‘Just Managing’ IST and Kicking Back at the Beach

After the introductory dinner and dancing the first night, we quickly got down to business the next day with our first sessions of our 8-5 days. The first day was characterized by everyone giving presentations, either in French or English, with their respective counterparts on the different health concerns of the places and various interesting aspects that came out during the community needs assessment period of the past 3 months. It was fascinating listening to my fellow health stagemates explain aspects of their lives in the community, and what they were most looking forward to tackling in the future. Overall, the health concerns are pretty standard across the board: malaria, HIV/AIDS, teen pregnancy, underutilization of the hospital, particularly by pregnant women for antenatal care and delivery, STIs, malnutrition, etc. However, the nature of the problems differs greatly between volunteers with posts in the ‘Grand South’ (every region south of Adamoua) and the ‘Grand North’ (Adamoua, North, Extreme North), meaning that although I want to work on the health issue of malnutrition in Kembong, it’s totally different in the fact that the malnutrition that I’ll be working with is more of a nutrient deficiency, vs. a total lack of food. Additionally, since the Grand North has a predominantly Muslim culture, the volunteers will face different challenges, e.g., working with women, since women predominantly stay in their family compounds, and are not allowed/inclined to work with male PCVs, even in a non-medical setting. In that sense, although my SW region has its own challenges (witchcraft and traditional medicine are widely used, despite the region being predominantly Christian) and although there is not so much of a taboo about talking about issues of sexual health (teen pregnancy, HIV/AIDS), that doesn’t mean that the people are any more likely to change their behaviors than  people in the Grand North. Although listening to the presentations was highly interesting for me, I’m unhappy to report that they were not for Pauline. In fact, Pauline was the very picture of a rude, disinterested counterpart who literally complained about everything: she whined about them ‘overfeeding’ us by providing us with a nice snacktime in between morning sessions, but was the first person in line stuffing her face with croissants and yogurt, she rued the fact that some of the presentations were in French (Anglophone regions are the minority) when she fell asleep during those that were in English. Her ridiculous, rude behavior knew no bounds, as she unabashedly answered phone calls from her obnoxiously ringing phone in the middle of different presentations. The snapping moment for me came when we had to put together a mock project implementation plan, from goals and objectives, to M and E indicators, etc. We were working in pairs with other volunteers and counterparts, and Julia decided to tag along with Pauline and I. Pauline sat there like a complete waste of space while Julia and I put together the whole action plan…she offered no feedback, even when I tried repeatedly to engage her in the work, and actually fell asleep. When Sylvie, the health program manager, came around to see how we were doing, we presented the information, Sylvie offered some minor critiques, and Pauline (who had suddenly become active and invigorated after her siesta) decided to chime in with harsh criticisms… I was done. It’s one thing if she actually contributed to the work, but to sit there sleeping and then make me look like an incompetent fool in front of my program manager was too much. She also feel asleep during the time that her and I were supposed to be creating our 3 month action plan, dictating the direction of my projects for the next three months. I called her out on it several times, and then finally told her that I would be very upset if she didn’t help me, or at least show some degree of effort/interest. The title of the blog refers to a common response in the Anglophone regions when you ask how someone is doing, their reply ‘just managing’ implies that they’ve been dealing with some rough stuff, but they’ve made it through. Dealing with Pauline was the rough patch of my IST, but I certainly made it through. 

            Another rough patch of IST was in our ‘Men as Partners’ joint session with the youth development volunteers. Genevieve, one of my friends from Emory and my MI class, told of an incident where she was sitting on her veranda one day reading a book, and a man came up and literally groped her boobs, thinking nothing was wrong with his behavior. After Genevieve told the story, one of the male counterparts responded with ‘I don’t see why she’s making such a big deal out of this, it was just a touch!’ Needless to say, al l the women, particularly the female volunteers, were livid. This man’s comments illustrate exactly why we are having the damn session. Gaaaahhh. Anyway, some good did come out of the session, as it facilitated a necessary conversation between Pauline and  I. In the session, Pauline was all fired up, talking loudly in favor of gender equity and cultural change related to how men perceive and treat women. But unfortunately, there is a discordance between her words and actions, meaning that she herself does not practice/promote gender equity in her own home and in the Kembong community. After my one on one conversation with Sylvie, I decided that one of my focus areas for health work in the community would be youth empowerment, and would be accomplished by me working with the health clubs at the government high and technical schools, with a special emphasis on women/girl’s empowerment by forming a girl’s club. This will also serve to promote sexual health education, particularly in reference to preventing teen pregnancy and transmission of STIs and HIV/AIDS. For those interested in the theoretical backing of the girl’s club, I’ll be using the care group model to form the group. Although Pauline will be an asset to the logistical planning of these activities, if she cannot ‘walk the walk’ with gender empowerment/equity issues, then I need to find another positive deviant model woman in the community who can work with me. Essentially, my point is that if I am working with a woman who refuses to put into practice what she preaches, my project/efforts to empower girls will not as successful. 

