A Day in My Life

My Monday – Friday life looks a bit like this…

- I wake up at 5:30 am (yes, 5:30 AM!) to my alarm clock because the
roosters are unreliable (they get really thrown off on overcast days).

- Take my bucket bath with cold water. I can get myself clean on 2
gallons of water! I bathe in my latrine which is located outside and
has one hole in the ground for both the toilet and bath water. It is
walled in and has a roof, but the roof is raised a bit to allow fresh
air to flow through. I use a small cup to scoop up the water in my
bucket and I bathe in the company of many cockroaches that call my
latrine “home.”

- Get dressed after bathing and leave my bucket outside if there’s a
chance of rain to save me a trip to the well or forage (water pump)

- Sanitize my hands and let dry before putting in my contacts

- Apply bug spray

- Hang towel on dental floss clothes line in my room. I can’t hang it
outside because mango flies burrow their eggs into damp clothes. One
must let their clothes dry (rest) for three days and/or iron them
before wearing them to kill the larvae. Out of all things one could
“catch” here, Mango Flies aren’t that bad. But they do burrow into
your skin and that’s just nasty

- Have breakfast which is usually deep fried omelet with a side of
extra palm oil, bread (sometimes with ants, sometimes with chocolate
spread), or buie de maiz (a thick, porridge like drink?

- Pack my bag and head to school/training. If we are in the village, I
leave at 7AM to walk. If we are in the city and it is nice, I leave at
6:15AM to ride my bike. If we are in the city and its raining, I leave
at 6:30AM to catch the PC shuttle that leaves from the Chef’s house in
the neighboring village.

- On my walk or bike to school, I walk/bike on rust colored, clay like
roads lined with dense vegetation. Cameroonians are usually out
starting their morning activities which means I am saying “bonjour”
about every 3 seconds. Greetings are really important here. Also
walking with me are the many free-range chickens (real free range) and
the kids you are starting their two hour trek to school. I also pass
the occasional pig or goat or exotic bird. On a side note, there are
plenty of cats and dogs here, but people do not walk their dogs. Some
do, however, walk their goats!

- An example school/training day looks like this:
o 7:30 – 9:30 AM Fulfulde (the other new language I’m learning… more
on this in a future post)
o 9:30 – 9:45 AM Coffee Break!!!! (only when we’re in the city and
only when there’s electricity… so I probably get a cup of coffee about
two times per week)
o 9:45 – noon Technical Health Session on a topic like Malaria,
HIV/AIDS. Peer-education techniques, etc
o Noon – 2 PM lunch break/siesta. I usually eat rice, beans,
plantains, fish, cooked veggies and fresh tropical fruit
o 2:00 – 3:30 PM Group session on Food Security & cross collaboration
between Health and Agriculture volunteers
o 3:40 – 4:30 PM French

- I then come home which takes anywhere from 30 mins to an hour
depending on where I’m coming from

- I help cook or do dishes if they aren’t done already but most of the
time, they are. My host mom cooks over the fire.

- I eat dinner. Couscous de maiz is the regional dish here so we eat
it often. It isn’t anything like couscous though, it more like polenta
and is served with a variety of different sauces that range from
delicious to not so delicious.

- Re-apply bug spray

- Do homework, hang out with family. If there is electricity we
usually watch the French-dubbed Spanish soap opera of the season…
currently El Diablo

- Start getting ready for bed around 8PM (it is dark by 7PM)

- Brush teeth under the most vibrant stars I’ve ever seen

- Fill water bottle for upcoming day (from my water filter)

- Lock everything up in my metal trunk that my mice friends might like
to munch on (this includes dirty clothes, shoes and my wallet for some
reason)

- Crawl under my mosquito net & tuck the net into the mattress around
me. Many people don’t tuck in their mosquito nets… you must tuck it in
or the mosquitoes can still fly in.
- And voila, I’m asleep by 9 PM.

Saturdays are similar but I have the afternoon free. I usually use
this time to run errands (by motorcycle taxi) and catch up on lugging
my drinking water from the forage/water pump. The forage is a water
pump and is about a 15 min walk away. The well is closer (just a short
walk through the banana fields) but the forage water is safer so I
walk longer to fetch my drinking water (still goes through the filter
though). I visit the forage every couple of days.

On Sundays, I visit the well to get water to wash my clothes. The well
is quite the experience – it is almost like the secret hang out spot
for the women and children of the village. Everyone helps each other
lift the heavy buckets of water up to their heads for the journey
back. I carry my (small) bucket on my head too, but I can’t balance it
yet so I also hold onto its sides with my hands. It really is the most
efficient way to carry a bucket of water.

I then soak my clothes with detergent for about 30 mins before washing
them. Washing them is hard but wringing them out is grueling. My
process is: soak – wash – ring – rinse – ring – shake – dry – hang on
line – fold & let rest for 3 days.

I also do dishes & sweep on Sundays but, as a rule, Sundays tend to be
lazy days.

And there you have it – a lengthy but still incomplete snapshot of my
life here. Every day is different and is about to change on Saturday
when we switch home stays with the city-living agriculture volunteers
for the last 5 weeks of training!

I have so much more to write & my endless apologies for not being able
to post more often – I really do try every chance I get but the
internet rarely works here. More to come!