Home Sweet Limbe!

Hayley wrote the title; she is crazy. What she means is we are back in Limbe and it feels so much more familiar than Bamenda. We had a lousy 7 hour bus ride so we are treating ourselves by checking into a seaside hotel with hot water! It's to the orphanage tomorrow.

Hi Everyone! Well it;s official... we have changed our flights. We are cutting the trip short just by 3 weeks. We will spend the the last week and a half in the orphanage and then make the long journey back to NJ. Time moves slower here, the pace of life is so different so it feels like we have been away for longer than we really have.

On Monday night we will attend the Rotary meeting to present Dr. Anyangwe with the CURE kit. He runs a very respectable clinic in Bamenda and there is no doubt the medical supplies will be put to good use.

Talk to you soon,

Hayley

One Month

We have offically been away for a whole month now. Bamenda is much cooler than Limbe, there is a nice breeze. However, it is a little harder to get around Bamenda by ourselves than it was in Limbe. Luckily Christopher and his children have been so nice to us and have been taking us around. He has a 22 year old neice, Susie, who lives with him and then a 12 year son and 5 year old daughter. We didnt realize we were living with Royalty either! Christopher is the son of the Fon (chief of a village)and Susie is the daughter of a Fon as well (different village) so she is technically a princess. They do not make a big deal about it here in Africa though, because Fons have many wives and therefore tons of children so there are many many princes and princesses. Susie really does carry herself like she is a princess and not at all in a concieted proud way, just in a regal lady-like way. She is so nice and sweet and she is also a wonderful cook! On Sunday she took us to Bafut Botanical Gardens. Bafut is one of the villages around this area. The Botanical Gardens is really just like a big park. She also has introduced us to Nollywood, Nigerian films, which are hilarous and very entertaining melodramas. Susie loves them.

Next week we are going to head south the Buea to stay at the orphanage run by the Dutch woman, Crystal. We are going to help teach the children English there.

We have finally gotten through the culture shock, but we still miss you all so much and we miss the good old U.S. of A.!!!

Happy Belated Mother's Day!

Happy Mother's Day Gooma! Cameroon doesn't have Mother's Day so we completely forgot it was yesterday. The internet cafe's are closed on Sunday anyway.

Hi Mom sorry we couldn't write yesterday. Also, for some unknown reason we don't have your personal email.

This is a picture of the Wardens home at the school we taught at. Finally got a picture up!

Hey, everyone! We're still trudging along here. This will be the third installment to this blog since the last time I wrote. Something always happens before I can post it and then Hayley posts and my info becomes second hand. Anyway we are now in Bamenda. We kept hearing from everyone in Limbe how great Bamenda was and how everyone came from here. Everyone talked about their village. So I expected to find this virtual Garden of Eden with people living in little grass huts or something. It's not like that at all. It's like a bigger, slightly more organized, much quieter version of Limbe. The people are nicer. Here at least no adult has called us "whitemon", to our face. Some children have though. My last blog I was trying to paint a picture in words of what it physically looked like... you won't believe this but we were actually able to post a picture. So you see every time I write my info gets to be old news.

I'll tell you about our crazy 6 hour bus ride. We arrived at the bus station at 9am and waited as they loaded all the luggage on top of the bus and strapped it down under a tarp. We sat around and a man that works at a little food place said Rosemary was his mother. I guess I should mention that she rode here with us, as she is taking weekend classes at the University near here. Well the man is not really the warden's son, but he did ask her if he could marry Hayley. We soon departed and stopped what seemed like every 5 minutes to pick people up, pay tolls, or be questioned by customs. Luckily there was a police commissioner riding with us so we never actually got searched. We really lucked out because we were traveling with all the medical supplies. The police and custom agents have a license to annoy people at will. But if you're in trouble, don't call them because they are not in the business of protecting the citizens or keeping the peace. Only the Lord above does that here. And I'm not being facetious. God save us if the people here had no faith. There certainly are no laws, as far as I can see. Anything goes. I seriously thank God every day for all the brave missionaries that came before. You've no idea.

