5/11/06
I was going to start this another way.
On the way back to Mvangan, the car stopped, and we all got out – not to walk up a hill, change a tire, or wait for a forgotten car part, but because the house planks stored under our feet had to be (removed) for their owner.I sat in the grass with my New Yorker. A man came over. "Oh, la blanche!"I sighed. Ignored him.
"Il paraît que vous êtes très appréciée ici. Tout le monde vous connaît ! Ils disent, quand on passe, " Voilà notre ntangen ! C'est la blanche de Mvangan, qui travaille pour nous ! " " Vous avez déjà mis longtemps ici ? "
" Un an. "
" Oui, c'est qulequechose ! Je suis de Mengbwa, je travaille au poste agricole là-bas… "
Etc.
( " It seems that you're very appreciated here. Everyone knows you ! They say, as we pass, " Here's our ntangen ! (white) It's the white woman of Mvangan, who works for us ! " Have you been here long yet ? "
" One year. "
" Yes, that's something ! I'm from Mengbwa, I work at the agricultural post there.. ")
I was not expecting this.Not a blanche anymore, but their blanche. The rest of the ride was just a little bit easier.
Coming home…there's power!The road is familiar. My feet go automatically- as obviated by my treks in the pitch-black night.This is home. People to bring things to. People expecting me.
The other morning, when I went chez Alice ("mon amie!" She calls out, everytime she sees me.) for my beignets and bouillie of the early am, a man came up, with whiskey sachet in hand (mmm…Kitoko and beignets…) "Oh, Ntangen!"I ignored him. AGGRAVATED that here, in my safe space – my place – I could be violated like that. A teacher, sitting with his daughter, launched into an angry discourse in Bulu. The man apologized to me. This has never happened.
*****
…not going anywhere for awhile ?
(wish I had a Snickers)
At a meeting in Zoebefam. Here for water meetings, which were supposed to start half an hour ago, but the PTA meeting is going over. Bulu. I'm bored. Two water meetings today because we start construction at the end of the month (! Many thanks to all who contributed).
Zoe's hopping these days. Several boutiques, a restaurant, people selling clothes – this, my friends, signifies 2 things. The start of the school year. And cocoa . Cocoa = big money, a leftover equation from colonial days and mandated initiatives. A PCV friend thinks you can make more consistent money with less work on a plantain plantation (and basically, he's right). But creativity is neither prized nor fostered here. Cocoa = CFA. It sticks. All the work – money, months and years of hard labor – that goes into cocoa leaves Cameroon. The pickups trolling through Mvangan (all the South) these months? The first and second choice beans go to European buyers. The leftovers – dregs, if you will – is bought by Chococam. This is why a country that produces both has neither good coffee or chocolate. Cocoa goes for about 500,550 a kilo these days. (Roughly $1). And it takes a lot of beans to make chocolate.
Anyway. Cocoa season, time when the not-quite-cloying-and-surprisingly-pleasant scent of cocoa fermenting in the sun permeates the air. When people have money. And when the bars…well.
Update on Mvangan – still no power. Three months now.
***
**update** power came back to about 10% of the village. Basically the hospital and scattered houses. BUT all hospital personnel are "allowed" (by the Doc) to hook up to the hospital, so I have power. And the peasants rejoice.
Thanksgiving!
Idyllic. Freezing, on top of a dormant volcano, looking out onto lush, green, rolling hills, watching the sun rise over the trees, cows and sheep grazing, scattered houses…is this Africa? Is it not Vermont or Switzerland? …Then it's Muslim prayer time and the Fulani herdsman are singing. This is all that brings me back to Africa. Hiked up Friday, spent the night, back down Saturday to a gorgeous villa and time to…start cooking. 30ish PCVs plus some PCV counterparts and other Cameroonian invitees for dinner, but during the day, just ..relaxing, running in/out of the kitchen, around the beautiful gardens, waterfall, etcetera…
We had turkey. The best turkey I've ever had – can't get much more free range/organic than a turkey raised in Cameroon. Killed by PCVs, plucked, stuffed, and cooked in a giant marmite (like a Dutch oven). We'd been planning this for at least 6 months, so every time someone had visitors from the states/went to the states, they brought back stuff for us. So the menu was: cheese and bread and apples, appetizer
-raw vegetables
- salads (provided by villa staff)
-tabouli
-TURKEY
- gravy
-stuffing
- mashed potatoes
-ginger-garlic green beans
-cranberry sauce
-fried okra and fried potatoes
-fruit salad
-pumpkin pie
- pecan pie
- carrot cake
-oreos (from the states :)
I don't know who will appreciate who amazing it is to have these things – and have had the ingredients for them – in Cameroon. Anyway. Another Thanksgiving in Africa. And it was a good one.
