kar0ling

It came to me in a flash of understanding tonight. People who live or have lived in Bekondo keep commenting on how you "just sit and sweat" here and I didn't get it. Coming from dry Manitoba if you're talking sweating (from weather as opposed to exertion), I think soaring temperatures. So it was with surprise that I waited and waited for this brutal heat they always talked about -- or, what I had interpreted as brutal heat. Some days were very warm, but really, nothing met up with my expectations of high temperatures. But tonight, as I sat on the couch listening to the sermon and sweating, I understood. No, the temperature -- while consistently over 25 -- is not so very soaringly high; that's not why you're sweating. It's the constant humidity that makes the warmth wrap around you like a shroud. Mystery solved.

I am endlessly amused -- and partially horrified -- that "hard work" is one word according to the Ministry of Education in Cameroon. The motto of the Ministry -- painted on every school sign across the country -- is Peace, Hardwork, Progress. Walking around the village the other day, I noticed for the first time that in Bekondo the Primary School advocates not only "Hardwork" but also "Progres." (In fairness, most of the country speaks French, so their slogans would be in French and are probably spelled correctly -- I hope.)

Avocados, where have you been all my life? Or maybe the question is, where have I been? I've always been ambivalent about avocados but now I realize that's because I never really tried them. The week (with me as master of the house) started with two avocados on the vegetable shelf and when kids came by selling some, I thought, “sure, why not? They're cute kids, and bought two more. Now, I have had an avocado salad here, using the fruit as a cup, filled with tomatoes and onions, which is lovely, but I didn’t want to make that. I’ve eaten avocado like butter on bread with a dash of salt and a slice of cheese or tomato, but I didn't want to do that either. One of the avocados was starting to look pretty nasty and threatening to spoil, so, running out of options, I made guacamole. I don’t think I’ve ever really tried guacamole before. It is the only explanation I can come up with for why I didn’t know the stuff is fabulous. First of all, it was fun to make. I n...

If everyone speaks English, why do we need this Oroko Bible translation? Consider this: The back-translator was going over some text when one of the Baptist pastors (seminary trained) happened by and was interested to hear the story of Cain and Abel. In Oroko, Cain says to Abel, 'let's go out to the [word for farm in "the bush" (read: jungle)]'. "No," says the pastor, "you've got the wrong word there. It should be [word for soccer pitch]. You know, the field." This particular misunderstanding has no major theological import, but you can imagine if an educated person could make such a mistake as this, what those with a less masterful grasp of English would make of the NIV, to say nothing of the King James Version, which many of them use.

Chickens going to town on drying cocoa. Conjure that up next time you eat a chocolate bar. Many people dry their cocoa beans under the sun in their front yards. It's a much slower and more laborious process than using a cocoa oven, particularly in rainy season (during which the first cocoa harvests start) when consecutive hours of sunlight are hard to come by, but it's cheaper than renting use of the cocoa oven, and (I'm not sure to what extent this is actually tracked by buyers) it bypasses the potential hazard of smoky-thus devalued-cocoa. Of course, one wonders what other chemical processes may be going on as the slimy beans sit (doubtlessly fermenting) for days on end, trying to become dehydrated in a climate where relative humidity is 80% in dry season, so if I had to choose, I think I'd lean toward smoke-flavoured chocolate myself. As these tarps, anywhere from 1½ to 3 or 4 metres square, sit on the muddy ground, there are no fences or screens to protect them from...

According to Encarta: Harmattan: The Sahara is estimated to generate 300 million metric tons of airborne dust each year, 60 percent of the worldwide total. During the dry season wide areas south of the Sahara are affected by the harmattan, dust-laden winds originating in the desert. Typical episodes last for three to five days, with a dusty haze obliterating the Sun, lowering temperatures, and sometimes reducing visibility to a kilometer or less. The frequency and intensity of the harmattan varies; regions near the desert margins are often affected for 20 to 30 days per year. Dust originating over the Sahara also affects North Africa, southern Europe, and the Arabian Peninsula. The hot, dust-laden winds that occur in North Africa between February and June are known collectively as sirocco, and locally by a variety of names (for example, khamsin in Egypt). Microsoft ® Encarta ® 2006. © 1993-2005 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved. Now the article doesn't specifical...

Somewhat--but surprisingly, not too much--later than the 40 days promised, a communications tower has indeed been erected, enabling us to get network in the village. It became functional on Christmas Eve. I left for Limbe and Kumba on Christmas Day and didn't return for just over a week, so when--alone in Scotts' house except for Rachel whom I'd borrowed to keep me company--a ringing sound pulled me from my holiday lie-in, my sleep-befuddled brain had no idea of what to make of it. I wandered into the utility room (from where the sound seemed to be emanating) and was staring at the solar power transformer, wondering if I needed to get Dan to come and fix whatever emergency was causing the noise, when Rachel stumbled in, rubbing sleep from her eyes and answered the phone. Phone!?!?!?! To think I didn't even recognize the sound of a telephone ringing. But who ever would have expected such a thing in such a place? Not me, apparently. So we are now connected to the outside ...

