What day is it?

This has been an eventful week to say the least: nightclubs, rusty nails, church in the house, death, vipers, and anteaters.

It’s been such an eventful week that I lost track of time somewhere. Yesterday (Friday), I thought it was Thursday until someone told me it was Friday. How this happened, I don’t know, but I am convinced that I was robbed of a day this week, or there was some sort of lapse in the time continuum, very strange indeed.

Let’s see, where to start.

Ok, last Saturday, after I last updated this blog, I went out with some of my fellow trainees and some Cameroonians. We went to this friendly little bar/restaurant where we spent the next four or five hours relaxing, chatting, drinking Guinness and other kinds of beer, and eating. Many of the American trainees are still uncomfortable with their French, so they weren’t going out of their way to talk to our Cameroonian friends. It was a totally segregated seating arrangement; on one side, the white English speaking Americans, on the other side, the French speaking Cameroonians. I thought to myself “why are we even here with these people if we’re not even going to talk to them.” So I took matters into my own hands, and forced people to change seats. It proved to be successful, my first accomplishment in the Peace Corps! For dinner, we had fish, chicken, VIPER, and rice. All this for about $1.75. The Viper was delicious.

Sunday was a typical day. I spent two hours washing a few articles of clothing. I sure miss washing machines! My hands are definitely getting used to the hard work, I managed not to bleed this time.

Monday I visited the supermarket in town that I will be working with. It was a very typical Cameroonian business in many ways. It is one of the larger businesses in town, yet they have no organization. Their accounting records are a pile of notebooks with sloppy handwriting thrown on the floor in the corner of an office. They want to computerize their operations, but they have no idea: where to get the computers, how much they cost, or how to use them. I want to help them in this area, but I don’t think I will have enough time to do that, since I will only be in town for 6 more weeks.

Tuesday I woke up, walked out of my room, half awake, and to my surprise there were about thirty guys staring at me. What a way to wake up! They were there to unload some wood from Papa’s truck. Here I am with no shirt, eyes half open, with a towel, some soap and roll of toilet paper in my hand. I could see in their eyes, they were thinking “Who is this white guy and what is he doing with toilet paper in his hand?” Some of these guys died this week; I will talk about that later...

Tuesday night, as I stumbled to my bathroom, I stepped on a rusty nail. I quickly rushed to my Peace Corps Medical Kit (the biggest medical kit you have ever seen!) and cleaned the wound, and put a band-aid on it. My next concern was tetanus… which was taken care of the next day...

Wednesday: I got my tetanus shot, and did some other things, but I can’t remember.

Thursday: I ate a sandwich for lunch, the first sandwich I’ve had since getting here. It had egg, sardine, beans, and onions. Sounds strange, tasted grrrrrrreat. Thursday night I came home, to my surprise there was a priest in the corner of the courtyard area, and my brother was confessing (I assume, since he was kneeling in front of the priest, and his head was down). I asked Papa what was going on. They were having a special mass at the house that evening for Papa to help him cure his diabetes and high blood pressure. The medicine wasn’t working, so they resorted to the priest. This was my first experience (that I can remember) at a catholic mass. Inside the house, they rearranged the furniture to make it look like a church of some sort. I got home at 6:30pm, the mass finished at 10:30pm. It was interesting for the first 2 hours, but then I got hungry, tired, and a little bored. We spent the four hours standing, sitting, standing again, then sitting, singing, lighting candles, walking in procession outside, walking back inside, singing etc…Half it was in French, half was in the local language, but I got the picture. After the mass, the priest watched soccer with us and we ate chicken.

Thursday night (around 3am): Papa’s truck crashed somewhere in the woods. He wasn’t in it, but some of his workers were, the same ones I met on Tuesday morning. There were two of them sitting in the back, on the logs. Apparently, the brakes gave out, the truck went over a cliff, the guys on the back jumped off, only to be crushed by the logs that fell out of the truck, they died, the driver and passenger in the front survived. I actually didn’t find out about this until Friday night when I got home from training and realized none of my brothers nor my father was home. They were in the forest, dealing with authorities, digging out bodies, and recovering the wood.

