September 14th : End of training : Boredom, Bleeding Leg, Big Meeting

September 14th : End of training : Boredom, Bleeding Leg, Big Meeting

“Can’t stand ya”
If you watch the TV show Seinfeld, you will remember when George Castanza was bullied, and that other kids would call him “Can’t stand ya” instead of Castanza. Well, seeing the same people for two weeks straight, everyday, all the time, I think “can’t stand ya” is appropriate. Maybe I am just speaking for myself, but enough is enough.. Besides the VSO volunteers being fed up with seeing each other, the training is becoming painful. Some training sessions are borderline useless, so waking up for them doesn’t seem worth it. Personally, I am looking forward to getting to work in my village. Anyways, the training is almost over! Pretty soon, VSO will cut the umbilical cord and I will be free!

Injury
How embarrassing…I fell into something called a ”canivaux”, a sewer on the side of the street. About two and half feet deep and one and half foot wide, these sewage corridors pick up excess water from the rain. Cameroonians also find them convenient for throwing away their garbage. I don’t know if I mentioned earlier, but garbage is everywhere here. In the canivaux, in the streets, in the fields, everywhere. You can imagine how dirty this makes everything seem. Anyways, late at night, I accidentally walked right into one of the sewage corridors. Consequently, I slit open my big toe and cut up my left chin. I am sure you already figure that getting injured in another country is a bad idea. Getting an open wound is probably worse. Dipping a bleeding wound into a sewage corridor filled with brown water and garbage? Now you’re asking for trouble. I walked home, my feet wet with sewage and gashes bleeding, wondering what kind of dirty bacteria was currently entering my body.

When I got back to the mission, I got someone to clean it up. Soap and water, polysporin, alcohol, the whole thing. I had to bite into a towel while they poured alcohol on my toe. Better this pain now than an infection later.

Obviously, I survived the small incident with no significant viral infections.

Big Meeting
Today I met the Mayor and the Inspecteur of Roua-Soulédé, which is the region where I will live. The Inspecteur will be my number 1 man for the next 5 months, so it was an important day. He is an imposing man. He stands about 6-4, and is probably over 230 pounds. He commands respect. He speaks his mind at meetings. He looks like he knows what is going on. Overall, I got a good first impression from him.

After I spoke with the Inspecteur and the Mayor alone, we joined a larger group of all the VSO education development advisors (our job titles). They were accompanied by their respectful Mayors and Inspecteurs. This meeting was pretty chaotic, long, and heated. This is what student politics and the fraternity prepared me for! This is my element. While other volunteers felt intimated and confused about what was going on, I feel like it is Sunday night with the Sammies.

After the meeting, the Inspecteur offered to drive us immediately to our villages. We were not prepared for that, so we opted to leave Saturday morning at 6:45am. We went out at night, as we were kind of celebrating my birthday, so I only got to bed at 3:00am (after packing). The next morning was rough, as we headed out to the bus station very early. We experienced “Africa time” that morning, as the 7:00am bus only left at 9:30am.

More updates to come very soon…