A Plethora of Experiences

It has been a good month or so in Cameroon with fetes, going away parties, visitors from the U.S., great participation in the Soy Project, and new adventures! I spent Easter morning attending two Lutheran Church services, one at the Norwegian Hospital and the other at a beautiful church next door. It was interesting to see the differences between each service even though they were the same religion. The service at the hospital pictured some benches set up in the shade so that I couldn’t really see the people talking. There was some French and also surprisingly, Fulfulde spoken. The other church is much bigger, bigger than most of the churches back in my hometown in the U.S., with stained glass windows and balcony seats. Both services had many baptisms and confirmations. Guess they figured since they have all these people together, might as well make the service longer. We arrived a little late to each service and left early, meaning that the services were probably each 4 hours long. The churches are mostly connected to what we call the “Norwegian Quartier”, a compound with a large wall all around all the houses and church office. I have met a few of the people that live there and have made some good friends. Many people are missionaries and work/live in different parts of Cameroon. Some are only there to learn French before moving to another country as missionaries. Others are not connected to the church at all like my German friend who is a doctor here. One of my favorite parts about traveling is meeting new people from different places. Gretchen and I had dinner the other night with a couple from Norway, another couple (husband from Cameroon & wife from Switzerland), my German friend, and the couples’ wonderful children. I found out that another friend used his dog as bait to kill a very large baboon that had been leading all the other baboons to kill off herds of animals and certainly making a negative dent in the circle of life. I was furious that he would put his sweet dog in harm, but thank goodness the dog is fine and the baboon has been turned into dog food. Oh the adventures in Cameroon.

Easter egg coloring!

To add to my Easter experience, I asked my neighbor’s children to color some hard boiled eggs and I explained that it was tradition to hide the eggs and they would have to find them. I love how Cameroonians do not question tradition. They might have thought it was weird, but hey, I participated in their traditions so it goes both ways. Plus I think they had fun. It took only 15 minutes to find the eggs and then we watched “Little Mermaid” in French. I explained that there is not just one Easter tradition for Americans. It depends on your religious beliefs just like in Cameroon. Many of the Christians in my village attended church on Easter and the churches I visited were packed with people from all over Ngaoundéré. Each country has its diversity.

After the beekeeping conference, Issa and I built our beehive, added honey wax to attract the bees, and placed it on his property a distance from the village. We need to go back and cut a few tree limbs so it sits better but then we just wait for the bees!

One of my fellow volunteers “COSed” (Close of Service) after living here for over 2 ½ years. She lived in a small village in the Adamawa for her first two years and then extended her service to Ngaoundéré. She became one of my best friends and mentors when I arrived here in Cameroon. We had a going away party for her and I couldn’t help but cry happy tears when I saw how many Peace Corps volunteers and Cameroonians came to support her. She made so many friends here and helped so many people. I only hope I can leave this place someday with such a grand show of love. It shows that Peace Corps volunteers may only be here for a short amount of time and may feel like we hardly make an impact, but in the end we help by just being here and make amazing friends.

Dada and her sister had plastic bags wrapped around their feet and hands one day. I found out that they were dying their fingertips red and bottoms of their feet black. It is a tradition for the Fulbe.

My neighbors gave me cous cous and legume the other night. So nice of them because they hardly ever have enough food for their family. I had to add a lot of salt and pepper to it and then drank my cheap box wine to try to satisfy my taste buds but I finished my plate (still tasted like tasteless mush and grass). I don't know how they eat this every day, but it is the cheapest food they know how to make.

 

The task of washing clothes in Cameroon (two buckets and hope for no rain for a few hours)

 

 

A friend of Gretchen’s was visiting from the U.S. so we did a lot of visiting “the sites”. We had an adventure to see the Shutte de Tello, beautiful waterfalls a couple hours’ drive from Ngaoundéré. It was an extremely bumpy and dusty road where we past the plateau of Adamawa and rolling hills that cradled a couple villages with only a few huts in them. It was interesting to hear about the history of one mountain where a couple tribes had fought for the land. There are many tribes throughout Cameroon including Fulbe, Mboom, Di, Mbaya, and Hausa in the Adamawa. Some villages have multiple tribes. Cameroon is actually a very diverse country with many religions (Muslim, Christian, Presbyterian, Lutheran), both English and French speaking regions (both religion and languages mostly from being colonized and then being visited by Missionaries) but then they have their many native languages and many different tribes that bring traditions that have blended with what colonization brought to Cameroon. It is no wonder that Cameroon has the problems that it does. So many ways of thinking and other countries’ traditions pushed onto Cameroon. Without the freedom to always choose what you do with your life, especially women, society just blends the laws of colonization and old traditions. I am finding that I need to learn more about the history (the history as it is told here) so that I can wrap my mind around how this place works and how I can work with it.

