Why Cameroon?

The easy answer is, of course, why not? What’s to stop us? The two-day travel to get there? The prohibitive costs? Not speaking the language? Snake bites? Malaria? Cerebral meningitis? Yellow fever? Bah!

We’ll be going to visit a good friend of mine from high school. Lana is one of the most interesting people I know, a real people person, able to cultivate genuine, long-lasting friendships with just about every person she meets. Not content with living the good life in Toronto working for a large software company, she decided to drop everything and travel around the world for a year. Six months later, she was still in Australia, not far from where she had started. She had made so many new friends she didn’t want to leave. Did I mention she’s a people person?

Fast forward six years later and she has worked and lived in Malaysia, Indonesia, Cambodia and a few other countries I am sure I am forgetting. And now Cameroon.

She’s volunteering for an NGO for two years, teaching at a secondary school in a village in the remote Far North province.

Keith and I plan to spend some time with her at her home, travel a bit with her and then travel a bit on our own. We have a month, but things in Africa move slooooowly, so hopefully that will be enough time for us to experience some culture, enjoy the scenery and come back with fabulous photos and stories to share with friends and family.