            On the positive side, in addition to focusing on youth empowerment, and doing a training of trainers with the health club members, with the eventual goal of having them go out and conduct health training sessions with different groups of people in the community. On a different note, my primary project will be combating malnutrition among children 0-5, the most susceptible age group of children to malnutrition issues. My efforts on this front will include: going from quarter to quarter in Kembong to determine how many children are malnourished, and doing informal surveys and interviews with their caregivers to ascertain food consumption trends, conducting nutrition education sessions at the antenatal clinics and vaccination days at the health center (gotta love captive audiences), conducting cooking demonstrations with proper food preparation techniques (no, in fact, you don’t need to take a perfectly good veggie/green and then cut it, pound it, boil it, and then fry it in order for it to be edible), working with the nursery and primary school teachers to incorporate nutrition education into their curriculums (using the ‘maison de nourriture’ model – the base of the house is the proteins, the walls are the starches/carbs, and the roof is the veggies/fruits, while the latrine is for palm oil/sugar), etc. I’m pretty excited about both my primary and secondary project ideas, and looking forward to getting started!   

            The rest of IST passed very pleasantly, as different members of my stage and I played euchre and drank wine after dinner nearly every night, we celebrated different birthdays, and got to watch copies of lots of new movies (the Oscars won by cast members of Dallas Buyer’s Club were well-deserved), found a thrift area of the market that had clothes from India, and bought a bunch of handicrafts to decorate our respective houses. On Sunday, I went with Kate, Cody, Ludi and Colleen to the Endarawa Tea Plantation , situated atop one of the mountains outside of Bamenda. The journey there was absolutely beautiful, and seeing the rows and rows of tea bushes stretching as far as the eye can see, was incredible. We saw the Nestle tea plantation holdings, along with those of several other companies. Although we didn’t get to see the factory, the security guard giving us an impromptu tour showed us the owner’s menagerie of sorts at the end of the tour. There, we got the opportunity to see peacocks, vervet monkies, pythons, ostriches, and finally, and most excitedly, chimps. Although I was not enthusiastic about the chimps’ living conditions, and in a way, by seeing them, condoning these conditions/the fact that these beautiful creatures are being kept as pets, I couldn’t help but be excited about the opportunity to hold one of them , named Uncle Billy. Uncle Billy was very gentle, and after walking a few paces, reached up to clasp my hand, and shortly after, hold out its outstretched arms for me to take it in mine. Regardless of the moral questionability of my actions, it was a cool experience. 

            The next few days of IST flew by, and before I knew it, I was traveling to the beach in Limbe with Sarah, Layne, Maria, Genevieve, Matt, and Edith (a Fulbright scholar living in Bamenda). Our hotel had its own private swatch of beach, and the hotel itself was situated a 20-minute drive from Limbe proper, meaning that it was the idea secluded location. We swam morning, noon, and night in the Atlantic Ocean, marveling at the beauty of our surroundings – ‘Baby Mt. Cameroon,’ Mt. Seme, loomed over us in the distance, and the scenery was picturesque. The first night that we swam, we were greeted with the unexpected pleasure of swimming with bioluminescents! It was absolutely amazing to move body parts in the water and see the tiny burst of light that followed. Apart from the beach, we also went into Limbe to eat at the fish market, munching on fresh-caught, grilled fish, and to check out Arne’s Café  (easily one of the best meals I’ve had in-country) and the Limbe Wildlife Reserve, a menagerie of sorts populated by rescued animals, ranging from crocodiles to gorillas. Overall, a much-needed, and very enjoyable vacation. I started the trip back to Kembong yesterday, and will head back today. Although IST and hanging out with everyone was awesome, I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t at least a little relieved to head back to my post and settle back into my routine.

