June 26th, 2011

Sunday June 26^th, 2011

Before leaving my bachelor pad, Mr. Djame informed me that we would be going to church the next morning. It wasn’t really a question, more of a statement. I hadn’t been to any Cameroonian churches yet so why not?

I put on my Sunday best (i.e. the wrinkled clothes from my hiking bag) and we moto’d our way to the Pentecostal church. At least I think that’s what type of church he said it was. Again, my comprehension skills are still a work in progress. Usually I just go with the flow and see where I end up. Hasn’t got me in trouble yet, but keep your fingers crossed.

To say church was interesting wouldn’t do it justice. It was INTENSE. We got there and they ushered me to a seat in the very front row. Not my first choice for seating location, but I appreciated the honor. I also wondered whose regular seat I was taking and whether he/she would be visiting the witch doctor after church to strike me down so they could resume their normal seat the following week. The church seats were plastic lawn chairs (very nice and clean lawn chairs I will add) and the dirt rows descended from the highest point in the back of the church to the front. The church appeared to be made out of concrete blocks (which I have later discovered are just mud cinderblocks that they form and cook in the sun. You guys can’t call the mortar mud anymore Joe, Tizz, and Gord. They’re actually USING mud here!) with wood pillars running throughout for extra support. 

Everyone was clapping, singing, and dancing from the moment I walked in. It was kind of like a call and response type deal with rhythmic clapping in a series of three claps and a pause. I actually got this pattern down quick after a few white boy attempts and some stolen glances from the audience. Then, they switched up the pattern and I was back to square one. Also, at one point I thought the audience was chanting Jay-Z, but then I realized they were saying Jesus. Thought I was in the Church of Hard Knocks for a sec. This continued for about a half hour with various people from the audience coming out of the audience to lead the singing. At one point churchgoers were instructed to march in place, I obliged. This was followed by running in circles at one’s seat. I kind of upped my marching pace and just kind of looked around at everyone looking back at me. This wasn’t your typical Holy Trinity Mass folks.

Finally around 10:30 or so we were told to sit down and I guess this meant it was actually starting? What I had been doing the last hour I’m not really sure. The first part of church, people came down and appeared to be giving testimonials about struggles they had been going through or all the things they were blessed with. At least, I think that’s what was going on. Mr. Djame, who had been placed to the right of the preacher were there were two rows of chairs seemingly “reserved” for the higher ups, got up and explained that I would be working in Edea and to make me feel a part of the community and look after my safety and security. Got some smiles from the patrons and no hisses or throat slashing motions so I guess they were okay with it. This lasted another half hour or so I believe. Then the preacher took over.

The preacher was a younger looking man with a shaved head, maybe late 20’s early 30’s. He had on dark, embroidered denim jeans and a white short sleeve button down. It started off like most church services I’ve been to with him reading from the Bible and acknowledging me as his guest and telling me, “Welcome friend” in English. Then, it got kind of weird. Another man started reading a line at a time from the Bible. The preacher would repeat it, except that he would yell it. There was also another man that got up and was translating the French into Basso, one of the local dialects in Edea. This was interesting to hear as well. Back to the preacher. This guy was getting into it. He’s yelling/screaming out Bible verses, sweating profusely and giving his sermon for at least an hour, maybe longer. There was also a woman behind me yelling out Amen Papa! practically every other phrase, which got old rather quick. I really can’t do it justice through words, you just had to be there. Also, once he was done someone from the crowd came and gave him a cold Top Pamplemousse, a type of Cameroonian soda. Not the usual water and wine of HTS. The service lasted roughly three and a half hours not including the half hour or so of singing and dancing. Probably three hours longer than I think it needed to be, but I’ll take all the good karma I can get in Africa. It was also very intriguing for me to see the Cameroonian church dynamic so I’m glad I was invited.

After church, Mr. Djame and I went to grab some food and a beer. I also made a note at this point, that instead of waiting for an intersection to pull a U-turn and pull up at the restaurant, both of our moto drivers decided to get all the way over to the left and drive down the wrong side of the road to arrive at our destination. At the time, I was sure my demise was imminent, but later saw that this was a common practice and moto drivers coming at us would always get out of the way. I’m actually happy that we are prohibited from driving anything besides a bike in this madness.

Upon our arrival, Mr. Djame chatted up the man grilling large chunks of meat which appeared to be wrapped in paper bags. I was later informed that this is called soya. I don’t know if the meat is called that or just the cooking, seasoning process, which looked king of like cajon seasoning or cumin. We went into the bar to the right of the grilling station, was informed that a beer would be 600 CEFA (roughly $1.20), and quickly left because Mr. Djame said this was too much. He would pay 500 or even 550 but not 600. He drives a hard bargain. We told the meat man where we were headed next and went to the bar on the left. Mr. Djame ordered a warm beer, I chose a cold one (which the first drink was and not much else) and we talked while waiting on the food. I hadn’t ate breakfast so was pretty eager to munch on whatever meat was inside that charred paper bag. The meat didn’t arrive after 10 minutes so Mr. Djame went to get it. A man came up to the bar and tried to sell me what he proclaimed was anti-venom for poisonous snake bites, but really just looked like black tar in a little plastic bag. I eyed his Cameroon map, but with my stomach growling, I decided I wasn’t in the haggling mood. Mr. Djame soon returned with our soya. The meat was very tender and came with little pieces of grilled onion and a toothpick to make little soya-onion samiches. I’m pretty sure it was beef, but who knows in this frickin’ country. It was delicious regardless.

