All plans are written in Jell-o

The title of this final post is a mantra I learned early in my Outdoor Education career. It's always good to have plans, but things rarely go exactly as planned. Take the final week of my trip, for example.

Be careful what you wish for

My flight out of Douala was at 3:50am. Awkward. For some reason many of the flights in and out of Douala are in that odd time period between sunset and sunrise when you can't quite decide whether to call it "ungodly early" or "really freakin' late." Us travelers are then left with a crucial decision: stay up all night or get up early?

1am? Stay up late. 5am? Get up early. 3:50am? Let's play it by ear...

Bad idea. After a "last" night of fish and beer with Evan, Lisa and Elvis (the new owner of my motorcycle), I realized that I was too tired to stay up all night, so I'd try to take a quick nap before heading to the airport. As can be expected, the next thing I know Evan's standing in the doorway and it's 4am. Oops.

Regardless of the fact that it was well past departure time, I decided to make a run for the airport and try my chances. I believe my thoughts were somewhere between "Well, it's Africa, maybe they run their planes like they run their buses and it won't leave for another hour or two?" (forgetting that it's an international airport), and "Well, it's an international airport, so there's bound to be another flight soon or someone I can talk to to get this cleared up." (forgetting that it's Africa).

Once at the airport, I found it empty of anyone save security guards and sleeping taxi men. All of the airline personnel had left promptly after check-in and would not be returning until Monday, more than 24hrs later. Dejected, I hopped back in a taxi to Evan and Lisa's, tail between my legs. Going off a security guard's suggestion, I tried to visit the downtown airline offices first thing in the morning, only to be reminded that it was still Sunday and they probably wouldn't be coming in, although they might in the afternoon (they didn't, I checked). Without anyone at the office or answering the phone, my next plan was to just show up at the airport again that night and hope it was a daily departure.

More time for science with Mr. Murphy!

Long story less long, there wasn't. All I got was another shortened night of sleep, some more time hanging out in Douala, and another suggestion to go to the downtown offices the next day, where I was charged a ridiculously large fee I'd rather not dwell on and given a new flight for Tuesday morning (5am, thankfully).

When I crossed the river from Congo I said I wished I had more time in this trip to explore Cameroon. This isn't quite what I had planned...

Wedding plans

Om nom

The original idea, with the Sunday departure, was to spend a few days in Morocco visiting my friend Sue (another PCV, but this time one I knew from before) and attending the wedding of her friend. On the plus side, Moroccans apparently also write their plans in Jell-o (couscous?) and the wedding was delayed indefinitely, pending the arrival of the groom. Downside: my 3-day visit with Sue was down to 24hrs.

Even the 24hrs was lucky, though, as Sue lives near Agdz in southern Morocco and my flight was in and out of Casablana. The main route between the two is a 7-hr bus ride over the notorious Tichka pass (buses tend to fall off from time to time), but I got some comfort knowing that I'd be taking the safer, official CTM bus. Wrong again. CTM was sold out, leaving me to wander into the melee of the Gare Routiere to find a souk bus (for those east-coasters reading this, it's similar to opting for Fung Wah over Bolt Bus, but without any real schedule or rules).

In the end, I was able to find a bus, get over the pass and give the finger to the fates who seemed determined to keep Sue and I from hanging out (Anna and I had tried back in December, too).

Success!

So after a fourth night in a row of shortened sleep, I got to spend a day eating Tajines and sandwiches, drinking tea and coffee and debriefing long international experiences as only two Outward Bound instructors can. Then, it was back on the night bus to Casablanca for a fifth sleep-deprived night.

The home stretch

I was in the airport a solid 4 hours before my flight left (not making that mistake again), quickly whisked away to Madrid for a short stop (long enough to realize that Spanish is a different language than French and they don't seem to appreciate it if you try to speak bad African French to them), then lobbed across the ocean to JFK, 282 days after I last stepped foot out of the US. Customs was quick and painless (I was expecting interrogation after all the spy accusations in Kazakhstan) and I was soon back with good friends, good food, good coffee and good beer.

