24 July, 2009
I'm a closet feminist. Don't tell anyone.
Heard this on Sweet Melodies Christian radio while I was in a waiting room today.
After returning home from church, a man immediately approaches his unsuspecting wife and hefts her up onto his shoulders. He then proceeds to go about his normal business around the house. Eventually, the man’s wife asks him what, pray-tell, is going on. “Pastor,” he replies “ has told us to always carry with us our sorrows and our burdens.”
Which reminds me of the Akan proverb: “If you stumble upon a brawling couple, don’t make any hasty judgments, for it is only the husband who knows what the wife has done to him.”
Most of my perceptions of relationships here have been in the negative. That is, the guys I live with at the hostel are away from their wives. In the case of my roommate, because traveling four or five countries to the left is prohibitively expensive, he won’t see his wife or two year old daughter for two years. And I have the nerve to curse the stars for being separated from my girlfriend (who doth teach the torches to burn bright) for five month intervals.
There are chauvinist elements of Ghanaian culture just like there are chauvinist elements of American culture. A few months ago, I rode to a beach party on a bus with a group of guys from Commonwealth Hall and three or four female residents of Volta Hall. Commonwealth boys’ moniker, the Vandals, is pretty accurate. From campus to the beach, the bus roared with bawdy and aggressive songs, some pretty clever, others less so, especially, I imagine, if you were one of the young women in the backseat. One song involved a call and response, and guys took turns ad libbing a quick line about what they “do.” Eventually a finger speared out in my direction; the song’s familiar and now dreaded refrain crumbled beneath me: “Oboruni, what do you DO?” Heads swiveled towards my rapidly shrinking person. My head feels empty, like Dodge City before the shootout empty. Then a mental spasm and tentatively: “I steal your girlfriends?” That satisfied them. They went back to singing. I went back to looking inconspicuous. Judge me if you like, but “I respect all women as equals” didn’t fit the beat.
Gender equity under the law and in political representation is a big issue here. A large coalition of groups secured the passage of a domestic violence bill just a few years ago, and a law providing women some protection of their inheritance rights is on the books. President Mills pledged to fill 40% of appointed government posts with women. Last I heard, he was well short of that number, though that could’ve changed by now. The Speaker of Parliament, Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, and several ministers are women. 19 of Ghana's 209 MPs are women (9%), which is just slightly below the percentage of female representatives in the legislatures of South Carolina (0 in the Senate, 17 in the House, 10%, rank among US states: 50) or Pennsylvania (Senate: 10; House 34; 14%; rank: 46).
You can’t study agricultural policy here without taking gender into account. The majority of food crop farmers are women, and food crop farmers are the poorest segment of the population. Male farmers have greater access to land, labor, capital, and extension services. Men are often responsible for providing the starch in meals (like maize), but women are expected to produce the food for the soup (vegetables, leaves, etc).This is on top of any labor obligation they might have to family members or a husband and on top of the tremendous amount of labor necessary for the social reproduction of the household.
There are direct implications for development policy. Take for instance the use of Gross Domestic Product as shorthand for the extent of country’s development. Ghana had set a goal of becoming a middle income country with a GDP per capita of $1000 by 2015. (I think that target has been put aside; the current GDP per capita is about $500.) The government is going to prioritize those activities that contribute to GDP, that is to national aggregate growth. That means that women’s domestic work isn’t considered work. It has no “value” because it hasn’t been assigned a monetary value. Cutting the health care budget might make sense from the aggregate growth perspective, but only if you ignore the fact that it’s going to increase the burden on primary care givers, who in most cases are female. The examples go on, from promoting cash crops over food crops to moving from traditional to freehold land tenure.
I just say good thing gender isn’t an issue in America. Right?
After returning home from church, a man immediately approaches his unsuspecting wife and hefts her up onto his shoulders. He then proceeds to go about his normal business around the house. Eventually, the man’s wife asks him what, pray-tell, is going on. “Pastor,” he replies “ has told us to always carry with us our sorrows and our burdens.”
Which reminds me of the Akan proverb: “If you stumble upon a brawling couple, don’t make any hasty judgments, for it is only the husband who knows what the wife has done to him.”
Most of my perceptions of relationships here have been in the negative. That is, the guys I live with at the hostel are away from their wives. In the case of my roommate, because traveling four or five countries to the left is prohibitively expensive, he won’t see his wife or two year old daughter for two years. And I have the nerve to curse the stars for being separated from my girlfriend (who doth teach the torches to burn bright) for five month intervals.
There are chauvinist elements of Ghanaian culture just like there are chauvinist elements of American culture. A few months ago, I rode to a beach party on a bus with a group of guys from Commonwealth Hall and three or four female residents of Volta Hall. Commonwealth boys’ moniker, the Vandals, is pretty accurate. From campus to the beach, the bus roared with bawdy and aggressive songs, some pretty clever, others less so, especially, I imagine, if you were one of the young women in the backseat. One song involved a call and response, and guys took turns ad libbing a quick line about what they “do.” Eventually a finger speared out in my direction; the song’s familiar and now dreaded refrain crumbled beneath me: “Oboruni, what do you DO?” Heads swiveled towards my rapidly shrinking person. My head feels empty, like Dodge City before the shootout empty. Then a mental spasm and tentatively: “I steal your girlfriends?” That satisfied them. They went back to singing. I went back to looking inconspicuous. Judge me if you like, but “I respect all women as equals” didn’t fit the beat.
Gender equity under the law and in political representation is a big issue here. A large coalition of groups secured the passage of a domestic violence bill just a few years ago, and a law providing women some protection of their inheritance rights is on the books. President Mills pledged to fill 40% of appointed government posts with women. Last I heard, he was well short of that number, though that could’ve changed by now. The Speaker of Parliament, Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, and several ministers are women. 19 of Ghana's 209 MPs are women (9%), which is just slightly below the percentage of female representatives in the legislatures of South Carolina (0 in the Senate, 17 in the House, 10%, rank among US states: 50) or Pennsylvania (Senate: 10; House 34; 14%; rank: 46).
You can’t study agricultural policy here without taking gender into account. The majority of food crop farmers are women, and food crop farmers are the poorest segment of the population. Male farmers have greater access to land, labor, capital, and extension services. Men are often responsible for providing the starch in meals (like maize), but women are expected to produce the food for the soup (vegetables, leaves, etc).This is on top of any labor obligation they might have to family members or a husband and on top of the tremendous amount of labor necessary for the social reproduction of the household.
