MINUTE people saw our prize bag we were mobbed. We gave out the 2 trophies and the other prizes to the winners of the sports events from the past 4 days – people were very excited. My counterpart did this part with Mike while I guarded our other prizes. Around now, 4:30ish, the doctor and the nurse showed up. This was exciting because we weren’t sure if they would – there is one doctor for the health district of like 40,000 people so he is quite busy! So, we set up the chairs for the discussion and it went on really well. The people who took part seemed to really get a lot out of it. I didn’t get to take part because I was dealing with 300 children who were all loud and wanting shirts and trying to take our sound equipment. Mike had taken the task of trying to hand out the last 10 shirts to the actors. He got chased the kilometer back to his house by a mob of children. He didn’t have his keys, I did, and so he ended up back at his house with 4 members of his neighbors soccer team (the winning team) and 4 shirts left SO he promised them the shirts if they would help us take the chairs back to the mayor’s office (the carts were gone now). By this time its dark (like 6-6:30) and I am alone at the Sous Prefecture and had locked myself into the room where I had gathered all the chairs and sound equipment and was guarding them. Mike shows up with his teammates to find me like this. We are both SO exhausted at this point. We’ve been going for 12 hours and haven’t had much water or food at all. The last problem is – 5 of Mike’s teammates showed up and we had 4 shirts and Mike doesn’t know which one hadn’t been at his house – it is dark and we are tired. So, the 5 of them start to fight about who gets to bring the chairs back (thereby getting a shirt). They are taking chairs from one another. It is crazy. Mike hands out the 4 shirts to 4 of them randomly. The remaining guy is super upset and tries to talk to us and yelling at his last teammate, the 4th shirt winner. So, all of a sudden Mike and I decide that this old DVD player we are lugging back to my house to live under my bed is nothing but a nuisance. We have been thinking about who to give it to for a while now – so that 5th guy got it. Yep, as he is yelling about how he wants a shirt and he was promised one by Mike and blah blah blah, Mike takes the DVD player from my hands and thrusts it at the guys chest. He was blown away. He immediately stopped talking and said thank you. With that, Mike and I left, in search of beer. All we wanted was cold beer. Well, the brasseries truck hadn’t made it to Bibemi this week and there was NO beer or alcohol in the whole town. We know, we walked to EVERY day. We found 3 little Guinness’s at one bar, bought those, and went to my house. We had bought fried potato wedges off the street and ate those and drank our beers and watched something like Shrek the Halls on my TV. We both decided we had to get outta there the next morning ASAP, we need to go to the city and have a real meal and beer and maybe a shower – we needed a break from Bibemi. So, at 6:30am I was negotiating my price of my motto and I was asked about the DVD player. I pretended to not understand, got on my motto and left. Ahhh, it was over.

The next week at some point I went and brought the mayor back our left over money (it blows his mind every time we do this) and the final budget. My counterpart got mad and told me I couldn’t give him back money – we had to use it for something – and he wanted us to build some statue with it. I said no, that money was for World AIDS Day and we had about 20 bucks left over (of our 300 dollar budget) and so we gave it back to my counterparts disapproval. Then, I went to the hospital to talk with the doctor about how he thought it went. He was very impressed. Everyone in town told me how much they enjoyed the day and what a success they thought it was. I saw people wearing our shirts and ribbons until I went home for Christmas. While the day itself was crazy hectic and I am not sure I would do it again, I was SOOO happy it went well. Well done us.

South Africa. My first impression upon my arrival was seeing a giant soccer bowl counting down to the world cup’s commencement (which is June 11, 2010). The airport also had a large number of deaf people working at it, all of whom were wearing vests that let other people know they were deaf, and one of them gave me directions to the nearest duty free store with food. At this point I was sure of it – I wasn’t in Africa anymore. The following is my collection of reasons I was sure that I wasn’t in Africa, and the Pretoria couldn’t be on the same continent as Bibemi – sushi, manicured lawns, electric driveway doors, curves weight loss centers, delivery pizza, delivery Chinese, movie theaters, malls with department stores, sidewalks, Subway (the sub chain), McDonalds, KFC, and theme parks. Yes, in the 16 days I was in South Africa I saw all of these things. It was fabulous. I got my haircut and my eyebrows waxed. I further confirmed my opinion that no other country does pedicures as well as the US (Asia does them well, but the US still wins). I ate cheese and apples. I had sparkling apple juice every damn day. It was heaven. Oh, did I mention I also got an emergency root canal and went to the dentist 5 times in 16 days. Yea, that was the downer part.

Some facts I learned about South Africa – particularly the Gauteng province (I think I am spelling that correctly). Gauteng is the richest province in South Africa and it has both Pretoria and Johannesburg in it. Pretoria is the 2nd largest university in the world (after Mexico) thanks in large part to their huge numbers of correspondence students. Soweto (a large, black South African populated, suburb of Jo’burg that was created for Apartheid) has the largest hospital in the world. The discovery of gold completely changed Jo’burg. The Apartheid museum is located near both a casino and a theme park. In Soweto there is a museum about the events of 16 June 1976 and I learned that the white South Africans used the language of Africaans as a form of oppression by changing it to the mandatory language in schools and the students revolted and some died. Crazy. Jo’burg has 2.4 million people. Pretoria has 2 million people. Soweto has 5 million. Nelson Mandela and Desmond Tutu were both from Soweto.

There are numerous malls in South Africa. I went to three of them that were in Pretoria (Menlyn, Brooklyn, and Hatfield). In all of these malls many kids, and a few adults, walk around barefoot. It was very odd. These were rich people dressed in nice, clean, expensive clothes, shopping in a nice mall, BARE FOOT. WTF.

Other cool things I did in South Africa, besides EAT – went on two different one day safaris, ate at an Indian buffet, shopped at a flea market in the malls parking lot on Sunday morning, took a hot shower every day, watched cable tv, bought a World Cup t-shirt, went to see a movie in a movie theater (twice), went to dinner and clubbing in Jo’burg with some locals.

Oh, yea, and I didn’t do all of these things alone – although I did some some of them alone. I met lots of other volunteers who were also med-evaced to South Africa – some from Tanzania, one from Kenya, one from Zambia, one from Uganda, one from Ethopia, and one from Mozambique. Oh, yea, I knew the girl from Mozambique already. It was Gracey Uffman. Gracey was a friend from childhood in Hammond and I hadn’t seen her in 13 some years. But, there I was at breakfast one morning and she walks in. Crazy small world. She had gotten injured during a soccer game (that her team did WIN) and got sent down to Pretoria. So while hanging out with her I got to see the inner workings of a South African hospital (they are run quite nicely and even have restaurants with milkshakes and fresh juices. She had her 23rd birthday during this med-evac trip and we went on a one day safari to Plainesberg National Park (spelling might be off but you get the idea) and saw lots of cool animals – photos to come.

After my root canal, I also got my tooth bleached and my tooth buffed and the root ripped out and all that good stuff that I was sent down there to have done. It was the nicest dentist office I had ever been to – honestly soooo nice. Full of computers and scanner things for teeth and other high tech inventions. My dentist had a picture of him and Bono together at that dentist office – apparently Bono needed some work done at some point in Pretoria. Didn’t want to guys to think it was all fun and games in South Africa – just like 90% 

While in South Africa, I heard in some movie the phrase “it is a common belief among anthropologists that you must fully immerse yourself in a foreign culture before you can truly appreciate your own” and I think I have witnessed that a few times. First, being in Cameroon has really made me love and miss certain things about the US. But, at the same time, being in South Africa made me realize that while SA is amazing and beautiful and full of everything you’d want, it made me miss some things about Cameroon and Bibemi. So, I think what all these recent travels have done is simply confuse me – or maybe teach me that you can find things about any culture of place to appreciate. Who knows. Guess I will have to keep traveling to figure things out!

This morning my guardian (the person the NGO who's house I live in employs to watch my house and the rest of their property) called me at 6:25am telling me he was bringing me my electric bill soon. He showed up around 6:45am and knocked on my door with an electric bill. But, the bill was for 11,000 CFA - which is about $25 now - and that was way more than I thought it should be since we rarely had power that month and I had unplugged my fridge. Upon examination I realized that he had changed the date with a pen in one point - making the date of 20/06/2009 to 20/10/2009 trying to make an old bill appear to be a current bill. I had already paid that bill and that was noted on the bottom of the bill. I simply pointed that out to him and told him that was an old bill and stood there looking at him. He tried to convince me it was the recent one for about 5 minutes and I very nicely just kept saying that it was old, that is was from June and July and that I had already paid it (hence the PAID note and date stamp on the bottom). Finally he agreed with me and said he would go find me my current bill. I said, thanks, I will wait. He shows up about 15 minutes later with my current bill. But, this time he has manually added a 0 to the end of the price changing it from 796 CFA (like a dollar 50) to 7960 CFA (like 15 dollars). I caught it because I added up the individual amounts, also I knew that was too much money for last month as well. So I calmly gave him 1000 CFA and told him that would cover it because I had done the math and it was 796 CFA. Then I thanked him giving the electric company the money. I didn't even get mad, you cannot get mad when people do something you expect them to do. Just need to make sure I check each bill thoroughly. A few months ago he brought me someone else's bill and I caught that too. Oh the best part, as he was leaving with my 1000 CFA and my bill he asked me for a loan (again). I kindly said no and closed my door wishing him a good day as I did so.

OH CAMEROON.

This brings me to one final story. Buying apples in Yaounde can go one of 3 ways. One, you are tired and don't want to discute the price and you just pay what they ask. I have done that, but it is boring and not part of my fun story. During my trip to Yaounde this week I went to buy apples, twice. The first time I was walking down the street and saw a man with an apple cart. I asked him the price and then told him that was the white person's price and apples should cost this and that I wanted to buy these two apples for this much. He laughed and went down in price but not enough. We talked back and forth a few minutes and finally he wanted 50 more CFA (like 10 cents) and I wouldn't pay it and so I grabbed a plastic bag and bagged my own apples and left the money on his cart while we both laughed and I walked away saying thank you and that I would come back next time (this is a common way to leave a conversation in Cameroon - saying thanks, next time). The is the second way you can buy apples in Cameroon. The third way is less fun and brings me to my second attempt to purchase them recently. I saw another man with an apple cart outside of a white person store in downtown Yaounde (that was mistake one, trying outside a white person store). I asked him how much the apples were, went into the store with my friend and her mom, and we came back and I decided I wanted apples and began to bargin. He got angry and started screaming at me that why would I assume the price could change - he told me the price and I should have accepted it and blah blah blah. So I laughed it off telling him, this is Cameroon you discute for all the prices and tried again to bargin with him. He got angry again. Then, I got mad. I told him he was very rude and that I didn't care what his apples cost now I wasn't buying any from him. He yelled back that I was rude to try to bargin with him when I was rich (aka white). I repeated that he was rude and wouldn't get my money today or in the future and left. A year ago that interaction might have upset me but now I simply ran to catch up with my friend and her mom and repeated it while laughing and saying that I guessed it wasn't my day for apples.

OH CAMEROON.

So I am aware that I owe ya'll a blog about South Africa but you aren't going to get one just yet. Sorry. First, while it is fresh in my mind, I am going to tell you about the last month here in Northern Cameroon.

I got back from my whole schnanigans in South Africa and ran right back up to post. I took the train up north on the fete for the ending of Ramadan and there was NO ONE on the train. My couchette car was half empty - that is unheard of here. It is always oversold. I made it back to post in record time. I was in a rush to get back because I was helping Phil to put on a day long AIDS training in his village that our mayor paid for and we are hoping to replicate in Bibemi. So, I spent lots of time in Adoumri that week helping sort out the details like the price to pay the women who makes food and how much beef to buy and drawing the pictures for different parts of the training - like portals of entry or a map of the world for when we gave the epidemiological statisitcs. The day before the training (which we were planning to basically co-facilitate with an NGO from Garoua) the man from Garoua called and told us he had to go to Yaounde and wasn't going to make it this weekend but he could come next weekend so we should just change the date. He was the person who was bringing the PVVS (people living with HIV/AIDS)from Garoua as well. This PVVS was the biggest deal. That was an intergal part of our training - having the PVVS talk about living with AIDS and having them meet a person who they had lunch with and have them talk about AIDS and help reduce stigmas and everything was essential. So, we called the most amazing person in the world - Amadou - the Peace Corps staff in Garoua - and he found us a PVVS that day who would come. It was awesome. So, crisis averted. The training went really well. Mike came and was great - asking questions when other people didn't, willing to read things when other people wouldn't, etc. We made a few faux paus like we didn't have drinking water as well as coffee and sodas. Little things. But, all in all soooo successful. The next week we brought the mayor our actual budget (the prices things turned out to be) and we gave him the remaining money (something unheard of in Cameroon). Then, we pitched him the idea of doing a training like it in Bibemi and he seemed very receptive. I spent the next couple days preparing the budget. I used Phil's from Adoumri as a foundation, talked with my counterpart, Mike, etc. My counterpart came over and we talked about which 25 people we would invite from Bibemi, who would present topics, etc. So, Wednesday I brought the budget back to the mayor and ended up getting sucked into a meeting (with Mike) for 7 hours about development in Bibemi. It was brutal. Honestly so bad. It could have been great - but it was just so poorly organized and people just soapboxing there different positions. But, it was good that we showed our faces there.

All in all since I have gotten back I have been really productive. It is 63 days til I go home for Christmas. I am quite excited. The rains have been intense. Rainy season ended with a harsh winds filled two weeks. We lost power about half the time I've been back. My electricty shorted out and caught on fire. Long story. I'm fine. The house is fine. I have electricity again thanks to Abel (a village friend), my counterpart Bouba, Mike, and duck tape. It will eventually get really fixed. I have pictures. It is fairly impressive. I went to the Lycee (the local high school) this past week. They have no electricity because bandits stole the lines. Got to love this village life right? But, I got to see the library. It was depressing. It has about 25 books - max. 12 of which are leather bound books from the 1980s on Africa - with countries like Upper Volta and Zaire. 1 of them is a world geography book with a section on the USSR. The teachers at the Lycee asked Phil and I if we could help them to get more books. So, my sister Courtney happened to call that day and ask me about any project I had in my village that she could take on for a school class project - I got talking about the Lycee and now she is working on getting us books. And that my friends is how shit gets done here!

There were rumors going around here all this past rainy season about sorcery (which is a very popular belief here that I haven't met someone who doesn't believe in it) and a group of people from Nigeria who steal people's sex. So, let me explain. The belief is that these socerist shake your hands and that act alone can take away your penis (I mostly heard about it happening to guys) and leave you completely penis-less OR they can switch your penis and leave you with a very small one. So, there were many many people who claimed they saw evidence of this and a Lycee student in a neighboring village was stoned to death over it (they thought he was one of the sex stealers). It was a bit tramatic and very strange but, that seems to have died down now so that is good.

Alright I am drawning a blank as to what else there is to talk about now. So, signing off for now. Promise a more detailed blog about South Africa soon!

Okay so this is a long awaited blog, I know this and I am sorry! Let me first start by writing about the week leading up to my vacation in East Africa....

Mike and I planted 100 moringa trees at our hospital in Bibemi in July. These trees got planted over the course of 2 days but the hole digging and spacing took the whole week prior. Then, after we planted each tree we put some prickly bushes around each tree to protect them from the goats and cows that graze on the hospital grounds (what? you're local hospital isn't also a lifestock grazing ground?). Then, the next day I had my site visit from my APCD (in Peace Corps lingo that means the person who is the head of your specific program, which for me means the associate Peace Corps director for health). Silvie (my APCD) and I talked about my ongoing projects, my upcoming projects, etc, etc. It was nice to have her visit. She was also very impressed with my well behaved kitten. Well done Lulu, way to impress the boss! The tree planting was Monday. The site visit was Tuesday. Wednesday I headed down to Ngaoundere (where I catch the train) but there were no tickets for that night. So, I tried again the next morning and spent the first 4 hours I was awake on my 24th birthday waiting in the world's most chaotic line at the train station and they finally found me a first class ticket reservation. After the train station, I ran back into town and had my birthday lunch - beer with steak and cheese sauce - YUM! Then, packed my stuff up and grabbed an omelet sandwich for my birthday train dinner and headed to the station. Well, I was in first class, kind of. I was in the dinning car. My seat had no cushion on it - well actually that isn't true. The women who was sitting next to me, her seat had no cushion and she had gotten there before me, stolen my seat, and refused to move. I asked her to move and she ignored me. So, I went a got the train attendant and told him the situation and he told me to find another seat and just take someone elses. Lovely advice right? Well, some grande (important person) got on the train at this point - realized that his first class was really the dinning car and refused to sit there. He gave me his seat and demanded they find him another. 16 hours later I was in Yaounde. Ever sat at a picnic table in a moving train for 16 hours (6pm - 10am). I have. Be jealous. But, when I arrived in Yaounde I allowed myself to eat all the beautiful foods that I could find. I had chinese food, strawberry sorbet, black forest ice cream, and eggplant parmesan (that my friends and I made from scratch). I went to happy hour at the Yaounde Hilton (twice!). I attended a 5 hour VAC (think Peace Corps student council) meeting and a 1 hour PSN (peer support network) meeting. I got to wash all the clothes I had with me in a washing machine and then dry them in a dryer! I got to take a hot shower! To top it all off, one of the other volunteers had found seasons 3-7 of West WIng on DVD and I was able to copy it onto my external hard drive (a God send in Peace Corps). My last task before I left for East Africa was that I need to find US dollars. My visa for Tanzania cost $100 and you had to pay at the airport for it in USD (odd I know). Well, I asked around trying to figure out the best way to get USD in Yaounde, Cameroon and I heard that the Hilton had them (who the hell knows why). So, I headed back to the HIlton in search of dollars. I walk inside and one of the doorman asks if he can help me. I said yes that I was looking for USD. He guided me back outside and over to the corner and introduced me to a Nigerian man who had a WAD of cash in all currencies that he was willing to exchange for me. I handed him 100,000 CFA and he handed me 200 USD (a 100 dollar bill, a 50, and 5x 10s). It was quite entertaining to experience this situation. I was glad to have the money for my visa even if I was a bit sketched out by the process :) The next morning I headed to the bus station to go to Douala (where I was flying out of to go on vacation). I didn't leave until midnight but I was worried about arriving at the airport after dark so I was going to get to the airport 8 hours early. Woot. Well, of course, I couldn't get to Tanzania that easily - something had to go wrong. As I was getting off of the bus at the airport in Douala I fell (really complicated 15 seconds of things going wrong that ended with me falling) and I face planted on the pavement with a great deal of force - enough to cut up my face and chip my front left tooth. Lucky me right. The people at the airport were really nice and everyone was asking me what happened and telling me they were sorry about my face. It was a bit embarrassing but lucky after 11 months in Africa I was use to people staring at me and the added stares didn't faze me too much. So, with that accident under my belt I bored the plane to Tanzania.

After landing in Dar and getting in the taxi I fell asleep on the way to Nicky's apartment. The driver had a bit of trouble finding the place but luckily Nicky had told me it was the tall orange building and so I could find it in the sky line. It was odd to see a big city with apartment building and multi story buildings. It looked nothing like Cameroon. Oh, did I mention they drive on the left side of the road and car in Tanzania. Again, somehow I missed that memo. I should have figured that an African country who's currency is the Tanzanian SHILLING still had some of those British colonialist roots in them and they probably drove on the other side of the street but I didn't. Once again I almost sat in the drivers seat. Note to self - more countries than England, Ireland, and Australia drive on the left. I know Thailand does - learned that this past summer - and now I know Tanzania does. I leave for South Africa in a few days, I bet they do there too!

So, I arrived at Nicky's rockstar apartment and shower and then we began the best of Dar self guided tour (that was to be conducted in one afternoon). We got to drink Savanna dry cider (absolutely delicious) and go into lots of neat shops. We went to the traditional wood carving market and I bought a traditional Tanzanian wood carving of people working together (you have to see it) off a guy as he was carving it. It isn't polished or anything and I need to take it to the wood guys in Garoua to have them make the bottom smooth. Oh, did I mention that I couldn't stop speaking French to people. Apparently in my head now all Africans speak French. Well, clearly this is not the case and people in Tanzania speak English or Swahili. But, I wouldn't stop with the French thing. It was an unconscious response to people. I did learn a few words of Swahili while I was touring the city. White people are muzungus. Elephants are tembos. Lions are simbas (way to be creative in your naming of characters Disney). Friends are rafikis (again, Disney!). It's cool is poa. Hello is jambo. Thank you is asante san. Nicky was pretty good at the Swahili thing and with my mad bargaining skills and her skills and Swahili we were a good team. I had a lot of fun running around Dar in one day. OH, and I found Obama pagne. Well, of course it wasn't called pagne cause we weren't in francophone Africa but still, I found it. I bought the 4 the lady had and brought them back to people here in Cameroon. Speaking of pagne, everyone I encountered in East Africa (Nicky, her friends, Emily, her friends) was jealous of the rocking West African pagne (which I sported most every day). So yea, East Africa might be more developed but West Africa has the cool pagne and the tailors to make them into clothes.

My second day in Dar we spent the morning on a great bike tour of the city (we biked 24km in a few hours) and got to try to local cuisine and see parts of the city most tourists don't venture out to. Seeing those parts of the city made me feel much more like I was still in Africa - up until that point I wasn't convinced that somehow I had been transported back to Europe or America. That afternoon we flew on a 15 minute flight to Zanzibar! Oh, have I mentioned yet that Tanzania (and Zanzibar in particular) has a lot of Indian influence? Yea, so we got to eat some delicious foods that night in zanzibar. We spent the first night there on the south side of the island at a place called Dolphin View Village on a part of the island called Kizimkazi. We did this because at 6am that next morning this hotel had us booked to go swim with dolphins in the Indian ocean. So, we got up at the crack of dawn, literally, and got in bathing suits with dresses and sweaters and towels and headed out in a wooden motor boat to go find the dolphins. They knew where the dolphins would be because of the tide of something. About 10 minutes off the shore we saw them! Dolphins just swimming near our boat! Nicky and I were each given flippers, goggles, and a snorkle and told to jump in. It was cold and woke you right up but then again you were swimming around with dolphins in zanzibar so you couldn't think much about the cold. It was amazing. We jumped out and swam with dolphins about 6-7 times and the last time we ended up swimming with a family of about 20 dolphins! So cool. Oh, did I mention that my face was all scratched up though - so that mask and salt water felt interesting. But, after about 4 jumps into the salt water my face stopped pussing and must have gotten all that infection out. It was probably really good for it. It healed very quickly and quite nicely after that!

After swimming with dolphins we got back, showered, ate breakfast and got driven to Stone town. We ate a local lunch there in Stone Town, which was quite good (again, that Indian influence means the food is well spiced!) and headed out to our spice tour! The spice tour was interesting- we literally pulled up to this guys farm and got out and he took us around to all the trees and made us try to guess which spice they were - I got about half of them correct. We got to see vanilla bean pods, cinnamon bark, cumin, pepper, lemon grass, ginger, coriander, and a few others I am sure. We also got to taste them from the tree/ground. That was fun. Then, we bought some spices from this guy and headed out to see the slave caves. That was about a 15 minute trip - we arrived, climbed down the steps into the caves, walked around with flashlights and then I saw about 100 bats and said I was going back out. I don't do bats - they carry too many killer diseases. After these slave caves we headed to Kendwa on the north side of the island - which was our final destination point in Zanzibar. Kendwa is paradise. I got to meet lots of Nicky's friends - Kilimanjaro (the massai man who sold jewelry and danced for us), Tarloch (who owned the hotel we stayed at), Rodger (who worked at Duniani Lodge - where we stayed), etc. It was so amazing, pictures cannot do it justice. Oh, also, apparently Zanzibar is like the Bahamas for the Italians. There was a whole resort next to us that was exclusively for Italians and you could only stay there if you booked this all inclusive vacation from Italy. Very odd. But, Duniani had happy hours in the evenings and we arrive just in time (well planned us) and so we got to drink Konyagi (the local moonshine type drink) and local beers (Tusker, Kilimanjaro, Serengetti, or Savanna dry cider) while watching the sun set in Zanzibar. Nothing to complain about at all. My face healed more and more every day and was healing really fast - everyone was amazed by my healing abilities! Nicky and I staked claim to the 2 beach chairs that were outside Duniani and maintained them for the week. Tourism hasn't ruined Zanzibar so the hotels are small and don't ruin the ambiance or view of the island and so there aren't 1000s of beach chairs covering the beach. These were two woven wooden chairs with a thatched umbrella protecting them. I was careful to keep my face and knee out of the sun so that they wouldn't scar and Nicky, like Courtney, put on sun tanning oil and went out to get tan. I bought lots of local jewelry and other artisan work from Kili that were made to order (apparently I have larger wrists then most Africans). I every night Nicky and I ate sea food that was caught that day in the ocean. I got to listen to my favorite African group P Squared who are popular apparently everywhere in Africa (I think they may be from Uganda). The power in Zanzibar oddly enough went off every night from 7-7:10ish like clockwork (pun intended). Every night as Tarloch would start walking to turn on the generator the power would come back on. It was hilarious. Then, soon enough, it was Nicky's 25th birthday/the full moon/the lunar eclipse. We started the morning by going to a place called the Aquarium which was really just an ocean water lagoon where like 20 sea turtles lived. We got to feed the sea turtles and then get in the lagoon and swim with them - this I have pictures of but the swimming with dolphins I only have pictures of dolphins not me with them. Then, we walked along the beach to a bar where the driver from Duniani was suppose to meet us and we found ranch flavored pringles and twix at this boutique and promptly bought them and ate all the pringles on the spot. While sitting at the bar we found a super brave local girl who came up to us and was sitting on our laps and stuff - it was adorable. We needed some hair of the dog as we had gone to a party down the beach at Kendwa Rocks the night before and drank like college kids! We got back to Duniani and met some of Nicky's friends from that states who were flying in to see Zanzibar and climb Mt Kilimanjaro with Nicky. Tarloch had found a way to make Nicky a birthday cake and we all sang and then headed out to a bondfire party down the beach to celebrate the full moon/lunar eclipse/Nicky's birthday. We danced the night away to odd songs requested by European tourists and then came back to the hotel in time for me to grab two hours of sleep and get up to get in the van and be driven to Stone Town to head to Rwanda. The two girls I ended up in the van taxi with had no more cash so I ended up paying for most of the 3 of us (the had a little bit of money). All the ATMs in Stone Town were down that morning so they couldn't get money. All 3 of us were flying to Arusha (northern Tanzania) where they were going on safari and I was going to Mt. Kilimanjaro airport to fly to Rwanda. They promised to get me the money in Arusha. And, when we landed in Arusha the driver who picked them up had brought me my money!! Then, I had to figure out how to get from Arusha to Mt. Kilimanjaro - there was suppose to be a shuttle, but their wasn't. So, I went and talked to the airline that I had just flown with (Precision Air) and convinced the driver to bring me and my stuff with him from the Arusha airport to downtown Arusha and then from there for him to drive me with the pilot and flight attendants to the Mt Kilimanjaro airport. He agreed and I got an interesting tour of the city. I could have taken a taxi but that would have cost like $50 so this making friends with the airline staff was much more economical :) Needless to say, I did arrive 3 hours before my flight to Rwanda at the airport and sat down to wait. My face was healed almost completely and I was headed to Rwanda. Tanzania, check!

How do you respond when the person you sit next to on the airplane tells you his wife and 4 children were children during the genocide? I don't know but it was a heck of an introduction to Rwanda. He was a really nice guy and we were talking about Rwanda and he just casually mentioned this information. I told him I was sorry and I didn't know what else to say or what the appropriate response was. He accepted that answer. Crazy. Sad. So, after this flight on Rwandair Express I landed in Kigali and immediately felt more of this "this isn't Africa" feelings I had in Tanzania. There was a coffee shop in the airport! Some friends I had made en route stayed and waited with me while I bought a sim card (the company MTN exists in both Rwanda and Cameroon but you need to buy a new sim card in East Africa - of course!) to call Emily with. Emily's post mate is dating a South African who picked me up in his car with Em and Ali. From there Em and I got dropped off at our hotel and then walked to a delicious dinner at a place called Soleil et Luna where I got to try to famous Rwandan beer Primus and eat some delicious pizza. They weren't kidding when they named Rwanda the land of thousand hills - Kigali was full of them and we trekked up the hill back to our hotel. Also, despite the fact that English is now Rwanda's national language, French was very helpful while I was there. It made the fact that I want to speak to everyone in Africa in French kind of useful. Emily kept telling me not to talk to people she knew in French because she had already laided the NO FRENCH policy down in stone. Woops. My bad.