Friday: After training, went to a bar with my friends. A crazy old Frenchman came up to us, and started babbling nonsense. He asked me if I was enjoying Cameroon, I said, “yeah, it’s beautiful, the people are so friendly, etc.”, then he says “soon, you will hate this place, the people are evil, you will want to leave.” He babbled some more, and then I asked him why he was here if he hated it so much. His answer wasn’t clear, but it had to do with making money and bribing people in high places. Crazy old Frenchman.

Today is Saturday. I will play soccer at 3:00 with all the other trainees. Tomorrow, I will go to the forest with my Papa and another trainee to see his whole operation, this is assuming, of course, everything is sorted out with the accident. Sunday night, I will eat anteater, I’ll let you know how it tastes. The porcupine was delicious by the way, kind of like turkey, but greasier and tastier.

There are rumors swirling around about where I will be posted for my two years. I’m pretty sure I will be in West Province. It is the most developed province, and the economic powerhouse of Cameroon. It is also the coolest (literally) area of Cameroon. It is in the hills. Apparently it gets pretty chilly at night, and it rains a lot. It is also on the road to Limbe-the beautiful beach with the 12,000 ft volcano overlooking it. I want to climb this volcano at some point. If I get posted in the west, I will be happy, but Peace Corps is full of surprises, so I could end up anywhere...stay tuned.

I miss everyone, friends and family, but not enough to leave Cameroon. I’m having a great, interesting time so far…you should come and visit!

Ok, that’s all for this week, until next time, au revoir!

Porcupine for dinner!!!!! Mmmmm

It’s hard to believe I’ve only been in Cameroon for two weeks now, it honestly feels like a lifetime. I guess I’ve seen so many new and interesting things, it’s enough to fit into a lifetime. The time seems to move a little slower here, two weeks in the States was a blink of the eye.

Peace Corps has definitely been a full time job, and then some. Let me take you through a typical day of training:

6:45am: Wake up! I actually wake up on my own now, no need for my alarm clock. Between the roosters, the barking dogs, the noises emitting from the courtyard of my host family’s house, and my natural biological clock, waking up is easy. I crawl out from my mosquito net and hop to my feet.

6:55am: Shower time. My host family actually built me my own bathroom facility. It is a separate structure from the rest of the house. It’s basically a brick structure with a tin roof. Inside there is a toilet (no toilet seat, I’ve really developed some powerful quadriceps!), a sink and a shower. No hot water, but cold showers are actually starting to feel good. There is no mirror, so shaving is a bitch. I am fortunate to have these amenities; there are other volunteers who rely on a pit latrine and bucket baths every morning. Apparently I was placed with one of the more affluent families in town. My host dad is in the timber business, and he chops down some pretty big trees. Everyone in town knows him by the giant Toyota Land Cruiser he drives.

7:10am: Get dressed. I wear khaki pants and a collared shirt everyday. Cameroonians take dress pretty seriously, and I like to look good (not that I have to try!). Since its so humid here, I tend to sweat quite a bit, so my clothes can only be used twice. Cleaning clothes here is a huge pain in the ass. I have to hand wash them, which not only tears my hands apart, but also really gives the clothes a serious beating. Then you have to let them dry for two days, and then you have to iron them. I even iron my boxer shorts. Why? Because there are these insects called “mango flies” that like to lay eggs on damp clothes, and when the eggs hatch, the worms that come out like to burrow under your skin. Then you have to squeeze out the worms, kind of like popping a zit. So, I definitely iron EVERYTHING. I don’t know how common these mango worms are, but I don’t like to take chances with things like that!

7:25 am: Breakfast. The food here has been delicious, and that includes breakfast. My host sister, Florence, usually cooks me breakfast. It’s often an omelet with onions and tomatoes, some bread, pineapple, mango, and coffee. Sometimes it’s different, though. Like this morning I had mackerel (fish), and beans, and bread, and banana, and coffee.

