21 May 2010
Now despite what you might be thinking I have not been catching up on my Sesame Street reruns, I actually just got back from a short visit to Mayo Darlé and up there I am commonly referred to as Quinze… as in the number 15 in French… as in sounds and looks nothing like Kate but is the closest we can get to the correct pronunciation. Now really I don’t care what they call me it’s just that sometimes I forget that I’m Quinze and then I don’t respond right away when someone is calling for me which is apparently a problem. When I was up there on Wednesday Haja, the first wife, decided the best solution would be to give me a village name. I told them to think about a good one and next time I visit they can tell me what it is. I’m kind of excited.
So the reason that I was in The Darlé was because this past Thursday was Cameroon’s independence day and Aislynn invited me to celebrate with her and Josh. Basically it’s the equivalent of our 4th of July except that there are no hot dogs and it lasts an entire week. This year is an especially big deal because it’s the 50th anniversary of reunification and independence of the country. I wasn’t here last year so I really have no basis for comparison, but I can say that Cameroonians know how to throw a party and they pulled out all the stops for this one.
The day started promptly at 6:30 when I was awoken to the sounds of someone pounding at the door, which wouldn’t have been that big a deal had I not been sleeping on the floor about two feet away from said door. Turns out it was Aislynn’s party dress being delivered (side note Cameroonians with a deadline are like me in college with a final paper… they work right to the wire but miraculously they always seem to get it done), so we took that as a sign to get dressed and went over to eat breakfast with the wives. After breakfast we made our way up to the parade grounds to watch the “march pass” and the traditional dances. It was pretty much your standard Cameroonian parade with the exception of the equestrian portion. Despite my personal beef with horseback riding (thank you mother…you know what you did ;) ) it was pretty fun to watch. They dress up the horses and then kids ride them bareback and try to get them to jump back on the hind legs. I’m gonna go ahead and say it’s probably not the safest thing one could be doing with their children, but the effect is pretty cool. Aislynn’s neighbor was riding the winner so that was exciting, and his parents were just beaming ☺. Once everyone had finished marching some of the groups came up front and performed some traditional songs and dances, which was a major crowd pleaser. People take a lot of pride in their traditions here and it really shows when they’re performing and they’re grinning from ear to ear. I love it!
So after everything at the Sous Prefecture finished up we went to a “cocktail hour” at the District officer’s house and did a little schmoozing with the big-wigs (thank you white man status… sometimes you actually are a good thing to have around). I don’t think whoever made the invitations actually knew what a cocktail hour was because there were no cocktails in sight and it lasted way more then an hour, but there was one hell of a spread so I think that more than made up for the false advertisement ;)
Lunch finished and we went to watch the championship football match, because lets be honest, what’s a Cameroonian party with out a little foot? It was the high school boy’s team versus the twenty somethings who called themselves The Hungry Lions (Now tell me that’s not an awesome team name!). The Lycee team (high school) ended up winning 2-1 and no sooner had they finished handing out the trophy, the sky opened up and it started pouring rain. This gave the three of us the perfect excuse to head back to the house to do a little power nappage because we still had the gala to attend that night.
The Gala got started around 9 pm with another round of feasting and then dancing until the wee hours of the morning. Highlight was hands down the opening of the dance floor. So what normally happens is that the DJ will choose random people to pair up and dance together awkward middle school style to some really cheesy slow song and then when the song finishes the floor is open and everyone gets up to dance. Now somehow Peace Corps volunteers always seemed to get picked to do this dance (imagine that) and this was no exception. We each got paired up with some old government officials but then they couldn’t get the slow song to come on the speakers. The only song they could get was this really upbeat song called Kiriku (happens to be one of my favorites…look it up, downloaded it, you’ll love it) which was not at all what they were going for. Everyone was just standing around not quite sure what to do, but then I looked down the line and saw Aislynn rock’n out so Josh and I followed her lead and the next thing you know all the Cameroonians were in on it too. I’d like to think we saved the dance☺
Peace,
Kate
P.S. on the way home from Mayo Darlé I saw an antelope walk across the road, and all the other passengers in the car thought it was really funny how excited I got.
P.P.S. I got in a standoff with a really big, really unfriendly goose the other day and had to be rescued by a Cameroonian. I think the geese here are even meaner then the ones at Mount Trashmore.