There are direct implications for development policy. Take for instance the use of Gross Domestic Product as shorthand for the extent of country’s development. Ghana had set a goal of becoming a middle income country with a GDP per capita of $1000 by 2015. (I think that target has been put aside; the current GDP per capita is about $500.) The government is going to prioritize those activities that contribute to GDP, that is to national aggregate growth. That means that women’s domestic work isn’t considered work. It has no “value” because it hasn’t been assigned a monetary value. Cutting the health care budget might make sense from the aggregate growth perspective, but only if you ignore the fact that it’s going to increase the burden on primary care givers, who in most cases are female. The examples go on, from promoting cash crops over food crops to moving from traditional to freehold land tenure.
I just say good thing gender isn’t an issue in America. Right?
04 June, 2009
Fog of Field Work
Tamale has very wide streets. So wide I imagine that if I do melt under this sun – which is seeming increasingly likely – the puddle of me will roll out and out until one of the Chinese made motorcycles with the Japanese sounding names zips across me and tracks me back towards the city center.
I was trekking up the Bolga Road towards the Northern Region’s Ministry of Food and Agriculture offices. This was my first attempt at field work, a somewhat flattering title for the jumble of interviews cobbled together over two weeks in Tamale, Nyankpala, and Zebilla in Northern Ghana. After repeating my topic (perceptions of food insecurity) and my questions (Is there a food crisis here?) to several different interviewees, I actually began to convince myself that I was not just pretending to be a researcher. I don’t know that I convinced anyone else, but still farmers merchants, development workers, and government officials were extremely generous with their time and candor. Because of that, I have started to see something of the lean season.
Small farmers, the majority of which are women, grow about 70% of food crops in Ghana and a similar proportion in most of the nations of Sub Saharan Africa. Small farmer is not synonymous with subsistence farmer. A small farmer may grow only cash crops. Most of Ghana’s cocoa is grown by farmers with only a few acres. The fully self-sufficient farmer, growing what he eats and eating what he grows is also the stuff of myth. Food crop farmers may derive a sizable portion of their calories from their own fields, but the economy is too monetized for them not to enter the market by selling their surplus crops or labor. Inadequate storage facilities and the need for immediate cash (credit is too scarce and expensive to be accessible to most) force small farmers to sell their produce right after harvest. The glut on the market means they take a low price, knowing that a few months later they will buy food for their families and seeds for their farmers at prices inflated by shortage and demand. Profits go to those traders who have the capital to store food. They buy low and sell high and move the food to markets with the most attractive prices.
Yields here are already comparatively low. The savanna of Northern Ghana sees only one rainy season each year. The South has two. Moreover, food crops, especially roots and tubers, have been “orphaned” receiving little of the research and extension lavished upon export crops like cocoa. The part I need to conduct more research on is the role played by the political and economic marginalization of the North. By blocking freehold tenure and investment, the colonial government kept the North as a labor reserve for Southern industry. Attempts in the 1970s to commercialize agriculture in the region were aimed more at enriching a well-connected elite and providing cheap food for the South than at improving livelihoods in the North. Over the past two decades, national poverty rates have dropped, as they increase in the three northern regions.
One consequence of these interlocking factors – environmental, technical, political – is a perennial lean season. In May, June, and July, many of the families which were eating three meals a day cut back to two. Vulnerability expands and deepens. A flood or a drought, illness or loss of income – under these circumstances, a hardship can become a disaster.
The plight of Ghanaians living in the North hasn’t gone unnoticed – though I think you could argue that the same can’t be said for the structural aspects undergirding the plight of the North as a whole. A host of government interventions has attempted to boost production and reduce poverty. Most recently, small dams, fertilizer subsidies, and a school feeding program aimed simultaneous at encouraging school attendance and supporting local farmers have met with varying degrees of success. A new government initiative funded by IFAD and ADB, the Northern Regional Growth Program, promises a new tack. It eschews the narrow focus on production, assesses the entire value chain, and assists farmers in meeting the demands of national and international markets. In addition to government efforts, an army of NGOs has fanned out across the three northern regions. World Food Program, World Health Organization, CARE, and World Vision all have outposts in Tamale. There must be as many pick ups and SUVs plying the roads of Northern Ghana in the service of “development” as there are for private purposes.
I’ve been asked several times how I see the North. There’s no good way to answer a question like that. I usually say, “It’s nice,” and go on to speak favorably of the absence of Accra-style traffic. One of my friends in Tamale took issue with my response. It’s not nice. It’s not nice that so many people here don’t have access to clean water or adequate medical care or a decent way to make a living.
So if you ask me how I see Northern Ghana now, I’ll tell you that I see it as a violent place. Not because there are chieftancy and land disputes in Yendi and Bawku. Not because armed robbery is prevalent. I bet it’s more common in Accra. I say it’s a violent place because violence is an exercise of force, an act of power. It is also an exploitation of vulnerability. Violence requires, thrives on vulnerability. Northern Ghana, like any place where poverty is deeply inscribed, is a place where people are vulnerable and so subject to a high level of violence. When the White Volta breaks its banks. When another child dies of malaria. When work goes forward on an empty stomach. When a farmer sells his sweat and blood and calluses at a pittance. When extension agents siphon fertilizer coupons to the highest bidders. When government knocks down trade barriers so subsidized American rice can flood out the local crop. This is violence. It is the hand of the stronger raised against the weaker. We may not like to see it that way because it says something about us.
The Ghanaians who struggle daily are not victims. They are survivors. First and foremost, they deserve respect. They deserve a level playing field.
I was trekking up the Bolga Road towards the Northern Region’s Ministry of Food and Agriculture offices. This was my first attempt at field work, a somewhat flattering title for the jumble of interviews cobbled together over two weeks in Tamale, Nyankpala, and Zebilla in Northern Ghana. After repeating my topic (perceptions of food insecurity) and my questions (Is there a food crisis here?) to several different interviewees, I actually began to convince myself that I was not just pretending to be a researcher. I don’t know that I convinced anyone else, but still farmers merchants, development workers, and government officials were extremely generous with their time and candor. Because of that, I have started to see something of the lean season.
Small farmers, the majority of which are women, grow about 70% of food crops in Ghana and a similar proportion in most of the nations of Sub Saharan Africa. Small farmer is not synonymous with subsistence farmer. A small farmer may grow only cash crops. Most of Ghana’s cocoa is grown by farmers with only a few acres. The fully self-sufficient farmer, growing what he eats and eating what he grows is also the stuff of myth. Food crop farmers may derive a sizable portion of their calories from their own fields, but the economy is too monetized for them not to enter the market by selling their surplus crops or labor. Inadequate storage facilities and the need for immediate cash (credit is too scarce and expensive to be accessible to most) force small farmers to sell their produce right after harvest. The glut on the market means they take a low price, knowing that a few months later they will buy food for their families and seeds for their farmers at prices inflated by shortage and demand. Profits go to those traders who have the capital to store food. They buy low and sell high and move the food to markets with the most attractive prices.
