Healy in Africa: My Cameroonian Adventure

1. Killed my first African roach so I didn’t have to compete with him for the shower. Suck it!

2. Played soccer two consecutive nights in a row. People from all over come to watch “la Blanche” (what people usually refer to me as) play with all the kids. S even made a video of tonight’s match.

3. Saw a little bit more of Maroua, which seems to be just as busy as Kousseri and D’Njamena.

4. Randomly tagged along with Saidou around town while he went on business meetings and serendipitously was able to meet with a collegue of his from Heifer International named Henry. Henry was super awesome, and because he is from the western part of Cameroon, spoke English! I started to do my awkward French intro of “Bon jour! ca va?” When he interrupted me and said, “Oh no, I speak English” Anyway, got a lot of insight from him (he is a veternarian who has been doing vet pub health projects in Cameroon for about ten plus years now) about conducting research in Cameroon and tips for the bush.

5. Saw a goat get slaughtered. Because that’s what you do around here. Get up, eat breakfast, slaughter a goat. Ya know, just a casual Saturday morning.

6. I would say that most of meals here have been delicious, but today was a day where I found myself repeating “the gag reflex is learned, the gag reflex is learned” for almost every meal after breakfast. I think we were eating the said goat from item five and organ meats have never really been my thing. It’s just so, um, earthy. Also, I never ask exactly what I’m eating. It’s just better psychologically that way.

7. Learned to count to ten in Fulfulde.

8. Moved the research schedule up a little bit and will be heading out into the bush tomorrow afternoon and stay just one night. It’s going to be a test run to see how both me and my survey do the first time out. Wish me luck and I’m sure I’ll have tons to post about Monday/Tuesday!