P.P.P.S Snake-be-gone = fail… found another snake in the yard
Now despite what you might be thinking I have not been catching up on my Sesame Street reruns, I actually just got back from a short visit to Mayo Darlé and up there I am commonly referred to as Quinze… as in the number 15 in French… as in sounds and looks nothing like Kate but is the closest we can get to the correct pronunciation. Now really I don’t care what they call me it’s just that sometimes I forget that I’m Quinze and then I don’t respond right away when someone is calling for me which is apparently a problem. When I was up there on Wednesday Haja, the first wife, decided the best solution would be to give me a village name. I told them to think about a good one and next time I visit they can tell me what it is. I’m kind of excited.
So the reason that I was in The Darlé was because this past Thursday was Cameroon’s independence day and Aislynn invited me to celebrate with her and Josh. Basically it’s the equivalent of our 4th of July except that there are no hot dogs and it lasts an entire week. This year is an especially big deal because it’s the 50th anniversary of reunification and independence of the country. I wasn’t here last year so I really have no basis for comparison, but I can say that Cameroonians know how to throw a party and they pulled out all the stops for this one.
The day started promptly at 6:30 when I was awoken to the sounds of someone pounding at the door, which wouldn’t have been that big a deal had I not been sleeping on the floor about two feet away from said door. Turns out it was Aislynn’s party dress being delivered (side note Cameroonians with a deadline are like me in college with a final paper… they work right to the wire but miraculously they always seem to get it done), so we took that as a sign to get dressed and went over to eat breakfast with the wives. After breakfast we made our way up to the parade grounds to watch the “march pass” and the traditional dances. It was pretty much your standard Cameroonian parade with the exception of the equestrian portion. Despite my personal beef with horseback riding (thank you mother…you know what you did ;) ) it was pretty fun to watch. They dress up the horses and then kids ride them bareback and try to get them to jump back on the hind legs. I’m gonna go ahead and say it’s probably not the safest thing one could be doing with their children, but the effect is pretty cool. Aislynn’s neighbor was riding the winner so that was exciting, and his parents were just beaming ☺. Once everyone had finished marching some of the groups came up front and performed some traditional songs and dances, which was a major crowd pleaser. People take a lot of pride in their traditions here and it really shows when they’re performing and they’re grinning from ear to ear. I love it!
So after everything at the Sous Prefecture finished up we went to a “cocktail hour” at the District officer’s house and did a little schmoozing with the big-wigs (thank you white man status… sometimes you actually are a good thing to have around). I don’t think whoever made the invitations actually knew what a cocktail hour was because there were no cocktails in sight and it lasted way more then an hour, but there was one hell of a spread so I think that more than made up for the false advertisement ;)
Lunch finished and we went to watch the championship football match, because lets be honest, what’s a Cameroonian party with out a little foot? It was the high school boy’s team versus the twenty somethings who called themselves The Hungry Lions (Now tell me that’s not an awesome team name!). The Lycee team (high school) ended up winning 2-1 and no sooner had they finished handing out the trophy, the sky opened up and it started pouring rain. This gave the three of us the perfect excuse to head back to the house to do a little power nappage because we still had the gala to attend that night.
The Gala got started around 9 pm with another round of feasting and then dancing until the wee hours of the morning. Highlight was hands down the opening of the dance floor. So what normally happens is that the DJ will choose random people to pair up and dance together awkward middle school style to some really cheesy slow song and then when the song finishes the floor is open and everyone gets up to dance. Now somehow Peace Corps volunteers always seemed to get picked to do this dance (imagine that) and this was no exception. We each got paired up with some old government officials but then they couldn’t get the slow song to come on the speakers. The only song they could get was this really upbeat song called Kiriku (happens to be one of my favorites…look it up, downloaded it, you’ll love it) which was not at all what they were going for. Everyone was just standing around not quite sure what to do, but then I looked down the line and saw Aislynn rock’n out so Josh and I followed her lead and the next thing you know all the Cameroonians were in on it too. I’d like to think we saved the dance☺
Peace,
Kate
P.S. on the way home from Mayo Darlé I saw an antelope walk across the road, and all the other passengers in the car thought it was really funny how excited I got.
P.P.S. I got in a standoff with a really big, really unfriendly goose the other day and had to be rescued by a Cameroonian. I think the geese here are even meaner then the ones at Mount Trashmore.
P.P.P.S Snake-be-gone = fail… found another snake in the yard
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