The Legacy of a Godmother

Allow me to commence this present post with an apology for what shall most probably be the most egregious example of my inability to formate and spell check. For you see, I shall be doing all from my iPad. This is not, let me state lest mine action be misconstrued, an attempt at honoring the late Steve Jobs, but rather it is out of necessity. My computer, you see, has perished from an epidemic that razed all the computers of Cameroon. It is likely that I shall salvage it. Indeed, I have handed my computer over to a graduate of Augustans college, and is great Viking merely nodded when he saw the problem and asked to see my flash drive. How, I expressed in wonderment, did he know I had such. He said simply that every computer in Cameroon feasts upon the host that is the USB drive. And. So, when once upon a time I carried my exam to school in my flash drive I took from that experience a way for my computer to become most ill. From here on, I shall email myself files, if indeed there is a from here on. I shall wait to make any indicative statements till the computer be settled upon my desk once more.

Some might express surprise that I have a computer and an iPad along. Is such not technological overkill? I want to emphasize that the iPad is far from a word processor and for the length of my communiques, much less the expose on Blake from a few weeks back or the intense brainstorms toward a dissertation that I write, I require the rapidity that a keyboard encourages. Further, the iPad rejects several online features like flash, which I use on some sites from which I steal text book materials and from which I must acces ceretsin sites within which I download PDFs.

Now this has been quite a week, and if my computer had not broken you would know none of the reasons why for I had a much different experience planned for ye readers of integrity. But instead I present you the wonder of the last weeks of the last time I shall experience October whilst in my twenty-fifth year.

My mother, the pastor Erika, was once a pastor of a paradise called Roseni. Here a small child frolicked through cornfields, stole combine rides from noble Norwegian farmers named Don, lost himself in a system of culverts and hunted crawdads. And when barbed wire cut his thigh, a bandaged poultice from torn maple leaves served to staunch the blood. Why, you may ask, to I delve into the depths of such memory? After all, I did not begin this series of blogs with a comment on the state of my candle before falling asleep (apologies for the recondite Proust reference). It is because I have had recourse to a lesson delivered to me in those early days of misted memory. One of my marvelous godmothers is a beautiful woman named Janette, and among her many skills is the ability to squarsh with her foot bared to the elements any cricket that might come her way. I have exaggerated memories of her tripping the light fantastic through our garage and across thousands of insect carapaces, though in reality I am sure I only saw her perform this feat once.

Well, here in Cameroon, in preparation for the dry season, I was allowed a rare glimpse into a phenomenon of crickets. Sunday night out of nowhere one leapt into my chateau. But these are not our darling black small crickets that an intrepid children's literary journal taked for its name. No, these are two inch flying beasts and they coated the floor within moments. They search water, you see, and every morning the ground is littered with the desiccated corpses of those who failed in their quest. Now that these bugs would come was a closely guarded secret from Phil and one that caused much surprise, I will admit. However, I was well prepared for I had fortified myself with the legacy of my godmother and once an hour I sally forth like George of the red cross across the battlefield of my concrete floor and percuss the night with the splintering of their backs and in the morning sweep them out the front door where they remain about an hour before they are born away to the happy mastication of ants.

That made me seem rather bloodthirsty, didn't it. But you must understand that these crickets interrupt my evening readings of Shakespeare, the complete works of whom I am currently completing.

On Saturday I also had a nice first for the year, I got a haircut. My last was in Peru last christmas while dancing south from the beacher's hedonism of Huanchachou. I decided to do so in the midst of severe abdominal cramping. (readers less inclined toward knowing my digestive awesomeness might want to skip a few paragraphs). I had been since thursday rather constipated. I, and I have since learned better, thought that the best way to solve this problem was to eat some fruits to get things working again. Consequently I bought about 1,000 francs worth of bananas. Now this provided me with about sixteen bananas and I ate them over two days. It turns out that bananas have a rather opposite effect from the laxative and I found myself greatly discomfited. I went to a pharmacy and purchased some laxatives, though I don't think they really worked, I took up daily Constitutionals of an hour and ate a raw potato and carrot every day. Still nothing happened. Friday, going out for our evening meal at he coffee shop, I ordered Ndole, a dish rather similar to the horta of Greece, and a few hours later found myself splendidly emptied. But, let me warn any yet again, bananas are not a purgative.

