Tuesday, April 21, 2009

tuesday: quiche à la camp stove


A conventional oven is a high ticket item here, so we Peace Corps volunteers have embraced an alternative baking method of which our camp stoves are capable. Along with the gas stove, you need a huge pot (marmite) which serves as the oven space. We place the marmite on the gas burner, and add a few empty cans. The cans are basically the grate in your oven at home: they lift the dish so that it’s surrounded by hot air, instead of being placed directly on the heat source. You can see this configuration in the picture above, except throughout cooking the lid covers the marmite.

This recipe is once again based on Chop Fayner. For the quiche, you will need:


Crust:
1 ½ cups flour
½ cup chilled butter
3 T cold water
½ t salt


Filling:
3 American-size eggs
½ to 1 cup grated cheese (or five slices vache qui rit and three or more slices vache cheddar)
1 scant cup milk
1 small onion, chopped
1 tomato, chopped
1 green pepper, chopped
Handful of mushrooms, chopped
Salt, pepper, basil, paprika

If you make this recipe in a fancy conventional oven, preheat it to 350° F (180° C). Otherwise, just light the stove and let the marmite air warm up.

Start the crust by combining the flour and salt. Add the butter, breaking it up with a fork. Once the butter is well distributed, add the cold water by the tablespoon. Once the mixture can hold a ball shape, you’ve added enough water. Chill the dough for half an hour to an hour. To chill, I just placed a wet cloth over the bowl in lieu of a refrigerator. Roll the dough out on a floured surface with a floured rolling pin (or a wine bottle), then lay the dough in your well-greased baking dish.

In a mixing bowl, beat the eggs with the milk and spices. Place the vegetables into the uncooked crust, and spread the cheese over them. Pour the egg mixture over the veggies and cheese. Bake 30 minutes to an hour. The top will turn golden brown, and a knife stuck in the center will come out clean.

It took an hour to bake my quiche, I believe because my oven did not reach to 350°. As always, cooking with vache qui rit requires generous spices, since it’s so bland. Vache cheddar can really improve this recipe, so get it if you can. Also, even though Cameroonians seem to insist on refrigerating the vache cheddar, it does not say “keep refrigerated” on the package. I have bravely risked stomach discomfort to tell you that the vache cheddar can be kept on a shelf without refrigeration for weeks, and consumed safely. For those reading in America, vache cheddar resembles Kraft American Singles in taste, texture and packaging. And yes, this is considered a fancy cheese.

Saturday, April 18, 2009

pagne


Pagne refers to the colorful, patterned, fabric everyone wears here. I believe it is based on the original cultural dress, but it is now manufactured en masse. It is sold pre-cut to six yards. I cannot explain why all fabric is sold in yards, but tailors measure you in centimeters.

To have an outfit made of pagne, and therefore look well integrated, you first go to the market and pick a pagne design. There are plusieurs choices, and I could spend all day at the market admiring them (though there are the appallingly tacky choices). Once you’ve chosen your pattern, you bargain for the price. There are many qualities of pagne, and the prices reflect that. They range from 4,000 cfa (eight dollars) to 20,000 cfa (forty dollars) or even more. If I ever fell in love with a fabric I would consider paying up to 10,000 cfa, but so far I have stuck between 5,000 and 7,000.

Once you’ve bargained the price, you take the pagne to a tailor. The tailor’s shop usually has poster collages of Cameroonian fashion, and you can point to a style you like. Then the tailor measures you, and you schedule a time to pick up the finished product. Once you come back, you try it on to check if adjustments are needed. Then you pay and take your garment home.

Cameroonians favor big sleeves (the poofy and the long-flowy are very popular styles), and decorative necklines. Americans tend to prefer their sleeves more subdued, (especially when the fabric is already so expressive!) However, since the tailors never write down anything but your measurements, they seem to often forget the request for something boring. This, and their artistic pride, often leads to a garment nothing like you pictured. It takes some time to find a tailor who will embrace our dull fashion sense, and make quality pieces.

