Et Le Navire Va: My Month Away from Guider

Sunday, July 14, 2013 (Bastille Day)

I’m finally back at my post after almost an entire month away. It started with a VAC meeting in Garoua on June 15. That is basically where we discuss problems that we are having as a region and go over rule clarifications and mandates from Peace Corps Administration in Yaoundé. We had a lot to say as a region – we had basically had no contact from Administration with security updates in months, and none of us had any idea what was going on. Since then, we have been told that we will start receiving periodic emails updating the situation, having received one so far.

After that I had to take the train in just a few days, so there was not much reason to take the bus all the way back to post. I hung out in Garoua for a couple of days, and then headed down to Ngaounderé to take the train. I had to get down to Yaoundé to finish up final preparations for the National Girls’ Forum (NGF). Though we tried to give ourselves more time to work together and finalize all of the documents, Administration refused to let us go down early, hence why I just hung out in Garoua and Ngaounderé – I wasn’t allowed in Yaoundé yet. I still don’t see the logic in that micro-management.

Due to last-minute editions from the presenters and formatting issues, especially making the transition from our computers to the ones we could print on, we worked for more than 12 hours straight at times, one committee member even having to stay up until almost 4 AM to do printing. We went a day early to Kribi to set up, and had to get up quite early then to finish all of the printing and get the Welcome Books bound.

I thought that it was really going to be great to have the NGF in Kribi, and it was, but I really didn’t get to enjoy it as much as I would have liked. I was usually setting up by 7:30 every morning and didn’t finish wrapping up and entering survey data until around 6 every evening. After that, I was usually so exhausted that I had dinner and went to bed fairly early. Of course, I still made an effort to enjoy it. Kribi has amazing food that I spent a lot of money to appreciate, including some delicious seafood. I would have liked to go to the beach more though.

After Kribi I went back to Yaoundé where I had to hang out for another couple of days until our Steering Committee meeting started. It was a really successful meeting. We created the basic training schedule, including adding at least five new sessions – backwards planning and lesson design; community needs assessment; money management and savings; working with people living with HIV/AIDS; work zones and collaboration; and more room for best practices. We chose who we would like as trainers, pending the approval of the Training Director. We also were able to find a new Editor-in-Chief for the YD Newsletter and a new Keeper of the YD Toolkit from my stage to replace those who will be COSing (leaving) in the next few months.

I stayed down in Yaoundé for another couple of days where we had a BBQ at the Case (transit house) for the 4^th of July. It was a lot of fun with about a dozen PCVs and a family that was visiting from America – just grilling and beers. The next day we went to the Embassy for a party there, which was pretty terrible. They were charging 2000 cfa for a beer (we usually pay 500 cfa at bars) and the marines there we incredibly rude. A friend of mine who is one of the calmest and most mature people I know even almost got provoked into a fight. Needless to say, we thought it would be a good idea if we left early. It’s amazing how much better our party that was planned and orchestrated the day of was than the embassy party, which had been planned for weeks.

I got back up to Ngaounderé and stayed a couple of days to help out with an extremely successful camp put on by some friends of mine from that region; the fourth such camp that they’ve held in the Adamaoua. In the three days I was there, they covered everything that YD should – the bridge model; decision-making; leadership skills; gender; HIV/AIDS; and a host of other issues. The kids were all incredibly engaged and there were some exceedingly competent facilitators from the University that the PCV in Ngaounderé had been training. It was really great to watch how successful a camp can be, and something to aspire too. If the camps we are hoping to have this fall are half as successful, I’ll be happy.

Finally I went up to Garoua to see the PCMO (medical officer) about my back and knees. Due to a combination of the terrible mattresses and travel in this country, both have been killing me. In reality since I got here but more so over the past few weeks. Looks like I’ll need to wait until I go to Yaoundé next to get a couple of x-rays – until then just ibuprofen and some exercises that will hopefully help.

And so I am finally back in Guider with Ramadan just beginning. I’ve got a lot of work to do on my national projects (training, steering, NGF), but I am not sure how I will start new projects here between Ramadan and school still being out, not to mention the fact that I will have to leave in less then a month for another Steering Committee Meeting in Yaoundé, followed just a couple of weeks later by TOT/TDW (Training of Trainers and Training Design Workshop). I’m glad I at least have this month at post.