Before the Comice, but after the Holidays

Its been quite a while since I last updated so I guess I am going to split this into two parts. After I got back from the Holidays, and before I left for the Comice I had a few more PACA meetings that went pretty well, but mostly more of the same. I don't know how excited I am about having to go through 10 more of them at this point, but I guess its necessary. Meetings here always seem to drag on forever, and before you can even start anyone who is “important” has to be paid respect to, which can take a while. At least there is always singing at some point, and some how everyone in my village has a pretty good voice which is a plus.

I was also able to start in on some actual work which was exciting. My first little mini-project was starting a compost pile in order to have some good soil for the tree nursery I will begin work on soon. It ended up being really great because a couple of people who saw what I was doing came over and started asking questions, and it ended up being a little hands on lesson in short term composting. They seemed to be pretty aware of what composting was, but they really had no idea how to do it in a controlled way so hopefully they took something out of it.

The sticks don't just make your compost pile look cool, they make it go faster.

I also started in on the school garden for the elementary school that is close to my house. The teachers and head master of the school helped out but most of the work was actually done by the students. This seemed really strange to me at first as the oldest kids in the school are still the equivalent of 5^th or 6^th graders in the United States, but let me tell you having a whole army of child laborers has its benefits, like the fact that the whole area was cleared in only two days (and without any injuries thankfully).

Pictured: Child Labor

Pictured: The benefits of child labor

Don't worry I helped too

It was really weird when I first got there and the teacher was yelling at all the kids who forgot to bring their machetes to class that day, seemed kind of backwards to me for some reason. The whole thing was coming along really great, and I drew up some plans to grow corn, soy, peppers, banana, and Manioc in a rotation, and use nitrogen fixing trees, and contour farming and all of these great agro-forestry techniques which I guess I am still going to do, only when I got back from the Comice they had burned all of the brush to make turning the soil easier (after several people specifically guaranteed me they would not do this).

Yay for traditional practices/laziness!

For those that don't know the whole slash and burn thing should really be avoided not just because it causes deforestation, but also because good soil should have all sorts of micro organisms in it, and burning it pretty much kills the soil and makes sure that the land will be infertile after only a few years of cultivation because everything that would put nutrients back into the soil is dead.

Life in village on the whole is something I am really starting to get used to. I was invited to a funeral one Saturday which was to say the least a little bit different than an American funeral.

The woman was catholic so they did a full catholic service

The traditional musicians

Each of the family members gave a speech

This particular funeral was well attended.

All of the members of the family did kind of a dancing line around the coffin and then did some sort of traditional dance in front of the drummers

I bet you can't pick me out of the crowd! Its like Wheres Waldo only not hard at all

The whole thing ended up being kind of a party and it seemed at least to me that it was as much about the food alcohol and dancing as as anything else. This became really obvious after the actual ceremony was over and the two kegs (where the hell do you find a keg in this country anyways?) and bottles of whiskey came out. I guess that a funeral is really more of a celebration for everyone that isn’t in the immediate family, but after a period of a few years in which they are supposed to mourn there is a kind of second funeral where they are allowed to celebrate, and there is of course more food, more alcohol, and more dancing. It was really cool to see the way that people here mix catholic traditions in with African culture.

As far as the rest of the country goes though, I am starting to have my doubts. Every time I get out of my village where people don't know me I get constantly bothered. Everyone assumes that I am either a tourist or a businessman, and in either situation I should have a lot of money to spend (and or steal). Small things like constantly being referred to as “le blanc,” getting quoted ridiculous prices for things, and constantly being stared at get really grating after a while. Really integrating into the culture here seems like it would be completely impossible for the sole fact that you are so obviously different, so obviously from some place else. You are always treated differently everywhere you go, and even when its something that seems like its positive, like being called to the front of the line at the bank, being given the best seat on the bus, or getting a little extra attention from females, (I need to buy a wedding ring and start telling people I am married because its getting ridiculous) the fact that you know its not because of merit, its not because of who you actually are, its just because you happen to be white ends up just making the whole situation feel embarrassing. All in all I guess I am just really happy to be back in my village (except for the moot moots), and I don't plan on leaving again until its absolutely necessary.  

Moot Moots are tiny biting flies, and this is what they will do to your hand

Once I get some more time and motivation I will write up something about the Comice and post all the pictures I took.

Comice and Christmas

Well the Comice have been postponed until January, which I found out when I was on my way to Yaounde after waking up at 4:30 in the morning to catch the three hour bus there. At least I was able to stay in the Case, and I had to buy a few things for my house that I can't get in Lolodorf anyways. Also I took this picture of a dump truck that ran into a building near the Case.

