L'Américaine au Cameroun

I live in Bangou Carrefour, across the street from the intersection that gives the neighborhood its’ name. Just a few steps up the path leading from my concession door is the garre, with taxis going to Banganté, Bafoussam, Bafang and even – if one is willing to wait half a day for the car to fill – Douala and Yaoundé. Lining the garre and the main street are bars, two omelet shacks, boutiques that sell powered milk, prepaid phone cards and other assorted necessities, pot mommies selling rice and sauce and meat. Women set up shop on the side of the garre, selling avocados, herbs and this weird chalky rock that can be ground up and used to thicken sauces. On market days and weekends women and children walk around selling all kinds of things from baskets and trays balanced on top of their heads. An old traditional dancer walks around, beaded leg coverings rattling, selling dances for a beer or a few hundred francs. Motorcycle taxi drivers wait in a line along the side of the main road and for a few hundred francs they’ll take you places regular taxis don’t go: The chefferie, Batchingou, Balembo.

All this action makes a lot of noise. Chauffeurs shout out their destinations: “Banganté, Bamena pressé la!” Music, especially after dark, blasts out of the bars. Côte d’Ivorian ‘couper-décaler’ dance music, Cameroonian bakutsi or makossa, popular African pop songs, Celine Dion, American hip-hop. Outside my door, the Muslims who run the omelet shack splash water while washing before their constant praying and men urinate against the building across the way. The women selling on the sides of the garre call out to people walking by: “Ton-ton, il y a les bons avocats ici!” People selling off the tops of their heads just call out their merchandise to nobody in particular in nasally voices: “Arachide, arachide.” Those rattling leg coverings. Car horns beeping and prerecorded voices on moto taxis repeating the fare: “Cent francs, cent francs.” If there is a soccer match going on, it’s possible to count the Lions’ score by the cheers that go up through the carrefour.

Personal space means nothing here. Life is lived up against others. Friends, male and female, young and old, walk together holding hands.* Likewise the idea that one person’s noise could disturb another person is completely foreign. I’ve never heard of someone making a noise complaint to the police, but I am sure that the gendarmes would laugh if someone tried. The gendarmes might even be at the party or bar keeping the neighbors up at night. Or, I should say, making all the racket, because there’s no amount of noise a Cameroonian can’t sleep through.

Cameroon conducted a census a few months back. Census workers went door to door, trying to collect information on everyone in the country. On the day the census worker showed up at my door, I was cleaning my house, hair tied up in a fular, Modest Mouse blasting from my stereo. Once she got over the initial shock of a white woman answering the door, the census woman came inside and got right down to business. Was I married or single? Did I rent my apartment or own it? Is there running water and if not how far do I have to walk to get water? What was my education level? Profession? Age? Nationality? Religion? She didn’t ask me to turn down the stereo and I didn’t offer. We leaned our heads close to each other to hear as she posed her questions and I answered them. After she finished, she asked for a glass of water and went on to the next house and my music kept right on blaring.

My contribution to the neighborhood noise is usually my stereo. I listen to music while I clean my house, cook, work and sit on my porch contemplating the progress of my peas and zucchini. Marcel likes dancing to the new live Wilco album (thanks Allie!) and when Taco (I swear that’s his name) comes over to play Uno he always asks to put a c.d. on. He really likes Tori Amos, and ‘whoo-whos’ along with her when she sings, “Whoo-who, the time is getting closer. Whoo-who, time to be a ghost.”

I recently bought a short-wave radio, hoping to be able to catch the English-language BBC news. I bought the radio in Bafang and while I was waiting for my taxi to fill I bought some batteries and started listening to it in the backseat of the car. Again, after getting over the initial shock of sharing the taxi with a white woman, the other passengers didn’t seem to notice the noise of the radio.

My radio doesn’t get reception in my house, so I have to rest it on the railing of my porch or hang it off the metal supports for my pea plants. If I’m not on the porch, I just turn up the volume loud so I can hear the news in my house. When the weather (or whatever affects reception) is good I can get the BBC World Update, which repeats the same six international news stories over and over. Sometimes I get the Voice of America. I heard an editorial promising easy immigration to the U.S. for any foreigner who helps return a POA/MIA American. Once I heard an English-language call-in on RFI, the French version of the BBC. For what it’s worth, my radio also gets Japanese, German, Cameroonian, French, Arabic (or possibly Northern Cameroonian) and music stations. When the weather (or whatever) is not good, the BBC fades in and out, mingling with these other stations.

So now the noises of Bangou include not just chauffeurs, bar music, prayer noises, people in the walkway, sellers selling things, rattling leg coverings, car horns and Lions’ scores but also British accents, fleeting Japanese and German, Muslim chanting and French rap laid over De la Soul tracks. Nobody’s noticed the radio.

--------------------

* The Cameroonian hand-hold requires its’ very own explanation: Hand holding is an expression of friendship here, not a romantic activity. So two male friends may hold hands and two female friends may hold hands. Occasionally a male and female friend may hold hands. Couples do not hold hands. The man-on-man hold goes like this: Two friends, who maybe haven’t seen each other in a day or two will hold hands, palms crossing each other. This is also the quick handhold to be done between two male friends while crossing the street. The man-on-man close friend or brother handhold requires interlocking fingers. Every so often, the woman-on-woman handhold is like the first man-on-man hold, but more often it has one woman grasping the index finger of the second women. Both women have a slight swing to their hands and arms as they walk. Sometimes, male and female friends will hold hands while talking, but this is usually just a handshake with a delayed release. Couples rarely, and in the village never, hold hands.