Ahh, but I was talking about a haircut before I turned from the hirsute to the scatologic. It was easy enough as there are little huts every few hundred yards with young men eager to couper les cheveux. All they seem to need is a mirror, an electric razor, and a chair. After all, most men here basically shave their heads and keep their scalps as close to the air as possible. And so into one of these wind unresistant huts and got a haircut for only five hundred francs (a bit over a dollar). He did it all with an electric razor too. I shall try and post a picture next week.

I thought that some would notice, but the entirety of Ngaoundere seemed to stand up and renew their subscriptions to GQ. The lady from whom I purhcase tomatoes said I was now tres beau. From the avocado lady I heard that I was well improved. From Phil I was more distinguished, but the greatest joy came from my students. In the three classes I went into that Monday I received three standing ovations, three iterated shouts of excellent, bien, finalement, hoots and hollers, and from one class a much appreciated "bonjour Jonas brother". it was a bit over the top, and I did not have enough on the top to protect myself!

Of course to regain some status as an eccentric, I began planning and th perfect moment arose Thursday morn when I spotted a small flower in a cranny wall (reference to Tennyson). I plucked it and placed it behind my ear, well, ne'er have my students been so distracted and upset my their feminized teacher. They could not sit still till I removed it, and once I did so I leaped into recitations of Romantic poetry to try and bash poetically through this stigma of difference that is so horrifying to all. It was crushingly disappointing.

Friday, are your tired eyes releived they near the end?

out of nowhere this week we were informed by the Cameroonian secretary of pedagogical bilingualism that the English club would report to the radio station 102.5 for a program that would be recorded and then aired on saturday afternoon. The english club gathered three timed in preparation and put together a truly admirable program involving two discussions of cholera, a thoughtful essay on bilingualism, and several poetic readings. Interspersed were songs sung en masse. We came to the station and all was going well. Until, that is, Madame secretary informed me that though the whole program would be in English, she would ask me my questions in French and expect answers similarly. Well, thank goodness for the warning, at last I managed to convince her to let me know the questions before hand so that I might deploy my limited vocabulary in the best way possible. Turns out one of those questions was how I was using the "ten minute bilingual game" in my class. Ha, I have nothing but contempt for the bilingual game and no one has yet to use it. But we were trapped in this radio station, forced to submit to the indomitable will of an educational government that turns out drones and elects the same man despite the fact that the rest of the world moves forward. I was bound and enchained myself to the yoke if mendacity that we all must endure and like yet another ox I pulled forward propaganda.

Oui, Madame, j'ai trouver beaucoup les choses interessants avec cet program. Il y a plusiuers les elevees qui aiment le jeu. Le plus reussi activite, que j'ai trouver, etait un discussion philosophique sur le role du traduire culturel, literaire, et personnel.

Pardon the spelling, but this program insists on auto correcting and does so even when forbid it. But for the most part, especially errors of grammar, I can be blamed.

Anyway, I spoke for about four minute. Some of what I said was vraiment, namely the fact that my students think it is funny when try to speak French for more than merely a quick phrase and also that they applaud me when I create a phrase well.

Upon my return from the station and after shopping, I returned to school to look for my notebook that I seem to have misplaced. Well it was not in my last 4e class, but one student was in the area I wished him a nice weekend and told him to practice the passive voice. He responded, roughly, "please, sir, I don't understand the passive". What a rally cry for a teacher. With a flourish I dashed into the nearest classroom sniffing out a blackboard and calling for chalk. Slinging off my backpack of groceries with one hand I swung my hand to the outsert he'd piece of chalk with the other and Woochie and I proceeded to have a roaring grammar lesson for about twenty minutes. At the end, when he had such a grasp on the passive voice that he was no longer eating beans but the beans were eaten by him, I pushed the tension from my shoulders and turned around to a small crowd of about seven others who had gathered for the lessons, three of whom were taking notes, and none of whom were my students.