Back to the bus ride: We bounced around for a few hours looking at the stunning scenery; mountains, banana plantations, rubber tree farms, palm trees, etc. The next thing you know we're slowing down to pay a toll and all the local people are rushing up to the windows of the bus trying to sell you things. They offer granuts (peanuts), fruits, things that nobody could tell us what they were and the farmers don't really speak English, so they didn't understand my question. It's a much smaller version of the people who descend on you when you cross the border in and out of Mexico. I bought some granuts for the trip and later pineapples and carrots to bring to our hosts. Then we were all treated to a show of sorts from the insane travelling salesmen/traditional medicine pushers that just jump on the bus at various stops. We had two, though not simultaneously. The first guy was selling ginseng from China. First he got all our gullible fellow passengers attention by asking them simple questions and then giving them candy for the correct answer. He spoke in English but the accent was very difficult to decipher. Therefore, when he claimed that the ginseng would cure malaria, AIDS and typhoid fever I had to ask him to confirm this claim as I repeated it. He said this was true and he had no problem with me questioning this. With this, even Hayley, who usually tells me to mind my own business, piped up and disputed this charlatan’s claim. Would you believe that most of those people defended this guy? They weren't nasty about it. It was all civil but pointless to argue with them as I have learned since being here. So I just said, "Well if you can believe that...". This made a few people laugh. But a few people bought this stuff and later the same people bought more illusion in a little glass bottles from the second travelling sales shyster. It reminded me of the musicals, "Oklahoma" and "The Music Man", well a little anyway. The trip ended uneventfully and our host, Christopher, picked us up in his SUV. He is a very nice, intelligent medical doctor who runs a clinic.

The Birthday

Thanks for all the Birthday wishes! My birthday was actually a terrible day. It started out ok if you don't consider the monsoon like rains. We went to use the internet and we're there for a while when everyone started running down the street. Someone told us there was a fire. We went down the street to see too. Just down the hill there was a house completely engulfed in flames and a giant cloud of black smoke rising in the sky above. There was a large crowd in the street watching. My mother turned to someone and said, "Where is the fire department?!" The woman just shook her head. It was then that I remembered something Walters had told us when were climbing the mountain. He told us the only fire department in Cameroon was where the president lives. I wish I could show you the pictures of what the houses look like here but maybe for now you should just picture something a little nicer than Slumdog Millionaire. You can image how terifying a fire is once it starts and how quickly it can spread! Most of the houses are cement but there are still many that are made of wood and sadly this house was. Luckily they were able to put it before other houses caught but the house burnt to the ground along with everything in it. Fortunately no people were injured and no one was home, but as we later found out the house was occupied by a mother and her four children, three of whom are students at our school. To our knowledge no one has come to inspect and there are no government programs to help the family.

After the fire when we finally got back to the house, the youngest girl, Honorine, told us she had to go out to the morge to support two of her classmates who had lost their parents only this past weekend. Her tone was very matter of fact and neither her nor her friends knew what they had died of. It was only more dreadful news!

However, life goes on. My mother and I went to get something to eat down the street and then picked up a cake from the bakery which we had ordered the day before. When we got back to the house everyone sang Happy Birthday and despite the events of the day the air was cheery and festive! Everyone but my mother and I enjoyed the cake as it was the weirdest taste ad consistency. It only seems appropriate that I spent the rest of the night vomiting. Before I fell asleep my mom said, "Hayley I hope that all you birthdays will forever be 100% better than this one."

Well it has been a crazy couple of days! But it seems that each day here brings it's own challenges. We have decided that we will continue to write our stories and experiences on the blog, but that people should keep in mind just that... that these are just our experiences and one point of view. We also will be more careful in using the names of organizations and individuals. We apologize to LUKMEF a wonderful organization who obviously does great things for the community here. We have always thought highly of them and their volunteers. Again we are writing about our experiences and responses. However in regards to a particular member we will just have to agree to disagree. The German Clinic as well is a fine establishment and we want the best for all of them and of course the people of Limbe (otherwise why would be here). Also we have been somewhat naive to the fact that so many people were reading this!

