Ashia

Ashia. It's a beautifully pronounced word, either way you say it. You'll here it "AH-she-ah" or "AH-see-ah," depending on whether you're speaking English/Pidgin or French. The context doesn't really matter, it always seems to fit. It means, depending on who you're talking to, something along the lines of "Sorry about that," or maybe "Hang in there." Maybe even a little sarcastic "Sucks to be you." But mostly it's a genuine sentiment expressing sympathy.
So, that being said, ASHIA.
Ashia that I've neglected you. Sorry about that. Really. My reason is, unfortunately, not that I've had limited internet access or time, but rather that I've simply not made Goal 3 a priority. Peace Corps goals:

Helping the people of interested countries in meeting their need for trained men and women.
Helping promote a better understanding of Americans on the part of the peoples served.
Helping promote a better understanding of other peoples on the part of Americans.
So I've been actively working on two of three. Thats 66%. It may be a D in the American system, but we're looking at 13/20 in the Cameroonian system, easily seen as passing with flying colors. That being said, Cameroonian culture dictates that if you don't CONSTANTLY (maybe even multiple times a day) update your friends and family about your whereabouts and activities, there's something wrong. So ashia.

The reality is that it's tough. Making time isn't as much of an issue as making mental space. The Peace Corps prepares you to adjust to living in a new culture, but doesn't always prepare you to live in three cultures simultaneously. To be a Peace Corps volunteer means living in three worlds at once: your American culture, the host country culture world around you, and the culture of PCVs - others like you who are trying to cope with meshing the two countries' cultures, resulting in a third culture, a creole culture with some unique aspects of its own.
So at some point in the last year of my life, the term "culture shock" stopped referring to bush taxis, palm wine, and couscous, strange to my American context, and we PCVs started using the phrase more often to describe tiled floors, air conditioning, and wifi. It began as a joke but becomes more and more true with time. It's uncomfortable, this switching back and forth between cultures, and you become close to those who know a little bit about your other contexts and can relate. The new class of trainees arrived last week, and I was beyond pleased to find that one was from the Kansas City area and had gone to Missouri State (we even had a couple of my favorite professors in common!) and another was from just the other side of Springfield! These are the people I'm going to call when I want to make Bass Pro and Silver Dollar City references, when the yankees and Californians make fun of my accent [YES, there IS a linguistic difference between WINE and WHINE], and when I just generally want to talk about home.

"C'est un question d'habitude" is one of my most commonly used new phrases. "It's a matter of getting used to it." You'd be amazed what you can get used to. You get used to doing housework with no paper towels, cleaning chemicals, vaccum cleaners. You get used to not having running water or consistent electricity or coffeeshops or bookstores. You get used to not driving. You get used to having to recharge your phone credit every few days if you get too chatty. You get used to French and to not understanding the local language. You get used to never fitting in. You get used to the marriage proposals and the sexual harrassment, to the mud and to bright sunlight. You get used to not hearing from your family for over a week at a time. You get used to seeing pictures of your friends' engagements, marriages, and babies from home. You get used to always wanting to write home but never knowing where or how to start, for fear that you've become a different person in the mean time and your friends won't have any context to understand the New You that's writing to them. And so you put it off.

But none of these new norms and habits fully sink in, The only thing I've TRULY, deeply becomed accustomed to in the past year (or perhaps I should say the last three years, for those of you who know my life a little) is being unaccustomed. A year into Peace Corps service and I'll be the first to tell you that it's difficult, yes, but it's worth it a thousand times over. For every hour I've felt homesick or uncomfortable there's been days of happiness or at least general contentment. Cameroon is a beautiful and diverse country, and I'm already proud to have experienced as much as I have here, and I know the next year is going to be every bit as good as the last.

But I also really miss you back home.

There's No Place Like Home

The following entry is how I left a draft about three months ago. I'd like to say that it was lack of internet that kept me from writing the paragraph about my trimesterly report, Kola nuts, and Coca-cola, but to be honest I don't remember why I abandoned the draft, and I think I owe you every paragraph I can muster at this point. Forgive the lack of conclusion, and just keep reading the next entry.

I've said it before, and I'll say it again: my life is like a film.

In village a few days ago, I crossed paths with a friend on her way home from the hospital, terribly distracted. My well-intentioned small talk was thoroughly interrupted by her announcement that her son and granddaughter had in fact woken at five that morning to the crumbling of their house around them. Yes, that's right. A house fell on them. There are no ruby red slippers for proof, but apparently I'm not in Kansas anymore.

This was not my first trip to the hospital that week, though. A several-day stint of appetitelessness and an accompanying feeling of nausea, chills, and lightheadedness left me fearful of one of those illnesses that may or may not actually be that serious, but by their tropical nature automatically register in the American mind as potentially deathly: malaria, typhoid, and what have you. I cancelled a trip to Bertoua and plans with friends. I climbed in bed at 1pm and listened through several Ben Harper albums to keep me from thinking too keenly how badly I wanted my mommy. Luckily, a bottle of Coke, 75 fcfa worth of Parle-Gs (that's 15 cents worth of graham crackers) and 18 hours in bed did the trick, and I woke up bright eyed and bushytailled. A quick visit to the hospital (clinic may be the more appropriate word) just for good measure, and Laura was back on track.

