Month 10 commences!

Okay so I know that is has been like a month since my last blog, and I am sorry. I have been rather busy. Rainy season is in full force. Power outages, humidity, a greenness. Everything looks so incredibly different than it did during dry season – it’s hard to believe it is the same place in some respects. So, I have been in Cameroon 10 months now. Damn that is a long time to be someplace without ever leaving. I haven’t been on an airplane in 10 months – that is crazy. I am normally a fairly frequent flyer. But, exciting news, in 21 days from now I will on an airplane headed to Tanzania! That’s correct. I am going to see Nicky in Tanzania and we are going to party in Dar and then go over to Zanzibar! My last night in Zanzibar will be Nicky’s quarter century birthday which happens to be the next full moon – so yes, my last night there will be a full moon party on the beach in Zanzibar. The next morning I fly to Rwanda to play with Emily for 6 days! I am very very excited.

June was very busy with work. I helped another volunteer do a soap animation en brousse – we taught a group of about 10 women to make soap and Mike checked on it last week and it was great! (soap takes like 3 weeks to make). Then, I did some soy animations with another volunteer and taught about 25 women to make soy milk and soy beignets. It was really fun! Mike and I got permission from the head doctor at the hospital to plant 100 moringa trees on their property and I gave the doctor all the information about the health benefits of moringa and will start doing animations as soon as those trees are in the ground and have some leaves. While we were digging those 100 holes (which we did this past week) the doctor from the health center in Lombo (a village about 20km from Bibemi) came by and told us he wanted 30 trees for his health center and the information about the health benefits in French. Mike promised the trees and I promised the information. Next week Mike and I will plant those 100 trees in the ground! My counterpart and I also spoke with the head doctor about the possibility of doing animations about traditional birthing techniques or just maternal health in general. We have to give the doctor back another proposal with exact indicators for the maternal health stuff and the traditional birthing stuff I think may be a no go. Still trying… Speaking of trying, Phil and I are still working on getting out the kinks from out AIDS training we want to do in Adoumri. Projects take a really long time here to get started. You have to get money, permission, etc. And, all of that takes about 3x as long as it should, minimum. But, slow and steady I suppose. We are trying!

The first week of July was a giant vaccination campaign here in Cameroon. I got to help out and watch how this vaccination campaign worked. It was a bit different from the polio eradication campaign because we were vaccinating against measles, polio, and tetanus (for the pregnant women) as well as de-worming kids and giving them vitamin A supplements. For 3 days my team sat in various neighborhoods in Bibemi and set up shop and sat for 7 hours (from 8am-3pm). While we were sitting in Bibemi we set out teams to the 3 villages we go en brousse to. The next 2 days they walked door to door in Bibemi or en brousse and vaccinated the people who had missed the previous 3 days. Turn out was really great and we got a number of kids who hadn’t been previously vaccinated. When they came to the campaign Salamatou (one of the nurses) would ask if they knew about the childhood vaccine days every Tuesday at the health center and whether they went. She would encourage those who didn’t come to do so! It was really neat to see how people mobilized for this campaign.

It’s official, there are no volunteers left in Garoua. They all left in May and June. But, we will get new ones in August (most, but not all, of them are being replaced). I miss my friends and it is crazy to think how fast time is going. I went to a number of going away parties in June and got to go clubbing in Garoua and see just how fun it can be to people watch there. Cameroonians love to watch themselves dance in the mirror at clubs so all the clubs have these floor to ceiling mirrors that people crowd near. It is hilarious. For those of you who brave the trip to Cameroon to see me, I will be sure to let you experience this joyous sighting.

Oh, did I mention that I am writing this blog entry from my house in Bibemi and will post it on the blog while sitting her on my couch. Yea, I got internet in Bibemi. I have had it for two weeks. Camtel (Cameroonian telephone company – properly named CamTel) arrived in Bibemi in May and it took me awhile to figure out how to get internet (having a Mac made things difficult) but with the help of my grandmother and sister I got a program that let me run windows and then bought an antenna that I put outside my house and bought a phone from Camtel and presto – internet! It has been super nice to have and unfortunately I forgot how addicting internet can be – all that information at your fingertips! But, the internet connection isn’t great and clicks off all the time and often for hours or days. But, once again, this is rural Africa. I am lucky that internet works ever. Lots of duck tape, string, black bungee cords and machetes, helped to make this internet possible.

4th of July was great and I got to celebrate with a number of other volunteers. We hung an American flag and tried unsuccessfully to listen to American music but we did all get to talk and hang out and drink beer. One of the volunteers was from Texas and wouldn’t stop talking about Texas independence and how she celebrates that as well. I learned that Texas Independence Day is March 2, 1836 and after hearing that date told to me about 30 times that evening I shall not forget it anytime soon. There was lots of cheering to America! (led mostly by Phil) and lots of talk about how people wish fireworks were possible. But, it was super fun to get to celebrate with friends! Mike, Phil, Kauleen, and I (all north province volunteers) have July birthdays and we are planning a get together for later this month complete with us in matching pagne – get excited for those pictures. I got a great outfit made with sleeves inspired by a shirt Caroline wore her last night out in Garoua.

Alright, I have some cleaning to do before I make dinner. Food is super scare in Bibemi now because it is rainy season so I have been getting creative with food. Eating lots of peanut sauces, started cooking with dried leaves rather than fresh (which are hard to find), created a lemon cream sauce (cause citrons are available). But, we are managing to eat pretty well even when everything, and I do mean EVERYTHING is out of season. Tonight it’s peanut foulere sauce with rice. I also made oatmeal raisin bread – hadn’t made bread in awhile and had raisins and oatmeal from Garoua! It will be delicious :) Happy belated 4th of July to all of you! And Happy birthday to Mike and Phil tomorrow!