So we will pick up where we left off. On Saturday we climbed Mt Cameroon. We met our guide, Walters, whom was recommneded to us by the Peace Corp. volunteer in Buea which is just a short bus ride from Limbe. Walters is a 20 year old Cameroonian and has been super nice and helpful to us. He goes to high school but also works in his spare time as a mountain guide. It takes two days to reach the top and he has done it 30 times! (you camp overnight). Now you are probably wondering how we did this and the answer is we didn't. We went about 1/3 of the way up. We hiked up for 4 hours and down for 2 and we never even made it out of th forest and into the Savanah, but still it was a beautiful trip. Walters told us about a friend he has who runs an orphange. She is young Dutch woman and often takes in volunteers to work with the children. He suggested me meet her and so we did! We were at first preparing ourselves for what we thogught would be heartbreaking as neither of us have actually been to an orphanage, but it was actually one of the best times we have had so far. There are nine children total so to us (especially for my mother) it was more like a family. The house was so nice too. It was big and airy and all the rooms were painted in vibrant colors. Mom said, "It looks like the Brady Bunch" when she saw the girls bedroom. The kids were adorable and very well behaved. The woman who runs it has really done an amazing job. She had the house built and they even grow their own vegetables and fruits. She also has to collect water when it rains, which it did last night, because their plumbing doens't always work (bad plumber). They have a dog and two cats which they actualy treat like pets. Walters goes there on weekends to help with maintaince around the grounds. Many of the orphans came from the Francophone area of Cameroon so she is loking for someone to help her teach them English beside what they are learning in school (they are a little behind in their English). Walters is a very nice kid. His dream is to finish high school this June and then move to the United States to join the marines. He has told us that once he is a marine for two years he will become a citizen.

Labour Day

Cameroon has Labor Day too. It was this past Friday and it's a national holiday so everyone has off from work and school. Limbe had a parade and all the workers from the various different companies and businesses march. Each company has there own African material which is very colorful and has the name of the companies on it and then the workers have dresses and suits made from the material. So in a way everyone matches but still everyone is wearing a different style. The streets were very lively. We went to get omlettes at Bola's (a small street cafe). We happened to meet this very nice guy from the Peace Corp who is from New Jersey! He was with two Irish friends. They were so nice and helpful. Brian the guy from Jersey has been living in Cameroon for 3 years! He told us some good weekend activities we could do so we ended up going to the beach for the rest of Labour Day and then on Saturday we climbed Mt Cameroon the tallest peak in West Africa!

-Hayley

Sign your name please...

...when you leave a comment. We don't know who left some of the messages. Thanks!

Hi Everyone! We are doing fine. We have been so busy and haven't had the chance to post any of our messages. Internet is also really slow here, so that has been challenging. Also the internet cafe closes at 6pm. Thanks for all the comments and replies. Miss you!

P.S. Thanks to Bern and Joan for making us laugh out loud and to Annie for keeping us informed all the normal wonderful activities at home. -Kathy

Greetings from Cameroon. You are welcome. That’s what everybody says here. But sometimes we wonder if that is how our host family feels. We are experiencing some technical difficulties. At first they gave us food then they stopped and told us we had to cook for ourselves. This is after we had given a substantial amount of money for our food and general keep. The Warden (that’s what they really call the Principle at this school) has left on a trip and the woman she left in charge said she left her almost no money for food. She insisted we take all our meals in the house and that she would help us cook, but she was out of all staples. This girl is one of the ones we thought was the Wardens daughter. It turns out no one is really blood related except for a niece who went back to University. Anyway, I suggested that I would buy what the household needed but could we then just eat what she cooked. The food is all fresh and good albeit different. This girl tricked me into buying huge supplies of everything and then she still won’t feed us. We had to buy gas for the range. There is no oven. I bought her a huge bottle of oil. They usually just fill empty bottles they bring to the marketplace. We paid for everything and helped the young girl, Honerine, who they make do all the cleaning carry it home. The older girls don’t have to do that kind of work. Oh, but cleaning is not an accurate term. By cleaning I mean moving dirty rags around and carrying heavy things-and working on the family farm, a small plot somewhere. Anyway we bought it all but whenever we went to add some fruit or fresh vegetables to our starch, it was all gone. Then when we were out they would just run to the market and get just enough fresh stuff for themselves. This girl, Edwan, had given us such a convincing sob story we really thought they weren’t eating. She was practically crying that the Warden did this to her often and they all practically starved. Then one afternoon I see her giving a huge plate of food
to a man who works at the school who has now been at the house everyday since the Mama Cat has been away. Said food was the last of a huge salad we had made the night before that was financed by me. I told her not to be feeding everyone else with our food. “This is Africa,” she said. They have to feed people like that when they came over. It turns out that that is the truth if a man comes over. When Polycarp comes over she makes him a huge plate of food too. Not to mention bringing in a basin for him to dip his hand in. I could go on and on but I’ll wrap it up. I just need to tell you one more thing.