First morning in Kigali we went to this fabulous little place called Bourbon Coffee where I got a latte and a cinnamon roll and ate some crazy amazing food. It was so good we shopped around in the area and ate lunch there as well. The food at Bourbon Coffee was fabulous beyond words and Kigali has this pleasant "external spring" weather that I just loved. I met most all of the Rwandan PCVs (Peace Corps volunteers) and they were very welcoming and very curious about what my West African Peace Corps experience was like. Where we went to dinner was even more ridiculous. We went to a new place called Shokola and when we walked in me, Em, and the two other PCVs we were with all stood there with our mouths open. It was NOT Africa. The place didn't serve alcohol and we knew this and had brought our own (shhh, don't tell). So, I ordered a fresh squeezed orange juice with hummus and guacamole has appetizers for our group. The rest of the dinner was equally ridiculous. We had tilapia with mango salsa, moroccan style cous cous with roasted veggies, salad with grilled chicken and something else that I cannot even remember. I know this might not shock all of you in America but it meant the world to all of us here in Africa to eat that for dinner. Then, we spent the rest of the evening being driven around to different hot spots by one of the embassy marines in the armored car that the embassy staff drive (they have drivers). Kigali has quite the posh ex-pat establishment in terms of night life. One of the bars we went into was legit like Perkins Park in Stuttgart and had flavored Absolut. Crazy.

The next morning I got to see the Peace Corps's new office in Kigali. I left my bag of gifts that I had bought in Tanizania at the office (no use lugging those around Rwanda with me!). Then, post office and sans stuff, Em and I went over to this mall called MTN center and went to yet another Bourbon Coffee (there are 3 or 4 in Kigali and I think one is set to open in DC soon) and had more delicious food. I had to try to cheesecake there but it was rather disappointing. Mom, yours is seriously not beatable. The MTN center also had a GERMAN grocery store. It wasn't super German but it was fun to walk around in and they did have Aquafresh Extreme Clean toothpaste - my family will know what that means to me!!

There are tons of white people (aka muzungus) in Rwanda - way more than Cameroon. Also, some of the cars are British (steering wheel on the right side of the car) and some are "normal" with the steering wheel on the left. That took some getting use to and I swear was just that way to keep you on your toes. Also, for a country that has so many white people - they have no international ATMs. All their ATMs are local banks only. So, getting Rwandan Francs was an interesting process. So, I had to take my VISA to a bank called AccessBank in Kigali and they ran a charge on my credit card in Euros and then gave the the corresponding amount in Rwandan Francs once the charge successfully went through. Sound complicated - it was! But, it also worked. AccessBank was convienently located in the other (that's right there are two) mall in Kigali called UTC. There was also a large Kenyan grocery store their called Nakamat where you could check your bags while you shopped. Well, Em and I would check our stuff there and ask if we could leave it while we went places in the city. Sounds risky I know but we couldn't very well lug our suitcases around Kigali with us. But, it turned out just fine.

The second afternoon we also went to the co-op. This is where you can buy all the local handcrafts in Rwanda. They are big into baskets and paper necklaces and carved wood items so I picked up a number of those for myself, friends, and family and had fun with Em speaking Kinyarwandan and me speaking in French. As we left the co-op we bought tickets to go to Em's post the next morning - it is in the south of the country near the DRC border. Post shopping and ticket buying it was time for dinner again (eating is a favorite travel habit of mine, as is shopping) and this time we went Indian. Ice and Spice, an Indian restaurant in Kigali is where we ended up for dinner with a group of other PCVs and I had some fabulous dinner. Stupid East Africa with their Indian influence. Not fair.

A favorite thing to do in Cameroon is oversell buses. If the bus is a 15 passenger van you can guarantee there will be no less than 25 people in it. This was not the case in Rwanda. They only sold the number of seats that the bus had. So, I got to ride the 6 hours to Em's post in my own seat - it was quite nice! Also, people don't try to sell you stuff off their heads out of the windows of the bus. That was nice but I also kind of missed it to be honest. It is nice to have all the food come right up to your bus :) As we were pulling out of Kigali the scenery was great - green hills and little houses and all that good stuff and I told Em how pretty it was and she looked at me and said, "this, this is ugly for Rwanda". Well, she was right that the drive did get prettier and prettier. When we got to the big national park en route to Em's village of Mwezi called Nyungwe National Park we had about 30 baboons along the side of the road when we entered the park. It was great. Em said that she hadn't seen that many. It was great. Then we got off the bus before the ride was over and stood on the side of the road waiting for the mottos from Emily's health center to come pick us up. We then took mottos up the mountain for about 40 minutes to her city of Mwezi. For dinner that night we went to visit the nuns who live next door to Emily and Ali (they are post mates who live in the same house - odd set up for Peace Corps) and we brought two instant muffin mixes that they had received in the mail and wanted to make in the nuns oven. So, we had muffins for dinner and I sat and talked with the nuns in French. One of them was from Chad and spoke some Fulfulde as well. It was great fun getting to talk with them and she complimented my French (which I swear isn't very good). That next morning we went to see Em and Ali's health center. It was beautiful and well stocked and nicer than Bibemi's hospital. It was insane to see. They have a computer at their health center where they track the AIDS statistics for their health region, the had a pharmacy that had Coartem (the malaria treatment Peace Corps gives us). It was very interesting to see. Their health center works with Catholic Relief Services AIDS relief project though and is much more well funded than Bibemi's is. Still, the dfiferences were astounding. Then, we went on a walk through Mwezi to see the sites. The town in beautiful and situated up in the mountains and surrounded by tea fields (I learned that you only pick the top few leaves each time you go tea leaf picking). It was about this time that my tooth started to hurt, a lot. But, I tried to ignore it - nothing I could do from rural Rwanda.

That night we had a pagne fsahion show where they took pics of my pagne made clothes for inspiration for their clothes in the future. I had one of the health center staff by my ticket for the next morning back to Kigali and we settled in for our last night together in Rwanda. The next morning I headed out to catch my bus. The bus had been told that there would be a white girl waiting in this small town about 20 minutes from Cyangugu (the closest big city). I got there and the motto driver waitied with me until the bus arrived. When the bus got there I was told they had saved me my seat - I was sitting up in the front right window seat - the muzungu seat. When I arrived in Kigali I was tired and my tooth was hurting so I went to the hotel and went to sleep. The next morning I woke up to find that my tooth was turning brown. I was less than pleased. I called the PCMO (Peace Corps medical doctor) and he told me not to worry that I had a dentist appointment Monday. I enjoyed a last breakfast at Bourbon Coffee, checked by bag and the Nakumat store and went to the Genocide Memorial Center in Kigali. I only had about an hour to spend there but that was enough to get a feel for the museum. The bottom floor told the story of the genocide, complete with personal accounts, clothes, and random bones from Kigali. It was horribly sad. Then, the top floor was dedicated to other genocides that had occured - Cambodia, Bosnia, Armenia, the Holocaust, etc. It was very moving. There are about 250,000 people burred at the Genocide Memorial Center in Kigali. I was glad I got to see the museum before I left. From there, I got back to Nakumat and grabbed a cab which I made stop at the office to grab my other bag and then go right to the airport. I got there plenty early (I hate being late to airports) and checked in.

On the flight to Narobi I sat next to a women who worked for International Medical Corps who was talking to me about their work in Uganda - most of the white people in Rwanda are NGO workers or rich people coming to trek the gorillas. It was a nice close to the East Africa experience, a talk with an NGO worker. The trip to East Africa was fabulous, pictures are already up on picasa! I am about to head out to South Africa for a root canal (hence the painful brown tooth I got last day in Rwanda) so I promise stories about that whole situation will come soon!

I've been busy here in Yaounde trying to get recent pictures online - feel free to look and enjoy - they took me long enough to post that you had better!

http://picasaweb.google.com/aubreyinafrica

Okay so I know that is has been like a month since my last blog, and I am sorry. I have been rather busy. Rainy season is in full force. Power outages, humidity, a greenness. Everything looks so incredibly different than it did during dry season – it’s hard to believe it is the same place in some respects. So, I have been in Cameroon 10 months now. Damn that is a long time to be someplace without ever leaving. I haven’t been on an airplane in 10 months – that is crazy. I am normally a fairly frequent flyer. But, exciting news, in 21 days from now I will on an airplane headed to Tanzania! That’s correct. I am going to see Nicky in Tanzania and we are going to party in Dar and then go over to Zanzibar! My last night in Zanzibar will be Nicky’s quarter century birthday which happens to be the next full moon – so yes, my last night there will be a full moon party on the beach in Zanzibar. The next morning I fly to Rwanda to play with Emily for 6 days! I am very very excited.

June was very busy with work. I helped another volunteer do a soap animation en brousse – we taught a group of about 10 women to make soap and Mike checked on it last week and it was great! (soap takes like 3 weeks to make). Then, I did some soy animations with another volunteer and taught about 25 women to make soy milk and soy beignets. It was really fun! Mike and I got permission from the head doctor at the hospital to plant 100 moringa trees on their property and I gave the doctor all the information about the health benefits of moringa and will start doing animations as soon as those trees are in the ground and have some leaves. While we were digging those 100 holes (which we did this past week) the doctor from the health center in Lombo (a village about 20km from Bibemi) came by and told us he wanted 30 trees for his health center and the information about the health benefits in French. Mike promised the trees and I promised the information. Next week Mike and I will plant those 100 trees in the ground! My counterpart and I also spoke with the head doctor about the possibility of doing animations about traditional birthing techniques or just maternal health in general. We have to give the doctor back another proposal with exact indicators for the maternal health stuff and the traditional birthing stuff I think may be a no go. Still trying… Speaking of trying, Phil and I are still working on getting out the kinks from out AIDS training we want to do in Adoumri. Projects take a really long time here to get started. You have to get money, permission, etc. And, all of that takes about 3x as long as it should, minimum. But, slow and steady I suppose. We are trying!

The first week of July was a giant vaccination campaign here in Cameroon. I got to help out and watch how this vaccination campaign worked. It was a bit different from the polio eradication campaign because we were vaccinating against measles, polio, and tetanus (for the pregnant women) as well as de-worming kids and giving them vitamin A supplements. For 3 days my team sat in various neighborhoods in Bibemi and set up shop and sat for 7 hours (from 8am-3pm). While we were sitting in Bibemi we set out teams to the 3 villages we go en brousse to. The next 2 days they walked door to door in Bibemi or en brousse and vaccinated the people who had missed the previous 3 days. Turn out was really great and we got a number of kids who hadn’t been previously vaccinated. When they came to the campaign Salamatou (one of the nurses) would ask if they knew about the childhood vaccine days every Tuesday at the health center and whether they went. She would encourage those who didn’t come to do so! It was really neat to see how people mobilized for this campaign.

It’s official, there are no volunteers left in Garoua. They all left in May and June. But, we will get new ones in August (most, but not all, of them are being replaced). I miss my friends and it is crazy to think how fast time is going. I went to a number of going away parties in June and got to go clubbing in Garoua and see just how fun it can be to people watch there. Cameroonians love to watch themselves dance in the mirror at clubs so all the clubs have these floor to ceiling mirrors that people crowd near. It is hilarious. For those of you who brave the trip to Cameroon to see me, I will be sure to let you experience this joyous sighting.

Oh, did I mention that I am writing this blog entry from my house in Bibemi and will post it on the blog while sitting her on my couch. Yea, I got internet in Bibemi. I have had it for two weeks. Camtel (Cameroonian telephone company – properly named CamTel) arrived in Bibemi in May and it took me awhile to figure out how to get internet (having a Mac made things difficult) but with the help of my grandmother and sister I got a program that let me run windows and then bought an antenna that I put outside my house and bought a phone from Camtel and presto – internet! It has been super nice to have and unfortunately I forgot how addicting internet can be – all that information at your fingertips! But, the internet connection isn’t great and clicks off all the time and often for hours or days. But, once again, this is rural Africa. I am lucky that internet works ever. Lots of duck tape, string, black bungee cords and machetes, helped to make this internet possible.

4th of July was great and I got to celebrate with a number of other volunteers. We hung an American flag and tried unsuccessfully to listen to American music but we did all get to talk and hang out and drink beer. One of the volunteers was from Texas and wouldn’t stop talking about Texas independence and how she celebrates that as well. I learned that Texas Independence Day is March 2, 1836 and after hearing that date told to me about 30 times that evening I shall not forget it anytime soon. There was lots of cheering to America! (led mostly by Phil) and lots of talk about how people wish fireworks were possible. But, it was super fun to get to celebrate with friends! Mike, Phil, Kauleen, and I (all north province volunteers) have July birthdays and we are planning a get together for later this month complete with us in matching pagne – get excited for those pictures. I got a great outfit made with sleeves inspired by a shirt Caroline wore her last night out in Garoua.

Alright, I have some cleaning to do before I make dinner. Food is super scare in Bibemi now because it is rainy season so I have been getting creative with food. Eating lots of peanut sauces, started cooking with dried leaves rather than fresh (which are hard to find), created a lemon cream sauce (cause citrons are available). But, we are managing to eat pretty well even when everything, and I do mean EVERYTHING is out of season. Tonight it’s peanut foulere sauce with rice. I also made oatmeal raisin bread – hadn’t made bread in awhile and had raisins and oatmeal from Garoua! It will be delicious :) Happy belated 4th of July to all of you! And Happy birthday to Mike and Phil tomorrow!

Yes, that is a quote that Phil and I have both been told now. Apparently, the refugee camp has bags of rice that the UN has provided for them and it is "American" rice (at least in the minds of Cameroonians here). This rice is suppose to be a much better quality than the rice available at the market here and in the boutiques soooo.... everyone says that if you want really good rice you should head to the refugee camp and buy theirs from them. I found that statement a bit disturbing. I know the refugees try to sell everything - I've been offered many UNHCR fleece blankets at the market and almost bought it once or twice - but still - thoughts??? Oh, speaking of the refugee camp - on the way home from Garoua last time, Mike and I were in our bush taxi from Pitoa to Bibemi. Now, the bush taxi had made us wait about 2 hours in Pitoa before we left and so we were leaving so that we would get back to Bibemi about 30 minutes before sunset. Well, this bush taxi sucked worst than most do and it broke down twice in the first 15 minutes and then finally broke down for good it turns out directly in front of the refugee camp. We had blown two tires. Mike and I saw that this was going to be awhile and he went and bought beingets from a refugee women who was selling them and we ate beingets while talking to some of the refugee men. One of them had been studying English at a language center in Ndjamena (Chad's capital) when they were evacuated. We learned that 4,000 of them had initially settled the camp and about 2000 of the original group were still there and more had come from other places and he thought about 3000 lived there. They didn't know when they'd be going home but he didn't seem optimistic that it would be anytime soon. About this time, the driver(s?) of our bush taxi who had been working on the problem for about 30 minutes they just gave up. Okay, well we don't live at the refugee camp so Mike and I began to formulate a back up plan. We had to turn down two open bed trucks because they were full and PC doesn't let us ride in them. We contemplated calling Phil and making him send a motto from Adoumri or calling someone in Garoua to send a motto from there but just about this time I saw a random guy driving towards Bibemi on his motto alone. We flagged him down and he agreed to take us home for 3000 CFA total (about 6 bucks) and we were thrilled and would have paid just about anything as we watched the sun set quickly behind us. I was glad Mike and I were together cause I would have been much more unhappy doing that whole thing alone! But, we did get home safe and sound!

Anyways, moving along to exciting news - Alyssa, my wonderful and amazing friend who COSed (close of service - because her two years were up) brought a CD of photos back to the states for me and uploaded a bunch of pics on my blog and onto my picasa site! So, enjoy those and thank Alyssa! Second, I have my ticket home! I will land in Germany at 8am on December 19th and get to see my family! Courtney - arrange your ticket so we land together! Joey, you too if possible! Also, 49 days from now I head to East Africa to see Nicky and then Emily! Wooohooo!!!

Okay, time for an update on life here in West/Central Africa. First, let me say something about the "nassara rumor mill" that Cameroonians have perfected. On May 20th (Cameroon's version of July 4th)I had my friend Sarah who lives in the south in Bibemi with Mike and I for a visit. After the official ceremony was over we took Sarah to try her first calabash of bil bil. Then, the three of us took a motto back to my house to start lunch. This was around noon and since we were only going to my house the 3 of us (plus a driver) all shared a motto. I was wearing a skirt that required me to sit side-saddle on the motto and I was right behind the driver, followed by Sarah, followed by Mike. By 2:30pm Phil, who lives in Adoumri which is about 30 minutes away from Bibemi, had heard that Mike and Sarah and I all rode the same motto and knew that I sat side-saddle and which order we had sat in. WOW. I was impressed by the speed of that rumor - and on a fete day to. People in village keep track of everything we do, wear, eat, buy, etc. It is rather strange but if our friends come to visit they came simply ask someone on the street where the white girl/boy is and chances are that person can point them in the right direction. It takes some getting use to, the whole living in an environment like that, but all I can tell you is, you do get use to it.

A while back my mom sent me a cookie sheet because I have an oven and like to make cookies. However, my oven is really small and this American sized cookie sheet was just too big. So, becoming more and more "bien integreite" I simply took that cookie sheet up to the main road and handed it to one of the men working on the mottos and using saws and welding things and asked them to take the two sides off of my cookie sheet. Within 2 minutes I had a new cookie sheet that fit in my oven and they did it for me free of charge - you have to admit - there are times you must love this country!

For those of you who don't already know, recently the European Championship League soccer finals occured. It was between Manchester United (who wins the Championship League often) and FC Barcelona (where Cameroonians Samuel Eto plays). Well, Mike, Phil, and I all got to watch the game at the inspectors house in Bibemi where I swear Sonel got the power back on just for the damn game because it had been out for 2 days and came back within 90 minutes of kickoff. But, they set up a small tv and the whole town it seems like crowded around this television and watched Barcelona WIN! (Oh, I am sorry, excuse me, watched Eto win - there was little talk about Barcelona doing anything). Yes, Eto did score the first goal and the excitment that ensued was on par with the excitment that you feel at fan fest during the world cup. I seriously hope Cameroon qualifies for the world cup because I cannot imagine the insanity that will come with that.

So the roads become shittier during rainy season, that is a fact I know. However, I'm not sure I fully realized how bad they could be until I went en brousse with the health center last Wednesday. So, there are 3 "roads" to Baxa. One, is totally impassible during the rainy season so that one was out of the question. The second is the main road but it takes the longest so people don't want to use it. The third is a shortcut off the main road where you literally go left at the cows down a foot path for about 30 minutes. We got to the short cut and the chef of the health center asked whether the road was passible and the young man with his cows says yes so we took it. HE LIED. But, by the time we realized just how bad it was, we were committed to it and had to keep going. I may have aquired schisto a few times while traversing some river beds that had water in them and we both had to put our feet down multiple times to keep the motto from toppling over into the mud. The chef was pissed! He kept yelling about how "he says the road was open, he didn't know what he was talking about, etc". But, I was very glad we kept going because that day we had more women bring their babies to get vaccinated than we knew what to do with. 42 of them came from this small village. It was great. The health center hadn't gotten to come in May to Baxa so I think there was some spillover but it was great to see the turn out. We were there almost 4 hours! But, we did make a pack to take the main road for the return trip that afternoon - people in town couldn't believe the nassara had come on that short cut this morning. It was pretty funny. While we were waiting for the women to show up - all things in Cameroon involve LOTS of waiting - I talked to the chef about the structure of the health district a bit because I had some things I wanted clarified. Our district has about 30,000 people I think, there is one hospital and 14 satillete health centers - each of which go en brousse to a specific set of villages. Our health center goes to 3 but one of the health centers apparently goes to 8 places. It is crazy but somehow they do make the system, despite its limited resources, work.

So, Mike's old counterpart who moved up to Maroua to work with the NGO who the volunteer Mike replaced works with came back for a visit recently. Mike and I went over to talk with him and say hello and see how things in Maroua were going. When we arrived, Kasmir (the old counterpart) gave me a giant bear hug. It was strange, I had never had a Cameroonian hug me before. But, Kasmir is a funny guy and so I hugged him right back. First Cameroonian bear hug, check!

Last Sunday I had a crazy, bien integre day! I was suppose to go to my mom in villages house at 10 to start helping her make this complicated sauce for a party she was throwing. We had been working on this sauce all week, washing the leaves 3 times and then draining them and putting them in a fridge for 3 days and all that stuff and I was anxious to taste the fruits of my labor so to speak. So, I arrive at 10am, get mocked (lovingly) for being on time (which is a super American move and I know it but I cannot help it, I don't like being late). Of course she wasn't ready to start so first I got to peal the skin off of peanuts that had been soaking overnight in water for about an hour. Then, we took these peanuts across the way to have them ground in a grinder. Then, we brought back the peanut paste and while her daughter strained the leaves I sold beingets and maggi cubes to the little kids who came to buy them. Yes, I started selling the beingets. I was sitting there watching her and her daughter work and people kept coming to buy them and they were busy so I offered to, she asked if I knew the prices, I said yes, and she said go ahead! So, after selling beingets and maggi for about 20 minutes we started making the sauce. That was the easy part. Then, she made couscous while I ground up salt and ginger and piment to put into the sauce. Then, we got to eat and yes, it was delicious. It is called ndoulay or something like that. After this, I hopped on a motto and went to Adoumri to go to a tantine with Phil. Now a tantine is like a village group who collectively save money and then each member gets this money once a year. It was the president of the groups turn this week. So, he had bought bil bil for the group and we all sat around drinking and talking and hanging out. At one point, one of the nurses in Adoumri showed up and as he slowed his motto down to a stop he and the motto very gracefully fell over. After the tantine, we went to an afterparty at the presidents house and they drank more bil bil and I got into a discussion in German with the nurse who had fallen off the motto (he was fine by the way). It was great and I was one of two women at the afterparty so I was glad that I was there to provide moral support to her! Anyway, last Sunday I felt very African. It was nice.

Tomorrow is Caroline's going away party. This involves killing off all her pets and eatting them. The list of things we will bring to get killed today so we can eat tomorrow include one goat and 3 chickens. I promise pictures if possible. For now, I must go eat some lunch and run some errands. I finally get to pick up my bank ATM card here! Wish me luck with the goat roasting tomorrow! Happy Flag Day weekend and enjoy the 7 postings of pictures!

Okay so I realize it has been awhile since I wrote a blog entry. First off, let me start with the story of Stephanie’s bonne voyage party. Stephanie had asked me to help make spaghetti for the party so we went and bought meat in the market (a first for me!) and had them grind the beef for us (included in the discutted price) and brought it back to cook with. It was strange making spaghetti from scratch with only African ingredient but we did have fresh garlic, onion, tomato, basil and tomato paste and beef – so it went pretty well. So, needless to say, Cameroonians seemed to enjoy the spaghetti – either that or all the volunteers who were there enjoyed it enough for 2 groups of people – but in any case it was the first dish completely eaten. Well done me.

So I had purchased from Stephanie her dvd player and television and tv stand and after the party I got to face the daunting task of getting it from her house in the center of Garoua to Bibemi. Once again, I was successful but it was a big group effort. We broke the piece up and a couple of people helped me carry all the piece to the cars to Pitoa – then when we got out of the car we hired a cart (pus pus) to take us to the market cars that were going to Pitoa and we payed to take all my extra packages onto the car (I had packed the tv in its box and wrapped it in sheets (which were cadeaued to me by Steph) and then the tv box fit nicely into the stand – we were quite a scene. Then, when we arrived in Bibemi we waited until we found enough mottos to take each piece of the puzzle back to my house individually. Let me just say – they all made it safely to my house and are working just fine thank you very much! (Knock on wood)

Rainy season is back in full force and along with the rains came the humidity (imagine that) and Sonel (aka the electricity) left with its arrival. I mean we have electricity sometimes but at least one or two times a week it goes out for varying lengths of time. Right now we are on day 4 without it in village. But, you do learn to adapt, slowly but surely. But, the rains hear remind me of the rains in Asia a bit. Suddenly, the skies get dark and ominous and the wind starts. Then it starts pouring for about 40minutes to an hour and after that it goes away as quickly as it came leaving in its path the humidity. It truly is something to experience. I mean hell, Toto wrote a song about the “rains down in Africa” so you know it is sometime special – haha.

Since it has started raining all the bugs and insects and creepy crawly things have returned in full force. Along with them of course are mosquitoes. Therefore, I have started doing malaria animations at the health center. I have learned that toofee is the word in Fulfulde for mosquito and pot-bow-jay is how you say malaria. It was interesting trying to figure out how to draw pictures of fever, headache, fatigue, and stomach ache (the tell-tale signs of malaria – or palu as it is known among the volunteers and many Cameroonians). But many of you I am sure would be quite entertained by my drawings – I don’t claim to be any sort of artist but hey, the do get the damn health message across so go ahead and laugh I suppose – I will work on getting pictures of those up on my blog.

Speaking of pictures, I have sent my friend Alyssa home with a CD full of pictures to put on the blog so hopefully she will be able to do that soon so you will all get an updated look at life here in Cameroon. Be patient, things here take lots of time.

Earlier this month (May) I got to help out with the polio eradication campaigns. Twice a year the do these campaigns where every child under 5 who they can get their hands on in village (regardless of this vaccination history) receives a polio vaccine. Polio vaccines are easy to do on a campaign level because they are an oral vaccine that you can carry around for a hour or so in your hand when it is 100 degrees and they don’t go bad. My team the day I joined went to 75 houses and vaccinated 97 children. One in 75 houses turned us down. 4 children had to be held down screaming while I gave them the vaccine. 3 children tried to spit it back at me. We then went to a preschool and vaccinated all the children who the campaign hadn’t vaccinated yet. We knew which kids the campaign had gotten to already because when we vaccinate a child we use a permanent market to color in the left hands pinky finger. Then, on the outside of each house we write in chalk which number house it was, which campaign and year (ie A/2009) and how many children their were and how many were vaccinated. It was really interesting to get to watch how a mass vaccination campaign worked and to get to help out with one. At all the houses they told the children it was white person candy I was giving them but at the school (where the kids spoke some French) we explained that it was a polio vaccine and that polio was what made some people have to live in chairs and not walk and that they didn’t get this vaccine as a kid and that is why it was very important they get this. At the school we had NO trouble and each kid tilted back their head and opened their mouths of the vaccine without hesitation. Perhaps leading up to the next campaign I can do some animations about polio and why the vaccine is so important – we shall see! But, I really enjoyed taking part in that first one.

I HAVE KITTENS. I have two babies that we born I think on the 30st of April or 1st of May but I have declared their birthday to be May 1st (easier to remember their age that way). The cat had them the night of a big storm when I had no electricity but Mike did so I was staying at his house. When I got back home she was gone ( I had to kick her out of my house when I left for Mike’s) but came back about 30 hours later and came in the house looking for attention. She left after about 20 minutes and came back with a kitten in her mouth. She ran into the house with it and put it on the shower floor. She then stayed with the kitten for about 20 hours non stop really and I figured that was it. But, the next night she went outside and was wondering around and next thing I know she is running back into my house with a second kitten! Where the hell it was for the day she was in my house with the first kitten I will never know. She then stayed with these two kittens for another 20 hours. After this she went out again, possibly looking for more kittens and spent about an hour crying outside but has since nursed these two babies (both of whom I am pretty sure are girls) back to health. Then are super precious and have opened their eyes and I am pretty much in love.

Question that I am throwing out their into cyber space – can you win the battle against termite ants? If so – how??? Anyone who can give advice on this I would be greatly indebted to. They are currently winning the battle in my house and I killed about 200 (no, not kidding) of them the night the first kitten arrived but there are still hundreds around.

So I have spread the Cameroonian love of American cookies now. Not only do the children in my neighborhood have a love/appreciation of the cookies but now both my counterpart and Phil’s counterpart have a love of them. I had made some snickerdoodle (a huge hit here in Cameroon) and some oatmeal chocolate chip (a favorite among volunteers) and the counterparts got a chance to try them both. It was great to watch adult Cameroonian men get excited about a cookie. Phil’s counterpart also insisted that they must be eaten with tea which Phil and I found quite amusing. Oh the strange reactions people have to American foods. Speaking of that, the night we gave Phil’s counterpart the cookies I made him dinner (a full meal of pasta and sauce) on a hot plate. There was no gas in Garoua so Phil didn’t have any at his house but we had a hot plate he bought so we cooked on that. Phil’s counterpart doesn’t really like his wife’s cooking and loves when I cook him dinner – did it once and it started a trend where he asks me to stay and do it every time he seems me in Adoumri. Phil also makes him mac and cheese sometimes which is a hug hit. So, I did manage to make a successful pasta dish for him with only one single burned hot plate. Go ahead and be impressed.