Soya is an ambiguous word, and I couldn't say what exactly I would expect of something called "soya" at home. It might be soy beans themselves; it might be tofu or another soy bean product; it might be the ubiquitous soya sauce of Chinese restaurants. But I'm fairly positive that it would not ever be spiced, skewered meat roasted over a barrel fire on the side of the road. It's delicious, despite its seeming misnomer. Some are "party in my mouth" spicy, while others are "get water quick, there's a fire in my mouth" spicy, depending on the vendor. It's also known as "typhoid on a stick" but I prefer not to be so negative about food. As long as they're reasonably hot when you buy them, you just chow down with relish and pray that ignorance is bliss.

The interesting thing about translating the Bible into a jungle language is that you learn things about your own language, knowledge-base, and assumptions. A lot of the things in the Bible make a lot more sense to the Oroko people than to your average North American English speaker: kinship relations, aspects of animal husbandry, ways of celebrating (I have a whole new understanding of the parable of the 10 virgins after being involved in a wedding out here). But, then there are a few things which have no referent in this culture and require extensive modifying phrases to explain a concept or object denoted by a simple word in English. "Bronze" was the problem word for the translation team most recently. Oroko has only one word for all metal, but the Bible names many different kinds of metals, and the distinctions between them, while not absolutely crucial to meaning, are important enough that they worth differentiating. Another troublesome concept because it not only reoccu...

Saw a pink chicken running around 3 Corners Bekondo. A cheeky voice in my head asked “Why paint chickens?” riffing off a bewildering book and calendar series of psychedelic cats. When I verbalized the question Mike teased me about the flamingo strain of chickens before admitting it was for identification – so you know which chickens are yours and which belong to your neighbour – like painted sheep in England.

Douala has mosquitoes. Hordes of them. They were swarming Rachel and me as we tried to sleep at the Union of European Baptists Resthouse – which does not have mosquito nets on the bed. After hours of flailing and swatting at the buzzers, and hiding under the topsheet in a stuffy cocoon, I heard Rachel trying to turn on the fan. Brilliant idea! I turned on the light to aid her in her endeavour and discovered why it had been such a miserable night. There were a good half dozen mosquitoes on the wall above my bed and an equal number over by Rachel’s. We performed a mission of annihilation (trying not to smash the blood-filled suckers against the white wall) then went to sleep, finally able to get some relief from the pests and the heat. The next day Dan liberally applied Moon Tiger to the entire apartment so the second night passed much more peacefully. I carry with me the scars (mosquito bites) from the experience thus I’m unconcerned by the chemicals I surely inhaled after the Moon...

The team's Oroko literacy coordinator is getting married. His traditional wedding ceremony was to start at 2:00. Returning from Douala that day, we'd only reached Kumba by 2 and needed to run some errands yet, so alas, we'd just have to be late. Then Mike bumped into the groom at market, so apparently festivities hadn't started yet. He gave the new start time as 5:00. We reached home in Bekondo around 4:30 and wanted to unload, grab a bite to eat, freshen up and pretty up for the celebration, so we didn't arrive at the house of the bride's parents in Mofako (a few villages over) until 6:30 -- still the earliest guests to arrive. Ladies were bustling about arranging and rearranging chairs, the groom had not yet arrived, and the pastor who would oversee the proceedings was with his broken down car in Kumba. While we waited, we were offered some "traditional" waiting food, called "light refreshments," of popcorn and groundnuts (peanuts). When it...

A dinyangi is a birth celebration, usually held about a month after the child is born. It also purports to be a fundraiser, but after all the expense of putting it on, whether any profit was cleared is up for debate. Some essential elements of the celebration are a temporary shelter of bamboo poles and palm leaves, lots of chairs, a generator to run the lights and sound system, food, drinks, and, of course, a cake, to be unveiled and chipped away at piece by piece -- for a price. Johannes (Scotts' househelp) had a baby in August (more accurately, his wife did). Both Scotts and Friesens were invited to the dinyangi at the beginning of November, so I tagged along with Mike and Dan when they went. (Given that it's a fundraiser, you definitely want to invite the white people because besides having status, they also have money.) The invitation said the party would start at 6:30, I think, but being just around the corner from where the event was held, we didn't even think of goin...

On a thrift store in Bamenda: Fairly Used Goods In the police station in Bamenda: Don’t Don’t bribe Bamenda businesses: Naturophatic Medicine Glorious Printshop Microsoft Office Bamenda grocery stores/supermarkets: Vatican Our Parents New Life In Nkwen Baptist Church in Bamenda: Please honour the Lord / Switch off your phone(s) At the Baptist resthouse in Bamenda: No drinking of alcohol here please! Bars/Restaurants: Peaceful Off Licence All for God Bar Explosif Bar Chop Gain In Big Bekondo: Bobecafs-cigs / Exploitation: Cocoa, Coffee On a roadside kiosk in Wafa: Sweat Provision Store On a roadside kiosk in Ekombe: Persi Verance Roadside businesses between Kumba and Yaoundé: God’s Favour Computer Centre Diligent Bilingual Schools A children’s aid-type society in Kumba: Bend Down Women / Care for Orphans and Vulnerable Children Miscellaneous Kumba signs: Divine High School—Excellence in education Heavy fowls for sale At the Presbyterian seminary in Kumba: Sex can wait; my future can’t....