After our soya, Mr. Djame showed me maison du parti (house of leaving or leaving house in anglais), which was basically where people gathered while cars and buses going to Yaounde stopped to squeeze in more passengers and make some more money. This was also when I took my first public urination. We walked down a path a little bit, from the main road and Mr. Djame informed me that he was going to piss. By this point, I had seen over 20 different people just taking a leak along the side of the road already. Mr. Djame informed me that it was natural to piss and therefore people just take a leak wherever they see the need. Could also be why you get overpowered by the smell of piss at times when you walk by a creek, but hey, for someone who has had to drain the main vein in public before, this was one cultural fun fact I could get used to. So long as Mr. Djame stopped talking to me while I was trying to go.

We walked for a bit, Mr. Djame showed me some more of Edea, and we stopped at another bar. This is where I made the mistake of asking Mr. Djame if he was married. I figured he was mid 60’s maybe even early 70’s, he had to be so I wanted to ask what his wife thought about him coming to Bafia for a night for the community host workshop. He informed me that after always yelling and being loud, she left him. Yeah, insert foot in mouth at that point. This also explained all the weird comments he had been making like, oh that volunteer speaks good French she would make a great wife for somebody. I think I quickly tried to change the topic to soccer. 

After that awkward exchange and slugging down another beer, we headed to Mr. Djame’s father’s house. The kids of the neighborhood were pretty eyed to see a white man walking through. We walked in Mr. Djame told me to have a seat. I thought he just wanted to show me the place and we’d dip out. All of a sudden a girl comes out from the kitchen and scares the hell out of me. I find out that this is Mr. Djame’s daughter Marcel. I introduced myself as best I could after Mr. Djame took pretty much all my basic go-to-sentences upon introduction. I won’t go into detail too much about it, but it was interesting to see the dynamic between them. Pretty much right after we walked in, Mr. Djame seemed to tell her to make us dinner. I guess this is the norm here, but it still just seemed kind of rude. Guess that’s the American culture still in me. We ate a dinner of fish and vegetables, I met Mr. Djame’s creepy brother, whose name I forget but we’ll call CB from now on, and Mr. Djame’s uncle, Emmanuel, stopped by. Emmanuel seemed younger than Mr. Djame, but this happens in the states as well so no big culture shock here. 

They talked for awhile in French and Bakoko (their village language that I probably misspelled) while I sat there awkwardly trying to appear like I was paying attention. Apparently, they had also been discussing some problems they had with some pastors and homosexuality because pretty soon Mr. Djame was asking me what the U.S. and my opinion were on homosexuality. I will preface this by informing you all that homosexuality is constitutionally illegal in Cameroon. You can be beaten in the streets if believed to be homosexual and put to death if found guilty in Cameroonian court. I have a very big problem with this. I am a heterosexual male (for those of you possibly questioning my sexuality after that comment),but I believe strongly in equal rights for all regardless of sexual preference, gender, race, hair color, whatever. There are a few other qualms I have with Cameroonian law, but I will save that conversation for another day, as I still have much to type up.

Back to the narrative. I informed Mr. Djame that in some states in America homosexual couples could be married, but in most they could not. As for my personal opinion, I told him the truth. The gender of who someone else wants to be with is no concern of mine. Love who you want to love. He took it better than I thought he would. Then, he went on saying about how it isn’t natural and it’s in the Bible and some other common responses you hear when someone is against gay marriage. I let him say his two cents, but did not nod in agreement to make him think that I was agreeing with him. We shall agree to disagree. Which is what more people should do instead of trying to impose their beliefs on others, but again, I’m getting away from the real purpose of writing this.

We took off from Mr. Djame’s with Uncle Emmanuel and said goodbye to CB outside. I thought he was going with us, but found out as we walked to Emmanuel’s car that I don’t think they cared for him too much and that “all he wants to do is sit around and do nothing.” 

On the way to the bar I’m pretty sure I discovered that the shocks in the back of Emmanuel’s car were shot because I thought we were gonna lose the bumper on about every pothole we hit. We arrived and Emmanuel went for the reverse pull in and didn’t stop until we had driven up on the sidewalk and practically over the concrete barrier. Flashbacks of driving over the concrete barrier in the parking lot at OSU Marion on a snowy day in ’07 came to me. I found out this was a private bar, where Emmanuel worked security at, when we entered and they took our names down. Since Emmanuel worked there, I think we got our beers for free. Not really sure, I just know I didn’t pay for any. After having a few with the guys it was time to go home. We climbed in Emmanuel’s little maroon shockless death trap and headed for casa de Max. Along the way it was determined that we needed to stop to pee. We pulled over right on the side of the road, over the little divider for motos, and got out. They both headed left, I went right. Right as I was about to unzip I looked up the giant concrete wall I was about to desecrate and saw about five or six Cameroonians sitting in lawn chairs. You can’t make this stuff up people. Now, I can pee in public, but not with an aerial audience. I let out a gasp, they started laughing and yelling. I moved about 10 paces to the right and felt a little more comfortable relieving myself on the side of the main road. We did our business, piled back in, and made it to my place. Uncle E came in and fixed my toilet that hadn’t been flushing that morning. Didn’t even bother to wash his hands after, he’s a trooper. They left and I crawled into bed. Right before I drifted off, I heard a rustling in my air conditioner. It sounds like my little cockroach buddy had left some friends behind. I rolled to the other side of the bed and was out like the electricity of Bafia.

More to come...