A good week indeed

Well, I am still working on my big piece about the North. It may be a while, but i hope it will be worth it.

It has been a pretty good week. It was the first full week we've had in Yaoundé for three weeks, so it was nice to get back into a big of a rhythm. Wednesday, for our Orality and Landscape class, we met with one of the few female artists in Cameroon. Her house is in a nicer part of town, and it absolutely beautiful! She has vines on the side of her house, and flowers everywhere! Not to mention that her art is amazing! She's the only person in Cameroon who does fiber-glass art! Furthermore, she also seemed very interested and knowledgeable about colonization (her father was an ambassador, and so she was always very well aware of the legacy of colonialism), so I might interview her for my honor's thesis, as well as for my colonization paper here. On Thursday, I recieved a package from my parents, which they had sent over a month before. I cannot even describe how happy I was to find Reese's Peanut Butter cups, Twizlers, Crystal Lite, and a host of other American goodies sitting in that box. It certainly made my week!!! Thanks again!

Friday, most of us stayed at the appartment and played charades and just hung out, which was a lot of fun. Saturday I didn't do too much one I came home; just did some work and slept. Very relaxing

Today, I had a meeting with that woman who gave me her book to edit. I met her at Rond Point Express (just down the hill from me), and she treated me to some pastries and a drink. I had met her and her son before, but this time her husband, a nice Cameroonian man, came along as well. They are very much a horse family. Their old German car has a imprint of a galloping horse on its side, and both father and son were wearing legitimate cowboy hats. They really are quite an eccentric family, but very very nice and intelligent. I think that I may end up interviewing the son, who speaks very good English and has studied abroad in England and other places, for my future Honors thesis as well. From our brief talk about it today, he seems to have a good handle on the psychological, as well as physical and economic effects that colonization and decolonization has had, and so I think he'll be a valuable resource.

So we talked about her book, and all the work that needs to be done with it, and then she asked me what she could do for me in return. I said that I would just like to have my name somewhere in the acknowledgments, and if they could teach me to ride a horse, that would be awesome. They said yes to both, and so it looks like I'll be learning to be a Cameroonian cowboy in no time! sweet!

Well, i am going to go keep editing. I want to just power through it so I can hopefully have some time to do my own reading before i leave the country.

Hope everyone on the other side of the pond is doing well! See you in a few months!

Much love,
Andrew