practice my religion

6/7/2001:
can’t seem to get this alarm to work properly! anyhow... we ate dinner @ our CD’s residence today. quite posh. nice man. tomorrow ibrahim or ibrahima will be taking me to prayer (jum’aa, that is). looking forward to it. will be strange not understanding the khutba however. guess i’ll know how all the non-Arabic speakers in the states feel. looking forward to that, too.

full day today. seems much longer than a day. intros, orientation, shots, etc. actually, i’m quite impressed with the training staff... most of them cameroonian. professional. competent. friendly. patient... all it takes. looking forward to working with them at training sites.

still don’t know what to think about homestay??? most of us are a little worried about the language thing... understandably. that the staff is so confident and optimistic about it is comforting. it’ll be full immersion come Sunday when we leave for Babadjou.

my APCD already knows my name (enjoys saying it fully) b/c, he says, it’s different and i sent my aspiration statement in last! also b/c i “want to practice my religion.” he says he knows exactly where to place me, too. can’t imagine where?... the North is francophone. maybe there’s a Muslim town somewhere in the NW or SW... we’ll see. glad he’s taking care of me, so to speak. now i have to find someone to wake me up tomorrow...