Baseline perspective

Today's New York Times has an article on air travel in Africa, and in Cameroon in particular. I can totally relate to the author's frustrations, but the guy's story really isn't that bad. His flights to and from Cameroon left on the scheduled day, he had the means to buy a ticket, he got a partial refund from Kenya Airways, and most importantly, he arrived at his destination.

I have some pretty bad air travel stories from the country that is near and dear to my heart. I flew more my second year because I was posted up north and air travel was more reliable than the train, which is pretty sad.* On one trip from Garoua to Yaounde we made an unscheduled stop in N'Djamena, which not only is in a different country but is NOT on the way from point A to point B. On a trip to West Africa for Christmas vacation, I got bumped from an Air Afrique (now bankrupt) flight because my elbows weren't sharp enough to push my way to the front of the line. The following day, when the next flight left, my elbows were sharper. And my final domestic flight when I was leaving my post never happened because the planes stopped coming to Garoua for some reason. Instead, I took the overnight train with all my crap in tow. I had stopped taking the train because on my last trip we got in a minor train wreck, but when faced with not being able to leave the country or take my chances, I opted for the latter.

Other volunteers have worse stories, like plummeting several thousand feet while in-flight or seeing bloody cow carcasses come down the baggage carousel. But this isn't a contest.

I think the point of this post is that it is all about perspective. Cramped in coach with no peanuts isn't really that bad. When things don't happen when they are supposed to, I just try to remember the time when I waited a day - a day! - for a bush taxi to leave my first post in Mamfe, only for the bush taxi to arrive at 4 PM and then tell everyone waiting that it would leave the following morning. Or if I'm ever uncomfortable, I just think about when I was smashed in the back seat of a two-door Toyota Tercel holding 7 other adults for the 5 hour journey over an old logging road, the only passable road from Kumba to Mamfe in the rainy season.

And if I ever think that I had it bad, I just think about the volunteer who was posted in the East province near the C.A.R. border. A one-way trip to the capital took three days. See? Perspective.


*If you think I omitted an option by road, I did not.

Fashion Victim

I'm unimpressed by fashion labels, mostly because I don't care and I think that designer clothes are a waste of money. However, I do notice them, usually because they irritate me. I especially dislike clothes or accessories where the label is the design, like when logos or letters form the pattern of a purse or something like that. On women, a Louis Vuitton handbag can be fine.* But men, as a general rule, should stay away from pattern-y fashion labels.

Today I was in for a treat. While waiting for the train on the way home from work, alongside me stood a confused gay** tragedy. The (thankfully young) guy wore: an unidentifiable brand of designer jeans, pattern-y Coach tennis shoes, a Louis Vuitton belt with a big gold "LV" buckle, an Abercrombie t-shirt, a Burberry shoulder bag, Dolce & Gabanna sunglasses, and, get this - a pattern-y Louis Vuitton baseball cap. Oh, and he had a gold Motorola Razr phone with a custom download.

I am not making this up. I wonder if all of it was genuine, but the sheer tackiness of the Louis Vuitton baseball cap makes me think the outfit was one big knockoff. Come to think of it, the gold "LV" buckle was a little too shiny. Maybe the $30 Abercrombie t-shirt was genuine.

But what is more depressing: that some would spend $1500 on an outfit that makes him look like a total slave/whore to fashion marketing, or that someone would buy a bunch of knockoffs so that he could look like a total slave/whore to fashion marketing?


*My boss has a Louis Vuitton handbag.
**Trust me. I have good gaydar. Especially when it smacks me in the face like a brick.

Toys

Nacho has lots of toys.

His favorite is probably the orange ball, although he likes all the ones I can stuff with treats (orange ball, blue ball, purple football , red kong). He's not a big fan of the green squeaky martian.

The nice thing about the stuffable toys is that they essentially serve as puzzles and give him something to do. The distraction can be welcome when I want to play on my computer, because cute as Nacho is, he weighs 52 pounds and is not a lapdog.


Nacho is pretty smart, though, and it doesn't take him long to figure out how to get the treat out. If only he had opposable thumbs, the process would be so much faster.


You may notice from the photo that Nacho's hair looks a lot shorter. He got a haircut last weekend and it turned out a little shorter than I expected. Just in time for summer! It should grow out before it gets cold, though, and shedding has *not* been a problem this week.