From Delivering a Baby, to Demanding Justice: Being A Woman of Strength

This week was probably one of the most trying weeks of my time here, not because anything happened to me personally, but because I empathized greatly with the plight/situations of those around me. On Monday, I assisted Teckla with doing wound care for a man who had gotten in an awful motorcycle accident. The next day, a young woman came in who was about the deliver her baby. Pauline calmly cleaned her office at the health center while I anxiously tried to read my Smithsonian magazine to the background of her guttural grunts and moans. After about ten minutes of hearing these groans increasing in succession and strength, I grabbed Pauline and asked her if we could please check the woman. An hour and a half later, the woman was in labor, with me as the assistant. I didn’t actually do anything as the assistant during the delivery itself, other than feeling a huge adrenaline rush and I implored the woman to ‘go, go, push, push’ whenever she had a particularly strong contraction. She delivered a healthy baby boy, and after the placenta was delivered and Pauline cut the umbilical cord, she handed me the baby to wash it off, soap and dry it, and then bundle it up. Despite knowing that children are pretty hardy beings, I was scared to death of harming the wriggling, wrinkly bundle of baby. I was also the first one to rock and hold the baby boy – eee! I brought the baby over to his mother, who didn’t seem pleased at all to see her son, and in fact, did not want to hold the baby at all (I understand that she is probably exhausted, but good lord, it’s your baby!). Although, to be fair, the mother’s lack of enthusiasm to have a baby could also be due to the fact that she’s 17 years old. The whole experience was absolutely amazing, and served to reaffirm, yet again, that I will not be having children anytime soon. I also proved my worth as a pseudo African woman by carrying a 10-liter bucket of water on my head for half a mile – woohoo!

           On Wednesday, Kate and Adrian came up to visit me in Mamfe and Kembong. I decided to meet them in Mamfe and from there, we all went to the hanging German bridge, taking pictures and tentatively crossing over the wobbly, timbered bride that’s suspended 400 feet over the now-shallow river. It was a cool experience, and it was great to experience it with friends. From there, we headed back to Kembong. Once there, all the children and some of my neighbors gathered to meet these strangers, before Kate, Adrian, Pauline and I headed for roast fish and beers at Chop My Money. Despite a minor fiasco where Pauline flipped out that I was having people pay for their own drinks, even though I had made it clear that if people wanted to join us, that it was an ‘American’ invitation (a Cameroonian invitation is one where the person inviting people is expected to pay for everyone else’s drinks and food – not happening with my PC budget), we had a wonderful time and went back to my home to chill out on my veranda. Although I enjoy living alone, it’s also great to have visitors – but on the flip side, although I was super happy to have them with me, it was nice to have my space back.