Yup

Apparently this is not exactly the first time that this has happened. According to August the Comice used to happen every four years, but they stopped in 1990. After a ten year hiatus Paul Biya said in 2000 that there would be a Comice in 2004, which was then put off until 2006, and then put off till 2008, and then put off until 2010, and I guess since it will (supposedly) be in January it has been put off until 2011. That seems to be kind of how things work here.  I know a few people just from Lolodorf and Bibondi who had already left for Ebolowa just like me (except they don't get their travel expenses covered by the Peace Corps) and they just got left high and dry when they postponed the day before. There is a volunteer who unfortunately lives in the area that the Comice will be held, and she said that they are using entirely too much concrete in the cement mixture, and none of the buildings they have built are drying. This is of course to counteract the fact that usually they use too much sand in the mixture to save money, and all the concrete buildings start falling apart after just a few years. Sometimes it is hard to keep thinking you can make any difference whatsoever when there doesn’t seem to be anything that works like it is supposed to in the whole country.

At least my work is going really well, and even if the country as a whole is not going to completely turn around any time soon, I can do some good here in Bibondi. I already have some plans for projects I want to work on and just today when August was showing me the school that is being renovated he told me about the garden that they are going to start clearing the ground for in January. 

August is the guy with the cane, and this is the school.

All of the parents of the children are going to help, and when they sell the produce it is going to go towards hiring a new teacher because there are six classes and only five teachers, so the people from the village have to help out and teach some of the classes. I am going to work on the farm, and use it as a demonstration plot for Agroforestry techniques so that the rest of the community can see them in action. He was trying pretty hard to recruit me to teach English once a week for like an hour a day, which I am going to at least try. I also distributed all of toys that people sent me to all of the people I have met with young children to give to their kids for Christmas. I know that isn’t technically development work, but it does make you feel good.

When I was in Yaounde I also picked up a replacement for my broken bicycle pump, and I was able to explore the parts of the village I hadn’t seen yet on bike.

The rest of the village looks a lot like the other parts of the village.

I stopped to talk to a lot of people who where all pretty confused as to why some white guy was riding through their village on a bike, and unfortunately met up with one particularly drunk guy (it was before noon, but that is just how people roll here) who refused to believe that I was not French, and said that it was my fault that he didn’t have a nice house, or food to eat. I tried to tell him I was here as a volunteer, and I could help him if he had any problems with his farm, but I think between my broken French, and his drunkenness he didn't really understand. It kind of got me to thinking though, the developing world really is a completely separate world from the developed world, and I really am just kind of a visitor here. That night as I was on the internet I saw this map which kind of drives the point home.

On a lighter note here is a kid fishing.

I'm pretty sure he told me they were not biting

This will most likely be my last post before Christmas because I won't have my computer, so Merry Christmas everyone. I will be spending it on the beach, but I would trade the beach for Christmas in Michigan with all of you guys any day.

My Christmas Tree in Bibondi, Thanks to my Mom and Dad.

Also Happy Birthday Alex.

Paca-tastic

I feel like I should update right now because I will be traveling to the Comice Argo-Pastoral show in Ebolowa tomorrow early in the morning, and I will probably have a bunch of news from that. The local dialect here is called Ewondo, and everyone here is rather insistent that I learn it even though everyone speaks French which I am still having enough trouble with. The language is really cool but it has absolutely nothing in common with English so all the words are really hard for me to remember. Here is most of what I have learned thus far:

Embolo- Hello (this is really informal)

Mbebe Ngoge – Good evening

Ngoge Mbam – Response to good evening

Mbebe Kidi – Good morning

Kidi Mbab – Response to good morning

One Mvoe – How are you?

Mene Mvoe – I am good

Akeba (abwe) – Thank you (very much)

The PACA meeting went surprisingly well, and everyone seemed pretty motivated to be involved which kind of surprised me. It was held at the Chefferie in Bibondi, and it was reasonably well attended. After I was introduced to the neighborhood the people attending split up into three groups, the men (mostly the important older guys),

The guy in the corner is the Chef

the women,

and the young men.

There where more younger guys, but they where smoking/peeing when I took this

Each group came up with a list of the needs in the community, then they got together and made a list of the five most important. Then I made a chart of those, and they decided through “pairwise ranking” which was the most important.

