Wednesday, January 17, 2007

Taking the 'ou' out of Cameroun

Before you all start getting uppity and questioning my competence as an English teacher, there is method in my misspelling ... twas but an historical hark back to it's, by which I mean my soon to be country of residence's French roots ... and what with "où" being French for where, it seemed too good a chance to miss.
So there.
Cameroun, Cameroon ... you know what I mean.
Where is it?

but then you probably new that ...

Wednesday, January 10, 2007

Time waits for Norman and I am not he ...

"Time time time, see what's become of me ..." A wibbling, dribbling wreck cast upon the still ticking ruins of an horological blow-out.

Yes, it didn't wait and I am here once more with the cranial excretions of my fast decomposing mind.

Cameroon creeps ever closer and in 24 hours will be approximately 7 weeks away ... that's to say 49 days ... *gulp* to coin a phrase.

How do I feel. Remarkably composed at times; intensely excited at others. Trepidation, anticipation, anxiety, and a peculiar desire to run around screaming, allied with an understandable wish to stop time ... 'tis a queer frame of mind but I guess it's only natural.

Back in July, as I pressed the innocuously labelled "submit" button on the VSO webpage, how was I to know that in less than 6 months I would be here, and I don't mean Birmingham. The 'here' of now is as diverse as my diet in two months won't be. Not that I can really grumble as this is something I've always dreamt of doing and feel so incredibly priviledged and honoured to have been accepted to do that it still seems a little unreal.

Yes, it's self-inflicted as is the impending separation from everything and everyone that means anything to me ... it's going to hurt in all those parts you don't want to hurt. Yes I could avoid the hurt but that wouldn't be me.

The unpredictable looms, and it is wrapped in its multifarious, malformed and malcoordinated limbs that I am casting myself. Unpredictability is at the heart of what makes me tick and if two years enveloped in it's uncomfortably clammy grasp doesn't keep me going then ...

2 years isn't so long in many ways but it is an awfully long time in others ...