Village Time

I really have stopped telling you about my normal, day-to-day activities. I suppose because they've become just that - normal. Like the heads painted on walls throughout Yaoundé, advertising a "salon de coiffure" (beauty parlor) - hair is different here and most women get it coiffed every couple weeks. Or the endless markets, vendors shouting out "Cinq cent Madame, cinq cent Madame!", selling everything from shoes to whole pigs to pineapples to blue jeans. The taxis that I felt so triumphant voyaging in the first time have become unquestionably habitual, and I often find myself arguing with the driver or chatting with other passengers. I get asked for my phone number almost every day. I never have enough monnaie, change. I find cockroaches in my room and leave them there to chill. I watch Disney channel or various dramatic series with my host sisters. I don't take showers super often, and I haven't shaved my legs in months. I go to bed early and eat white bread for breakfast. I sing along to the music pounding in bars as I pass. Normal life.

In any case, I have been voyaging quite a bit recently, which gives me quite another perspective on the country as a whole, and is what I tell you about more often because it's more interesting to me. Village, then, Bantoum. I have to say it wasn't exactly a real village as one says, being right on the side of the road and having electricity, but there was all the same a spirit of community and a slow life that was more or less exactly as I imagined. The house was home to four mamans of varying ages, one boy and one girl in high school, and two little girls. We spent lots of time sitting around outside, prepping food and chatting - although they spoke mostly in Mjimbo, the local language, and didn't know much French, which meant that we conversed only occasionally in a broken French.

Life in the village is molded around food. Each time someone stopped by, they were given a full plate to eat. Time was spent cutting up plantains, building up the fire, sorting sweet potatoes, or chasing the chickens away from the papayas. There was rather a conflict between the cat (and her two adorable kittens) and the chickens, one of which attacked the kittens multiple times. Everything was cooked by fire, which meant lots of time, wood, and smoke. The first night I was there, I was shown the "garden" around the house: papaya trees, coffee trees, corn, prunes, yams... everything to eat grows right there next to the house. Maman Marie also owned multiple "champs" - acres of land for agriculture not too far from the house.

I went to work in the champs a couple times. I was feeling rather like a country bumpkin or villageois with my farming pants (unfortunately not Carharts), tramping through the fields munching on a raw sweet potato I'd just pulled from the earth and skinned with a machete. The first day, I participated in the War on Beans, or rather on the thorny plants that grew next to the dried beans we were harvesting. I then did my best to carry said beans like a real African, although the bundle in the picture is rather larger than the one I ended up carrying. One of the little girls was much stronger than I was and could carry quite a load, making me feel rather inadequate, but that is to be expected, she's used to it. And it was nice to have the mamans pleased by all my efforts, little as they may be.

The other day at the champs was spent gathering legumes - leaves - for ndole.

Others spent time digging up infinite sweet potatoes (patates). The products of these endeavors are, of course, eaten, and the rest is sold at the market on Thursdays, which was not terribly different from markets in Yaoundé.

We spent Christmas at the community church. It was Protestant, which was a change from the many Catholic churches I've spent time in elsewhere. It meant there was no bloody Jesus on the altar. We also all wore scarves over our hair, not necessarily a Protestant rule but part of that particular church. When I went the first time, the pastor recognized me as a stranger to the community, and had me introduce myself to the congregation. It made me feel more a part of the community, welcome. On Christmas day, everyone brought large pots of food and we all ate together in the church. Our pot was the biggest, and the mamans had spent two full days cooking it over the fire, a mix of meat and plantains and oil. It was pretty delicious, if a little fatty for my taste (like many things here, I find myself eating basically raw oil often. The second time I ate the dish at the house, the sauce was all oil and my piece of meat was not actually meat but a piece of fat. Oh well, I ate it all the same).

Preparing for the Christmas meal

I was feeling emotional all day, because it was Christmas, and at Christmas you should be with the people you love best. I had a good time, but it was not nearly the same as being home with my family and friends and food and snow. I found myself with a lump in my throat multiple times that day, and tried not too think about what I was missing too much to avoid an overflow of tears. But I know I'll be back in the U.S. soon.

Like I said, we ate a lot in the village, although much of the same thing - they always made a huge pot of something, to be able to serve any and all who pass, but it also meant that we ate the same meal of peanut fish cabbage 3 times in a row the first couple days, and the Christmas meal more after Christmas day as well. We ate lots of sweet potatoes and yams (which are not like yams in the U.S., they are more bitter than sweet, but decent enough). One night we hadn't eaten dinner, and finally I said I was hungry and we ended up eating just yams for dinner (I found refuge in my last granola bar that evening, worried about shocking my body too much). I also ate a rat! Two men killed it in the champs and placed it right next to me, which was rather unpleasant. When we brought it to the house, the little girls had no qualms about poking it with their fingers and picking off the bugs. Soon it was roasting over the fire and then gutted. Later, I ate it braised for breakfast, and it was delicious.

Nom nom nom

The village seemed to me to be similar to how it must have been throughout the ages. Fires, sitting around, farming... There are, however, a few modern inventions that make rural African life much easier. Pots are infinitely superior to a hollowed-out rock, or whatever else they used to use. Matches make fires much, much easier. Running water, even from a tap that is far away, is so much more convenient and safe than walking to fill up an urn in a river, as I imagine in the past. Also, oddly enough, the old ladies all seem to wear spandex under their cabas, the loose African dresses that one wears throughout the house.

I left with two enormous sacks and a basket filled with food: sweet potatoes and legumes and yams and papayas. All in all it was quite the experience, a tranquille week surrounded by dirt and agriculture and sitting cooking. I'm thrilled to have had the opportunity, but I was happy when I finally returned to Yaoundé, and my family there (I have too many homes). My sisters were happy to see me again, and we celebrated the New Year together.

Congès is now over, and back to work wildly before I leave, in exactly two weeks. The last month has past far too quickly. Happy New Year!

P.S. I forgot to tell you that in Dschang a while ago, I was dying to take a picture when I saw a chicken crossing the road. Picture didn't happen, unfortunately, and nor was I able to discover the profound motives behind the behavior of that particular hen. It shall remain one of the deep mysteries of the world.