So as I mentioned, I went on vacation and seemed to leave behind me a great deal of cogitating among my readers, but don't feel left out, for I was just as confused and perplexed for a great part of my travels! Let us begin at the beginning. Early in my experimentation in tue culture of the Bumenda people, it was suggested by Alfred and Oliver that I might like to make an excursion to the northwest to see the anglophone zone that is their home. I thought this to be a fine idea, and since we had vacation time, two weeks and a half weeks, for Easter, I decided we should try to make it happen. But I never wanted to put someone out, but Alfred mentioned that he had to go to the region anyway since it had been thirty nine (!) years since he had been home. At first we were talking about sharing the cost, but as time went on it became increasingly clear that he would not have the money to make the trip. However, I thought I could swallow the cost of a trip through Africa for two. (and to spoil the surprise I could have, if certain things had happened). Before we could go, though, I demanded that he prepare a rough idea of the costs for our trip. The preliminary receipt I got was for two hundred and fifty francs. Right, not to bad, about five hundred dollars. I was a little surprised, but decided we might cut some corners. And so we continued planning, here came the first hidden cost. Alfred insisted we have a phone, and so I bought a sim card for that. Then there were cost for the amazing amount of calling that seemed to be going in (and it is not like America, the calls by cell phone gauge everyone here at 100 francs for 0-59 seconds. And then about a week before we were to leave Alfred thought we should visit the Fon of N'du, his home village. Sure, I thought, why not. Well a preliminary reason is that we had to take a gift. I almost backed out here when I found out the gift was to be a fifty thousand franc sword, but I agreed to take half the cost as it appeared to be something quite special. Then we set out, I provided a kitty of 360 thousand francs fully expecting and anticipating at least 150 thousand at the end. And zoom we were off.
First leg: Ngaoundere to Banyo. Estimated cost, 7.5 thousand each. Actual, 6,000. Time. 11 hours
This was a pretty easy ride. It took eleven hours. We were in the fairly typical white van that seats fifteen and in which they put nineteen or twenty. Still it is not too uncomfortable, though a mother fell into a deep narcolepsy and abandoned her child to me and Alfred, and I promptly surrendered my responsibility of the child's drooling mouth to his leg. The country side was pretty as we began to move off of the savannah of Ngaoundere and through the jungle a bit. We stopped in a desolate town for a bite of lunch, tasty rice and pepper sauce, before taking the second half of the trip to Banyo, a small city that feels like an abandoned midwest former steel town. We took a beer with a fellow from Alfred's village and this began my negative beer experience, for it was warm, now 33 is normally a palatable beer, but warm it is faintly uric. But a nice breeze was blowing and I enjoyed looking out. But here three things happened that should have warned me about the nature of traveling with Alfred. Every time the bus would stop he'd complain about delay and immediately say "I know it, it is Africa" or "it is god's choice." but the two were never really comparable. Second, even though his friend spoke English and would try Alfred often switched straight to dialect and explain, the dialect is important. Now I don't normally mind if they have something to say that is serious and private, but just shooting the breeze it is nice to be included. And third and most telling, I said I wanted to get a copy of my ID in case something happened. This I proceeded to do. As I was standing there, Alfred came up and said he needed to do the same thing. Sure, I shrugged my shoulders. And as I put my ID back in my pocket and the copy in a folder in my bag, he put his copy in his ID, which seems to me to ruin the entire purpose of having a spare. But this quickly became normal, a demanded equality without having a reason.
But it was still day one and I was flying fast and free and happy seeing new things. Then we had to book a second leg to get to the village.
Second leg. Banyo to Ndu. Estimated cost: 7,500 actual: 7,000 time 9.5 hours
Now to get to the village, actually to a junction called three corners, is only 230 kilometers, but it takes nine and a half hours. How you might ask, well I invite you to look to the Mars Rover as an example. You know mars is the red planet because of its dust, well we drove Mars Road to Ndu. To get a vehicle, first of all, you negotiate a price with a man running a brothel of cars, sleek Honda and Toyota hatchbacks sit for the customer's purveyance. And we negotiated and placed out bags nearby. After being told to be there promptly at seven, we did not leave until nine-thirty. Not so bad, because it wad a night voyage anyway and it would be rotten to arrive in the very early morning. But then people started getting in the car, it began with three women in the back. Normal. Normal. Then Alfed and I got in the front passenger side. Then FOUR more people got in the back and one more sat next to the driver. This means that we had half a ton of luggage strapped to the hatch and roof, and eleven people in a car that seats four comfortable.