          Backtracking to Monday of this week, there was a most disheartening incident that occurred with my teenage neighbor girl, Precious. Precious’s father died when she was young, and she is the youngest daughter of five girls, several of whom still live in their uncle’s family’s compound with their mother. Precious has told me before how she has had problems paying for school fees, most notably because her mother gave her uncle the entirety of her school fees, and her uncle proceeded to ‘chop the money’ (take it and spend it for other purposes, also a euphemism for corruption). Consequently, Precious was ‘driven from school,’ meaning that the school staff goes through and if students haven’t paid the entirety of their fees, they don’t get to stay at school. Quite literally all of the students that gather at my house on a daily basis have been driven from school at one point or another. Anyway, the point is that Precious really wants to be in school – a great, and somewhat rare, thing. On Monday, I heard these heart-wrenching sobs coming from near Precious’s house. I immediately went over to investigate, finding Precious curled into the fetal position, sitting on her veranda. I immediately gave her a hug, started rubbing her back and making soothing noises as I waited for her crying to abate so that she could tell me what was wrong. Other children had gathered around, and wanting privacy, I asked her if we could go to my house. She acquiesced, and after we went into my house, I sat her down and asked her what was wrong. She proceeded to tell me that she had gotten angry with her mother and her uncle and had spoken harshly to them because both refused to pay her school fees, and provide for her. She said that the situation had come to a head during Youth Day, and that her mother had refused to feed her, even acknowledge her because her daughter was angry and had spoken harshly. She then told me that her uncle had beat her, and was a wicked man. She had gotten in another fight with both mother and uncle that day, and her mother refused to acknowledge her, while her uncle accused her of being a prostitute, and told her that if she wanted to pay her school fees, that she should earn them by being a prostitute (it’s worth mentioning here that her school fees were 3,000 CFA, the equivalent of $6…), and he proceeded break her spirit by telling her that he was going to call his father from the grave to deal with her/haunt her (resurrection is a big deal here, so for Precious, this was a very real, horrifying threat). He then proceeded to beat her again, telling her that he would not only not give her the money for the remaining school fees for this year, but also would not pay for her next year of school (my thoughts: pshaw, he didn’t even pay for this year’s school fees). When people asked why he was beating her/why she was sobbing uncontrollably, he proceeded to tell people that she was a wicked girl who did not want to go to school, and that he was beating her so that she should have the desire to go to school. Precious again expressed to me her ardent desire to go to school, particularly as all of her friends whose families weren’t able to pay their school fees are now pregnant. To make matters worse, the awful uncle is my landlord, David. Precious’s spirit was completely broken, and she could scarce tell me the story without her voice cracking/breaking down crying every other sentence. I was livid. How on earth does David get off thinking that it is in any way, shape, or form okay to completely break the spirit of a 16 year-old girl, just because she wants to go to school??! After making Precious dinner so that she could eat, I formed a plan of action with her. I asked her what were the absolute things that she needed for her school fees, books, etc (a total of 10,000 CFA, $20), and told her that I would pay for it under the condition that she must sweep the outside of my compound once per week (a 30-minute task, at most) and help my cleaning lady, Rita, every Tuesday morning from 6-6:45 before she went to school – all for two months. I also wrote the school staff a note saying that I would be coming the following day to pay the school fees, and under no circumstances should she be driven from school. It was incredible how much her demeanor changed – she offered me a tentative smile, and seemed, for the first time since I found her sobbing, actually hopeful. The next day, I went to the school and paid the remaining balance for Precious’s school fees, test books, and work books. From there, I negotiated a meeting with Felix Tanyi to chat about what to do, both of us deciding that the next course of action would be to mediate a discussion between Precious and her mother. At first, Precious was not at all open to the idea, but after chatting with her, she understood that things as they were could not continue. I orchestrated the time, and had the negotiation/intervention in my house. Felix mediated the discussion, which was ideal due to his status in the community, and his ability to converse in Ejagham. The meeting brought a the much-needed resolution to the issue: Precious would be getting fed and acknowledged at home, her mom would support her school efforts, and Felix gave her his business card with his personal line, so that she would have recourse if anything like this should happen in the future. At this time, nothing would be done to deal with the uncle, lest he take it out on Precious. After seeing how relieved Precious looked, I was happy. And after all was said and done, Precious chatted with me on my veranda saying how grateful she was that I intervened, and how good of a person I was – unnecessary praise for the actions that I knew to be right, especially if the end result is the restoration of spirit/happiness for this girl.

          The next few days passed uneventfully, and before I knew it, I was heading to IST with Layne, Julia, and Pauline. It was an absolutely incredible feeling to see everyone again (and very overwhelming, but in a good way). We celebrated the first night together with a delicious meal with our counterparts, followed by watching a traditional Northwest masked dance routine – a fabulous end to a somewhat trying week!

Adversity and Success: Youth Day, Race of Hope, and Chop My Money

This week started off on both a great/bummer note, as I was excited to celebrate Youth Day with all my children (they had been practicing their songs and traditional dances on my veranda for the past week), but in the midst of doing my Community Needs Assessment report and presentation in preparation for IST, the start button of my laptop stopped working (additionally, my shift key stopped working – appreciate the shift key, people – you have no idea how unnerving it is to write an entire report using caps lock for all capitalized words in a 20-page report, haha). The Youth Day festivities started off with the Cameroonian national anthem and a procession in of the various community dignitaries, followed by the marches of all the various schools in Kembong. The nursery school children were beyond cute as they stumbled over one another in their efforts to simultaneously march in the correct steps, and sing their appointed songs. My companion for watching the day’s activities (traditional dances, games, singing, and other exposition events) was a small child who sat ensconced on my lap and insisted on calling me ‘Aunty Bess,’ which was most charming as she has a small lisp and an under bite. After eating with the dignitaries, I moseyed back to my house where my laptop magically started working, and Pauline and I had a heart-to-heart. Despite her rough, bulldozer exterior, Pauline is actually pretty sensitive; apparently her good friend/maid of honor cancelled on her three days before the wedding, and had waited til a week after the event to see how it went, but didn’t have phone credit, so she told Pauline to call her back/waste her own credit so they could talk – needless to say, Pauline was understandably hurt. It was good to chat with her, especially as I saw a different, softer side of her.

