The History of Time

Before I tell you about my fantastic Thanksgiving on the beach (in a separate post), I figured I’d better describe the weekend before last. Invited by our history professor with the program, we went to a deuil, which is kind of like a funeral celebration. We only attended part of the weekend’s activities—after the tears—the festivities. One of the main reasons we went was to see traditional dancing, which was a big part of the celebration. The more dance groups you invite, the more important the person who died. Well, there certainly were lots of dance groups. One tradition is to hold money up to your forehead, dance to the middle of a group and drop the money on a dancer.

We all wanted to participate in the dancing, and were encouraged, so:

As you can (hopefully) see, I had a pretty good time. One of the reasons I wanted to go to Africa was to experience traditional events like this. And to think, we were still in the middle of the city!

Time has an interesting rapport here. It’s a mix between age-old traditions, like these dances or using a giant mortar-and-pestle to prepare dinner over a fire, and new-fangled toys—Blackberries, taxis, ovens. My classmates always have varied clothing: one day a full traditional costume or dress in a classic vibrant fabric, the next jeans, a T-shirt, and wedge heels. Walking down the cobbled streets of Europe, or viewing pieces of Egyptian hieroglyphics in a museum, I get the sense of having a connection with something ancient, deep in the past. Here, I don’t find that—the buildings aren’t particularly old, there aren’t many landmarks dating back to the umpteenth century—but there is a certain timeless about life here. Certain cultural aspects have remained the same for much longer than Notre Dame Cathedral or the Liberty Bell existed.

Anyway more coming (I’m sorry, I feel like I keep saying that. But, seriously), hopefully lots of pictures of Anglophone Cameroon, the mountain, and the beach. Hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving as well!

P.S. I added more pictures to my food post, so check back.

On Food

One of my goals here has been to examine food and agriculture systems here. Also, I know many of you are interested in what I'm eating.

I'm a bit obsessed with local agriculture, and going to the farmer's market every week in the summer, etc. in the U.S. One aspect of note here is that all agriculture is local. You have to buy all fruits, vegetables, meat, fish, chickens at any of the various markets interspersed throughout the city. Yaoundé has many trees and greenery throughout the city, so often a bunch of plantains or a deliciously ripe papaya will have come from within the city. There are western-style supermarkets for packaged products (and cheese and butter, which don't exist otherwise), but for general meal-cooking purposes all shopping is done at the markets. So, for the most part food is fresh. 

I will say that I do not eat many fruits and vegetables here. Occasionally there will be a salad with a meal (generally consisting of carrots, and maybe some tomatoes or avocado), and some sauces have tomatoes or are made of crushed leaves of manioc, for example. And fruit, though prolific, is often just for special occasions. However, I have definitely been enjoying the super flavorful pineapple, papaya, bananas (5 cents each), oranges... the list goes on. 

I've been trying to learn how to cook certain foods here - often in mass quantity with my family because there are so many children. Here is a picture of us stripping leaves to be ground up:

 

Making fufu, or cous-cous (not the same as Western cous-cous), using plantain leaves and the red palm oil. At the market, you can buy big bags of the ground root used to make cous-cous, it looks at little like cement mix.

The grinding process: Typical mortar and pestle (although very large). All of this is done outside behind the house, next to where the fire is. 

I did succeed in finally getting around to making cookies with my sisters recently! I felt skilled because we made them in a fire (no oven!), although it ended up as one cookie (the second batch purposely) and was rather complicated, so I'm not sure if we'll do it again. We made crepes the next day with the rest of the ingredients. Yum!

Francesca was pretty excited abou the cookies

"Oven"

Most main dishes here have some form of fish, chicken, beans (or other legumes, possibly ground up and mixed with corn), or (rarely) meat, accompanied with rice or plantains. I think I've already mentioned my love for beignets-haricots, fried dough served with beans. It is delicious. I admit to not being a huge fan of sauce arachids, peanut sauce, most often with poisson fumé (which tends to be a little dry...) on rice. It's interesting, my taste buds have had to adjust to flavors here. I find that Americans are used to many international flavors, there are always Mexican or Thai or Mediterranean restaurants.  However, most African flavors are completely foreign - every once one could find an Ethiopean restaurant, but that's about it.

Sometimes when I miss American food I take a brief respite from French and read NPR's food blog, The Salt, which is great. Although, it doesn't really help the problem of my missing cooking with cheese and the like.

I have lots more to say on the subject of food (what a surprise), but I'll leave it for now. Off to the beach tomorrow! Have an awesome Thanksgiving! I am sad to miss it (a holiday dedicated solely to food and company, what could be better?).