But hey, I'm a great sport and was ready to go. But do you have any idea how hard a four barrel engine has to work to move that many people? And then add the fact that the road is not a road but a deglorified goat path. This means at when the driver turns the wheel a little bit the entire backend of the car whips to the side and so the only way to proceed is to carve ones way through roads made up of deep rivets and an average of five inches of dust. The effect is one of skiing, or being in a dune buggy. For nine and a half hours. Still it could be okay, except I sat on the locking mechanism of the seat belt. (which will account for what is to come). I managed to sleep for a bit, enough to know that at three in the morning when the backstreet boys came onto the all African radio I was jolted out enough to lead the passengers the drowsiest version ever karaoked.
Arriving in the village, we soon found a hotel, called Dallas Complex. One of the dingiest uric locations known where the dips in the bed could rival certain oceanic trenches for deepest place on earth. But we needed to be seeing people. And off we zipped to Alfred's relatives. And then began the eating. Beautiful corn foufou made from yellow ripe corn, and vegetables that lapped the tongue with joy. We then met Alfred's Tata, a sort of sub chief, and drank shah and rafia with him and had a very nice time. And then his sister got jealous that we had eaten at the sister in law's which meant that we had to eat again. This time it was rice and meat sauce, still good, but not as good. And it introduced a problem for me. People thought it was an honor to kill a cock for me when all I really wanted was some vegetables.
Protocol
The next day we were to visit the Fon, basically the king of the area. He resolves disputes, negotiates with the government, has something like sixty wives and over a hundred children. If I had know the last I probably would have been less willing to undergo something I was already not thrilled for. But on we went, after being told there is protocol. What this means: a case of beer and twenty liters of shah (ten thousand total). Okay sure fine. But then, we can't just moto there, we have to rent a car. And we have to provide Hangers-on. And so there are scads of people I don't know, going to a palace. And we arrive at a smallish compound and go in to take seats around grungy tables beside an elevated chair covered in a green cloth. We then sit and drink some, but the beer Is warm and everyone has finished the raffia. So I sit there staring at the drinks I bought. And then there is a shuffling and everyone rises as the Fon enters. We stand until he tells us to sit. He welcomes us. We chat for a moment. We make a formal presentation and I think great this is fun. Let's drink some more and go. But now here are pictures, and I have to give a speech. And then sign the book. And as I reach for the beer determined to at least have something I am told we have to leave and I need to give money to all the Fon's children who did nothing but drink my drinks. Protocol.
The upshot? When we got back to town and went to a bar I discovered an amazing beer called Castle Milk Stout which I could drink warm and it is a very high quality beer. So the day soon got much better.
--warning--the next section is very graphic about my bowels--
The next day I did not feel so good. I had some pain going to the toilet, but thought it nothing but minor indigestion. After all today was a major reason for my trip. I was going to give a lecture to a class of students at the Baptist Seminary in town. Now, I am here preparing a lot of research material but lack an audience, and so jumped at the chance for this grip especially because of the opportunity it would allow me. And off I went to make some copies of my handout. We were soon strolling to the campus, a beautifully manicured lawn, paved sidewalks, nice library and seminar room. It has that special academia feel. And inside my classroom I had chalk, a blackboard, and most importantly sixteen students had agreed to stay an extra day after break began to listen as well as two professors. I began and everything felt fine and I was waxing pedantic and people were taking notes and interested. And the question and answer was full of perspicuous inquiries. I had a great talk afterward with the professor of Hebrew and old testament (an American with an excellent mind for bibliography and who gave me a lot of fabulous and generous feedback). But when I stood up something was wrong. I thought I had been sweating through the talk, but actually the chair was covered in a thin film of blood and feces. I quickly ran to the bathroom and discovered three large protuberances standing out of my anus. But unlike normal piles, they were white with a tinge of blood. I decided to do something and told Alfred. After twenty minutes trying to explain to him what it was and that maybe I should go to a hospital, he shrugged and said it was normal and African's did not go to the hospital for such things. And, since the hospital was far and at this point I could not sit and could barely walk and needed to lie on my stomach in order to avoid pain I agreed. I gave him twenty thousand francs to covered costs. Six hours later he returned with two men. One wad the great John, his inlaw who was very kind to us, and the other was a lanky man who kept taking copious snorts of snuff. Well, this man was a bush doctor. He looked at me, nodded, and began mixing crushed powders with red oil. And mixing a juice in an old coke bottle. He had been out to the bush special to make these powders and searched for the special leaves. He had then slaughtered a cock over a sacred stone, washed the sacred stone with raffia wine, and pestled the powered on this particular mortar. I then applied one of the powders to my anus, washed my hands, and took a huge scoop of it with the middle finger of my right hand. Everyone there then did the same because the problem would try to escape my body and jump into someone else unless they had this protection. They then left and I lay down to read. Two hours later a shudder ripped through my body in the reverse direction, as though a vacuum were in my intestines and I felt a painfully powerful suction. I lay panting at my contractions when another ripped my body followed my a third of somewhat reduced state. And I felt amazing. I stood up. I sat down. The pain was gone. I went to examine my rectum and the protuberances were gone.