Yields here are already comparatively low. The savanna of Northern Ghana sees only one rainy season each year. The South has two. Moreover, food crops, especially roots and tubers, have been “orphaned” receiving little of the research and extension lavished upon export crops like cocoa. The part I need to conduct more research on is the role played by the political and economic marginalization of the North. By blocking freehold tenure and investment, the colonial government kept the North as a labor reserve for Southern industry. Attempts in the 1970s to commercialize agriculture in the region were aimed more at enriching a well-connected elite and providing cheap food for the South than at improving livelihoods in the North. Over the past two decades, national poverty rates have dropped, as they increase in the three northern regions.
One consequence of these interlocking factors – environmental, technical, political – is a perennial lean season. In May, June, and July, many of the families which were eating three meals a day cut back to two. Vulnerability expands and deepens. A flood or a drought, illness or loss of income – under these circumstances, a hardship can become a disaster.
The plight of Ghanaians living in the North hasn’t gone unnoticed – though I think you could argue that the same can’t be said for the structural aspects undergirding the plight of the North as a whole. A host of government interventions has attempted to boost production and reduce poverty. Most recently, small dams, fertilizer subsidies, and a school feeding program aimed simultaneous at encouraging school attendance and supporting local farmers have met with varying degrees of success. A new government initiative funded by IFAD and ADB, the Northern Regional Growth Program, promises a new tack. It eschews the narrow focus on production, assesses the entire value chain, and assists farmers in meeting the demands of national and international markets. In addition to government efforts, an army of NGOs has fanned out across the three northern regions. World Food Program, World Health Organization, CARE, and World Vision all have outposts in Tamale. There must be as many pick ups and SUVs plying the roads of Northern Ghana in the service of “development” as there are for private purposes.
I’ve been asked several times how I see the North. There’s no good way to answer a question like that. I usually say, “It’s nice,” and go on to speak favorably of the absence of Accra-style traffic. One of my friends in Tamale took issue with my response. It’s not nice. It’s not nice that so many people here don’t have access to clean water or adequate medical care or a decent way to make a living.
So if you ask me how I see Northern Ghana now, I’ll tell you that I see it as a violent place. Not because there are chieftancy and land disputes in Yendi and Bawku. Not because armed robbery is prevalent. I bet it’s more common in Accra. I say it’s a violent place because violence is an exercise of force, an act of power. It is also an exploitation of vulnerability. Violence requires, thrives on vulnerability. Northern Ghana, like any place where poverty is deeply inscribed, is a place where people are vulnerable and so subject to a high level of violence. When the White Volta breaks its banks. When another child dies of malaria. When work goes forward on an empty stomach. When a farmer sells his sweat and blood and calluses at a pittance. When extension agents siphon fertilizer coupons to the highest bidders. When government knocks down trade barriers so subsidized American rice can flood out the local crop. This is violence. It is the hand of the stronger raised against the weaker. We may not like to see it that way because it says something about us.
The Ghanaians who struggle daily are not victims. They are survivors. First and foremost, they deserve respect. They deserve a level playing field.
Two pictures
Coming to Ghana, I was confident that I was going to become an accomplished student of local culture. Of course, I was contractually obligated to make at least some efforts in that direction. Rotary’s purpose in sending Ambassadorial Scholars all over the world is to promote cultural exchange in the noble belief that building people-to-people connections is the key to lasting peace. But my goals as a Rotary Ambassadorial Scholar were far loftier than world peace. Stuffed somewhere between my boxers and tooth brush, I had packed an agenda for personal aggrandizement. I viewed myself as the savvy, thoughtful world traveler - the polar opposite of the stereotypical American tourist. Instead of doing drive-bys of the pre-packaged sites pointing, and taking pictures, and being loud, I would work myself into the corners of this place. I promised to “get out into the community,” search out the Real Ghana. I would settle for nothing short of cultural enlightenment.
Look closely enough at these two pictures and you can get a sense of where that misguided project has taken me. The first was taken in Madina market, a few minutes up the road from the university. Before I explain my grimace, a few general comments. Maybe you’ve never been to an open-air market like this. They’re not as common in the States. Such a dizzying mash of smells and noises and cash and people pump through the veins of this place so that sterile words like “economy” and “commerce” don’t come close to untying this knot of power, culture, struggle, work, life. Which makes the prospect of going back to Wal-Mart that much more depressing.
You might notice that aside from my big red self, everyone else in the place is a woman. The market is a woman’s space. Ghanaian women are legendary for their trading prowess, and “market queens” have amassed a great deal of wealth and influence for themselves. The liberalization of Ghana’s economy starting in the 1980s resulted in a contraction of formal sector employment (like factory jobs) so that more and more Ghanaians – men and women – earn their living in the “informal economy,” a phrase referring to untaxed and unregulated exchanges . (For trivia buffs, the term “informal economy” was coined by a guy doing research in Accra’s Nima market in the 60s and/or 70s.)
You might also notice what’s being sold. The green pods in the foreground are okro, a vegetable with a lot of seeds, which is why it’s used in some ceremonies to symbolize fertility. For practical purposes, it makes your soup slimy which can be a good thing, believe it or not. Behind the okro there’s what looks to be yellow tomatoes. They’re called garden eggs. I thought that they were, in fact, yellow tomatoes until a friend used them in a stew, and I found out that they’re actually stiff inside. I wish I could tell you more about how this produce got to market. I would frame it as part of a larger commentary on the political, technological, economic, and social constraints on small farmers throughout Ghana, but I have no idea where this food came from.
And I couldn’t have asked it properly even if the question had popped into my mind. Because I haven’t learned Twi. Now we can take a look at the people in the photo. You’ll notice that the woman selling okro looks a bit upset and me a bit pensive. I had asked a Ghanaian friend to take some photos of the Madina market because people don’t particularly enjoy being filmed by foreigners as if they were part of the scenery. He suggested a picture of me, which I rightly suspected wouldn’t end well. For me this is an image of frustration. She’s frustrated because the picture is coming without her permission. I’m frustrated that I haven’t become enough of an “insider” during my time here to make this situation anything but extremely uncomfortable.