Current projects, with brief updates:
Zoebefam
Project starting today (as in, November 28). Bought supplies yesterday, the truck's being loaded up and driven down. Many, many thanks to all contributors. More to come when the project is completed, with pictures
Soja
Meaning, soy. Fields planted in about 6 villages in and around Mvangan, with a demonstration field at the hospital. It's growing well. Soon, we'll harvest, and the Delegue d'Agriculture (henceforth DAADR, or Essome) and I will do animations on the benefits of soy and how to prepare it and incorporate into local dishes. Baby step one in my malnutrition campaign. What's step two? I have no idea. Yet.
Nutrition
Well, see above. That and the other week when I was alone at the hospital (our HIPC personnel – or all of the hospital/district staff- were in Ebolowa clamoring for their pay. All other provinces got paid in September, and they got paid for a year. The South JUST got paid…after much fighting…and they got paid for 6 months. Have I expounded on corruption yet and on how World Bank/IMF/Global Fund initiatives DON'T WORK on the ground? Another time.) I had fun drawing nutrition posters. This is work, too….in the life of a PCV, anyway.
Club santé
High school health club. I'm their "conseillère" (advisor). We're planning activities for Dec. 1, World AIDS Day. Their ideas, mostly. Last week they launched a contest for the best AIDS day related drawing/slogan. I was pretty excited about that. We're planning a party for Friday, after a round table discussion..this is the suite to my own "Semaine du SIDA" (AIDS week) that happened in mid-October.
Bibliotheque
Library! The building is finally under construction. As in they've knocked out all the walls in an old house to make one big room. Next is building bookshelves…This is the Mairie (town hall + mayor) 's contribution. I received books from an NGO in Paris, Les Enfants de Madame Ici. Library opening should be in the next few months.
Follow-up Semaine du SIDA
The AIDS week was a success. We taught about 400 students all week on HIV/AIDS basics, transmission, testing, counseling, prevention, living positively…and some had the opportunity to have a testimonial from an HIV-positive woman. 190 students got tested, from 6 th to 12th grade. Follow up has been the creation of the health club and work on Dec 1 activities. We'll see. This is a much longer story…for later.
…And that's all she wrote, folks. For this time. Happy almost-December.
14 January 2007
21 November 2006
District BAD
28 Sept 2006
The only way to describe my life, I think, is in particular anecdotes.Take yesterday.
(at this writing, have not slept in about 40 some-odd hours. take note)
Got up around 6:30 with the neighbors chopping wood (ususally it's at 6, so this was a bonus). Had a leisurely breakfast with the cat for company. Got dressed in my 'brousse' clothes (there are a lot of clothes relegated to that status, now) and set off to "work" with my hoe in hand. (Not the machete, this jeudi propre). For the next 2 hours, along with tall the hospital personnel - nurses, lab techs, the doctor, etc - I helped to clear the field we're using as a soy demonstration plot. As the lowest skilled membre of the team (when it comes to farm work), I got to clear brush for most of the time, though I did end up tilling with my trusty hoe. After two hours, thoroughly covered in dirt (which actually shows on me), I went home to shower and really get ready for "work." Work consisted of a few hours of action planning with the doctor, on STIs/AIDS, Malaria, Tuberculosis, Water and Hygiene....etc. As he said to me about a week ago, "Mvangan has been declared a district BAD!" "But what did we DO?"
BAD = Banque Africaine du Developpement, and they're funding us, apparently, specifically to do formations/in-services on topics related to family planning.
So all week we've been working on very detailed action plans on every possible topic in the district. Most with objectives of "by December 2007..." funny, cause, that's when I leave. Sortof like i'm writing out my own legacy, or my plans for one. And if we even do half of what we've set out to do, it will be pretty wonderful.
