Wow, has it really been a month since my last blog? I guess time flies when your day consists of wash (if the water is running), teach (if your students can understand you), repeat. I am sure to have some brain flatulence along the way, but I will try to recall this last month as best I can.
The first few weeks were spent adjusting to my new city. I walked around a lot trying to get a visual layout of the city, find where the cold beer was, and figure out which way led back to my apartment. Probably in that order too. I was lucky enough that Greg, the PCV in Edea before me, had left my house pretty well stocked so I didn’t need to look for too many necessities right away. I still have yet to buy a TV, but so far I haven’t missed the bad music videos and trashy soap operas that were rampant in Bafia.
The neighbors to my left are Anglophone and I am quite glad about that. Not that I don’t want to practice my newly acquired French skills, but sometimes it is nice to just come home and communicate with someone else without an enormous amount of effort on both sides. Even if they say that I am “rapping” when I talk too fast in my American English.
So the first few weeks were all about getting used to Edea. I quickly became friends with the neighbor boy, Treneo (pronounced Rahn-yo), who named my apartment the “House of Musique” because I was “always” playing music from my laptop or iPod. Anymore though, he’s the one that runs the batteries all the way down on my iPod ever since he discovered there were games he could play while listening to music. At first, he only liked to listen to the one Michael Jackson I had in my iTunes, “Billie Jean”, but he’s discovered an Avett Brothers song he likes along with a few others. Unfortunately, he’s also discovered which is my bedroom window and when I don’t come to his knocks at the front door he comes to the bedroom window and yells until I respond, usually with “I’m sleeping Treneo, Come back later!”
They told me that school would start for the administration on August 29th and that the first day of school for teachers was September 5th. What that really meant was that students would start coming to ENIEG to pay their school fees throughout the week and the end of the week we’d have staff meetings where teachers seemed to yell and complain a lot while the admin just smiled. A few of the Anglophone teachers made their comments in English so I was able to understand a little better than the French fragments I had been picking up otherwise.
My first day on the job was pretty bad. They couldn’t understand me, I couldn’t understand them. They laughed at my pronunciation, I got flustered. I started doubting my ability to actually be able to teach my students again, but by the end of the week I knew that I had improved somewhat and that’s really all I can ask for. People in the states go to school for 4+ years to become a teacher, I had 3 months. Will I make mistakes? Sure will and probably a lot of them. Will I like teaching every day? Sure won’t and probably a lot of days. But, I made a commitment to come to Cameroon and try to make a positive difference in the lives of the people that I interact with and knew it wasn’t going to be cupcakes and rainbows all the time. Optimism goes a long way over here if you can’t tell.
In case I had forgotten or become temporarily color blind, the locals have been kind enough to remind me that I am “le blanc” every chance they get i.e. while I’m walking by, on the back of a moto, or eating a meal. I try not to let it bug me. It’s more annoying than anything. I knew that I would be in a fish bowl, everyone constantly looking at you, and tried to mentally prepare myself, but it is pretty much impossible until you experience it firsthand. If it is a kid, I usually just smile and wave because they don’t know any better. If it’s a teen or adult I usually call them “black man” in the local language. They get a kick out of whitey speaking the native tongue. They also call me Jesuit (Jesus) a lot because of my beard. At first I got a kick out of it, but the novelty has worn off of it too. For a very religious country it seems pretty blasphemous. A beard shaving is in the near future, but I’m kind of getting a kick out of seeing how many creatures can find residence inside. Actually, a sense of humor is how I survive here with some optimism sprinkled in.
I’ve also had a few maintenance problems with my house already. The cable that ran from the water pipe to my toilet was constantly leaking and I figured I was probably going to be paying for more water than I was actually using. Doing my best Handy Manny impersonation, I grabbed some pliers and tried to tighten the bolt connected to the wall at the end of the loose cable. Apparently, I’m not a toilet technician or whatever is the politically correct term nowadays for a plumber. Somehow, I managed to break the bolt/washer thing when I tried to tighten it, disengaging the cable from the wall and the water line. Water began to spray, no maybe jet is a better word, into my bathroom like I had just ran into a fire hydrant. I tried reconnecting the cable, plugging the hole, catching the water in a bucket. Nothing was helping. Luckily, my neighbor was home and I yelled for his help. He saw the problem and was smart enough to go and turn the water to my place off outside. In my defense, I had no idea where the kill valve is so that was not an option when I was feeling like Captain Blackbeard in a couple inches of water. At least this time when my place flooded none of my electronics got wet like in Bafia. I gave him some CFA and he went and bought a new line and a stopper for the water line to the toilet so we could at least turn the water back on for the shower and sink until it got fixed. They took way longer than I would’ve liked to fix the toilet, probably at least two weeks. During that time frame how did I flush you ask? I filled up a bucket with shower water and dumped it down the toilet. It was like Bafia 1A and it did not work as well as you might imagine. I am happy to report that the toilet is fixed and the guy even managed to get the key working into my outside “kitchen”. So far I’ve only made a fish dinner one time, but that was an accomplishment in itself. This ain’t McDonalds people, you cook the entire fish: head, fins, skin and all. I fed Treneo and neither of us have become ill as of this writing, so chalk that one up as a success.
My other maintenance problem was a bit more Posh Corps. My mini-fridge and air conditioner in my room were not working. I know, I’m really roughing it over here right? It cost a bit more than I would’ve liked, but the technician that worked at ENIEG came to my apartment and fixed both in one day. In fact, he worked so long into the night that when he came out and sat in one of the chairs while waiting for the fridge to cool down he dozed off. Multiple times. Only until I played a 17 minute live version of “The End” by The Doors, where Jim Morrison is shrieking into the mic, did his eyelids flutter. Seeing my cue I asked him if everything was good with the fridge. He said it was, but went back and fiddled with it some more. He then came out and declared that the fridge was running, but he was too tired to drive back to Douala and wanted to stay the night and leave in the morning. I didn’t want to make the guy drive back and flip his car on the way home so I cautiously agreed. While I was “preparing” the couch for him to sleep, I managed to take all my valuables to my room to be locked away with me. It’s not because he was Cameroonian. It’s because I didn’t know the guy from any other random person I came across on the street. I just thought I’d remove that temptation either way. He had been very kind to me and also gave me a good deal on the labor, I think anyways, so I would have had a hard time telling him to hit the road. My belief in my fellow man may burn me someday, but not this night. He left in the morning without a problem. Fridge is still running great, but A/C seems to be on the fritz again. Hopefully, next week he will return to fix it minus the slumber party.
The presidential election for Cameroon is next month on Oct. 9th. Last week, I saw my first “election rally” for Paul Biya, the current president, and my first election poster, for another guy running. It proclaimed he was the man for the situation. I am interested to see how this all shakes out.
That was my first month, more or less. Every day brings a new challenge and a new laugh. I miss all of you back home and will try to update with more regularity in the future. My water is currently not running, so enjoy that American plumbing.
MMM
