Missionary-trip to Maroua

The week-end two weeks ago all us Norwegians living at the Mission Station, the Dankels (living at Dang) and Solbjørg (living in Gadjiwan) went on a trip to Maruoa, as the social part of a missionary-meeting. With tree full cars we started the long road trip. And our car was going to be even fuller, as one Cameroonian man that knew we were travelling to Maroua, suddenly called and wanted to join us to Garoua. I guess that's normal here, because that always happens when we are going on a longer travel... Anyway, we got everyone inside the car together with all the luggage, and drove the five hours to Garoua. There we had a good lunch before driving the three last hours, and finally arriving at the hotel in Maroua in the evening. After taking a shower and having a delicious "buffet", we were all tired and went to sleep in the good beds in the hotel.




Next morning we had a Bible lesson, before driving to town. There we saw some very nice apartments that Jan Martin, an older volunteer working for NMS, has constructed and organised the building of.

Later we went to a leather tannery, which actually is the biggest in Cameroon. There they treat animal skins, for example from cows, snakes and crocodiles. They had made many holes in the ground and filled them with water. Then they washed the skins in the different waters in order. After finishing washing them (and maybe removing the fur), they could also put the skins in different holes to make them get different colours.

Washing

Removing fur from a cow

Snakeskin

Crocodile skin

Colouring the skins pink/red

The head of a crocodile

Drying the skins

When the rainy season comes, there will be lots of water in this river again!

 When finished watching this, we went to town just to look around at the market. First we saw a pharmacy market, where people sell different kinds of herbals and leaves, which they say can cure all different kind of sicknesses or give you luck in life. You just have to lay the leaves in water for a while, and then wash yourself with this water. They told that people come here to buy medicines because it's cheaper than going to the hospital.

Selling herbals

Herbals and leaves

Then we saw tinsmith using old car wrecks to make different kind of things, like wheelbarrows, buckets, knives, rakes, spades and axes. Amazing to see how they can transform this wrecks into useful tools!

The boy is turning the wheel to blow air into a fire to make it keep burning

The boy makes air blowing into the fire, and the man uses the fire to warm tin, so that he can  form it into a tool

Wheelbarrows & buckets

Knives

Rakes, spades & axes

We had a good lunch, containing grilled fish, chicken and meat in the home of some friends of Jan Martin.

At last we also went to the tourist-marked. There were a lot of nice things and clothes there, but I think it was expensive (more than 50 NOK per clothing). Therefore I had to use a lot of time on bargaining, and then I finally got some nice clothes, even though I still think it was a bit expensive according to what I'm used to here. But I guess I have to accpect that it's more expensive in the tourist-markets than in the normal markets... Couse it certainly was not possible making the sellers to sell their stuff cheaper than the price I paid... It was fun to use some time on bargaining, even though I only manage to be in two stores in the market before we had to go... But when I talked to the other Norwegians, I found out that I had been quite good at bargaining!





After the marked we attended a meeting together with a pastor of a church in Maroua and some teachers at the university there. In the evening we went to a really nice restaurant.

Next morning we went to church in Maroua, a little, nice local church. Then we started the long trip back. We had lunch in Garoua on the way back also. The Bischler family had a puncture on one of the wheels, but after changing to a new wheel, we all arrived safely at the Mission Station in the evening, after a nice week-end together with good people :)