http://www.pietisten.org/authors/SwansonChristine.html http://www.pietisten.org/authors/SwansonChristine.html en-us http://www.pietisten.org//fall98/africacameroon.html http://www.pietisten.org//fall98/africacameroon.html It’s October 2nd and I’ve been here in Cameroon now almost four months. The first three months were training in a town called Bandjoun (West Province), which is near the large city of Bafoussam. http://www.pietisten.org//summer00/oral.html http://www.pietisten.org//summer00/oral.html Reading <cite>Pietisten</cite> while surrounded by plantain trees with leaves four-feet long and grass that can be up to eight-feet high, I realize how important the pietist book culture has been to me. Let me begin, in oral culture style, with a story. http://www.pietisten.org//winter00/villagefuneral.html http://www.pietisten.org//winter00/villagefuneral.html I spent Christmas Eve, 1998 in Cameroon, West Africa, with another Peace Corps volunteer, watching a Nigerian "home movie." These movies are products of studios in Onitsha, about 250 miles from where I lived. The plots often involve fashionable young urbanites who use love medicine or cast evil spells to get their way. In one, a victim is brought home to his village for funeral rites. http://www.pietisten.org//summer02/fiskar-sofia.html http://www.pietisten.org//summer02/fiskar-sofia.html Over the past few months I have had the pleasure of translating a memoir by Sofia Franklin. Sofia was the wife of August W. Franklin, an early leader in the Covenant Church.