Update 02 March 07

Hello All,

 

Greetings from Yaoundé, Cameroon where the men are strong, the women quiet and the children are everywhere. We finished our newsletter this week and sent it out. If you did not receive it let us know and we will try again. Our last one was an electronical nightmare to send so we were looking for better things this time and so far it looks good.

 

We have a snow day today. School is closed and everybody stayed home. Since so much of "our country" has been blanketed with snow and ice, we thought we could convince the administration to have one here just for fun. They bought it and we have a 3 day weekend. Actually, there has been an issue with some of the local landowners around the school property. Apparently, the land including and around the school belongs to the city. SIL has an airtight lease for this property and pays the bill with no hassles. However, there are many homeowners (probably into the hundreds) who have also bought small chunks of this big property and have put their houses up on it. What they didn't know is that the people selling the land off in 500 square foot chunks did not have the land to sell. These people were buying it and building without permission from the city. Whoever sold it to them somehow convinced them to buy it with forged or no paperwork. Many have put their whole savings into their homes and land. There is not a real idea of a mortgage here. Now, the city or some bureaucrat looking for a "raise" decided to take it all back. The people around here had about a week notice before the city said they were coming in with bulldozers and flattening the whole thing. Why cancel school for this? Many rumors were flying around the neighborhood that SIL and RFIS wanted the land and were having everybody pushed off. On Wed. this week there were about 20 people shouting and yelling by the front gate in protest of the eviction. They stopped a few cars but no contact that we know of. Yesterday, we found out that people were planning a massive protest centered around our school and in the past these kinds of things apparently can go south very quickly. In Bamenda a few years ago a protest event ended in hundreds of arrests and a few deaths all because of misunderstandings like this. The Director decided to just have everybody stay as far as possible from school to avoid any headlines.

It turns out that absolutely nothing happened and now I have a nice quiet room all to myself to get work done. Betsy went to the market with another teacher and should be getting back home by now. I had a lot planned today but I guess it will have to wait until Monday.

We have a family coming over for dinner tonight. We have gotten to know them well and they are really great people. They have been here for quite a while and are hanging it up after this school year and moving back to Dallas. Their son was on the Bball team and I have an independent study geography course with their daughter. They are a lot of fun and we always have a good time with them. Saturday is a surprise party for Frank, a Covenant teacher who lives over by us. I was surprised to get the invitation and see that the party is at our house. I have to pay more attention to things. Sunday is the monthly Covenant prayer meeting and dinner at another family's house. Finally one where I don't have to do all the dishes.

That's about it from here. The Drama performance is coming up in 2 weeks. Betsy is having all the costumes made. She really gets into that stuff. I hope it goes well.

God Bless

Brian & Betsy