Watching the East River from Brooklyn after a hipster-soaked food festival with BJ and John

The end

282 days, 12 countries, 2 continents (ignoring Madrid), countless new friends, cups of tea, shots of vodka, plates of plov, bowls of Ndole, bottles of lager, uncomfortable seats, cold nights, sweaty nights, new experiences and some very worn-out travel clothes. I'll never be able to fully quantify the events of my life since I left home last summer, nor what I have learned, nor how I have changed from it. As Oliver Wendell Holmes once said, "A mind, once stretched by a new idea, can never return to its original dimensions." Mine's been stretched quite a bit over the last year and I'm sure I'll be continuing to learn from this trip for the rest of my life. I'm glad I at least got to share some of it with you all along the way.

So, that brings an end to my publicly-broadcast life of the past 40 weeks. I'll spare you from the details of my American experiences from here on out, although hopefully many of you'll be there to share them with me. Thank you all for your support and friendship during this trip, I couldn't have made a trip around the world alone like this without knowing that I wasn't truly alone in the world. See you soon!

A welcome-home from Kenny and Julia in NYC

Anglophone adventures

Moto

So I spent the last two weeks taking my moto through the NW and SW (anglophone) and W (back to francophone) regions of Cameroon. Internet was pretty terrible througout, so I stockpiled stories and photos to dump them on you now. Rather than try to do anything chronologically or choose between photos and stories, I have instead plopped all the most interesting photos here with all of the memorable stories. 

On the road! This was taken before most of the dust happened...

Paperwork

First off, some bad news: I won't be taking my moto outside of Cameroon. I had high hopes for the Cameroonian bureaucracy, but it turns out that it will take anywhere from a day (heavily bribed) to months (average) to get my registration and an unknown amount of time to get the license plate. Both of these things I need to apply for my Carnet de Passage from the CAA (Canadian Automobile Association) so that I can legally cross borders with the bike. The Carnet takes a minimum of 6 weeks processing time, plus shipping. I don't have that much time, so I'll be headed to Gabon and Congo the old fashioned way.

Stamps and photos. That's what makes it official

Gendarmes

The gendarmes set up roadblocks all over the place. I was a little worried about them at first, since they apparently stop everyone. However, I have only been stopped twice thus far and they've looked at my (incomplete) paperwork, nodded, and waved me on. I think they're afraid to argue with a white guy, or they just don't care.

Roads

Over the two weeks and couple thousand kilometers, I saw all sorts of roads ranging from the high-quality multi-laned paved variety to... other. 

Sometimes they were smooth

Sometimes they were rough

Sometimes they were hilly

Sometimes they had lava

  

Sometimes they were idyllic country carriage roads

sometimes they were rutted (i watched a box truck half disappear in the rut to the right)

sometimes they were muddy

Sometimes they were more like single-track mountain bike trails

Sometimes there was no road

Peace Corps Volunteers

Up until now, I'd been staying with locals or Couchsurfers for most of my trip. Once in Cameroon, however, Evan and Lisa introduced me to a whole new jackpot of free housing and local knowledge: The Peace Corps Volunteer (PCV). Lisa had been one here a few years ago and put me in touch with her friend, Ryan, in Buea, through whom I met Nate, my next host, who told be about Ashley (below) and Ryan and Jamexas in Kumba, who set me up with some people in Mamfe who ended up not being around, but connected me with Cynthia and Eric in Bamenda, then Kristin in Njinikom, who introduced me to Steven and Alina in Fundong and called ahead to Christian in Kumbo who put me up for a night and we had drinks with Shannon and Ryan before heading down to meet 13 PCVs who all happened to be meeting up in Mbouda to celebrate Eric's birthday. They're the ones who gave me Annie's number, with whom we'll be staying in Ebolowa in the South before going to Gabon.