Despite my best intentions, I haven’t learned the most common language. I have a pile of well-rehearsed and very reasonable excuses for this omission, but at the end of the day, I can’t expect to walk into Madina market deaf and dumb and not experience some cultural alienation. But that’s not right. I was supposed to be the good foreigner. More on this after we consider the second picture.
This is me pounding fufu (here, cassava and plantain, though it could include yam, pounded into dough and eaten with soup). I’ve included a picture of my friend pounding so you can get a clearer idea. Now I’m sure you’re struck by my focus, hand-speed, raw strength, etc. all on display here, but I ask you to look beyond those extremely striking features (you can return to admiring them in a moment) and take note of the surroundings. I’m in the kitchen of my friend’s sister, and I’m being assisted by another friend (the young woman at right). The young woman mostly obscured does domestic work. In the market, I was an intruder. Here, I am a guest.
My fufu was awesome, by the way, mostly because I did almost none of the work involved. I do believe, however, that the few strokes which I delivered were decisive in the preparation.
I’m offering these two photos for contrast because they depict the opposite of what I expected coming into this experience. 10 months ago I would’ve thought I’d have a picture of me skillfully negotiating the anonymous market space and being more uncomfortable trying to observe decorum as a guest in someone’s home. In other words, I thought I would be the half-Ghanaian dialoguing and debating in Twi as I mingled with the people in out-of-the-way places never frequented by the culturally uninitiated. And I didn’t really stop to think that I might make friends along the way. Actual people who have enriched my life not because they represent some abstract slice of Ghana, some moral I can condense and distill for this blog or footnote in a term paper, but because they offer companionship and ask only for as much in return. So yes, in the second photo, I’m doing something “Ghanaian,” but if you look closer you can see that I’m really just making lunch with some friends. I will leave here regretting that I don’t speak Twi (or Ga, Ewe, Fanti, Dagbani…), but I won’t have any regrets about the relationships that I take back with me.
Look closely enough at these two pictures and you can get a sense of where that misguided project has taken me. The first was taken in Madina market, a few minutes up the road from the university. Before I explain my grimace, a few general comments. Maybe you’ve never been to an open-air market like this. They’re not as common in the States. Such a dizzying mash of smells and noises and cash and people pump through the veins of this place so that sterile words like “economy” and “commerce” don’t come close to untying this knot of power, culture, struggle, work, life. Which makes the prospect of going back to Wal-Mart that much more depressing.
You might notice that aside from my big red self, everyone else in the place is a woman. The market is a woman’s space. Ghanaian women are legendary for their trading prowess, and “market queens” have amassed a great deal of wealth and influence for themselves. The liberalization of Ghana’s economy starting in the 1980s resulted in a contraction of formal sector employment (like factory jobs) so that more and more Ghanaians – men and women – earn their living in the “informal economy,” a phrase referring to untaxed and unregulated exchanges . (For trivia buffs, the term “informal economy” was coined by a guy doing research in Accra’s Nima market in the 60s and/or 70s.)
You might also notice what’s being sold. The green pods in the foreground are okro, a vegetable with a lot of seeds, which is why it’s used in some ceremonies to symbolize fertility. For practical purposes, it makes your soup slimy which can be a good thing, believe it or not. Behind the okro there’s what looks to be yellow tomatoes. They’re called garden eggs. I thought that they were, in fact, yellow tomatoes until a friend used them in a stew, and I found out that they’re actually stiff inside. I wish I could tell you more about how this produce got to market. I would frame it as part of a larger commentary on the political, technological, economic, and social constraints on small farmers throughout Ghana, but I have no idea where this food came from.
And I couldn’t have asked it properly even if the question had popped into my mind. Because I haven’t learned Twi. Now we can take a look at the people in the photo. You’ll notice that the woman selling okro looks a bit upset and me a bit pensive. I had asked a Ghanaian friend to take some photos of the Madina market because people don’t particularly enjoy being filmed by foreigners as if they were part of the scenery. He suggested a picture of me, which I rightly suspected wouldn’t end well. For me this is an image of frustration. She’s frustrated because the picture is coming without her permission. I’m frustrated that I haven’t become enough of an “insider” during my time here to make this situation anything but extremely uncomfortable.
Despite my best intentions, I haven’t learned the most common language. I have a pile of well-rehearsed and very reasonable excuses for this omission, but at the end of the day, I can’t expect to walk into Madina market deaf and dumb and not experience some cultural alienation. But that’s not right. I was supposed to be the good foreigner. More on this after we consider the second picture.
This is me pounding fufu (here, cassava and plantain, though it could include yam, pounded into dough and eaten with soup). I’ve included a picture of my friend pounding so you can get a clearer idea. Now I’m sure you’re struck by my focus, hand-speed, raw strength, etc. all on display here, but I ask you to look beyond those extremely striking features (you can return to admiring them in a moment) and take note of the surroundings. I’m in the kitchen of my friend’s sister, and I’m being assisted by another friend (the young woman at right). The young woman mostly obscured does domestic work. In the market, I was an intruder. Here, I am a guest.
My fufu was awesome, by the way, mostly because I did almost none of the work involved. I do believe, however, that the few strokes which I delivered were decisive in the preparation.
I’m offering these two photos for contrast because they depict the opposite of what I expected coming into this experience. 10 months ago I would’ve thought I’d have a picture of me skillfully negotiating the anonymous market space and being more uncomfortable trying to observe decorum as a guest in someone’s home. In other words, I thought I would be the half-Ghanaian dialoguing and debating in Twi as I mingled with the people in out-of-the-way places never frequented by the culturally uninitiated. And I didn’t really stop to think that I might make friends along the way. Actual people who have enriched my life not because they represent some abstract slice of Ghana, some moral I can condense and distill for this blog or footnote in a term paper, but because they offer companionship and ask only for as much in return. So yes, in the second photo, I’m doing something “Ghanaian,” but if you look closer you can see that I’m really just making lunch with some friends. I will leave here regretting that I don’t speak Twi (or Ga, Ewe, Fanti, Dagbani…), but I won’t have any regrets about the relationships that I take back with me.
30 March, 2009
Fragments
Sheyi Adebayor’s thickly muscled frame is inclined towards the ball, which like the crowd, impatiently awaits the inevitable. We can all trace the path the ball will take, off the golden foot, past the helpless keeper, into the loving embrace of the net. A penalty kick for Africa’s 2008 Balon d’Or winner? The fact that we are even bothering with the formality is a bit ludicrous. The Togolese fans hundreds thick around me have stopped waiting. They are celebrating as if the goal is scored, the game is won, and the Hawks’ ticket to the 2010 World Cup is already punched. I don’t blame them. An upset is in the making. The Indomitable Lions of Cameroon, the top-ranked football team on the continent, have no answers for Togo’s defense. And now with Adebayor lining up his penalty kick, they look resigned to defeat.