So, the power's been out in Mvangan for the past month. The action plan needs to be typed for BAD. We wrote everything by hand, with the plan to take our computer to the Catholic Mission hospital, Bimengue, 7 km away - they have a generator and it's on every night.
Sunday. We did this. And forgot to take our power strip which adapts to all plugs. Well apparently (we hadn't realized) we have an American plug monitor. And Bimengue, funded by Italians, has Italian plugs.
So, no dice.
Every subsequent night it was raining too hard to drive over there - and - the road is quite a walk from the hospital, with a computer...
Doc knew I was leaving Friday morning and we had to finish. So he proposed we go over THursday around 4 pm, ask them to turn the generator on early (it's usally at 6 pm), and work until we finished. We did go then, and luckily, because it was the only time all day that it wasn't raining. (In case it's not yet clear, it's rainy season now).
At the hospital, we found Desiree, one of the volunteer nurses at the District Hospital - in labor with her 5th child. She'd been in labor since early that morning, and it wasn't progressing very fast. Her husband is a nurse at Bimengue. As the Doc examined her, I entertained their 3-year-old daughter, Brenda...until he power returned and I tried to distract her with the very Western game of "draw me a picture." No dice.
At any rate, power comes on at 6:30, Doc and I set up the computer and begin to work on our 35 page (now) plan, while he periodically checks on Desi. The action plan, in very complicated tables I've only learned how to format here, details reproductive health, maternal and infant health, maternity at lower risk, vaccination programs, STIs/AIDS, family planning, primary care, malaria, tuberculosis, nutrition, water and hygiene, and pharmacy management. If we actually do half of this, this year....anyway.
We worked until 10, me enertaining Brenda/writing, the Doc checking on Desi/writing and brainstorming with me (we'd already written a draft of the plan, longhand), the other nurses running around...and labor not progressing. The child, by estimates, looked to be over 10 lbs.
Around 10 pm, the head nurse of Bimengue brought dinner for he "night crew" assembled. I didn't know it at the time, but we got special provisions of extra generator time due to the impending delivery (it usually goes off at 9).
So, 11 pm, Doc decides it's time to do an emergency C-section. The nurses are assembled and scrub in. And I...leaving my typing duties to my medical curiosity...follow, put on scrubs, and stand, fascinated, as the procedure is readied. Desi's husband also scrubbed in...able to work? On hand, anyway.
I'd been warned before...real-life, movies...that this was a fast procedure.
And yes, it was fast.
But the baby had already descended pretty far down in the birth canal, so it was work to bring him back up. Fast. Handed over to two other nurses, ready for reanimation.
One minute. Two minutes. Shaking him, suctioning his nostrils, doing mouth-to-mouth, shaking him upside down...
In the third minute, he cried.
And I started breathing again.
As the long, complicated closing procedure began, I followed the nurses with the infant. They weighed him, washed him, clothed him, and then, completely unsterile, I walked the floor with him in my arms. I tried to introduce him to his big sister, but she wasn't impressed.
The operation was finished at 1:15 am, with the action plan duly (almost) finished. Doc and I demounted the compuer, packed it in the car, and drove back to Mvangan. 1:45. We woke up the pharmacist to write a command for HIV tests for me to take to Ebolowa the next day, in preparation of AIDS week (Oct 16-21). 2 am, I'm home, finished packing. 2:30, the car arrives, and I leave for Ebolowa. ...to then go to Yaounde, arrive after running errands all morning in Ebolowa, and get straight to work preparing for the arrival of 30 new trainees.
The next evening, back at the airport. 365 days later, waiting for a new group.
African time.
As this is almost a month old, now, more to come soon.
The only way to describe my life, I think, is in particular anecdotes.Take yesterday.