A common PCV (and Cameroonian) pasttime

PCVs are great for several reasons: 1) a refreshing taste of American culture in a very different place. This can be a good and bad thing, as it does remove one a bit from the local culture. However, this is why it's great that they are 2) very well connected with the local community, introducing their guests to interesting local people, cuisine, culture and places. 3) They all tend to be pretty cool people, as it's a self-selecting sort who decides to leave all that is familiar and comfortable and well-paying for two years to bucket bath, eschew moto riding (as per PC rules) and eat inordinate amounts of cassava on the other side of the world.

if I were a baby still, I would want to get weighed every day just to sit in this swing

As someone who came very close to becoming a PCV myself (I deferred my application in lieu of Outward Bound and independent travel the day my acceptance to PC Armenia was sent. I still have the welcome packet), it was great to get a glimpse of what life is like for a PCV on the ground.

Educating the mothers

Another side effect of staying with a tight network of PCVs all over a country is that you become intimately familiar with all of the Peace Corps drama and gossip. After a week, I had gathered enough gossip from my previous hosts that I was actually the bearer of new information for my next hosts, as I knew more than even they did. I still hope that I never actually meet Josh, knowing about how he's getting med-sepped from PC because he got robbed in Bamenda, but it's not so surprising that he's leaving because he wasn't so comfortable here to begin with and he's kind of just using it as an excuse to leave without having to ET which is worse and it sucks that he got robbed but he was kind of dumb for walking around commerce ave at 2am when there are always tons of taxis around and he was kind of asking for it to begin with but he's still a cool guy and will probably be missed when he's back in the states. Especially since he has no idea who I am.

The PCV gossip mill: "the only thing that actually works in Cameroon"

"Ashia"

The first word I learned in Pidjin, a language spoken in the anglophone regions of Cameroon that's loosely based on English. It doesn't quite have a direct translation in English, but it's used daily here whenever you see someone in an unenviable position. Carrying a heavy load down the road? Ashia. Working in the hot fields? Ashia. Crashed your moto? Ashia. Hung over? Ashia. Have to go to work? Ashia. No job? Ashia. Riding your moto on a local street? Ashia. The response is almost always a smile and "thank you!".

"White Man!"

First off, there aren't many white people here. Those who are here are generally government or aid workers and mostly concentrated in major cities. A few make it to the villages, but usually in a taxi, company car, or riding on the back of someone's moto. When I come riding through, the look I get is generally ambivalence (lots of motos around), confusion (why is he wearing those weird clothes?), recognition (Whoa! Is he white??), and reaction (Waving, pointing, smiling and screaming "White Man! White Man! White Man!"). The same is true for white women, or people of any ethnicity who are culturally western or "white". Even some local Cameroonians who have lived in the states or Europe for a few years can lose their "blackness" and get nicknamed "the white" by their friends.

Fright

Once, I realized I missed a turn, so I pulled over to look at my map. The road was mostly deserted, but a young boy was walking his bicycle up to me, so I took off my helmet, turned to him and said, "Good morning! How are you? Is this the road to Buea?" The boy froze, his eyes went wide, he fumbled with his bike to try to turn it around, gave up, tossed the bike to the ground, turned tail and sprinted 50m away to stop and watch me cautiously. Dumbfounded, I just sat there watching and thinking, "This actually happens?" He didn't return to his bike until after I had ridden away.

Dust

After a few days of unseasonal rain, the true dry season set back in. The result is a lot of dust. I'm told it's better than mud.

Not the best fashion choice in a society that would rather "buy clothes than buy food"

Uphill

On the way way from Kumbo back to Njinikom, the road turned back into the crazy single-track that I'd seen before. This time, however, I had to go up and over a 2500m (8200ft) pass. At one point, the road was so steep that even gunning it in 1st gear wasn't working and I stalled out. It was too steep to push the bike up on my own, so I put it in gear and ran alongside it while gunning the engine of the passengerless bike. After about 10m, I realized that I was running uphill pushing a motorcycle at 8000ft and collapsed, panting. About an hour later, I finally crested the summit and prepared for an equally steep downhill on the other side.

unfortunately there is no inclinometer on my bike, but you'll have to trust me that it's steep

Tumble

I took my first (and hopefully only) two tumbles on the bike around the ring road. Both times I was barely going walking pace, if that, so I was fine and the bike was fine. The first was on a super steep, rocky, single-track of a road from Fundong to Bua Bua. I had stopped to let another bike pass (the locals are crazy on these bikes... I'm impressed) and getting started on the downhill again was tricky, leading my to tip my bike over. No biggie. The second time was taking a turn up a hill on a crazy dusty road just before Kumbo. Turns out dust is slippery. A bruised foot, loose mirror and plenty of "ashias" later, I was back on the road without a problem. 

