Time has slipped by. I have officially been in country for one year now.
I have just returned from a week in France with old friends Mickey and Chris from CA who met me there. It was rainy and cold almost every day, but it was still a wonderful getaway. We laughed, ate, and drank our way thru Paris for 5 days. (Talk about culture shock...my body is still reeling!) It seemed like we ate non stop, always seeking out new restaurants and sampling new wines. I stayed in the Marais at the Hotel Georgette, a charming boutique hotel right near the Pompidou center. We managed to get some walking and exploration in, mostly to the next restaurant! My favorite (culinary) adventure was having brunch at the top of the Eiffel Tower...ridiculously expensive but so wonderful and delicious. I lost count of the courses. We were there for hours. Oh! Did I ever get spoiled!!!! And yes!! We still managed to squeeze in dinner that night! Missing a meal was not on the program! We even squeezed in a day at the French Open (between meals) and got to see Rafael Nadal play! …. a very special treat for me. After Paris, we spent 2 days at the truly fabulous Hostellerie de Levernois in Bourgogne with it’s gorgeous rooms, beautiful grounds and, of course, gastronomic restaurant. It was so hard to get on that plane to come “home”, especially since I knew that M and C would be boarding a plane for Provence later that day….ouch!….but I am back safe and sound…. and constipated) and realized that I had missed my new friends and family here (not the food tho!!). I’m refreshed and ready to get back to work.
Speaking of work, I have been working with my group of 5 mamas to try to get our chicken raising business off the ground. We have been doing so much research. The mamas have been working so hard and doing everything I need them to do and doing it on time!!!!! (what? in Cameroon?). I am having trouble getting it to pencil out...can’t seem to find the profit. We keep coming at it from different angles trying to see where the profit is. It’s taking a lot longer and taking a lot more work than originally planned, but it is so important to get the business off on the right foot! At least, through this process they are learning how to draw up a budget and how to do feasability studies….so it is not lost time to be sure. There is so much cutting of corners and risk taking here to eek out a profit that I am not at all convinced it can be done otherwise. We will see. I have written and re-written the grant proposal. I’ve been totally focused on this project for the past couple of months at the expense of everything else…..wheels spinning. One of the group said to me yesterday that she was becoming discouraged….ouch!….”Non!”, I said, “do not be discouraged, It is the planning phase when we determine what we must do to make it work. This is the hardest part. We have to discover what WILL work….that’s the point of all this work we are doing now. Du courage!!! “ Luckily, the other mamas backed me up. We are going to make this work. The business is named “Cinq Femmes”. Don’t let the picture above fool you. They are full of energy but they were up all night at a “Deuil” (funeral party) the night before.
I don’t know if I mentioned it, but a couple of months ago, some friends (mamas, of course) came over and planted the hell out of my garden, so now, with the rains, I have my garden that you see above full of corn and peanut plants thriving. I’ll eat and share the peanuts and give the corn (mais) to the mamas to prepare or sell as they wish. The mais is not sweet corn, but what we call feed corn in the States. They crush it and make foo foo from it ….balls of mush wrapped in palm leaves….not my favorite thing to eat, not to mention lots of work to prepare. A storm has just rolled in as I type this with thunder, lightening, winds and rain. I love these storms, but as the rainy season progresses, they will become more constant and make it difficult to get out of the house. It will become cold and damp and gloomy every day….full on rainy season. Then I will yearn for the dry season which will become hot and dry and dusty at which time I will yearn for the rainy season. What ever became of spring, summer, winter and fall, I ask myself. But perhaps, when they have returned to me, I will say to myself…”Gee, i miss the rainy season and the dry season….what ever became of those? No, probably not...but I know I will miss my mamas whatever season it is. Yes, probably so…..