(at this writing, have not slept in about 40 some-odd hours. take note)
Got up around 6:30 with the neighbors chopping wood (ususally it's at 6, so this was a bonus). Had a leisurely breakfast with the cat for company. Got dressed in my 'brousse' clothes (there are a lot of clothes relegated to that status, now) and set off to "work" with my hoe in hand. (Not the machete, this jeudi propre). For the next 2 hours, along with tall the hospital personnel - nurses, lab techs, the doctor, etc - I helped to clear the field we're using as a soy demonstration plot. As the lowest skilled membre of the team (when it comes to farm work), I got to clear brush for most of the time, though I did end up tilling with my trusty hoe. After two hours, thoroughly covered in dirt (which actually shows on me), I went home to shower and really get ready for "work." Work consisted of a few hours of action planning with the doctor, on STIs/AIDS, Malaria, Tuberculosis, Water and Hygiene....etc. As he said to me about a week ago, "Mvangan has been declared a district BAD!" "But what did we DO?"
BAD = Banque Africaine du Developpement, and they're funding us, apparently, specifically to do formations/in-services on topics related to family planning.
So all week we've been working on very detailed action plans on every possible topic in the district. Most with objectives of "by December 2007..." funny, cause, that's when I leave. Sortof like i'm writing out my own legacy, or my plans for one. And if we even do half of what we've set out to do, it will be pretty wonderful.
So, the power's been out in Mvangan for the past month. The action plan needs to be typed for BAD. We wrote everything by hand, with the plan to take our computer to the Catholic Mission hospital, Bimengue, 7 km away - they have a generator and it's on every night.
Sunday. We did this. And forgot to take our power strip which adapts to all plugs. Well apparently (we hadn't realized) we have an American plug monitor. And Bimengue, funded by Italians, has Italian plugs.
So, no dice.
Every subsequent night it was raining too hard to drive over there - and - the road is quite a walk from the hospital, with a computer...
Doc knew I was leaving Friday morning and we had to finish. So he proposed we go over THursday around 4 pm, ask them to turn the generator on early (it's usally at 6 pm), and work until we finished. We did go then, and luckily, because it was the only time all day that it wasn't raining. (In case it's not yet clear, it's rainy season now).
At the hospital, we found Desiree, one of the volunteer nurses at the District Hospital - in labor with her 5th child. She'd been in labor since early that morning, and it wasn't progressing very fast. Her husband is a nurse at Bimengue. As the Doc examined her, I entertained their 3-year-old daughter, Brenda...until he power returned and I tried to distract her with the very Western game of "draw me a picture." No dice.
At any rate, power comes on at 6:30, Doc and I set up the computer and begin to work on our 35 page (now) plan, while he periodically checks on Desi. The action plan, in very complicated tables I've only learned how to format here, details reproductive health, maternal and infant health, maternity at lower risk, vaccination programs, STIs/AIDS, family planning, primary care, malaria, tuberculosis, nutrition, water and hygiene, and pharmacy management. If we actually do half of this, this year....anyway.
We worked until 10, me enertaining Brenda/writing, the Doc checking on Desi/writing and brainstorming with me (we'd already written a draft of the plan, longhand), the other nurses running around...and labor not progressing. The child, by estimates, looked to be over 10 lbs.
Around 10 pm, the head nurse of Bimengue brought dinner for he "night crew" assembled. I didn't know it at the time, but we got special provisions of extra generator time due to the impending delivery (it usually goes off at 9).
So, 11 pm, Doc decides it's time to do an emergency C-section. The nurses are assembled and scrub in. And I...leaving my typing duties to my medical curiosity...follow, put on scrubs, and stand, fascinated, as the procedure is readied. Desi's husband also scrubbed in...able to work? On hand, anyway.
I'd been warned before...real-life, movies...that this was a fast procedure.
And yes, it was fast.
But the baby had already descended pretty far down in the birth canal, so it was work to bring him back up. Fast. Handed over to two other nurses, ready for reanimation.
One minute. Two minutes. Shaking him, suctioning his nostrils, doing mouth-to-mouth, shaking him upside down...
In the third minute, he cried.
And I started breathing again.
As the long, complicated closing procedure began, I followed the nurses with the infant. They weighed him, washed him, clothed him, and then, completely unsterile, I walked the floor with him in my arms. I tried to introduce him to his big sister, but she wasn't impressed.
