8 mars: bon fete! (march 8, happy women's day!)

Athough Women's Day is allotted on March 8, the activities began a full week before. I joined the women playing football a couple times in a tournament! It turned out to be really fun, tiring and amusing to see some of the older ladies kick a ball around. But there were a couple younger players who were pretty intense about the game and I kept up for the most part, but I found out later that they said not to push the 'white girl'. But it was a great bonding experience sweatin' it out with the ladies. There was also cultural soirees which are events held in the evening and the women dance or act out sketches. I didn't always understand the sketches when they spoke the native language of Moundong but they did speak of the rights and equalities of women in Cameroon which is great to at least start talking about it!

On the actual day of March 8, I 'marched' (yes, i said march) in a line in front of the important people of the community in my pagne (fabric) specially made for Women's Day 2010. Here are a couple photos of the defilé.



They stuck me right in front of the lines. Very Awkward.





I spent the rest of the day partying with the women and my Girl's Club. The evening was full of eating, drinking, socializing and cant forget about the dancing! And as for the whole production, I met some of the more influential and successful women which was great to see in my little village.

Quality Bilingualism for Quality Education; You can decipher what exactly that means...

I wanted to share some photos of Bilingualism Day so enjoy!


My 6eme class singing Row Row Row your Boat.


My 5eme class reading a Cameroonian poem in English.


My 4eme class singing the chorus of Lean on Me


A class singing and dancing to This Old Man.


And some students playing Simon Says.

Now that I know how this works I hope to add more photos in the future. Go English Day!

so...how about that weather?

I fully realize that in the states when we start talking about the weather it is because we have run out of things to say or the conversation is going nowhere. It is quite the opposite here. People like to do this thing called ‘state the obvious’ so the weather is discussed in almost every conversation. And its not even like the weather changes dramatically. I probably say ‘Yes, it is hot today’ about twenty-seven times a day. But I don’t mind. In a way it connects me with the people here. Now on to my real topic: I really am going to discuss the weather.

Dry season started in the middle of October when the rain officially stopped. But we could see the real change within the first weekend of December. Suddenly everything actually felt dry, the heat and air, and a light cloud of dust descended onto my village. It disappeared but the wind appeared in its place. During the months of December and January, every night the wind came, forcefully blowing its way around my house. Because my village is located right next to mountains, the wind is amazingly powerful. I would wake up several times a night from the noise of wind whipping past the windows. And it would be chilly in the morning! Too cool to bathe in the morning and I even wore a sweater on some days!

The combination of dry season and the wind increased the amount of dust in the air. My sinuses cannot seem to become accustomed to it because it has left me with a bloody or very runny nose. There is also this phenomenon called the harmattan winds that blow in from the Sahara and fill the air with dust. From what it sounded like it was not bad this year but there were some days were it was hard to see the mountains next to my house. Now the coolness has parted ways and it seems to be heating up very quickly. At midday the sun is already beating down with full force and it is stronger than any sun I felt in the states. And it will only get hotter in March…whew…so how about that snow in the states?

Bilingual? More like two hundred and fifty-six-something-lingual.

Although the official two languages of Cameroon are French and English, it is really quite different in the field. From my experience I would say majority of Cameroonians speak French (some speak French well, some speak a simplified version of French) and the majority of Cameroonians do not speak English. They might know a couple of words here and there and have the greetings memorized but actual conversations are not possible.

My village is pretty small and what we call “en brusse” so there is even less formal language and more of a mélange of tribal languages. The tribe in my village is the Moundong so they have their own langugage but the language of the Extreme North, Fulfolde, is from another tribe. The villagers have told me that by the end of two years I will speak fluent Moundong but I am finding it pretty difficult just to pick up this gibberish. Luckily, I have several students who find it very amusing to teach me the local langue. I have a couple of pages of translated phrases and the students will force me to practice with them. And I can always get a kick out of the older ladies of the village if I throw out some Moundong words.

But all these languages are getting hard to keep track of and sometimes speaking English has even become more difficult. In class, I speak a slower, simplified version of English. A couple of my colleagues practice their English with me but once again, I have to think of simplified phrases before I respond. It is an interesting blend of teaching English but speaking another language to communicate. So there’s a reason if you start noticing my blogs becoming more dull and simplified. Maybe I can just add some French and Moundong to spice it up.

