Wednesday, May 30th, 2012
“...Is there anybody out there?”
Here I thought a month was a long time
between blog posts. Thanks to my fantabulous parents, I am now back
on the grid. I'm thinking of sacrificing a broken computer at my
school to the computer gods so this Toshiba makes it through my time
remaining. The school year is over and I'd be lying if I told you I
didn't do the Carlton happy dance once I was done. I'll try and give
the highlights of each month since my last post.
October- The highlight of Oct. was the
Halloween party I went to. The theme was characters from the LMFAO
Party Shuffle video. I chose the dancing Jesus. As some of you saw in
2009, I make a pretty convincing Almighty. I was lacking the
stigmata, crown of thorns, and long locks, but I got to wear a 2pac
chain and grow out a mountain man beard so I think I broke even. We
know how to get down in Cameroon exemplified by our Jell-O wrestling
tournament. It was actually more of a red sticky water tournament
since the last batch was still steaming and managed to melt the rest
of the chilled Jell-O. The championship came down to an American vs.
a Cameroonian, but ended in a tie before they killed each other.
November- Turkey Day, minus the turkey,
was pretty awesome. Killed my first chicken. Learned how to pluck and
gut, which I have since forgotten since not practicing. Ate lots of
deliciousness. Thought I'd be bummed to not be with my family, but
was happy to be distracted in the company of good friends. Hiked and
swam in my first waterfall. It was The Game that weekend so I also
posed for a pic with arms extended in the Ohio O that a friend from
the University of Florida was not too eager to take. Also, hiked to
another waterfall in a different region, but was a little shallow for
swimming. We still got in it regardless. Will definitely have
schistomiosis (sp?) by the end of my service. Google it.
December- This was about the point
where I decided that instead of getting frustrated over trivial
matters I'd do my best to try and enjoy each and every day here since
this will all be over before I know it. I've not always accomplished
that, but I've come a long way. I went to a local cultural festival
in early December called the Mpo Festival for the local people of
Edea. There was a stage for traditional music groups to play and the
place was packed. It felt like a music festival in the states. I left
right before a semi-truck lost control and drove into one of the
thatch walls around the festival, but no one was killed luckily. This
month also contained what PC calls In-service Training (IST). My
entire training group came back together for a week at a resort in
Limbe, one of the two beach cities here in Cameroon. It was great to
see some friends that are multiple days away from me, not necessarily
in distance, but in travel time it takes to get there. We were
applauded for our attentiveness throughout the week (Not you Rob) and
went out with a bang our final night at the resort. I'll leave it at
that. Christmas was also great. A lot of us got together and had a
Feliz Navidad complete with delicious Mexican food. Some of us also
went to a festival called Yao Fete. Long story short, we almost
incited a riot due a drunk security guard that decided what we were
gifting him was not good enough, but it's a better story in person.
New Years found us popping bottles of cheap champagne and wine on a
stoop. Who needs a giant, descending ball?
January- “Back to school. Back to
school, to prove to Dad I am not a fool.” Took awhile to get back
into the school routine, but eventually I was back at it. I found the
local basketball court and a group of guys that play 3x a week so I
was stoked. I was also anxiously looking forward to my parents
visiting in March. Can't think of much else that happened this month.
February- Youth Day was in Feb. and
school was pretty much non-existent with cultural planning, dances,
etc. A store close to the PC house in the capital had a wine sale for
youth day. Seems pretty accurate around here. Finally sampled some
termites and they were actually delicious. The right balance of
crunchy and chewy. Coming to a Super Bowl party near you.
March- The Blenda in Bamenda. I don't
feel like writing it up for the umpteenth time, but may write a
longer blog about it down the road. Long story short, got a couple
wounds, dished out my fair share of punishment, and still breathing
so that's all that matters. The month finally came and the Millers
descended on Cameroon. My mom wrote a great article for our local
paper with the highs and lows of their trip. We've got plenty of
stories from that trip so catch me in person some time and I'll give
you the unedited version of most of it.
April- Another year older. I saw my
parents off (after getting to spend an extra unexpected night with
them and a battle to get them out of Africa) and celebrated with some
friends in Yaounde. Managed to lose my ID card and personalized money
clip in the wee hours of the morning. A good time was had by all I'd
say.
May- Finished up the school year. Saw a
friend of ours from France off after he spent a year here. Next month
I'll get together with some other Education PCVs to have some
medical/dental checkups and probably consume a beer or two. Sorry
that there wasn't too much detail in this blog, but I'm going to try
and get back into the swing of updating this regularly on my
adventures in Cameroon. It is a bit harder now as things that seemed
so strange to me before, I don't bat an eye at these days. It's
amazing what the human spirit can endure and get used to. I never
thought I was gonna survive a month here, but here I am a year later.
It hasn't been easy, but the friends, now like family, I have made in
country and the family and friends supporting me back home have
helped me come this far. I look forward to seeing what year two
brings and to seeing a lot of you out there in about 6 months. I need
to start making my list of places to go and things to eat back in
Amurrica. Five Guys Burgers and Fries haunt me in my sleep.
Special shout out to Mrs. Judith
Greene! Thank you for staying interested in my service over here and
giving my Dad some extra cash for us to enjoy. It's been awhile, but
I'm gonna do my best to post regularly throughout the summer.
Until next time.