Ah, the best news. I got malaria. Yep, I had just been thinking (not saying out loud – I know better than that – but thinking in my head) that I had been really healthy for almost a month and that had been so nice and blah blah blah and within 24 hours of having that thought the malaria symptoms started. Now, I don’t get bit by that many mosquitoes but I did manage to get palu. I am fine, coartem (the malaria treatment Peace Corps gives us here in Cameroon that I had at my house) worked well and treated me. But, it is not pleasant. Mostly, my head just hurt really really badly. I had a fever and all that good stuff and felt fairly nauseous but nothing too bad. But, I did loose electricity for about half the illness so it does suck to be feverish without electricity. But, I am all better from that now. While malaria sucks, bacterial dysentery is worse I think.

Okay yesterday was national day here in Cameroon (basically their forth of July). I had a great milestone achieved when the day before the fete (which is the 20th of May) I got my invitation and it was made out to Madame Aubrey Pirosko, Corps de la Paix. VICTORY LAP! My name was spelled correctly and on the invitation. It felt great. Anyway, for the fete itself my friend Sarah (the other Tulane MI here in country) came up to visit and faired the fete with me and Mike. There was no electricity and therefore no cold drinks but it was great. We went to the parade in the morning and got some great pictures of that. It was fun to see a fete when the outside setting was green and brown and not just brown (amazing how much color changes the looks of a city). It was the shortest of the parades and a great length and we then went home and made mango salsa, refried beans, rice, and tortillas (a mexican feast for Cameroonian national day seemed to fit for some reason). Then, we got to go out on the town and consume warm beer or soda with the rest of the town and hug out and introduced Sarah (who everyone got excited about, especially because the girl I replaced was also a Sarah) to everyone in town. Then, around 8pm we all went to a reception at the sous prefect’s house. It was great because it gave Sarah an opportunity to try northern Cameroonian food! The fete was fun and the sous prefect had a generator that ran lights for his house and music for the fete. When everyone had finished eating a man came on the microphone and announced that dancing would commence. But, before everyone else could dance there was a special dance for all the grands and their wives where they paired up each person with someone else’s spouse (for instance the mayor’s wife danced with the sous prefect and the sous prefect’s wife danced with the head of the gendarmes). I hadn’t seen that before but apparently it is a common tradition at important Cameroonian events – good to keep in mind for the future. I was just glad I wasn’t asked to dance awkwardly for 30 seconds to Celine Dion music with one of the grands for town! But, another successful fete was faired in Bibemi. Well done there!

Okay, time to go the to travel agent and see if I can find a reasonable priced ticket home for Christmas! Wish me luck and hope May is treating everyone well!

Okay first things first, IST (in service training that all volunteers go to after 3-4 months at post) is over and the rains have begun. Craziness. After not seeing rain here up North for 6 months it was insane to see it again. The first big rain in Garoua was on Easter, it was awesome. Okay, so Easter in Africa. I went to church – I wanted to see what an African Easter service was about. A group of us volunteers in the Garoua area all went to church at the Anglophone (English speaking) church in Garoua. Oh, did I mention that when I say English I mean Pidgin English (which I speak small small :)) It was truly interesting. We showed up at 8am for church and no one was there (Cameroonians have a very different concept of time then Americans) and we were told by another person heading to the service that they were meeting a couple “blocks” away and walking to church while singing songs and telling people the good news (that the Lord had risen). I couldn’t miss seeing that and so we drove over to this corner they were all meeting at. All in all about 20 people were there and walked to the church together singing. Once church started we sang songs that they taught us as we sang them. They passed out fans to each person in the congregation (did I mention this church was a tiny concrete building lacking fans or AC or real windows and it was 120 degrees?) and so I began fanning myself vigorously. Oh, did I also mention that I had bronchitis (super nasty flemmy cough) and was making some loud noises myself that got me many looks that said “that nassara has TB or something else nasty”. It would have been embarrassing to me in a previous life but I have grown a much thicker skin in my 7 months here. I did get a few of the songs on video so some of you will be lucky enough to see this scene for yourself one day. Oh, the service was also translated into Fulfulde so we had Pidgin and Fulfulde going on at the same time. Throughout the service, the preacher would get the congregation to participate by saying “Hallelu…” and we would follow with “jah”. That was pretty entertaining. Then, once the sermon itself started the fun truly began. We got to clap for Jesus who had conquered death. Some of my favorite quotes that I managed to write down during the sermon were – “the stone had been placed by strong heftic (is that a word?) men and couldn’t be moved by no women” ; “they had a problem, the weak women could not roll that stone” ; “maybe your mother in law is like a big stone before you” ; “if left to man, Jesus Christ would not have risen from dead, the stone was too big” ; and my personal favorite “why aren’t you the happiest of people now?”. It was a fantastic experience and despite the fact that it lasted 2 ½ hours and we left early and I haven’t sweat so much in a long time – it was worth it. Also, I was wearing a very festive Easter moo moo with giant fish on it and a crotch pocket (yes, that’s not a type-o). Pictures will eventually come, if you are lucky! After church we all went to the missionaries house and had a delicious brunch and watch a movie together. We also got rain so that was a special Easter treat!

When I got back to post with bronchitis I learned a few interesting cultural beliefs. First, to treat my cough I needed to eat lots and lots of raw onions. Also, I had my bronchitis because I had gone swimming in a pool when it was very hot outside. I tried to explain that this whole pool theory was not true but they wouldn’t hear any of it. But, I did give in a eat some onions (along with my erythromycin and inhaler) and I did get better soon so who knows – that could have been a good health tip! I find it interesting all of the taboos about illness that people have here. For instance, this week I also learned that they don’t like to drink water when they are sick – they don’t see the point. Also, cold drinks are bad for your health in hot weather – this one I have fought vigorously against because it means I don’t get cold beer in the hot season unless I bring it home and make it cold, but so far, I haven’t won that battle either.

So, last weekend Phil was sick and he came over to Bibemi to be nursed back to health – his words not mine. So, I played nurse and made him soup and we watched movies with my two fans pointed at us. Phil had been sick for about 2 days when he showed up and was better by the next day. He stayed until Saturday because there was a dedication ceremony for the new computer lab at the CETIC (like a technical high school) in Bibemi. The Peace Corps had been involved with getting them these computers so one of the Peace Corps staff and a handful of volunteers showed up for the opening ceremony of the Barack Obama Information Center. Yes, they are truly obsessed. Anyways, by Monday morning I was not feeling well. Phil had been kind enough to give me his bacterial dysentery. I will spare you details about this illness (you can google them if you really want) but it is disgusting and you feel like you got hit by a truck for 2 ½ - 3 days. Lucky me, right? But, this is the afternoon of day 3 and I feel much better. Not 100% or anything but the fever has left and I can move around now.

I got another invitation to an event here in Bibemi that was addressed to me. This time I was not Madame le Blanc but rather I was Madame Obri. Apparently that is the Fulfulde spelling of Aubrey. Hey, it’s shorter, it works! That is improvement though – it is an attempt at my name – that is all I ask for! It’s not nassara, le blanc, or Sarah. Progress is being made. Just wanted to keep you all posted on that!

Okay, I wanted to close this blog with a list I have started (with the help of another volunteer Kauleen who was equally bored during a special IST session). It is a list of all the most ridiculous things we have seen on pagne (the African fabric, but I hope you all know that word by now!). Okay, here goes the list for now – I will update it every so often as need be.

- dresser on round carpet with only bottom 2 drawers in it

- loaves of bread

- king kong and a bus – yes, together!

- Severed hand with spray paint can

- Wrenches

- Modern living room set (chair, lamp, carpet, table, etc)

- Computer with mouse

- Pope

- Jesus

- Virgin Mary

- Paul Biya (Cameroon’s President since the early 80s)

- Bird 3x the size of the accompanying bird house

- Toasters

- Toothpaste and tooth brush

- Electric fans

- Chairs

- Lamps

- Eyes

- Saucer and coffee cup

- Phones of all types (cellular, finger dial, etc)

- Sodecoton with peanut oil bottle

- Coo Coo clock

- Oyster with pearl

- Ladybugs put together in shape of large flower

- Computers with linked hands symbolizing the internet

- Hand with eye in the middle

- Diploma with hat and gown (more ridiculous here than you’d think)

- Different types of houses

- Game controllers (like for an Nintendo)

- Western Kitchen (sink, table, cabinets, etc)

- Alka-Seltzer in a glass

- Luggage at a hotel front desk

- Champagne glasses

- Badminton birdies

- House burning

- Sewing machines

- Spoons and forks

- Combs

- DNA strains

- Binoculars with eyes peeping out

- UFOs

- Rubber duckies

- Ears of corn

- Razor blades

- Bowling pins with bowling balls

- Men wrestling each other

- Personal CD player with CDs

- New Years part scene

- Western Bathroom (tub, shower, toilet, sink, etc)

Now, would you really want to been seen in a dress or shirt made out of any of these? Come on now, some of them are hilarious right – if I ever find some of these for sale and not just on someone – some of you will be getting the world’s best gag gifts!!! Be prepared. More to come…

Women's Day - March 8th - in Bibemi

Women's Day - March 8th - in Bibemi

I am eating a piece of brain - gross!

En brousse with the chef of the health center

Fete de la jeunesse

Okay so Sunday morning my kitten died. Well, to be honest I don't know that for sure but it was super sick and I finally just brought it outside and left it in the brush to die and I am 99.9999% positive it is dead now. But, 10 hours before I did this, the cat bit (bit, bite, I don't know which one) me. I was simply trying to move the poor creature to a cleaner spot of the floor and it reached around and bit me. It barely broke the skin but sure enough, it did. So, I went into Garoua on Sunday and let the Peace Corps doctor know about this bit from a soon after dead animal. He told me I need two post exposure rabies shot (we have three pre exposure shots as volunteers). The bad news is, he thought I might have to go down to Yaounde (a 3 day train ride there and back) for said vaccines. But, the lovely Peace Corps doctor (or PCMO as we lovingly refer to them) found a place in Garoua that was rumored to have the vaccine I needed but they weren't answering the phones so I had to take a motto over there and see. At this point, I of course start to have a massive panic attack and am convinced it's too late and I am dying of rabies (anxiety is a sign of rabies in humans and this furthered my case for me). I want to cal my mom (who is at work) but I decide that calling your mother at work to tell her you got bit and may be dying of an incurable disease with 100% fatality rate when there is nothing she can do wouldn't be nice or the best idea. In my head I knew I was being crazy but it didn't make much difference at the moment. See, rabies, once the symptoms begin in humans is 100% fatal. I think 3-4 people have ever survived it. All but one of them had had some previous rabies vaccines and one was a 16 year old girl in Wisconsin who no one knows why she made it and the protocol (which is now refered to as the Wisconsin protocol) has been attempted numerous more times but never successful again. However, I had been bitten 28 hours ago. Rabies has an incubation period of 10days to 10 years (normally 3-7 weeks if you leave out the extreme cases) so I knew in my head I was just being paranoid, but still, 100% fatality rates don't make me happy. I arrive at the place in Garoua where the vaccine is rumored to be located and sure enough, after some questioning by me, the PCMO, and the PCMO's (who is American)secretary (who is Cameroonian) we establish that this is the right vaccine and that it will cost about 17 bucks (very expensive for here). So, of course I cannot get the vaccine for another hour so I leave to go get a juice. Come back and figure out the process to get the vaccine and finally get to come into the room and wait my turn. In front of me are 3 Cameroonian men two of whom are getting vaccinated, one of them it is his first vaccine (at least that he remembers). His friends are taking photos of him getting his vaccine (which he is nervous to get). It was hilarious. I of course have had 20 vaccines in the past year and was listening to Ricky Martin (don't judge) in one ear and barely noticed the shot (she was a great nurse who did a great job with this mean vaccine). So, as I walk out to leave the center the 3 men I have made psuedo friends with are in the nicest truck I had seen in Cameroon (seriously, new with leather seats) and offered me a ride back to the Peace Corps office. I quickly accepted and we had a great ride talking about Peace Corps and what I was doing here. It was great to talk to some really nice Cameroonian men who didn't ask you to be their wife.

I spent the night in Garoua and went back to Bibemi Tuesday morning really early. I went right to work at the health center and explained my absence to them and the fact that Thursday I had to go back for another shot. Then shared in my pain about the rabies shots and how expensive and painful they are. At this point the shot has given me a fever and made me physically exhausted. Get home and take a nap. Eat mac and cheese for dinner. Go to bed early. The next day I go en brousse with the health center and then come home, pack, and go back to Garoua. Thursday is Adoumri's market and while it is cheaper to get to Garoua you cannot know when you will arrive because they leave when cars are full. I didn't want to chance it. So, here I am, Thursday morning in Garoua. 3 hours from being through with this whole rabies extravaganza. I am going to have lunch with 3 friends after I get my shot and try to wind down from this ridiculous week. Oh, to top it off, this week sucked for my sister too. Poor thing coughed so much with her recent cold/flu that she fracture a rib and had to go to the hospital too. I tell you guys, when it rains, it fucking pours. Hey, at least I didn't actually get rabies (and die). There is my silver lining for you all :)

Okay so soon after publishing my latest blog entry, I tried the craziest food I have eaten thus far in Cameroon (or I suppose I should say craziest thing I have knowingly eaten) – I ate brain. Yes, that’s right folks. I was sitting at one of my favorite bars in Garoua with two friends (Angie and Caroline) and we were catching up and this little girl walked by selling something we didn’t recognize, we asked what it was and were promptly told “cerveau” which is brain in French. Well, I didn’t know that word in French and Angie and Caroline translated for me (I won’t forget it, promise). We said no thanks and kept talking. Well, a few minutes/seconds later we all agreed that we kinda wanted to try brain once, or at least that we would try it once – so we called the girl back and we did it – we each ate one piece of brain. I went first and we agreed we had to chew it at least 3 times (sound like the same deal with my bug in Thailand, right?) and so I have photos and Angie has a video and yes folks, I have officially tried brain. It wasn’t great. The texture was the killer. It looked like a brain, all folded up and okay, I’m done I promise.

Anyway, I returned soon to Bibemi after this whole excursion and went to the market in Bibemi and bought some delicious foods to prepare and drank a bottle of fullery juice (think hibiscus tea that’s cold) because it was hot as hell and I needed a drink. Came home, and Phil and Mike were soon at my house. We went to grab a pre dinner beer and saw my counterpart at the bar. I introduced him to Phil and Mike and we chatted a bit and he said he had an invitation for me. He lived nearby and ran to get it and caught me as I was heading home to start dinner (there was no cold beer so I opted to return home after one luke warm one and leave the boys – Phil had won a second beer in the 33 contest that is currently going on). Well, the invitation was in fact for me, but it was addressed to “Madame le blanc de Corps de la Paix) for those of you who don’t speak French that would be “the white women of Peace Corps”. Yes, priceless I tell you. Don’t worry, I kept that beauty. Oh, did I mention it was an invitation for a meeting that had taken place 10 hours before I received it?

So, to make a long story short, I got sick. Apparently the brain didn’t do it (I got sick 24 hours after eating it) and I think it was the fullery juice at the market. I was sick for like 36 hours and then fine. It sucked a lot; it is annoying to be sick when you cannot stop sweating due to the heat. Speaking of the heat, hot season is going in full force now. A friend in Garoua told me it was 110 there 10 days ago and I can only imagine is it closer to 120 now. It is very warm, you sweat all day, every day. I have turned my AC on twice but it doesn’t really help that much (it’s really old and really hot out) and one of my two fans broke.

I have spent the past 2 Thursday’s going en brousse with the health center to a new village called Baksa that is about 17km (about 10 miles) away. This means about a 25 minutes motto ride in the raging sun with a helmet on – talk about sweaty. Anyway, the best part about Baksa is the location we hold the consultations at – the middle of a school yard while school is going on. So, the first Thursday was prenatal consultations and we had to wait for one of the classrooms to become available so the women would have a bit of privacy while their consultation went on (privacy isn’t a huge deal here in Cameroon but no one wants an audience while someone lifts up their shirt to listen to their baby with a metal funnel like instrument). So, while Bouba (the chef of the health center) goes into the room to do this part of the consultations he left me outside in the middle of the school yard (and school has now let out for lunch leaving me, 30 pregnant women, and about 100 school children all in a ring around me and the women. It was quite a scene. I had to call the women’s names and some of them are impossible to pronounce even if I could read the handwriting they were written in (which normally I cannot). It was quite embarrassing and I got the kids to help a bit, but I laughed it off and apologized for slaughtering their names (I apologized in French though and I don’t think most of them speak French so not sure how much good that did) and I took their blood pressures and sent them on to Bouba. It was an experience that lasted about 5 hours outside in the 110/120 degree heat and I was exhausted afterwards. The next Thursday was childhood vaccines. I thought since we didn’t need to wait for an empty classroom it might not take some damn long. I was wrong. I figured I would be but hey, a girl can dream right? So all in all about 30 women (a lot) brought their babies to get vaccinated and I weighted every single one of those babies with an audience of 40-50 school children who shouted out the weight on the scale (the shouted the big number the scale showed the weight was closest to, they didn’t get that dashes were decimal points). I was actually quite amused by the whole thing and thought it was kind of cute. The women who’s babies were being weighted didn’t really love it. Honestly thought I wish someone had a video of that situation. I learned how to ask “what is the babies name?” in Fulfulde (or at least to get the message across that I wanted them to say it) which is “Indee bingle”. I am learning slowly but surely, but slower than Mike which people never cease to point out to me. What can I say, I have gotten a fairly thick skin and it doesn’t really bother me.

Women’s day. What can I say about women’s day. I got invited to go to a meeting that took place two days before the fete. Well, I was invited to 2 meetings before that, one 10 hours after and one while it was going on and I was at work. So, this was the first meeting I would have been really able to attention. It was scheduled for Friday at 8am at the Ministry of Agriculture building. I knew that 8am didn’t mean 8am but being American I couldn’t be too late so I showed up at 8:40. Not a sole was there. There was the guy who works there sitting at his desk and no one else. So, I asked him about the meeting and he told me there was no meeting. I said, oh, well I heard there was a meeting about women’s day here at 8am. Sorry I bothered you, I must have gotten the place wrong. He said to hold on he would check the schedule and let me know where it was. Sure enough, it was suppose to be there and it was suppose to have started 40 minutes ago. I waited until 9am and then decided it was too hot to wait outside I would go to Mike’s (he lives much closer this place than me) and wait a bit and then go back. I waited at Mike’s til about 9:45/10. Then, I showed up again. This time there were about 15 women all outside not meeting but rather selling things. I gathered from the small conversations I could have that they were selling things to raise money for women’s day. So, I waited 30 more minutes for a meeting, none happened. So, I bought a fan one of the women had made and went home. Crazy. So, then the day of the fete arrived. I sported my pink women’s day pagne. I don’t have any pictures of me in it (I have lots of pictures of other people and am not sure how I ended up without one of me) but there is a picture of 20 of me floating around town from that day I am going to try to get my hands on. It was fun. Again, it started about 2.5 hours late but I went to Mike’s and we ate beignets and waited. There was a decent turn out and I would say about 300 women and girls participated. I got some great pictures and videos of this event which I hope to one day get on this blog. I won two free beers that day (Mike only won one and he won it on his last beer and he was convinced the bottles knew it was women’s day and kept giving me free beers). But, Mike made dinner for me that night (women’s day, women shouldn’t work right?) and we tried desperately to explain to the people in Bibemi that Mike was cooking me dinner and this was a fete to celebrate women and all the work they do all year and how this one day a year men should do the cooking and whatnot. I don’t think we convinced anyone. They all responded with things like “I don’t know how to cook” or “only women cook food here”. But, Mike tried valiantly and I talked about how mother’s day (the closest thing I could think of to compare it to in America) men did things like that for their wives and I knew lots of men who cooked and Mike was a good cook and I was excited to eat what he made me. I am not sure we convinced anyone, but they are now all aware that American men do cook for American women sometimes. It was fun to see all the women in their outfits (some were really cute) and everyone yelling “bon fete” to me all week. I enjoyed the scene for sure.

Animations. I began that daunting process this week. I thought I would be doing just one, an animation about HIVAIDS to the health club at the middle school. Wrong on so many notes. That animation was suppose to be on Wednesday (and it was) but Monday at the health center my counterpart turns to me and goes tomorrow I want us to do an animation to the women who bring their children in about meningitis. What? That was like 22 hours away. I didn’t have any resources really about meningitis and no real French vocab for phrases like “stiff neck” – I mean does that even translate? But, I didn’t let my counterpart know these nervous thoughts and if he wanted an animation on meningitis, he was going to get one. So, I came home and broke out my health books, my French dictionary, my Peace Corps toolkit and went to work. I ended up with a decent animation (boring, but informative) and vowed that in the future I would draw out these symptoms so that they were really clear to people but I had no paper on hand to do so for this first one. Tuesday, my counterpart and I spoke with about 25 women about meningitis and it’s symptoms and how important it was to take their children to the hospital if they had these symptoms. Job well done. Wednesday, I had prepared (an my counterpart had too) an animation on AIDS that I was told we were doing to the health club. Wrong. We did it to the whole fucking school. Literally, about 120 (I stopped counting at 100 and I would guess there were 20-30 more kids) students and about 7 faculty members came to hear us. But, despite the large audience and how caught off guard I was, it went well. We got all the basics that I felt strongly about (like that the treatment is free and available in Cameroon and the test is free to all students and the ways you transmit HIV and the ways you don’t – like mosquito bites and hugging) and some of the questions were just hilarious – so middle school. We had one student talk about how he prevents himself from getting HIV by practicing abstinence. To counter this, another student stood up and said he has lots of sex but he prevents himself from getting HIV by using condoms each time he has sex. Priceless. Me, my counterpart, and the head of the school decided that next time we would talk only to the girls (in a school of 270 students there are 68 girls) and we would talk about sexual health and STDs. The girls don’t get this information from their parents are embarrassed to ask questions in front of the boys. During our AIDS animation there were probably 20 girls to the 100 boys and not a one of them spoke. So, I am super excited to get to talk with those girls after IST. Speaking of IST, that is where I will be soon – Maroua here I come. I am bitter about the lack of Kribi (beach versus hot season up North) but I will get over it eventually. It will be great to hear about all the things my friends have been doing since I last saw them! Must go, Angie is going to visit tomorrow and so I must get some sleep and rest up for my tour guide job tomorrow!

Abu remains my favorite nickname/pronunciation of my name that I have heard here in Bibemi (or perhaps ever). Others here include, but are in no way limited to: Oh-bre, Aubby, A-bre, Offrey, and of course Audrey (oh, so your name is like that yellow haired girl from 24 – damn TV shows seem to bridge that cultural divide anywhere and I cannot escape being called Audrey no matter where I move). In a given day, I hear most of those versions of my name with the exception of Audrey. There is only one Gendarme here in Bibemi who calls me that. I hear “Abu” each day I go to work because it is a family in the Muslim quartier that pronounces my name like so. I have to stifle back laughter each time I hear it. It is a great way to start the morning, honestly.

Mango season has officially commenced. Nonkong (the water boy) has started bringing me tiny green mangos as a cadeau (French for gift). I don’t know if the green ones that are picked when they are green will become ripe but we shall see. Many people here eat them when they are green and they are not very sweet. Perhaps tonight I will try one like that.

Okay I believe somehow in the midst of my enthusiasm over the wonderful things available in Yaounde I forgot to mention something very important – I heard the song “total eclipse of the heart” (one of my all time favs) in FRENCH at the main grocery store in Yaounde. Now, I know most of you reading this are trying to figure out why I am making such a big deal about this but – to me – it was amazing and I just ran to find one of my friends (who was elsewhere in the store and who had been rocking out to the English version of the song with me on the bush taxi earlier) and we both got extremely excited and happy about hearing the French version. So, picture two girls (both “from” Louisiana) very enthusiastically pseudo dancing to “total eclipse of the heart” in French in the middle of a large African grocery store. Can’t picture it can you? Guess you’ll have to come see it for yourselves.

On the way home from Yaounde I got off the train in Ngaoundere (just try to say that correctly!) which is the end of the train line and basically immediately went to the bush taxi to Garoua. Well I had missed the first bus by literally 3 minutes. It was still there when I got there but full and they wouldn’t let me on. But, I bought a ticket for the next bus and just sat and read my book waiting. Well, boarding a bush taxi is extremely hectic and they basically call your name out – but you often cannot understand that they are saying your name – and then you grab your ticket and then run to the bush taxi and push your way on and try to find a decent seat. The seat is important because it is a 5 hour ride and one person in each row will be sitting in-between two seats and that makes for a long 5 hours. Well this time for me a nice guy who worked there saw me and knew that I would be pushed out of the way and end up without a good seat and so he told me to give him my motto helmet and he went a put it on one of the good seats by the window for me. It made the trip awesome. For some reason, Cameroonians don’t really like wind. They keep the windows closed during this 5 hour trip during which the temperatures rose to about a 100 degrees. Well, I cannot be anywhere near comfortable for 5 hours in a stuffy bus sooooo I kept my window open – just a tiny bit – and kept my arm basically hanging out of the window trying to keep at least one part of my body cool. Also, each time the bus stops in some small town people come up to the windows and try to sell you things like fruit, beignets, juice, water sachets, etc. I was able to procure some papaya and beignets and a water sachet. Lovely. However, by this time I have been traveling for about 20 hours. I got on the train in Yaounde at 6pm on Wednesday and this is now about 4pm on Thursday when I am pulling into Garoua. I still have a long trip to Bibemi on the motto. Well in Garoua I have to drop off some of the packages I lugged up from Yaounde for the volunteers up here in the North and I had to pick up some of the packages for one of my postmates that I had left in Garoua. So, after quickly running these errands I got in a taxi to Pitoa where I could get a motto to Bibemi. Well, since it is Thursday and the day of the large Adoumri (a town near Bibemi where Phil is) cattle market (and by large I mean largest in central Africa) it is not very safe to travel at night because of road bandits. So, on the 20 minute ride to Pitoa (which finally began around 5:20 – which is an hour before the sun will be gone completely) we got a flat tire and didn’t arrive in Pitao until about 6pm. Well, at this point I cannot make it back to Bibemi safely – especially since I had to stop in Adoumri to deliver packages to Phil. So, I had the motto take me the hour to Adoumri and stayed the night at Phils and headed safely to Bibemi in the morning. Note to all those up in the Grand North with me – don’t attempt the trip from Yaounde in 24 hours unless you live in Garoua or Ngaoundere. Break it up. It is too much for one day – I promise. Lesson learned.

So I arrived back in Bibemi on Friday (market day) and was fairly exhausted from all this traveling but I went to the market to get some foods – since having been gone a week my fridge was empty. Monday, went to work and then lunch at the chefs house. Because this week was the fete de jeunesse (youth day – which is a huge national holiday here) they asked if there 13 year old daughter could come over and freeze a bunch of yogurt in my freezer as they had done with the volunteer I replaced in years past. Sadly, I didn’t have the large freezer anymore but I said she was welcome to use my tiny one. Well, I had about 60 bags of yogurt shoved into my tiny freezer (which normally holds about 3 bottles of vodka and is full) and then on the drawer/shelf below it she had shoved another 200 yogurts. Literally my whole fridge smells of sweet milk. That is what their yogurt is. But, hey, I was happy to do my part for the youth!

Speaking of youth, Wednesday was youth day. This is a national holiday here in Cameroon and involves all the big wigs in towns gathering together under a tent or on a platform to signify their status (along with all the other people who gather around the field where the fete will occur). I faired the fete in Adoumri with Phil as I was on route to Garoua that day and Adoumri is on the way. Also, we heard rumors that Adoumri was hosting the districts fete and while I think those turned out not to be true it was still a big to do. I took many photos but I am not sure they do it justice. Basically all the schools (and a few of the organizations) in town (and in the surrounding villages) dress up in their uniforms or in a special outfit for the day and then they parade across the field one after another. Then, when that is done, they come across the field again and this time each school performs a dance/song (and a few skits like a karate match) for the officials in the town. Now watching groups of African youth dance is quit different than watching groups of American children dance. It was hilarious and adorable and I was so glad I got to watch it. Phil and I had been standing with all the locals but were moved to the tent with all the officials. From what I heard (as in the reports from other volunteers) most of the other rural youth day celebrations were the same. We arrived in Garoua a bit late to see the main fete here but we did get to see the large crowds of children and it just felt so festive with everyone greeting you with “bonne fete” and all just excited about the day. Pictures will be posted when it is possible to post them.