And to those of you stateside, happy thanksgiving! Eat a cold turkey and mashed potato on wheat bread sandwich for me. Mmmm mmmm.

fulfilling (or lack thereof) my duties as a woman

For one, I am a terrible cook. At least in these conditions. I still have not been able to find a gas tank for my stove. I don’t understand how there are just not any bottles and an explanation has yet to be given so it remains a mystery why I cannot find one. So I cook over charbon (charcoal) and it is Difficult! There is a technique to lighting the charcoal that I cannot seem to master so that takes about an hour. Then actual cooking time takes about another one to two hours depending on how long it takes for the charcoal to really heat up. I have to plan my meals far in advance so usually I try to make as much food as possible that will keep without a fridge. So far I have made goopy pasta, runny oily eggs and metallic-tasting rice (that’s a whole other story that I will not get into here). None of it has actually tasted good but I guess it is edible because I haven’t gotten sick. I managed to eat most of the meals mostly because I was hungry but I had to throw some of it to the dogs. My lack of skill is embarrassing. It gets better every time so hopefully soon the food will be decent! Good thing for Maggie seasoning (MSG in a cube).

And second, I often surprise people when they ask me if I am married and have kids and I respond no to both questions. Sometimes for shock value I like to add that I don’t want this. I mean I am a lady of child-bearing age (if not too old), what else could I possible want? Then they start inquiring about if I would marry an African, specifically a Cameroonian. I have had some people, usually men, tell me as-a-matter-of-fact that I will get married and spend the rest of my life here. (They obviously don’t know me. Not that I am necessarily opposed to the idea but I am not really the type to sit in one spot.) Guys will ask to be my petit ami (boyfriend) the second time they see me. I feel as though they see me as a ticket out of here. The ‘unwanted attention’ does get tiring but it quickly makes you realize an aspect of life here: relationships of the genders.

A round of applause for teachers everywhere…and especially those in conditions such as these.

Although I have only been a teacher for a couple short months, I have gained a tremendous fold of respect for other teachers. This is a hard job, no doubts about it. I teach in concrete classrooms with completely open windows (the weather is mostly just hot so it works okay), so bugs, bees and lizards have free range. Parts of the roof are even missing in one of the classrooms. There are about 60 students in each of my classes sitting two to three at wooden desks.

Not only are the conditions rough, but actual teaching is tough. It is different everyday how the students will react. One day they could listen, take notes and participate in everything and the next day they couldn’t care less what I am doing in the front of the classroom. It is quite a feeling to be standing in front of 60 students with blank faces or not concentrating at all. I could make a lesson plan that I think will totally rock but becomes a total flop. It can definitely be frustrating but they are just kids and actually teaching me something. What’s that? Patience. And the job is more tiring than I ever imagined. It is like you are performing in front of the students and you constantly have to keep their minds attentive. Five hours in and I’m done. Props to those teachers who have to teach for longer.

Teaching has its perks too. Sometimes a class can go so well it puts me in a state of amazement. (Usually the next class breaks it pretty fast). But I will have to say that it is quite another feeling when you see a child’s face light up because he understands. You are getting through to someone. And the kids are quirky too. They can usually make me smile or laugh at their antics. I will catch them misbehaving and I all have to do is give them a look and they get all squeamish and scared. And sometimes they are just straight out funny. And every once in awhile they will yell at each other if the class starts to become too loud. A true miracle: when I don’t have to punish the students because they do it themselves.

Teachers everywhere deserve more than just a round of applause but that is all I got now.

a few natural bumps in the road never hurt anybody

After about a week of travel and banking, I finally moved in to my house at my post. My completely empty house except for my luggage and me. But on the upside, I live right next to a couple of mountains! I’ve climbed up them a bit to see the whole view and it is wondrous to see so far. Especially now since the landscape is still green, but in a month everything will be a dusty brown. My counterpart that I met with during training was affected to another school district but he was nice enough to come back for a day to introduce me to other school officials. So far everyone has been very friendly to me (maybe even too friendly sometimes). But I am slowly making friends and getting to know the community. As the only white girl in the village, people already know who I am and that I am teaching English at the lycee. It’s a little awkward when they come up to me like we’ve have known each other forever and I have no idea who they are. I spoke with a Catholic Mission here about getting some furniture built and I finally received that a week ago! I have had trouble finding a gas tank for a stovetop so I lived off street food for two weeks. Since my village is pretty small there is only benins (fried dough) and cooked beans. It was like the Fourth of July fireworks in my intestines for a good week. And my bathroom is an outside pit latrine (basically just a hole in the ground) so that has been interesting. I made friends with these two sisters who cooked for me and showed me how to cook meals over a fire. So I can eat real food finally! I’ve already seen some of the difficulties I will face as a female and how my experience will be different from a male volunteer. There are two other volunteers about 10 kilometers away in a bigger town where I can escape to if I need support. Petit a petit.