Coaching a Girl’s Soccer Team in Africa

I started coaching a girl’s soccer team in my village as a women’s empowerment initiative that is much needed in this extremely male-dominant society, but also just to have fun playing soccer again. We play for an hour and a half 2 days/week and every time there are boys on the sideline who practically beg me to let them play. I try to say no to all of them, but sometimes it’s honestly hard to tell who is a boy and who is a girl. By law, everyone at the high school has to shave their head to cut back on lice, so everyone looks exactly alike in their matching Cameroonian #9 soccer jerseys (the jersey of Cameroon’s best soccer player, Eto'o). This also makes it difficult to learn their names, which are unusual to begin with.

Most of the girls show up to play in jellies or other plastic sandals, while others play barefoot. Occasionally, someone will have actual running shoes, but it’s rare as these are harder to clean after a day of running on the dirt field and Cameroonians must have clean shoes for some reason. I will try and post a picture of the team soon!

Cameroonian Gas Station

Is it dry season already

I have been waiting and waiting for dry season to arrive, mostly so my clothes will dry in less than 5 days, which is hard to do when it pours every single day. The last few days, however it hasn’t rained at all – precisely when I actually needed it to rain. A few days ago, I went to fill up my bucket with water from the tap outside and nothing came out but a few precious drops. Apparently there was something wrong with the pipes. Every day since, the technician said he was going to come, but in true African style, he didn’t come for 4 days. Thinking he would fix it sooner than later, the only thing I did to find water was to strategically station my 5 buckets around the yard to hopefully catch the rain that never came. Meanwhile, dishes were piling up and I started rationing my drinking water until I finally decided I needed to search for water. I armed myself with some of my buckets and set out to find a water source in the village. As I was wandering around I luckily bumped into the technician on his way to my house! I’ve never been so happy to someone.

Running in Cameroon

Whenever you need a pick-me-up, going for a run in Cameroon is the best. The village paths are filled with smiling people waving and cheering in French and the local language “Good job!” and “Keep it up!”. Every once in a while along the way, you get a clan of school children who start running with you. One time I had about 20 of them following me for a good mile. You can’t help but smile and wave back, repeating “Merci, merci!” to everyone like it is a huge accomplishment to go running.

Scenes from the Village

View of Bangang



This is the NGO, called ACREST, which I am working with in an attempt to harness the power of the waterfall in town to generate cheap electricity to the villagers currently living without electricity. Other things that ACREST does is sell fuel-efficient stoves, natural water filters, solar fruit dryers, and electricity generated from the waterfall, wind turbines, and solar panels, as well as using biogas for stoves.



This is the microfinance institution, called MC2, which I am advising. They are all over Cameroon.



You can sort of see the waterfalls in the top right hand corner of the picture on the rock face.

Tu es la?

It is extremely common in Cameroon to ask someone if they are there (“tu es la” in French). This question is always asked when you are clearly right in front of the person posing the question, so at first I didn’t really know how to respond other than a quizzical expression. Eventually, however, you are no longer annoyed at the many obvious questions people ask and not only start to get used to them, but actually begin to enjoy them. It’s one of those things I can really only enjoy while here in Cameroon.

My new home

This is my new house! I am on the second floor. The goats live on the first floor.








This is my bedroom. You can sort of see the hot pink silk sheets I got made for $5. Everything you buy here is custom made because they don't have really stores, just tailors and carpenters.