Skyline in Cameroon

Bonjour tout le monde,
I hope that you all are having a great start to spring. I heard that it's at least warming up a little bit in the Cincy area. I, on the otherhand, am too warm here in Yaounde... words I didn't think I'd be saying coming from an Ohio winter. But it is at least 85-90+ degrees most days and everyday I get a little more sunburned which is gradually transforming my skin from red to tan. I definitely woulnd't trade to be back in Ohio, but I have gained a nice appreciation for the four seasons we have in the midwest.

This week has been filled with lots of random things, including many organization visits around the city. In the past five days we've visited the U.S. Embassy and learned about the foreign service, the Peace Corps, an environmental-development organization, a few microfinance organizations, and we started this week by attending the much anticipated International Women's Day parade which is a huge deal here. Everyone buys the same fabric in different colors and then gets dresses and outfits made for the parade. It was fun for me too because my host mom decided to celebrate and not go to work so I got to spend some more time with her, eating popcorn and watching Spanish soap operas until the electricity went out because of a huge storm. When that happened we lit the candle I gave my family as a homestay gift and listened to Cameroonian music on speakerphone from her cell phone. On Friday I got a phone call from my Cameroonian rugby friends and they told me they had a game on Saturday so I invited a bunch of my SIT friends and made an event out of it. None of my friends had ever been to a game so I attempted to explain the rules while trying to understand how these guys were playing on the hard dirt ground. It was a really fun afternoon and I even got a jersey out of it, holla. Then on Sunday my older host brother took me to 2 soccer games at the big stadium and I spent about 4 hours watching those games and eating random Cameroonian snacks. All in all a wonderful and relaxing weekend.

I also have had some fun culinary experiences. I made a Cincinnati chili feast for my friends on Thursday from the Skyline packets I brought from home. I wanted to try it out on my friends before making it for my host families just in case it failed miserably. So 5 of my friends enjoyed Skyline 4-ways which surprisingly turned out really well, despite the fact I was cooking in a kitchen in Cameroon. Wish me luck because I'm planning on making the same meal for my fam tomorrow night. I almost died last night eating fish with the tiniest and sharpest bones I've ever encountered but I'm still kickin it...I have decided though that if I am going to die in Cameroon it's going to be from choking on a fish bone. And then finally I came home on Saturday to two live chickens in our yard which turned into a wonderful chicken stew for dinner last night. My Maman was cracking up at the fact that I asked if she killed the chickens herself, which she did. Cameroonians are intense.

And finally, to end this long post, I have been waking up this past week to the sound of bells which I think are coming from one of the nearby churches. However the bells sound exactlyyyy like the bell from camp and therefore I've been waking up really confused at where I am and whether or not I need to go jump in the lake. The bells, added on to the fact that I've been having some dreams in French and crazy nightmares, make for some tres discombobulated mornings. And for Tracy, who loves my Wheat Freet updates, I found out the Wheat Freet is actually my parents' grandson! Cameroonian families are all over the place and I'm still working out all the relationships, but I thought that it was pretty funny to only find that out now, 7 weeks into my experience here.

Okay that's all for now, off to the World Bank.
All my best from over here,
Blanch-ney ... my new favorite name from my neighbor Linda, a mix between white girl and Courtney.