Roman Coke

Let's just say that I spent tonight having my hair picked out into a pseudo-white girl afro by my host sisters whilst I looked for the good kernels of corn amongst a sea of worms. Village life has been, shall we say, different? I'm writing right now from my new village, Bangante, located about three hours north of the capital, Yaounde. Bangante is unlike any place I've really been. I live at the top of town in what I think is a rather luxurious house by Bangante standards—in fact my bed here is bigger than my bed at home! My host family is absolutely hilarious—all 11ish of them. I have somewhere between 9 and 15 siblings, though that seems to change on a daily basis depending on which kid I ask.



It's weird to think that this will be my home for the next three months. It's the rainy season right now, which essentially means that in addition to the three hours or so that it rains everyday, the village is covered in a thick layer of mud that oozes EVERYWHERE, and there are power outages pretty much all day. Ironically, there was no water in the tap this morning…My five-year-old host brother, perfectly named Boris, told me that tomorrow the rainy season is supposed to stop, but then I asked my mom and she said that it should end some time around November.



We spend the majority of time in class—technical training for Agro-Forestry (AF) and French class. I somehow tested into the highest level of French, so I only have to take it for a couple more weeks and then I get to start a local language! AF classes are absolutely hilarious, namely because they are administered by Dr. Njiti—a man who has a most wonderful similarity to Rafiki from the Lion King (I swear they have the same laugh!). We get our machetes on Monday, so I'm pretty excited for the whacking on Tuesday to begin.



Food has been a rather interesting experience. Yesterday I ate monkey for the first, and last time. Apparently they "harvest" the monkeys by spraying a whole bunch of pesticides in the forest and then checking to see what's leftover about a week later. Needless to say, I was pretty excited to learn that info an hour or so AFTER eating. I'm currently on the, how do you say, diarrhea diet? But it seems that we all are right now—two people have already shat their pants. Fun times, my friends!



Last night at dinner we had guests over because I think that some man wanted to announce his engagement—though it never became clear to me who in fact this man was and if he was actually getting married. It was a lovely affair complete with beer, and the celebratory rum. A man at the table had been drinking beer for a while, and then decided to switch to rum. For some reason (which is still not apparent to me), I decided that this would be a good time to impart some good ole college wisdom: Beer before liquor, never been sicker; liquor before beer, you're in the clear. As I tried to translate this to French, I think I somehow implied that the man was going to fall ill that night. This, of course, caused a huge debacle, and I had to assure him that his stomach would be fine, and it was just a saying. I'm not sure he believed me because he left shortly after finishing his first and only glass of rum. Oops?



Tomorrow is Sunday, which means that we'll be heading to church. I'm pretty excited, and I'm sure I'll have some good stories. Though there's so much to tell, I must retire to my mosquito net—it's only 9:00, but this is equatorial time. This morning there was a loose goose in the house (no really…), and the chasing of the goose coupled with all 50ish children playing circa 6:15 means that I'm uber tired. Until the next time, hope you all are well, and that your gooses are well behaved (unlike mine).