March 6th

March 6^th, 2012

It has been an adventuresome couple of days! We left Douala on Monday the 5^th. We were allowed a late check out as we didn't need to be at the Airport until 3pm. We checked out promptly at 2pm, and asked about the 2:30pm shuttle bus to the airport that we had signed up for, and wouldn't you know, so he could take us immediately! Yeahhhhh, right? Not really; we were meeting the porter Abdouleye at 3pm. Of course we got there early and no he wasn't there, so Llonda made the bus driver stay with us to protect our luggage from the sharks. We had to pay him extra to stay, as well as a young kid who we had use his phone to call our porter and tell him we were there. Our previous morning trip to the Cam Air office was a bust, as they do NOT take credit cards so we used nearly all the rest of our CFA to pay for the extra luggage fees, and found that nearly everyone had a roll on carry on with them, which is what we were told we could not have. So our gifts we left behind in Douala, could have come with, but didn't.

The Cam Air flight flew from Douala, to Yaounde (the capital) to drop off and pick up passengers, only being a 40 min flight it wasn't all that bad, and they even gave out full cans of beer, as well as pop/or water. Brussels Air being an international flight didn't even offer that! After leaving Yaounde, en-route to Garoua, they offered another drink. Again the flight was fast, at about 1hr 10 min. Despite the smell of body odor it was not all that bad.

Once landing in Garoua, we were meeting up with Thomas, a connection made prior by a friend of Llonda's. We walked through the airport and waited for the sign being held with her name on it. He was a terrific man, who spoke English well. A man of God who travels all over Africa spreading the gospel to Muslim's trying to teach them about Christianity. On the way to our Motel we learned a lot about what he does, and I was impressed with his faith in God, and the confidence he has with his beliefs. Our Motel was not far, which we loved as it was already nearing 9pm. Thomas got us all set up with our room and agreed to pick us up again in the morning and take us to the bus station to get on the bus to N'Gaoundere. He left and we went to our room. After opening the door I hesitated & wanted to start running after the truck and begging for him to come back and take us anywhere else. The Motel, which at one point must have been a fabulous place had been run down, with walls covered in mold and peeling paint. There was no toilet seat with the toilet in one bathroom and a baud-ea with the sink and tub, in the other. In a matter of 5 minutes we managed to break the toilet and the lamp. Our only light. Llonda went up to ask them to come fix them and no one spoke any English. It was like a game of charades trying to explain to them about the toilet and lamp. Finally he said he would come and look. I think it was mostly just to shut us up. He got them all fixed. The toilet handles are a plastic pole sticking up out of the middle of the toilet lid that you pull UP. Not down, in case you ever need to know:) Since we were too late for dinner, we decided to try to have a drink at the bar. Llonda asked where it was, and we started to follow the man. I walked in and turned around and Llonda was gone. Lovely, I tried to ask the women if she was open and showed her my watch. She told me 10pm, I looked again at my watch and saw it was already 10:20. “Oh so your closed,” I said. She looked at me again and said 10 or maybe 10:30pm. The best she could say it to me. So again I said, Ok so your closed. Llonda walked in at that moment and in pure frustration I said “THEIR CLOSED!” We walked out and she said she wanted to jump in the pool; we had been sweating all day, and neither of us had showered. Sounded like a good idea, but we had only one towel in our room. Again to the front desk for a game of Charades, which was not understood so after this I reached my breaking point and figured I was best just going in that awful room and try to go to bed. Scared to even undress I laid on top of the sheet in a bed that I was jack knifed in from the mattress sinking to the boards in the middle and I just wanted to cry. Pure stubbornness kept me from totally breaking down. I set my alarm on my phone which was all we had, and tried to figure out if he was going to be there at 5:45am, we had to be up by 5:10, knowing neither of us would touch a thing in that bathroom, and hadn't even unzipped any of our luggage just hoping and praying for morning to get there. I had to set it for 10pm as the time never changed from local time at home, and so I was hoping it was right. Thomas came with another nice young man who spoke no English who was also traveling by bus to N'Gaoundere and he would watch out for us. Thomas got our tickets and waited for us to get loaded and we couldn't be more thankful for him, and Jim N., who connected us up with him. He did all of this for us with asking nothing in return! Which is not common around here, when it seems everyone expects a tip. And they expect an even bigger tip if your white. (especially a fat white, that means your rich). The bus ride was very long. We departed at 7:10am and I sat in the middle seat between Llonda and an African gal. It was not a fun ride. Both of them leaning on me, sweating, and no one would have the window open. African's like it hot! I felt like a was suffocating a slow a painful death. The road was paved the whole way which was nice and along the way there were many villages that we saw with women fetching water out of the well by buckets and rope and their small stands by the side of the road and the little kids running around naked or at a minimum a shirt that was too big for them. Most of the school aged kids were in school, and their schools are nearby their village. Electricity is not seen for many many miles on the road and the radio signal is weak for most of the ride. The closer we get to N'Gaoundere more life starts to appear. You can see electrical towers on the side, and certainly more markets. We went up a Mountain before getting into N'Gaoundere, and it is nothing for these buses to pass other vehicles going up the hill. Lots of broken down Semi trucks hauling goods, surely due to overheating. At the bottom of the mountain Security gets on the bus to check our passports and we are all cleared to continue on. We arrived at the bus station where one of the hospital workers met us there and waited for another vehicle to come and pick up our luggage. He drove us around to see the markets and there must have been markets on every street. Covered with people we could barely drive through. Honking left and right he finally gets through and we safely make it to the Mission Station. We arrived here (the Mission Station) around 12:30pm and couldn't wait to take a shower. It had been since Saturday night that either of us had showered and we were soaked in sweat with the same clothes we had had on for days, and my white shirt was now brown. They showed us to our apartment and informed us there was no water. Ummmm WHAT! They are shutting the water off daily from 7-5pm. Really? So here we were with no water and nearly no money left and filthy dirty. The mission house we are in is big, with two bedrooms, a living room, dining room table, kitchen, bathroom and even a laundry area with a washing machine. All of which we are grateful to have and look forward to being able to have water. It took all of an hour for Jean Baptiste (the chief supervisor at the Hospital) to come right over and take us over to the hospital and show us around. Llonda is clearly well loved over here and many recognized her right away and were very happy to see her. It only goes to show that the work she has done over here before has been welcomed and appreciated. She is happy to be back on her old stomping grounds and didn't take long to figure out where we both will be working and needed. The hospital is a large facility, spread out over a 10 acre complex. (I'm guessing) There are people every where waiting to be seen, and the Muslims are praying on their prayer mats in the hallways, outside, and inside. It smells of urine and the heat only makes it worse. The staff are clearly busy with patients and much like many hospitals in the states, they are under staffed and under paid (if they even get paid). They work long hours 7-5:30pm and 5-7am, with 3-4 per unit/department. We were well greeted, and most of it I'm guessing to due to Llonda's prior visits. Eric, on of our translators comes and joins us in our walk. He is a young kid with great enthusiasm and speaks English well. We meet in JB's (Chief) office and discuss the goals he and his staff have for us. I wasn't sure what exactly my role would be here, but they were very excited to have heard of my ambulance/trauma skills and have a whole list besides the CPR training of things they would like me train on. Llonda will be focusing most of her time in the ICU's which she is much of an expert at.

