Pictures!

I tried to mostly include things I talked about. I thought about going through my old posts and putting pictures up where I talked about things, but decided this was easier for me and for you, dear reader, because it means you don't have to look through all my old posts and I don't have to, either. The pictures go in order. I start in Bamenda, then Kumbo, then Bamenda, then Pinyin, then Awing, then Bamenda again, the Babanki, then Tunen, and finally Yaounde.

This was my very first view of Cameroon. I could look out my window and see all of Bamenda. If this is just a view from a guesthouse/convent/hospital, can you start to imagine how beautiful Cameroon really is?

This is the dormitory room I was moved to when I was kicked out of Little House, in Kumbo. Okay, it was nicer than that. They moved me out because someone else was coming in for longer than me.

This is me cooking by lamplight. I don't remember if I wrote about it, but it happened enough that I should have, if I didn't.

This is me cooking... with a big knife.

My poor feet after my hike to the market.

This is the mysterious attic. I never made it up there. But that just makes this another reason why I have to go back.

A flower outside Little House. It was beautiful.

See? Absolutely beautiful.

The man in the tan coat is Alfred and I really hoped I talked about him. He was basically forced to take me around to the literacy classes. He didn't really know what to do with me because I wasn't allowed to ride motorbikes, but we went to a few classes, when we could take a taxi. He's been with the Lamnso' translators since the beginning and worked with them to develop an alphabet.

This is one of the little boys at the VBS. Fuomo. He called me Mama.

Here's the whole group of the VBS kids.

this is Andy, the boy who held my hand and tried to scrap my freckles off.

You cannot really see him, but there is a lizard in this picture. This was my first of many lizards. This was my first night back in Bamenda after spending 10 days in Kumbo.

This is outside the guesthouse in Bamenda (I took this after I moved from the Grebes' and into the SIL guesthouse).

Here's the front of it.

Can you get a feel of how often the power goes out? And these are only about half of the candles that were there.

IT'S THE DOORBELL!

This is Courage, from the Pinyin village. He's the youngest.

This is Divine Favour. He's before Courage.

And Awa, with some neighbor kids. He's the middle child, but I didn't really meet the older two siblings.

This is Mama Vivian. She was fun.

And her pig.

Here's the whole team!

This is the sack of potatoes. Yep. It was huge. I left it with Papa Daniel in Tunen and I'm pretty sure there were still at least a quarter of them left.

This is Helen and one of her nieces.

I don't think I talked about this. This was my bed in Awing. I shared it with Helen, but it wasn't so bad.

Helen's family's chickens.

Me with my hair braided.

My Babanki team! They may have understood me the least, but they were such a blessing to me.

And not just because they gave me this basket. With a pineapple.

Pastor Gabe, the Babanki liaison. He kept asking me when I was coming back to record with his other villages. I told him I'd come back when God brought me back.

This is me with my hair half down.

And all the way down. Oh yeah. I'm styling.

This is the main room of the guesthouse. I stayed here a lot. I honestly came back to the guesthouse sometimes and felt like I was coming home.

It's a bag of water. That was fun.

My Tunen team! They were all old men... Papa Daniel is on the far left, next to me. I stayed with him. He's 63 and says he worked at the bank for 50 years.

I call it Tunen, but in reality that is just the language I was working with. The village itself is called Endikimiki. That's what the sign says, in Tunen.

This was my room at the Wycliffe Associates Annex. I called it "the Wycliffe place over there." until I realized when people said the Annex, this was what they were talking about. 

They have a laundry machine. And running hot water. And I had my own bathroom connected to my room. I almost threw a party and I was pretty sure I was in heaven.

This is me at the Pentecostal church, The Lighthouse Chapel. They danced. I clapped.

Nice try, Cameroon. I wish I had gotten a picture of their other soda, American Cola, but I never had it.

Me, Julie, and Mirjam! Those girls were so great. They ran all over creation with me on my last day to help me get some jewelry for souvenirs. And they took me out a lot while I was in Yaounde, especially Mirjam. They are great .

I took over the Annex commons room. I had a wonderful internet connection and it was comfy when I decided I should probably get back to work. Also, the kettle was right there. I probably drank 20 cups of tea in the 7 days I was there.

Me and Sandrine, right before I left for the airport! Sandrine was great, too. She's the one who worked everything out on the Cameroonian side so I could come to Cameroon in the first place!

Me at the airport. I wasn't nearly as scared as I look. The Yaounde airport has three gates and I think two planes fly in everyday. The Brussels plane and the Air France plane.

They tagged my backpack. I don't know why.

This was me when I got home. I was about five seconds away from falling on my bed and straight to sleep. This was thirty hours later, which is why I look.. not great.

And that is my Cameroon trip in a nutshell. A very small, condensed nutshell. I have a few more good pictures I might put up (none of elephants... another reason I have to go back to Cameroon) but that'll be later. I still have three weeks before school starts, so keep checking back weekly (or so) for updates on how I'm doing and maybe (hopefully) more pictures.