Background Check

Hello Hello! Sorry for neglecting you! Thank you for all of you that have sent me emails, I always love hearing from you and it really is wonderful to know what you are up to, even if it makes me miss you all more.

November is turning into Crazy Work Month. Good thing I got my health back, because I have exposés (group presentations) coming up in a couple classes, and then exams (some before and some after Christmas - in case you didn't know, I'm staying here until the middle of January, so will be participating in the grand fête [party] de Noël [Christmas] here). Also, we're planning a voyage in western Cameroon next weekend, which exacerbates the time crunch. But, ça va aller.

I've been posting about my life here, but I realize that many of you probably don't know a whole lot about Cameroon. Well, we'll start with a map (I'm getting good at drawing maps of Africa and Cameroon from scratch, but when there is internet it is much easier):

http://www.worldatlas.com/webimage/countrys/africa/cm.htm

As you know, Cameroon is in Africa. Central Africa. It is often called "Africa in Miniature" because the variation in climate and ethnicities is thought to be representative of Africa as a whole. The north is a more desert region, predominately Muslim, whereas the southern part of the country is more tropical. Yaoundé is in the center. 

The history of Cameroon is fairly representative of Africa as well. It began primarily under German control (although always contested, because it's in a nice middle position geo-strategically, particularly with the important port of Douala). After the first world war, the Germans were chased from the territory, and France and Britain shared the country (although it was technically a mandate of the League of Nations, it was administered by France in the south and a small piece by the British in the west, who connected it with Nigeria). Pieces of everything! There is now a Francophone part and an Anglophone part, although the Francophone region is larger. However, the country is bilingual (as many people in the street or in taxis will tell me). Attending conferences, for example, everyone speaks either French or English, and is expected to understand both. This prevents the confusion that might arise from misspeaking in a language you are not yet a master of. I think this is great for the program: in Yaoundé, we speak French in class and with our families and have a real assimilation in the language, but if there is a medical problem or other emergency there are people who speak English. Also, the students all take English classes and I've found some good bonding time helping my brothers and sisters with their English homework. 

Like many African countries, Cameroon hasn't had a great political record in terms of democracy and participation. I've talked a little about corruption before; November 6th marked the 30 year anniversary of the President Biya in power. Before him, there was only one other president after independence, 20 years in power. Examining why has to do with domineering colonial power structure being transferred to the new chef, and a host of other possible factors. What to do about it is even more complex: questions about removing recognition by Western powers, internal movements, both, or something else. This is not yet the space for that full discussion.

A quick note on the title of my blog: I am not really Francophone, because French isn't my maternal language. But, French is a goal of being here, and by the time I thought about it enough it was too late to change the title. In any case, I am indeed an American in Cameroon (although, working on being a Cameroonian in Cameroon).

I have another post coming soon. Cheers as ever!

Silver Linings

I am pretty much all better now! Hooray. And though it certainly was not fun, being sick has a few good points:

I now have these great new sheets with giraffes and antelopes! They are quite delightful. Here is a picture:

Also, as you can see I have discovered how to fix up my bednet during the day, so now it’s like I have princess curtains around my bed, which is pleases the little girl in me.

I am back to being constipated, which is much preferable to diarrhea. I had been wondering.

I also know how to properly take a shower with a bucket! Heat water in the kettle (even a little helps tremendously) and mix with cold water in the bucket. Then pour water over yourself using, for example, an empty margarine container. Not terribly difficult or complicated, but I didn’t know to ask for a margarine container before. When I was sick my mama prepared it all for me. Now you know too (and it uses so much less water than a normal shower!).

There are a few more lasting negative effects. The week before I was sick I felt like I was starting to fit it, going out with friends and really truly enjoying myself. Then I became ill and was in rather a bad mood for a while, not a good space for trying to appreciate another culture, and I was feeling rather like I wanted to go home. Now, I have the sense that I have to start over again being comfortable here, which is really frustrating. I’m almost halfway through with my time in Cameroon (two and a half months left out of four) and I think it’s time to be happy. Ça va aller (it will come).

On another note, we’ve decided with the program that it’s better to take less graded classes at the university, which means I have a little more time to spend with family and friends (no more 15 page paper on human rights). Hopefully that means I’ll be able to post a little more too. My papa is gone for a few weeks – he is a chemistry professor and is off teaching a course in Gabon for two weeks. Professors here do that frequently. It’s the reason the schedule at university is so confusing, because professors and therefore their classes come and go randomly. Anyway, I am sad not to have papa here, he is a good person to talk with (as well as his philosophic friend in the nearby village, Benoit). But Sunday tomorrow! Which means family time and possibly mass. Cheers!