Perhaps the most important thing for life here: buckets

Well I know I’ve mentioned these things before in other posts, I believe about water and washing clothes but sometimes when I just look at life here, I still can’t believe how important these things are. Yep, buckets that’s what I’m talking about. Buckets. Buckets of all colors, even tie-dye, all sizes – big and small, pretty much one shape – round, but really there is an endless variety of buckets here and for a reason.

Buckets are probably the thing I use most and for most of my household activities. It’s really crazy sometimes how much I rely on buckets and how much I would probably be in trouble if I didn’t have them. They are used for so many things: washing clothes and shoes, taking a bath, cleaning dishes, storing water, collecting water when it rains, storing items or even food, selling items on the street – buckets are essential to life here. I myself have about 6 buckets and one giant trashcan (kind of a bucket, right) that I use every day. Particularly now with a not-so-reliable water system and it being rainy season, any time it looks cloudy I make sure to put as many buckets out in a row under the roof to collect water.

It’s funny to think sometimes that we almost never use buckets in the States – maybe we have some stored in a garage or shed with junk or who knows what in them but very rarely are there buckets actually in the house and that we use often. And yet after being here now and using them all the time, I don’t know what I’ll do when I go back with no buckets. 

Almost all my buckets...still a few more around the house

Mosques

Since my particular area of Cameroon is mostly Muslim, there are mosques almost everywhere. In Banyo there is a mosque almost every hundred feet. Some mosques look pretty shabby and are practically falling apart, little square houses that you only know are a mosque because of the small Arabic writing in front or the minaret. Sometimes it isn’t really even a building, but just any area blocked off with bricks in the shape of a square building with a minaret cut out. And then sometimes the mosque looks amazing. it’s beautiful with lots of detail and just really a great structure within the community. In fact I would say that some of the msoquees I’ve seen are really the most beautiful buildings I’ve seen here altogether. I will really miss walking down the street and seeing such lovely buildings when I go back and of course I’ll miss hearing the call to prayer everyday multiple times of day. Can’t say however that I will necessarily miss the constant stops while traveling for passengers to prayer…

Mayo Djinga Mosque - The newest, probably most expensive and certainly nicest building 

in this small village

my favorite - the big mosque in Ngaoundere 

Another nice mosque in Ngaoundere

Banyo's main mosque 

Babies everywhere

In America, I would have to say that the average high schooler/college student/younger adult comes across babies maybe once in a while – perhaps a family member or family friend has a child and one gets to see and hold the baby. Here, well you practically can’t get away from babies. They are everywhere. I can’t even begin to count the number of babies I’ve held since being here, let alone all the ones that I just see every day. And sometimes I’m talking day old babies. Not only does everyone have tons of babies, but maybe since they’re just all over, people are not as concerned, I’ll say, about possible risky behavior for the baby. For example, it’s quite normal to allow a 3,4,5 year old to hold the baby, even walk around with the baby. You often see young children with babies attached to their back (like the mothers do) but sometimes I swear I don’t know how the child doesn’t almost fall over from the baby as the child isn’t much bigger herself. Then it's also normal to put babies on motos - either the woman just keeps the baby on her back while riding or even better, the moto driver rests the baby on the gas tank in front of them while on the moto. 

I really liked this particular baby and asked to
'borrow' him for a day or two but it never
happened don't think they took me seriously

Another common practice thats not so much possibly dangerous but just different from what we know is for one to allow someone else to raise their child. Often people send their young child to an extended family member for a while. And it’s also acceptable to even ask for someone’s baby. For example, maybe a woman’s own children are grown and she wants to have a young child to help with household chores and have around – so just ask someone you know who has recently had a baby. 

Here are some photos of just a few babies. Believe me there are many, many more …

A few day old twins

How most babies are carried around - just tie them to your back with some fabric

Home Sweet Home

My new house ! 

So almost an entire year and a few close calls later but I finally have the house that I want. And while it may seem ridiculous to be moving now when I have only 3 months left, it’s worth it. My first house was really great itself but there were problems more so with location. I’ll just say the problems were due to culture differences - some people here don’t have the same ideas about personal space and what’s appropriate as a neighbor. And for anyone who’s visited me, I’ll say one word – kudjo. So it’s better now that I have my own compound.

My new house is literally across the street – maybe 10 steps. It’s owned by the Lamido and was recently finished. It’s pink and green with a giant living room and high ceiling, two bedrooms and bathroom that even has a toilet seat and cover, an indoor kitchen and a detached kitchen for wood fire cooking. And there’s running water and power (most of the time)

  

I’ve only been here a few nights so far and still have a lot of work before it’s all pulled together, but it’s already been amazing being here and not having to worry about the many things I did before. I will most certainly thoroughly enjoy my last few months in my new house. And I hope my replacement will enjoy his or her full 2 years in this great house. 

My old house is on the left - again literally like 10 steps away

My new room 

Living room before... 

