National Youth Day

No matter how long you live in Cameroon, there will always be new experiences you have that reopen your eyes and make you remember, "Oh.... right, I live in Africa." After nearly seven months of living on African time and having "white man" yelled at me daily and often going without electricity or internet or even water, I've come to accept this as normal. But yesterday, on Cameroon's National Youth Day, I was reminded that this is definitely not my country, and there are countless things I have yet to experience, let alone understand.

Much like some holidays in America, Youth Day is celebrated by a parade of sorts down Commercial Avenue, the main street in downtown Bamenda... but however similar the idea, the execution was.... well, not really similar. In any way. No floats, horses, fancy cars, or baton-twirling acrobats paraded down the street - instead, every single school in and around Bamenda came to march in somewhat-straight lines through downtown, arms swinging and teachers yelling. And everyone else in and around Bamenda came to watch.

I have never felt so white before. Not even the first time I came to Cameroon, because then I was surrounded by the Jacksons, team members, and other expats. Yesterday it was just me and Sarah in a sea of brown heads turning to stare, shout, catcall, laugh, and grab at us. I'm glad I went and had the experience, but the day was fraught with misadventures... Such as waiting for over thirty minutes at the side of the road for a taxi, every single one of which was crammed with people, before trekking back up the hill and getting Papa Karissa to drive us into town. And losing Maimu, a small, blue-clad girl with braids in the ocean of schoolchildren wearing blue uniforms and braids for a terrible ten minutes. And walking the entire way from Commercial Avenue to Mile 3 and home sweet home, because we couldn't find a taxi back.... that only took about an hour and a half! Thankfully we had water, as well as some money, so we stopped at a few gas stations along the way for delicious pineapple and mango juice to fortify our weary, sunburned souls.

These misadventures are just Cameroon's way of helping us stay flexible, right? Haha. It actually really wasn't that bad, and I got to experience the celebration of a national holiday, Africa-style! Whooo! I'm pretty sure all crowds I encounter from here on out will look like fun little gatherings, all summer heat and humidity tolerable, and all eardrum-bursting noises just "kinda loud." If you want extreme, come to Africa.

So you get an idea of the insane amount of people there were!
And Commercial Avenue goes off into the distance awhile longer...