it's in my blood
on Camarooned Clara (Cameroon), 19/Nov/2009 13:57, 34 days ago
Hello.Been a while once more, and am feeling especially incapable of presenting my life in a neat concise paragraph friendly format. I'm sorry.The week's been a memorable one for me– first bout of malaria for one. Yes the one thing I was so desperate to avoid! (in the words of dear mischa: 'I was so sure fear would protect you'... me too love – either that or the repellent/mosquito net/doxycycline all of which I faithfully embraced in my daily routine.) never missed a dose! Well am so glad i've been intoxicating my body everyday with drugs that don't work..?! Hopeless!I was lucky in that I had the cerebral 'kills you within 24 hours' kind - not the lucky part, bear with me- despite being more threatening in the short term it's preferable in the long term as the other kind takes up permanent residence in your liver and can reappear time and again. I personally was not ready for that level of commitment.Sooo a week and several suitably knockout drugs later I am back on my feet and feel alright again. A distinct bonus has been the bags of attention and sympathy from home... ain't nothin like malaria to instill fear and dread into a westerner's bones! The locals don't bat an eyelid of course, death is so commonplace here (not that it makes it any less painful.) From the family planning approach of having 10 kids cos you know 5 will be lucky to make it to high school age, to the motorbike taxi drivers paid 7p a trip to risk their lives so much on the roads out here without so much as a helmet... human life is cheap in cameroon. Which is maybe why they are quite great at celebrating it every day.This weekend I am going to Yagoua which is rather excitingly right on the border... with CHAD! Looking forward to crossing that frontier. And then crossing back twice as fast.Gah!