Wedding Day in the Village

The Cameroonian Ambassador to South Africa’s (whose house I’m living in now) niece got married at our house yesterday…or at least the traditional wedding took place. It involved a lot of back and forth negotiations between the father of the groom and the father of the bride in front of everyone for the right price for the bride, who was not present for this part. It took longer than usual because they were from different tribes, which is usually frowned upon, even for these more modern families.

Eventually, some women stopped the debate and said they couldn’t find the bride. So the father of the groom gave them some money for a taxi to find her. They pretended to drive away in a taxi and came back with a girl under a big cloth so you couldn’t tell who she was. The family of the groom then had to guess whether or not it was the bride. If they got it wrong, then the wedding was off. The family said it wasn’t her, and then gave them money for a moto. The same thing happened again, and then they gave money for an airplane. They ladies came back pretending they were in an airplane with a third bride. The family guessed that this was the correct bride, and alas, they were right! Then, both families shared a jug of palm wine, made some speeches, settled the dowry, and then handed the bride over to the groom’s family.

There was lots of food, drinks, music, and dancing like in western weddings, but no white dress, bridesmaids, walking down the aisle, vows, rings, or anything I was accustomed to. Apparently, the traditional weddings are really more for the families of the couple, who are the recipients of all the gifts.

Here is a photo of one of the brides during the guessing game:


Here is the bride and her mother sharing the palm wine:

Funeral Season

It’s not as bad as it sounds. Funerals here are a celebration of someone’s life and they occur at least 5 years after someone dies, but it’s usually more like 20 years. This is because traditionally, they would dig up the body once it had decomposed and take the skull to put with all of the ancestors’ skulls in a little house built close to the main house. Only about 1/3 of the village still practices this tradition, but the rest of the funeral traditions remain the same. This includes an abundant amount of food and drinks and dances where you throw salt all around (no one could tell me why they do this). Funeral season coincides with dry season and there are about 3 every weekend in the village.

Girl's Soccer Club

Here's a picture of some of the girls on my soccer team that I'm coaching.

Crowd Surfing

Traveling in Cameroon is usually an unpleasant experience at the time, but makes for some good stories afterward. Buses are always at least a few hours late, there are twice as many people as should be in the bus, and sometimes you have to hold someone’s baby or chicken on your lap. In rainy season, you have to get out and push the car through the mud; and in dry season, you can’t see or breathe because all the dust kicks up from the dirt roads. Oftentimes, the buses break down and you’re stranded on the side of the road for hours until the next bus comes by. It’s also usually very hot, but Cameroonians refuse to open the windows because the wind will make them sick they say.

All of these things are expected whenever traveling and I can usually deal with them, but the worst part about traveling is finding a bus at the beginning. For example, upon arriving at a bus stop to catch a bus to the capital last week, I had about 15 people pulling at my arm and my bags trying to get me to travel in their bus. I eventually broke through, but my friend was not as lucky. They grabbed every limb, hoisted her above their heads like she was crowd surfing, and started to put her into a bus that wasn’t even going to the capital! Luckily, I found a nice Cameroonian and told him to save my friend, which he did and we eventually made it to the capital without too many more problems. For people visiting me, no fear – I know how to avoid this scenario now! Apparently, you have to get dropped off before you reach the bus stop, then look for private cars to flag down.

Rainforest of Central Africa

I spent the holidays at the beach and in the second largest rain forest in the world (behind the Amazon) where I got to see chimps! We weren't allowed to touch them because the last time a human touched them without being quarantined first, the chimps got meningitis. But I got a little too close to the baby who smacked me while I wasn't looking. Here he is:


Here is a sunset at the beach in Kribi:


Here are the little cascades that flow into the ocean at Kribi:

Decorating Christmas Cookies

A couple of volunteers and I baked sugar cookies for the kids at the orphanage to decorate. We even had frosting shipped to us from the states! It was a big hit and the kids didn't hesitate to finish off the frosting tubs by the spoonful once the cookies were all decorated.