Remember Honerine the young girl (about 16) who I mentioned. Well, Sunday she complained in the morning of a headache. I gave her an Advil. Then she came down with a fever. Edwan took her to a local clinic who described all her symptoms as what we would consider the flu. There was no doctor available so they sent her home. She got worse and worse. This man who works at the same clinic for the poor that Polycarp works at came by with his wife just to say hello to me and Hayley. Well it was a Godsend because Honerine actually had Malaria. This man calls himself a doctor, but he is actually a lab technician. Anyway he went to his clinic and bought back a drip. He took blood but said he would check it in the morning. It turns out she has Typhoid too. She had so much in her bloodstream she needed an extra drip treatment (4 IV’s total). Now she is on pills and doing much better. She had chills so bad, that even in this stifling heat we couldn’t keep her warm. Everyday she gets a little better.

Ok back to my first complaint. Guess who came crying to me to reimburse her for the money to pay for the treatment? You guessed it, my good friend, Edwan. She said she had no money -that she borrowed it from her friend and she needed the money back. So I gave it to her friend. I gave a Cameroonian fortune to these people and again I see her feeding her man friend with food I provided, but mixed in with all fresh ingredients she had mysteriously now had money to purchase at the market. “ That’s all I can stands, I can’t stands no more”. I finally had it out with her. I just wanted her to know I knew what she was doing. She raised her voice back at me after her usual lies and BS wouldn’t work. But the harshest thing I said to her was to never ask me for money or anything again. So now Hayley and I have wised up’. Hayley saw through people faster than I did. It took me a whole week. Polycarp has been jerking our chains too. But later that day (Tuesday), I told him too. I was just too generous to everybody and some people took advantage. The people here are really friendly but so many try to befriend us just to start asking what we can give them or how we can help them once we go back to the USA. So now we know.

Next time I’ll write about the good stuff again and there is plenty. The kids and the teachers really appreciate us. Remember that teacher who at first didn’t really want me to work with her. Now we get along great. She is a good confidante. She knows how some of the people are. She understands Europeans as she thinks of us and realizes Africans think very differently than Westerners. The teachers actually hit the kids. The men do it with whips. Maybe Hayley will tell you about her experience today in the computer lab. Maribel says they have to because the parents don’t discipline them at home. But she knows it upsets me so she won’t do it when I’m there. Overall though the kids have been pretty good and seem eager to learn. Oh! I made a mistake too when I wrote that mostly everyone spoke French. I was wrong. It’s pigeon English with a French accent…more on that next time. I really miss you all. Thanks to Gooma, Annie, Joan, Evan, and Laura for blogging back. Everybody else better get cracken. We’re sometimes a little lonely here. Just like Gilligan’s Island-as primitive as can be, as primitive as can be.

-Kathy

Hayley already told you about our hurricane like rain storm. So where should I pick up? It’s Thursday already and we’ve been very busy. We haven’t even had time to write at all. We have met so many people. It’s been great though hard to remember and pronounce everyone’s name. Mentioning pronunciation, all the kids keep laughing at us for the way we talk. The Cameroonians we meet keep telling us we’re in the English province of the country or as they say it the “Anglophone” side, but I couldn’t swear to it. Everybody sounds French to me. It’s Madame and Bonjour and many signs are in French. French is definitely the dominate language here but they seem eager to learn English. Hayley is a big hit. Even the teachers want her to instruct them in computers. I’m finally being put to use in the classroom. The teacher whom the principle assigned me to was kind of putting me off. She never wanted me to come to her classroom. She just told me I’d start teaching possessive pronouns next Monday. Finally yesterday I asked to be assigned to the other English teacher and then Mirabel said I could observe her class and that she would work with me. So now I’ll be working with both teachers. I’m looking forward to meeting with the Nursery school teachers tomorrow. Hayley and I are finally going to be giving the kids the toys and art supplies and few books we bought over. Now I wish we had had room to bring even more. The kids have no toys. We have given so many away already. We’re also going to give writing supplies to all the teachers. The school is unlike anything we have ever seen. They need everything. They are doing the best they can, but with almost nothing. And I mean NOTHING! The building is dilapidated and unsafe. There are no decorations of any kind. No fresh paint, no posters, not enough books etc. And still everyone smiles.