Repairs

Despite my bike being new, I've had to do a few repairs. I intentionally bought a cheap Chinese bike because I knew it's what all the locals rode, so if I ever had any problems anyone with a wrench could probably help me fix it. In most ways, I was right. My starter cables got caught in my chain once, locking up my chain and back wheel (I was going slow, thankfully) and rendering my bike effectively dead. Within moments, someone passed by, took a look at the damage, and started loosening bolts, tearing out wires, twisting them back together, taping things and tightening bolts again. I was back on the road in an hour. 

Clearly the best location for a repair shop

Other times I'm not so lucky. My front brake was rubbing, so I took it to the street where all the mechanics hang out. Apparently anyone with a box of tools can set up shop and pretend. I think they just mess with people's bikes until eventually they learn what they're doing. The guy who I came to dismantled my brake, then jammed his screwdriver between the pads to jack 'em open (rather than try to adjust the spacing and alignment, which is what I was thinking the plan was). So not only did he mangle the pads, but he also took off a little rubber gasket in the process and took 30 min to put it back together. When he was finally finished and the brake was still rubbing, he said, "oh, it's squeaking?" and applied oil to the disk. Thanks, dude. Nothing is better for a brake than greasing it up, I'm sure. It took a full day of riding the front brake to squeegee all of the oil off so that it could actually provide some stopping power. Win some and lose some, I suppose!

you can see a bit of my starter cable on the bottom there...

Nature

Most of the places I was in were hilly jungles, which leads to lots of waterfalls and pretty vistas:

they smelled nice

NW Cameroon

Met these guys while riding around Mt. Cameroon. They took me to see their swimming hole

This waterfall was surrounded by a church and images of the virgin mary

almost hidden waterfall in a not-so-hidden valley

Bridges

In Africa, you see some crazy bridges. Some are super-modern overpasses that connect to dusty dirt roads on either side:

not nearly enough use to justify it, but it was nice to ride on

Some are leftover from pre-WWI German colonialism:

People still use this one

And some are straight out of Indiana jones:

Locals opt for the ferry here

Villages

I passed through tons of villages on this trip. Some big, some small, some anglophone, some francophone, some with electricity, some not, some with paved streets, others with walking paths. Here are some of the images:

Back in the land of Christ (with some juju mixed in)

Mt. Cameroon (4000+ meters) beyond Buea

A small village school

Said small village (I unfortunately forgot the name)

Snakes

I saw this snake jump from a tree to attack the frog:

gotcha!

Then I think we scared it off and it let go:

Freedom!

End of story.

Bugs

Africa has lots of them. I've seen some crazy spiders and crickets and cockroaches, not to mention all of the flying things that like to eat us.

That's a big pile of termite house

Whatchu lookin' at?

Chimps

In Kumba (SW region), I stayed with a PCV named Ashley for a couple days. She, another Canadian aid worker, and I went up to a local crater lake to go swimming. There are these crater lakes all over Cameroon, and some spit out toxic gas from time to time and kill everyone and everything in the area. We just hoped that this wouldn't happen and headed on up. On the walk in, Ashley was explaining that there were rumors that you could see monkeys along the trail, but that nobody she knew had seen them and the locals all said they had moved away from where people are. As such, we didn't see any monkeys on the walk in despite our eagle-eyed attention to the jungle around us.

Then, while swimming, we heard an insane ruckus from the treetops across the lake. Pretty soon we saw two chimps chasing each other around the trees (it sounded like it must have been at least a dozen, I guess they're just really loud...). Even the locals were psyched, as seen here:

Fascination

Food

Unfortunately, I didn't take many photos of food this time around. Imagine lots of root vegetables (cassava, manioch mostly), or rice or plantains with some sort of sauce or beans or meat.

Acchu.

Next

Off to Gabon and Congo! Hopefully I'll be able to upload some photos along the way.

