this first picture is of a crazy tree inside my consession right next to the front gate and the 3 car port. it turns into an insane bird sanctuary around 2 or 3 in the afternoon - there's an unbelievable variety of birds that come around. then at dusk the very large bats come swooping out. second picture is my house, looking at it with that tree to my right. its from just inside the gate of the large barrier around the house.

crazy, huh? it's been a pain in the butt, but really, its a lovely place...


now to vent about the craziness that has hit my fan....


Why things are so difficult, I don’t know, but I think it has something to do with…

Lack of a solid education system
Level of corruption at every level of everything here
Communication barriers (not just between me and some here, but Cameroonians between themselves even-either cultural, tribal, experience/education levels…etc.)
Sometimes completely unreliable cell phone service
All communication based on cell phones to begin with
Unreliable transport systems
Shit roads

What else can I bitch about…

I do still love being here, it’s just that for some damn reason every thing that should be simple to take care of becomes a complete and utter debacle. I’m finally getting things together at my house, but jesus… I’ve been here since the 23rd January (in Maroua) and it has been nothing but a struggle to get things going at my house and now I’m stuck in my house waiting for a ‘technician’ to fix the air conditioning unit he supposedly fixed the day before yesterday. I am sitting here with a long list of things I need to take care of around town in front of me trying not to be mad. The AC unit worked for a total of 8 hours after he ‘fixed’ it and then after all of the Freon leaked out of a hole that he failed to weld closed, he’s back, welding away on my front patio and had the gall to ask me to pay to refill the gas. I spent more than $182 replacing the compressor and refilling the gas Monday and he asked me to refill the gas that leaked out because of his negligence. Fuck. I laid into him and though he didn’t fully understand the points I was giving him about why it is absolutely ridiculous that he asked me to do that, he accepted to go out and look for a way to fix it… sucks to think that I have to just assume that someone is going to rip me off or do a shitty job until they prove me wrong. Fuck.

Don’t mess with me today. I’m throwing around ‘je suis un vrai Bamileke’ left and right.
Didn’t think I would have to pull that card up here, but extreme frustration calls for heavy words.

Okay, now that I got that out of my system, all is well… I had a lovely day yesterday and will again tomorrow. Just need to get through today.

Breathe…..