bamenda

Trip to Bamenda this past weekend was so much fun. The city is the largest in the anglophone province which is the area originally colonized by the brits, constituted by the two farthest west provinces. It was nice getting to speak english in public for a change, and I did a fair bit of shopping (I am finding this quite amusing right now, because i wrote an essay in french about pretty much the same things).
Anyways, we arrived friday morning. During our time there we stayed in a baptist mission which had hot, running water and delicious breakfasts. Again I was in with the Cameroonian staff men, but oh my lord, Gaston, driver guy, snored like a jet engine. I somehow survived and slept a bit. Food was good overall, and we got buffet style deliciousness at a restaurant for dinner both friday and saturday.
Friday included a lecture on HIV/AIDS, which is obviously fairly prominent here and also a trip to a traditional chiefdom, which was interesting. the architecture and furniture and all were quite unimpressive, but the culture was there with the chief and his actual administrative control over the large area.
Saturday, we got time during our "drop off" to explore the city and buy things. Bamenda is known for its fabric, so I got two pagnes (six yards) to have more things made. I did not buy any art or stuff yet, maybe regrettably, though I expect to find more in Yaounde or even in Dschang on market day. ME and the two girls I was with ate lunch at a hole in the wall place, which was tasty and dirt cheap (ie 1 dollar for all three). those places run some small health risk, but are the way people do it here. Saturday afternoon we heard from a group fighting for the creation of a separate anglophone cameroon state (southern cameroons). a big issue in cameroon is the political and population dominance of the francophone area over the oil-rich anglophones. This group considered it a colonisation of the region and are working through international orgs to remedy the issue. I think similar problems of minority non-representation can be found in many african states, stemming a lot from colonisation and the many ethnic groups which get boggled together. Their perspective on the matter was interesting and might be worth watching in the coming years.
Sunday we spent with John Fru Ndi, who is the leader of the largest national political opposition party, the Social Democratic Front. He was first to force Cameroon to allow multiple party elections and was robbed of the presidency in 1992. IT was truly an honor to be granted time with him. We went to his church in the morning. The building was really large, there was great music in the service, although the service lasted 3 hours. Fru Ndi's whole SDF posse was with him, as it was a big get together for many SDFers. He himself spoke a bit during the service, then later, mid-service they auctioned off plantane bunches to raise money, which was really curious. In the afternoon, we headed to Fru Ndi's compound in the city where there was a political rally, with a couple groups (including us) giving him "new ears wishes," as is common in cam official stuff. After that he fed us and we got a chance for some q and a with the man himself. that was very interesting, and i got my questions in too. by the time the day was finished it was too late to drive back, so we spent another night at a separate mission, then headed out this morning.
Bamenda was fun and is encouraged me to think about travel to another anglo african country sometime. The entire political experience we had was also really interesting, and could somehow fit into my ISP at the end of the program.
Now its back to Dschang and school for 9 days. and by the way, a girl got malaria, but its really nothing to fear - its normal business over here. im staying comfortably healthy myself so far, fortunately.