New photos from Kelsey

Kelsey will add captions later...many are of her house, her pie safe, table & chairs, and kitchen.





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Ako FUN guba

It’s rained two times in the last few days. Glorious relief. The morning after, I couldn’t believe I was even in the same village. It was so green! It’s not that a little rain gives everything a growth spurt… it’s that the reddish dust is washed from every leaf, branch and zinc roof and the NW province just shines. Not everyone found the rain to be such a blessing. Some of the guys in my village clicked at my “rain dance” with contempt, saying it would really throw them off. Throw them off of what, I am not quite sure. The women do all the farm and house work… if they’re not driving a taxi (admittedly difficult in the rain), they’re drinking palm wine in the shade (I am generalizing… but only somewhat). Anyway, the “Christmas rain” finally came, and I thought it was wonderful. Probably won’t see more for a few months. Haaaa.

I have decided that market days are my favorite days. Everyone gets up early, does house stuff… like cook and sit and cut or pound things. Then they leisurely stroll the 2 kilometers to the market. At the market, you get what you need… and with a selection of about 20 items, it doesn’t take long… then you socialize. Ham it up with the mommy selling sugar cane, shake tons of hands… nod respectfully when people speak and I don’t understand (they do it to me too! Speak normal English and everyone is lost). Then people will find a little house next to the market selling mimbo… alcohol. Ya start drinkin’. You drink white mimbo at 11:30 in the morning. People drink until they can’t drink anymore, then they walk back to Akofunguba and the lights come on and they start drinking again! Market days… are fun.

Wednesday was market day. I didn’t end up going to the market because my counterpart Beatrice was having a savings party. Of course there’s a name for it, but I can’t remember any African names at this point. They all sound the same to me… Mm-bu-bu or Nnn-do-bo or Bo-bo-bo. Anyway, I was invited to the savings party, though I was not going to be a contributer. They just wanted my presence. The club is comprised of seven local people, most of them more “up-scale” in their professions; they are teachers, a nurse, bartender, agricultural post guy… I don’t know what Mr. Peter does. Every month they give money to the group, and then one person gets the whole pot. I don’t know if it really helps anyone save, but they can pay for big things and education and such. After the money is distributed they eat achu and drink. Woo! It was really pretty fun. They are some of the corniest people I’ve ever met. Kevin, the headmaster at a nearby school, went on a 10 minute diatribe about the “new face” and how God has blessed them with this face and that 2006 will bring other new things. Sigh… I’m the new face. I’m probably supposed to bring new things. It was nice, anyway. After one Satzenbrau (it’s a 40… with antioxidants, if you can imagine) I suggested that they turn the group into a book club so they have something to talk about after they distribute the money. It was one unified, blank stare… and then they just started talking about something completely different. I laughed inside and thought of Oprah.

Afterward, I attended the drink-fest at Ako Center (there is no Ako Center… its just what it would be if Akofunguba were in America… and it was a small, rural town with apple cider mills and fudge shoppes). It was there that I was introduced to a local Bafut man who has been living in New Jersey for a number of years, getting his masters degree in Biodiversity Conservation. He is the younger brother of the crazy foo man who was deranging me New Years Eve. We laughed a lot… about how stinking hot it is and you just sweat constantly in the daytime, how it is impossible for me to find a place to pee (ever), about crazy people like his brother, about how Peace Corps volunteers in Africa come back alcoholics. Right in my own village… guy from Compten.

Besides the diet of beer and palm wine, I have been trying to cook. I haven’t given up on American foods yet and gone completely tribal—eating achu every night and kola nuts all day. Some things come out well, some not so much. I made Carol Busse’s All-Day Beef Stew again… it was even better than before (except that my counterpart informed me the next day that the meat I had bought was of a cow that they found dead in the bush and slaughtered later on…. Woooonderful.) I also made Carol’s easy peanut butter fudge… and it was AWESOME. I tried to make focaccia bread, and it was a failure. Bagels were an edible failure. Wheat bread was another complete failure. Peanut brittle was sticky (though I was enthusiastic about it as I roasted and de-shelled my own fresh groundnuts). Hot milk sponge cake was good until I thought I was going to die from eating it. I get a ton of my meals from the old lady next door… some of which I eat, some (like “towel”… cow stomach) I just don’t. Its not wasteful, though… she hands it to me from the back door, and if I don’t want it… I just walk to the front door and hand it to one of the 10-40 children usually hanging out on my front lawn (sometimes they come just to watch my laundry in the wind… no joke).

Things are great. Just remember… you can never send too much American peanut butter.

Happy New Year!

No, I am normal.

Typical response in village when I ask, “how is it?”

Well, I am back in the big town after about a week in the village. Reese, Matt and I (other Agroforestry volunteers) had to give a presentation for the constituents of our NGO… mostly undereducated farmers. It went well, except that we were the first presentation. Our early start and finish meant that we had to sit through two other fairly painful presentations before we gave up for a beer and beans at midday.

I missed all holidays in village… New Years night I retreated to my house around 9:30pm after drinking some palm wine at my Cameroonian counterpart’s bar. A crazy JuJu man refused to leave me alone and got his crazy self roughly thrown from the establishment. It was a little too much excitement.. and since I get up at the crack of dawn (lie… I am up looong before the sun rises), 9:30 was way past my bedtime. No matter… the 1st is when people really party. Of course, I got stuck in Bafut with Gwen (my post-mate in Mundum) and Kate R. Gwen and I spent a good two hours looking for a car back to Akofunguba…. But as the sun began to set we thought it wasn’t so safe. Alas, we had to stay with Kate and her refrigerator, oven and hot water heater.

Work in village has had a big breakthrough. I discovered that there is another NGO down the road that has a lot of land, a nice truck and a 3000 tree nursery established. Its hiding in the bush a good km off the road. They want to work with me, provide me with demonstration space and other materials… all in all a great discovery that will really set work off on the right track.

Having a lovely time!