Humans of Blair: Kinetics, Cars and Cameroon

"I first learned that I was permanently moving to the U.S. when I was already on the plane.”

Sophomore Franck Demou walks into the media center with a confident smile. He packs together with his tight group of friends. Sitting down at a table, he thinks back to long walks during his sunny days in Cameroon.

Demou moved to Maryland from Cameroon in Feb., 2013. He recollects how he found out about his big move. His dad initially came to the United States for eye-surgery that couldn't be provided back home. Soon after, Demous his siblings and mom all received visas. He assumed he'd be coming to visit his dad, when it reality, he was moving for good. "I first learned that I was permanently moving to the U.S. when I was already on the plane,” he remembers.

But adjusting to life in Maryland took a long period of transition. "We used to be very posh," Demou recalls, referring to himself and his cousins. After crossing the Atlantic, he grew homesick for his pranking cousins, loads of rice dishes and working in his uncle's garage in his spare time.

But even after leaving his relatives back home, Demou still kept his interest in fixing car parts. "I had an uncle who had a garage and he used to teach me parts of cars,” he says, gesturing with his hands to the enormity of the motor machines. However, Demou's love of cars is just a snippet of his excitement for technology. He loves the constant innovation of gadgets in the states. "Technology is better here and I love physics. Technology is not so good in our home country. We need more computers and networks,” he says.

On top of gadgets and gears, Demou thinks teachers are much more accessible in the U.S. Demou learns English in the ESOL program at Blair. The ESOL program, classrooms here have made him feel more at home. "Teachers take more time to explain stuff here,” he says. "In Cameroon you have more than 60 students in a class. [But here] most of my classes have had a student from my country that helps me,” he remarks.

Among the many Cameroonians at Blair, you're sure to catch Demou having a quick conversation with a fellow French-speaker before the morning bell. Besides that, he's likely buried in a sketchpad or physics book. All in all, Demou not only loves Blair for its taste of the new and improved but also the reminders of home.