Christmas in Cameroon - Bamenda trip

After Christmas, my parents, and Ed and I traveled up to Bamenda, in the grasslands and mountains of northwest Cameroon, to show him a different side of Cameroon, not just the forest. Bamenda is the fifth largest city in Cameroon, in a valley surrounded by hills. In rainy season, it's beautiful, with everything green and waterfalls cascading off the hills. In dry season, the bowl Bamenda sits in can be filled with harmattan, dust storms that sweep down from the Sahara, and it becomes a dusty little town.
There were some sights that reminded us of home - who would have thought?One of my main goals in going to Bamenda was to meet up with my friend Jennette. We've been friends since 1996, when I worked with a Baptist network of clinics in this part of Cameroon. When I met her, she was fairly newly widowed, with a young son. She found a girl in a village whose parents had died, who was essentially serving as a slave for her uncle and aunt. She managed to get them to give her the girl, and started sending her to school. I thought this was cool, and since then, we've been sending our children to the best school we could, and they have stayed at the top of their classes. The girl, Cidone, is now 22 and works in a mission hospital and plans to go to nursing school. The boy Valery, is 16 and studying hard - they're great kids!! Jen is now remarried, and she and her husband just finished Bible school.We met up with them at a little restaurant and had Christmas presents for everyone, but as usual, Jen out-generoused me! She had beautiful matching outfits made for Ed and I.

A picture of all of us - thank goodness for automatic timers!

And one of just me, Ed, and Jen!

While in Bamenda, we stayed at the SIL guesthouse, on a hill overlooking the back of Bamenda - despite the dust in the air, rather pretty!

We drove up to Mbingo, about 45 minutes from Bamenda and site of a terrific Baptist mission hospital and some gorgeous scenery - great for hikes! The landscape is much different from southern Cameroon.

We went on a short hike, just to give Ed a taste.

Spectacular purple-blue flowers dot the hillsides

Ed and I in front of the huge hill behind the hospital, known as Mbingo Hill.Me and my Daddy!As sunset approaches, you can see how much dust is in the air. In the harmattan, sunset looks almost like fog!And no visit to Bamenda would be complete without a visit to Sister Rose's for grilled fish, plantain, and njama njama (greens!) - yum!!