          Several days later, Julia and I were on our way to collaborate on the Peace Corps-sponsored activities for the Race of Hope. The Race of Hope is a yearly event where people literally race up and down Mount Cameroon, the second tallest mountain in Africa, for a total distance of 24 miles. The day prior to the race, we stayed with Layne and other PCVs in Kumba, the biggest city in the SW region, with the biggest market in all of Cameroon. After living in a village setting for the last three months, the big city was a bit overwhelming, but very enjoyable. We visited the NGO that Layne’s been working with, called Needs for Children, run by an ambitious woman from Holland who truly cares about disadvantaged kids in Cameroon. We also experienced one of her more heartbreaking cases: a 10 year-old girl who had previously broken her neck and was now blind, now had terrible bedsores and a severely distended belly that was quite probably due to a form of cancer; she had had a surgery, and had waited an astounding 3 weeks for the biopsy results to be returned (the doctors ended up losing the sample, and the child ended up dying…) It was a sad reminder that while we, as international aid workers, can, and should do all in our power to help the people with whom, and communities in which we work, but at the end of the day, bad things will happen despite our best efforts, and you have to be satisfied that you did all you could. On a happier note, we got to hang out with different international volunteers and went out for delicious chicken from a restaurant where the owner honed his culinary skills in Louisiana. After Kumba, we all traveled to Buea to help out with the race and other preparation activities for the PCV-organized HIV/AIDS pre-counseling, testing, post-counseling activities. When we got there, the hotel had given away our pre-reserved room (we even had a receipt), and after much fighting and coaxing, the manager finally got us a room – complete with lime green mold snaking halfway up a wall, and a smaller than normal bed, with no running water, and sporadic electricity at best.

          After the hotel fiasco, we moseyed over to the nearby school, where the other PCVs were helping to set up the all the different stations for the next day: registration, pre-counseling, testing, and finally post-counseling. We also set up the tables and tents at the race site for the male and female condom distribution/demonstrations. The next day, we arrived at the school to assist with last-minute preparations. We quickly realized that the distance from the race site to the school was a clear detriment to having people actually come and get tested, so after walking through the streets and race grounds to try and garner interest in the free testing and counseling, we decided to move everything to the actual race site where everyone was gathered. I lost count after doing 25 pre-counseling sessions, and quickly realized that I was going to lose my voice if I continued doing pre-counseling. From there, I assisted people doing registration until I got drafted to go throughout the crowd and gather people to be tested. I decided to focus on the big groups of people that were representing different cultural entities, and came in contact with a familiar person, one of my carpenters from Kembong who installed my cabinets. At first, we didn’t really recognize one another, and as such, he was really rather hostile toward me, asking acidly ‘and why on earth would we want to get free HIV/AIDS??’ clearly missing the part where I had said over and over again that it was testing and counseling. I politely clarified, and then after asking ‘don’t I know you?’ and figuring out the connection, his demeanor totally changed, becoming super friendly and amenable not only to being tested himself, but to bring along his male friend, and encourage all the other females to do so as well. When he showed up with his friend, I personally did the pre-counseling and walked them through the other steps of the process. After they went through all the steps, this man specifically sought me out to thank me so much for encouraging him to get tested, and thanking the other PCVs for our activities here. I was truly humbled by the fact that he went from being skeptical and suspicious to thanking me profusely, and being appreciative of our efforts. Although the day was overall a huge success (we tested over 900 individuals for HIV/AIDS, and registered over 1,000), it was not without its tragic moments. One for me came when I had started to do a bit of post-counseling, aka, telling people whether their results were either positive or negative for HIV. I thought that with my public health and anthropology background that I could handle telling people their status (it’s worth mentioning here that we never used the word ‘positive,’ but rather told the people that their sample showed that their body was showing antibodies consistent with HIV, but then referred them to a local hospital for a second, conclusive test). It’s one thing to say that you can tell people their status, and another entirely with having to tell someone that they may be positive for HIV – I could’ve been the bringer of life-shattering news, and I couldn’t handle it for those that were positive. Therefore, I only post-counseling people whose samples were negative. The most heart-wrenching case was when a mother had herself and her four year-old son tested. Working as a runner who matched up test results with the registration numbers that people had, I was inadvertently able to see the test results as I delegated people to different post-counselors, the majority of whom were trained nurses working at hospitals in Buea. The woman’s test results were positive, but her child’s were not – both a hallelujah moment for the child, but crushing for the woman. I was happy that the child was beyond the age for breastfeeding (breastmilk transmits HIV), but incredibly sad for the mother. I can only hope/pray that we caught her in the early stages of the disease, or better yet, that it was merely a false positive. We stayed at the race grounds till 5:30, and discovered that Layne and Julia both had things stolen from a purse (the purse had been set down for a period of time, and people rifled through it, stealing money and a camera). The most frustrating part for Julia and Layne was that the crime was most likely committed by people that were there being tested, given where the bag was positioned; they were upset that the very people that we were trying to help would then turn around and do this. It was great to hang out and do work with other PCVs, and despite the different bumps in the road for the visit to Kumba and Buea, I was really happy with the whole experience.

