Woo Pig Sooie!

I am in fact alive. There is no internet cafe in tiny Bokito, so this is my first opportunity to write in 2 weeks. And when I arrived in Yaounde yesterday the power was out, so no free internet here, either.

Sheesh.

What an exciting, bizarre, hot, lazy, empty but busy 2 weeks. My first diary entry after arriving starts, "Oh my God. My kitchen is infested with cockroaches. THere are tons. I must buy huge canisters of Moon Tiger." I've done that and they seem to have retreated to the kitchen. I survived the first night, and the first two weeks. We'll see about the next two years. The last education volunteer lasted only 3-4 months.

My house is huge and for the most part empty. I have a bed (for which I finally got sheets and pillows), a desk and chairs (on loan from the school). I have been eating well. All I can get here is fruit and veggies. Looking at the meat makes me kinda sick, so I only eat it when other people prepare it. I have running water (a week before I arrived, a woman who couldn't drive wrecked her car into my water meter, so I had to buy a new one for 23,000 CFA ($46)) and electricity (no meter installed yet, after 3 trips to Bafia and roughly 30,000 CFA ($60) in expenses). But whatever. That's Cameroon.

I've been to the weekly market twice now. No cucumbers or eggplants sadly, but I can get green beans, carrots, and okra. Lots of people come by to give me food and fruit. It's nice. I've met all sorts of people. The inhabitants of Bokito are very friendly and welcoming. Most of them have been very nice, if a bit persistent. My colleagues are also friendly. I think I will be happy there. My house is on a main thoroughfare, a bit too public for my taste, but close to lots of things and I can watch people go by. I figure it helps them get used to me and also passes the time.

As for my official 9 to 5 job, it's going. "La rentree scolaire" is always very slow in the villages and there are still teachers missing. FOr their part, students and teachers are skeptical about "Informatique" taught by a young white woman who doesn't speak French and has no computers. I feel the same way, especially since I'm teaching 5 hours of it a week and have yet to receive the government-produced syllabus or a textbook. I teach the youngest class, and an older class that will take a national exam at the end of the year--one section of which is on IT. Thursday afternoon I had 47 absent students (just to give you an idea how big the classes are).

In closing, I will relate the story of my arrival in Yaounde. I left Bokito with an Anglophone colleage, Caroline, at 8 am. We got into a standard 4-door (like a camry), joining the driver, 2 parents plus child in the front seat, an adult male, and another female & child in the back seat. Total occupants: 9. We stopped to pick up a woman and her load of cassavas. Total occupants: 10 + cartload of cassavas. When we arrived in Bafia, we bought tickets for the van to the capitol. Our trip was delayed by a pig. The biggest pig I've ever seen. Except the luggage handlers at the agence are mostly Muslim and refused to touch it. So, 8-10 male passengers hoisted a screaming pig onto the roof and strapped him down. After arriving, the pig was unceremoniously rolled from the roof to the ground, kickin\g and squealing.

I'm sure it made a tasty centerpiece at someone's traditional wedding. Go Hogs!