Summertime adventure weekends break up rainy weeks playing cards and baking banana bread

The beautiful NW region of Cameroon, where we gathered for a birthday/going away party for fellow volunteers. This is Cynthia, who just got transferred to Peace Corps Cameroon after the Mali program got shut down. The same day I met her, she happened to mention an American woman living in this area who just  finished her doctorate on breastfeeding practices, including by HIV positive women. This is a hugely fascinating (for me) and complex, tricky cultural topic that I am SUPER interested in right now, as I am finding a massive lack of knowledge and proper counseling
 in this area at my hospital. We dropped by her house, she happened to be there, and over iced tea I got to hear all about her work, plus got her materials and final papers, and her contact. Cool!



Loading up cakes and side dishes for the bumpy motorcycle ride across town to the roast site



The pig roast set up...thank goodness for volunteers who know what they are doing. They killed, cleaned and slow-cooked the pig for 14 hours...yum.

Last month I escaped to Limbe (the beach) for 48 hours for another goodbye party, which was amazing. These are the times I LOVE how undeveloped Cameroon is - we had a whole gorgeous tropical black sand beach to ourselves, simply because there are so few tourists here (despite its beauty, we don't scratch our heads as to why), and even wealthy Cameroonians hardly have the culture of enjoying the ocean. We boogy-boarded in amazing waves under the
pouring rain, grilled steak shishkabobs, made a bonfire, slept in shoddy tents...really great group of some of my favorite volunteers, so it was the perfect pick-me-up.

Clowning around in the surf...feeling r e l a x e d, we all needed this a lot

Swing dance lessons with our cameroonian friend, who had never been to the beach

Rice and corn chop (beans and de-skinned boiled corn kernels, SO good!) food joint in the beach town of Limbe

I've just finished a marathon hosting run - total of 8 volunteers over two weeks (and expecting three more tomorrow), consisting most significantly of the married couple who will be moving to Nkongsamba in August - they are from Portland OR. I had one for one week and the other the next (volunteers do a site visit part way through training)- we opened their bank accounts (a painfully slow, inefficient process), met everyone, and made some awesome food including bomb cheeseburgers for July 4th, and delicious tofupeanut/ginger sauce over rice...with the fresh tofu I bought off a woman I trained - that was my secret motive all along, score : )

Mexican night! I miss a lot of specialty foods (sushi!) and specific products (Tostitos!), but don't think I'm not eating well!

There's my oven (three metal tomato paste cans sit on the bottom to raise up the cake pan), and the banana bread that I have been making for lots of Cameroonian friends and colleagues - big hit!! Made with Cameroonian honey and their super sweet bananas (I live in full-on banana country), it's a winner.

I've been teaching summer English classes to a motivated group of high schoolers - here they are reading a dialogue about a job interview.

We don't have any books or a real curriculum, so I am making up my own lesson plans and materials, and I wrote my own exam...I am hardly qualified, and feel pretty wobbly as an ESL teacher, but they really want it so I give it a shot.

One of my scholarship girls - it's been great to have quality time with each of them this summer, I think they've enjoyed it too - cards and popcorn, juice and music...days are chilly and rainy right now, so good ways to pass the time together.
 Sh was talking to me a lot about the father of her twin girls, with whom she has quite a complicated relationship. He is quite controlling of her and rather disrespectful - not trusting of her, not very supportive of her desire to go back to school...its hard to hear about and give advice around, but at least I can listen. He gives her a good amount of financial support, and therefore there is a power-dynamic that gives him the upper hand. He refused to meet me when I showed
interest, which I think is telling.

Another one of my girls, Viviane, got a summer internship at the local
radio station, which just opened in our town, and has actually wiped out our radio's ability to pick up other channels, a quirk I hope they will remedy - I miss BBC!

More health camp sessions with local kids - separating activities into risky and not risky for transmitting HIV. I have to remind people that thinking you can get HIV by being near someone who has it is like a woman being scared to be around men because she thinks she will get pregnant that way...they realize that's silly.

Teaching health and fun songs (head, shoulders, knees and toes!) to summer-school students at a church-run primary school. They are going to be big and strong!

This is how we wash our hands!

Here is my friend Brittney and I coming back from the welcome dinner at the (new) country director's house last Monday. I printed (with a carved wooden block and melted candle wax) and dyed that fabric (during the training shown in an earlier post), and just got the dress back from the tailor.

We had our "close of service" conference this week, where we went over loads of logistics for the last phase of service and the process of getting out of here and (gulp) moving on. We've become so well-integrated into Cameroonian culture that several bribe attempts were made when actual finish dates were being assigned - this last round, someone actually auctioned off their earlier date for $100. The week was complete with an awesome nostalgic and silly slideshow, the glee of eating two-year expired Oreos that the US Embassy "allowed" us to buy from their store (our government is now exploiting our desperation!), and a rambunctuous night watching the US women's soccer team take Olympic gold. Great to see the crew I came in with, and appreciate how much tougher, more confident and ragged-looking we've
all become!