Taking a Taxi in Yaounde

In Yaounde, the capital city of Cameroon, there are 6 places for passengers in a tiny car. 2 in the passenger seat and 4 in the backseat. If you want to take a taxi, you stand on the street. Each time a taxi with an available seat comes by, you shout through the window where you want to go. If they are willing to take you, they honk the horn and you get in. If they are not already going in that direction (because of the other people) then they just keep going. So sometimes it takes 5 or 10 minutes shouting into taxis to find someone going in your direction. The driver, unless there is 6 people in the car besides him, is constantly driving on the side of the road looking for other passengers. You pay usually 200 francs (50 cents).

Kumbo

We went on an excursion to Kumbo for a pig roast. This involved a 14 hour train ride from Ngaoundere to Yaounde. We tried to reserve beds but surprisingly, the person that cleans the office in Ngaoundere did not get the tickets on time, so we were in seats for the ride. The train leaves at 6pm. There were very loud people in our car that were screaming until about midnight and they do not turn off the lights during the ride, so I brought a sleep mask. We got in around 8 am. Then we went to the Peace Corps office to brush our teeth, and immediately got onto another bus. First we waited in our seats on the bush for over 2 hours. It was a seven hour bus ride, but we were happy because there were many corn and pineapple sellers along the way to buy snacks through the bus window. We arrived in Bamenda at dusk and went to meet our friends directly at a bar. We ate some meat then went to a restaurant to eat delicious chicken and jamma jamma. The next day we went to the bus station to catch a car to Kumbo. Luckily there were many of us so we filled the car fast and left. The road was fine until the last part which was unpaved and mountainous and made our heads hit the roof of the van many times. It took about 4 hours. The first day in Kumbo we prepared the food and the second day we had a feast, including ribs, ham, pulled pork, and a bucket (literally) of potato salad. We ate lunch and dinner without moving from our chairs. It was definitely the best meal I've had in Cameroon. I have not had pork in SO long because I live in a muslim community.

So on the last day in Kumbo we went out to breakfast and of course it had rained the night before and the road with slippery and muddy and when I got off a moto I took a huge tumble in the middle of the street. I bruised my knee really badly, scraped the other and my elbow. All my friend Janelle said that was a very graceful fall. I said I was due for a serious injury, the last time was when I fell down the stairs in Union Station so badly people had to hand me my shoes back. My kind friend Claire cleaned the mud out of my wounds and I was good as new.

We took the car back to Bamenda and then we missed the last day bus, so we had to take the night bus to Yaounde because we had a meeting the next day at 8 am. The night bus is supposed to leave at 9 pm. We left at 10:30. The bus arrived at 4:30 am and we took an overpriced taxi to the office/house. I needed a shower very badly, as I had not showered in 5 days. This is the longest I have ever gone without at least rinsing, but it was SO cold in the Northwest so I could not stand a the water temperature. So I was really looking forward to a hot shower at the house. Unfortunately the hot water heater was not on, so I took a cold shower at 5 am and it was not fun. Then I threw some laundry into the machine (!!!!!!) and went back to sleep for an hour.

Views of Nature

Feeling very good the past couple days. I did a young girls camp for girls 10-14 (we had a few 5 year old straglers) for a week with some other volunteers. It went really well. We taught them about communication, decision making, health, careers, saving and income generating activities. Let's not forget another condom demonstration by yours truly. I planned the whole thing start to finish so it was really good to see it come to fruition.

Now I'm heading down to mid service, which is basically a series of medical examinations. We will need to provide at least 3 stool samples, so we were told to bring at least one with us. Nice. So on my way I stopped in another town called Kaele to check it out. First we ate some traditional southern vegetables. Then we went to a nearby lake to see the crocodiles. It was one of the most beautiful places I've ever seen. We only drove about 7 km out of town, but it felt very isolated and remote. It was an old quarry so it was very deep with large ledges. There were mountains right next to the spot so standing up on the precipice with the wind blowing, I felt great. There was only one little grouping of huts at the foot of the mountain. That and the boys bathing in the lake when we first arrived were the only reminders of civilization. We saw the crocs pop their heads out of the water and float on the surface and then go down again. The most we saw at one time was 7.'

Then on the bus ride to Ngaoundere we passed the river in Garoua and saw a big pile of hippos. They were huge and just sitting in the water. One popped its head up as we passed.

After the 10 hour bus ride, we arrived and immediately went to our favorite restaurant Le Concorde, where I had delicious rotisserie chicken.

Today, after 3 hours of negotiations, we found a car to drive us to the waterfall at Tello. It was a little over an hour drive on an unpaved road. Now that it is rainy season, and we are in the Adamawa region, there is so much greenery and the earth is a dark red. Then we had to walk down a very long and steep flight of stairs made out of rocks until we reached the waterfall. The stairs led to a big cave, where the water was falling from the top of the cave, so we were essentially behind the waterfall. There was lots of moss and it was beautiful. Then we took another flight of stairs which led to the other side and took some great pictures. My camera is broken, but my friend has already tagged me in some photos on facebook.

This country really is beautiful and I cannot do it justice in my humble blog. I know that I will always want to continue to travel to new and majestic places like Cameroon.