Yesterday, Polycarp took us to a fishing village. It was like stepping back in time. Again, the people were nice. We saw how they smoke the fish, the canoe-like long boats they use, and the stable-like houses they live in. They are migrant fisherman. We also visit Polycarp’s clinic everyday. We met two woman who work here as volunteers for a social justice organization. They are both really nice and are roommates. Gene is from Alabama and Yanna is from Germany. We are going to go to the beach with them on a weekend and they said they’ll take us to a place we’re we can get a cappuccino. I can’t wait. I’ve been in Africa for 4 days (a huge coffee exporter) and haven’t found a place that sells coffee yet.

-Kathy

I am unable to upload picture :( The internet is very slow here. I will keep trying but so far I have been unsuccessful.

Rainy Season

Last night we were awoken by a load crack and then the sounds of the most intense down pour I have ever witnessed. The doors leading to the outside of the house started banging from the wind. At first it was a little frightening but when I felt the cool breeze trough the window I welcomed the rain. I only wish we hadn't left out clothes to dry outside on the line overnight. When we checked them in the morning them were luckily still there, but they were more soaked then when we washed them. This is what they call the beginning of rainy season in Cameroon. As a result of last night today is much cooler. I would be happy if it rained every night. I should be careful for what I wish for though because apparently there is a period where it rains for 10 days straight... day and night.

-Hayley

We have arrived! It is so hot here! Almost unbearable. We have come to terms with the fact that we are just going to sweat constantly for 10 straight weeks. Polycarp and Rosemary picked us up at the airport in Douala yesterday and then we drove down to Limbe. Rosemary is the principal of the school where we will be teaching. We are staying in here house with her family which is on the school property. We were greeted this morning by all the students. The day starts very early here…. sunrise when the roosters crow outside our window, literally. The children are so sweet. The little ones in preschool run right up and hug you. Polycarp runs the health clinic and he took us to see his operations after we were done meeting all the students. We had a meeting with him and his colleagues, Wilson and Dr. John, to discuss what we will be doing over our two and a half month stay and what we are looking to accomplish. Polycarp has been so helpful. He has set up internet for us with a little office/café right next door to the school. He also escorted us all around town today running errands, exchanging money, etc. We are really being taken care of. When we saw Polycarps clinic and lab today we really started to understand how much the C.U.R.E. kit is going to help (a box of medical supplies we brought with us). He is so excited about receiving it that he once we started telling him what was in it he decided he was going to move the meeting that was going to be Monday to tomorrow or the next day. The supplies are being donated on behalf of the Rotary Club so that the Rotary club of Limbe and NY can partner. We are under very specific direction to only present Polycarp’s clinic with the supplies at the Rotary meeting so we may document with pictures!

Rosemary has three daughters ages 26, 20, 15. They are so much fun and so sweet. We went to market with Edwan and her friend Pascaline. All the food is bought in a big open market. We bought oranges, plantains, corn, sweet potatoes, some kind of seeds, and ginger. Edwan and her sisters are going to teach us how to cook. They are excellent cooks. Also Edwan has a friend who can make us some African dresses, so on Friday its back to market to pick out some material and have them made for us!

-Hayley

“Toto, I’ve a feeling we’re not in Kansas anymore.” Hi everyone it’s the other one. Well’ we’re here. We’re alive. And we’re well. At least I am. Hayley threw up once. But she’s better now. Everyone here is so nice to us. They truly could not be kinder. So we’re in good hands. But the first feeling when we got off that plane in Douala and we felt that heat, then we saw an airport so different from any we’d ever seen-not knowing really which way to go, exhausted and jet lagged, it felt strange. I felt like a stranger in a strange land. Polycarp, his friend Enist, and Rosemary were there waiting for us with a sign. Hayley saw them first I had been directed to a different line by a man I assumed worked there, but he was just trying to shake me down for money. After we got thru customs, he kept asking me if I changed my money and insisted he would take us there. Finally I caught on. I tried to get rid of him with a euro. But he only wanted Cameroon money. Anyway, it was funny. Then a bunch of boys tried to carry our bags even though all of us had the bags so they just put their hands on it and still asked for money. We had a 45 minute drive to Limbe. People were just every where, walking all along the road. Drivers just do what they want. There seem to be no rules or laws for vehicles. It got dark pretty quick- though not quite as fast as I had heard. It took about a half hour but by 7:00pm it was dark. BLAH BLAH BLAH… more later. We must go to market. It is market day.

-Kathy

Easter Sunday

I leave for Cameroon in three weeks and two days.