11:00AM -- Saturday is cleaning day! I hand-washed some laundry, washed the dishes from
last night, and cleaned the kitchen and bathroom.
12:30PM
-- Pancake time! PCMO (Peace Corps Medical Office) sent a recipe
for banana pancakes in this week’s health email. Now, America Maria totally would have cringed
at the thought of banana pancakes. First
of all, bananas? Yuck! Second of all,
why would you ruin something as delicious as a pancake by throwing fruit into
it?! Absurd! That said, Cameroon Maria doesn’t despise
bananas as much as America Maria does, and I was intrigued by this recipe which
only called for two ingredients: bananas
and eggs.
So I made banana pancakes!
And then I ate banana pancakes! And
they were delicious! (Thank you, Dr. Angela!)
2:00PM -- I had been waiting for Mr. Mfugue to call me
about his daughter’s wedding, but he probably had a bit too much on his mind
(understandably), and thus forgot. In
Cameroon, there are three types of wedding ceremonies: the traditional wedding with the dowry (the
groom’s family gives the bride’s family a lot of money and food items: rice, plantains, bananas, oil, fish, chickens,
goats, pigs, beer, wine, whiskey, soda, etc.), a state wedding, and a church
wedding. Today, Mr. Mfugue’s daughter
and her fiancé were to be married by the state: a short 30-minute ceremony at
the mayor’s office during which they sign marriage certificates, followed by a
celebration at home.
The ceremony was to take place “in the afternoon.” The last state wedding that I attended
in Akono was supposed to be at noon and didn’t actually start until
3:00PM. Unable to get ahold of Mr.
Mfugue (his village has no cellphone service), I just assumed that “in the
afternoon” probably meant later rather than sooner. At 2:00PM I walked on over to the mayor’s
office, only to find that it was closed.
Hmmm... I popped into
Rashida’s tailor shop to sit and chat for a bit.
When I told her I was waiting for the wedding, she said that a ceremony
had just finished, and the party left around 1:45PM to go back to village. Dang!
(It’s okay – someone showed me a 30-minute recording of it later, and I
learned that I really didn’t miss much).
I went home to grab my motorcycle helmet and then hopped on
a moto to Mfida 4.
The wedding party was wearing matching pagne on the dance floor
while men in fancy suits dozed off in rented plastic chairs on the
sidelines. I walked around back to find
Mr. Mfugue nursing a glass of whiskey.
He pulled up a chair for me and he introduced me to his family members
as they passed by. His introduction typically went something like this: "This is my American daughter! We've known each other for a year, and she visits often. And you want to know the most amazing part? Her mother and brother came to visit! They came here to this house! Her real Mom! From America!!"
When it was time to eat, we were assisted to our seats; Mr. Mfugue was
seated next to the bride, and I was seated outside with a bunch of lively 20-something
year old guys, (who Mr. Mfugue repeatedly came outside to semi-jokingly warn to
keep their hands off me, thanks Pop!)
After dinner, they fired up the music again. I joined hands with a couple young girls and we danced our hearts out for a few songs.
 |
| To my left is Mary, Mr. Mfugue's adopted daughter and my good friend. The other people -- well, I have no clue who they are, but they wanted to be in the photo too! |
6:30PM -- Eventually
the sun began to set and it was time for me to return home. I said my goodbyes to Mr. Mfugue and his
family, and got a ride back to Akono with some of the other guests.
Topped off the day by hanging out with a buddy on skype! =]
No comments:
Post a Comment