The wheels of Fate start to turn. Adebayor is churning towards the ball, towards immortality. A stutter step freezes the goalie. A thousand breaths held. The strike. The second look. The ball is wide, very wide. It now bounces limply against the fiberglass barrier which bravely dams the disappointment of a nation from washing away its hero. I let a reference to the Mighty Casey slip. No one is listening.
The Great One for his part is unshaken, unshakeable. He turns his back on the goal, the ball, the imperfection and walks non-chalantly towards the mid-field, a jilted lover majestic in ambivalence. He has no fear for the victory. Or for his reputation. He has already scored the match’s only goal. His work was finished after the 15th minute. A teammate, lacking such divine confidence, has collapsed to his knees in front of the goal, a bit melodramatically. His head lowers to the ground so that he appears to be bent in submission to the goal.
Six men – five in a horizontal line behind the sixth – are in the same position, knees and forehead to the ground, in submission. They are just outside the stadium. It is half-time, and they are performing the evening prayer. I am looking at them from the stair well of the stadium. I trace a line from their backs to Mecca and back to Accra, to the dull blue ocean which spills out from behind a line of houses a few blocks from the stadium.
Accra is the friend I never wanted. The city is dirty and crowded, and the traffic is perennial. The architecture is forgettable, and there are few green spaces. My opinion of my adopted home further declined after a trip to Abidjan in neighboring Cote d’Ivoire. Abidjan has a lagoon and striking buildings and a je ne sais quoi which may grow from the threat of political instability which hangs over the place or the no-holds barred capitalism that created both the wealth that so enchants me and the threat of political instability which troubles my stomach. No, there is no lagoon in Accra and no air of romance. (Of course, as a man who’s spoken for, I wouldn’t be allowed to breathe such air even if it was on offer.) Instead, there is an infuriating unwillingness of the city’s contradictions to resolve themselves.
Its sense of history for instance. The Kwame Nkrumah Mausoleum is a massive, brash structure anchoring the city’s southern edge. Move to the city center and you find yourself getting jostled around Nkrumah Circle. Move a few kilometers further to the north and you reach the Kwame Nkrumah International Airport. No, actually, you reach the Kotoka International Airport, whose namesake toppled Nkrumah in a bloodless coup. After which the people danced in the streets. Accra is Whitman-esque in trumpeting its contradictions.
The Togolese are celebrating with abandon now. The upset is official. Their pilgrimage has been rewarded. I feel my back pocket. My money is still there. I look to my friends. They are taking pictures of themselves wearing serious expressions which bespeak the gravity of the occasion. We join the flood of yellow shirts and French worlds pouring into the dusk.
Back on campus, I’m sitting on a wooden bench at Margaret’s stall: Fear Thou Not Special Beans and Yam. It’s where I buy my beans. And yam. Margaret has left me for the moment to buy some fried plantain which she has run out of but which I require to complete my order of beans. I hear and understand as the guy on the bench behind me tells a newly arrived customer in Twi that she’s left to go and buy plantain. I wait for the surge of pride. It’s not usual that I understand every word in a sentence. It doesn’t come. I feel – a bit tired, like I’ve been staring at a very large and complicated tapestry for the whole day. I comprehend – or pretend I do – bits and pieces. These are my measures of progress, what shows me that I haven’t been here simply popping malaria pills and calling home for the past 8 months. The stray historical allusion comes into focus here, a familiar face emerges from the crowd over there. Not everything is strange anymore.
But I take my beans and wish Margaret good night and know that there has been no progress. She is still a stranger. We still occupy different worlds. None of my dumb smiling has erased that barrier. The only progress is that now with weary eyes I look out with a shade more humility, not expecting to understand, not believing that there is something to understand. I see fragments. Not puzzle pieces or clues to the Secret. Just shards of experience, mostly forgotten.
I am getting my beans on credit because I don’t have exact change. Tomorrow or the next day I will return and pay her. And a few days later, it will be forgotten. I will be forgotten.
The wheels of Fate start to turn. Adebayor is churning towards the ball, towards immortality. A stutter step freezes the goalie. A thousand breaths held. The strike. The second look. The ball is wide, very wide. It now bounces limply against the fiberglass barrier which bravely dams the disappointment of a nation from washing away its hero. I let a reference to the Mighty Casey slip. No one is listening.
The Great One for his part is unshaken, unshakeable. He turns his back on the goal, the ball, the imperfection and walks non-chalantly towards the mid-field, a jilted lover majestic in ambivalence. He has no fear for the victory. Or for his reputation. He has already scored the match’s only goal. His work was finished after the 15th minute. A teammate, lacking such divine confidence, has collapsed to his knees in front of the goal, a bit melodramatically. His head lowers to the ground so that he appears to be bent in submission to the goal.
Six men – five in a horizontal line behind the sixth – are in the same position, knees and forehead to the ground, in submission. They are just outside the stadium. It is half-time, and they are performing the evening prayer. I am looking at them from the stair well of the stadium. I trace a line from their backs to Mecca and back to Accra, to the dull blue ocean which spills out from behind a line of houses a few blocks from the stadium.
Accra is the friend I never wanted. The city is dirty and crowded, and the traffic is perennial. The architecture is forgettable, and there are few green spaces. My opinion of my adopted home further declined after a trip to Abidjan in neighboring Cote d’Ivoire. Abidjan has a lagoon and striking buildings and a je ne sais quoi which may grow from the threat of political instability which hangs over the place or the no-holds barred capitalism that created both the wealth that so enchants me and the threat of political instability which troubles my stomach. No, there is no lagoon in Accra and no air of romance. (Of course, as a man who’s spoken for, I wouldn’t be allowed to breathe such air even if it was on offer.) Instead, there is an infuriating unwillingness of the city’s contradictions to resolve themselves.
Its sense of history for instance. The Kwame Nkrumah Mausoleum is a massive, brash structure anchoring the city’s southern edge. Move to the city center and you find yourself getting jostled around Nkrumah Circle. Move a few kilometers further to the north and you reach the Kwame Nkrumah International Airport. No, actually, you reach the Kotoka International Airport, whose namesake toppled Nkrumah in a bloodless coup. After which the people danced in the streets. Accra is Whitman-esque in trumpeting its contradictions.