ASS-GIC stands for associations and Gic's just FYI

As I said this went surprisingly well, as I thought the whole exercise was kind of silly, but it actually sparked quite a bit of discussion and debate amongst the groups. At the end of the meeting the people gave me a village name, Eyene, which is a common name there, and they said that I was a child of the village and that I can go to any ones house and eat dinner (I think that is kind of a form of welcoming me to the community).

I feel like I have already done a bunch of work in the little bit of time that I have been here, so that I don't feel to bad about going to the Agro-Pastoral show so soon after getting to post. I also plan on going some where for Christmas to meet up with some other volunteers, and I will probably spend New Years Eve in Yaounde. Also every morning the whole village is completely covered in fog, which looks really cool, but reminds me of silent hill a little too much, here is a picture.    

spooky.

First Week at Post

As much as I hate the idea of having a blog, I decided that this was the easiest way to keep anyone who cared to stay up to date with what I am doing up to date. So the place I live is called Bikoka/Bibondi which is about 8k outside of Lolodorf in the Southern province of Cameroon. Bikoka and Bibondi are basically the same village, but there is a division about half of the way through pretty close to my house. The two are stretched out about 13k along a paved road, there are a couple of small boutiques, and a bar with cold beer (when there is electricity) pretty close to my house.

This is technically Bikoka

I live off the main road a little bit near the house of the General of Cameroon, and directly behind the house of another military official. Neither of them spend too much time in village, but I'm pretty sure that the fact that the General lives here is the reason that such a small village has running water, electricity, and a paved road. Lolodorf is a pretty small town and it pretty much just has one main street, and even though a lot of stuff is hard to track down, I am close enough to Yaounde that I shouldn’t have too much trouble finding anything I need. 

Lolodorf Main Street

The whole area is Virgin rainforest, and I am in the middle of a small mountain range, so it is all pretty beautiful which makes up a lot for the heat and humidity. 

This is what the rain forest looks like

Lolodorf was first colonized by the Germans (hence the name Lolodorf) and there are a lot of cool old , buildings that are in the process of disintegrating back into the jungle, as well as a surprising number of people who speak German.

This house was actually built by the French but whatever

Yesterday I went out and met the Chef of Bibondi (3^rd degree), and today I met the Chef of Bikoka/Bibondi (2^nd degree) the Chef of Bikoka (3^rd degree) and the Chef of the community forest I will be working with. Apparently the plan is that I will go to each of the 13 different neighborhoods in the village (each neighborhood has its own chief in bringing the grand total to 17) and do do a small PACA event. PACA stands for Participatory Analysis for Community Action, and it supposedly works really well, but some the “tools” seem to be rather contrived, and others seem like things anybody in a new community would do anyways. According to Peace Corps that is all I am really supposed to accomplish in my first three months here, so it is nice to have a counterpart who is going to help me organize all of it, and I will hopefully be done by the end of January. My community host is the director of a technical high school called CAAFBI for girls where I might do some agricultural classes, but I don't really know what type of projects I will be working on yet (that’s what the PACA stuff is for) besides a tree nursery for fruit trees, and Soy, both of which I already know there is a lot of interest in. All of the farmers I have met thus far, and the Chef's have seemed really interested in helping me, but we will see how much motivation there is when it comes down to doing some work.

Moving in to my house has been rather strange, as this is the first time that I have had any time not surrounded by people 24 hours a day in over 3 months. Living with a Cameroonian family during stage was great to learn the culture, but after a few months it gets kind of annoying feeling like you are always under a microscope. It is nice to have a little sanctuary, but if I am not careful I could spend the better part of two years just sitting in my house seeing as I brought a bunch of drawing supplies, bought a guitar in Yaounde, and now I have access to the internet from home. My community host set me up in a pretty nice place with a working bathroom, two bedrooms, a living room, and an attached kitchen. The only way to get to the kitchen is from outside, and as of right now it is still a bedroom so I will have to install a counter, a sink, and buy a stove. For now I am getting all of my meals made for me by my community host, which will be fine for a while, but I don't want to have to eat on their schedule the whole time I am here. They also set me up with a couch, some chairs, shelves, a desk, two beds, and even some curtains for my living room. There is a little bit of work yet to be done in the house, but I am really lucky to have fallen into a mostly furnished house when opening a post because I just talked to someone else that is opening a post and he said that all he had in his house was his footlocker and a mattress. Students in Cameroon receive a grade for manual labor, and the girls from CAAFBI cleaned my house as part of their class which was pretty awesome.

My house

I am going to start getting more pictures of all the people I am working with, and the mountains so that I can post them here, but until then I guess that is all the news that I have.