Missin you.

Hey, friend.

I miss you.

Love,
Laura

Be ne samba

The success of my social life can be measured by the length of my journal entries. During stage, I wrote daily. Now, I struggle to catch up at least once a week, resulting in chapter-length entries. Inversely, my busy schedule (and limited electricity) leaves little time for blogging. Forgive me, please.

Last weekend was my first Cameroonian veillée. That is to say, a wake. But this is no sombre experience like in the U.S, filing into a funeral home to see the body and hug the family. The atmosphere is much more like a Relay for Life: it's an all-night event for the whole community, complete with bonfires and traditional dances. I can't say it's joyous, because, well, it's a wake, but it's far from depressing. Family members of the deceased (unfortunately a young girl of just 16 who poisoned herself) mourned by masking their faces and walking about barefoot. I stayed for a short 3 hours, among dozens of extended family members huddled in blankets and dancing with the traditional dancers to the sounds of drums and whistles. The church choir belted out redemption songs, and people came and went.

People do that. They come and go. In fact, everywhere you go in Cameroon, you'll here the phrase "We are together." Ironically, these are actually parting words. But already I understand - it's a way of telling someone, "Even though I'm leaving, I'll be around." And they always are. In village I receive random visitors as early as 6am some days... or 3 or 4am on special occasions. These special occasions, more specifically, are the days of termite infestations.

Yes, that's right. Termites. Everywhere. Last Sunday I woke up at 4am to find hundreds of the flying creatures in my living room. I knew I was a true Peace Corps volunteer when my first reaction was, "Great. I know what's for dinner tonight!"

You think I'm kidding, but I'm not. At the time I went back to sleep but just a few hours later recruited my neighbors to help me sweep them all up. There were enough to fill a 5-gallon bucket more than half full, enough to feed the family. Seriously delicious. We ate it in a tomato sauce with some boiled manioc... definitely my prefered way to eat it, though roasted termites aren't bad either! Besides, I need a break from bushmeat, couscous, and spaghetti omelets from time to time.

Much more to say, but for now I'll leave you with one of the few Bamvele phrases I've finally picked up:
BE NE SAMBA. ("We are together." The most typical parting words in Cameroon.)

Waka waka

I need to start a tally. I’ve lost count of the moments where it hits me:

I live in Africa.

You’d think I’d have figured it out by now. I’m four months into my time in Cameroon, I bathe from a bucket, I’ve eaten animals I didn’t know existed, (or had only seen in cartoon form… sorry Toucan Sam) and my house has no electricity. Yet I get the mental catch-ups once every few days. My favorite was last week when my friend Flora, known to the general population as Mamiyanga, dropped by and informed me to grab my dirty laundry – we were going to “the source.”

I should take a moment first to brag, both for myself and for Mamiyanga. I am no wuss. I can hand-wash clothes, no problem. I got pretty good at it the six months I lived in La Reunion. Or so I thought. Homegirl taught me different. This sassy 25-year-old mother of three dropped out of school in quatrieme (8^th grade) and has been with a guy who’s married to someone else, her baby-daddy, for three years, and still manages to show up all the other girls in town with the restaurant she owns and runs single-handedly, 9-month-old child on her back. And it’s not some dinky little bean stand, either. We’re talking rice, beans, bread, fish, meat (of various qualities, most of which would make my friends at the World Wildlife Fund faint to think of eating) couscous, and whatever else comes along. Today I spent three hours with Mamiyanga going to market, negotiating the price of “erison,” which looks like a giant tailless beaver, carrying said erison from the hunter’s house to the restaurant, cooking beans, washing pots, and making sure the dogs didn’t run away with the uncooked monkey meat. And her boyfriend/babydaddy added to the day’s stock the rat he somehow killed with his motorcycle. Yum.

Anyway, the point is that Mamiyanga is a veritable force to be reckoned with. And she’s my best friend in village. She loves to chat, to tease, to dance, and to do anything and everything it takes to make me one of the community. (Unfortunately this involves trying to convince me to marry every unmarried guy in town.) So when she showed up to recruit me as company to do laundry, I was more than happy. Until this point I’d been doing laundry on my veranda with water stored in large plastic containers, hauled from a forage a kilometer away. You can imagine my pleasure when we headed off down a random path into the tall grasses, wash basins on our heads, rolling hills and trees all around, toward this mysterious “source.”