The Togolese are celebrating with abandon now. The upset is official. Their pilgrimage has been rewarded. I feel my back pocket. My money is still there. I look to my friends. They are taking pictures of themselves wearing serious expressions which bespeak the gravity of the occasion. We join the flood of yellow shirts and French worlds pouring into the dusk.
Back on campus, I’m sitting on a wooden bench at Margaret’s stall: Fear Thou Not Special Beans and Yam. It’s where I buy my beans. And yam. Margaret has left me for the moment to buy some fried plantain which she has run out of but which I require to complete my order of beans. I hear and understand as the guy on the bench behind me tells a newly arrived customer in Twi that she’s left to go and buy plantain. I wait for the surge of pride. It’s not usual that I understand every word in a sentence. It doesn’t come. I feel – a bit tired, like I’ve been staring at a very large and complicated tapestry for the whole day. I comprehend – or pretend I do – bits and pieces. These are my measures of progress, what shows me that I haven’t been here simply popping malaria pills and calling home for the past 8 months. The stray historical allusion comes into focus here, a familiar face emerges from the crowd over there. Not everything is strange anymore.
But I take my beans and wish Margaret good night and know that there has been no progress. She is still a stranger. We still occupy different worlds. None of my dumb smiling has erased that barrier. The only progress is that now with weary eyes I look out with a shade more humility, not expecting to understand, not believing that there is something to understand. I see fragments. Not puzzle pieces or clues to the Secret. Just shards of experience, mostly forgotten.
I am getting my beans on credit because I don’t have exact change. Tomorrow or the next day I will return and pay her. And a few days later, it will be forgotten. I will be forgotten.
15 February, 2009
The Tao of Ataya
The first time I came back to my room and stumbled upon my roommate Bai carefully portioning a pile of tea leaves into a midnight blue porcelain kettle, I had no idea of the journey that I had in front of me. He invited me to join him for ataya (a-tie-ah). We drink it in the Gambia, he said. We didn’t know each other very well then, and I certainly didn’t know what to expect, but I sat down. Soon we could hear the water boiling. Moving deliberately, Bai removed the kettle, added a double shot of sugar, and then returned it to the burner. We waited, steam wafting towards us. Bai took the kettle again, using a piece cardboard as an oven mitt. He daringly poised the kettle a foot or so above the tiny glass and then sent the tea in a neat black stream to its target. Sufficiently impressed, I braced myself to drink. But the glass didn’t come. Instead, with a snap of his wrist, Bai passed its contents back into the kettle. And then poured another glass, the line of steaming tea incredibly obedient as it fell into the cup. This one was for me, I was sure. Nope. Back into the kettle. The tea passed from glass to kettle and kettle to glass, again and again and again. Then the long-suffering kettle went back on the burner. I swallowed a sigh, my eyes wandering to my backpack, leaning heavily against the dresser, practically bursting with assignments.
We waited. And waited. Then the kettle came off, and he poured a glass. This time I actually reached for it. Bai smiled to himself as the tea arced once more from glass to kettle. And then back into the glass. To the kettle. To the glass. To the kettle. To the glass. To the kettle. To the - what? The burner? Certainly not… We waited. And waited. When I finally received my 4 ounces of sweet, strong, searing Chinese green tea, I was convinced that such a maddening process could’ve transformed the water, leaves, and sugar into liquid gold and it still wouldn’t have been worth it. This was no alchemy, though. It tasted like tea. I relinquished the glass and prepared to excuse myself when more water and an alarming amount of sugar were added to the kettle which still carried a clot of ataya in its bowels. And the ritual was repeated. Twice more. I had three glasses in all. As I polished off my 11th and 12th ounces rather summarily, I checked the time. 1 hour and 15 minutes since the ataya was unboxed. I cursed under my breath and then pledged myself to academic penance in the library after dinner.
The next afternoon when I returned to the room, there was Bai, brewing again. This time, I felt like I had had a reasonably productive day already. I deserved a little break, and what else was I going to reward myself with? So we drank our three glasses and chatted aimlessly. After I finished my 12th ounce, sipping, not gulping this time, I realized that I felt a bit different. I was relaxed, and thankful for the time out, for the bit of human contact.
Bai and I have settled into a pattern of drinking ataya nearly every afternoon. Sometimes we’re joined by friends. When they’re other Gambians, the Wolof flies thick and fast, punctuated by staccato “wow”s, which means yes. When they’re members of Bai’s insect science program, the discussion moves from the whims of never-been-pleased professors to the intricacies of acquired resistance in Anopholes gambie. And when it’s just Bai and I, we talk about home or going home, studying, and cooking, politics and the English Premier League.
I’m relatively good at time management, mostly because I have an abiding aversion of wasted time. I’m so good at not wasting time in fact, that some days I don’t leave time for anything but not wasting time. Making time for ataya won’t help me write my thesis, the methodology section of which is keeping me up at night and then giving me nightmares. But making time for ataya has helped me realize that the time we spend is a flexible currency.
We waited. And waited. Then the kettle came off, and he poured a glass. This time I actually reached for it. Bai smiled to himself as the tea arced once more from glass to kettle. And then back into the glass. To the kettle. To the glass. To the kettle. To the glass. To the kettle. To the - what? The burner? Certainly not… We waited. And waited. When I finally received my 4 ounces of sweet, strong, searing Chinese green tea, I was convinced that such a maddening process could’ve transformed the water, leaves, and sugar into liquid gold and it still wouldn’t have been worth it. This was no alchemy, though. It tasted like tea. I relinquished the glass and prepared to excuse myself when more water and an alarming amount of sugar were added to the kettle which still carried a clot of ataya in its bowels. And the ritual was repeated. Twice more. I had three glasses in all. As I polished off my 11th and 12th ounces rather summarily, I checked the time. 1 hour and 15 minutes since the ataya was unboxed. I cursed under my breath and then pledged myself to academic penance in the library after dinner.
The next afternoon when I returned to the room, there was Bai, brewing again. This time, I felt like I had had a reasonably productive day already. I deserved a little break, and what else was I going to reward myself with? So we drank our three glasses and chatted aimlessly. After I finished my 12th ounce, sipping, not gulping this time, I realized that I felt a bit different. I was relaxed, and thankful for the time out, for the bit of human contact.
Bai and I have settled into a pattern of drinking ataya nearly every afternoon. Sometimes we’re joined by friends. When they’re other Gambians, the Wolof flies thick and fast, punctuated by staccato “wow”s, which means yes. When they’re members of Bai’s insect science program, the discussion moves from the whims of never-been-pleased professors to the intricacies of acquired resistance in Anopholes gambie. And when it’s just Bai and I, we talk about home or going home, studying, and cooking, politics and the English Premier League.