7:50am: Off to stage (training). My house is about ten minutes from the training site. I walk through a series of dirt paths and grassy fields. On the way there I wave and smile to everyone who stares at me (which is just about everyone). Its fun being the center of attention, it’s like they’ve never seen a white guy before. Sometimes little kids chase after me, I give them gum, and high fives.

8:00am: Training begins. Since I already speak French, I don’t really take language classes, which make up half the training schedule. So while everyone else is in French language training, I have other duties. The other Allen in the group happens to be the other French speaker. We are in charge of publishing, and writing much of the weekly training newsletter. We also help conduct language classes. In the evenings I tutor one of the trainees who’s having trouble with French.

10:20am: Coffee break, really good coffee break.

10:40-12:30: Technical training. This is where we learn about what the hell we’re going to be doing for the next two years. For now I know that I will be working in a micro finance institution, as well as advising people on small business improvement. The micro finance institutions are like credit unions, where people can obtain small loans to help them start small businesses in order to become more self-sufficient. Small business can be selling bananas, opening an Internet café, organizing an art co-op, and just about anything else that can generate a profit. It should be pretty interesting. I get the impression that Cameroon has many business opportunities, but the people here are not educated on how to make the most of them. The other problem is a lack of technology. They really need some computers in this place, and they need to learn how to use them. It could do wonders for them. So based on all this, my project is potentially going to be very interesting, and very challenging, which is what I want. At the end of the two months training, we will be sent to our post in country. All I know for now is that I will be placed in a large city, somewhere. I will keep you posted.

Update: We have been assigned to work with a local business in town during training. We will basically monitor the business, get a feel for how it works, identify areas that could use improvement, and then write a report at the end of training which we will present to the business we work with. I have been assigned to the grocery store in town. I’ve already been there several times, and I already see things that can be improved. They are trying to computerize the store, because as of right now, they hand write receipts, and use ancient calculators to add up all the purchases. Their inventory system is in a series of old beat up notebooks. Hopefully I can take part in the installation and implementation of a computer system.

12:30-1:30pm: Lunch. Lunchtime is always interesting because we’re on our own as opposed to eating our host family’s food. I go out with the same four people everyday. We call ourselves “the Core.” We’re all similar in our humor, and attitude, yet very different in other ways. One is a 32-year-old MBA holder, who is very politically minded and wants to work in development. The other is a 25-year-old investment banker (she just left a high class Wall Street job and Manhattan apartment, to come to the armpit of Africa, and a lovely pit latrine, she’s crazy!). The other one is named Allen just like me; he’s a sarcastic Chicago guy, who studied theatre and economics. And the last one is an Ivy League educated, female version of my friend Blake (hey guy!). I think these people (5 including me, three guys, two girls) have quickly become my best friends in the group, for some reason. Its not that I don’t like all 25 people in the group, but in times like these, you need close friends, and it’s impossible to have 25 close friends.

1:30-5:00pm: More training. Usually a health session, or a cross-cultural session, and maybe more language. The health sessions are very boring and often disgusting. Yesterday we learned how to make a Malaria slide. To make a malaria slide you have to prick yourself in the finger to draw blood, then wipe the blood onto a glass slide, which you send to the PC medical office in Yaounde. You do this anytime you think you have Malaria. Luckily our medical kits contain many drugs to keep us alive in case we come down with the disease. So yesterday, we had to practice drawing our own blood, something I didn’t think I could do. But I managed to poke a hole in my finger. I got pictures of the whole process, and I will upload them just as soon as I can.

5:00-6:00pm: Tutoring/Beer drinking. Some days, I tutor my friend (part of the Core), other days we all go to a bar in town. It only costs about 90 cents for a giant bottle of Guinness. One of those a day definitely keeps the doctor away, and it tastes really really good after a long day of training.