We walk back to our place with Eric and visit, and ask him to take us to the market to buy some groceries. He is more than happy to spend the time with us. We hop on the Moto Taxi's, they are motor bikes, Eric, I and a driver ride on one, and Llonda with the driver on the other. They cruise in and out of cars and around pot holes at great speeds. Truly one would be very injured if they ever crashed. We go to the market with the little money we have left in CFA and choose our items wisely and get only the bare essentials. The International day of Womens festival is going on in town, and Eric suggests we go. We hop on another moto taxi and head over there. We meet Eric's mom, who Llonda has met before, and she is a nice woman who is happy to us. We walk around the festival seeing all of the different types of food and they way the prepare it in the various areas of the country of Cameroon. From porcupine, fish, chicken, steak to Boa (snake). Many vegetables being sold so we jump at the chance to pick up some potatoes and lettuce. They were cheap and plentiful in amounts given. We left the festival and went to a local pub, enjoyed a cool drink and then headed back home. Eric came with to visit, and good thing he did as we forgot our water. Beings you cannot drink the water here, it was much needed, so Eric took off with the last 3000cfa we had to buy us some water. As we stood outside with a man trying to sell us some silver, Adda, JB and another translator showed up. It was a great surprise as we had no way to communicate with them that we were here. Word got around fast and they knew. We talked about the wedding and the plans for the next couple of days, showed them the dress Llonda had picked up for Danielle (JB's daughter almost 4yrs). They loved the dress and shoes that she had picked out. We had a good visit and then they left and we had dinner plans with Jim and still no water at 7:15pm so we went as stinky and dirty as we were. Jim picked us up (he is only staying across the road) and we headed off to Le Plaza; a nice place downtown. The food was good and the company was excellent. We had wanted to pay for Jim's meal, but were broke so he had to pay with all intentions of us paying him back. We chatted for nearly 3 hours. It was hard to imagine we had been up since 5am and it was going on 10:30pm. Jim has truly been a god send for us and we could never repay him for all the contacts and set ups that he has made for us, and the security of knowing everything will be OK. He is a great man with many gifts and I am grateful God has brought us into our life. We finished dinner and came back home and started going over our list from JB (the chief) of all they would like to have done and where we should start. We pulled out all of the supplies we had brought with and sorted what goes where. Finally the water was back on, and it was more than due time to take care of the S's (s*!t shower and shave). All three of which I hadn't done in days! We knew it would be a short morning at the hospital but had to be to Chapel by 7:30am. Good night all, we love and miss you!