The operation was finished at 1:15 am, with the action plan duly (almost) finished. Doc and I demounted the compuer, packed it in the car, and drove back to Mvangan. 1:45. We woke up the pharmacist to write a command for HIV tests for me to take to Ebolowa the next day, in preparation of AIDS week (Oct 16-21). 2 am, I'm home, finished packing. 2:30, the car arrives, and I leave for Ebolowa. ...to then go to Yaounde, arrive after running errands all morning in Ebolowa, and get straight to work preparing for the arrival of 30 new trainees.
The next evening, back at the airport. 365 days later, waiting for a new group.
African time.
As this is almost a month old, now, more to come soon.
21 August 2006
Not going anywhere for awhile?
le 27 juillet
(grab a Snickers). American marketing is truly amazing. As are American pens (just went to my writing utensils bag to discover it...almost empty? Is this a quasi-veiled plug "please send me pens"? Yes).
I cannot count the number ot times that slogan has flashed across my eyes. Waiting for a bus, waiting on the side of the road for a bus to be fixed, waiting for a meeting to start...waiting. My IPOD has enlivened such times, as have the less-modern books and magazines, but I've gotten amazingly good at staring into space, thinking of nothing, and making the hours *fly* by.
And I've gained an appreciation for Snickers, rare as they are. Nothing like a cold Snickers and a cold COca Light from Deli in Ebolowa...oh, this letter will NOT be solely a product placement. But I do miss products.
Today...I grabbed a banana. This was during a water source/soy bean growing (longer story) meeting in Zoebefam. The meeting had erupted into a 30 minute long high-pitched brawl in Bulu, over the creation of subcommittees within the main committee. (which I mostly understood! victory!)
I wrote the silent scream in red pen on my banana peeel. (For those unfamiliar with my away messages of years past, the silent scream is a -silent- expression of utter frustration during which I channel Munch's painting of same title). I wish you could frame banana peels.
This is when I started yelling at the villagers. "The ONLY IMPORTANT THING is getting potable water for the entire village; the rest is just DETAILS!" Everyone agreed with me, but. Cameroon's culture (damn colonizers? maybe) is thoroughly entrenched in bureaucracy. You can't have a club, a meeting without officers and *titles* for everone else. People like titles. They collect them, like....like away messages on banana peels (I wish). And often, the title is just as empty as the banana's torn skin. In Mvangan, one person (I've been particularly angry with him lately) has been president of the local AIDS committee, community relay for malaria, community impregnator of mosquito nets, and now president of the COSA (health committee, made of community members, runs the hospital). What has he done? Absolutely nothing. NO need to rant now on how I *don't* understand the culture/mentality of continually appointing/electing people to positions when they have shown no evidence of work yet lots of stealing money. (Will PC shut me down for this? Hmm. Dev, please post a disclaimer "does not represent the views of the US Peace Corps." thanks ;) Oh, "not" being a government employee.
The meeting ended amicably with me responding to requests I stay for palm wine with "ma wo'en!" (I'm tired). Left the house at 1:30 pm, left Zoe at...6. The letter Paul had sent informing people of the meeting had only reached some, so we spent 2 hours visiting every house in the village, while he also gave me a deeper look at village social politics. (Have I mentioned he's my erstwhile counterpart- for this and other - and is the head of the lab at the District Hospital of Mvangan? Ok). (It's his village).
Still haven't written in the post book- dammit. Maybe I'll print these for the PCV in Mvangan 07-09. Oy.
Today was also jeudi propre (see previous), so by 7:30 I was at the hospital with my (dirty) hoe. An hour and a half. And only 3 of us working.
Today is also July 27, which marks one year since I got my letter of placement from Peace Corps. One year since I started thinking about Cameroon, talking about it, wearing it on T-shirts...and now, and now, it's truly home.
A word on "motivation." In French, it's an exact cognate with the English word. In fact, the word is Franch. In Cameroon...it means money. Apparently staff didn't receive "motivation" the last jeudi propre, from the Doc's own pocket, as he's done other times (we're talking 300 F CFA here - 60 cents - to buy beignets). So, most people were en grève today. ANd I'm currently baking banan bread because there have already been complaints that my formation on nutrition/malnutrition (in-service - tomorrow, was going to be today) included no "motivation" or "pause café" (coffee and pastries...which I'll admit was a highlight of those early days of PC in Yaoundé. STILL).