           I headed back to Kembong the next day, and enjoyed a pretty uneventful next few days as I prepared for IST. I also forgot to mention that the previous week, I went with Teckla, Pauline, and the commandant of the gendarmes to the local ‘nightclub’ where we enjoyed roast fish, several beers and lots of dancing. I was also introduced to the very Cameroonian concept of ‘mirror dancing.’ Having gone to clubs in the U.S. with mirrors, I know the basic idea, but Cameroonians literally stand in front of the mirrors (in Chop My Money’s case, a pillar with small mirrors on all sides) and watching themselves dance. Personally, it makes me uncomfortable, I mean, why would I want to willingly watch myself make a fool of myself dancing? Although I don’t plan on going back anytime soon with any other community members, it was a great night. Despite a lot of interesting/challenging stuff happened this week, being involved with the Race of Hope and having shining moments of success reminded me that I have so much to be thankful for, and that despite living the majority of the time outside my comfort zone, I’m happy with where I’m at, and things could always be worse.

“Aunty, I Know What A Condom Is…You Wear It Around Your Waist, Like A Belt”

Firstly, apologies for the lack of posting – the start button on my laptop stopped working, thereby rendering both blog writing/posting and photo uploading impossible for the time being. The past month has easily been the busiest of my time spent in Cameroon, with lots of amazing experiences. In thinking about my last posts, I realized that they were relatively introspective, which could easily be interpreted as melancholy, which wasn’t meant to be the case. After getting over med hold for my two cases of malaria in a month-ish, I’m feeling significantly more comfortable with my place in Kembong, my role as a PCV, and just life in general, and have had some incredible experiences over the past month. Also, as a side note, when I’m in Kembong, or in the Anglophone regions in general, I speak Pidgin and a form of “special English,” meaning that if my expressions/writing in these posts seems strange/slightly off, it’s because English fails me at times, so as they say here, ‘ashia’ (sorry).

          The title of this blog post is from an experience awhile ago, and was said by one of the kids who comes to visit me on a daily basis, Junior. I think I may have mentioned that after giving the initial HIV/AIDS talks at GHS that the chief of the health center and I decided that, in order to promote family planning/combat teen pregnancy, that I would dispense condoms from my house, at the request of males and females, in an attempt to eliminate the discomfort/stigma that teens may feel in going to the health center to acquire condoms, even though they’re free. One day, several teenage boys came to my house in the late afternoon saying that they had heard that I had condoms, and asking if they could have some. After getting some, I discretely gave the boys the condoms, which happened to be in front of several young kids – wouldn’t necessarily have been my first choice of situations in which to promote sexual health/family planning, but I realized that these children will eventually be adults, and if I make it not a big deal to access condoms, maybe I can help alleviate the stigma. Anyway, the children, curious as they are, immediately asked me, “Aunty, what are those?!” to which I responded that they were condoms, and that I would explain what they are/their usage at a later date (aka, when it actually comes time for these kids to need condoms). I did, however, tell the kids that they were used when having sex, and that they helped prevent pregnancy, transmission of STIs and HIV/AIDS. The kids immediately started speculating the uses of condoms, and after several failed attempts to determine the exact usage, Junior spoke up in an authoritative tone and haughtily responded to his peers saying “No, no, Aunty, I know what a condom is…(dramatic pause) you wear it around your waist, like a belt!” Feeling very satisfied with himself, and with me making several snorts in an attempt to cover my highly amused state, I responded “not quite” and then promptly changed the subject.

