Today we left Peace Corps orientation in Yaoundé for the
training centers where we will spend the next 10 weeks. For Youth Development,
Agroforestry and Environmental volunteers, this is the town of Bafia; Health
volunteers (or “the red-headed stepchildren”, an expression by which I heard us
referred to) are a little further out in the boonies, in the smaller satellite
town of Bokito. We dropped the majority off at the main Peace Corps center in
Bafia, after which the few, the proud, the Health Extension chosen continued 25
kilometers to our new home and dispersed with our host families. My maman, Mama
Jeanne, picked me up at the Peace Corps training center in Bokito. We threw my luggage on top of a van and
crammed four trainees and the six or so hosts that came with us into the car
for a drop off. This was my first experience travelling Cameroonian style, and
it did not disappoint. As there were more people than seats, I folded myself
into the front between Mama Jeanne and the driver—the little seat positioned
directly above the gear shift called the petit chauffeur. With my height, my
knees were smashed uncomfortably into the control panel, and I had to crane my
neck awkwardly to carry on a conversation with Mama Jeanne. Totally
unperturbed, she pulled out her cell phone and punched in a number. When the
receiver picked up, she held it up to my ear. “C’est Papa,” she announced, as
nonchalantly as a parent might inform their actual biological daughter that her
dad was on the phone, say hi. Taking my cue from her informality, I played
along. “Salut, Papa!” I sang into the
phone. My host father, the coordinator of an NGO named Boyomo Isaac (who, mind
you, I have not met and knew nothing of until this afternoon) told me he was in
Yaoundé for the time being and was sorry not to be in Bokito to meet me, but he
hoped I settled in well. As the van emptied out, I kept glancing back,
expecting us to collectively breathe out and rearrange to fill the newly
vacated space—but that did not transpire. The middle row empty, the four in the
back seat stayed put, and Mama Jeanne showed no inclination to end the game of
sardines up front.
We got
to the house and I met two of the Biyaga family’s three sons, Daniel and
Patrick. They are both in university in Yaoundé—Daniel is about to enter a
master’s program and Patrick is in his second year of undergrad—but had come
home to move me in and will be around for the next few weeks. A ten-year-old niece,
Marguerite, moved in with the family a year ago. She began at a technical
school, where she chose to study to be an accountant. She is apparently a
little overwhelmed by the math homework, and spent all evening studying,
assisted occasionally by her older cousin Danny.
The
house where we sleep is next to an unattached kitchen; a path leads back to
another house in the compound that a family that moved from l’Extrême-Nord
has been renting for several years. “But they are family now, too,” explained
Mama Jeanne with a shrug. “C’est Cameroun, nous sommes ensembles.” One of the
mothers in the family has a toddler, who came waddling up on my arrival—then
stared, suddenly apprehensive, and backed away warily. This amused Mama Jeanne
inordinately. Chortling, she led me back to meet the baby’s mother, who was
crouched over a pot of what is here called couscous on an outdoor wood stove,
pounding the corn grits with a long wooden baton. “Votre petite bébé a refusé
d’acceuillir ma grosse bébé!” she crowed, slapping her knee—your little baby
refused to welcome my big baby. The
other mamas in the yard laughed, not unkindly, and chucked the toddler under
her chin as Mama Jeanna repeated the story, still chuckling to herself. There
are several girls in the backyard family, who sat outside our case in the
evening, giggling and shyly answering my questions. Mama Jeanne nodded to the
middle one, Jamila, who at age ten is already married- not something done by
Cameroonians in the Centre province, explained Danny, but culturally acceptable
in the Extreme- Nord. “She will be your Fulfuldé tutor.”
I
followed Mama Jeanne into the kitchen case, where Danny had begun making
dinner—potatoes sautéed with carrots and tomatoes (“Because you don’t eat fish
or meat!” my mother exclaimed, shaking her head in disbelief), and a dish of
fish and greens called coque, which Mama Jeanne prepared especially for her
boys’ return visit, as it is their favorite. A few neighbors dropped by to
visit, greet the sons—word had apparently gotten around that they were back—and
meet me. They asked how many “enfants”, or children, had come with the Peace
Corps group, and mused about the Corps de la Paix enfants they had hosted in
the past. It is unclear to me whether they were simply referring to the average
age of the volunteers—late twenties; not as old enough to be deferred to by an
elder, but hardly children—or if it is our inexperience, blundering cultural
gaffes, and naiveté that has demoted us to less than full adulthood. I will be interested to see if, in time, we
can earn our way into more respect.
We ate in the living room, scooping
our plates with batons of manioc. The process was explained to me—the manioc is
soaked for several days, then taken to a mill where it is ground into a paste,
then wrapped in large leaves, tied, and dried. The dried batons are boiled to
soften them before eating. The texture was unfamiliar—not unpleasant, but hard
to compare. Luckily, as they may be a large part of my diet here, I liked them,
although I’m not sure I’d want to snack on one on its own; they don’t have a
very pronounced flavor.
After
dinner Danny dug out some photo albums, and I got to see pictures of the Biyaga
family history, from Jeanne and Boyomo’s wedding and the boys’ births to the
string of Peace Corps trainees the family has hosted in the past. I retrieved a
small album I had brought and showed my family, friends, and past homes in
return. Danny was intrigued by New York, particularly the pictures of winter
snowstorms; Patrick liked the photos of Israel, and seemed surprised when I
pointed out my mother in group shots—“But she’s so young!” (read: slender, which here is a marker of age. More on cultural values regarding size later). Mama Jeanne halted
at one of my favorite pictures of my father, which I snapped in one of his
sillier moments. He has an earflap beanie perched on top of a baseball cap, and
is making rock on hands and sticking his tongue out. She gazed at the photo,
perplexed. “Il porte son chapeau comme un enfant?” she queried, and I
laughingly admitted that yes, he was wearing his hat like a child. She smiled
and shook her head. “He likes playing the clown, then?” A wave of homesickness
washed over me as I nodded, smiling, and I wished my parents could meet the
Biyagas. I think they would like them.
After
the photos were put away, our attention turned to the television, which had been
on the whole time in the background. A Bollywood soap opera was underway, the
dramatic lip motions not syncing very well with alternately breathy and gruff
French voiceovers. Danny grinned apologetically. “Not for me or Patrick, but
Cameroonian women…” He gestured at the female half of his family. Mama Jeanne
was nodding off on the sofa, the work of the day catching her up. She woke up
slightly as an old woman burst dramatically onto the screen, declaiming that
someone was someone else’s true child, taken at birth (no, really, I’m not
making this plot up). “Ah, la Grandmère!”
she murmured, eyes drooping. “She is a bad guy.” She began to incoherently
summarize the plot, half-asleep, when Danny gently interrupted her to tell her
to go to bed. Given the early morning I have tomorrow, I followed suit. It
began raining fairly heavily about an hour ago, which is a boon; it mostly
drowns out the Rihanna pumping from next door. My clothes are mostly unpacked
on the shelves that take up any of the room not occupied by a double bed,
table, and chair—I have to shuffle sideways to get to the window—so I think I’m
going to crawl under my mosquito net and call it a night.
No comments:
Post a Comment