Apple Foster's Clark is amazing, ps. The more "cosmopolitan" PCVs had tried this long ago, but I just found it in Mvangan. (product placement! I can't hide the country of my rearing)
The formation wasn't today because Laure, one of my favorite district nurses, from Nselang, showed up with a case of PFA - paralysie Flaxe aigue, or, in short, suspected polio. In national (and WHO) policy, one case equals an epidemic, in terms of response. (At the time of this writing...well I thought I'd know but I don't know yet. So). I'm not revealing anything the govts of Cameroon, France, Congo, and WHO don't already know - stool samples were rushed to the Centre Pasteur in Yaounde Friday for confirmation, then to Brazzaville, then Paris. The Doc hurriedly explained all this to me this morning as he waited for the child (23 months) to arrive. Everyone was busy, and my medical curiosity got me - I wanted to see the exam (and I did). Nigeria doesn't vaccinate for polio, at least in some states, and thus endangers all of West and Central Africa. It's *almost* eradicated here. But there have been cases, often of transmission by way of Nigeria. ANd this - well. I've seen a lot of adult/teenage polio victims, but since they started every child campaigns...
Nutrition. Reading through myriad textbooks, I realize I've SEEN pellagra (vit B3/niacin deficiency), rickets (vit D/calcium deficiency), vit A deficiency, kwashiorkor...this in the rainforest where food grows to fulfill every need and children should not be suffering diseases cause by insufficient sunlight (rickets). There is a meeting of all the traditional chiefs of the arrondissementon Saturday. The Chef (mine, of Mvangan village) has asked me to attend, to take pictures (*3 things I'm not - English teacher, computer teacher, photographer, oh wait...) I'm hoping to use the opportunity to talk about health - all the services at the hospital and especially those that are free.
...finally, I'm doing something that feels like *something*...maybe.
The cat is boycotting dinner. There's something to be said for turning into your mother (eep, father, in this instance). Yelling at a feline "I don't CARE if you'd rather have Friskies, tonight is sardines! That's what's for dinner and you're going to eat it!" Well, she can go hunt, unlike myself at a young age.
NO snakes or other reptiles of note, indoors. Though in the last bush taxi I took, there was apparently a live viper among someone's luggage...the chargeurs put a swift, machete end to that, mid-voyage.
...and for this installment, that's all she wrote.
(grab a Snickers). American marketing is truly amazing. As are American pens (just went to my writing utensils bag to discover it...almost empty? Is this a quasi-veiled plug "please send me pens"? Yes).
I cannot count the number ot times that slogan has flashed across my eyes. Waiting for a bus, waiting on the side of the road for a bus to be fixed, waiting for a meeting to start...waiting. My IPOD has enlivened such times, as have the less-modern books and magazines, but I've gotten amazingly good at staring into space, thinking of nothing, and making the hours *fly* by.
And I've gained an appreciation for Snickers, rare as they are. Nothing like a cold Snickers and a cold COca Light from Deli in Ebolowa...oh, this letter will NOT be solely a product placement. But I do miss products.
Today...I grabbed a banana. This was during a water source/soy bean growing (longer story) meeting in Zoebefam. The meeting had erupted into a 30 minute long high-pitched brawl in Bulu, over the creation of subcommittees within the main committee. (which I mostly understood! victory!)
I wrote the silent scream in red pen on my banana peeel. (For those unfamiliar with my away messages of years past, the silent scream is a -silent- expression of utter frustration during which I channel Munch's painting of same title). I wish you could frame banana peels.
This is when I started yelling at the villagers. "The ONLY IMPORTANT THING is getting potable water for the entire village; the rest is just DETAILS!" Everyone agreed with me, but. Cameroon's culture (damn colonizers? maybe) is thoroughly entrenched in bureaucracy. You can't have a club, a meeting without officers and *titles* for everone else. People like titles. They collect them, like....like away messages on banana peels (I wish). And often, the title is just as empty as the banana's torn skin. In Mvangan, one person (I've been particularly angry with him lately) has been president of the local AIDS committee, community relay for malaria, community impregnator of mosquito nets, and now president of the COSA (health committee, made of community members, runs the hospital). What has he done? Absolutely nothing. NO need to rant now on how I *don't* understand the culture/mentality of continually appointing/electing people to positions when they have shown no evidence of work yet lots of stealing money. (Will PC shut me down for this? Hmm. Dev, please post a disclaimer "does not represent the views of the US Peace Corps." thanks ;) Oh, "not" being a government employee.
