Marching through February

I've heard talk lately of getting the wifi range at the hospital extended. This would mean wifi access in my apartment and at work in the OPD (Outpatient department). Good grief that would be nice. I say "would be" instead of "will be" because I doubt it'll happen (if it does happen while I'm here it will be nothing short of miraculous). Even though Prosper and Mrs. Bellosillo have both mentioned it, I've learned that everything in Africa is tentative up until the moment that it's already happened. I definitely miss that about home. Being able to take people at their word. It's not that everyone's a liar exactly, it's just that there's a lot of pipe dreams that people aren't willing to see through. I miss the feeling of progress. Africa feels like the land that improvement left behind. It's an odd potpourri of people with smart phones, chickens and goats roaming free, public urination, and shoddy African workmanship. Even if they had great building materials, technologies, etc, the human resources tend to thwart any benefit of material resources. A building made of the best materials is still a dump if it's not constructed well. And if a building isn't maintained? Don't even think about it lasting. The jungle overtakes civilization at an unbelievable rate. Probably part of this progress problem lies in the extreme corruption (especially in the education system), but I think the cultural view of work ethic here is pretty apathetic. That's not to say everyone's lazy. Work smart, not hard is a good model in this case. Except here people choose one or the other. Working "smart" means taking shortcuts (and bribes more than likely). Basically leaves working well out of the equation entirely. Working hard means that the person probably hasn't received enough education to land a "working smart" job. And working well still isn't necessarily a given. Either way, I look forward to returning to American soil where progress is taken for granted. Anyway, enough of the criticism, on to something more upbeat:

Yesterday I got up and did my usual morning routine: eat breakfast, download French vocabulary to study during work, check my emails, check the traps (usually I get more emails than mice), and get ready for work. I showed up to the clinic a little late (traffic was pretty bad in the 50 meters between my apartment and the clinic...   that's my story and I'm stickin to it). Anyway, I didn't need an excuse because there wasn't anyone there! Patients, employees, stray chickens - the clinic was totally empty! I wandered back to my apartment not sure what to do. I checked the date. February 11...   what could that mean? I saw one of the nurses and asked "Ou ont tout le monde?" which is my poor French rendition of "Where is everyone?". I literally asked where the entire world is, which I'm not sure is exactly correct. She replied "Sais pas quoi" - I don't know! I wandered some more and ran into another nurse. This one explained to me (in English) that it was a national holiday: National Youth Day. Not sure what that meant at the time, I asked for the Cliff's notes version. She told me "Just go up to Bongo Square (Yes, I know it sounds like it's straight out of Donkey Kong, but that's neither here nor there) and you'll see a big parade of all the preschoolers, primary schoolers, high schoolers, university students, gendarmes, police, nursing students, culinary arts students, underwater basket weaving students." (and she went on ad nauseum for effect. So much for the Cliff's notes thing.) Okay, I thought to myself, looks like I'm getting a day off. I am ok with this. I took off at a brisk walk for Bongo Square. In theory a taxi would have been faster, but it was still only 8:15 and every official event here has started at least two hours late. I didn't know what time this was scheduled to start but I figured that I would have plenty of time. In addition, I only had a 5,000 franc note, and trying to get change for 5,000 from a taxi driver is like asking a penguin to recite the Gettysburg Address - expecting way too much. I walked past a lot of people who had set up shop near the area of the parade, selling spaghetti and hard-boiled egg sandwiches, bonbons, chunks of beef(...?) out of metal pots, yogurt, etc. I made it up to the square and waited around for like an hour and a half. I finally meandered over to one of the grandstands and found a seat. There was a live band there from the University, which was pretty neat. They actually weren't half bad! I knew things were getting close to kickoff when the governor's convoy rolled up. The parade finally started after I heard the Cameroonian national anthem for the first time and we listened to some 30 minute pre-recorded speech over the loudspeaker. Actually I shouldn't say we listened, I should say the speech was played. It was so quiet that nobody realized what was going on, so the dull roar of about 1000 individual conversations drowned out the moving words (clearly no Gettysburg Address) I'm sure were being delivered by some Cameroonian bigshot. Maybe even the President...? During this speech the 2-year-old sitting next to me developed a fascination with ma casquette et mes lunettes de soleil (baseball cap n' sunglasses). We took some killer selfies. The first group to finally go was the "nursing care" students. This is an all-in-one term describing pre-preschool, preschool, and kindergarten. Ages 3-5. Their interpretations of marching were pretty comical. The uproarious laughter lasted for about 10 minutes. I think all in all easily 1500-2000 kids eventually walked by, herded past by plenty of stressed out teachers. After that I watched scads of primary schoolers walk by, singing some song about the President leading Cameroon to "emergence" (whatever that means). From the national anthem to this point it had been almost an hour and a half, and I was getting restless and hungry. I left the grandstand to get closer and take a few pictures, and made my way back toward the hospital buying some snacks here and there along the way (changed that 5,000 in a grocery store finally!). The rest of the day was spent taking a siesta, studying French, making dinner, and lifting weights at the gym. The holiday was definitely unexpected, but you won't hear any complaints here!

As this parade was going on I felt the tiniest spark of something that I can only compare to patriotism. Obviously for a Cameroonian it would probably be a lot stronger, but to me it was just a dope experience to see such a display of national pride. I haven't seen anything like it since I've been here. Of course I'm not turning my back on the colors that don't run, I will still love apple pie and baseball (and PB&J) no matter how many parades or other civic events I see. Don't get me started on the presidential candidates, but I still love MOST aspects of my country! It was simply a great opportunity to see how other people show their allegiance to the nation that's made them what they are, for better or for worse.

TL;DR Things at the hospital are progressing as usual. And when I say "progressing" I mean it's nearly at a standstill. Every step forward is met by countless obstacles, which I'm sure are a telephone-pole-sized thorn in the sides of the administration. Yesterday I was surprised by a national holiday which gave me a day off and an interesting way to spend part of it - watching a parade. It was a nice time to get some big stuff done: namely mopping my apartment. I ended up taking today off too, giving myself a much desired 4-day weekend.

Entrance to the Sunday market

Standard thoroughfare in the market

Chawarma stand. Some people might say to look for the s#*! on a spit. Not me of course :)

Crowds as far as the eye can see on parade day

I wear my sunglasses at night...

Converting  Cameroon to Giants fans one toddler at a time