School Exchange

One of the benefits of being a teacher in Cameroon is the social aspect. Every month the staff gets together for an afternoon of slaughtering goats followed promptly by an evening enjoying peppe soup with palmwine. Along with this, many schools also take part in staff exchanges. This entails one school visiting another for a weekend. Last year our school exchange was unfortunately cancelled, but this year was quite a success. We hosted a school from Bafang in the West region, with the exchange starting early on a Saturday morning in December. The staff from the Bafang unloaded from their bus all wearing matching navy blue track suits with their school's name on the back. These tracksuits were the envy of all teachers at our school, and so we made sure to purchase matching grey and black tracksuits of our own. The events of the day included touring through some of the local sites in Batibo, followed by visiting the school's campus. Students waiting to greet the visiting staff had prepared traditional dances and songs which they performed. After viewing the campus, the sports matches began. The first match played was handball, our team started out ahead but ended up losing in the second half. No one seemed overly concerned though, as football is what everyone is most interested in. I was slightly more confident in this game than I was in the student staff game earlier this year, but still felt sufficiently over matched. By halftime the match was still tied, and I subbed myself out. From the sidelines I had a great view of the twilight orange sky above a row of bright green banana trees lining the field. As I sat down at midfield I was immediately offered a hydrating beverage, palmwine. Our school was able to score a late goal which proved to be the deciding one. From here, we split the visiting staff up with local teachers to host them at their various houses. I ended up with about 8 people staying at my house. Luckily I had plenty of baguettes, avocados and hardboiled eggs, which we made into sandwiches, knowing dinner would likely be delayed. We then headed back up to school for dinner followed by dancing, which lasted until about 4am. The next morning we all gathered together one last time for breakfast and to say goodbye to our visitors. Soon enough however, it was time for the return visit. The drive alone was worth the trip. Seeing the landscape of Bafang and the surrounding areas was incredible. The town itself is situated amidst mountains, and in some ways is very similar to many places in the North West. We made sure to visit the chief's palace and then stopped to view a nearby waterfall. A quick visit to the school's campus followed by refreshments was the prelude to the football match. By now I felt somewhat confident and would say I played respectably. Unfortunately the match was ended early due to lack of daylight, and the final result was a draw. After this we identified our respective hosts and prepared to see Bafang by night. It was surprising how big the town was, and touring around it that evening was quite entertaining. We eventually made our way to a hall for dinner and dancing. It was somewhat sad to know this would be one of the last times I'd see teachers from my school at an event like this. But we all made the most of it. The next day we had breakfast together before finally departing. As we drove off I thought about all the similarities between Bafang and my village. In so many ways the cultures and geographies were nearly identical. The only noticeable difference was that French is spoken here as opposed to English. This helped to serve as yet another reminder that unfortunately African's have not been the ones to decide on the borders of African nations.