a freindly visit.
Monday November 10th 2003
The Peace Corps came. Well, not all of them, but three PVC’s (yes.. another acronym). One (who was here before) who was chaperoning two new volunteers. The Peace Corps is a little more rigorous than VSO with its preparation. 3 months, which involves homestay in some other part of the country.. so you can make all of your newbie mistakes in a relatively neutral location. Before the placement actually takes, you get sent on a courtesy visit…and that is what this visit was. One young lady (ooh.. look at me, I’m all old and stuff) is going to be posted in Mindaru (the truckstop between here and Among M’bang about 2-4 hours up the road),and the second is a rather flamboyant and exubrant guy who is going to be in Ngyola..which is a few hours down the road the other way… in is the end of the road… quite literally. They had a long adventure getting here… passed through quickly, and headed back soon after. They got to stay in the fancy hotel here… the hotel with sort-of running water… and apparently MTV. Whew, I feel a whole lot better knowing that MTV is available here. So the volunteers, they stopped by for a few hours.. we chatted, and they seem nice. The guy (who’s name I forgot, and wouldn’t mention anyway) is a pretty extreme personality… he was trying to save all the bugs that were flying into my house and landing on their backs. It will be interesting to see how the community responds to him. I have this theory that to most people here, a white man in a business suit and a white man running down the street naked would attract an equal amount of attention here, so most of our cultural signifiers will probably be missed. I hope for his sake this is true.