          After convincing the PCMO nurse that I did not need to go to Yaoundé for further tests, instead feeling much better and wanting to return to my house/the familiar, I returned to Kembong for Pauline’s wedding. The ceremonies started on Thursday with the traditional wedding. After going bright and early to Pauline’s house, which resembled a beehive with all the flurry of activity and people running around, I went back to my house to wait for the actual wedding to start. Three hours after the proposed start time, and in the hottest part of the day, we all gathered at Pauline’s mother’s family’s house for the first half of the festivities. After one man served palm wine in a huge communal glass from a huge container to all gathered guests, the groom’s family left to convene with the bride’s family to pay the agreed-upon bride price. Pauline’s bride price was roughly 260,000 CFA for one side of her family, meaning that the total paid to both mother’s and father’s families was well over 500,000 CFA when it was all said and done. It’s also the groom’s responsibility to buy the additional alcohol consumed at these proceedings. After all had drank of the palm wine, people proceeded to engage in mock guessing to determine why we were all gathered at the proceedings; it’s more the ritual of the proceedings rather than an actual guessing. From there, Pauline processed in with several other women, and members of Rafael’s family had to fake guess who the bride was. After that, there was much celebrating, and the same procedure was replicated at Pauline’s father’s family’s compound, except with food and lots more palm wine and alcohol. After paying the other bride price, there was another ceremony (all in Ejagham, so I have absolutely no idea what was said) where Pauline and Rafael sat in front of their family and, from what I can guess from the proceedings, were traditionally married. Overall, it was a cool experience, and people seemed to enjoy that I was there, as they took every opportunity to tell me about what was happening.

          The wedding saga continued the next day with the court wedding by the Mayor/judge of Mamfe. My morning started out bright and early at the ‘saloon’ (the hair salon) where Stella, one of the nicest women in town, braided my hair in a cinnamon bun style (braids encircling my head, close to the scalp, in a circular pattern) with black mesh, and then taking curly weave and sewing it into my hair. Needless to say, the end result was not drastically different than if they had used my real hair, pulled it back with a bandeau/headband and curled it. However, with the bandeau and mesh look, I truly resembled a Cabbage Patch doll…much to my dismay. Being the type of person with the mentality of ‘if the bride wants me to do/wear something, I’ll do it, within reason of course, since it’s her special day and not mine.’ With that in mind, and my attitude to just go with this wedding flow, I decided to embrace what would no doubt be the first of many outlandish wedding looks. From there, the honored guests and close family members all caravanned to Mamfe, me sandwiched in between Pauline and Rafael in the back of a car, as they bickered about having their documents and I tried to wipe the magenta lipstick that Pauline favors from the areas all around her mouth (she enjoys putting on lipstick without a mirror, much to the detriment of the skin around her lips, since she often has lipstick in a 1-inch radius on the skin surrounding her lips…). Once at the council/court, we all filed into a room and waited for the judge. Once he arrived, he wasted no time in grilling Pauline and Rafael about their reasons for wanting to get married, their personal lives, what they liked about one another, etc. Needless to say, it was very interesting to witness, especially since it seemed like an interrogation of sorts. For instance, I learned that Rafael was previously engaged to be married to the mother of his two sons, but after having left to prepare his home in Kembong for a year or so, and returning to the town where his fiancé lived, discovered that she was pregnant with another man’s child. After the judge was satisfied with their answers, the marriage proceeded much like a court ceremony in the U.S. From the court ceremony, we stopped to pick up several things for the ‘coup de gras’ church wedding ceremony the next day. After taking a much-deserved rest, I went back to Pauline’s house to see what else she needed to do for the ceremony, and hope that we were going to, at some point before the wedding, rehearse what I, as chief bridesmaid was supposed to do. Since the electricity went out, Pauline’s daughter, Teckla, and I found ourselves decorating the hall for the wedding reception in the pitch black with only our measly cellphone flashlights for guide. The other bridesmaids, who I had quickly come to regard as lazy piles, after their unwillingness to lift a finger to help prepare anything for the wedding, let alone assist Pauline, decided that they would shirk wedding duties in order to get their hair done…blargh. But despite no electricity and apathetic bridesmaids, we got the hall decorated and prepared for the next day’s festivities.