I bought a sewing machine and have experimented with my own seamstress abilities. I’m just as good as a mediocre tailor here, and I like controlling the project. The best part of sewing with pagne is choosing how to incorporate the pattern into the overall design.

One way people celebrate here is to buy the pagne manufactured for a specific holiday. While festive, this pagne usually is not the prettiest, in my eyes. It often consists of a poorly chosen background color, and a series of drawings depicting the holiday’s theme. The drawings are splashed around the pagne with no real structure, and bear an uncanny resemblance to clip-art. Special pagne is manufactured for annual holidays: Women’s Day, Mother’s Day, Teacher’s Day, Rural Women’s Day; to celebrate unique occasions: the pope’s recent visit; and to celebrate certain people: the Virgin Mary, President Paul Biya, and Francoise Mbango Etone (who won Cameroon Olympic Gold: http://sports.yahoo.com/olympics/beijing/blog/fourth_place_medal/post/Francoise-Mbango-Etone-Cameroon-s-indomitable-l?urn=oly,101257). I’d say a head-to-toe ensemble of Olympian pagne is a pretty outspoken souvenir.

Friday, April 10, 2009

friday is laundry day


In Peace Corps, we have the same weekly chores as we did in America, but none of the modern conveniences. Therefore, around once a week, I carry my clothes and a couple buckets to my outdoor sink and soap up. I start by soaking them in a detergent (I use the brand Blu). I swish them around in the water for a minute, then pull each piece out and wash them by hand. Hand washing means rubbing a lard soap into the tough spots, then forcefully pushing the cloth down your forearm. The work of laundry is mostly wringing out the soapy water to eventually rinse clothes clean. I usually use two rinse buckets, refilling them periodically to clear the water. After a few rinses and a final wringing, I hang the clothes on the line to dry. This process is rough, and some of my clothes have started to show wear from it. During dry season everything dried fast, but now I have to time laundry day to coincide with a sun break.

I actually think of laundry as a more enjoyable chore here, even though in the developed world it’s hardly as much work. I bring my ipod and speakers out with me. I wear my swimsuit and sunscreen and “play” in the water. (I only get away with this because my backyard is walled in). It’s time consuming, but no one in Africa is ever in a hurry. Once finished, I feel much more accomplished than I ever felt after loading a machine and pushing the buttons.

Friday, April 3, 2009

congé de pâques: rainy season

The rainy season arrived to Ngaoundéré last week when I was out of town. By the time it rained again, I was back home, and never so pleased by the weather. Typically in rainy season, we have cold mornings which melt into hot noon-times. It actually gets hotter than it would in dry season, until the sky opens up and lets down a short shower. It doesn’t seem to rain long in the Adamaoua, but the downpour can be strong. Once it rains the wind will blow through my house and the air feels much nicer. Yesterday I just stood in the doorway as the cool air billowed through.

The other benefit of rain, is that the dust that’s floated in the air for months, is replaced by humidity. Ngaoundéré is relatively tame as dust goes, since the main street I live on is paved.

We are now one week through our two-week Easter break, and I’m really enjoying the time off. I don’t work very hard at school, especially since I’ve found a way to leave next year. (I’ve tried to tell myself to just get through the year without slacking off, but the whole charade feels purposeless and I struggle to find my work ethic). Still, every teaching day is absorbed by the teaching. Even Mondays, when I only teach one class for two periods—if I have afternoon class, I dread it all day, and can’t start anything else since I’ll be interrupted. If I have morning classes, I spend most of the afternoon and evening recovering. So even though I teach only eleven hours and don’t spend much time lesson planning, I am exhausted by it and have not progressed much on projects outside the lycée. However, next week I will be scheduling a teachers training for a primary school in an outer neighborhood, and hope to establish a tentative schedule at the women’s center.

We finished presenting new material before the break. After break we will review for three weeks, and then I’ll give my final exam for the year. Once the students are done with school final exams, the troisième, première and terminale take the national exams. I do not envy them, and I will be so glad to power through the last round of grading and close lycée for good. So the next two months will be a mélange of finishing with lycée and planning real work for the summer.