As Mary and I were walking around the hospital grounds we noticed a tall, thin man who was sitting on one of the walkways wearing a white cap with a snowflake on one side, and that curled forward at the top, similar to those worn by the Smurfs. He never had much affect, and stared off when people walked by. We wondered if he might be schizophrenic, and stayed around the hospital grounds just for somewhere to be. We decided to say hi one day, and he returned our greeting with a big smile, and said “good morning.” We asked “how for you?” (Pidgin for ‘how are you’), and he replied something along the lines of ‘fine, yes, thank you.’ The next day he was walking around, and Mary politely asked why he was at the hospital (the family member’s of patients are responsible for feeding and clothing their loved-ones, and so they are often outside the wards). He lifted his pant leg, and revealed a mangled, but healed, shin. He explained to us that he was in a car accident in Bamenda, and his leg was repaired at Mbingo. You cannot leave the hospital grounds until you pay your bill, and so he was waiting for his brother to come from Yaounde (the capital) to pay his bill and take him home. “When is he coming?” we asked.
“Soon , I hope.”
“How long have you been here?”
“Three months. I am very hungry” I’ll try to remember and post if he leaves before we do. In the meantime, we’ll try to help him avoid Gargamel.
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