This note was sent out to all volunteers and I thought some of you reading this might be interested in participating. Kaitlin, the woman who is running this is a friend of mine. I will not be personally involved, but I'm confident it will be very well run- so to speak...


January 16, 2004


Greetings from Dusty Cameroon,

We hope everyone is enjoying the New Year. We are planning a Women’s Day road race for March 6th, 2004 in Bamenda Cameroon. Women’s day is a national holiday in which women celebrate their womanhood. As Peace Corps Volunteers living in Cameroonian communities we see the effects of HIV/AIDS daily. 2 out of 3 people living with HIV/AIDS in Africa are women. As a result, we feel it necessary to promote HIV/AIDS awareness and the importance of a healthy lifestyle to the women. Last year Peace Corps Volunteer Kaitlin Haws organized a 5km road race in her small village. It was a huge success with over 100 women participating in the race. This year we are hoping to expand the race to the city of Bamenda with 500 runners. After the race we are planing to have a health fair run by Cameroonians to share information about HIV/AIDS, obesity, diabetes, and family planning.

Peace Corps fully supports our initiative however due to budget constraints Peace Corps is unable to assist us financially. Therefore we are soliciting you, our friends and family, for your financial support to organize this race and fair. According to our budget we anticipate needing $3000. We are aware that this is a lot of money, yet every little bit counts. In the event that we do not receive the full $3000 we are still planing to hold a health fair for women’s day. This has the potential to impact more than 5,000 people living in the Bamenda area, who are at a great risk for HIV/AIDS and other diseases.

If you are interested in donating some money to the ‘Bamenda Cameroon Women’s Day Race March 6th 2004’ or if you are not personally interested but know someone who might be please pass this email on the them. All checks should be made out to Pat Vaughan and should be sent to The Vaughan’s, 4038 Thornoaks Ann Arbor, Michigan 48104. We ask that all checks be sent before February 1st, 2004. (Due to our geographical constraints Kelly’s father is collecting the money, which will be wired to the race account in Cameroon. If you contribute money please email Kaitlin at kaitlinzoe@yahoo.com with your name and the amount for our records.)

We will provide receipts for tax purposes, a report on the race, and a photo to all that donate.

Thanks in advance,

Kaitlin Z. Haws and Kelly A. Vaughan

Another bunch of photos. Most of this one is when I visited my homestay family in Bandjoun after Thanksgiving. These are by far the best photos of them, although not all of the kids are represented. There are 13, and every kid in these pictures is part of the same family. All of the closeup photos of the inside and outside of the house is where I was living for my first three months in this country.

At the end are the beginning photos of the trip to Limbe. The guy doing the acrobatics is my friend Khalil who is a volunteer in a village called Loum.

Photos

and here are a few photos from the meeting we had in Limbe in the middle of December. As you can see, most of the fun was had on the beach- yes that's me getting buried in the volcanic sand by a bunch of kids...

Photos

These are some photos a friend of mine took over the past couple of months. I'm in some of them...


Photos

Monday, December 22, 2003

My its been a while since I've written, and its because life has been quite busy in the past few weeks, I haven't had a chance to settle down and write it all down!

After Thanksgiving, I returned to Edéa for a mostly calm week until Saturday when I was picked up by Tyrone, the Peace Corps Director of the Small Enterprise Development program- my boss, on the way to our week-long training in the beach town of Limbé. I figured since he had to pass right through my town on his way there, I might as well ride with him! Since we got there a day early, I ended up staying with my friend Mike, who lives in Limbé, right on the ocean- rough life. We all went out to dinner with Tyrone for a nice meal seaside of roasted chicken and fries after which we went to an outdoor bar with live music and dancing. It was great fun, and of course I had to get up and make a fool of myself.

Sunday, a bunch of us who were already in town met up with Sonny for a ride in his pickup out to the beach for the day. Sonny is a one-in-a-million type guy. He's from rural Mississippi, south of Jackson and grew up a crop-duster. He decided that he would use his experience in crop-dusting travel the world. So, now he's in Cameroon living on the beach with his pickup truck. Three times a week he gets in his bi-plane and crop-dusts cocoa and coffee plantations and gets paid very well by local standards. Just a good-ole boy, never meanin' no harm...

The beach is a black sand volcanic beach next to Mt. Cameroon, the largest mountain in Western Africa. Obviously, this makes for a dramatic tropical backdrop from which to enjoy swimming!

When we finally checked into the hotel where the training was to be held, there was a large spread of food awaiting us. After we had finished eating, a group of women performed some traditional dances for us. The last of these, I have gotten used to and it requires appreciating the dancers by dancing with them and giving them money. What happens is the dancers come around and choose a man to dance with. This is signaled by putting a scarf or towel around their necks. The man is then expected to get up, shake it a little and place paper money of some denomination on the lead dancers forehead, where due to sweat, it usually sticks. We don't always get along, but Tyrone, who sent the dancers my way in the first place, seemed quite happy that I got into it.

The conference itself was quite boring, and I won't get into the details. The biggest problem from our perspective was that one person from each of our banks was there, which forced the conference to be in french and much more formal. If we had been there alone, we could've concentrated on more sharing of best practices with how to cope with daily life in a micro-credit bank in Cameroon. Each night we tried to decompress by chosing a different restaurant on the water to eat, drink and catch up on the last three months we had spent apart.

On the way back to Edéa from the conference, about five of us stopped at Kristen and Peter's place in Douala. Kristen, Isabelle's friend from DC who lives the expat life and whom I have hung out with several times, had invited us over for a lunchtime conference call. Kristen is a member of Democrats Abroad, and on the call that day was none other than Howard Dean to answer questions from concerned Americans around the world. Kristen got to ask the first question, about Dean's policy on renewable energy and throughout the call, Dean was impressive. He was knowledgeable yet personable. He was really able to convey that he truly cared about the issues and was not a stiff Gephardt-like politician.

Several friends followed me back to Edéa to rest for a day or so before heading on home. The refrain I kept hearing was "This is not Peace Corps". I was hoping they were referring to my innovative interior decorating, but I'm pretty sure they were talking about the large kitchen, air-conditioning and hot water.