Carmen is in LA!

Greetings,

Hope everyone and everything is going well. It’s been a good while since I’ve blogged…I had been so busy with my work project. I’m currently in LA for three weeks vacation!  

My Peace Corps Partnership Project, NGO fair, kicked into high gear. The event took place on February 23-24, 2012 at Congress Hall in Bamenda. The main goals of the fair were to bring NGOs together through networking, recruit young people to apply for volunteer work and internships, and participate in an updated NGO directory. The fair was pretty successful – 76 NGO and donor stands, nearly 500 participants, and over 100 potential volunteers attended the two-day event. There’s still work to be done upon my return to Cameroon – engaging in the monitoring and evaluation processes to ensure networking was done, volunteers recruited, and the directory developed. Hopefully people will remain connected as a result of this project.

Check out an on-line article on the NGO fair (it’s in French):

http://africa-info.org/societe/3596-afrique-cameroun-nwado-vso-peace-corps-etats-unis-promeut-les-ong-camerounaises.html

Planning this project was a 15-month endeavor that started in November 2010. The time it took to garner initial support from the community (local NGOs), writing the Peace Corps proposal and getting it approved, raising the money from family & friends back home, raising the money from local Cameroonian businesses, then planning of the event itself was a crazy journey. Event planning is generally stressful. Put this and apply it in the Cameroonian context – organizing meetings where people consistently don’t show up or people are late; Cameroonian male colleagues engaging in chauvinistic and egotistic behavior towards you; dealing with politics within local government; trying to encourage collaboration with others and the others not quite on the same page as you…I’d have to say it was quite an experience that has made me that much stronger. I really have to thank all of my donors, advisors, volunteers, and well-wishers that supported me. I’m so lucky to have amazing people in my life, regardless of where I (or you) am in the world.

Now I am thoroughly enjoying my time at home – spending time with family, catching up with friends, TAKING HOT SHOWERS EVERY DAY, eating so many different kinds of food I’ve missed, drinking beer on tap, sitting on my couch, sleeping on a comfortable mattress, watching the Lakers beat the Celtics, filling out my March Madness bracket, observing everyone use features on their touch-screen iPhone, deciding if I want to watch The Hunger Games when it comes out, plans to beach/museum/club, etc., etc., etc. I’ve REALLY missed LA. It’s made me realize that I can’t be stay out of the country for too long at a time.

Anyway, people have been thinking that I’m back for good. Not quite yet…I fly back to Cameroon on the 28^th. Upon my return, I will stay in the capital Yaounde for one week for my Close-of-Service (COS) conference before I head back to my post in Bamenda. There I will learn my official COS date to return to the United States! It should be between July and August 2012. I’ll spend the last few months wrapping up my work and preparing for the next Peace Corps volunteer that will replace me. So crazy how fast time flies!

Will keep everyone posted on my COS date in the upcoming weeks…

xoxo