The kids attack!

This afternoon, we made a surprise visit to the catholic school elementary and kindergarten students who are receiving some of our educational packages later this week. I think we may have been more surprised than they were though, within seconds of arriving we were surrounded by hundreds of children who were so excited to meet us, it was incredible.

This Morning's briefing: The Plantation and today's mission

The Plantation:

Just a little information about the plantation the team is staying on: The goal of the plantation is to be self sufficient and not to necessarily make money. On this 338 acre plantation, it produces high quality coffee beans but they are trying to not only produce coffee but have other options as well incase something may happen to the coffee beans such as disease. This past year they lost 80% of their coffee beans due to a fungi. Luckily they also grow corn and raise cattle which they are trying to do more of, and they also have their own monstrous chickens. The plantation also have their own schools and are provided with health care which they feel makes them rich compared to people who do not live on the plantation.


Today's Mission: Micro Finance Program
The plantation manager (Anadou) arrived early this morning from France. He is very tired yet very excited about the micro finance program we will be starting today. We will be going into town to talk to the women about how we can arrange for them to set up a sustainable business program.

Stay tuned for pictures and information about what kind of businesses the women choose to set up.

Day One - preparing training materials

After a great breakfast we are reviewing our training materials for the Hygiene and Micro loan training materials - also looking at applying our materials out self by empowering one of the local woman by having her make dresses (as a souvenir). We are trying to see what are the blockers to offering each woman in the local village a chance to free enterprise.

Making new friends

We found out very quickly that we are sharing the space with a lot of different critters - made for a very interesting dinner (in the outdoors). We are so excited to get started tomorrow - we will be meeting with Anadou in the morning (the plantation manager) to discuss the micro loan program (got some great information from our guide today about what the needs of the women might be and what are the limiting factors). We have arranged the transfer of the schools supplies to us (we are crossing our fingers that customs clears our shipment as planned). More information will come tomorrow.

Arrived at the Plantation

We have arrived at the Peptnoun Plantation, our home away from home which is simply pictures - beauty and peace. We are looking forward to exploring the plantation and meeting some of the families we are going to help over the next few days (we saw so many kids)

Water Fall

Enjoying the beauty of the West of Cameroon with an amazing water fall.

Local Fruit Market

We had to make sure we had all the fruits and avocados Carolyn could eat (our vegetarian) - of course being able to sample your purchases was a lot of fun for everyone.