          The day of the wedding dawned bright and hot, and at 7 am, I went to see how I could help Pauline on her big day. We spent the large part of the morning at Stella’s saloon where she busily pasted on the other bridesmaid’s fake eyelashes with acrylic nail glue (eek, and I’ve never been more thankful for mascara and my long eyelashes) and applied Pepto Bismal-colored hair oil to each of our hair weaves. Other members of my cluster arrived in time for the advertised start time of the wedding, and staked out spots in the Catholic church (Pauline’s Presbyterian, but Rafael’s Catholic, so they had a Catholic ceremony – as a side note, I feel like inter-faith marriages are made into much bigger of a deal than they are in Cameroon – it was interesting seeing the differences in priorities with marriages between the U.S. and here). In my bridesmaid attire, I felt like ‘80’s prom queen meets Africa, meets Michael Jackson (just a recap, my outfit was a one-shouldered, three quarter-length sleeved dress with electric blue lace over traditional African material, complete with an electric blue satin flower positioned directly over my left boob – the outfit was tied together with a single lacy, sparkly white glove on my right hand – never have I wanted to bust out my “Thriller” dance moves more…) While at Stella’s place, a bossy woman showed up (one of Pauline’s friends) and tried to completely change the way that the wedding was structure – how everyone processes in, the order of the wedding events, etc. I could tell Pauline was getting anxious with this, and after trying to more quietly subvert her efforts to change everything less than an hour before the ceremony, I decided to politely, but firmly tell her that we had everything well in hand and to not worry. Stella and the other Kembong women also stood up with me, which helped to ease Pauline’s stress, but therefore served to make myself an enemy of this pig-headed, know-it-all woman. Welp, as I’ve learned here time and again, can’t win ‘em all. After we were all ready, we proceeded to drive up and down the roads of Kembong, incessantly honking the horn of the car in which all five bridesmaids were squeezed, in order to tell the villagers that yes, in fact, there is a wedding going on – as if they could forget. Three hours after the intended start time, everyone was attired and waiting outside the church to process in. The other bridesmaids then decided to tell me that we would be singing a song, IN FRONT OF THE ENTIRE DAMN CONGREGATION, and they wondered if I knew it. Since I’m obviously a mind-reader and incredibly familiar with little details of Cameroonian culture, like songs, why wouldn’t I know this song?! Not. After making it clear that my embarrassment/willingness to make a fool of myself had its limits, I told them that I would dance with them in front of the entire congregation, and smile while they sang the song. Thankfully, the song didn’t end up happening – yay! Additionally, one of the groomsmen didn’t show up, so the bridesmaids decided that since I was already putting the phrase ‘one of these things is not like the others’ into real-life practice simply by my different looks, I should dance alone down the aisle in front of the rest of the bridesmaids…oh joy of joys. But in reality, their plan actually backfired when everyone started clapping and cheering more loudly as I shook and shimmied my way down the aisle…in a church. The wedding itself took a full four hours, and by the time it was done, I decided that I was long overdue for a beer (conveniently, there was a bar not 50 feet from the door of the church), and very ready to be done with the whole wedding business. Two beers later, my clustermates and I headed over to the reception, just in time for the gift reception: the bride and groom stand up at the front of the hall and people, as called by the MC, process (rather, dance) up and give the gifts. From there, we got food from the buffet line and, of course, another beer to prepare us for the imminent dancing. The reception was by far my favorite part of the whole proceedings – not in the least of which due to the fact that the weddings were over. But it was genuinely a great time. We danced nearly every song, got super sweaty, and laughed with the absurdity of our dance moves and the fun that we were having. It was at the wedding reception that I felt an overwhelming sense of rightness, the feeling that ‘yeah, this is where I’m meant to be in this moment in time’ – that’s an amazing feeling. All in all, although the wedding was a fantastic, frustrating, stressful, and satisfying experience, it was something I wouldn’t have traded doing/being a part of for the world.

          To continue with the marriage themes, this week has been my record for marriage proposals, having received three in one day alone…oof. Apart from the marriage proposals, the rest of the week passed relatively uneventfully, as I participated in my third vaccination campaign for polio and visited Julia in Afab. During the vaccination campaign, I practically had to fight with an idiotic, ignorant man who, after at least five minutes of explaining why his baby needed to be vaccinated and how this vaccination was different than those normally received as a child, decided that he was going to ignore everything I just said, and insisted that he knew more than me about vaccinations. With steam practically coming out of my ears in frustration, I calmly explained, yet again, the need to vaccinate his child, and after which, he decided we could vaccinate his child. Needless to say, the whole experience reaffirmed the need for health education in Kembong. On the plus side of health activities, I had a great time visiting Julia’s post, where we helped at the health center, assisting in wound care and paperwork while bonding with her staff friends. I also gathered water for the second time since living in Cameroon (I am so, so happy that the water supply in Kembong is practically endless and always flowing). It was a cool experience, particularly I got a chance to bond with Julia’s children friends in the village. In sum, it was definitely a fun, event-filled week.