Foumban

We are back!! And here is the first in a series of posts about the beautiful village of Foumban!!

Welcome to Foumban!!!!



A lady washing clothes by her house on a hill...there's a nice view of some of the city from there!



There are Pine Trees here! Maybe Ponderosa pines??



The yellow building that you see off to the right is part of the artisian community. There are probably 20 shops--all filled with pretty much the same thing: Masks, stools, necklaces, interesting memorabilia. We spent much of our time shopping, but it was interesting to see the different craftsmen and to talk with them. Talk about a crash course in French! But I became much more comfortable speaking French and hearing it.




Deep thoughts on Foumban:

This trip was definitely an experience! It was a crash course on real life in Africa. There was nothing touristy about Foumban, except for all the artisans. They have a place called Craftsman Street, where all the craftsmen and artisans have their shops set up, and they just sit and wait for foreigners (probably) to come and spend a lot of money on their things! So different! The roads are horrible. Almost the whole place is set up like a market--all kinds of things on the side of the road to buy! There was a whole lane of little tiny 'shops' full of material; lanes with only fruits; lanes with only veggies; it was just so interesting.

As we were driving home from our trip, I watched all the houses pass by. The houses of the people here remind me an awful lot of Guatemala. They live in absolute poverty and filth. Their houses are usually cement-ish (more like adobe brick) with the regular aluminum siding roof. But I was watching them as we flew by, and I would see little children running in and out of the houses that looked as though they were abandoned...or should be... without any shoes or socks, wearing clothes (maybe) that had seen better days... but they were playing so happily! There were mothers walking with their babies tied to their backs. There were old people shuffling along the dirt roads. They are the ones that impressed me the most. I thought of all that they had to go through to get to that stage of life. What kinds of trials they had to endure--living in the same village; seeing so much disease, poverty and death in their lives; the experiences that they went through are probably so much more intense because of where they live. It just made me think. We also passed an accident that had just happened--and in the middle of the road was an old lady all crumpled up. She had just died! It freaked me out to see that, and then I thought about how no one will ever know about it. Millions of these people in this country die every day, in one manner or another, and no one ever knows about it! It was another sad thought that I had. Thankfully, Heavenly Father knows each and every one of us--he knows about it! and I suppose that that is more important than having your death announced in a newspaper or on the 10 o'clock news. But it is just overwhelming to me. I'm glad that I'm not the one in charge!