The meeting ended amicably with me responding to requests I stay for palm wine with "ma wo'en!" (I'm tired). Left the house at 1:30 pm, left Zoe at...6. The letter Paul had sent informing people of the meeting had only reached some, so we spent 2 hours visiting every house in the village, while he also gave me a deeper look at village social politics. (Have I mentioned he's my erstwhile counterpart- for this and other - and is the head of the lab at the District Hospital of Mvangan? Ok). (It's his village).
Still haven't written in the post book- dammit. Maybe I'll print these for the PCV in Mvangan 07-09. Oy.
Today was also jeudi propre (see previous), so by 7:30 I was at the hospital with my (dirty) hoe. An hour and a half. And only 3 of us working.
Today is also July 27, which marks one year since I got my letter of placement from Peace Corps. One year since I started thinking about Cameroon, talking about it, wearing it on T-shirts...and now, and now, it's truly home.
A word on "motivation." In French, it's an exact cognate with the English word. In fact, the word is Franch. In Cameroon...it means money. Apparently staff didn't receive "motivation" the last jeudi propre, from the Doc's own pocket, as he's done other times (we're talking 300 F CFA here - 60 cents - to buy beignets). So, most people were en grève today. ANd I'm currently baking banan bread because there have already been complaints that my formation on nutrition/malnutrition (in-service - tomorrow, was going to be today) included no "motivation" or "pause café" (coffee and pastries...which I'll admit was a highlight of those early days of PC in Yaoundé. STILL).
Apple Foster's Clark is amazing, ps. The more "cosmopolitan" PCVs had tried this long ago, but I just found it in Mvangan. (product placement! I can't hide the country of my rearing)
The formation wasn't today because Laure, one of my favorite district nurses, from Nselang, showed up with a case of PFA - paralysie Flaxe aigue, or, in short, suspected polio. In national (and WHO) policy, one case equals an epidemic, in terms of response. (At the time of this writing...well I thought I'd know but I don't know yet. So). I'm not revealing anything the govts of Cameroon, France, Congo, and WHO don't already know - stool samples were rushed to the Centre Pasteur in Yaounde Friday for confirmation, then to Brazzaville, then Paris. The Doc hurriedly explained all this to me this morning as he waited for the child (23 months) to arrive. Everyone was busy, and my medical curiosity got me - I wanted to see the exam (and I did). Nigeria doesn't vaccinate for polio, at least in some states, and thus endangers all of West and Central Africa. It's *almost* eradicated here. But there have been cases, often of transmission by way of Nigeria. ANd this - well. I've seen a lot of adult/teenage polio victims, but since they started every child campaigns...
Nutrition. Reading through myriad textbooks, I realize I've SEEN pellagra (vit B3/niacin deficiency), rickets (vit D/calcium deficiency), vit A deficiency, kwashiorkor...this in the rainforest where food grows to fulfill every need and children should not be suffering diseases cause by insufficient sunlight (rickets). There is a meeting of all the traditional chiefs of the arrondissementon Saturday. The Chef (mine, of Mvangan village) has asked me to attend, to take pictures (*3 things I'm not - English teacher, computer teacher, photographer, oh wait...) I'm hoping to use the opportunity to talk about health - all the services at the hospital and especially those that are free.
...finally, I'm doing something that feels like *something*...maybe.
The cat is boycotting dinner. There's something to be said for turning into your mother (eep, father, in this instance). Yelling at a feline "I don't CARE if you'd rather have Friskies, tonight is sardines! That's what's for dinner and you're going to eat it!" Well, she can go hunt, unlike myself at a young age.
NO snakes or other reptiles of note, indoors. Though in the last bush taxi I took, there was apparently a live viper among someone's luggage...the chargeurs put a swift, machete end to that, mid-voyage.
...and for this installment, that's all she wrote.
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