Ah, before I left Bibemi on Tuesday I was walking back from the petite market where I went to buy eggs to make cookies for the kids in my quartier (for the fete) and I saw all the cotton workers in the midst of the cotton drop off point for all the farmers and all the cotton workers were singing together. A group of them were in the cotton car (picture a giant orange like garbage truck) and they were dancing the cotton down (to compact it) and singing a song. It was a surreally African moment that I did manage to snap one photo of but I didn’t want to disrupt them so I only snapped a quick photo. It was awesome to witness though. After that, Tuesday afternoon my guardian brought me my electric bill. This was a bill for a month that I had the old (electricity sucking) fridge for about half of so I knew it would still be kind of expensive but I didn’t think it would be as bad as it normally was. When he brought me my bill it was almost 20,000 CFA again. I thought that seemed wrong but it is what the bill said so I gave him in the money and kept the bill so I could look at it more when he wasn’t rushing me. Well, he told me he had to have the bill back so I went to get it and decided I would examine it before I gave it to him. Well, once I got to studying it – I realized it wasn’t my bill. It was someone elses’. He had given me the wrong bill. So, I went out to where he was waiting on my porch and brought an old bill with my name and account number on it and showed him that this wasn’t my bill. He tried to tell me I was just confused but that it was my bill. Then, I got mad. I told him to give me back my money and that I would start paying my own bill and I would call the company and sort it out. He wouldn’t give it back. Well, he wasn’t leaving until I had my money. So, after about 5 minutes of arguing he got upset and realized how pissed I was and gave me back my money and said he would go look for my real bill. He came back no joke 3 minutes later and said he had found it. This is the third bill I have paid him. The first one I gave him 20,000 for a 17,500 bill (I didn’t have exact change) and he refused to give me my change and had a different excuse each time I asked. So, the next bill I gave him exact change to the penny (as I will from now on) and so this time I think he figured he would get some extra money by giving me the wrong bill and keeping the difference. I am going to try to get the company to take the money directly out of my account each month. I don’t enjoy this money exchange with the guard. If only the internet would work here in Garoua so I could do so!

Alright well that is about it for me this week. Happy Friday the 13th to everyone. Happy 21st birthday to my baby sister. Happy valentines day to all of you who are choosing to celebrate this hallmark invented holiday ☺!!

Okay well since the internet in Garoua chose to not cooperate with me the last time I was in town and chose to be down the whole time, this blog will cover about a month of time! Awesome. Just a heads up about that and I apologize to all of you who are avid checkers and won’t have any new news for a bit.

I just had a pretty typical afternoon here on the Wednesday the 18th of Feb but what is typical to me would seem surreal to all of you I imagine. . First, it’s getting damn hot. It is over 100 and the sun just beats down on you relentlessly. Those cold bucket showers actually feel great – too bad I’m just as hot and sweaty soon afterwards. But, I got back from going “en brousse” with the health center again to the village where the children gather round in large masses to laugh at/with me. I broke out my camera a bit at the end of our vaccination day and they had never seen a camera that was digital and they had quite a fun time looking at pictures of themselves and taking pictures with it. I only got about 3 photos of it but I will try to get those up at some point – let’s be honest it probably won’t be until July when I am back in Yaounde or maybe in Maroua if I am lucky. Anyway, after we got back to Bibemi I ate lunch with the chef (as per normal) and came home only to decide that I had to brave the heat again and go find Nido (powdered milk) and insecticide (apparently the spiders have also decided it is too hot outside and are going to all hang out in my house). So, I leave my house and start walking to the only boutique I know will have both of these things. I have made it about to the carffour/petite marche when one of the bars starts blaring the rap song “lean back” loudly and still in English which means only I get the benefit of knowing what the awesome lyrics to said song are. I am just shaking my head and giggling when I see my friend Onerray and greet her. She asks me where I am going (as do about 3 other people just in this carffour area) and I tell her to a boutique on the big street. Asking you where you are going every time you leave your house is a slightly annoying habit that people here have. But, you get use to it and learn to keep the answer short and sweet. Making my way towards the boutique this whole time, I pass the daily afternoon card game between about 6 men in Bibemi and one of them is Barka – the man who greets with the one armed fist pump and Obama shout out. The children nearby who had previous to this been shouting “Bonjour Offrey” (which was their interpretation of Aubrey in that family) but hearing me also response to Barka’s Obama shout out they began also screaming “Bonjour Obama” at me. Lovely. I keep walking and make it past the Catholic Mission and am greeted by yet another posse of children. They are yelling “Bonjour Ma Soeur” (hello my sister) or perhaps it was “Bonjour Monsieur” (hello sir) – to be honest I cannot tell the two apart when small children who don’t speak French attempt to scream them repeatedly at you. But, I replied with “Bonjour tout le monde” (basically – hello all) and then in Fulfulde tell them my name is Aubrey. I have told them this before but hey, they’re kids and they forget funny white people names easily. Then they switch to “Bonjour Aubby” which was apparently the pronunciation they were going with. Finally, I make it to the boutique. At this point I have greeted about 100 people, no joke. I arrive at the boutique only to find that it is closed. I ask one of the many people just hanging out in the shade around the boutique if it is closed and they reply “No, the man (as in the owner) is just in his house which is right there (and they point to the nearby mud hut). I say thanks and then one of the guys who had been telling me this gets up and comes with me into the owners concession and basically wakes him up and tells him the “nasara” is here to buy things. I feel pretty embarrassed at this point but have learned to get over that feeling pretty quickly here and smile and tell him thanks and go wait by the door of the shop while he puts a shirt on. Then, of course, the shop is out of Nido. That’s fine, I can wait on making more yogurt til I can find Nido (which I should be able to do in Adoumri tomorrow) so I buy more cookies for the children in my neighborhood and the insecticide and begin the whole process of greeting people on my return journey. When I get to the cotton area near my house they are dancing and singing the “cotton song” again in the large orange cotton container. By the time I get home I am disgustingly sweaty again and rather exhausted from all the cultural experiences that are involved in simply trying to buy some milk and bug killing spray. Just wanted to give you all a snapshot of what it is like for me to go to the corner store.

I am excited to report that this week both Phil and I (the two health volunteers, Mike is an agro-forestry volunteer) both got to weight our first babies named Obama. Well, I suppose mine was named Obama and I believe SHE was born sometime around mid December. Phil’s was named Barak Obama and was born in September (so I guess that baby is lucky Obama won!). I am not sure whether Phil’s Obama baby was a boy or a girl. I will have to ask. (I have now got confirmation it was a boy) Anyway, I laughed and smiled to myself a lot about the fact that a baby born in a small village on the outskirts of Bibemi in Northern Cameroon was named for the first black President of the United States. Makes it seem like a very small world to me. Thanks to my grandma (who sends me lots of great magazines so I can stay in touch with America and the rest of the world outside of Northern Cameroon) I have been reading about how Obama won the election and all about his first few days as President. That’s right, she got me a January 26th Newsweek by February 13th! Oh, Courtney got a package sent back to her that she sent UPS and didn’t write AFRICA on it sooooo I would recommend USPS and that you specify that Cameroon is in fact in Africa. Apparently the people who work for the postal system didn’t take basic geography or know to consult a map.

On Friday (the 20th of Feb) the Prefect of the region (the big wig guy) came to speak in Bibemi. He has been newly appointed and is making the rounds to all the local villages. Well, needless to say a visit from the prefect is a big deal and the whole town turned out. Three of the different local ethnic groups (the Kapsiki, the Giziga, and the Moondong) came and did traditional dances for him. Everyone was in their best pagne and all the other local big wigs turned out to watch the festivities. Of course, Mike and I had to go. We had just been watching it with everyone else but someone noticed us and came and got us and we had to sit on the stage in the elite seats. It was nice to have a seat in the shade but that meant we couldn’t leave when we wanted and had to stay the whole time. I did get photos of most of this (and movies of two of the dances) but we had to sit through 2.5 hours of talks. It was all in French, and then translated into Fulfulde, but I understood about ½ of it. The prefect spoke very clear French so it wasn’t too hard. I think my favorite line of his was “the women work more and better than the men” (les femmes travaillent plus et meilleur que les hommes – in French for those of you interested, don’t quote my spelling though) and most everyone clapped – or if you were the crazy old women near me you screeched. Anyway, it was interesting to watch everyone get so worked up and be so nervous about this man’s presence. Rank is a really big deal here and people took his visit VERY seriously. The gendarmes kept the crowd backed up by swatting at them with random sticks off the ground. At one point when Mike and I were still on the ground, one of the gendarmes was trying to back the crowd up that we were in and he went to hit a group with the stick and noticed that it was close to where I was standing and he was too afraid he would hit me and moved on. So odd. But, hopefully I can get up some photos of these fete as well.

Ah more exciting news, I got a new kitten. Phil had gotten a kitten a week or so ago and well, he didn’t like it. It followed him around crying and wanted too much attention and things (Phil, hint, it’s a KITTEN) but so I inherited this baby kitten. It is tiny and malnourished and I am trying to fatten her up. Phil had named her Eleanor and I call her Ellie. So, I will try to get a picture of that new family member up soon. Right now, Ellie is sleeping on top of my clothes which are on my bed (it’s so hot I am down to a tank top and underwear in the house). Yes, it is about 110 here (or that is my best guess as when I blow on my arm that feels like AC) and it will just keep getting hotter until it reaches about 140 during the day. Oh, added bonus, we keep losing electricity. Now, when it is 110 degrees and I cannot have cold water and a fan, I am not a happy person and I take many cold bucket showers a day. Except, the water isn’t that cold either! AH! But, right now my fan is on and my electricity is working (it went off at about 5:30 this morning and came back around 3:30 this afternoon).

So Saturday (Feb 21st) Mike, Phil, and I were just hanging out Chez Moi (with my new kitten) and we decided that we wanted some beers. So, Mike said he would stay and Phil said he would go carry the beers back but I had to show him the bars. So, we went off. Well, the two bars closest to my house were both closed. Odd. We could hear loud music off in the distance in the other direction so we asked and apparently that bar was having a fete and they were the only ones open. So, we went walking towards the music. Now, I have a hand cranked flashlight with me but it is pitch black out (no street lights here in Bibemi). We got to the bar and they party was going on in the courtyard type area outside behind the bar but the gate to it was locked and closed. So, we waited, knowing that as soon as someone saw us they would come let us in. Soon enough, a nice man came and convince them to let us in (apparently it was a somewhat private party for a specific group) so we went in and attempted to order beer. Well, we had basically just crashed a private party in hopes of buying beer and bringing it home with us. They weren’t too pleased to let us go without us feteing with them. So, before they would give us our beers they made both Phil and I (him first, then me) dance around this circle with a group of people (all of whom were way ahead of us in terms of beers) doing this crazy traditional African dance that I can at least be willing to say I was horrible at. My body doesn’t move that way, and it certainly doesn’t without some alcohol in me! But, it was hilarious. Phil and I just laughed at each other (I got photos of him but as he doesn’t carry his camera everywhere with him like I do, he had no such luck photographing me!) and laughing at the two very drunk people who were hilarious in their dancing. We had finally satisified them enough with making complete fools out of ourselves that they allowed us to leave with our beers (with the promise that we’d return the bottles – that is a big deal here) and wished us a fun evening. Oh Africa.

Monday (Feb 23rd) at the health center I was just hanging out one of the prenatal consultation rooms with one of the nurses, who for the sake of confidentiality I will call Holly, and a young guy (who was wearing Western clothes and spoke good French and seem pretty progressive) who had been talking with a number of the staff members who I will call John. Holly works at the health center is Muslim. Her husband works for one of the high ranking individuals (therefore he makes decent money) in town and is also Muslim. John was asking Holly (in French which I appreciated so I wasn’t completely left out of the conversation) if she was excited about Women’s Day (which is March 8th). Holly said she wasn’t really excited because she didn’t think she was going to celebrate this year. John asked why not – he asked if she hadn’t been able to buy the pagne (here in Cameroon to celebrate you have to wear the women’s day pagne from either this year or a previous year). Holly said no, that she had the pagne, but that she wasn’t going to celebrate because her husband didn’t want her to. John asked why not and Holly explained that she husband didn’t like what the fete symbolized and didn’t want his wife celebrating it. John began to argue with Holly that she needed to tell her husband that it was here right as a women to celebrate this fete and that she should celebrate if she wanted to. Holly turned to me at some point and asked if I understood. I said yes I did and that I also though that she should think about celebrating if she wanted to because it was a day to celebrate the women of Cameroon, of which she was one. But, Holly wouldn’t hear any of it from us and said no, she wouldn’t upset her husband with even mentioning it. John then turned to me and said “this is what’s wrong with Africa”. That is the second time someone (both times a young modern thinking man) has said those exact words to me. The time before, I was in a bush taxi and witnessed corruption occurring (details aren’t necessary – I don’t think I am suppose to say stuff like that on my blog) and a young man two rows in front of me in the bush taxi turns around and asked me – “did you see the corruption” and I replied “yes, I did”. He then said to me “this is what’s wrong with Africa” and I said yes, I thought it was a big problem as well and hoped in the future things would be different. I am never sure how exactly to respond to things like these two situations other than to be glad I was born in America and hope that I am doing some good in being here and talking with people about how it is possible for things to be different. Also, pleased feel free to be impressed by the fact that I was able to have these conversations, or understand them at least, in French ☺

Tuesday (Feb 24th) was Mardi Gras. I didn’t get to celebrate in the same fashion that I did last year in NOLA but I did allow myself to eat the box of velvetta mac and cheese (with broccoli) that my grandma had been kind enough to send me. It was delicious and made the day seem a bit special. But, I learn another important cultural lesson. When you go to a tailor en brousse (or at least here in Bibemi) DO NOT pre-wash your pagne. When I went to one of the tailors in Garoua she told me it was important to wash the pagne before you made clothes with it because it shrank a little bit the first time. That made sense and I said I would be sure to do that from now on. Well, so, I pre-washed my women’s day pagne before I brought it to the tailor on Tuesday. Oh dear God, you would have thought this was the stupidest thing anyone had ever done. I got yelled at by my “mom” here in village for about 10 minutes, then her 13 year daughter, then her husband, then one of my coworkers. The tailors had to get it explained to them that I was white and didn’t know what I was doing and therefore washed the pagne. I tried to tell them why I did it but apparently because it isn’t nice and neat and starchy now it is harder to cut and sew and so in their opinion I was just stupid and they didn’t want to hear about why I did it. I felt like a 5 year old – but then again I feel like that a lot here when people lecture me about why the things I am doing are wrong. When I try to explain that there is a different between WRONG and different they often just smile and nod. It’s frustration but, petite a petite (little by little) I suppose I need to earn their trust. But, I now know that when you are getting clothes made en brousse DO NOT pre wash pagnes. Therefore, I don’t plan to get much made en brousse that needs to fit well because, well, it won’t. Go figure.

Finally, today (Wed the 25th of Feb) I was sitting on my couch reading a book about the 1918 influenza (don’t judge, it’s really interesting) and I heard these kids making lots of noise and “playing” around in my backyard. It didn’t bother me. To be honest, I kind of like the sound of kids playing. But, all of a sudden one of them hits my wall with something. I stick my head out the window and ask them to stop and not touch the house. They scatter away quickly but return about 3 minutes later. I let them stay because again, they aren’t bothering me and they seem to be playing nicely now. Well, about 10 minutes more go by and suddenly a giant rock is thrown onto my roof (which is metal) and makes a huge noise. I am done letting them play. I quietly put on my shoes and open my door and make my way to the back of the house. I just stand there until they seem me. They are throwing rocks up into this tree near the back of my house and trying to knock down these seed pods. About 30 seconds later one of them notices me and freezes in the act. The rest follow, terrified. I said (in Fufulde) NO! (Kai) GO! (Moof) and they scatter tres rapid (very quickly). Sadly for them, they leave there bucket of seeds. So, I know that they plan to come back and continue said activity as soon as I am back inside so I take there bucket and bring it into my concession. None of them were brave enough to come ask my for the bucket and they came back to find it gone and went home. Hopefully, that will be the last of the giant rocks hitting my roof. Last thing I need is them to throw one that breaks a giant hole through my roof just in time for hot season and then rainy season. No thanks children! Ah life in Africa, you never cease to be entertaining.

Okay well you should all be caught up now on my month of February. The heat has commenced. In March, I will do my first animation on AIDS and sexually transmitted diseases to the middle schoolers here in town. My external hard drive got brought back to Cameroon for me. All in all, February was pretty great! Hope ya’ll had a great month too!

As Courtney eloquantly put it - I am finally "back in a city with a Hilton". This is true. The one and only one in Cameroon but yes, I am. Now, don't get confused about the city - it is nothing like an American city and still has many roads that aren't paved (the main ones are but the side streets aren't). But, I just got back from eating Chinese food. I cannot describe to you the happiness that ensued when I bit into that spring roll and my eggplant dish. It was amazing. It was such a group of flavors that I hadn't had in 5 months and so my body was happy. But, the best part of the experince here in Yaounde had to be the amazing supermarket I got to go in. Now, this supermarket is no better (and to be honest much smaller probably) than any grocery store that you would go to in America BUT compared to the open air markets or small boutiques that are available in the North it was honestly slightly overwheleming. Now, you would all be proud that I contained myself. I will be going back tomorrow to buy one box of cereal for the 14 hour train ride back but one my first trip I kept it down to 8000 CFA (about 16 bucks) and bought balsamic vinegar, mustard, conditioner (not really available up North and I am getting low on the stuff Sarah - the girl I replaced - was kind enough to leave me), haribo cola flavored gummies, and blue cheese. I am planning all of tomorrow around when I can consume the Chinese leftovers and blue cheese. Don't judge - you cannot understand my excitement. I wasn't able to attend the happy hour at the Hilton because I have spent too much money already this "paycheck" but I plan to save a bit for my next trip here because it sounds awesome.

I have been productive while here. I have met lots of volunteers in the southern part of Cameroon. I have gotten lots of administration stuff done - which is great cause I doubt I will be here more than 4 times a year! All in all this is a successful trip for me so that is nice.

People in the south are a bit different. They aren't as friendly as the northerners (in general) and I have to be super careful not to throw Fulfulde in the mix. Crazy that last time I was in this city I didn't speak a lick of French let alone Fulfulde and now I am speaking French (granted not awesome French but functional) and trying not to throw in my random Fulfulde words like I do in the north. Here in Yaounde there are also no mottos like there are in all the cities up north. There are taxis. And, these taxis randomly stop along the road while you stand there trying to get your attention and you yell out where you want to go and they either stay there (in which case your answer is yes, get in) or they say nothing and drive away (which is their way of telling you no). It's hard to get use to when you are use to the mottos who the only thing that you have to debate about (using words not just yell/drive away action) is whether your trip is 100 or 150 CFA. I can handle that. Also, I feel so out of it because I have NO idea about the food here. Nothing on the menu means anything to me! Up north I have learned most of the foods and can navigate most menus/ladies who sell food on the street. Here - not so much because it is all new foods - but I did decide for lunch to not get pizza or a hamburger but to eat some southern Cameroonian food and had some great black sauce with catfish. I was quite pleased. I know I talk a lot about food but food is big deal for me here! So, ya'll can all deal with it!

Also, it is strange to see all the men in western style clothes (not the booboos I see them in up north - think Muslim robes with basically scrubs out of the same material) and the women here don't all where pagne like they do up north. It is just less conservative all in all. I mean I think it is different in terms of the women whereing pagne if you go en brousse to the villages but here in the big city - you see lots of women in western clothes. Up in the north, it is rare to see that even in the provincial captials. Food wise and culture wise the south seems like a different country in many ways - and it is much more humid and a bit cooler too! I look forward to getting to travel about in the south and see what this humid/wetlands/jungle area is like.

Alright, signing off because I need to give other people a chance on the computer and get a decent night sleep since tomorrow night I will be sleeping on a train. Also, time to change the laundry - that's right my clothes are all being washed in a washing machine and dried with a dryer - no bucket wash and clothes line for me this week - I am so excited for warm, soft clothes! I am telling you guys, it is the little things in life....

Okay so at last weeks provincial meeting, I got elected to be the North Province (actually i think we are now the North region but whatever) representative who serves on the VAC (volunter advisory counsil). So, that meant that I had to come to a meeting in Yaounde the next weekend! So, I am currently in Yaounde (where there is decent internet - hence the 20 pictures I just put up!)!

Not much went on the few days I was in Bibemi between the provincial meeting and leaving to come to Yaounde - it's a long trip that takes a number of days if you do it at a normal pace. My wall got finished! That was exciting. But, apparently the price of the new door wasn't included in the price of the wall soooo my guardian and I are fighting over the 4000 CFA that he signed a paper saying was included but now claims wasn't. It's only 8 dollars but it is the principle of the thing! I don't like prices changing on me no matter by how much.

Thursday after eating lunch at the Adoumri market with Phil I headed into Garuoa to spend the night. I bought some cheese and crackers and treated myself to that fabulous dairy filled meal. Despite that fact that I arrived in Garoua by 4pm to check the mail - they wouldn't let me check the mail. So, I went back Friday morning only to find that all the packages were for PHIL! But, I was a good friend (as Kauleen had been to me) and brought Phil's packages to the office on the motto and will later bring them to him in Adoumri. I am hoping when I pass through Garoua on my way back I will have some packages in Garoua - I know they are on route!

Friday morning, along with the VAC representative from the Extreme North named Fleurange, I traveld down to the Adamoua (the cooler province)on a bush taxi. Our bush taxi got chased by Baboons at some point but other than that it was fairly uneventful. Strange how normal the travel here has become to me - I don't even want to right about that 5 hour bus trip. I did get to buy some papaya from some kids that was pretty amazing! Then, when I got to Ngaoundere (which I am sure I a misspelling)I got to see some of my stage mates and eat the most amazing street meat in Cameroon. While I know I haven't tried all the street meat in the country - this was amazing and I ate soooo much of it. Beer and meat was a fabulous dinner for me! I will have to do it again on the way back up!

Saturday we did't have to leave on the train until 6pm but we picked up our tickets (we splurged for the sleeper cars) and I ate some more meat with a cream sauce - though I was going to die of happiness! Anyway, enough of meat. I managed to super glue my headphones back together (again! things here have a short shelf life) and bought another whiskey bottle full of peanuts for the train - that was my snake on the first train ride and you cannot break tradition. We arrived at the train about 20 minutes early and found our sleeper compartment - there were 3 of us and 4 beds so we would be sharing with one random Cameroonian man. The window in our room didn't open which made me sad but hey - everything cannot go right I suppose! But, the window in the hallway did and I spent the first 2 hours of the trip watching the sun set out of that window while listening to my ipod. Love it. I was actually able to sleep a tiny bit with the sleeper car (unlike the first time in 1st class when I didn't sleep a wink). We stopped a number of times during the night for a bit but all in all it was good. Every time we stopped people would approach the train trying to sell you things and you could almost track the progress of the trip by what people were selling. In the Adamoua it's mostly just honey. As you get further south you see oranges, bananas, and batons (so type of Cameroonian food that I don't yet like). I finally got out of bed around 5:20 and was back maning my window waiting for the sun to rise (which I knew it would circa 6am as we are so close to the equator. The sky was purple and then gradually gained color. We stopped for about an hour from about 6-7 and I got to watch the sunrise, and take pictures of the whole thing while many other people got off the train. At some point a lady came around selling Palm wine (the local brew down south like bil bil is in the north) and so I tried some Palm wine out of a tangi (water) bottle. It was milky looking but not tasting. I liked it but I prefer bil bil so far. But, I will certainly have to try it a few more times. As I stood there on the stopped train watching the sun rise and drinking palm wine I was super content and realized I don't mind the train ride so much. It can be beautiful and fun.

Today it rained in Yaounde. You cannot understand how big of a deal that is for me or how it took me a bit to realize what the sound was unless you also haven't heard or seen rain in 5 months. It's so much cooler and wetter down here than up North where I am. It's strange to me that the north of somewhere can be warmer and than the south since I am use to the climate patterns in America but Africa is a whole other ball game. When I got the the Peace Corps house in Yaounde (called the Case but pronounced Cause) I got to take my first hot shower in 5 months - also was a huge deal for me and something I enjoyed more than I could ever explain over a computer. Alright, time for me to find some food for myself here in Yaounde. But, since I have internet for the next few days I will try to write again while I am here! Enjoy the pictures!

For those of you who are curious, the title of this blog means "I am learning Fufulde slowly", which I am. But, I am learning it! You pronounce Fufulde exactly the way it looks - it isn't really a written language so I just wrote it out how I would say it. Exciting news in that department – I made my first purchase using Fulfulde. I was trying to buy “kitchen pagne” and the guy wanted me to pay 3200 (borroro tati et temerre didi) CFA but I got him down to 3000 (borroro tati) by speaking to him in Fulfulde. Woot. Way to go me. So, I did get the gas and I did get the bottle home. But, let me just say that riding a motto with a driver, me, and a large gas tank is interesting. I did make it home safe and sound though with the gas I needed to cook with so – all in all a success I say!

Saturday night I didn’t sleep much for some reason and so to stay awake and insure that I would be good and tired on Sunday night I spent Sunday cooking. I went crazy with the cooking. I decided to make all the things I had wanted to make but hadn’t had the time or energy to attempt. I made (keep in mind all of this is from SCRATCH) yogurt, cheese, fudge, chili, and cornbread. The cornbread involved finding corn to be ground in the grinder into corn flower. Yea, I mean FROM SCRATCH. But, I am happy to report they were all successes and Mike and I happily ate them for a few days. I will definitely be making them again. The cheese tasted kind of like ricotta. The yogurt is like European yogurt – unsweetened and thicker. The chili was with beans but no meat (Yankee chili according to both Sam and the PC Chad cookbook I was using as a basis for my recipe – but of course didn’t listen to).

My wall is making progress. Everyday more and more of it is built. It is being made from mud. Apparently I have to coat it in something so that it won’t die during the rainy season. I am currently trying to decide whether to pay about $120 for them to cover it with cement/sand combo or to pay about 25 dollars to have them cover it with something else that I don’t yet understand what it is. My English construction vocab isn’t great – let alone my French or Fulfulde.

Tuesday was a huge day here. It was the “Fete de Obama”. I wore an Obama shirt around all day and got tons of complements and well as a number of people asking me if they could have the shirt when I leave! Haha. People had taped pictures of Obama to their mottos. American flags showed up around town (hand made and inaccurate with the stars and stripes count). Obama posters were around as well. It was hilarious, they were so excited. I have no TV or cable so I didn’t get to hear the speech or anything but I heard about it from my family and heard it was pretty great. People here were trying to find it on the radio but the signal wasn’t great that day or something. Anyway, thank goodness I know I can watch it on you tube next time I am at a place with internet that will handle you tube (ie when I get back to a Western country).

So apparently this issue of sleep was going to last all week. Tuesday night I also didn’t sleep well and so Wednesday I was in a funny (lack of sleep induced) mood. I went en brousse with the health center to a new village I hadn’t ever been before. Immediately children started to direct their attention to me. By the time the childhood vaccine consultations began I had a crowd of easily 60 children (between ages 4 and 16) watching me. The older people in town tried to chase them off with sticks but these children wouldn’t be chased off. I tried to say that they weren’t bother me but figured they might bother the women whose babies were getting shots so I didn’t say anything. But, I did start making funny faces at them – I would grin suddenly, make a fish face, stick out my tongue, etc. They would laugh hysterically and hide their faces and then wait for me to do it again. It was adorable. But, having a group of people stare at you like that makes you want to do crazy things. I wanted to do something crazy like put on my motto helmet and chase them around or something. Start yelling and waving my arms. You know? Perhaps I was just that out of it from the lack of sleep. So, when I got home I was still in a weird mood and decided to rearrange furniture. Well, first I just decided to clean this traditional bed that was in my living room. So, I dragged it outside and used a can of insecticide (to kill the numerous large spiders that lived under it) and a bucket of soapy bleach water and an old rag and went to work. Once it was clean and already on the porch, I decided to see what the futon and chair that were currently on the porch looked like in the living room so I cleaned them off and dragged them inside. I have decided I like them and left them inside. Moving all this furniture was interesting though and it was super hot and so I was glad I had left overs I could eat for dinner!

Oh, can I just say – salad season has begun. Overnight lettuce is now everywhere! I am super happy about this and have been eating large salads every night! I am getting creative with the dressing though since I am all out here. I like to keep it interesting though!