Sometime between 6:00 and 9:00pm: Dinner with host family. It’s actually usually only with one other person in the family, and always someone different. I guess everyone is on their own eating schedule. Dinner is great. Usually some sort of meat (fish, beef, chicken, or pork), some rice, some potato or manioc, some fried or boiled plantains or some sort of spinach like green leaf in a peanut sauce. There’s other stuff too, but I can’t think of it all. They always have “piment sauce” on the side, which they like to spread on the meat. It is the spiciest stuff you have ever eaten, but it’s really good. I made the mistake of putting too much on the first time I ate it, ouch, burn.

This morning, my host momma wanted to show me what host papa caught in the forest, which we will eat on Sunday night. Unfortunately the thing escaped the storage room where they were keeping it. Not to worry she said, the porcupine can’t be far! Yes, we will eat porcupine on Sunday night. The porcupine is still alive and wondering around the compound. They say its tres tres bon. I’ll let y’all know what it tastes like! ***UPDATE**** The porcupine has been found, Antoine, my host brother, put it in the freezer last night, apparently it was still alive when he tossed it in there. I got a great picture of my sister holding the thing upside down.

Sometime between 6:00 and 9:00pm: Right now there is the Euro 2004 soccer tournament. I watch all the matches on TV with my host brothers (all 6 of them). It’s just like old times in Boulder, watching hockey (minus the Keystone Light!). I root for France, who is playing well.

Then I go to bed around 9:30 or 10:00pm. If I can, I listen to my music, and read some of the technical training handouts (there are many of them). But I’m usually so tired by then, I go to sleep. I have Mefloquine (malaria medication) induced dreams every night. The drug makes you have really lucid dreams and sometimes they’re fun, but sometimes they are downright scary. Like the night I dreamt I was being attacked by the guard dogs that watch over the compound at night. I’m not one for animal cruelty, but I really want to kick these dogs, they sit right outside my window and bark in the middle of the night. On the other hand, they have these really cute puppies. Cute for now, then they grow up and bark, and then I want to kick them!

So that is, a typical day, although no day is ever all that typical. Today is Saturday. After our morning classes, I will head home for lunch, then to the internet café to upload this blog entry and hopefully write some emails. Then it’s off to “Les Rolls”, the hottest bar in town. All of us PCTs (Peace Corps Trainees) will be meeting there for an afternoon, evening, and night filled with Guinness, music, dancing, and whatever else. It will be nice to unwind.

This is probably the longest blog entry I will ever be able to write. Luckily, I got my hands on someone's laptop, and I was able to type it out before going to the internet café.

LAPTOP DONATIONS? OK, here’s the deal: I really need a laptop. If I get a laptop I can keep this blog detailed and interesting. If I get a laptop I can be a hell of a lot more productive with my project. Working at a bank, it would be nice to have a machine to create spreadsheets and other documents. The volunteers in country highly recommend getting one. I don’t need anything fancy, just something that will run Microsoft office. If you, or anyone you know, or any corporation you know has an old laptop that they would like to donate to a very worthy cause, or even sell at a very affordable price (I’m working for peanuts here), please contact me by email allenbanick3@yahoo.com. I would be ever grateful. I will arrange the shipping details, and everything else.

Ok, I think thats it for now. You are welcome to call me or email me anytime. The internet connection here is so damn slow, it may take me a while to get back to you, but I will in due time.

Can you feel my sweat?

Finally! I have been dying to share the adventure that has been my time in cameroon thus far, and I have finally located the "cyber cafe" in my training town which is called "Mbalmayo" pronounced "ball my o".

To those of you who thought I was dead, not to worry, I am alive and kicking here in beautiful, interesting, crazy, hot, sweaty, freindly, smelly, crowded, cute, interesting, slow, stressful, relaxing Cameroon.

Let me sum up the events of the last 8 days since I left Philly.

We arrived in Yaounde (the large, chaotic capital of Cameroon) last Saturday night. The first thing I noticed when we got off the plane was the wall of humidity and warm air which hit me like a freight train. It felt surprisingly good after spending 14 hours on Air France (can you say free wine? we all enjoyed that!). We collected our bags and in a very efficient, planned out way, we were ushered through Yaounde in our Peace Corps vehicles (they actually have a fleet of Land Cruisers) to our hotel in town. I was pretty tired, so I went right to sleep and was only awoken by the most intense thunderstorm I have ever seen, gotta love living on the equator.

