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Jun
13
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Greetings #4,
Yesterday I found the Cyber Cafe and know I can send emails now. It was actually pretty easy once I logged on to CWIA and figured out how to get my mail. That took a while. Today is the day off so I will go back over and mail these two greetings.
We started clinics on Tuesday. There is an MD, two medical students, nurses, 3 dentists and a hygienist. They have been very busy once they get started in the mornings. We are in the stadium where the meetings are going to be held. It has rained every day and our platform is outside. Better keep praying for miracles. Today we can=t have clinics because there is a Soccer game which we plan to attend this afternoon. The players work out there each day running up and down the bleachers, running in the field and doing exercises. No doubt they are black, they can’t even exercise without their sense of rhythm showing.
The medical patients are mostly suffering from intestinal problems due to contaminated food and water. There have been a couple people with AIDS. The dental has all been pulling of teeth. Hans says they have such solid bones it is difficult to pull their teeth. Poor people they have no chance of getting actual care, due to poverty. The average income is $2000 a year. I can’t do the math on that one considering the price of everything. Actually it bugs me no end we are staying in one of the best hotels. When we work in these places I think we should stay in the most minimal places that are safe and sanitary. All this does is set us apart even further from the nationals. This is one reason they hate Americans – jealousy. We are having to pay $50 a day here. It is clean and comfortable, (but doesn’t’t have a single drawer so I have to literally live out of a suitcase on the floor for the whole time.)
The church has a four dentist clinic here that stays busy. As usual it serves the rich. They do bush dentistry once in a while but have plenty to do right in their own office. By the way, no one asked them before they arranged for us to come. I was riding with the head dentist yesterday and asked why this is scheduled during the rainy season. His comment was, “Well, the powers-that-be, in some other country, were probably looking at their calendars and said, Awe don’t have anything scheduled for November why not do it then?” That makes sense to me, because if logic were what prevailed we would be here in January instead.
I have spent the past two days working on my programs. They don’t have a translator for me. Actually, it is a blessing because I have to redo several talks for Africa and my computer is not behaving well at all, I was so exasperated I was in tears yesterday.
We had an interesting incident two days ago. There was a huge black (what else) guy who thought he was a gorilla (and actually resembled one.) He wasn’t dirty and disheveled like most mentally ill people so maybe he was just high. Anyway, he because infatuated with our bus. He wouldn’t leave it alone. He would rub his face on the windows, Try to lift it, wrap his arms around it and eventually when we got away he chased us for two blocks, running like a gorilla the whole time. It was so weird that everyone on the streets were watching and the traffic came to a complete stop. In fact they even made way for us to Aescape@. Several of the people on the bus freaked out. It was there first day here!
There is a belief in “totems” here. The males are often assigned an animal when they are young which they can morph into. It seems they believe they can actually become the animal. So when people are hunting they have to be careful so they don’t shot Uncle Pogo in case that is they night he decides to morph into a lion or whatever he is. (Actually there are no wild animals here – they have all been eaten.) Anyway, I wondered if that guy was either demon possessed or high on drugs and if the gorilla was his animal. We will never know.
One of our team was “arrested” the other day for taking videos. It seems they are very suspicious that anyone with a camera is a spy. Of course the guy was an idiot. He was across the street from the American Embassy. Since Sept. 11 the street in front of the Embassy has been blocked to traffic with huge cement planter boxes. It was the main street of the city so it is a royal pain to daily travel. I heard on the Cameroonian news the other day that in the USA on Sept 11 hundreds of thousands of Americans died due to terrorists, so now they must be more alert to money laundering activities. Hmmmm, makes we wonder who is giving us a better exchange rate when we change money on the black market.
Enough chit chat. Hope to hear from you soon. Love, Hugs and Prayers,
D
PS Computer help! After one of the many times my computer froze up yesterday my desktop was reshuffled. In the process my taskbar ended up at the top and twice as wide as normal. How do I get it back down?