One day after work, the chef of the health centers daughter came home with me to watch a movie and make ice in my freezer that she was going to sell at the market (or something like that). So, during the middle of “My Best Friends Wedding” she gets up and goes into my bathroom and I suppose started looking at all the things I had. She brought out two things to ask me about. One was mascara. I didn’t know the French words for makeup or eyelashes so I said “it’s for your eyes and then proceeded to put some on to show her). That seemed to satisfy her in terms of mascara. She came back out like 2 minutes later with item number two – a tampon. She had taken it out of the wrapper and was asking me what it was. Of course I also don’t have the French vocab for that (and I am not sure she did either as French is also her second language). I told her it was for women to use every month when they were bleeding. Nope, that didn’t mean anything to her. She is 13 so perhaps she doesn’t need that knowledge yet, but I doubt it. I brought out a pad to see if she knew that that was. Nope. Then I brought out the tampon box which had French on it and tried to explain it to her with their phrases – Nope. Finally, I decided to use the all encompassing phrase “it is an American thing”. That did it, she was satisfied with that answer. Bizzare to think that a 13 year old girl would have no concept of what that item was. Made me think of the airport incident with the security men and Courtney. Ha. I laugh just thinking about me showing him what the item in question was (they were crazy about security after 9-11 and some of those security people were just stupid!).

On Thursday I head to the big market in Adoumri to pick up a few things I still needed for my house. This trip is suppose to take 30 minutes max. It took me 90 minutes to get there because 7 minutes outside of Bibemi we broke down (something with the front drivers side tire which is always the problem tire in bush taxis it seems). So, we had to wait til some car came around that was willing to take us. Finally, an hour later one came. It was about 95 and no shade and not super fun – but , I got there in one piece so no harm done. I had known to bring water (you always bring water when you travel, even for short trips). At the market I made an exciting discovery – WORLD CUP PAGNE. That’s right. They call it FIFA, which made me laugh, but I’ve officially seen it now. I know it was just the first of what I am sure will be many more World Cup pagne’s but I am excited to start getting crazy things make to wear during the World Cup!

Alright, I will be posting this tomorrow when I go into Garoua for our provincial meeting. But, before I end this blog I must brag about my sister for a second. She got TWO internships – one with the state house in Boston and one with American Public Television. Also, she got accepted to the DC program so she will spend next fall in DC. Way to go Courtney my dear! I am so proud! Alright, hope everyone else is as excited about the new president as the people in Bibemi are (or heck, at least ½ as excited would suffice)! Lets hope I have some packages waiting for me in Garoua – I think Kauleen (my new favorite person) may have brought me up some from Yaounde!!!!! WOOO HOOO. I love mail (hint hint) even cards and letters are awesome so start writing people!

Mike pointing at his house in Bibemi

Cotton Truck in Bibemi

My house in Bibemi - notice the new wall is being build around the old one

newly named Obama Coiffure in Garoua

Obama shirts being sold in the Garoua marche

Long time no write. Okay so what’s new in the life of Aubrey in Cameroon. Let’s see. Well, first off, everyone note the new address. That is the address you should use for letters and packages. It is much closer to where I actually live (as in not a 3 day trip but rather a 2 hour trip) so I will get these letters and packages much sooner. Now, packages are expensive to send but letters aren’t so no excuses for not writing letters! Okay, moving quickly along, I have been working weekdays at the health center. It is a pretty sweet job. I give polio vaccines, vitamin A supplementations, figured out that the blood pressure device I am using is for people who are left handed and that makes my life much easier now – ha! Monday’s are prenatal consultations, Tuesday’s are childhood vaccines, Wendesday I go en brosse (out to really rural areas). So one random Tuesday, one of the women at the health center was trying to pinpoint her child’s birthday (or at least ballpark it) and her response was that her child was born right after the “big group of nasaras arrived in Pitoa” – hey glad to do my part in keeping time here in Bibemi! That made me laugh.

Mike and I bought new refrigerators for our houses. This wouldn’t be a big deal in the US (or Europe) as you would simply have this large item delivered to your house. No such deal here in Cameroon. So, (and keep in mind when I say I bought a refrigerator that it didn’t buy a full sized one but a mini one that is larger than a dorm fridge but not by much) Mike and I purchased these refrigerators, they were put into their large boxes and that was that. We were stuck with them in the middle of the grand marche in Garoua. Well, we convinced the store owner who we bought these fridges from that he should include in the price of the fridge a car ride to the Peace Corps office in Garoua (about a 5 minute car ride). He agreed to this and included that ride (which was rumored to be about 2000 CFA – or $4) in the price of the fridge. Little victories people, little victories. So, now Mike and I had these monstrosities at the PC office but that certain wasn’t our houses and we still had to figure out how to get them back to Bibemi. There aren’t cars to Bibemi, there are mottos, and as much fun as riding a motto with a refrigerator would be (they would have been willing to do it – anything in this country can go on a motto – and I mean anything) we opted against it as a concept. So, Mike had been brilliant enough to get the phone number of the guy who drove us out to Bibemi the first time (when we moved there) and so we gave him a call and Mike successfully set up this car to bring us to Bibemi the next day at lunch. Sadly, we were going to have to pay a lot to do this – but, that is life and honestly I didn’t see any other way to realistically get these fridges home. So, once we knew we were getting a car, we bought all the large things we knew we needed. Mike bought 2 giant garbage cans to store water in. You don’t have trash cans here because well, you just throw trash on the ground – sad, but true. I road a motto from downtown Garoua to the PC office (on the outskirts of Garoua) and that was quite a site – people laughed at the nasara with the crazy stuff on her motto. The next morning when I was buying sheets for this couch I have a man who works in the store was wearing a Southeastern Louisiana University t-shirt. This might not mean anything to most of you reading it but if you are my mother or grandmother it will – they both went to this university at some point. It is a small university in the small town in Southeast Louisiana where I grew up and lived for 14 years. I didn’t take a picture because he was at work and I thought that would be rude but my grandmother has strongly requested one so I am not on a mission to go back and find him again with the shirt on. I have two years to do it I suppose! Anyway, we made quite a seen entering Bibemi again with a car loaded down with all this giant stuff.

The next day we went a raided the furniture warehouse of things left by the NGO who’s house I live in. I got a few new things and moved around some furniture in my house and Mike took a few things too. Then, I began to settle in with my new things and my new set up. I am still not done nesting but then again, are you ever really done doing that. I feel like anyplace I lived I am constantly changing things I don’t like and moving things around and whatnot – perhaps I am just really restless.

Soon after we arrived home with all this new stuff I started to feel sick. Sadly, I got nothing cool. No malaria. No schisto. Just a plain old fashion sinus infection. But, of course that is also fairly complicated here. I went to the hospital in Bibemi, the doctor wasn’t there, some guy who works there with the Minister of Public Health offered to see me and write me a prescription (at this point it was obvious what I had) and so he did. I am allergic to penicillin though and this of course got complicated. They have no antibiotic other than penicillin in Bibemi right now. Great, awesome. That meant I had to go back to Garoua on another 2 hour motto ride (2 hours each way, not total) and find erythromycin. But, I did this. On the way I stopped at the big market in Adoumri and bought some food and all that. Carrots are currently in season (down south, they don’t grow up here) and they suddenly have popped onto the radar here. Honestly one day they just showed up. It is the strangest thing. I also saw a one legged man riding a bicycle and props to him because that looked difficult. I shared the road to Garoua with many a cotton trucks because right now it is cotton picking time. I love that I know when cotton picking time is. I am not aware of that in America. Garoua was a success though and I was back here the same day.

Once I got back and had the medicine I needed I started on fulfilling the promise I had made to Non Kong about making him the cookies. So, Sunday I made cookies for him. I made 1.5 batches of cookies. You might wonder about the .5 of a batch. That would be because I ran out of gas for my oven/stove. Want to know where the only place you can get gas is – GAROUA! Literally 36 hours after returning to Garoua I already have a reason I must return shortly. Well, at this point I cannot go Sunday because it’s too late and I have work Mon, Tues, and Weds so I will go Thursday. Mike and I ate at his house all this week – it worked out just fine but was sad because I couldn’t have tea in the morning. Also, since this week is a full moon, when I walk home at night the sky is so bright because of the moon that I don’t need to use my flashlight until I am in my eucalyptus forest! Again, I have never in my life been so aware of the cycles of the moon as I am here but honestly – it makes a huge difference in how bright the sky is at night! Oh, did I mention that one night Mike and I were at my house cooking dinner (the day before the gas ran out) and suddenly my cat starts dragging something large across the porch. She has left me rat tails and mice heads before as gifts so I know she is a hunter but this didn't look like an animal. Well, it wasn't an animal, it was a giant bat! She had taken down a bat and was dragging it over to her dishes to kill. Mike and I ran outside to see what it was and noticed it was a bat. I swept it off my porch onto my dirt front yard. A few minutes later the cat had the bat back on the porch, dead and headless and on my door mat as a gift to me. Mike then picked up the now dead bat and threw it over the fense. Two mornings later the partly petrified bat was on my mat again! Guess the cat really likes me!

One thing about the medicine I forgot to mention, the doctor didn’t give me any guidelines about how much to take, how often to take it, and how much to buy. So, I looked up the adult dose for erythromycin in the book “Where There is no Doctor” because at that moment in time that applied to me. The PC doctor is on call during the weekend but this wasn’t an emergency so I didn’t bother them. The book said the adult dose was 500 mg 4x a day. So, that is what I meant to take but honestly 4 times a day with food is hard to pull of when you eat 3 meals a day and spacing the pills out means that you need to wake up in the middle of the night to take the 4th pill and that just doesn’t happen often. So, between Saturday and Monday I took 4 pills only once and 3 each other day. Turns out, 3 was the dose I needed. I called the PC doctor on Monday and talked with him and he said I needed to take 3 pills each day for 10 days. Awesome. I had only bought 2 sheets of pills and that would only last me about 6.5 days. Yet another reason I couldn’t put off going to Garoua. So, tomorrow morning I will be meeting Phil at 8am at the Adoumri market and we will be heading to Garoua. Thursday is the cheapest and easiest day to get to Garoua because thanks to Adoumri’s large cattle market (and by large I mean largest in Central Africa) there are cars to Garoua. At least I won’t have to take my giant gas tank that is about half the size of me on the motto with me both ways! Wish me luck with this adventure!

Alright, in the provincial capital now at a computer. Let me just say that getting here with the giant gas tank was far from fun or easy, but I did it. I arrive here only to hear that THEY ARE OUT OF GAS IN GAROUA! What the hell? Honestly, I almost threw something. But, instead I just brough my gas tank to the PC office and I am going to go see if I can get the story about the gas situation while I am not carrying around a 35 pound gas tank (that I already carried for 20 minutes this morning while walking to the vans). Once again, wish me luck.

Oh, side note. Some of you have been asking me what exactly a motto is. I will try to get a picture up – if possible a picture of me, the driver, and my giant gas tank sharing a motto – but it is basically a small motorcycle. Bigger than a scooter but smaller than a Harley. I seats two people fairly comfortably and 3 if you are willing to swish. I have seen about 6 Cameroonians share one (I honestly don’t know how) and also a driver with a table flipped upside down with a cow inside it and a man sitting on the cow. Mottos are the only form of transport once you get outside the big cities and aren’t traveling from one large city to another (in which case there are “buses”) and therefore Cameroonians have learned to fit any and everything on these little guys. Also, the roads here aren’t paved outside the major cities (and all the roads in a major city aren’t paved, only the really big ones) so riding a motto off route on these bumpy dirt paths when they are loaded down with things is the reason I wear a motto helmet each time I ride (that and it is one of the 5 rules that if you break they kick you out of PC no questions asked). Alright, hope that explains the motto thing a bit more!

One more side note, can I just say that the world of PC is extremely small. Well, I suppose the world itself is small and PC is just an especially small group within it. So, I was looking at my friend Sarah's (who is a fellow PCV and Tulane MI) blog. She is serving in Mozambique. As I looked at her pictures one of the girls in the photos stood out to me and I realized I knew this girl. That's right, a girl named Gracey who lived in the same small town in Louisiana that I did so many years ago is now a PCV in Mozambique with Sarah. It is seriously a small world.

Old Car next to a mud hut with a kid playing the tire game - typical of my quartier in Pitoa (this is outside my homestay house)

Me with the cookstoves in my pagne dress

So I made a cook stove this week with mud. An improved cook stove to be more accurate. And, when I say that I made one, I mean that I attempted to make one, but I sucked pretty badly compared to the local women who showed us how to make one. She made a beautiful, perfect cook stove and made it look easy. Then, I made a mini version of something that a 10 year old would bring home from pottery class – but I got the basic idea down and I have 2 years to perfect it. I do have pictures of them that I will try to post. I feel I need to share this experience because it was very interesting, amusing, embarrassing, etc.

In French class this week we did riddles (enigmas in French) one day. Surprisingly many riddles do cross cultural barriers. For instance, the “what is black, white, and read (or red since they sound the same when you say them) all over” has a French counterpart. The answer is of course newspaper (or journal in French). As does “what first walks on 4 legs then 2 legs then 3 legs”. Kauleen and I introduced our French teacher to the “a child and father are in a car accident and get taken to separate hospitals, the doctor at the hospital with the child says that they cannot operate on the kid because it is their child – how is this possible?” She didn’t know and we had to tell her it was because the doctor was the mother! When I tried to play these enigmas with my host brother that night I got to the one about “what is black, white and read all over” he knew the answer was journal. I then tried to explain to him that in English the word for red and read sound the same and so in America many children answer “a sunburned zebra” to this riddle. He found this extremely amusing – which it is. Keep in mind that all of this is occurring in French and feel free to be impressed by how much French I have learned since being here – I am a bit impressed with myself to be honest. I have a huge test to see if I have reached my required “intermediate high” level in a few hours and so I have my fingers crossed. My host brother has wished me “bonne chance” (good luck) and so we shall see I suppose. I won’t know until Monday.

One night over dinner my host brother and I got to discussing recipes for the local food. He explained to me the dishes that he thought I would be able to figure out and when I asked about how to make these coconut balls they sell he told me it was too complicated for me. That made me laugh. He is probably right but I will try nonetheless. That is the things about Americans, we like to try and see for ourselves before we accept defeat. But, I know now how to make ham ham and fullery sauce and peanut sauce. That should hold me for awhile.

My trainer told me yesterday that he was impressed with me and my willingness to try all the different foods off the street or whatnot. He said he hadn’t ever seen a volunteer jump into the food like I have. I suppose that was a complement and took it as one. I figure, the sooner I figure out good food that is here and how to make it, the happier I will be. I told him about my love of piemont (peppers and spicy food) and he seemed fairly impressed with my stomachs ability to handle the spice and food. Apparently the majority of Americans that people here have come in contact with have weak stomachs and don’t enjoy food with copious amounts of piemont in it the way I do. I have started to be known in Pitoa for my stomach and experimentation with food. For instance, the women who sell ham ham get upset with me when I don’t have it for lunch. The children who sell the sesame seed balls know me and what I am buying and are ready for me. The children who sell the coconut balls sell them out of a closed pot you cannot see through – when I walked down the street they removed the lid to show me that they had them, knowing what I was looking for. The omelet man was shocked when he was being a jerk and took a huge scoop of piemont and was pretending to dump it on my food (after I asked for more piemont) and I told him to drop it and he did and then I ate it and he was shocked. It was hilarious to me.

This past weekend we all went to a huge soccer game in Garoua. It was the finals for this inter Africa cup. The two best regional teams in African were facing off and one of them happened to be from the province I will be living! The Coton Sport team from Garoua is one of the two best regional teams in Africa – pretty cool right? Well, the other team was from Egypt and they beat us. Egypt always beats us. But, the game itself was so entertaining. They gave all of us these awful marigold yellow tshirts that we had to wear. Then, two guard stood on either side of our section – real “immersion” type situation right? Well our group was quite the commotion. One of us (the boy who will later be my post mate) got the entire stadium to do the wave. Multiple times. It was so funny. It may have been televised so try to you tube that if you get bored. I would love to know how far this made it around the world. The final score of the game was something like 3-1 but it came down to this stupid penalty kick that gave them the lead and took the steam out of Coton Sport. Prior to the game I went to the market and attempted to find a jersey and realized this is a complicated process with many options, many different styles, many different qualities, etc. I have started the process of shopping around and I will eventually find one that fits all of my qualifications I am sure of it.

Found a store in Garoua that sells cheese and wine. Last weekend directly after finding this I ate a block of swiss cheese, a box of crackers made with olive oil and rosemary, and drank a bottle of South African Merlot. Be jealous. It was the best thing in the world and I ate it with my hands at a bar with two other volunteers. It is pretty much awesome and I know call it the magic store – a name I had previously conserved for a store here in Pitoa that sells vashe (the cheese that doesn’t need refrigeration).

So today we have our “final” language exam. Cara and I took bets yesterday that we would go last because this seems to be the general rule with language tests. Low and behold Cara and I arrive at 7:30 to find that our exams are the last and will occur at 12:30 and 12:00, respectively. You would think they would work on switching it up a bit. But, no, you would be wrong. Anyway, wish me luck – time to watch a movie and consume a lot of peanuts in preparation for my exam!

Today I saw some truly bizarre things on a motto. I saw 6 – yes count them 6 – grown men on one motto. While that was truly amazing and highly entertaining, the most amazing thing I saw by far was a man driving a motto with a table overturned on the back and in the table was a live cow and on that cow was another man just sitting. Seriously – how did they get that cow into that table and onto that motto? I cannot picture that occurring.

Okay so some things appear to be universal. Sibling rivalry. I have seen a number of siblings here in Africa bicker the same way I do with my siblings and the same way I witness countless other people in the states bicker with theirs. Love of cold beer. That transcends all cultures I believe. Curiosity. I think all people are curious about things they don’t know much about or understand – like the children here with us.

So I have had some fun this week experimenting with random street food and the market. There seem to be many possibilities for food here if you are willing to put enough time and effort into the process of experimenting. Rice beignets could make an English muffin like base for a personal pizza. Parle G cookies could be crushed up to make a pie crust. These types of things. Also, I am super excited to have time to get to experiment with food soon. I have found some winning foods on the streets of Pitoa. The bakkaroo (crunchy sticks of peanut butter basically) are rather tasty. This beautiful ginger candy has appeared lately. Spaghetti omelets with beans. Fullery juice (which tastes like hibiscus) with a bit of ginger. Fresh peanut butter – which apparently I am suppose to boil before eating but haven’t yet done that. Rice beignets I am partial too. This street soup called Ham Ham that is basically fullery and peanuts (which are cooked to taste kind of like tofu) – this Italian wedding soup with peanut like tofu instead of meatballs. The food situation is getting better and will certainly get much better once I can cook for myself and control the amount of cotton oil and magi that is going into my food. Right now I cannot and so I have just given up being healthy.

So exciting news, most of the trainees are going to the final regional African soccer match on Sunday. Coton Sport (The best team in Cameroon which happens to hail from Garoua – my provincial capital) will be playing the other best regional team in African who happens to hail from Egypt. I am super excited and think I will celebrate by buying a jersey to wear to the game. Score and such to come.

Okay so Christmas presents, don’t expect them. I have yet to figure out the mail situation. I have been sending letters slowly but surely and don’t worry if you haven’t received one – I got more envelopes and plan to send more soon. I will send things to people as I find and buy them and once I figure out the mail system. Know that I love you all and am thinking about your potential birthday or Christmas presents. I will text you for sure!

Let’s see. Since site visit not much has happened. We are all pretty over the whole training situation and ready to get out there to our villages and start some projects. That being said, I think I for one am also equally terrified of being on my own in my village and having to speak French with everyone and terrified that I will suck at my job as a community health promoter, that no one will understand my French, etc. But, petite a petite as they say in French (little by little in English). I have my next French exam next Friday and while they claim it is our last we all know there is a secret one right before swearing in for all those of us who still need it. I am learning more and more French but it is still hard as hell to communicate health messages.

This week we got to go to a local school and first observe a health class and then teach a short health lesson. The health class we observed was super interesting. It was suppose to be about communicable disease with a focus on palu (malaria). The information they learned was learned verbatim from all the students who could tell you things like that you take quinine for malaria and that it is spread by the anopheles mosquito (things I doubt most health classes in college would expect all students to know in America). But, at the same time these students didn’t know much about malaria life cycle or how this knowledge they had applied to them or impacted their chances of acquiring the disease. School in Cameroon is extremely focused on memorization. When the teacher makes a note on the board under a certain heading all the students break out the notebooks and copy word for word the paragraph, then all the students memorize this exact paragraph and can spit it back at you. No critical thinking is done. The whole time we were at the school many students raised their hands to answer questions (verbatim stating things they had memorized previously) but not one question was asked by a student. I was pleased to see that both girls and boys seemed to contribute in school fairly equally. To be called on they raised their hands and snapped – it was bizarre. For our session we chose the message of hand-washing. Short and simple. We first did two skits (one with good sanitation practices and one with bad). Then we asked them about the two skits and to tell us the differences and what such. After analyzing these skits we taught them a song (Si tu veux le bon sante lave le mains – if you want good health wash your hands). It was entertaining beyond belief. Then, we played a good game of telephone (which we taught them) with health messages like “wash your hands after you go to the latrine”. It was certainly an interesting experience. Keep in mind we did all this in French and I understood it enough to at least write about it!

The other impressive French thing I did this week was during our community groups. We were doing an animation (which is the PC buzz word for presentation that is interactive) about the fecal oral route and diarrheal diseases. I was in charge of facilitating the discussion about which diseases were diarrheal diseases and whether they were viruses, bacteria, parasites, or worms. It was interesting. Then, I was also in charge of making the oral rehydration solution with them. I did manage to get both of these messages across in French. Quite a personal accomplishment might I add. Other than that we make a poster about the fecal-oral route and how each leg of it could be prevented. Then we talked about what type of diarrhea needs treatment. Super fun and lots of talk about poop and diarrhea – that seems to be a PC theme.

Still no packages. Apparently there have been problems with the embassy pouch and apparently the mail man who gets to mail from the embassy and brings it to PC has been sick. Anyway, I probably won’t get anything for at least 2 weeks since that is the next time I know of someone coming up here from the south. No one got anything this week and all of us were expecting something. We were fairly sad but I suppose that’s life here and we all are just trying to adjust our expectations with the mail system. But honestly, no one even got a letter. Bogus.

Alright well not much else to report here on the Africa front. Found a magazine that is published weekly here in French that talks about world affairs that I will be buying to practice French and try to stay connected to the world. Also, listen to BBC focus on Africa fairly regularly now. BBC here is hilarious and does things like holds English lessons. It does the job though – fills me with basic worldly information. Miss all of you and send me emails and blog comments! Two double fist pumps to Obama – which is all we seem to get here (with at least5 daily Obama shout outs). Bye for now!

Sunset on the road to Adoumori, with cows.

Me biking around Pitoa

Baby being weighted in Bibemi!

Site visit was this past week. This was the first time I got to spend the night in my new village, meet my future co-workers, go bar hoping in my new town, meet my new cat, meet my new neighbors, go to my new local market, actually help cook Cameroonian food, etc. All in all, a huge success I think. There are going to be 3 of us in the Bibemi district of Northern Cameroon – me, Mike, and Phil. Mike and I will be living in Bibemi and Phil in a neighboring town of Adoumori. Mike is an agro-forestry volunteer and Phil and I are both health. Alright so the 3 of us leave with the two volunteers who are currently living in the Bibemi district, Sarah and Andrew. Sarah is a health volunteer in Bibemi and Andrew is ag in Adoumori. We couldn’t procure a ride on a truck that was leaving anytime soon and rent a whole car was rather pricey sooooo we took mottos the whole way. Now this is only about 30 kms as the crow files but it took about 2 hours on mottos. In part it took this long because Sarah’s motto blew a tire, but mostly it took this long because you cannot go that fast on this dirt roads. But, it was a beautiful ride – it looks so very African in this part of the country. Honestly they could have filmed the Lion King on this route, if the Lion King was a filmed movie to begin with. Phil and Andrew left us in Adoumori and Phil would rejoin us in two days for the election and to do protocol. Mike, Sarah, and I arrived in Bibemi and ate some mac and cheese for dinner. Sarah was nice enough to share a package of her American sent mac and cheese cheese powder with us!

Monday was our first full day of site visit. Made an omelet on my stove (yes I have an oven, stove, and fridge) for breakfast that was fairly delicious. Then, Sarah took me to the health center I will be working at/with for the next two years and I got to observe and pseudo help with (as in write down the weight and blood pressure of the pregnant women when the nurse said them in French) prenatal consultations. I just helped with the in processing part. It was great to get to experience this with Sarah there to translate everything. My French is still far to poor to communicate much with people. Also, most women coming to these consultations don’t speak French (or much French) but rather they only speak Fulfulde. So, I need to get on learning that too! It was really interesting to get to observe that and got me excited for the next two years. After work (which is in the morning) we ate at the house of the head of the health center. His wife is a great cook and a super nice women who speaks French and made us chicken (which is very rare) and cous cous and it was delicious. I am very much looking forward to getting to know enough French to communicate with her and learn to cook some of her dishes. After lunch we headed back to Sarah’s house for some afternoon/heat of the day relaxing. We hit up the “veggie” market in Bibemi (a slightly expanded version of the daily market but smaller than the weekly Friday market). I got to try corn beignets there and we bought the stuff to make “stir fry”. We made a sauce/stir fry that consisted of hoola halla (that is terribly misspelled and probably not even the correct phonetic attempt but it is a double H word), aubergines (eggplant for you non-Francophones), okra, tomatoes, onions, garlic, ginger, pimont (super spicy peppers that are ground into a powder most of the time) and rice. On the way back from the market we stopped at two bars to meet some of the people in the town and I was introduced to two gendarmes (one very large man and one Anglophone who I can speak English with), I met a number of very nice community members at these bars – beer makes people so open and friendly and gives you an automatic in. Plus, everyone was so excited about the upcoming election that we were invited to two different celebrations for the election day. After visiting two bars and leaving a beer on reserve for tomorrow that someone bought us that night, Sarah and I heading home to make our delicious stir fry. It was honestly amazing. Tasty beyond belief. Mostly, it had LOTS of flavor and spices which most Cameroonian food I have gotten doesn’t because I think they are scared American’s cannot handle spice and therefore give me bland food. We ground up ginger root in a mortar and pistol made of wood, added garlic and pimont to make a delicious spice mixture. Cooking the hoola halla was interesting. It looks slightly like spinach and is rather bitter tasting until you cook it enough. Then you have to strain it, add cool water to cool it, restrain it and squeeze all the extra water out and then put it into a frying pan with all the other veggies. It is a rather long process but well worth it in the end. Mmm, in Joey’s words “mega tasty”.

Day two aka election day. For breakfast (as I wanted to eat as much of the food in Bibemi as possible) we went to a place by my new house that sells beans in the morning that are already prepared so we bought some of those and ate leftovers from last night with beans. It was also amazing. Amazing food was a theme for me (even sans real cheese) and that makes me excited so stick with me. Today at the health center we childhood vaccinations. Now, they were out of regular needles. So, we could only do BCG (TB) vaccines (which use a needle similar to the one they use for the TB skin tests), oral polio, and baby weighing. I got to watch babies being weighted in this sling that was hung from a tree branch and attached to the bottom of a scale. I cannot properly describe how adorable this scene is so I will try to post one of the photos I took of it. Again, I just helped with in processing and it was very fun. Great to see how all that stuff actually works in a health center in semi rural Cameroon. I learned that for it to be economically, they can only do BCG vaccines on days when at least 10 children need them. Once they open the bottle of vaccine they must use it that day and each bottle will be enough for 20 vaccines and therefore they won’t open it if that day there aren’t at least 10 people who need them. Tuesday there were 13 so we could give them. The little babies screamed a cried at the vaccines but they were fine soon after. They seemed to take the whole being weighted thing very well. It was so adorable. Once again, after work we went to eat at the head of the health center’s house. This time his wife had made a green fullery type sauce (which is one of my favorites) and again I ate way to much lunch. Then, we went home to prepare for the election. Let me just point out that I wore an Obama shirt this day and I was very popular. Everyone was so thrilled for the election, asked me if I voted and if so who for – but only one answer was acceptable for them. Phil joined us this afternoon and then we set out for our fetes. Problem number one: the electricity went out around 3:30pm. Problem number two: the radio wasn’t working to pick up BBC. Problem number three: the brassiere (place that brings beer to all the rural areas) comes on Wednesday and maybe Saturday so Tuesday nights are always low on beer and EVERYONE was out celebrating the election. Word got around that one bar (that never had electricity and therefore only was able to offer warm beer) had alcohol and so everyone headed there. The whole evening was spent cheers “OBAMA” and learning a gendarme drinking command type game where the gendarmes would tell us to pick up our beer, drink our beer, and replace our beer. It was hilarious and all in French and I got maybe 1/3 of what was going on. We stayed out for awhile and then heading home for a late dinner. Despite the lack of electricity and the beer consumption we created a very tasty dinner of tomato sauce, pasta, and a peanut sauce. Literally the minute we were done cooking on the gas stove via light from a kerosene lamp, the electricity came back on. Of course, right.

