Even the goat thinks I'm strange

            Its true. As I sat outside of my house with my two buckets doing my laundry, a goat passing by stopped and looked at me. It wasn’t the type of look that suggests general recognition, its gaze was of the flavor of “what in the world are you doing here”. Just a couple of days ago I was walking home from school and a young man asked me what I was doing here. He went on to explain that he has observed many Americans come and go from this town of Bafia, and he was puzzled as to what our objective was. Due to communication issues I was unable to convey that we were merely training in his village and that later, we would all be going on to separate villages with the intention of positively influencing some sector of development. But it made me think. What can a person like myself, so completely different from the people we are living with actually do to help? We come here and general day-to-day life seems insurmountable. Laundry takes an eternity, I have no faucet for water, nor a shower, ice cubes are a dream, and fast food has become more appealing in its absence than a $50 steak. Had we not a host family cooking our food and helping us with the ins and outs of life in Cameroon, I dare say that we would all be struggling to make it. Yet somehow we are all hopeful and optimistic about the prospect of changing this world we don’t even know how to fit into. It is these thoughts that daunt me daily, but also push me to surge forward. For those of us in this situation that go confidently into this work with no reservations or doubts about our capacity for good here, I commend you, yet I feel as though I am not among you.
            Fear not, this is not a testament to how I believe that what I am doing here is pointless or hopeless, it is just a truthful recognition of the grandiosity of the task at hand. I wonder, when all has been said and done for me here, who will benefit more; myself, or the village in which I am posted. I tend to side with the former. And while this has the sound of the least altruistic intentions, I believe that it is still for the benefit of the world.
            This prosperous white American has not come to Cameroon as a savior for the disadvantaged African people. No I view myself merely as a person in the world that has more want in my heart to learn from a people that live harder, and yes better than I have ever known. It is with this perspective that I humble myself, and present myself to the people here not on high, but below, eagerly aspiring to live better, and in turn use my ambitions and gifts to impart whatever positivity I can. I may not change the world, but I know will change myself. And at the very least, I will have the ability to return to America with a renewed worldview. This will be something that I will share with all that are willing and able to hear it. This I believe is enough. It is not all that I will aspire to achieve while I am here. I am yet hopeful and optimistic that in partnership with my community we can greatly affect the trajectory of the youth I will be working with. It is with cautious optimism that I continue on this journey, and every little success will be something I cherish and share with all of you.

            Now that time has settled, and I have slept, I will introduce this blog in the way I had formally intended. The name of this blog is “We make the road by walking”. Upon preparing for this adventure in Carmeroon, my mother gifted me a journal that became a symbol of the next step in the development of myself as the person I aspire to be. The gift inspired me to begin making the changes in myself and in the world that I see necessary for a positive change in both. Trust me when I say that I know, at this point, that changing the world en masse is an insurmountable task, but to anyone who has ever seen the movie “What About Bob” we know that it takes “baby steps” to achieve anything, big or small. Once I had recognized the significance of the journal and the goals that I set forth in the writings to be entered into it, I asked my childhood friend who is an incredible artist to make an insert for the first page. I prompted him with only two things. I told him to think of me and what I am doing, and the word journey. This friend has mastered many mediums in the artistic realm, so my expectations were open. When I met with him two months later he handed me a sleek laser etched insert with five words on it; Make The Road By Walking. The emotions I felt upon viewing this piece for the first time were overwhelming and many things in my life began to fall into place.
            For those of you who knew me in the time I lived in Boston and New York, you remember my proclivity for walking and exploring those cities. I would routinely walk multiple miles a day. During these walks my mental wheels were always turning, it is where I get my best thinking done. It became clear that the road I have followed my whole life, has been made by walking. This is the first way in which this phrase holds significance to my life.
            Now as for how the title pertains to the life I am currently living. The addition of the word “we”, signifies the fact that in order to do anything that will have a lasting impact; it cannot simply be done alone, nor can it be done in a streamline manner, it must be slow. Many international aid workers go into their work with finite ideas about what needs to be changed and how it must be done. It is this mindset that causes so many failures in international aid throughout the world. For a person to think that they can impose an idea, plan, or structure to a culture they do not yet understand is folly. With this in mind, there is no other way to approach a situation like the one I find myself in but with an attitude of collaboration, openness and patience. I have been taught many things throughout my life in the United States. These lessons will prove to be instrumental to my success in this current endeavor. But the learning on my part has only just begun. It is with these aforementioned thoughts in mind that I go forth, with many tools and skills to aid me in the process, and a conscious knowledge of the fact that here, I am a child. I know little of what it takes to live a life in Africa, let alone what it will take to positively influence the youth of Cameroon in a way that causes sustainable positive change. I will humbly walk through each day, experiencing life with a new set of eyes, for I know this is the only way I will ever see life here as Cameroonians do. The process will be difficult. More than likely the most difficult thing I have ever set out to do. Bare with me while I struggle through self doubt, isolation, a new language, new pace, new food, new faces, new surroundings, new climate, new pains, new tragedies, new triumphs… a new life.
            It is at this moment that my life makes a dramatic shift. I haves spent the last 27 years of my life learning to talk the talk. And now, it is truly time to learn how to walk the walk.

Bonsoir toute le monde,
Greetings from Bafia, Cameroon. My journey has begun, and a journey it has been thus far. This is a test post, so it shall be brief, but I needed to do it so as to not let it fall by the wayside. The ups and downs of the transition I am currently undergoing have been trying to say the least. Saying goodbye to loved ones and putting a life I loved behind me has proven to be one of the biggest tests I have yet to endure. Yet here I am, en Afrique for 27 months. I will go now. But I'd appreciate it if every reader did something for me. This is my third day in Bafia, and the first two nights I have slept for a combined 1.5 hours. Both nights I have woken within an hour of falling asleep, to a burning sensation in my head and neck, which has disabled my ability to sleep any further. So to my readers, pray, visualize, chant, sing a song, or do a dance, put out the positive energy so that I can have a restful evening. Au revior!