This was a pretty amazing experience.
Unfortunately it did not remain so. We were, apparently, to be 'honored' by the Fon. Alfred was reluctant to tell me what this means, he thinks because he wanted it to be a surprise, I think because he knew it would make me upset. And so once more we underwent protocol. We bought the beer and wine. We fetched the retainers, we arrived and stood and specified. And then he gave us red feathers. Which, if you happen to see it, are pretty cool. My awesome red cap with a feather does look good. And we had the honor of buying the most expensive fabric in Cameroon to make a bubu. And we had the honor of honoring the Fon for his honoring us, in the form of twenty thousand. But more honors were to come. We got to take the retainers out for more beers and print pictures for them. Honors! But at least there was castle milk stout to drink.
Oh, I never mentioned. We left the Dallas Complex before even one day and moved to the wonderful Santana Clara where the rooms were clean (still no running water, but that's no problem).
Said at this point to Alfred that we had to double check our finances. He said we would once we got to our next destination.
Next: edward's in Bumenda Town. Estimated cost 7,000 each actual, 4,000. Time. 4.45
This is Alfred's elder brother, a former diplomat in NY and really fun to talk to about politics. I mostly read here in the morning, played games with the children in the afternoon and talked in the evening, in between making awesome shopping at the market for cups made from horn and the classic Bumenda bag which resulted in me being asked everywhere if I was a "Bumenda boy." but the city is clean and every first Thursday of the month there is city wide cleaning, and there is a bit of a breeze and excellent aquon and corn foufou djamba djamba. And castle milk stout.
We passed an excellent time here until Alfred told me that 150,000 francs was missing. He started saying that god would take care of it, but I was too upset to let him finish. I said that he had insisted on carrying the money and that I had put all I could into the trip and we had to go home on the thirty thousand left and that if it needed to be taken care of further he'd have to find some money. Luckily he did, but the second half of our trip we did a great deal of traveling for sixty thousand while we had done the first half of the trip, which was less travel, for 190,000 so I was and actually am confused whether to be confused or upset, but gravitating toward upset right now. My mood was thus rather sour as we turned to the next phase.
Visiting Limbe. Estimated cost, 11,000 each. Actual cost 5,000. Time 8.5 hours
Travel was on a big bus and no trouble at all. Are you understanding now why I am including the estimated and actual, the trip should have been a reasonable price, and the estimates were outlandish when I thought they were serious. The city is beautiful, on a shore, old colonial buildings (its original name is Victoria) and large avenues. We enjoyed walking a great deal here beside the shore, at my insistence, and through botanical gardens. And then I discovered the best thing in the city, keg beer. It has been since America that I have had beer out of a keg. It has been longer since I could order it by the liter. And, sorry everyone who complains about my drinking, it just got a lot easier to deal with the loss of the money and my increasing irritation with my traveling companion. My irritation was augmented by the fact that in Limbe his son and daughter are going to school and he has not seen his son for nine years. I decided to take responsibility for this and insisted we bring him down to spend time with us and his sister because it seems apparent to me that a parent should see his or her children when he travels twelve days to do so.
We also snatched a day up to Buea, a town that creates a sort of twin cities with Limbe, and passed time with some really wonderful relatives of Alfred's. And then it was into a bus to Yaounde (estimated cost, 13,000; actual 5,000) and then the train up to Ngaoundere estimated 22,000; actual, 10,000--total travel time Limbe to Ngaoundere 23.6 hours). And now I am back in what does feel like home and have met with Phil and June and the Canadian gals. I have showered and shaved and clipped my finger nails and typed my blog and taken care of my 93 emails and really thinking I had a great time on the trip.
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