Day three: protocol. This means that we spent the day going around to all the important figures in town (the majority of whom we had seen at the bar the night before and cheered Obama with). My sister (who rocks!) had been awesome enough to call the moment they declared the election (at 5:11am my time) and tell us that Obama had won. Apparently they waited til the polls closed in California, Oregon, and Washington and then called those states for Obama almost immediately and he won the election. I then got a text from Emily (thanks dear!) telling me Obama won. Everyone wanted to make sure I heard and I was glad. I swear Africa might have been happier than America. Kenya I heard declared a national holiday. There were literally Vive Obama signs that popped up in Bibemi. People were thrilled and everywhere we walked people yelled OBAMA at us. We yelled it back and it became quite and entertaining game. During protocol, we went to the house of the city chief. He is Muslim and the majority of the people are Christian. He lives in a Palace that has about 10 peacocks and a man follows him around and does things like hold his chair when he sits. It was incredibly odd but fascinating. Everyone was extremely welcoming to us and it was a great way to get a tour of the town as these buildings are all quite spread out. We stopped for a breakfast of spaghetti omelets (which are exactly what they sound like, eggs made into an omelet with spaghetti in the middle). It was much better than it originally sounded to me at least. Add some pimont and I enjoyed it. Throughout the day we would find radios playing excerpts of all the election night speeches and got to hear the most pro-American BBC broadcast I had ever heard. Everyone in Cameroon kept telling us that the election of Obama was going to save the world. The people hear were ecstatic to say the least. After all the protocol we returned back to Sarah’s house to make Mexican food. Yes, that’s right, Mexican. We made tortillas from scratch (quite an experience), guacamole that was sooooo amazing, used vache and velvetta to make quesadillas – it made me really want a Margarita. Then, seeing as we actually had the results of the election – we of course had to celebrate with the rest of Cameroon. More Obama cheering (this time with ice cold beers) and delicious food at Mike’s counterparts house. Then, we returned home to top off the beautiful day with a viewing of the Simpson’s Safari episode. It was as classy as it sounds.

Day Four: Went to the Catholic Mission to meet the nuns and check out the large pharmacy they have there. Apparently they are resource that I should tap into in the community and someone I can work with to do nutrition and cooking demonstrations and whatnot. They also have the best stocked pharmacy. Oh, did I mention they have running water when no one else does – another major benefit! Then we headed to the largest cattle market in the country and the region to be honest. It is in Adoumori. Got to see the cattle market, the regular market, and the Bil bil (home made local alcohol market). Want to guess which was most crowded? We caught a bush taxi (large van that is crammed with almost twice as many people as it should be) there and it was a pretty smooth 20 minute ride. But, I did get to see my first person riding “petite chauffeur”. This is when a person sits in the front seat straddling the gear shifter so that when the driver shifts gears he does so between that persons legs. It is as awkward as it sounds. The man next to me had that privilege. Lucky him. Then, the fun started as we caught a bush taxi home to Pitoa. We caught one no problem, put our bags on the roof and climbed into the 15 passenger van with 20 other people (totally 23 now with us). Two of these people brought chickens (live ones) with them that proceeded to head butt my legs throughout the ride. Two of the people brought giant AK 47 style guns in the bush taxi. 20 minutes into extremely bumpy ride we had to stop because our axle was shredded down to the point where the axle and wheel had no groves between them – raw metal on metal. The sounds this bush taxi was making are not describable and certainly not sounds a car should be making. We stopped on the side of the road for about 30 minutes while the took the whole tire apparatus off and did something and then put it back on. The car still sounded awful. About 15 minutes later we get stopped by the gendarmes who are planning to make everyone show there ids and give some unlucky passengers some trouble possibly. But, the three of us knew of the gendarmes. Sure enough, one of our new Pitoa friends! So, rather than being stopped and searched we stuck out heads of the window and told him we were heading home but would be back in a month – then we ended the conversation with a friendly round of OBAMA shouts and our bush taxi went on its marry way. I can only imagine the thoughts going through the minds of our fellow riders. Well, 20 minutes later, one of the metal bars that was helping hold the overweight ceiling up fell onto Phil’s lap. People then began helping to hold the ceiling of the van up as we went over large bumps. Then, we broke down again about 20 minutes outside of Pitoa. Another 20 minute stop and tire fix and we were back on our way. We did make it home successfully this time. What a beautiful site visit.

Some information about my house: It is near a river about ½ the year and near a giant sand bank the other half (there is only water in the river during and soon after the rainy season). It is basically in a eucalyptus forest and smells faintly of vicks outside (which I like). It has electricity (complete with oven, stove, and fridge) but no running water. There is a bucket toilet (which means it is a toilet but you flush it by pouring buckets of water on top of where you just went to the bathroom). At some point when an NGO was in my house it had running water and that is why there is a toilet, sink, and shower. None of them work currently (as in they lack running water) but I get to take a bucket shower in a shower stale and the drain works. The sink is currently clogged but that is getting worked on. There is a nearby pump and I pay to use this and then pay to have local children bring me water with their families cart. I have a cat that has kittens basically every 3 months like clockwork – she is black and white. My house is cool inside because it is shaded by the forest. I have a porch that is pretty sweet so that I don’t have to invite visitors into my house but can host them on the porch. The temperature at night is very tolerable and I even used my fleece blanket at night (keep in mind that what feels cool to me now would make all of you sweat still). I have a guardian at my house that lives nearby and looks out for me and the property. The bugs are minimal in the house and it is pretty well insulated. I have windows that provide light and can also be closed with metal doors to make it darker if I wanted to sleep in (not all the windows have this but the biggest two do). All my windows have screens and bars. I have a screen door (which is key to allowing cool night air in but keeping mosquitoes out). I have cement floors which help keep it cool. Hmm, I cannot think of anything else to tell you all about site visit or my house. Bibemi seems like it will be a great experience. Sarah has left big shoes for me to fill in the town but I feel I am up to the challenge. I am going into Garoua tomorrow to post this on the internet soooo hope everyone is doing super duper. Don’t forget I got a new number and it works much better so I expect to hear from all of you shortly!

This is going to be short. I typed up some stuff but I am at the internet place with the viruses so I won't be using my flash drive!!

Basically my news is this: I got a new cell phone chip so check the number on my blog and update your phones accordingly. The service I had wasn't working and I couldn't ever talk to people and it is worse in the new town I am moving to so I changed numbers!

Second, I got my POST!! I will be working at the Health Center and Hospital in Bibemi! I am very excited and promise details and photos to come. I will be spending all next week there so I will learn all about it before I move there on December 5th.

Oh, my French moved up to level Intermediate Low! Woot! I got the "most improved" apparently! That basically means I sucked the most upon entry! But, at least I am improving!

I have found amazing avocados here now and I am living up the peanut butter and all the strange foods I don't have the time to describe. Just wanted to give everyone the new number, tell ya'll I got my post (it is in the North Provience about an hour, hour and a half outside of the provincial capital of Garoua).

I have learned to talk on my cell phone while riding on the back of a motto with my helmet on. Yes, feel free to laugh at that image. I talked with mom today in that way and my motto driver laughed. The helmet holds the phone jammed in place!

Oh, I also broke my big toe. Ha, yea, soccer games in Cameroon. I was playing and I broke it somehow. It is fine. No big deal but the big toe on my right foot is disgusting looking. Purple and huge and yea, but I am fine and taking advil and about to wrap it in tap! Lucky me right??

Promise details to come!!!! Thanks for all the comments! Miss Tammy your long one was awesome! Thanks for everyone who text me and for the packages that I will one day recieve!

GO VOTE FOR OBAMA ON THE 4th!!!

Sunday Market in Pitoa

Drinking at our first bar on Ramadan with our "audience" - we have since found better bars!

Soccer Game - Best regional team in Cameroon versus best regional team in Zimbabwe (we won 4-0)

View of the countryside during my first 6:30am bike ride

Alright so this blog is the first one I will totally write at the internet cafe and not before hand. I have finally figured out how to change any keyboard over to American style (shift and alt simultaneously) but you have to type from memory since all the keys are labeled differently. That isn't a huge problem but sometimes get a bit old.

So this week, let's see. Oh, tomorrow I have my second French test. Lets hope I am making enough progress that I will reach my required intermediate high level in another month. Next week I find out my placement - woot! - and then week 7 is spent at site. Weeks 8, 9, and 10 are spent back here in Pitoa and then week 11 I swear in and move to my site.

Went on a bike ride to Nassaro (spelling) which is where the Agro volunteers live on Wednesday - a group of us decided to bike rather than take the car. It is about a 30 minute bike ride which was fine on the way home at 4:30 but a little rougher in the heat of the day at 1:30 when we were heading there. I survived though and my camelback sure helped with that water access while biking situation!

I found some great cookies - well not great but great comparatively. They are Indian apparently and the package is tan or off white. I cannot remember the name of them but needless to say they are fairly awesome. Also, I have taken to eating the cheese that doens't need refridgeration. A girl can only last so long without dairy. It isn't awful. Or perhaps it really is but I am just desperate. I think that once I get to cook for myself I may be able to make the non-refridgerated cheese work for me. It might do well in pasta with tomatoes or something. Who knows. In case it isn't obvious by my blogs, we talk and think alot about food here. Besides friends and family, food is easily the thing we miss most. So, all you people in America or Germany best embrase the food that you have while you have it. The fact that you can walk into a grocery store and get ANYTHING you want - yea embrase that. Selection is limited in the rest of the world to what is local and in season. Which means I get dried fish and rice and tomato sauce alot. Be jealous.

Let me just take a moment away from talking about my life here to point out that at this moment, I am sitting in a cyber cafe on a random Friday morning while the rest of my friends are taking language test (but me - lucky girl I am - don't have mine until tomorrow) and the man next to me is watching some episode of prison break I believe. I just heard, in English, the words - "last week on prison break" or something of the sorts. I am jealous! I cannot watch movies or tv shows! Now, this isn't normal. Plenty of houses have tvs - about half of the host families do (those with money) and half don't. Mine does not, at least not to the best of my knowledge. I hear that Desperate Housewives and Spanish soapopears are particularly popular here in Cameroon. Go figure? Guess trashy tv loving is a universial guilty pleasure.

I am going to the marche this weekend with another fellow trainee to try to find a halloween costume. We were thinking Rommie and Michelle aka trashy 80s but we shall have to see about availablility. Basically there is a section of the marche that is like a giant outdoor salvation army or goodwill and so we will have to weed through the piles of clothing to find something that will do for a costume. I am not yet creative enough to think of a costume with pagne.

So this week during our community group meeting I got to have my first real experience with power structures in groups of men in Cameroon. The president of the group, a very loud A type personality, who had been absent from the group meeting the week before (of which this weeks activity was a continuation of) had to answer every question, got extremely upset with us when we didn't just take his word as "the word" and tried to extract information from the other group members, would just shout over other people or demand that he be allowed to speak by continually interrupting them - it was interesting. When we asked what they could use our assistance with his replied that they need a megaphone and a car/bike/vehicle of sometype. One of my fellow trainees who was assigned to this group with me asked if they thought it might be possible to use the microphones that are already in place at the mosques. He replied that he was Christian and this wasn't possible. It was very interesting. Anyway, after redirecting the conversation back to each individual person we finally got out that they want to learn more about malaria (aka Palu in local French). Oh, did I not mention that ALL OF THIS WAS HAPPENING IN FRENCH. I got about 1/2 of it I suppose, which is a lot for me. So, we are currently planning an amination (the French and PC Cameroon word for presentation) to present to our group on malaria utilizing the non formal education techniques we are learning... haha.... don't you love my PC lingo usage.

Mail update: I haven't recieved anything but the postcard my mother sent me before I left, my absentee ballot (but I already voted) and a ballot to vote in a local election in Louisiana that took place Oct 4th and I recieved the ballot two days ago on the 22nd. So, mail is taking its time. I have heard from people that they have recived postcards. Many of you had postcards or letters sent and many of you will have one sent soon.

My host father has malaria and has been sick for a month. He went to the hosptial already once since I was there and is going back. Another member of my extended family (who doesn't live in my home) died this week. This is a similar experience for all of us - most trainees have lost family members and everyone has had someone sick (most all of us have had numerous people sick and at least one with malaria). Just wanted to give you an idea of what the health situation here was like. Oh, when asking my host brother about food last night I learned that women don't get fed the same food as men - they get less and poorer quality. Go figure. He did tell me that it is different for pregnant women but wasn't able to get me specifics - again all of this is occuring in French so bare with me, I am learning.

Alright, time to try to get some pictures up on the blog! (which I just did and I will have you know took over 20 minutes and only worked 4/6 times) Hope everyone is doing well and I love and miss you all - keep the comments coming, they greatly amuse me!

So I finally found internet and that is beautiful. I am sitting here at a Catholic mission in garoua and the internet is working. It only let me put one picture up on the blog so that is going to get interesting. So to find this interent we convince a nun to open the missions computer lab - which is very much closed on sundays - and we figured out how to connect them all the the network. That isn't the funniest part of our internet journey though. so first, it took me 3 motto rides to get internet. came to one place and it was closed until 2pm. It was about 11:30 at this time. walked all the way back to the center of town to where I thought I would find some other friends (it was just me my friend Phil at this time) and we did find other people - 4 Nassaras to be exact. Together we all went to a place 3 of them had seen ont he way into the city. Well 3 of us got there (not me) and the other three of us were taken to the Peace Corps office. They just saw white people with helmets and i guess wanted to take us home. when we made it clear we didn't want to be there they took us directly to the UN human rights office. Lovely. All white people places. We finally just decided to go to the catholic mission and hope they were open. They weren't but they opened for us - the group of "nassaras".

This morning I went on another 6:30 am bike ride and this time I biked past the Chadian refugee camp that is down the road from us. strange that I am biking distance to a refugee camp. It is huge though. Tons of people living in tents and such. We have to do a cross culture presentation (30 minutes in French) at the end of the training and I am going to ask if I can do it about the refugee camp. We shall see!

So this weekend has been awesome. Saturday we got to go to a soccer game - that's right a soccer game. It was the best regional team in Cameroon against the best regional team in Zimbabwe. These teams had already met in Zimbabwe once and Cameroon had won. This Saturday Cameroon killed them 4-0. It was awesome. We bought the cheap seats and sat with all the locals, which was where the party was at but also where the sun beat down on you. We had to sit on things to keep our asses from burning - but it was beautiful and I loved each and every minute of it. Garoua scored in the first minute of the game and they took control from then on. It got me really excited for the World Cup in 2010!!! Prior to the soccer game I had another amazing experience - I found something in the super market that I had predicted I would find. Mom and Sam know and other people will at Christmas so I don't want to give anything away. But, I got to eat another delicious omlet with plantains and this time the omlet came with onions and tomatos too. Honestly fabuolus.

This weekend I have recieved text messages from Joey, Jensen, mom, Sam, and my grandmother. Courtney - I know you are in Pittsburg so you get a break and Sandy I only told Jensen to say hey to you so I suppose you get a break to. I do love hearing from people though :)

Today I greatly amused a group of children by taking the pate de arachide (home made peanut butter they sell here - go ahead and be jealous) and a banana and putting it on my baguet. The kids laughed and laughed and laughed. I was also eating yogurt witha straw and basically they thought that was the funniest thing they had ever seen. I was only too thrilled to amuse them.

Well aside from being insane hot - life is good! I will find out my placement on October 30th - then I have a halloween party with the other trainees the next day which is excited but my costume will be interesting with my lack of options but, you know, I will be as creative as possible. Then, November 1st I start my site visit to the place I will be living the next two years! Cannot wait! Lets hope my phone works better there and you can all talk to me while I am there!

Alright, time to post while the posting is good!!! Love and miss you all!!!

These are the rain clouds descending on Yaounde (the capital of Cameroon)

Okay so week four is over! I cannot believe it but at the same time it is going by faster. First off, I am getting to know my fellow stagiaires (like trainees in French) very well and that is a good thing – I love all the health volunteers! Second, this week was a hot one. Seriously each day being hotter than the next. October is the mini hot season but wow, seriously, the use of the word “mini” to describe the heat the past week, well it frightens me to be honest.

So this week started off with last Sunday me and 3 friends going on a bike ride. Now, let me preface this by saying that we started this bike ride at 6:30am. Now, we didn’t chose this time because we are crazy, we are morning people, we love the challenge, or any of that crazy stuff – we chose it pure and simple because we are all awake at that time – thanks to the Peace Corps schedule – and it is not quite so miserably hot at that time of the morning. Needless to say, we began at 6:30 and returned at 9 and had a blast. I may or may not have contracted schisto through my forced entry into the standing water – but hey, all in good fun right? My legs are ridiculously bruised, I had cuts all down them (learned that despite the heat, off road bike trip require pants) and had an amazing time. Honestly it was beautiful and tons of fun. While I was taking my turn in front (we are a bunch of first borns who all have to take turns leading) we began riding along side a “stream” of standing rain water. Well, the ground next to it was not what one would call stable and so being in front I ate it into the “stream” once, and half another time. The girl behind me ate it with me that time. We learned though and soon were back to our normal functioning biking selves. I took a bucket shower and scrubbed off afterwards and almost a week later seem to be no worse for the ware.

A whole other set of injuries are coming from soccer. People here can PLAY soccer. And, being the overly aggressive small white girl I am – just doesn’t stop and runs right into people who get in the way of me and anything I want to do on the field. Now, this has resulted in many a collisions and my shins are taking the toll on that one. But, alls well that ends well and I am still walking, talking, and behaving just fine!

For those of you, cough mom cough, who are keeping track this is week 5 of me taking my malaria pills and as far as I can tell I am still sane. I have drank beer, been around people, and eaten lots of random foods all while on it and seem to be no worse for the wear – thank god. For anyone who saw me on the last malaria pills – cough friends and family in Germany cough – you know how insane I became. So, glad I am avoiding that with this new set of friends. A little early to introduce them to the insane side of me don’t you think.

Okay so Cameroon doesn’t do dairy really. So, I miss cheese. Stupid Wisconsin with there overly amazing cheeses – it isn’t fair. I miss them a lot. Rope chcese…. Mmmm… yea. Other than that, I have found most things here in various forms and for various prices. The candy here (or bonbons in French) are all hard candies and some not that great Cameroonian chocolate or very overpriced European selection that comes and goes – and all the hard candy come from Nigeria from a place called “old airport road”. There is one ingredient in the candy we cannot identify – we have stopped wondering what it is – cough jet fumes – cough.

So, some of the crazy things I have seen this week include, but are in no way limited to, a group of 12 goats waiting outside a mosque for their owners to be done praying, you can fit a very large number of “citrons” (think tiny oranges the size of limes) into a condom, two children chased me down the street this week jus to shake my hand, I finally worked up the nerve to purchase the local version of peanut butter from a lady (in French) and it turned out she only spoke Fulfulde and so a local schoolgirl had to help us out with the transaction. But, I did purchase said “pate de arachide” and it was awesome. It is like the ultimate natural peanut butter. Every morning I get bread for breakfast and with my new found “pate de arachide” and perhaps some bananas and honey – my mornings will be awesome.

My bike has now had two maiden voyages and tomorrow with my trip to Garoua I will be taking my first motto ride I believe. I am going to a soccer game of Garoua (who is suppose to be really great) against an unknown opponent. I am very excited. Got to love the African soccer! I do miss the tuk-tuks though. Man Asia was awesome. I hope Sarah is loving her time in Mozambique. I know that since I have been here Cameroon has played Mozambique in soccer and won. Woot – yea Cameroon! (Sorry Sarah)!

This week I received my last vaccine – Rabies number 3. Let me just say for all of you who haven’t known the joy of rabies shots – they aren’t the best. While they don’t hurt like typhoid of tetanus, the make me a bit dizzy and my arm would randomly hurt for a few minutes for days afterwards. Also, let me just say that taking a thick and thin smear of your own blood isn’t as easy as it sounds. We all had to practice yesterday and I sucked! I couldn’t get myself to bleed enough. Going in from the side did NOT help. I finally had to take the little metal cutter thing and stab myself deep into the finger and then blood came. Hey, at least now if I need to do a malaria smear when I am sick I have some practice! Oh, continuing with the medical theme, I got stung by a bee! A mean mean African bee! Went to move my towel away from the line of aunts that was near it and some bee flew right out and stung me! Jerk! Well, I killed it and of course my host brother witnessed all of this and laughed – but he has since asked me how I was. I am fine, by the way, just a bit angry with the now dead bee and the copious amounts of sunlight that the bite receives doesn’t help – in fact it angers it. But, thank god for benedryl cream and my remember to bring it!

In two weeks I will have my placement for the next two years! How strange is that you might ask – really freaking strange! I hesitate to get too strong an opinion now about the placement I want but I promise to update it with my placement as soon as possible.

Also, for those of you who aren’t texting me – that is just mean. It is free for me to receive them and even if I don’t respond I really love them. Especially the ones that say great comments that are pointless but really pick me up – or those with updates about the debates – or those with stupid shit that Palin or McCain say in debates – I love them and either keep them coming or start them up. I know its expensive but just like once a week – come on people. We will have to figure out the communication thing once I get to my site and see what all is available.

Oh, any creative friends who want to submit Halloween costume ideas to me please do so via text. I have just the clothes I brought – which is nothing to be excited about costume wise – and African pagne (material – which is pronounced pan-yea and the a in pan is like the ou in pound – wow I suck at explaining pronunciation almost as badly as I suck at actually pronouncing Cameroonian words) and the random clothes they sell at the goodwill like section of the local Sunday market. As of now I think I will be “summer” and be one of the four season but that was just something recently suggested to me. We shall see.

Alright, my first pagne is at the seamstress getting made into something I can wear as we speak and I promise pictures of that ASAP. But, I did buy a dress off my friend who received two dresses of the same material and well, it is entertaining. Think, African print with what might be trees and what might be asparagus on it. Yea, it’s pretty great. Her host sister forced us to purchase it in the market – apparently, with her host sister if you look at it, you buy it. And, if you touch it, that is like signing a blood contract (mom you would be in trouble like I was).

Okay well I must head to bed since I have class at 7:30 tomorrow! Miss and love all of you very much (well those of you whom I know)!

I am hoping to get to post this tomorrow (Saturday October 11th) but we shall see. So, this week of training was particularly difficult. None of the sessions were of real interest to me, there was a lot lot of French, and yea, it dragged. However, the weather was a bit better (most days, with the heat of today being an exception). I also got to play some soccer so hey, not all is lost right?

Another person from our group of 30 left – this time it was an agro trainee. I don’t know if I mention before that one of us had left. A male health volunteer (who are already few and far between) left, or rather was asked to leave, because he broke protocol. There are apparently 5 rules in PC that you don’t break or you leave: always wear your helmet (both moto and bike), don’t do illegal drugs, don’t get pregnant, trainees cannot become involved with trainers, and I cannot remember any others. Anyway, this particular boy rode a moto without a helmet – on the very same day that we had the transportation training about how this was against protocol. He was honest about it and told one of the staff but regardless, he had to leave. It was rather sad. This week a female agro-forestry volunteer left. She just decided that the PC wasn’t for her – and it is not for everyone. Still, hard to be down to 28 people.

However, I have decided that it is nearly impossible to be upset during an African rain storm. They are too loud and demanding. I adore them. They make me super happy. Also, I have found a beer in Africa that isn’t too bad. It is called Turborg (or something similar) and it is much better than the 33 or Castle I have been drinking. It is a bit more expensive (like 100 CFA / 35 cents) and I am very willing to spend this money for the better beer. Still haven’t experimented with African hard liquor but I promise to soon enough and report back. PC has a one beer policy for us while we are in training so that has kept me rather subdued. Also, to be honest, it is too damn hot to drink much. You are dehydrated as is – no need to add beer to the mix.

Three weeks and very much counting until we find out our posts! We find out on a Thursday the 30th of October and then we have a workshop with our new counterparts on Friday and Saturday and then Sunday morning we leave to go to site visit. There is a PC Halloween party that Saturday the 1st in Garoua and the group of us still aren’t sure whether we are going, whether that is too complicated, etc. Regardless we shall be doing something I am sure so that is exciting – getting to plan something that isn’t training related. Anyway, the following week we get to spend the whole time at our new sites, checking things out and learning the ropes from any volunteers around. It will certainly be an interesting week of staging!

Next week I have volunteered to help led some of the training sessions. Thought that might make them go by faster. I will be helping with malaria next week and with M&E the following week (wouldn’t professor Keating be proud of those choices!). A number of us all decided to start helping with the sessions to try to make training a bit more involved and entertaining.

I still have the pagne (think brightly colored African style printed material) that I bought the first weekend at the market in Pitoa. I have a fellow trainee whose host family are all tailors (or many of them are) and so perhaps by the end of next week I shall have a pagne made into something wearable. Get excited for pictures as soon as that occurs.

Oh man, my Ipod shuffle feature just put on “I hate everyone” – Emily that totally brings me back to the road trip to Atlanta where this song became like our mantra. Love it. Miss it. Etc. Just had to share.

Speaking of which, people who are reading this – email me, comment on the blog, respond to me in some way. Hell, text me! I enjoy communication and I believe I remember from training that communication is a TWO WAY street sooooo feel free to do your part – clearly I am doing mine. Haha. No but seriously, call, write, email, hell send an owl to me Harry Potter style… something…. Also all of us here in Cameroon feel disconnected from the whole American political world so please send funny quotes, tid bits of information about debates/polls, etc. We really enjoy them.

So my eyes starting get sick here so I had to switch to the glasses. I am hoping that is because the contacts were old (like more than a month) and I think they might be but with all the airplanes I was on I kind of lost track. So, mom, prescription sunglasses might top the Christmas list. We shall see. Other than that, I am pretty healthy. Not sure how to be honest… I am eating a lot of dirt, some rocks, some unfiltered water, and many unknown dishes. They clean many of their dishes by scrubbing them on the dirt or with stones and well, sometimes those make it into the dishes. I have picked more rocks from my mouth and chewed more sand than I knew what to do with. But, hey all part of the experience. Tried some more interesting food – including maranga leaves, fullery, and some other green things. I am getting much more experimental with the food. I also tried some liver. Not that good to be honest. The most popular restaurant in Garoua ran out of food while we were there and we ended with liver, some seriously unknown meat, noodles, an odd chef Boyardee type sauce, and smoothies. The smoothies were extremely tasty mostly because they were so unusual compared to my current diet. Every day for lunch I eat the same thing. Don’t ask me to name it all – because about 1/3 of it is still a mystery to me. It is rather tasty though, at least for now while it is only week 3 of the food. Talk to me week 10 and see if I still find it tasty.

I have braved the bush taxi now once and I plan to brave the moto taxi tomorrow (with my cool space suit looking helmet). So far nothing too bad. Didn’t get stopped by the gendarmes for a prolonged time or anything yet. Haven’t been asked to bribe anyone. We shall see. It was only the first time, fate might have been being nice to me.

We went to a hospital in the town we are staging (Pitoa) today. That was an interesting experience. The staff was all very nice and the whole experience occurred in French with our trainer translating for us. Some interesting facts: abortions are illegal in Cameroon, it cost the same amount to birth a live baby as a stillborn, it is also the same price for a birth and for a miscarriage (I think), family planning is done only to women – not men, it cost 100 CFA for post pregnancy hospital stays regardless of whether you stay 3 days or 10, the family planning is shown to women who bring there kids in for vaccines and not when they come for prenatal care, there are 8 vaccines kids in Cameroon all receive – yellow fever, TB (which doesn’t prevent TB but just makes it harder to get), measles, hepatitis B, Tetanus/Diptheria/Pertussus, Vitamin A supplement, the oral polio vaccine… and that is all I can remember for now. Also, at the hospital, for a few things I got the feeling they are giving us the party line. Telling us things like some medications were free or very inexpensive, that TB patients stayed in the hospital for free, etc. Not sure if that is actually occurring or not, but it would be great if it was. The hospital was basically outdoor, in the same manner that a strip mall is – each individual building is indoor but to walk between them you must go outside. There was no morgue in the hospital – I found that interesting. Also, most children who come to the hospital come due to malaria – but none of the windows had screens and there were no mosquito nets – go figure!