Becky was reporting the results of the church meeting and mentioned so-and-so had been elected an usher. “They have ushers here?” I asked in surprise. Offerings and communion are taken by having the congregation dance up to file past the basket or the elements, and of course, there are no bulletins to hand out, so many of the traditional offices of usher are not relevant here. “Yeah, that’s the guy who hits the kids.” Oh, he’s an usher! I had gathered he was working in some kind of official capacity but I didn’t know his title. I kid you not, there is a person every Sunday whose job is to slap, switch (as in, hit with a slim green branch), or bodily remove unruly children. There’s usually some rearranging of children necessary during the course of the service, occasionally the usher will reach through the window with a whipping branch, or a threatening glare and authoritative shake of the head may ward off further misbehaviour. One day the usher kindly but firmly uncrossed Kenneth’s le...

I don’t quite know what to do when my assumptions about “Africa” are utterly disproven with nothing else to take their place. I know the culture and worldview here are different and that those factors account for differences in ways of doing things, particularly as regards work habits, saving and spending money, and the family unit. When the way they do things here grates on my nerves, I look to justify it with cultural necessity, historic precedent, or as a trade-off negative side effect of a generally positive principle. But at times I find it hard to see the positive side. What if I return home as or more ethnocentric than when I left? In that case, shouldn’t my term here be judged worse than a failure? It was a meeting I observed in the village in December which started me on this path again. Not that there’s anything inherently bad about this, but as I strolled through the village at dusk the other night, I came upon the palm-leaf shelter, thumping music and throbbing generator of...

While I was in East Province, in the Baka area, I went on a short jungle hike with one of the missionaries and the kids. There were rumours a Baka youth would accompany us to serve as a guide, but to my disappointment, he never showed up. “So, does the rainforest here look any different from in Bekondo?” Mike asked with a smile when we returned. As usual, I mostly observed the ground upon which I trod, but would you believe, the earth beneath my feet did have a different appearance than in Bekondo. It’s amazing how much you can observe about an ecosystem, just from looking at the path. There’s plenty of mud on the path in rainy season in Bekondo, but this “Bakan” forest had swamps. The path was half-submerged muck in parts so I found pathside weeds or fallen leaves to step on in an attempt to avoid getting my sandals entirely soaked, though really, the underwater log at the beginning of the journey took care of that. Just a ways beyond the path in one spot was what I like to think of a...

Pistache. Perhaps my translation of French to English is off, but one would think it’s safe to assume that means pistachio — only it doesn’t. It is a slightly green colour, vaguely reminiscent of pistachio pudding, though not nearly as bright. Similarities to things I’d call pistachio end there. It’s a spongy paste, wrapped in a banana leaf, tasting like…hmmm, not nothing, but not much either. The flavour is quite subtle. It’s made of egusi: roasted, ground-up gourd seeds.

There are no power shortages in heaven. A ripple went through the crowd as the speaker at our missions conference made that statement. We were sitting there in the dark, the speaker preaching from the light of a laptop screen — on account of a power shortage. What he meant was that God has sufficient power to deal with all our needs. But the statement had an immediacy, a vivid meaning, which the speaker had probably not anticipated. We understood it in a whole new way. The frustrations of this life do not limit God. Out here, in the culture where we are not at home, we are perhaps of as heightened an awareness of spiritual “power” than we are of electrical.

Now, youth is a tricky word anywhere. In government documents it may denote people under 25, but in a church context in North America, it usually refers to grade 7-12 kids. In Cameroonian churches, it refers to anyone of child-bearing age. That’s a pretty broad spread but it really does reflect who may possibly go to “youth” at church in Cameroon! My Lutheran friend regularly deals with 3 churches around Kumba and their youth groups. The diversity of these groups becomes an issue when they get together as a youth association. One group follows the North American model with kids ranging from 12 to 21. Another consists of a handful of early twenties youth. But the third group, when asked to define the parameters of “youth” said “under 43” because that’s the age of their oldest member. 43!!!! Good gracious! I knew in the village one may be part of the “youth” until one’s own children are old enough to be included. That just blows my mind. The definition “within the childbearing years” mak...

From all those movies, animated or otherwise, I developed the notion that the huge vines on which Tarzan and others swing are just thicker versions of juicy green ivy runners. Not so. Vines which grow that big are woody — they look like small tree trunks, except that they run in all directions, not exclusively vertical. They’re often woven; the result of small, still green and juicy vines interweaving. There’s always something interesting to see and something new to learn in the rainforest.