Tuesday, October 30, 2012

Sickness Strikes


Well, poop. From constipation to diarrhea in less than a day, I have not been having the best weekend.

It started last week with a sore throat and a bad mood, so I went to see the doctor (which involved calling him and then showing up at his office a little later, no forms or anything, although I did have to wait for him to show up). I got medicine for my throat, but the next day at school I was feeling feverish and fatigued and came home in tears. A doctor friend of my papa came to make a house call and diagnosed me with, guess what, malaria, and additional infection. Lots of drugs, dozing, and pages of plots twists in A Dance with Dragons later, I end up with diarrhea as well (I’m guessing as a side effect from one of the treatments). Took something for that as well, and I think it’s safe to say that my body is not at all pleased with all the foreign elements.

Malaria, you say, oh no, don’t die! Well, it certainly wasn’t fun (are fevers and headaches ever?), but it’s a normal part of life here, kind of like the flu back home. Everyone in my family has gotten the paludisme at least a couple times. As long as you catch it early enough (and everyone knows the symptoms) you take medicine and it goes away. And I’m much better already, I think the malaria is gone and it’s just the other stuff that remains. I am rather irritated because I’ve been very careful about following the directions with my anti-malarial medication, Doxycycline. I know none of them are 100% effective, but another student on the program taking the same meds also got malaria, so I am rather suspicious. Oh well, too late to change now.

I must say that being sick makes me miss my own family quite a bit. There’s nothing like your mom bringing you soup or toast or tea, just the way you like it. As it was, the smell of poisson fumé just about made me vomit, and I am now seriously tired of plain rice. But, on the up and up.

I think I have more to tell you but I’m tired, so I’ll stop for now. Enjoy Halloween for me! (It doesn’t exist here) Mmmm, squash and pumpkins and apples…

Thursday, October 18, 2012

On Religion

I had an experience today that reminded me of why I am here. I was having lunch with some guys that Chelsey and I had been talking to that morning (on campus), and we came to the subject of God, and religion. I said that it was possible that God didn't exist, and what followed was an extensive debate about science, religion, and (bien sûr - of course) the meaning of life.

I think I've mentioned before that most of the people here are Catholic. Before coming, I never thought that that would be one of the main differences in the community, but that is why one must travel. My host family is very Catholic, and most of the taxis have bumper stickers about God or Jesus. I also go to a Catholic university, which magnifies the issue. I went to mass a few times with my mama and it was very confusing. Mass in English is foreign enough to me, I don't know the words or when to stand or sit... In French, well, you can imagine, I was rather lost. I explained my difficulty to my papa afterwards and he thought it was hilarious.

You see (if you didn't know already) that I am not very religious myself. I don't necessarily NOT believe in God (sorry for the double negative, but it's different than believing in God. Although I rather think I do believe in God), but I don't believe in organized religion for myself at this point in my life. And I fully recognize the possibility that God might not exist.

My conversation today was an attempt to express that. However, the students I was talking with are Catholic with very strong convictions. It was pretty interesting - at the start of the argument they said "Okay, you know that mankind started with one man and one woman," to which I quickly declined, and began to explain evolution. I love this - at university in the US most of my friends have similar views to me, not necessarily religiously, but I rarely have to convince someone of evolution. I don't think I really accomplished that today either, because our conversation evolved (ha) into me listening to them trying to explain why God must exist, including all the tiny scientific probabilities that happened along the way if evolution is real (it was also easier for me to listen to them in French than explain myself in depth). I won't bore you with the other details, other than we ended up agreeing to disagree. One of my friend's conviction did not allow him to recognize the possibility that God does not exist, and I realized that I believe very strongly that God may or may not exist. I wonder if this will change as I keep learning in such a Catholic environment?

All in all I was very happy, because this is why I'm abroad - to share ideas and completely different understandings of the world. Similar discussions are great anywhere, but will not have the same impact or distinction of opinion. Despite many difficulties of being here - adventures with cockroaches, falling in the mud (yesterday morning), how stressed out I get sometimes - and the things I miss about home - butter, cheese, tea all day, running water for showers, and of course my friends and family - I am very, very glad to be here.

Tuesday, October 16, 2012

Lions

Hello again!
I apologize for neglecting you a bit. More than a week seems like a long time in blog-years, but not too much has happened since the last post. I haven't had any more classes at the university, although I do have my two classes with the program, and I've been going to the university during the day anyway to say hi to everyone and do homework. I generally prefer having a routine, but I'm trying to get used to not knowing what's going on half the time, what people are talking about, what I'm eating... I think it does rather stress me out though. 

I have also discovered that I rather prefer finding dead cockroaches in my room in the morning (although I don't know how they got there and died) to having adventures with live ones. However, I am perfecting my technique of showering with a bucket, and becoming much more at ease with cold showers if the water is working. 