Paperwork and Pedagogy (and another petit problème)

Pedagogy

While in Douala, I was staying with my friends and hosts, Evan and Lisa. They both teach at the American School of Douala. Evan is a science teacher, working with grades 6 through 10 (9th pictured below), and Lisa is an ELL teacher, working with all grades (8th pictured below). After months of relatively aimless traveling, it was good to have a chance to get a different type of intellectual stimulation and think about teaching again. 

Mr. Murphy teachin' SCIENCE. I got to wear some of his teacher clothes (tie, of course)

Ms. Penor at work with the francophones

"Thinking about teaching", however, only involved a small amount of me actually teaching in the class, although I did do some of that. Mostly, it was Evan and me talking for hours about science (Why do the tropics have two seasons at all? What exactly causes hot air to "rise"? How does solar radiation actually cause things to heat up? Where can we find enough invertebrates for a dozen sixth graders?), and me helping with a lot of the non-teaching things that Evan has on his plate besides planning for 5 different classes every day. One day that was designing new lab tables, one it was trying to figure out what materials one needs in a Chemistry classroom, and one day it was cleaning and taking inventory of the materials he already has:

mm... Pringles

The fun part about being sent to an American School on the other side of the world, is you end up with a collection of whatever past teachers have gathered and discarded, all without the full amount of regulation or oversight that one would see in a school in the states. If I was lucky, the bottles were sealed and labeled. Sometimes, labeled but not quite sealed:

...I'm sure that cap was like that before...

Sometimes, not labeled OR sealed...

Taste test, anyone?

Thankfully, Evan also had three rubber gloves in his inventory (not three pairs), so I was able to wear one of them while working, saving two for emergencies later. For any of you worried about my safety while riding a motorcycle around Africa, rest safe knowing that the more miles I put under my wheels, the further I will be from this cabinet.

Paperwork

The other reason for staying in Douala for a few days was to prepare for that motorcycle trip. I was lucky to find a bike within the first week of being in town, but that was only the first small step in getting ready to take it through several African countries. On top of the receipt of sale, vehicle registration and license plate (for which I'm still waiting), I need insurance (done), a drivers license (eh...), a carnet de passage (kind of like a passport for the bike. I need the registration before I can apply for that) and visas (one down, one to go).

Vroom vroom! At least it's paved here

Sick of waiting and itching to get out of the city, I decided to test my paperwork (mostly a collection of receipts at this point) and head to Yaounde for a few days to apply for my Gabon visa. I had been told that there were several checkpoints on the way where I would have to show my paperwork, but they didn't seem to care about motorbikes. Instead, they pulled over taxis and buses and trucks all around me and waved me on through. The only stop I needed to make was to grab some oil and some delicious Mbongo at a roadside stand.

Mbongo with bushmeat (they called it "antelope") and some starchy roots

Le petit  problème

After the ride to Yaounde, I found that my back wheel was a bit loose (no biggie, right?). Rather than risk the ride back to Douala, I made my third mechanic stop of the trip. Not exactly what I hoped my first week with the bike to look like, but that's how it goes. $8 and a couple hours later, I left with a solid bike and a little more confidence in the melee that is African city traffic.

Wah wah... luckily, it's not $80/hr for labor here

Unfortunately, I didn't take many pictures in Yaounde, so you'll just have to imagine the relentless mosquitos without a bed net (but with plenty of malaria prophylaxis), the simplicity of a 6hr visa from the Embassy of Gabon (most visas take days to weeks to process), water polo and bbq with French EU workers (I am constantly jealous of, thankful for and embarrassed by other nation's linguistic education, especially while I can barely follow a conversation in French, which I studied for 5 years), and trying to keep up with my couchsurfing host, Manu, and his 650cc Honda on my 150cc Lifan (while dodging taxis, motos and pedestrians). I did, however, take this picture on the ride back:

Nature

Paperwork encore 

Now that I'm back in Douala with visa in hand, I still have to wait for a few more documents before I can leave for good. I am planning on heading off for a week or two in Cameroon once I get everything but the carnet, so I at least won't be stuck in a crowded city for the entirety of my visa duration. Adventures await!