I’m relatively good at time management, mostly because I have an abiding aversion of wasted time. I’m so good at not wasting time in fact, that some days I don’t leave time for anything but not wasting time. Making time for ataya won’t help me write my thesis, the methodology section of which is keeping me up at night and then giving me nightmares. But making time for ataya has helped me realize that the time we spend is a flexible currency.
08 February, 2009
Home, through another's eyes
If you look hard enough, you’ll find traces of the people and places you miss almost anywhere you go. Waiting in the International Programs Office at the university early in ther term, I glanced at a bookshelf to my left and saw a promo VHS for Marywood University, my sister’s alma mater. A few weeks later, I was handing my backpack to the porter at the library when I found myself staring at the logo on his polo shirt. It was from Bishop Hoban, the now defunct Catholic High School in Wilkes-Barres whose baseball and basketball teams dealt me and my friends many a sound defeat. I constantly find myself in circumstances that remind me of my parents, my girlfriend, my home.
Not too long ago I was having a conversation with a friend and fellow grad student from the Gambia (not my roommate) when he mentioned that he had studied for a semester in the US. I asked him where. Indiana University of Pennsylvania, in the western part of the state. I asked him his impressions. He replied that while he found the people at the school to be very pleasant, small town Pennsylvania wasn’t exactly his cup of tea. So he headed for Boston where he spent the rest of the year with family. On the bus ride to Boston, he looked at the window. And I know what he saw. The low-lying hills, the bare rock where the road was blasted through, the forests and cornfields tripping over each other, truck stops, and Perkins. So he wondered to himself what types of opportunities could possibly exist in a place like this. His bus stopped for a time in a small, gray city, a very depressing place. “W something. Wiksbaum maybe.”
I held my breath. “Wilkes-Barre?”
“That’s it.”
I laughed nervously. He was saying exactly what many of my friends have said about the non-Pittsburgh, non-Philly parts of PA and doing exactly what many of my friends and, despite my genuine fondness for my home, myself have done: leave. But he’s an African. Shouldn’t Africans look upon America – all of America – as the land of opportunity? Whether its amber waves of grain or a strip mall, doesn’t America at its least appealing beat Africa at its best?
Well, no. Brain drain from Africa is a much-discussed topic, but it’s just as live an issue in the rural T of PA (the Northern Tier and the central part of the state). My friend’s impressions don’t prove anything about the US, PA, or the Gambia. They just present a reminder that Africa does not look upon the US with unqualified envy and that America need not look back with unqualified pity. For that particular man, gazing upon that particular part of the country, the Gambia held more promise.
Not too long ago I was having a conversation with a friend and fellow grad student from the Gambia (not my roommate) when he mentioned that he had studied for a semester in the US. I asked him where. Indiana University of Pennsylvania, in the western part of the state. I asked him his impressions. He replied that while he found the people at the school to be very pleasant, small town Pennsylvania wasn’t exactly his cup of tea. So he headed for Boston where he spent the rest of the year with family. On the bus ride to Boston, he looked at the window. And I know what he saw. The low-lying hills, the bare rock where the road was blasted through, the forests and cornfields tripping over each other, truck stops, and Perkins. So he wondered to himself what types of opportunities could possibly exist in a place like this. His bus stopped for a time in a small, gray city, a very depressing place. “W something. Wiksbaum maybe.”
I held my breath. “Wilkes-Barre?”
“That’s it.”
I laughed nervously. He was saying exactly what many of my friends have said about the non-Pittsburgh, non-Philly parts of PA and doing exactly what many of my friends and, despite my genuine fondness for my home, myself have done: leave. But he’s an African. Shouldn’t Africans look upon America – all of America – as the land of opportunity? Whether its amber waves of grain or a strip mall, doesn’t America at its least appealing beat Africa at its best?
Well, no. Brain drain from Africa is a much-discussed topic, but it’s just as live an issue in the rural T of PA (the Northern Tier and the central part of the state). My friend’s impressions don’t prove anything about the US, PA, or the Gambia. They just present a reminder that Africa does not look upon the US with unqualified envy and that America need not look back with unqualified pity. For that particular man, gazing upon that particular part of the country, the Gambia held more promise.
22 January, 2009
A meeting with the Rotary Club of Garoua / Une reunion avec le Rotary Club de Garoua
On January 12, I had the pleasure of attending with Emily a meeting of the Rotary Club of Garoua at the Hotel la Benoué. Emily and I were warmly received by the club President Njialeu Blaise and all of the other members. I shared information about how I was using my Rotary Ambassadorial Scholarship, and they in turn told me about the club’s activities, which include some great work with an orphanage and rural schools. After the meeting, the club treated us to dinner at a nearby restaurant. Emily and I were both extremely grateful to be able to spend the evening with such friendly and generous hosts. I will now translate this into awful French.
Le 12 janvier, Emily et moi, nous étions ravis d’assister à une réunion du Rotary Club de Garoua à l’Hôtel la Benoué. Le président du club, NJIALEU Blaise, et tous les autres membres nous sont rendus très confortable. J’ai partagé des renseignements sur mon bourse de Rotary et mes études au Ghana. Ils nous ont parlé des projets du club. Ils travaillent avec une maison des enfants abandonnés et des écoles rurales. Après la réunion, les membres du club nous avons offert un repas à un restaurant proche. Emily et moi, nous étions très heureux de passer une soir avec des gens si gentils et si généreux. Maintenant, je vais traduire ceci en français horrible.
Le 12 janvier, Emily et moi, nous étions ravis d’assister à une réunion du Rotary Club de Garoua à l’Hôtel la Benoué. Le président du club, NJIALEU Blaise, et tous les autres membres nous sont rendus très confortable. J’ai partagé des renseignements sur mon bourse de Rotary et mes études au Ghana. Ils nous ont parlé des projets du club. Ils travaillent avec une maison des enfants abandonnés et des écoles rurales. Après la réunion, les membres du club nous avons offert un repas à un restaurant proche. Emily et moi, nous étions très heureux de passer une soir avec des gens si gentils et si généreux. Maintenant, je vais traduire ceci en français horrible.
