11.12 Hi everyone! I have a lot to write and not a lot of time, so I will try to do an update this week and post it soon. For now I wanted to let everyone know about my post! We found out our posts on Wednesday, it was exciting and a little nerve wracking, but I am pretty sure that everyone is happy with their posts. I am headed to Ndu (said `nndoo`) in the Northwest province. It is a little town of approx. 5,000 I think and is in the mountains where it is (apparently) beautiful, `cold`, and not far from Nigeria (!!). There is a large tea plantation there also. I will be working for the Serve the Orphans Foundation, a local NGO, focused on income generating projects, education, foster homes, social/spiritual/emotional support and education, and child labor issues for orphans in Ndu and the surrounding communities!! I am very excited about it. We are headed to site visit tomorrow and will be there a week and afterwards I will know much more!

My friends are headed all over the country; South province, East Province, Adamoua and the Northwest. Two of them are actually at the end of the road...it does not go beyond their village! I cannot wait to go visit and see the rainforest, the end of the road, and numerous wild African animals that they will be encountering daily!! We are already planning trips around the country for holidays and short day trips to the Congo, the C.A.R., hiking into Nigeria, etc!! Everyone is very excited about their potential jobs and it is nice to have an idea (finally) of where we will be for two years!

A quick story before I post this and get off the internet because it is apporximately 98 degrees in the cyber cafe and I am slightly uncomfortable in my business-casual attire from the day! My family bought our third goat recently. It seems that they get a bit anxious in the barn/storage shed where they live. The other morning, at about 6 AM I heard them baaing and whining for a while. Then, as I was brushing my teeth outside, they busted through the wooded door and started sprinting around the yard dragging their gross ropes and chasing after the rooster. Then they were leaping off the the cement slab we call a porch and making goat sounds and moves that reminded me A LOT of Goat-boy from SNL...use your imagination, it is probably a pretty accurate picture!! Fun times with goats, and roosters :)

OK, I miss you all and will start a long update on my life here soon. Until then, keep the emails coming (and mail too, thanks!!). I miss and love you all!!!

Oh, PS. Would you, if possible, send me a post card of where you are? I want to use them to decorate a wall in my house in Ndu...that way I can have a visual of the US (to think of you all) in my house!!

address:
Allyson Packer
Crops de la Paix
B.P. 215
Yaoundé, Cameroon