A day in the life of an organisational development advisor...

Life in my compound begins with the call to prayer at 4:30am.  I had no idea that such an hour as 4:30am existed until the mosque near my house installed speakers; now their call to prayer is so loud my house practically shakes with it.  

Not being muslim, I refuse to leave my bed until at least 7:30am, at which point I go to the bathroom to make use of the first of my Great Luxuries: running water.  My shower is somewhat temperamental, in that more water comes out of the unidentified pipes on the wall than out of the shower head.  Taking my morning shower therefore requires me to run back and forth between the various torrents while taking care not to slip on soap suds or passing spiders.

Having decided to avoid Men on Honda Street, my bike and I wobble down the longer but infinitely more scenic route to work.  On our way we pass some or all of the following: herds of cows, sheep or goats that wander down the centre of the road, apparently without anyone to mind them; groups of children who shout 'nasaara' (white person) to get my attention before dissolving into fits of giggles (I've never been able to figure out what's so funny); the man who lives by the side of the road and holds long conversations with himself in Fulfulde; vultures with great hulking backs and tiny pink heads who pick at discarded trash; market vendors selling fruit, vegetables and phone cards, who think my name is 'chérie'; thousands upon thousands of lizards; women selling beans and beignets (doughnuts), the oh-so-sumptuous meal that is going to render me the only person to go to Africa and actually put on weight.

I arrive at the MDDHL office and begin Work.  It turns out that VSO intends for its volunteers to do very little Work - we are supposed to assist others in doing more and better Work themselves, as apparently this is more sustainable.  Currently I'm preparing a workshop that will explain all this to my colleagues: I hope to temper the news that they'll all have to do more Work by investing in a bountiful supply of tea and croissants; however I fear they may see through this strategy.

Some time between 12pm and 1pm I break for lunch with my two nasaara colleagues; some time between 2pm and 3:30pm we come strolling back into the office to discover that everyone else is still on their lunch break.  Everyone, that is, except Yacoubou, who is a constant presence behind his desk at all hours of the day, even when (as is currently the case) he has malaria.

Twice a week at 3ish our Fulfulde teacher arrives.  His name is Oumarou and his 'real job' is as a talent scout for professional football players.  This means that at a moment's notice he may be sent to some far-flung corner of the continent to retrieve a promising young player and escort him somewhere equally far-flung.  Such is the case today, and so Sarah (my partner in crime for Fulfulde classes and other Work-avoidance schemes) are planning to sit down with our copious sheets of illegible notes and see if we are capable of teaching ourselves.  We may even do a better job than Oumarou, who sees nothing wrong with jumping from the present tense to the subjunctive when he knows very well that we can barely say 'hello'.

In the evenings I cycle home.  The light here is so beautiful around 5:30pm that the whole city appears to be under some kind of enchantment, and even the cries of 'nasaara! nasaara!!' can't disturb my peace.  I arrive at my house to find Babadou, Abdoulaye's cat, waiting for me to let him in.  He spends about an hour scuffling about the living room, looking for trouble and tinned fish, before eventually getting bored and wandering off.

Each evening the question of how to fill the hours of darkness between 6pm and whenever I decide to go to bed is raised.  Occasionally I find that the solution is to go to bed at 6pm, but mercifully there's usually enough going on in Maroua to keep me occupied.  Fried fish, grilled chicken, and even pizza and banana bead (courtesy of a fellow volunteer's chef boyfriend) are all a moto-taxi ride away, as are the houses of various volunteers who are often equally baffled as to how to kill time in the evenings.

On weekends Maroua fills up with volunteers coming in from the villages, looking for entertainment.  So far this has meant that a large and raucous group of ex-pats has gathered at The Bar Opposite the Chicken Place (to use its official name) drinking Cameroonian beer and eating fried chicken with their fingers in the dark, so that you cannot tell until you put it in your mouth whether what you are attempting to eat is chicken, bone, slice of onion or random stray insect.

So that's what I do all week.  Not a bad life, all told.

Unwanted Attention

Are all the men in Maroua completely mad?

One evening, shortly after I arrived home, there was a knock at my door.  It was Bogo, my landlord's mother in law, who handed me a sheet of paper and launched into a long explanation in Fulfulde, not a word of which I understood.  The sheet turned out to be a letter addressed to someone called 'Jeanne' and signed 'Dieudonné' (yes, literally 'God given').  Being that my name wasn't Jeanne, I had never heard of a Dieudonné and Bobo's insights into the matter were lost on me, I decided to ignore the letter.

A week later a young man with glasses and a baseball cap appeared on my doorstep.  When I opened my fly-screen door to see who it was, he greeted me like an old friend and asked me if I was settling in well.  I have a terrible memory for faces but I was sure that I had never seen this person in my life before.  I asked him who he was and he replied in astonishment, 'Mais c'est moi, Dieudonné!'  I wracked my brain and then remembered the note.  'Didn't you receive my letter?' he asked.  'Yes,' I replied, 'but my name isn't Jeanne.'  'But you're a new VSO volunteer.  I do a lot of work with VSO,' he continued, 'helping new volunteers to settle in.'