And after

Indoor kitchen 

So fresh and so clean

I would have to say that the thing that struck me the most about life here that I hadn’t expected at all is the importance of appearances, specifically clothing. I’m sure anyone back home wouldn’t really expect to see people here in Cameroon so nicely dressed and I know there are plenty of volunteers here that use the excuse – ‘It’s Africa and you just get dirty so why dress nice’. But appearances and attire are actually very important to people.

When people go out, they try to look their best, whether they are wearing traditional clothing or more modern clothes. And yes things are dirty here particularly now with the height of dry season and red dust absolutely everyone but that doesn’t stop people from putting on their whitest t-shirt and going out. It’s important to have clean clothes and clean shoes – yes shoes. People wash their shoes some almost every day. And for example every morning after students and teachers make the trek out to the school and are covered in dust, the first thing they do after arriving is make sure to dust off and clean their shoes. And even tennis shoes that are used for sport are cleaned. I myself have even begun to clean my tennis shoes even though I wear them every day for sport and they get dirty every day, it’s important here. Ironed, pressed clothes are also important. And when you look extra nice and clean, sometimes people will say you look ‘fresh’ which is a nice compliment.

So cleanliness is across the board an important part of looking nice when going out. But then there are other things that maybe wouldn’t be that popular back home, but people do love here.

- Tight t-shirts with decals or glitter/sparkles. ‘Africa’ and ‘Cameroon’ t-shirts are super popular right now. And Ed Hardy knock off t-shirts also.

This was given to me for my birthday

- Small ties. Every big man, important person at some point rocks out a super small tie. The smaller the tie, the more important you are. Also super pointy men's dress shoes.

- Man purses worn around the neck. You know something nice like Gucci or Louis Vutton.

- In the realm of traditional clothing, right now a popular outfit is pants and a long tunic for girls with of course a scarf to cover the head and hair

So while I don’t necessarily follow all the particular fashion trends here, I do always try to look presentable with ironed clothes and cleaned shoes. And I would say for any volunteers coming, don’t underestimate your appearance here. If I could do it over, I would definitely bring some nicer clothing and dressier shoes. Things do get dirty, but it’s nice to look clean and professional every now and then.

Don't they look so nice and clean

How integrated do you feel in your community?

Every 4 months, one of the responsibilities as a volunteer is to complete a report about my activities. As you would imagine, I list all the work that I have done over those months. but in addition, I report about basically all the aspects of my life in my village – how my language skills are, if I’ve had any security or safety issues, culture exchanged, etc. Well one of the questions we are asked is ‘How integrated do you feel in your community?’ I find this to be one of the most difficult questions to answer. What does it even mean?

I feel like so often when we talk about life in another country as a volunteer, we talk about how we have ups and downs, how it can be so challenging with a different culture and how we try to integrate into our community. But really what does any of that mean? I think we often too easily say that our life is so different just because we are in a different country, but is it really? Why do we put such an emphasis on the highs and lows and that we are working and living in another country? I mean do you not have good days and bad days when you are back home in America? Do you not have moments when it feels like nothing is working how you want when you are in America? Maybe other people don’t but I definitely do. When I look at my life here and compare it with my life from before, I realize that really there are so many similarities. Yes, of course some of my daily activities are different, but in essence, isn’t most of it the same? I have my friends here who I care about and spend my time with. I have my work and responsibilities. I have days that I wish would never end and some that don’t end soon enough. But isn’t that all part of life no matter where you are or what you're doing?

So back to the first question – How integrated do you feel in your community? – Well for everyone back home, I mean do you ever ask yourself this question? No who does. And well if you did, what would you even say? It’s not something you think about and even when you do, how do you determine an accurate response. But here it’s something we discuss at times a lot with one another and I would just like to say that sometimes I find it to be an absurd question that we would otherwise not ask one another if it weren’t for living in another country and culture.

Boys English Group

So I don’t usually really talk about my work and most of that is because my work is really just teaching English everyday but here is a small project that I’ve recently started that I wanted to share about because I was happy it was finally happening.

Since coming to Banyo and starting work at the lycee, I have wanted to work with students outside of regular class – to work with a small group and do more activities that I was interested in and that they were interested in. Well I have finally gotten things rolling (only after a year and half). Some of my younger students came to me a few months ago and wanted an opportunity to practice English with more of a focus on conversational skills. So I invited a few more students of the same age level and we set a day and time to meet each week. It’s been going well for about a month now. And the students really seem to enjoy it and I definitely enjoy working with such a small group where I can actually hear everyone and they all have a chance to participate. The meetings thus far have been rather unstructured, some meetings we go over more in depth what they learned in class, some meetings we just talked about culture like school and differences in America and here. But I think it is going well and I am planning on using our meetings to incorporate lessons on topics like study skills and life skills while also allowing them to practice their English.

Here are some pictures of an activity we just did this past week. I brought in maps of the US and the world and we discussed some geography and I shared about America. Then they drew a map of Cameroon and described their country. All of this in English of course for them to practice.