Bienvenue a Tchamba

Yesterday was my first day at my post. This week is post visit. Tami, who is the volunteer i am replacing, just left this morning. Now the only two white people in the city are me and Heather who is a CHAP (community health and aids prevention) volunteer.

my opinion of this place? awesome. i am very happy with this small city. my house is georgous and i have a little court yard and a front porch and stuff. i have a huge living room, a huge bedroom, a huge bedroom with a proper shower and a flush toilet, i even have a guest bedroom. how friggen sweet is that? i cannot wait to have visitors, whether they are from the US or from other villages.

Affo is the name of my homologue. his role is to help me get stuff done. if i want to start a club or something, i talk to my boy Affo and he helps sort me out. yesterday he took me all around the city to meet different people such as the gendarmes, the police, the chief etc. This morning, before tami left, she took me to the big school (seriously, its huge) and introduced me to some important people. word is going around the village that i am replacing tami and that she is skipping town back to the US.

i am so friggen excited to start my service. at the end of this week i have to get myself back to the training village, Agou, which is about 4 or 5 hours away for the last 5 weeks of training. honestly, i dont want to. i want to stay here and start making friends around the village and hang out in the bar and go to the school and talk to the kids and chill in my belle maison.

i will take pictures of my house and around town and maybe they will make it to the internet. but it is extremely slow and they may never make it onto the internet. the internet cafe i am in right now is about a 5 minute walk from my house and its pretty cheap, so i will definitely have regular internet access.

also, i talked to nicole on the phone yesterday and she has not recieved the letter that i sent a while ago, nor any letter since then. ive written many letters since ive been here and one might be on its way to you, just be patient. yesterday i got a letter from sarah which she sent on september 9th.

i cant tell myself this enough: this is going to be a 27 month lesson in patience.

also:
"In the Harry Potter universe this is the hometown of the Quidditch team the Tchamba Charmers" -wikipedia... really?
and you can bet that i will be all over this wiki page by the time i leave...