Apparently there is no French translation for either country music or oldies. You have to say music from the 70s, etc – and my French teacher calls country “traditional American music” which I don’t know about, but it works for now. Also, the French have no verb “will” – they only have “must” – I find that interesting as well.

Alright, well Cameroon is hot, interesting, and unlike anything I can explain. The candy isn’t good – so if you are visiting bring some. Well, I guess I shouldn’t say it isn’t good, it is just really different and I don’t like it nearly as much as German/American candy. Apparently the cool weather is on its way, but it doesn’t stay long and then the unbearable hot comes. Think 140. Apparently though, you don’t sweat – it’s too hot that it evaporates immediately - you only know you are sweating because your skin is covered in salt. Yes, this is me being excited for that. OMG now the shuffle is playing Journey’s “Don’t stop believing” – Emily it must be missing you tonight! I can still see Laura doing the dance at Pat O’s on Mardi Gras. Ah, good times.

Well I shall sign off for now and not go into too many more details about my life here. I wake up at like 5:45am and go to bed by 11pm at the latest. No, I don’t get up that early because I am a freak, I get up that early because it starts to get warm then, the sun comes up, the roosters start making noise, and everyone else is awake at that time. I am mastering the art of using a very small amount of water during my bucket shower because apparently water will soon be very hard to come by so I might as well get use to it now. It isn’t so bad. It is rather refreshing in this heat. My hair feel different here though. Not sure what that is about. Perhaps it is just getting use to Africa as well. Still have yet to receive a package or letter from anyone but I promise to let everyone know when I receive one! Love and miss everyone! Please update me on life there! Also – Nicky, Melissa, and Emily – I have texted all of you but haven’t gotten any response – let me know if you are receiving them! Nicky I got the email just now so I know you are getting them! Signing off!

These are the mud huts on the way to my house in Pitoa...

I am sitting here writing this blog entry on my laptop in my new bedroom. My family lives in a compound of many building and I have a whole one to myself. It is about 20ft by 10ft and made of concrete and has a tin roof. I have two small window both of which have bars on them and netting to keep the bugs to a minimum. I have a double sized bed that is covered with a mosquito net and is rather comfy. I have a water filter, a tiny table, a chair, and a “desk”, a trunk, a bike, and one shelf. All in all – it is good. While I am typing I can here a parade of village children playing local instruments and singing – literally like something straight out of a movie. I am surround by mud huts with thatched roofs – no Courtney I am not kidding. Yes, I have a cell phone but to make it work for phone calls (not text messages which work more places – like under my desk in my room!) I have to leave my family’s compound and go stand next to the tree that is between the two mud hut compounds. It is fairly entertaining. I live on the outskirts of Pitoa – a city whose population I do not know because when I ask my host brother Daniel he simple replies “Pitoa a grand ville”. I suppose they don’t feel the need to do a census here in Pitoa. I doubt anyone knows the exact population. I would guess about 5,000 – but I hear it is more like 15,000 but I would have never guessed so. Problem is all the people live in tiny crammed houses so it is hard to tell. There are two paved roads. I live near one. Other than that – its dirt roads all the way. There is not a restaurant in the town and the Peace Corps has arranged for a local women who is known to be a good cook to make our lunch each day and we pay her 700 CFA (pronounced say-fa) to do this. That is about $1.50.

So some Cameroonian things I have tried thus far include: goat, Kola nuts (a nut/seed that grows here that is bitter and is a natural amphetamine), roasted peanuts, unroasted peanuts, tomatoes, tiny bananas, noodle/rice combo, papaya, guava, pineapple, beef, chicken, fish (no idea what kind), tomato sauce, there spicy picanta sauce which makes Tabasco seem like ketchup, cous cous (which is nothing like our cous cous and basically like really really thick grits or maybe like super sticky oatmeal minus the oats part) and many many more dishes I have no idea how to describe because I literally have no idea what was in them. While I haven’t loved everything thus far, none of it has been awful. I don’t ask (partly because my French is still poor and partly because I don’t know if I want to know) what I am eating most of the time.

Bug bites cover my legs from the mid calf down. Same thing happened in Asia – why do bugs like that part of my body? I also have one new one on my waste line that is rather annoying and two on my stomach. Silly bugs. I don’t know what type of bite they are but they burn. Knock on the biggest piece of wood I can find…. I haven’t gotten sick yet. I haven’t done anything too stupid yet – like eat raw fruit or chug a bottle of tap water – but I haven’t been unadventurous. I brushed my teeth twice with tap water and have eaten tomatoes after I washed them and soaked them for 10 minutes in bleach water and I eat tons of bananas and oranges and peanuts (which they call ground nuts or arachide in French). Also, I only boiled my water before I filtered it for two of the times – it is too much work for my host family to boil all that water and then I have to wait for it to cool…. so I just drink filtered water. I have been told that since my water comes from a pump and not a well that this is okay. Although I must admit I haven’t actually seen this pump.

Oh, my name apparently is no longer Aubrey. It is “Nassara” or occasionally “le blanc”. Nassara means foreigner or white person in the local language – Fulfulde and of course “le blanc” means white in French. Literally I think I get pointed at and called that about 1000 times a day. It doesn’t bother me though, the children who do it are adorable and the other people are just happy to see me and they are being friendly when they say it. It is not a demeaning word or anything. Also, today (4 October 2008) I walked past a group of Cameroonian children with my new bike, bike helmet, and motto helmet. These children were playing some type of stick ball and appeared very interested in my new items. They screamed “NASSARA” at the top of their lungs and waved. About 15 minutes later I passed them again, this time sans stuff, and they screamed BONJOUR NASSARA (now this is at about 4pm so it is time to say Bonsoir not Bonjour at this point in the day) and one of the oldest kids (circa 10 years old) ran towards me with his hand out. I shook his hand and said Bonsoir. All the other children (about 8 of them) bust out laughing hysterically. Then, in turn, each one as they get brave run up to me and shake my hand. It was adorable.

So far I have gotten 5 shots and I have another to come in a few Wednesdays. I have yellow fever, typhoid (PC won’t pay to give us the oral vaccine so I had to have another shot and that shot sucks a lot), rabies #1 and #2 (there are 3 total), and meningitis. All I have left is rabies #3. I had many of them before hand – hepatitis A and B and tetanus and such. The rabies vaccines made me slighty dizzy – boo to that – and typhoid makes your arm very sore – but so be it.

We got to watch some very upbeat videos from the PC about volunteer who got AIDS and then we got a talk about how we shouldn’t have unprotected sex or get pregnant – really? Thanks PC! Haha. The training thus far has been informative I suppose – I have an awesome med kit with everything from Band-Aids to a syringe to malaria pills to a blood smear kit in it. I am basically set.

In Yaounde I bought a giant Johnny Walker Red bottle full of roasted peanuts – hey now that is recycling if I ever heard of it. In Cameroon – like most developing countries – recycling is scarce so I am impressed by any show if it I see. Oh, and apparently all the children want your empty Tangi (the local brand of water) bottles so I have started saving them. As we drove through the villages to get to Pitoa the children would run up to our bus asking for them. Who knew?

So far I have found Toblerone, Bounty, Snickers, Mars, and Perrier here (and of course coke, sprite, and fanta). All of this is only in the biggest of cities I haven’t had Snickers or Mars yet but the Bounty was delicious and the Toblerone was also. The Perrier however sucked. I haven’t had Perrier in America in awhile and I wonder if it is awful everywhere or just here. But here, honestly, it tasted disgusting. I don’t know what was wrong with it. But, I had it about 10 days ago so I know it didn’t make me sick!

From Yaounde we took a night train up to a city in the mountains that I cannot pronouce (N’Gaoundere – and those e’s have French accent marks) which is where the train ends. That train ride took 16 hours. Then we got on a 5.5 hour bus ride from N’Gaourndere to Pitoa. Pitoa is in the Northern province of Cameroon about 15km north of Garoua which is the 3rd largest city and may be on some maps you find. Garoua has internet and a market that people assure me is large but would make your average 711 look great. I have no idea when I will find internet so I am just typing this now and I will carry it around with me in the hopes I get to a cyber café tomorrow.

Oh, in case y’all couldn’t guess – it is hot here. It is about 100 degrees most days. I hear that in March and April your thermometers black out at 140 so hey – something to look forward to. Right now it is still a little humid and by then it will be super dry so we shall see how bad this 140 is. I am not really looking forward to it. But, I hear that by that point I am somewhat acclimated to the temperature and is doesn’t bother me like it sounds like it would. Already I am sweating less, but that is not to say that I am not sweating all day everyday.

Also, when it rains, it RAINS. Jesus. Out of no where comes there clouds – then the sky turns colors and the clouds rush up on the town and then seriously the skies open up and torrential rain follows. It is amazing to watch. Also, rain makes it cooler outside so much to my host family’s amusement - I leave my door open in the rain. Basically they think this makes me am alien and they come by continually and ask me if I want help closing my door. I saw no, I like the breeze (and I say this in French) and they give me an odd look and walk away.

I have braved doing my laundry only once yet but I have helped my friend Anna do hers twice. The problem is after I finally figure out how to communicate to my family that I want to do my laundry, I do my laundry, I hang it outside to dry – I have to let it sit outside in the sun for 3 days (taking it in at night and when it rains) because if it doesn’t sit outside in the sun 3 days then it will be infested with “mango flys” which are worms that will burrow into my skin when I wear the clothes – lovely thought right? Never have I ever appreciated a washer and dryer so much and it is only the start of week 2 in country.

My homestay family is awesome. They are really nice. My dad is a retired police officer. I have one light and one outlet in my room and electricity fairly regularly. I barely speak to my host mom and dad but my host brothers Leopold and Daniel are great – Daniel especially. They sit and help me speak in French every night and are very helpful. Daniel gave me a Lonely Planet for Central Africa – it might be from 1994 but it still has lots of useful information I think. I live on the outskirts of town about a 20 minute walk to the Peace Corps training center every morning but it isn’t so bad.

My friends host mother had a baby the day we arrived. It was alive for one week before it was allowed to be named in a naming ceremony. I know the baby’s name but have sense forgot – something cute but foreign. They try to make me hold it when I go over and I have once but it makes me rather nervous. It is adorable though and the mother and her female relative who is 15 and basically in charge of the household while the mother is still recovering parade it around proudly.

We were told in training that women in Cameroon – at least in this part of the North – weren’t suppose to go to bars alone. If you did, you were looked at as a prostitute. Well two other girls and myself finally braved the bar scene in town today with a male colleague and there were other women in the bar so that was good. We shall see how that whole things pans out. In training we are only allowed one large, or two small, beers a day. That was the first I had in Pitoa so I don’t foresee that being a problem. But, beers are tasty when it is hot and it was nice to sit with locals, speaking English with my friends drinking a cold drink. I have since braved the bar many more times and we found a bar in town with a back area so that we aren’t stared at constantly while we drink like we were the first time. They often run out of cold beers though so that sucks. Luke warm beer – especially Cameroonian beer – isn’t worth it.

Bucket showers – I have gotten more use to them. I am taking my in the pit latrine like I was instructed to do and that is interesting but it is so hot that throwing a cold bucket (which is really a bowl) of water over my head isn’t so bad. I don’t wash my hair often because it seems useless since 20 minutes after I get out of the shower I am soaked in sweat already. Haha. At least in the South (of America) when you go inside there is Air Conditioning – not here!

We met the US Ambassador to Cameroon – she seemed nice and very complementary of PCVs. They encouraged all of us to take the foreign service exam – which they offer at the Embassy in Yaounde so perhaps I will consider doing that. It was a big media to do because she met us up here in the North at our training site and not at the headquarters in Yaounde which is normal. It was lots of photos and journalists and such.

Well Monday (the 6th of October) starts week three of PST. 8 weeks to go! I am very anxious to get through this and move into my permanent community – not because I don’t love my host family because they are great but because I am anxious to be doing things on my own and feel useful here in Cameroon and not just be here struggling with French and learning about the culture – I am ready to speak French and know about the culture – guess I am just being impatient. But, it has been a hell of an adjustment and things are so different and I think if I could walk into a grocery store I might kiss it because I really want fresh juice and salad that I know won’t potentially make me very ill. It is all just new and overwhelming but also exciting and I am sure once the adjustment takes place I won’t crave all those things I cannot have all the time.

Pitoa is known for there giant market. Last weekend I got to experience this. I bought a pagne of fabric that is crazy printed and I am scoping out tailors to have a shirt and skirt made. Send me measurements if you want something but be aware that it will be in noisy African style fabric and prints and that it won’t be plain – they don’t do plain here. Feel free to wait for pictures of what I end up with and decide then. I also got some fruits, some strange squash looking thing, a bucket to soak my fruits/veggies in, the bleach to soak them in, and I think that might be it. All in all though I spent about 6 dollars but had a blast be dragged around the market by a fast paced local women who is Anna’s host sister. I know we got the “blanc/ nassara” price for many things but I watched and we didn’t pay much for then Anna’s host sister did. Her host sister was tough though – if we looked at something or God forbid touched one of the fabrics – basically we were suppose to buy it. Mom, you would be in trouble here. Haha. You learn quickly though and they learned that nassaras are just strange and do things like that.

Got to talk to Courtney and my grandma recently and that was great. Talked to mom only briefly. To talk to Courtney I had to stand by the tree though and the sun set while this happened and my host brother Daniel sat and watched me while I talked. Got the same text message from my grandmother about 20 times total – but I got it. That made me laugh. Everyone was just impressed that my grandmother sends texts though – most of them cannot get there parents to so congrats on being tech savvy there family! To talk to my grandma I had to stand by yet another tree and be watched by a group of 20 Cameroonian children and a herd of goats (Chev in French). If only the phone calls were video conferences my family would crack up watching me just TRY to talk to to them – searching about for signal – moving around, holding up the phone, kneeling down, roaming from tree to tree, being followed by a pack of children and goats…. Picture that!

Note about the cell phone – yes I have one. The number is on the blog. However, text, don’t bother trying to call unless I have texted you and told you to because I do not get enough signal in Pitoa 99% of the time to call. Testing works much better. There is a tree near my house that gets decent signal. Also the main road isn’t so bad. So, it is a work in progress this whole developing country cell phone thing. We all just have to be patient. So, if I don’t text you back right away or you cannot get a hold of me I am sorry and I know it is frustrating but I promise to text you back as soon as I can and hopefully my permanent city will get better reception….

Wish me luck – Love and miss you all!

BONJOUR!! Ca Va! (hello. how are you?)

So day one as a trainee is over. First off; excuse the strange typing... this is a strange keybord. Second; yes people really do carry things around on their heads in West Africa. I saw a boy today carrying a single shoe on his head. *

The PC office is really nice. Thus far everyone - staff and trainees seem really awesome. I have had some good food in Cameroon and some very excellent peanuts! The beer here is decent too - although I am still bummed that I am missing Oktoberfest.

Vaccine count - typhoid and yellow fever (I had already had hepatitus A). Yellow fever wasn't so bad but yellow fever hurts fairly badly a few hours later!

I have officially begun my French learning. Thus far I have mastered the phrase "what is that" in French and not much else. Although with my Rosetta Stone vocab I can name all the clothes a person is wearing. This skill is found quite entertaining by others.

Yaounde has a good temperature - it is cool during the evening and warm during the day. I accually need a light sweater at night. I have been told to enjoy this because it is not the case in the North where I am headed. By Thursday I will be in the North and Thursday night I will be sleeping in the house with my host family. *

I should have a phone soon! Once I do I will post the number - complete with how to dial it.

I am taking Larium as my anti-malarial - this is the PC norm. So far no crazy dreams or anything. I shall keep ya'll posted on how they progress though. I have been assured that this drug is in NO way similiar to Chloriquine which some of you might remember made me insane. As my grandpa would have said "we shall see".

Saddest news though... I think my most favorite bracelett - the one mom and Court got me in Spain - is gone. I was wearing it all day and to dinner and I was playing with the clasp and it must have fallen off someplace. Of course this is the only piece of jewerly I brought that I remotely care about. I knew better than to bring it. But still I am sad. I might find it or get it returned - but I am not counting on it. I am very sad about it.

But my French is growing slowly but surely. I am really anxious for language training to start and really get to improve with classes and living with a Cameroonian host family. Wish me luck with that since we all know that foreign language and spelling are two of my biggest weaknesses.

In Yaounde we qre staying at a hotel that can see the soccer (football here) stadium from the window. We are not really allowed out in Yaounde right now but I took pictures out of the window. I am getting excited for the train ride up to Garoua (pronounced ga roo a) which might be a 16 hour trip but should be really beautiful. I promise pictures as soon as I find a connection that can upload them!

Au Revoir!!!!

Alright I am officially in Africa! After being back in the US of A for about 60 hours, getting a yellow fever shot and taking a malaria pill (Larium), I flew back across the ocean to Belgium. From there, we got on a plane to Douala Cameroon - the biggest city and the largest port in West Africa! So far, it is great. The country director (CD) James Han met us at the airport along with a number of other Peace Corps (PC) staff. They took care of everything for us. My luggage arrived and in fact out of all 30 of us, most of whom had two bags, only one bag didn't make it. The hotel staff is amazing. We are staying at the Jet Hotel which is about 10 minutes from the airport. Had a fabulous dinner of fish and plantains... drank some pretty great pineapple juice... and tried my first Cameroonian beer which was brewed locally here in Douala. It was called Isenbeck. I was impressed with it to be honest. It is hot here. It is currently 10pm and from the rooftop bar I can attest to the fact that it is about 85 and super humid. Tomorrow we get on a 4 hour bus ride up to the capital city of Yaounde. We will be there about 3 days and then get on a 16 hour night train to Garoua - the 3rd largest city in Cameroon which is up in the Grand North part of the country.

Alight I promise to keep you as posted as possible with the unreliable electricity - we have been here 2 hours and it has already shut off twice - and the lack of internet. I think my phone is going to work and I will try to get a new chip for it ASAP. Love and miss y'all very much! I will try to upload a few pics now!

Pictures from Bangkok:

http://picasaweb.google.com/aubreypirosko/Bangkok#

Pictures from Vietnam:

http://picasaweb.google.com/aubreypirosko/Vietnam#

Pictures from Cambodia:

http://picasaweb.google.com/aubreypirosko/Cambodia#

Pictures from Koh Chang:

http://picasaweb.google.com/aubreypirosko/KohChang#

Pictures from Chiang Mai:

http://picasaweb.google.com/aubreypirosko/ChiangMai#

The final leg of our long trip – trekking in Chiang Mai. Sarah and I had booked this trek (2 days, 1 night) a few days before we went and boy was that lucky. When we got there, the hostel we had booked through was FULL! That was the first full hostel we had encountered in Asia (the one in Hanoi was close to it, but not quite). We were staying at Julie Guest House and booked our trek through them and their travel agency on location. We left the next morning (Monday morning) at 9:30. They gave us a list of things we should bring and even lent Sarah a small backpack for the trek. We headed out in search of an internet café because Sarah and I thought we were suppose to do our quiz that afternoon but that turned out to not be the case. Our teacher had decided we should take the quiz after everyone else, not before. I don’t know if we were confused on the dates or what but we weren’t suppose to take the quiz that night. But, since that would be our last internet access until we got back to Little Rock, we checked in with our family and friends and then headed for the Sunday market. Well we had just gotten to buy a pair of really neat handmade wooden earrings when it started pouring. Sadly we didn’t get to see the rest of the market. Good thing too because sometime around now I realize that I don’t have my credit card. I brought two to Asia, one with most of my money and then the other one. The one with most of my money was gone. MIA. No clue where it was. I checked everywhere but I didn’t have it. Many things had gone missing in Ko Chang, we added it to the list of casualties. I ran back to the internet café and caught it as it was closing. I got a hold of my mother, via my sister and a complicated phone/internet combo and managed to get her to cancel the card for me and there hadn’t been any fraudulent charges and so they ordered me a new one right away. Phew, disaster averted. Only problem was I had basically no money left because the card I had with me had about 100 bucks left on it. I quickly transferred money to that account but of course that takes 3 days. I had mom see if they could rush it and they said they would try (turned out it only took about 2 days so that was nice). All I had to pay for was the trek, the hostel, and the airport taxes and fees, oh and one or two meals, but still, I was a little worried.

Monday morning arrives and we hurry downstairs, check out, leave our luggage with the hostel and bring a small backpack with us for this adventure. A pickup truck arrives to carry the 13 of us, our guide, and our driver up to the mountains. 3 of us (me and two of the 3 Irish sisters along on the trip) squeeze in the front of the truck and the rest sit in the back of the pickup which has been turned into two long covered benches. We stopped along the way at a market so we could buy water and snacks. I got some of the most glorious food Asia has to offer that Nicky introduced me to: Coconut covered peanuts. I eat them by the bags. They are awesome. Dude, miss them already. Our guide bought fried bugs. Well, back in the front of the truck, one of the Irish girls turns to me and says “would you try a bug with me?”. Now, we aren’t sure whether theses are roaches, crickets or some nondescript Asia bug, but our guide it popping them in his mouth like we would eat popcorn at a movie. So, I agree to it. She and I each eat a bug. Yes, I have pictures. We both chomped it about 2 times and then swallowed it and chugged water from our Nalgenes. The bug was about the size of my pinky finger. It was crunchy and weird texture but not the worst thing I have ever eaten. It is probably better than ham and I know it is better than snake wine!

Finally we stop the truck and we have arrived at the elephant riding part of the trek. Hell of a way to start, right? Well, being an odd number of 13, one elephant must have 4 girls which means that one must ride directly on the elephant while the other 12 ride on the basket type thing on top of the elephant. Now one would think that I would jump to volunteer to be that one girl, and I would have had I been paying attention, but the oldest Irish sister beat me to it. Luckily though, she was on my elephant with me. Now we rode these beautiful elephants all through the jungle while they chomped off tree branches, showered us with snot and water and swatted away millions of bugs. About half way through the Irish sister got tired of being on the elephant and asked someone to switch with her. I was wide awake this time and jumped at the opportunity. I got to ride DIRECTLY on the elephants back. Now I haven’t ever ridden a horse bareback but now I can officially say I have ridden an elephant bareback. Again, yes I promise there are pictures. Beautiful scenery, awesome elephant adventure.

After the elephants we did lunch, which was some homemade Thai rice dish, we drove another 30-45 minutes into the jungle and then we got out and were told to start walking. And walk we did, for 2.5 hours, straight up a mountain. So much sweat, so many bugs, so so awesome. We walked past waterfalls (small ones we were told compared to tomorrows) and we walked with elephants at one point. We learned about some random plants that grow including one that blows bubbles and one that fakes it’s dead if you touch it. The jungle rocks! This whole time we are carrying all 2 liters of water we were told to buy and everything else we brought (thank God I packed light!). Anyway, we did make it to the tribal villages on the top of the mountain eventually and it was well worth it. The last bit of the hike was kind of trippy – it was through a corn field, yes a corn field (I checked what grew under the stalks) and that made for many a “children of the corn” references. But, what a view from the top!

Now, just a word of caution, these tribal village stays aren’t really what they sound like. I pictured some homestay with a traditional tribal family that spoke no English. That isn’t quite the case. That isn’t to say that the experience isn’t completely lovely, because it is very cool, but it isn’t quite the authentic view of tribal life they paint for you. What actually happens is your hike up through the village to the outskirts where a number of bamboo huts that are very thin and long have been built. Inside these long huts are a center room which has a fire and can serve as a camp fire location, dining room, and optional opium den – yes, keep in mind you are in the golden triangle. Attached to this center room is a kitchen, which you never enter, a cooler which houses the beer, water, and sodas they charge you for (NO drinks are included in your trekking price but all food is). To the other side is a giant sleeping area with about 14 beds and each pair is under a large, old, mosquito net. These beds are really mats with sheets and woolish blankets. But hey, it’s all part of the experience. Notice that I haven’t mentioned a bathroom? That is because it is downstairs and in an outhouse style. There are two pit toilets and two bucket showers / faucets for the group. Nothing warm about any of this water but hey, you just hike 5 miles up a mountain so you don’t mind the cooler water. Oh, also, when they tell you to bring long sleeved stuff for the night, they aren’t lying. It gets cool outside on top of that mountain at night. Also, flashlights are essential. Headlights are even better. They ONLY have candles up here, electricity hasn’t quite made it. The lack of electricity means that you can see for MILES and that it is really dark and silent at night. It is truly a superb view. Lovely, just lovely. Oh, last thing to mention. DEET is a blessing. Both Sarah and I, being public health nerds, were constantly covered in DEET. Immediately after my shower I smothered myself with more DEET cream. The smell of sweat, sunscreen, and DEET and the fact that when it all combines it forms a greasy coat on your skin – that grows on you eventually. But hey, I didn’t get one mosquito bite that evening and most everyone else did!

In the morning we woke up much earlier than we thought, basically soon after sunrise. The top of the mountain where we were sleeping was covered in fog. It was cool and beautiful and muggy and awesome. We ate American breakfast of white bread, hard boiled egg and pineapple jelly. One piece of toast and an attempt at eating a hard boiled egg later I was eating those beautiful coconut peanuts and chugging the tea I had brought. The green tea up in that area is also different. It is very bitter. This is true of most all of the green tea I had in SE Asia. Also, it is loose tea and not strained. But, I really liked it, many did not though. The coffee was all instant though so tea was a better call in my opinion.

After breakfast we were given 30 minutes to pack, get ready, and meet to walk down the 5 miles we walked up before. Now, we took a different way down, a steeper (which we didn’t think was possible) was down. Honestly a number of us fell and all of us had loose feet at some point. We were forging rivers and using trees as a source of balance and all that great natural stuff. Finally, we got to the giant waterfall for most all of us stripped down to our bathing suits and got in – we were hot, greasy from the DEET-sunscreen-sweat combo and ready to feel clean. The waterfall was much stronger than you thought it was by looking at it and basically it tried to steal your clothes off you. Naughty waterfall.

After the 30 minute break at the falls, we walked along the river bed for about an hour until we reached a road and the river fed into a giant river. Now it was time for lunch and then rafting. At lunch, we were surrounded by chickens, roosters, and baby chicks – we fed them our pad thai (which has eggs!) – bad job us! I was careful to pick out the egg and only feed them the tofu and noodles. The big ones would steal food from the babies so we all tried to make sure to feed them when they were alone. During lunch it started to rain, not that we cared since we were about to get wet white water rafting. We all got on our neon orange life vest and matching helmets and got into our rafts. We couldn’t wear long pants (shorts or just your bathing suit) and NO shoes allowed during this rafting adventure. Our guide began to loving call the boat of 6 females he got “lady boys” aka whimps in his vocabulary. Sarah and I were in front basically power steering the thing. It started off rather slow but it got really fun once we got stuck a few times and had to throw ourselves from one side of the boat to the other and then we hit some GIANT rapids and that was pretty great as well. At one point, the guide tells us to strip off the life jackets and helmets and leave them in the boat, get out of the boat, and walk/swim over to these giant bamboo rafts. Now these bamboo rafts are nothing more than long pieces of bamboo held together by shredded tires (what is it with shredded tires and me this trip?). Somehow these things stay semi-afloat with 5 people sitting on them balancing in the middle. One person, and I went first at this, stands up and with another piece of bamboo tries to guide the boat. Many of us took turns doing this. At one point the bamboo raft was sinking so far, and it was pouring out so much that a number of us abandoned ship and just started swimming next to it.

After these two rafting adventures Sarah and I notice the time and realize we have about 2 hours to get back to the hostel and get to the airport to make our plane. The rest of the group is still taking their time looking at pictures and changing clothes and whatnot. Sarah and I grab our stuff and wait impatiently until the rest of the people join us. We have a smaller truck bed and only one person sits in front this time (not me) and we drive straight back to the hostel (one stop to drop two French girls at their hostel) and Sarah and I run, seriously RUN, to our hostel and grab our stuff (much to the dismay of the people who own the hostel who try to yell at us to slow down) and run back to the main road (the hostel is down an alley) and try desperately to grab a ride to the airport. We snag a tuk-tuk (moto bike with some seats attached) who crams our luggage onto the back, we jump on top of it and yell airport as fast as you can. He understands, breaks many a traffic laws and gets us there in about 7 minutes. We over tip him generously and check out watches to see we have about 25 minutes til our flight leaves. Thank God Chiang Mai is a tiny airport, that is all I can say. We did make the flight, barely, but we made it. And thank God because we had to be at the Bangkok airport at 6am the next morning and we would never have made it back from Chiang Mai if we had missed that flight (the last of the evening). Now, Sarah and I haven’t showered or changed since rafting. I want you to keep that in mind when you picture this airport seen. Sarah is in boxers and a sleeveless shirt. I am in the pants I wore trekking for two days and a black tank top that has giant white streaks from the DEET and sunscreen and has also been worn for 2 days now. We look HOT!

