The Village of Waiting

I just finished reading the Peace Corps memoir The Village of Waiting by journalist George Packer a few days ago. So far it's both the best book about the experience of being a Peace Corps volunteer I've read and an incredibly insightful look at West African culture. Packer is an excellent writer and the book is an engrossing read. He served in Togo, but most of what he wrote about Togo could just as easily apply to Cameroon. While reading this book I constantly found myself saying "Yep... been there, done that." In the future I'll probably find myself liberally quoting from this book when I want to explain either something about Africa or about what it feels like to be a (white) Peace Corps volunteer in Africa. If anyone out there has the inclination to, I can't recommend this book highly enough.