Not Afraid to Dance

There are only 13 minutes until dinner is served, and the wifi takes about 3 minutes to load anything (but there’s wifi!!), so I’ll ask you in advance to please forgive the shortness and mistakes of this post.

I left for Cameroon on Sept 12 and arrived at 1am on Sept 13. Granted, there is a big time change, but man was that trip long. Luckily, I had 54 new friends to share it with. Yes, there are 55 of us beginning our journey of Peace Corps-ing, in Youth Development (like me) or Health or Agroforestry/Environment. We’re a diverse group, representing different states, races, educational backgrounds, religions, and ideals. Kind of like America, which I suppose is the point. 

Drummers and a dancer

Other than doing our Orientation here in the capital of Yaoundé (which, similar to college or summer camp orientation, involves many ice breakers, late nights, and paperworks), we’ve had several adventures. The powers that be worry about us getting hurt/mugged by being generally stupid, so they don’t really let us leave the hotel without accompaniment.

Luckily, they have accompanied us to leave! We’ve attended a Cameroonian drum/dance performance in which participation was encouraged (see title for questions about whether or not I got up and did some body-shakin’). Several of us went to a Catholic mass, where the chorus involved marimbas and drums and dancing in robes decorated with white Marys. And we attended dinner at our Country Director’s house, along with the U.S. Ambassador to Cameroon and several Cameroonian journalists, ministry workers, and NGO employees.

It’s certainly been an adventure so far! And I assure you, this place is not what you’d expect from the ‘poor African children’ commercials.

View from hotel porch.