We met Nicky at the skytrain stop nearest her apartment, which was Nana just like the Ambassador hotel had been. We got showered, changed, found food and passed out. 4 hours later we got up and headed to the Bangkok airport to head home. We got to the airport really early. We found food and ate a huge breakfast – trying to spend all our left over baht in the process. We got on the plane to Tokyo (6-7 hour flight) where we get bulkhead seats but it is still really uncomfortable. I pass out for about 4.5-5 hours of the flight and we land in Tokyo where we have a short layover that is complicated by our having to get our tickets reissued for some reason. I pay 6 dollars for a smoothie (which I didn’t know at the time) and I eat a green tea kit kat – which was strange. Sarah and I make our flight back to Dallas and I am awake the entire 13 hour flight. I watched 5 movies. In Dallas we once again RUN to catch our plane to Little Rock but this time, we make it. We are home at last!! I was already missing those coconut peanuts and that beautiful scenery…..

I don't know whether this is spelled Koh Chang or Ko Chang - I see it both ways. So, whichever you prefer, I am talking about the same "elephant island" off the coast of Thailand near Trat, which is in the south near to Cambodian border.

We arrive at Koh Chang the cheap way and the hard way. Sarah, Nicky, and I took a bus from Bangkok's Eastern bus terminal to Trat. That was yet another 6 hour bus ride. Apparently everything in SE Asia ia about a 6 hour bus ride apart. Just keep that in mind. Oh, and this bus to Trat thought it would be really cute if it NEVER stopped long enough for anyone to get out and go to the bathroom. Now prior to getting on the bus we had stopped for waters and beers (it was forth of July that day and we figured we could celebrate). Nicky had also purchased and drank a coffee before getting on the bus. Well about 4 hours in we all seriously had to pee but Nicky, having drank that coffee, was especially miserable. When we got to a bigger city along the way to stop at that bus terminal Nicky had to run out and I made sure the bus man didn't leave her. Now, this bus was soooooo crowded that some people were standing in the aisles. That's right, standing in the aisles on a 6 hour bus ride. Anyway, somehow we arrived at Trat, bought some candy - since it's about 7pm and we haven't had dinner or lunch due to the crunched travel times. We got in the glorified back of a pick up truck - which is what taxis are in this part of Thailand and were driven, along with a cute little German family and some other wayward travelers, to the Trat - Koh Chang ferry pier. Then, we got on a 45 minute ferry ride to the island and drank those celebratory beers. Then, when we got off the ferry this pick up truck style taxi drove us an hour to another side of the island - there is ONE road on Koh Chang - and we finally arrived circa 8:30-9pm.

Well, we immediately got taken to our bungalow, which was not exactly what they had described and was 100 baht more expensive, put out stuff down, and went in search of food and celebrations (it's still forth of July afterall). We end up eating dinner and drinking some seriously interesting Mai Tais from the place we are renting the bungalows. Then, we met some other travelers who convinced us to go basically bar hopping down the 4 bar strip near us. Well somehow during that process we met another group of travelers - that included two Aussie brothers (Charlie and ummmm, cannot remember), a girl from Holland, and some other random Europeans. They took us to this awesome bar that was on a deck over the ocean and had these crazy giant colored lights and whatnot. There, we got a table on the edge of the deck so that we were leaning far over the ocean, we drank lots of good juices, vodkas, and beers and hung out with our new friends for hours. We found our way home, not an easy task in the pitch black dark of a new island, and slept from about 3am to 7am.

The next day Nicky and I woke up early, found the nearest beach access while still in our pjs - if you saw the bungalow set up you would know why - and then came back to get dressed and go find breakfast. On the way out of the bungalow area one of the owners pet monkey's tried to steal the glasses off my face. Mean monkey! But he was so cute and fuzzy! Sarah opted out of the Asian breakfast that morning and Nicky and I found an open Thai restaurant - now by restaurant I really mean a persons home that has plastic furniture outside and she feeds us out of her kitchen. So, Nicky and I had frozen, that's right like actually blended in a blender frozen, coconut and pineapple fruit smoothies, green curry Thai, and Thai soup (Tom Ka Gai or something like that spelling). It was awesome and really hit that breakfast spot. Then, on the way back to the bungalows we shopped a bit in the shops around that area and found some cool jewelry an whatnot. Nicky and I met back up with Sarah, we to an internet cafe to write our families and then decided we could eat more food and went to get some lunch and then go to the beach. Well, somewhere in there we ended up heading back to the bar area from the night before. We knew they had a restaurant and were near sandy beach access. When we got there, we learned that there bungalows cost 3 dollars a night - much less that the 15 we were currently paying - and they were on the beach which our current ones were not. The pay off was that they didn't have bathrooms and we had to use communal ones. Small price to pay for being near the nightly party, beach, and food. So, we moved to the new bungalow. Sarah and I scheduled our 5am taxi for the next morning to get to the 6am ferry and we got lunch and headed to the beach.

The water was the perfect temperature, there was really not many other people on the beach, the clouds went away for a perfect day. The whole experience was great. We swam around a bit, layed out, and then Sarah read a book while Nicky and I went in search of more fruit juice, this time perhaps with some vodka added. We ended up drinking a vodka pineapple bucket at a beach front bar while making friends with a Norwegian man.

After a few hours of beach we headed back to shower for the bbq that the bungalows was throwing that night. Oh, and my shower, I mean bucket showers. That's right, a tub of water with a bucket and that is what you use. Hey, it can work. Good practice for the Peace Corps I suppose.

For this dinner, Nicky and I got barracuda - I wanted to say I had tried that. Oh, we almost got bamboo tattoos - bamboo is the the way to make the tattoo NOT the picture we almost got drawn on ourselves - but we decided we had no way to know we weren't going to place that would leave us with Hep C. Dinner consisted of fish, Thai food, and lots of lots of fruit smoothies of all fruit combinations - mango, pineapple, banana, coconut - mixed in as many ways as possible and all fabulous. Oh, mango orange juice with vodka - which was awesome. Smoothies (which are really just blended ice and juice in Koh Chang) with vodka. Then we moved on to the vodka buckets. Sometime during the night of partying, Charlies passport ended up in the ocean and he and his brother dove in after it. The norwegian man we had met earlier and his friend found it for them. We also played ring of fire - got to love universal drinking games - and just hung out til the wee hours of the morning when Sarah and I headed in to get 2 hours of sleep before our taxi to the ferry.

Sarah and I got in that taxi ride, which was much rougher with a stomach full of vodka soda buckets and juice, and made it to the ferry. Then we made it to the bus stop in Trat, but the pick up truck that brought us there turned around to go back for more people at some point and made us miss the first bus to Bangkok. We made the 8am bus to Bangkok where Sarah and I proceeded to pass out and sleep as much as we could for the next 6 hours on the bumpy local bus we were on. This bus did stop for 20 minutes about half way through for people to get out and get food/drink and pee. Thank God. Sarah and I made it to Bangkok, immediately got in a taxi to the old Bangkok airport, and flew to Chiang Mai (in Northern Thailand near the Burma border) for our finally Thailand adventure - trekking in the mountains.

Total of things lost/stolen in Koh Chang (also the only things that I had go missing on the trip - Sarah got money stolen at the hotel in Hanoi): my USAA credit card, Nicky's rainbow flip flops (which were old and worn in), and my bath stuff that I had on the porch to dry (my shampoo/conditioner bar that I bought at Lush and it's case, my body wash and luffa). Morale of that story - people take weird things!

Well thanks to the lack of rain - which is funny to write as it's was pouring a few hours ago - we had to take a bus to Phnom Pehn rather than the boat through the Mekong as planned. Sad, but that is life I suppose.

After we got to the Vietnam/Cambodia border it took a while to get out of Vietnam as they INSPECTED the American passports for way too long. Then, getting into Cambodia, which was held in a separate building, was very easy. They just wanted the money for their visas. Oh, Cambodia uses the US dollar as there currency, except they don't use our change, instead they use their currency, the riel, instead of coins. Each 1000 riel is about a quarter.

As soon as you cross the border into Cambodia we were bombarded by casinos. Honestly it was like crossing the California/Nevada border. It was a crack up and something I had absolutely not expected. Anyway, we arrived in Phnom Pehn after the 6 hour bus ride that left early in the morning.

Once we got to Phnom Pehn we hired a tuk-tuk for the day and had them bring us to the hostel we had picked out. They were brutally honest tuk-tuk drivers who informed the 4 of us that we were too fat to fit in one tuk-tuk. They tried to change our option and bring us to stay somewhere else but we held strong. They kept saying that area of the city doesn't have AC, and we said we know but we are staying at that hostel because it is 5 dollars for a room for the night and we are here for less than 24 hours! We finally got to the lakeside hostel and it was beautiful out on their porch which went over the lake. The lake was like no lake I had ever seen in that it was covered with plants and people were rowing tiny thin boats through the breaks in the greens. It was really cool. The rooms were nothing to brag about but for $5 we hadn't expected them to be.

The only thing we got to do in Phnom Pehn was go to the killing fields. I really really wanted to go see the horror the Khmer Rouge caused and it was well worth it. It was disturbing on the same level as Auschwitz is. The main monument is a tower of 8000 skulls of the victims shot at these killing fields, along with piles of their clothing and the holes left in the ground by their mass graves. There were signs telling the story of Pol Pot and the whole Khmer Rouge and explaining what happened at that site. Well worth going to if you ever get out to Phnom Pehn.

After this, we heading to meet our TA from the class, Beth, who is working in Phnom Pehn for 6 months. We went to get tapas and drink at happy hour. I had the most fabulous concoction called a Mojito Special which was a mojito with champagne instead of club soda. Pure beauty. I also got hummus. Basically, I was in love.

The next morning we got an early bus to Siam Reap - the base for heading to Ankgor Wat. Another 6 hour bus ride later we were there and when we got off the bus we were BOMBARDED with tuk-tuk drivers all trying to get our attention. We found a set of them we liked and hired them for the day (a popular option) and had them bring us to the hostel we picked out. Then, after 12 of the last 36 hours had been spent on a bus we went to get massages. I opted for the dead sea mud wrap and massage option. Lovely and worth every pretty penny. It was also the cleanest I had been in days! We topped it off with a pitcher of the fabulous Angkor Beer - it is seriously tasty and listed as SE Asias number one drink to try for a reason! Well ranked Lonely Planet!

Then, we headed to the old market to buy many things we didn't really need. We almost went to the silk farm but chose to just buy the silk at the market from the silk farm! Saved a trip and allowed us time for those massages. Then, our tuk-tuk drivers hooked us up with tickets to a traditional Cambodian dinner and dance which we went to and it was a very cool experience. I got to try to Anok fish which is the regional specialty and it was very good!

Then next day we had the tuk-tuk drivers pick us up at 5am to head to sunrise at Anggkor Wat. We figured sun rise would be cooler and less crowded than sunset and we were right! Sunrise over Angkor Wat was awesome. It was cloudy but still beautiful and turned out to be a crystal clear, very very hot, day. Then we toured temples - Angkor Wat, Bayon, terrace of the elephants, etc. Then, we rode elephants around Angkor Wat and went to get Mexican food for lunch. Then we headed back to Angkor and toured the temple Angelina Jolie filmed the Laura Croft movies at and two others - including one that required a 15 minute hike to get to and then climbing 5 flights of the steepest stairs the world has ever seen. However, the view of the Angkor Wat temples was soooo worth it. The photos are priceless and I cannot wait to load them! After 12 hours, and 20 dollars of admission, to temples we were done! We went to Pub Street for pizza and beer and I finally found two Cambodian thimbles - I don't love them but they work.

Friday morning, the 4th!, Sarah and I flew out of the Siam Reap airport back to Bangkok. The Siam Reap airport is new and very snazzy and had a Dairy Queen in it! They charged us $25 to fly out of it, not $6 like we thought, but we finally got on our flight to Bangkok that lasted all of 40 minutes and then got a taxi to the Eastern Bus Station where we met Nicky to head to the beach on the island of Koh Chang (which translates to Elephant Island). We had to celebrate the 4th of July somehow right!

SAIGON Day TWO

Today we caught an 8am bus that we had booked the day before to the Cu Chi tunnels. Now these tunnels are only about 30km outside Saigon but it took about 2 hours to get there. They are out off tiny roads And, we had to stop at the infamous pit stop/place that sells you homemade crafts at outrageous prices (for Vietnam, moderate prices by our standards). We finally arrived at the tunnels though. The first thing I want to tell you is that our guide referred to us as “my group of 48” since that is how many people were on our tour bus. Upon arrival at the Cu Chi tunnels you watch the world's greatest video. Literally, it is the best piece of propaganda I have seen – and I loved looking at the Nazi stuff. This video was Ho Chi Minh style anti-American propaganda. Some key phrases included “like a little batch of devils they fired... into schools and at Buddhas” and the proudly bragged in the video that “bamboo traps which use to be used to catch animals were now used to catch the American enemies” and they claimed that “America wanted to turn Cu Chi into a dead ground – but Cu Chi refused to die”. There were countless of quotes that were equally priceless but I didn't get a chance to write them all down. You get the gist. I tried desperately to buy a copy of that beautiful masterpiece of propaganda but they don't sell it – go figure! Anyway, then we got to walk around and see how they hid from the US Gis, all the traps they set for them, and then we got to crawl around in the tunnels. At best they are 1.2 meters high (about 4 .5 feet) and Sarah and I crawled through the most we could, including points where we literally crawled on hands and knees pushing our purses in front of us and I was carrying my camera in my teeth. Yes, I do have some pictures. Anyway, I had thought Bangkok was hot until we got to Hanoi and Vietnam which was a whole new breed of heat. Well, these tunnels took it to a new level. The heat was ridiculous. We were covered in dirt and sweating bullets but loved the whole experience, truly priceless. As we were leaving the Cu Chi tunnels, they gave us the option of going to the on site firing range and paying money to fire the whole American weapons they had collected like AK 47s. An 8 year old Asian book in our group got to fire one. I was very disturbed and lets just say I did NOT take the opportunity to fire the US abandoned Vietnam war relic AK47s.

Now, let me take a moment to tell you all about some of the beautiful things I saw carried on motor bikes in Saigon – refrigerator, tvs (in the box), computer monitors, computers motherboards, etc. This is all on something smaller than a Harley. Oh, also with all the driving around I notice that there are a plethora of Ho Chi Minh posters all over Saigon, whereas I saw very few in Hanoi. I found that interesting, but not that surprising.

The Clintons and there visit to Vietnam in 1995 is very popular in Vietnam. You know if the shop you go in our the place you eat is someplace they visited. They also sell lots of books about the Clintons, go figure.

Just an FYI, so far from my experience in cities in Vietnam, men's hair is much more done up and eccentric than womens. Women tend to have straight hair whereas the men often feather theres and whatnot. While I am on the subject of beauty in Vietnam, they sell skin bleaching solution and whitening powder here. The women especially are desperate to have pale skin. They want it so much they buy and where these gloves that go up to where a t-shirt would end while they are walking or driving a motorbike to prevent there skin from tanning. Now in that heat, that is a really dedication to the quest to be pale.

Finally, I think it is funny that while the war museums and other war relics yell messages of Communism and anti-Americanism they are milking it financially for all it's worth – seems pretty Capitalist to me. Just a thought though....

After the Cu Chi tunnels we went the Reunification Palace, the same palace that the Viet Cong broke down the gates of on April 30, 1975. Now, let me first say they have preserved it much as it was on that day (including tanks in the yard) and all I can say is HELLO 1970s. The entire place is in yellows and greens of the 1970s with the arictecture straight out of the Brady Bunch. I loved it. Brady Bunch with a Communist twist and plenty of Ho Chi Minh posters. Downstairs in the basement is the war command center of the South Vietnamese President, complete with all his maps - my favorite part, Also, they have the spots where the bombs were dropped on the palace marked with red circles, which is pretty entertaining. Apparently the Viet Cong who first bombed it now runs Vietnam Airlines domestic flights. I flew them to Saigon. Lovely.

Post the Palace we ventured back to the hostel. We went for a drink at the Rex Hotel rooftop bar and tried very unsuccessfully, as in 4 massage parlors later, to get massages - a new goal for us in Siam Reap, Cambodia. The Rex Hotel bar was highly overpriced but gave a great view of the city and took credit cards we we smiled and payed. The, we went to dinner at a place called Milwaukee that had Harley Davidsons everywhere and I ate some Mekong fish with a cheese. It was good. We also got Saigon beer on draft which is pretty damn tasty and cold. Then, Sarah and I decided we must try snake wine our last night in Vietnam and we headed back to Saigon bar near our hostel to try some. Literally, the man poured us two glasses out of a vat of snakes in juice. He even pulled the cobras head out of the jar to give us the full view of the snake. We cheers and drank and boy is it gross - tastes like rotten black liquorice. But, try everything once. And yes, we do have pictures.

We left the next morning at 8am for a long bus ride to Phnom Pehn, the capital of Cambodia!

Oh, on a personal note.I have news!!! First, my little cousin Jensen's soccer team won FIRST PLACE at Badger State (aka Wisconsin) soccer games!! WOOO HOOO! Also, Emily accepted a Peace Corp placement in Rwanda that leaves in January.That means I shall be in Cameroon, Sarah in Mozambique, and Emily in Rwanda! Keep those posts coming guys! Also, sad note, Germany lost the EuroCup final game 1-0. They lost to Spain. I was crushed. Next time guys! Next time! However, on the bright side, that should make Jensen's and her soccer team's upcoming (as in the next few days) trip to Spain all the more exciting. Too bad they are too young to enjoy the marvelous bar action that goes with winning the EuroCup - I suppose I shall have to rise to the occasion and head out for a beer right now in their place. Hard life I have right??

Welcome to Saigon/HCMC. First, let me tell you about the complicated name of this city -is it Saigon or is it HCMC (Ho Chi Minh City). Well until April 30, 1975 the cities name was Saigon. April 30, 1975 is the day that North Vietnam stormed the Independence Palace (now the Reunification Palace) and basically won control over Vietnam. They promptly changed the name from Saigon to Ho Chi Minh City to honor the fearless leader of Communism/Socialism in Vietnam. Remind anyone else of St. Petersburg becoming Leningrad??

Well upon arrival we got more Dong (Vietnamese money) and took a taxi to the backpackers area (Pham Ngju Lao) and walked into Sinh Cafe to book a tour to the Cu Chi tunnels for the next morning. Then, we walked across the street to Delta Adventures and booked a bus for Tuesday morning to Phnom Pehn, Cambodia (the capital city). We decided to a bus not a boat to save time. We will do a boat from Phnom Penh to Siam Reap (the launch city for Ankgor Wat). Then, we dropped our stuff (which we had been carrying/dragging along in the 90 degree weather with circa 90% humidity for about an hour) at the Yellow House Hostel and immediately headed out to the War Remnants Museum. This museum showed the Vietnam side of what they refer to as the American War. All I can say is, if you go to Saigon you must go, but you will feel awkward being an American there. While yes, the US committed a number of unthinkable atrocities, the other side was far from innocent. There are lots of Ho Chi Minh posters up and the museum opened September 4, 1975 – count it 4 months and 4 days after North Vietnam got control of the city. It had fetuses in jars who had died prematurely due to their parents exposure to some of the chemicals the US sprayed. It had lots of information about Mai Lai and another similar situations. Also, it had an interesting section about all the journalists and photographers who were killed during the war and showed the photos they died taking. The whole thing made me fairly pissed about Iraq – as the section about the build up to the war had many parallels. Now don't get me wrong, I support our troops 120%, and that is why I want/believe they need to be sent home now. Those stories and pictures showed what war does to people – it isn't pretty, it isn't glorious. The museum gave us these numbers: 3 million Vietnamese died during the war, 2 million of whom were civilians. Another large number were injured or missing. Bottom line: War sucks.

Moving quickly along, after the museum, we were feeling the whole history thing so we headed to the Binh Soup Shop. This was the soup shop in Saigon that was near to a US army post where the entire wait staff was Viet Cong. It was from this soup shop they spied on US troops and overheard their conversations. It was hear that the Viet Cong planned the infamous Tet Offensive (for those of you who don't know what that is, open a history book or Wikipedia it – you should know the reference). Anyway, the man who owned it and allowed the Viet Cong to use it and received many a medals from the Viet Cong in return still works/lives there. He is older now, but he still sits there. Sarah, Nicole, and I got a picture with him. We ate their famous Pho (spicy- well you can make it spicy and I do- noodle soup with green onions, vermicilli noodles, and pork/beef/chicken – famous Vietnamese food that they eat mainly for breakfast) soup which I did proudly eat with chopsticks – Courtney I have gotten much better since PF Changs!!! We signed the guest book. Oh, and I got up the nerve to ask if we could go upstairs to see his medals and the secret meeting room where they planned the Tet Offensive and countless other battles, and they let us. So, we got to see that too!

Now, we were all pretty damn tired of the war, so we walked around the city a bit and ended up finding this ice cream parlor called Fannys that has an all you can eat ice cream bar the first Friday of every month – sadly we missed it by days. But, we had awesome ice cream / gelato including passion fruit flavored and a frozen mango stuffed with mango sorbet. Honestly though, how good does an all you can eat ice cream bar sound??? Pretty damn awesome to me.

Taxis in Saigon have better meters than those in Hanoi had. However, our first night we had a taxi driver take us on our first drive around. Aka where they know you don't know where you are going and therefore drive you around aimlessly and run up the meter. We caught on but it was too late, also, there wasn't much we could do- they speak very very little English in Saigon (surprising to me). Most tour places spoke some but we got numerous taxi drivers who spoke not a word of it.

Then, we had a quick night cap/beer at this Saigon Bar near our hostel where draft beers are 15,000 dong (about 90 cents). This bar also sells or exchange books – including Nancy Drew which I was excited about!

I forgot to write about the legend surrounding Halong Bay. Apparently, as the mighty dragon descended from the mountains it gorged out valleys and caves and left Halong Bay in its path. I like legends that involve dragons.

Oh, Vietnam (which is actually Viet Nam if you want to be correct with your translation because Thais and Vietnamese have one syllable languages so all words are one syllable) means "the people who came down from southern China". Similarly, Hanoi means "the people who live south of the Red River".

All the houses in Hanoi, and some in Saigon, are very tall and very thin. This apparently goes back to the days of the French when people were taxed by how much of the street their property took up - same as New Orleans! It is very trippy to see all these super thin, super tall houses and everything here involves TONS of stairs.

All the traffic lights in Hanoi, and some in Saigon, count down how long til the green light becomes red and then again til the red becomes green. You would think this would help make traffic orderly, but it does not.

Oh, all the bus trips in Asia involve special bathroom/shipping stops at factories and stores (most of which involve hand made crafts by handicap people that are exploited for tourist money and the goods overpriced). I haven't seen that since Egypt and it gets rather old but I suppose the bathroom breaks are nice. Silly Asia.

So far, my favorite foods/drinks are: Bun Cha (pork and noodles- odd since I don't really eat pork), Pho (spicy noodle soup), squid, tofu, morning glory/pumpkin greens - we would call morning glory water spinach, and passion fruit everything (including rice wine), oh, and of course the great goat cheese apple salad I have had twice now.

So this morning we took a taxi to the Hanoi airport and our driver pulled over to let us out and apparently pulled over to the wrong side so as we were paying him a police man came and hit him with a stick on the back. We could tell we just needed to leave so we tipped him and paid and left. Poor guy.

Now, time for Saigon/HCMC....

Early Friday morning our group got on a bus to Hai Phong - an industrial port city northeast of Hanoi. We got to visit this amazing NGO started by a women who contracted HIV from her husband and who was basically shunned by her community. Her son who is 5ish also has HIV and is not allowed to go to school because the Headmaster is discriminatory and thinks he will basically infect or scare the other children. Now for those of you who don't know much about the HIV epidemic in Vietnam, there is a LOT of stigma associated with people with HIV. Most of the people who get HIV in Vietnam contract it through a "social evil" - there words not mine - like injection drug use (IDU) or commercial sex work (CSW). This women did not contract HIV that way but the stigma she encountered was horrendous. It was a great morning, but a rather sad one.

Then we headed to lunch at some local tiny Vietnamese restaurant. Oh, all the toliets in Vietnam are pretty much squat and pee ones. This one was out behind the restaurant by where they held all the sea food they later cooked you. Quite a site.

Friday night we went back to a restaurant we had been in Hanoi already called Hoa Sua - this is a restaurant that is also a cooking school for street kids to give them vocational skills and whatnot. The food is awesome and the teenagers who work there are great. I have this amazing goat cheese and apple salad - mmmmm makes me hungry just thinking about. Oh, and the chocolate moose isn't too bad either! Then we headed to the Dragonfly bar to have some drinks (less then two dollars for a very potent vodka soda!) but we headed home by midnight because we had a trip to Halong Bay schedule for the next morning.

Halong Bay, well I can't say enough about it. First, the driver who got us there and back - CRAZY! Now most drivers here you would call crazy but this guy went above and beyond. He was never in a lane and constantly flashing and honking people. Shannon and I were in front (the girls who get car sick!) and we were fairly amused/terrified the entire time. Oh, we also witnessed a motorbike crash (nothing serious though) and got to see people carry an interesting array of things on these motorbikes including, but not limited to, 4 dead hogs, two giant baskets of live chickens, a basket of dogs, and about 4 giant bushels of melons. No, none of those are jokes. Sadly, no pictures to prove this thus far, but I promise to work on it.

Halong Bay is a bunch of limestone islands in the Gulf of Tonkin - for those of you who aren't history nerds like myself the Gulf of Tonkin would be the same gulf we faked the attack on our ships in, blamed Vietnam for, and thereby justified starting the Vietnam War. Lovely history right? Well, it is beautiful! Plenty of pictures of that. We also go to go through a giant cave. Pictures of all of this to come. The boat was super and while it was rainy the whole time, that made it seem more tropically and such. Sadly, we didn't get to swim, but I suppose I shall just have to come back! Alright well it's Sunday morning here and Sarah, Nicole, Daniella, Twan, and I all have to catch planes to HCMC/Saigon in a few minutes so I must stop.

Driving in Hanoi is an adventure. The drivers use their horns constantly, not out of road rage, but they use they as a type of announcement to the other drivers and passengers - kind of like a "hey y'all, I'm coming!". It takes so getting use to and my blood pressure is normally a bit higher post driving. Picture the 15 of us on a full sized bus driving around with 1000s of motobikes and a few cars - as my teacher put it "those motorbikes are like gnats" and they need to watch out for us. We just plunge ahead into the traffic because we are the biggest and we can. What a riot!

Seriously the food in Hanoi rocks. Bun Cha (slaughtering that I am sure) is some noodle pork dish that rocks (and I don't really eat pork). Pho is a breakfast noodle soup thing that is pretty stellar and Iwill be having a bowl in about 5 minutes when I must leave for breakfast.

Last night we had the alumni dinner at a place called Highway 4 that makes there own rice wine. Well, rice wine is flavored, a tid bit I didn't previously know, and pretty alcoholic - made for a fun evening of people not being aware of how much they were drinking. We had a passion fruit flavored one (probably my favorite), a pulm, an aprocot, and I believe apple. I enjoyed the experience. We went to a lunch place yesterday that was not in any guide book to say the least. It was tiny and some local people working at a hostel pointed us towards it - you had no menu and when you sat down they just brought you Bun Cha and you ate it. It was awesome.

Sights seen in Hanoi so far: the ballet at the opera house (modern, Asian, and really neat), water puppets (pretty damn awesome!), Temple of Literature, the Prison, and Ho Chi Minh Masoleum (a word I need to learn to spell). The HCM masoleum was awesome. You had to leave your camera, walk in pairs on a specified path. You could only go inside in groups lead by a socialist guards in a white uniform and they you were marched around the tomb and stared at the embalmed body in a highly air conditioned room. It was creapy, HCM looked like he could just sit up and chat. Hard to believe he'd been dead so long! Outside the masoleum we saw the One Pillar Pagoda (pagoda is the word for like temple) and that was pretty and the pond surrounding it was filled with lily pads.

Today we are off to Hai Phong which is an industrial coastal city. Should be interesting.

Oh, the green tea here is very bitter - nothing like Chinese green tea. Word to the wise who are future Asia travelers. I mean I like it, but it isn't what you expect. We have been driving through the tea and rice regions and lining the road are farmers in the wicker Vietnames hats picking tea leaves and rice. It is so beautiful. Oh, good beer here is the Saigon beer. It is awesome.

Alright, time for my breakfast of spicy noodle soup.