20 January, 2009
18 January, 2009
Christmas en brousse (in the bush)
It’s about 650 miles from Douala, Cameroon’s commercial hub and main port, to Garoua, provincial capital of the Région du Nord. Another 45 miles to the border with Chad. The road network between Cameroon’s lushly forested south and arid, sahellien north is in poor condition, making the route one of Africa’s most expensive transport corridors. (According to the Institute for Food Policy Research, it costs 11 cents / km to transport goods by road between Douala and N’Djamena, Chad. The comparable rate in the US is estimated at 5 cents / km; in Pakistan, it’s 4 cents / km. To make matters worse, Douala’s is West Africa’s most expensive port.) Consequently, most people and goods go north by rail, that is, by the government-owned, French-operated CAMRAIL train running daily between Yaoundé, the capital, and N’Gaoundère, about 200 miles to the south of Garoua. It’s a 15 hour ride, a red-eye leaving at 6 in the evening.
The Midnight Express disgorged me, red-eyed and rubber-legged, under the concrete fin of the N’Gaoundère train station a little after noon on December 21. I was lucky to wedge myself onto the first bus leaving for Garoua, where I was retrieved by my girlfriend Emily, a radiant vision in an African print skirt, bronzed skin, lugging the bulky helmet that the US Peace Corps requires its volunteers to wear whenever they travel by motorcycle taxi (moto). As I caught sight of her from the window of the bus, all of the time between when we said good bye in Philadelphia and the present collapsed.
Cameroon was one of the first countries to receive Peace Corps volunteers after the Corps’ inception in the early 1960s. Agroforestry, Emily’s sub-program, is, however, a much more recent endeavor, opening operations in Cameroon’s three northernmost provinces in 2000. Emily is posted in a rural village called Bamé, about 30 miles southeast of Garoua. As a Peace Corps volunteer, she wears many hats (headscarves, actually): ambassador of goodwill, student of culture, cultivator of foodstuffs. But essentially, she’s there to peddle trees. And she’s got a good product to push. Trees do everything but tuck you in at night. They generate income. Emily is helping some of her neighbors to acquire gum Arabic trees, the sap of which is in high demand for its industrial applications. Trees offer shade, a luxury easily forgotten until you get stuck without one in the 125F heat. Fast growing trees provide sustainable sources of firewood and construction materials. They can improve crop yields by fixing nitrogen and furnishing green manure. They say no to erosion and desertification, critical functions for a region on the doorstep of the Sahara.
Bamé is a sprawling classroom with a faculty of approximately 3,000. Mbroro pastoralists, Toupori famers, Muslim Fulbés, Christian Mafas, and a half dozen other ethno-linguistic groups are scattered across the dusty plain. The diversity is at once fascinating and a bit daunting. For instance, a matter as simple as saying hello becomes complicated in such a cosmopolitan environment. Use French and you run the risk of being that nassara (foreigner) who hasn’t taken the time to learn any of the local languages. Don’t use French and you may be implying that you don’t think your interlocutor has had much formal education. Use fulfuldé, the lingua franca across Northern Cameroon, and you may offend non-Fulbé, some of whom carry a historical grudge dating to the Fulbé jihad’s of the 19th Century and don’t appreciate being addressed in the conqueror’s language. Even if you do select the culturally appropriate greeting, it’s likely to touch off a chain of rapid-fire pleasantry exchanges, a dizzying call and response that Emily navigated effortlessly but which left me feeling like I knew even less of the language than when I started.
It’s easy for an outsider to see Bamé for what it doesn’t have. It doesn’t have a paved road. It doesn’t have a secondary school. It doesn’t have running water. It doesn’t have electricity, even though high tension wires run right through the middle of the village. I was struck, however, by what it does have. Friendly people welcoming to visitors and supportive of Peace Corps’ mission. A great weekly market. Lots of fat, tasty looking ducks. And, of course, Emily. That’s more than enough to lure me back.
The Midnight Express disgorged me, red-eyed and rubber-legged, under the concrete fin of the N’Gaoundère train station a little after noon on December 21. I was lucky to wedge myself onto the first bus leaving for Garoua, where I was retrieved by my girlfriend Emily, a radiant vision in an African print skirt, bronzed skin, lugging the bulky helmet that the US Peace Corps requires its volunteers to wear whenever they travel by motorcycle taxi (moto). As I caught sight of her from the window of the bus, all of the time between when we said good bye in Philadelphia and the present collapsed.
Cameroon was one of the first countries to receive Peace Corps volunteers after the Corps’ inception in the early 1960s. Agroforestry, Emily’s sub-program, is, however, a much more recent endeavor, opening operations in Cameroon’s three northernmost provinces in 2000. Emily is posted in a rural village called Bamé, about 30 miles southeast of Garoua. As a Peace Corps volunteer, she wears many hats (headscarves, actually): ambassador of goodwill, student of culture, cultivator of foodstuffs. But essentially, she’s there to peddle trees. And she’s got a good product to push. Trees do everything but tuck you in at night. They generate income. Emily is helping some of her neighbors to acquire gum Arabic trees, the sap of which is in high demand for its industrial applications. Trees offer shade, a luxury easily forgotten until you get stuck without one in the 125F heat. Fast growing trees provide sustainable sources of firewood and construction materials. They can improve crop yields by fixing nitrogen and furnishing green manure. They say no to erosion and desertification, critical functions for a region on the doorstep of the Sahara.
Bamé is a sprawling classroom with a faculty of approximately 3,000. Mbroro pastoralists, Toupori famers, Muslim Fulbés, Christian Mafas, and a half dozen other ethno-linguistic groups are scattered across the dusty plain. The diversity is at once fascinating and a bit daunting. For instance, a matter as simple as saying hello becomes complicated in such a cosmopolitan environment. Use French and you run the risk of being that nassara (foreigner) who hasn’t taken the time to learn any of the local languages. Don’t use French and you may be implying that you don’t think your interlocutor has had much formal education. Use fulfuldé, the lingua franca across Northern Cameroon, and you may offend non-Fulbé, some of whom carry a historical grudge dating to the Fulbé jihad’s of the 19th Century and don’t appreciate being addressed in the conqueror’s language. Even if you do select the culturally appropriate greeting, it’s likely to touch off a chain of rapid-fire pleasantry exchanges, a dizzying call and response that Emily navigated effortlessly but which left me feeling like I knew even less of the language than when I started.
It’s easy for an outsider to see Bamé for what it doesn’t have. It doesn’t have a paved road. It doesn’t have a secondary school. It doesn’t have running water. It doesn’t have electricity, even though high tension wires run right through the middle of the village. I was struck, however, by what it does have. Friendly people welcoming to visitors and supportive of Peace Corps’ mission. A great weekly market. Lots of fat, tasty looking ducks. And, of course, Emily. That’s more than enough to lure me back.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