On Sunday, Cameroon was playing Cape Verde in football (soccer) to quality for the Africa cup. We all decided we wanted to go, so Olivier took us. Here is a picture of the ridiculously full stadium:

The energy at the beginning was contagiously exuberant. Many people were really excited to see us (seeing me in my jersey: "Even the white girl supports the Lions!") and celebrate. Super fun. Cape Verde, unfortunately, got the first goal. We fairly quickly put in one for ourselves, and most of the game was 1-1. We left a little early for security purposes (which was good because it started pouring a few minutes later anyway), and found out later that Cameroon won 2-1, but everyone was upset because there wasn't enough points to qualify to continue. The air was much more tense upon leaving. Instead of smiles, there were glares and sullen looks. The mirrors on the car had been stolen too. Despite the sad ending, all in all I had a great time.

I think I'll keep this post short and hopefully post again later this week. I have a few things I've been thinking about - religion, corruption, taxis - that I'd like to talk about more in depth when I have some time to think. Also, in case you were wondering, I voted successfully by email last week.

Monday, October 8, 2012

Classes Commence!

So, I’m essentially done for the semester with my first class.
Classes started last Monday, which I was very glad about (about time!). However, the system of classes here is very different. The professor of my first class, Droits de l’homme (human rights), has to go teach somewhere else soon, so the entire class was jammed into one week. This means that I had the same class for four hours in a row, Tuesday through Saturday (yes, Saturday). And then we’ll have a paper to write due in November, but other than that, done. I also don’t know what other classes I’ll be taking yet – the programme (schedule) comes out each week, and changes depending upon the availability of the professor. At UCAC there are three “Options,” which are akin to majors, and everyone in the same option takes the same classes, and has for the previous years as well. So as foreigners it's even more confusing, because we don’t have the same base knowledge as everyone else. It would be better to choose a few first-year classes as well as third-year, but we can’t really do that since the schedule changes each week and there might be future conflicts. I've picked out a couple classes with the Option Sciences Juridiques et Politiques that look interesting to me, so there shouldn't be conflicts in the future. We only take half of our classes at the university, and then have two classes with the Middlebury program: one on African and Cameroonian history, and the other on Cameroonian literature, films, and language.

All the students at university are super nice, I feel like I’ve been making friends with a number of the girls. Everyone here always says “Bonjour” in the morning, even upon entering a taxi with strangers, which makes for a nice atmosphere. I’m working on speaking in class (makes me nervous because I know my French is not perfect). So far, so good! Although I am rather tired these days, probably something to do with how I get up at 5:45am every day to get to class (it theoretically only takes like 30 minutes, but if I leave after 6:30am there is lots and lots of traffic). Ugh.

Here is a picture of campus:
Université Catholique d'Afrique Centrale campus Nkol-Bisson
Monitor Lizard
In other news, we visited a village the week before, which was tremendously fun. A group of people started drumming and dancing and we joined in. Also, we ate this lizard-non lizard thing that apparently is the food of kings. It was pretty tasty, kind of a mix between chicken and pork.
For eating








I also ventured out with mon père (father) to visit a friend just outside the city, which was delightful. I had a long philosophical conversation with his friend about marriage and the point of life (reproduction, in his opinion, which kind of makes sense because he is a biologist by profession). I also watched a pig getting slaughtered (although the knife was very dull and it took a while, making my stomach do flip-flops).

This past weekend (it has been a while since posting! Time passes quickly when you get up super early to have class Monday through Saturday), we went to a conference for the anniversary of the death of Mongo Beti, a renowned Cameroonian writer and activist. On the 7th (which happens to be the birthday of my dear sister, happy belated birthday!) we then went to his village for another event. As I learn more about him (we're reading one of his works in the literature course) I will be sure to tell you. For now it will suffice to say that I really love visiting villages and taking some deep breaths outside the city. Cities are exhausting.

I don't think I've mentioned yet that the weather here is perfect every day, although it does rain pretty hard pretty frequently (it's the wet season for the moment). But the temperature is great, and I love not having to worry about carrying layers. I did get sunburnt once because I forgot sunscreen (it was raining in the morning! but became rather hot later), and my skin is more sensitive because of the malaria medication, Doxycycline. Oh well, I'm remembering sunscreen every day now. 

Well, I have homework to get back to. I also have to vote, which for me requires downloading the most recent version of Acrobat, since I opted to vote by email (an option for overseas). Don't forget to vote, everyone! Voting is very, very important. If you don't know anything about the candidates in your area, now is a good time to do research so you can be a well-informed citizen, and go to the polls knowing you will make the right choice.