Shutte de Tello waterfalls

 

As for the changes in Beka-Hosséré, five new baby chicks have been born! Now there are two hens, a rooster and five chicks hanging out in my front yard. When days get stressful, all I have to do is watch the chickens and I am reminded of home.

The hen and her chicks in front of the chicken hut

I will end with some exciting news about my work here. After having some difficulty getting enough participants for the Soy Project, we met with the leader of a very large (and active!) cooperative on the other side of Ngaoundéré. They sent 8 members to participant in the project. That makes 13 participants for the soy project! They were caught up on the introductory session on soy and we just had the business/entrepreneurial session. Recently we submitted the grant proposal to fund the project.

I’m not sure if I have really explained how the soy project works but I had to write up a summary recently, so here it is:

“The Ngaoundéré Soy Project was started January 2014 by PCV, Daniel Giddings. After doing a needs assessment, it was found that the area around Ngaoundéré had poor soil fertility because of the large amount of corn produced (corn depletes nitrogen in soil). Also poor diet diversification is a problem in the Ngaoundéré area. It was concluded that increasing soy production (soy is nitrogen producing) and transformation (making soy milk, tofu) would help with these problems. During the first year of the project there were 12 women farmers that learned how to produce and transform soy. The project was then passed on to PCVs, Renée St. Jacques and Rachel Jennet in November 2014. The project involves the government organizations, IRAD (a Cameroonian agricultural research agency), MINMEESA (Ministry of Small and Medium Enterprises), and the Ministry of Agriculture. They help by leading the training sessions and giving in-kind contributions, including the meeting space and the demonstration plot. In January, farmers apply to be in the project, once selected they pay a participation fee which helps cover the cost of the training. The farmers meet each month to learn about soy production and soy transformation. There is a demonstration plot used to teach how to grow soy and make compost. The farmers are given soy seeds to plant at their farms and agents from the Ministry of Agriculture visit the farms to observe the plots and help with problems. By November, the farmers will have learned about soy production and transformation by attending sessions, practicing at the demonstration plot, and cultivating their own soy at their farms. After they finish the program, they give soy seeds from their farm to the seed bank for next year’s group. One of the great outcomes from this project is that the 12 women from the first year enjoyed growing soy so much and made such wonderful friendships by working together, that they started a women’s soy cooperative and are receiving guidance from MINMEESA on how to plan their activities and learn more about soy production.”

Making soy milk, tofu, and bouille

We just had the Soy Transformation session today where the participants learned how to make soy milk, tofu, and bouille (tastes like porridge). Rachel and I had the help of a couple Cameroonian women to teach the session. We found that everybody here has a slightly different way of making tofu and bouille. Also it is important that Cameroonians like the soy products. If it were up to me, I would put not a lot of sugar in the soy milk and not fry the tofu, but I am not the one that will be buying soy products from these participants. Soy is still not a usual food in people’s diets here so we need to make it as sweet and maybe a bit spicy as possible. I was surprised to see the male participants get involved and “get their hands dirty”, but less surprised that there were still some of the men that refused to help make anything and instead sat back and watched. And of course the women served the tofu to the men first. Yet even with the culture showing itself throughout the day, the session was very successful. It took us all day to make the three soy products but I think the participants walked away happy with new knowledge and that is all that matters.

The Soy Project participants after the soy transformation session

 I leave this weekend for a visit to my hometown in the U.S. to be in two weddings and visit family/friends. I am so excited to be going home but also very nervous about seeing home so early in my service. As much as I like Cameroon and the friends I have made here, home is always on my mind. But I still have a lot of work to do. We start preparing the soy demonstration plot and visiting participants’ fields when I get back. And then my friends and I are off to climb Mount Kilimanjaro. Is this really my life?