We spent Sunday relaxing, touring Yaounde, and having a nice dinner at the country directors house (which is auite nice). I got to know the Peace Corps stqff in Cameroon which is very impressive, and friendly. Most of the staff is composed of Cameroonian nationals who really believe in the Peace Corps mission, and who certainly know what they're talking about.

The next few days in Yaounde, we spent at the Peace Corps compound in town (yes, compound, with a big wall surrounding it and armed security guards on patrol). We had orientation on health, safety, culture, language (pas de problème pour moi), and technical stuff (the field i'll be working in). The health sessions were pretty painful to sit through, as we learned about every disease, parasite, and worm that can attack us here in Cameroon. Luckily the PC medical staff is quite good, and they healed me quickly when I got sick during my thrid day (dont worry, just food poisoning, but believe me, I was fearing much worse).

On thursday we were brought to Mbalmayo (about 20 miles south of Yaounde). This is where I will be spending the next 9 weeks training and living with my Cameroonian host family. When we got to town, the host families were waiting for us with huge smiles on their faces...

The Esalla family.

I lucked out. I was placed with a wonderful, relatively well off (electricity, running water (usually), large house, stereo, dvd player, two (small) tvs) large, Cameroonian family. In my compound there are about 12-14 people living. 10 of the kids belong to my host parents, and there are a couple nephews as well. My little sister is 1 years old and she is still scared to death of me, being the first "blanc" or whitey she has ever seen. She is sooo cute though. I have many brothers and sisters ranging from 1-24 years old (better watch out for that 24 year old host sister ;)...hahaha just kidding.

My mama cooks great food. Last night we had an abundance of pork in piment (spicy) sauce, beef stew, fried plantains, rice, manioc, mangos, pineapple (the sweetest pineapple you've ever tasted), wine, bread, and more. Needless to say, I might put some meat on these bones of mine in the next three months!, probably not though because I sweat so damn much).

After dinner we watch kung fu movies and "makossa videos" (strange music videos of people shaking their derrière, but good music). Then I go to sleep in my own room, which I share with many lizards and spiders. My bed is covered with a mosquito net which protects me from the malaria. In the mornings I take my bucket bath, eat breakfast and drink coffee, then I walk the ten minute path to my training facility where I begin the day sharing stories of host families with my fellow trainees. I have it pretty well with my family compared to most others, and the fact that I speak french makes it easy for me. I,m also learning the local language.

I'm making many great friends in the Peace Corps and in my host family. The experience has been wonderful thus far.

My internet time is running out, but I expect to keep this updated at least once a week now that I'm in training.

D Day, Philly, new friends, birthdays, and more

Plane leaves in 9 hours from Philly, but we have to be at the airport in three. Its time to hurry up and wait!

I got my vaccinations this morning, Yellow Fever, Measles, Mumps, Rubella, and another one that I've forgotten. Those shots made me feel a little WOOOOOOOOZZYYY. But I'm ok now.

Yesterday was my big 24th birthday. Get this: Out of 24 people, there are 3 Allens (same spelling, all in the business program), and three june 3rd birthdays. One of those birthdays happens to be my roommate at the hotel who turned 69 yesterday! He's pretty amazing for doing this. Last night we all went out and splurged a little with the $160 walk around cash PC gave us. Calamari, Tuna, Guinness, and more...It was real nice. Hung out at an Irish pub with some local Phildaelphians who had no idea where and what Cameroon was. They said "You's guys are all craaazy!" What a way to go...haha.

I reall like this group of people. Talk about diversity, every age, race, background, you can imagine. Although, the majority of the people are in my age range. I think I'll make some good friends.

Staging was good, lots of interesting info, well put together, I feel more prepared and enthusiastic about everything.

Ok, gotta go pack, or unpack my bags down to 80 lbs. Should be interesting...

This will be my last post before I leave the country. Next time I write, I will be in beautiful Yaounde, Cameroon.

A bientot!