Day 1 in Yaounde

I embarrassed myself this morning by not having changed my watch and thinking it was 10am just out the shower and everyone was waiting downstairs as it was 11am. I was 10 minutes late so you can see I am au naturel with African time.

We went to the internet café and had breakfast, sent family emails and initial registration emails to the British High Commission in Cameroon. You have to be ‘confirmed’ and then fill out a big form which I haven’t done yet. After that we went up to this lovely Benedictine monastery up on the hill above the city and had a buffet lunch where we met all the programme staff and some volunteers who happened to be visiting Yaoundé.

I met three people working in the Far North today – all French Canadians – a guy called Pierre who has gone totally native and adores his village, doesn’t mind that there is no running water or internet access and has lost 9kgs in weight. He looked very well and is obviously very happy. I also met Yvette who works in Maroua and is now in her fourth year she loves it so much. She said lots of nice things about how beautiful Bogo is. Then I met an older woman Maude who was a bit more cynical and is now back working in Yaounde, not sure why, could be the cynical bit.

Pierre said there are two other young women in Bogo itself and they share a compound rented by this old 60 year old lady that has 3 huts. He thinks I may get one of the huts. Yep – it is looking increasingly likely that I get the mud hut. I’m glad I bought my solar panel! There is a huge divide for Cameroonians and for volunteers between the Far North and the relatively south, North West. I keep hearing that the Far North is more ‘challenging’ and more ‘african’. We don’t know quite what this means yet. I have heard that the Bogo mayor (my boss) is also the local chief and a very very tall, powerful man.

At the monastery was a museum of African artefacts – mainly chairs, bowls, statues and chief collars that were really beautiful. The meal was nice – salads, rice, plantain (which are a type of banana that taste like chips), chicken (which I think is chewy, but maybe it’s because the chickens are free range) and fish. Then we came back and sat outside the hotel talking and drinking ice cold beer. Tonight we went and had a pizza.

Quite a lot of people are struggling with the heat and humidity, but I’m fine at the moment. I’ve had several people tell me what beautiful skin I have today. I found my steroid itchy ear cream and my face moisturizer. So far I haven’t realized I have forgotten something really important.

Lots of people are keen to get out to their placements immediately, but I’m happy to just chill here. I think the first few months are going to be getting to grips with the language, because although I can pretty much understand the flow of the French Canadians I am going to have to work at talking.