January 20

January 20, 2009 (From now on it seems like the entries are going to be a collection of thoughts. I try to write a narrative of what we are doing here, but for every story there is a back story or an explanation as to why things are the way they are, and most of the time i dont even know myself. So hopefully you can piece together our life through random thoughts and photos...)

New President today. No changes here in Cameroon: counterpart - whose actual name remains unknown - and supervisor are both still away. Three weeks at post and not even a chance to 'work'. Things are moving slowly to say the least.

Most of the kids are pretty cute, but its difficult to keep them all straight-who belongs to what house and what family. For the most part they are sweet and just want to look at us. There is one boy in Meng who we have decided is our favorite. He is like a miniature old man. Once we saw him with flour all over his hands and he informed us that, of course, he was baking. He talks to us like hes just another adult, telling us to 'listen' and says 'bon' before explaining something that nassaras would not understand even though it is blatantly obvious to all Cameroonians, even this 9 year old boy.

Abdul, our only adult friend, has been very helpful. He takes us to stores and helps us bargain for things. He even brought us to a wedding ceremony (the wedding was for a man-muslim-who was marrying his second wife--he married the first woman the night before! But the most bizarre thing about it was that the song he and his new bride walked in to was Celine Dion, and the song at the end was another Celine Dion song. Oh how they love her here.)

The house is continuing to evolve. We had bedside tables made by a carpenter in town. he did a pretty good job, (we have to prop up one leg on each to make them even) so we commissioned him to make a desk , a living room table and a cover for our water outside- just say no to malaria-all for under $30. Interestingly, two days later we heard that he was arrested for stealing from our favorite bar, the New Texas. Turns out he was just being questioned and our furniture should be ready in a week.

Our [houseboys] have made us a lovely garden. We planted tomatoes, peppers, onions, garlic and lettuce. I imagine Brian and I trying to do it without their help and i'm reminded of Poisonwood Bible. Here's something you wont find in the US: we needed fertilizer for the garden (read: cow poop) Hiver, our expert gardener, found some kids to go collect it for us from the fields about a mile away. they spent 3 hours one afternoon searching for and collecting cow pies (no, no gloves) and carrying them back on their head in a plastic bag. For their work, we were generous and gave them each the equivalent of 50 cents. THEN, a few hours later, another boy heard about how much fun we nassaras are to work for and came around asking if we needed any more shit. What these kids will do for half a buck.

The pets are still around. The cat is huge, I dont know how much longer she can hold on to those babies without exploding. Barbi is proving to be very sweet and relaxed even thought she was originally 'wild'. She only shows here strength when the three legged dog who hangs around our house tries to get too close to her when she is eating. Zuma, while sweet when he wants to be, can be really annoying, expicially at night. Every night the neighborhood dogs form a few gangs and go around barking at each other. As we have learned what Zuma's bark sounds like, we realize that he seems to be the leader of one of these rogue gangs. Every morning when i find him sleeping on our porch, i'm surprised that no one has shot him. Last night I gave him a Benedryl hoping he would sleep trough the night. We only heard him a few tmes and was able to sleep without worring about him being murdered. Next task is to figure out what to do with the owl and the bats. If you've ever had an owl living in your roof, please advise us as to how to make it shut up.

Good news. SNEC (Cameroonian water company) might be coming back to Meng. We have all the plumbing set up for water, but all we can really do is pour water down the drains. I'm trying not to get my hopes up, but perhaps before we leave we'll be able to wash our dishes in the sink, not on the front porch.