Remember when you were a kid and you watched Fern Gulley for the first time? That’s what it felt like at the source. After a few minutes, the path to the source descends onto a stone staircase that leads directly to the little concrete enclave through which the stream is directed, ankle-deep and cool in the afternoon shade. Four hours we were there. I finished my small pile of laundry in half an hour, but my dear friend had three times as many clothes, four times as dirty (restaurant work and a baby tend to do that), and twice as thorough. Clothes here get USED, like tools rather than decoration, so Mamiyanga was straight-up scrubbing, hard-bristled brush and concrete. And that’s how I learned to wash clothes properly. By late afternoon, when I saw her rinsing the last of the clothing, I was mentally preparing myself to leave, when all the women, one by one, discretely disrobed and began bathing. Yup. For once it wasn’t my skin that made me stick out from the rest; it was the fact that I was still clothed. That was the moment it hit me -  I was at the river with half the neighborhood’s worth of mothers and children bathing, shameless, in front of each other, buckets full of clean, wet, heavy laundry ready to be placed on the heads of the women and carried home to be laid out on clotheslines and roofs and bushes to dry in the sun.

Waka waka. Welcome to Africa.

Week One of Two Years

 It’s beginning to feel a lot like Christmas. I’ve woken up by 5:30 every day this week, well before my alarm, eyes wide and mind racing. This week, my fellow trainees are quick to laugh, quick to show affection, and giving gifts and cards right and left.

But it’s not Christmas that’s bringing on this feeling – it’s the general mental state of transition. Today is Swearing In.

The final weeks of Stage have been amazingly different from the first few weeks. After Site Visit, everyone had a much better idea of how our training could be concretely applied to our communities, and the subsequent feeling of ownership and responsibility drove us through the end of Stage. A few highlights:

Pagne: (sounds kind of like “pine-ya”) Everyone wears it. It’s a general term we use for the colorful patterned fabrics you find everywhere in Cameroon. Keep an eye out on Facebook for some pics. All the Stagaires (trainees) own at least once pagne outfit; some own enough to completely phase out everything they brought from the U.S.

My host family: They’re convinced that I’m going to be marrying a Cameroonian and staying here for the rest of my life. I admit to fueling the fire by confiding in them my crush on a certain excessively attractive language trainer (you know who you are*) and they thus informed me that WHEN I marry a Cameroonian, they get the dowry. It’s all in good fun, but really, I couldn’t have asked for a more perfect situation. They’ve truly welcomed me in as part of the family, and I have every intention of calling my host mom up for advise and encouragement when I get down. She and Maman Julienne (our neighbor) have also made it QUITE clear that they expect an invitation to come visit me in the East once I get settled in.

Superlatives: Within YD (Youth Development), we voted superlatives for each other. You ready for mine?

1. Most likely to incorporate bush mean into their daily diet.
2. Most likely to have a diet comprised solely of baton de manioc.
3. Most likely to get married first. (See above)*
4. Most likely to become the next Stage Greeter (Two PCVs are responsible for the new class of Stagaires in Yaounde for their first few days in country.)

IEP:  I gave a presentation on Sorcery and Traditional Religion in Cameroon for my Independent Exploration Project. It was 30 minutes long and in French. It was awesome.

Motos, Monkeys, and Mbamvele, Oh my!

Sandwiched between my new postmate and my new favorite moto driver, I travel the 40km/one hour from Bertoua to Diang, my soon-to-be-home, watching the hills carpeted with dense forest spread out in all directions. Along the road mud huts and small cement buildings that serve as homes, hospitals, and boutiques present themselves as the locus of village life - people cooking, playing, arguing, working, lounging in the shade of their hengards.*

Diang is, quite frankly, the epitome of an African village. Everyone knows everyone. In my 3.5 days there, I managed to meet the Sous-Prefect, the doctor, all of the teachers and administration of the high school, several members of the Association des Femmes (Women's association), both mayors, the head of the police station, a traditional Chef, and several, several others. I visited several schools, including one primary school with two classrooms and a third "salle" that is simply a covered outdoor classroom. There are three teachers, each covering two classes at a time. What's in that pot? Sure, I'll take a plate of couscous de manioc with bushmeat. Who needs silverware? Yes. I ate monkey. And drank palm wine.

Welcome to life in the East, Cameroon's least populated, least developed region.

For Site Visit, I stayed with Justine, my new post mate. Her small apartment is a spacious two-room studio, not counting the latrine out back. Along with her neighbors, we took a pleasant walk to Kombe, 5km down the road. Along the way we saw fields of corn, manioc (cassava), sugar cane, plantains, and many other crops. I have a promise from my new friend Jean-Pierre to teach me to farm.

A few paragraphs couldn't begin to describe the experiences and transition I've gone through this week, but I hope this post may serve as a brief introduction to my life at post. The people of the East are extremely welcoming, and I can genuinely say I already feel comfortable in village. I can't wait to start working with OREOPRODHU: L'Organisation pour l'encadrement des enfants orphelins et la promotion des droits humains de Diang. With this new self-orientation within Diang, the final four weeks of Stage will have an entirely different atmosphere, and I can hardly wait to take on the challenges.


*I actually have no idea how to spell this word, but it's a reference to the wood lean-tos that most village families have outside their house. It's generally where people hang out - drink palm wine, eat, chat, etc.