November 2009

The month of November has been a strange month. I have had many different activities, and ive been really really busy. It all started when I ran into the germans. There are a bunch of german volunteers here in mamfe. They aren’t very friendly, so I don’t know them well. I was headed to afab on a Saturday, thinking about how I didn’t want to go. I had my backpack and was just waiting for a moto to take me to the motorpark. As I slowly crossed the street, one of the germans called me over and invited me to a party. I accepted to go that night and went back to the house. The party’s main event was a pig roast. They put the pig on a spit, and roasted it over a bonfire. The rest of the party was pretty lame, but it gave me an idea….

Lauren (my postmate) is preparing to go back to the US. Her two years are finished in December, so we wanted to give her a nice send off here in mamfe. She lives in a small village outside mamfe, but she is always doing work and visiting here. I decided that the main event should be a pig roast. It was a lot of work to plan everything.. I know a man that owns a piggerie (pig farm) in afab, so I bought the pig from him. He agreed to kill, clean and gut the pig, and to send it in a vehicle to mamfe. I picked up the pig from the motorpark, and carried it on a moto to my friend george’s house. We marinated it and carried it again on a bike to a cold store (frozen fish store) where my friend agreed to store it for the next day. The party was on a Friday, so Lauren, Felicia and I spent the morning cooking fufu and eru. George was preparing fried rice and eggrolls, and we would serve the pig. I raced off to go to school, where I collected a bagful of cockroaches as an extra credit project (I later released them into the wild). I hate cockroaches. From school, I raced into town to pick up last minute things, and raced to stanson’s house, where we were holding the party. I helped to spear the pig (it was not pretty shoving a metal rod up that pigs you know what), which was gross, and we started to cook it. I helped clear the grass in the yard and start the bonfire. We decided to make punch to drink, because there are no drinks in town. The roads are so bad here, that big trucks can not pass. That means, there is no beer in town, no soda, no flour, no cabbage, etc. we don’t have anything that is heavy, unless it was carried on a boat from Nigeria. Close to dark, Lauren and I decided to bathe and change clothes. Along the way, we also had to carry plastic chairs, and pick up the borrowed dishes. The party was a bit slow moving. There was no light, so we set up candles around the verandah. It was actually nice. I had battery operated speakers, so we had music, and there was lots of food. About 20 –25 people showed up to say goodbye to Lauren. We all went around and gave advice or said something nice about Lauren. It was my turn and halfway through talking I started to cry. It was super embarrassing (people here don’t ever cry, so don’t understand it if we do), so I cut my speech short. If I cried for Lauren, what will happen when I go?? I’ll cry every day. Anyway, her send-off party turned out really nice.

Pretty much every weekend this month, I have been working on my world map project. Lauren helped me to paint a world map on the side of my school. We are just finishing up, and it looks awesome. The students struggle, because there are few textbooks, and no maps. Some students draw them in their notebooks, but its not the same. This is an opportunity for them to learn where they are in the world, and to realize how much is out there that they could learn about it.

The rest of the month has been busy moving back and forth to afab. I have ejagham tutoring 2 or 3 days per week, plus lesson planning and teaching, and after that, im spent. The end of November will have our thanksgiving celebration, and Lauren leaving. For thanksgiving, we are having grilled chicken, mashed potatoes, gravy, garlic green beans, homemade stuffing, and im pretty sure george is bringing spaghetti and meatballs. That’s not quite a normal part of thanksgiving, but, the more the merrier. After dinner, ill head back to kembong with Lauren, to finish her packing, and then 1st of December, she is gone. Its an action packed month, just like December will be. I’m planning a trip to the extreme north, which should be fun.