At this point he made a gesture to come into the house, but I blocked his path.  'So you work for VSO?' I asked.  'Well, not exactly,' replied Dieudonné.  'I assist VSO volunteers if they need help.  'But if you don't work for VSO, what do you do?'  Pause.  'Actually, I'm a student teacher... but I appreciate the work that VSO does and I want to help VSO volunteers.'  Again he tried to enter the house and again I had to stand in his way.  'Could I have a glass of water?' he asked, finally.  'Of course,' I replied, and as he again made his way up my front steps I closed the fly-screen in his face and left him outside as I filled a glass from my water filter.  Thinking back, I wish I'd given him amoeba-water straight from the tap.

By the time I brought him his glass, Dieudonné had recovered himself and immediately launched into a detailed description of all the VSO volunteers he was friends with.  As I heard names I recognised I began to feel guilty about treating him so coolly - had I just insulted someone's best friend?  I mentally chastised myself for  being so mistrusting of people's motives, and so when he asked for my phone number, I couldn't think of a single reason to say no.

My suspicions had not gone away, however.  The next day I decided to investigate Dieudonné's background from the many volunteers he had listed as 'close friends'.  Of the ones who had heard of him, most said that he had randomly turned up at the Baptist Mission in an identical manner to my encounter, alleging an alliance with VSO and promising to help them with any problems they had settling in.  Some people were concerned by what had happened and encouraged me to do something about it.  'You should tell Abdoulaye,' they warned.  'If Dieudonné knows where you live then it could get more serious.'

My relationship with Abdoulaye is two-fold: he is in charge of VSO volunteer welfare in Maroua, and he is also my landlord.  My little house, squeezed into his compound, is so close to his that I wake up if one of his wives so much as coughs in her sleep.  I cannot begin to describe how comforting it is to live within a stone's throw of someone whose job it is to keep me alive and out of trouble.

Abdoulaye has already caught on to how completely daft I am (whenever he explains things such as how to pay the water bill or where to empty my rubbish bin, he turns to me and says 'Do you understand?  Are you sure?').  For this reason I was a little hesitant to relate my Dieudonné story to him, especially as I had so rashly given away my phone number.  'Well that wasn't prudent,' was all he said when I eventually told him, 'but if you hang up whenever he calls you, he'll get the message,'  As an afterthought, he added, 'If he keeps calling, tell him you have a fiancé.'

Dieudonné called and texted at all hours of the day and night and wasn't in the least put off my my non-response or by my hanging up on him.  In an effort to avoid surprise visits I spent my evenings at friends' houses, not returning home until after 9pm.  Thinking myself finally safe after a lull in the phone calls, on Tuesday evening I invited some other volunteers over for a curry at my house.  Realising that after several days of avoiding my house I had not so much as washed a plate in a week, I headed home early to start scrubbing pots and peeling vegetables.

About ten minutes after I arrived, Dieudonné appeared at my door.  'Can I come in?' he asked.  'I'm busy tonight,' was all I could think of to say.  'What about tomorrow night?' he continued hopefully.  My British phobia of being rude to people can be really inconvenient sometimes!  As I stood in the doorway, stammering, trying to think of a polite way to say 'sod off,' Abdoulaye suddenly marched around the corner towards us.  'Are you Dieudonné?' he asked.  When Dieudonné replied, Abdoulaye launched into a furious tirade in Fulfulde.  Snippets were in French and so I caught '...you can't just come to volunteers' houses uninvited...' '...taking advantage of people who are new to the country...' '...no connection with VSO...' '...her house is private...' .  Having said all he needed to say, Abdoulaye turned and went back to his house.  Dieudonné, slightly shaken, turned to me and said, 'so can I come in?'  

'My fiancé doesn't like me having male friends in my house,' I replied upon a sudden burst of inspiration.  It seemed I had found the magic word that could do what even an angry onslaught of abuse in Fulfulde couldn't: Dieudonné apologised for troubling me, turned and walked straight out of the compound.  I haven't had a single call from him since.

The next day, I was cycling home from work when I head the sound of a motorbike behind me.  I moved closer to the side of the road to allow the bike to pass, but instead of continuing down the road, the biker cut across in front of me and tried to block my path.  As my bicycle is slightly too big for me, I try to avoid stopping (and therefore falling over) whenever possible and have turned wobbling precariously around obstacles into a sort of art form.  I therefore somehow managed to circumnavigate my interceptor and carried on cycling, speeding up so as to put some distance between us.  

The biker accelerated and then I realised that there were two of them, both well-dressed, in their thirties and riding large Hondas.  One drew level with me and the other followed behind.  At this point I started to panic.  I tried to maintain a passive expression and ignore them but this became more difficult when they again attempted to cut in front of my bike.  'Leave me alone!' I shouted to the first biker.  'I won't leave you alone!' he shouted back.  I sped up and he kept pace with me (to be fair, I can't cycle very fast and he was on a motorbike).

Not knowing what else to do, I reached into my pocket and pulled out my mobile phone.  Before I could even dial the number, the bikes were gone.  I called my friend Calla who lived about two blocks away and five minutes later I was recovering in her living room, trying not to burst into tears.  When I recounted the story of my traumatic encounter, first to Calla, then to some friends and finally to my work colleagues, they all concluded that the men had simply wanted to talk to me.  And they couldn't think of a better way to get my attention?!  

Anyway, I'm fully recovered now and according to my Theory of Limited Fear (in that I cannot be afraid of too many things at once else I'd be in danger of spontaneously combusting) Men on Hondas have replaced cockroaches on my list of Scary Things.  Which means I'm no longer afraid of entering my bathroom, and that can only be a good thing.