Swearing-In and Thanksgiving

Friday, November 30, 2012 – Swearing-In and Thanksgiving

Well it has been quite a while since my last post, and a lot has happened, so I will probably break it up into a couple different posts.  It’s hard to even remember everything that’s happened. 

Two weeks ago we had our Bridge to Post where we met our counterparts.  Mine is a guy who is the chief of the CMPJ, which basically translates to a multifunctional youth center.  He seems like a really nice guy, and we made a pretty ambitious plan for my first few months here, including starting to teach the students English, Sexual and Reproductive Health, healthy lifestyle decisions, computers, and micro financing.  There is also a lot of protocol to do like meeting the mayor, the prefet (kind of governor of the area), the commissaire for public security, and the traditional chief of the area, who is called the Lamido.  I also have a bunch of integration activities to do, like going to the market, meeting directors at schools, my neighbors, boutique owners, and stuff like that. 

My counterpart sounded really excited to have a volunteer to work with, and seems like he wants me to get going as soon as possible.  He was a bit long-winded, but funny too.  He was also happy that my French was as good as it is, and that I want to learn Fulfuldé, which I found out is basically like Fulani, so it is spoken in something like 7 countries – a lot more useful than I thought it would be. 

Then Last Tuesday, we went to Yaoundé to do banking and administration stuff.  It didn’t take as long as I thought it would, and we ended up going to the boulangerie (bakery) and spending way too much money.  It was nice to be able to get something a bit different than the usual in Bafia.  I thought I was going to get my tooth fixed by the dentist (the one I broke a month and a half ago), but apparently there weren’t any appointments available.  Now I have to wait until IST, which is at the end of February.  Luckily it didn’t break to the nerve so it doesn’t hurt.  After that we went to the Palais de Congress and practiced a bit for the next day. 

We went back to Bafia that night, and then headed back to Yaoundé the next day where we had our Swearing-In Ceremony, so I’m finally a real Peace Corps Volunteer (PCV)!  It was a pretty big deal – a lot of dignitaries showed up, my host-mom was able to come, and we kept on schedule for the most part.  Our training group performed Michael Jackson’s Man in the Mirror with a Cameroonian choir, and it actually sounded surprisingly good.  Afterwards we took a bunch of pictures, and Chantal Biya, the First Lady, came and looked at booths for the different Peace Corps sectors and regions.  I’m going to post a picture below (never mind, didn't work), but definitely look her up too; she has an… interesting style. 

That night we had a shindig back in Bafia, where we rented out a hotel room.  I shared it with another guy here, but had to sleep on a couch in the lobby, which was pretty uncomfortable.  It was definitely an interesting party. 

The next day, a few of us had Thanksgiving at the house of a friend.  I didn’t do too much but talk to people and cut up the sweet potatoes.  The others made mac and cheese (which was pretty good, but more mac than cheese), stovetop stuffing (that turned out really well), sweet potatoes (that we called sugar potatoes, which were basically sweet potatoes with sweetened-condensed milk and pineapple), and a pumpkin pie (that turned out great considering it was pan-fried).  I swear, it’s more than two weeks later and I’m still on a sugar high.  After that I had fish and fried plantains with my family.  Just writing this makes me miss those guys. 

Well it’s market-day here and there are a lot of people in town, so I am going to go hang out with them.  Still a lot of catching-up to do. 

 I posted this a day later because I was trying to upload pictures.  That didn't work.  My internet key is ridiculously slow.