May 29, 2006
Greetings from the armpit of Africa.
Ha, caught your attention there. But just because I’ve called Cameroon the armpit of Africa doesn’t mean I don’t like it. Quite to the contrary, it looks like both Rebecca and I are going to enjoy Cameroon.
No, the armpit of Africa refers entirely to the geography and climate. If you look at the map, Cameroon is right up in the place where the bulge of West Africa meets the torso of Central and Southern Africa. So, it’s in the crux, like an armpit. Plus, it’s hot and humid in Yaoundé, much like my armpit in this climate. Yummy.
That’s not entirely fair, though. Cameroon is about the size of California and has just about every climate zone on the continent within its borders. Up in the north there is desert and savannah, so we’ll be able to see all the hippos, lions and giraffe we missed in East Africa. The west of Cameroon, along the coast, is reportedly among the wettest places in the world. It is also punishingly hot, according to the guidebooks and friends, but the beaches are great. Douala, the country’s commercial capital, is nestled in this area. The east of the country is dotted with mountains and is part of the central African rain forest areas. This part of the country also has gorillas, so we’ll be able to see the beasties we couldn’t afford to see in Rwanda. They’re apparently not as spectacular as the Rwandan gorillas, but honestly, a gorilla’s a gorilla to me. We’ll be able to see the fellows in their natural habitat and that’s fine.
There are over 250 ethnic groups in Cameroon, each with their own language, many of which are incommunicable. Yet the country is at relative peace. I don’t have any large, global statement to make about this. It’s just an observation.
Bec and I arrived safe and sound on Thursday night. So did our luggage, so we’re already one step up on our Rwanda experience. To be fair, and I am always fair, our bags got lost in London on the way to Kigali, not Nairobi or Rwanda. So we can blame the English for that one.
CRS-Cameroon handled our visas and we got them in an e-mail. You’ve got to love a country that let’s you scan a visa into an e-mail, send it to someone coming from Rwanda and then let’s you enter the company with only a printout as proof.
Rebecca has a dispiriting commute to work every morning in the apartment CRS is giving us until we find our own place. I don’t envy her. She has to walk out of our apartment, hang a left, then a right and then a third left – all without going down a flight of stairs – and she’s there. That’s right, our apartment for the time being is in the office. It does have its perks. First of all, it’s extremely large and pretty comfortable. We have the office Internet in our house, which is great, although sometimes the router goes out. But still, we can listen to NPR in the morning. I can listen to the Yankees when they play in the afternoon. Hopefully we’ll have it in the next apartment – that’s probably what we’re going to do – so I can listen to Ranger games on the radio. It’s the little things, right.
Bec’s co-workers all seem extremely pleasant. Her boss, Jennifer, has two boys, 6 and 3, so I’ve got friends at my own maturity level. The local staff is extremely welcoming and competent. We had met a few in Kigali when the CRS regional meetings were there, and were greeted in Yaoundé with hugs. There’s a young Italian guy who works on corruption issues based in the CRS office, although he doesn’t work for CRS, who we’re told is lots of fun and good at what he does.
Plus there’s Ruth, who lived in Rwanda for years and who is the regional technical adviser on HIV/AIDS based in Yaoundé. We met a few times in Kigali. She’s a lot of fun, and when she found out we were coming to Yaoundé, she said, “Charles will be so excited there will be another husband with nothing to do.” Well, I don’t know about nothing, but he sounds like a good guy to go exploring Yaoundé with. We’ve already arranged to go restaurant trolling with Ruth and Charles – for those of you who didn’t get Rebecca’s last blast e-mail, she’s very excited about the food here – and they’ve invited us to go to the beach at Kribi with them.
As for me, once the Internet comes back, I’m sending in my first story and photos in to the Catholics. Jennifer invited us to an event at a Catholic school for an anti-corruption curriculum, and I got a story out of it. As always, I will provide the link when it appears. I’m still waiting for my last Kigali story to get published in Dallas, but hey, it will. They liked it, but it’s the problem of fitting it in the paper.
I think this will be an interesting – and far easier place – to work. First of all, everyone who knew anything about Cameroon before I wrote about it here raise your hands. Both of you can put your hands down. Don’t worry. It took me weeks of research in Kigali to know anything about it either. There are hundreds of stories here in Cameroon alone, plus there are neighbors with stories bursting out the seams, including Chad, so I’ll get some Darfur in without going to Darfur.
The attitude towards the international press is far different here, mostly because there are few if any foreign journalists based in Cameroon. For starters, I get a three-month grace period to work here free, and then it’s 5,000 for the year. Excuse me, that’s 5,000 CFA Francs, around $10. In Rwanda, it was $300 for the first two months and $1,000 for the year. I didn’t pay that thousand. Nobody does.
More importantly, people talk to you. They’re not afraid. And they won’t look like they’re going to kill you when you pull out a camera. It’s extremely refreshing.
Now, the country isn’t all mangosteen and cream. As I’ve said before, the country is extremely corrupt, one of the worst in the world in that respect. It’s odd knowing that, because I expect that the response to every question will be, “Give me $20 and I’ll tell you.” That hasn’t happened, yet.
And despite being blessed with ridiculous natural resources, including oil and abundant timber, people are poor. That’s where the problems of corruption come in. There isn’t even universal primary education here, despite there being a 65 percent literacy rate. I had earlier read that the rate was around 85 percent, but I was wrong. Either way, it’s one of the highest rates in Africa. I wonder whether that literacy rate is holding among kids.
No more walking around with my headphones on or my wallet in my back pocket. I’m not even sure how much walking around I’m supposed to be doing here. We have our security briefing at 3 this afternoon. But I can’t imagine Yaoundé is as safe as Kigali. Nowhere is as safe – from street crime – as Kigali.
Cameroon is a chance for a new beginning for Bec and me. And since this is a new beginning, there will be changes on the blog. First, you may have noticed that I’ve changed the way I do the dates, from the pretentious 29 May 2006 to the normal human being May 29, 2006.
Second, you may have noticed the change of names on the blog. The URL will stay the same, still www.evanrwanda.blogspot.com. But the name is now “Another Day in Shrimpistan”. Now, why Shrimpistan? It all comes from the country’s name. Cameroon derives its name from the Portuguese word for prawns. The Portuguese never colonized the area, but their missionaries were among the first Europeans to make it to this part of Africa. Traveling up the rivers, the missionaries noticed huge numbers of prawns in the river. I like to imagine that one of them asked, “What should we call this place?” and another said, “Camerao!”, dumbfounded by the number or prawns. The Germans, French and British all liked the name so much that the people in the country were stuck with it.
Bec then dubbed the country Shrimpistan. I wonder what the people here will think of that.
Since I’m insane, I was hoping that the people here would be more along the size of their namesake. Bec told me that I shouldn’t get my hopes up. But I did. I hoped. I was wrong. It seems ironic that people named after shrimp are really large – tall and broad. But they are. And so, living in Shrimpistan, I am the shrimpiest of them all again.
But it’s okay. They’ve got mangosteen, the world’s greatest fruit, here.
I think we’re going to like this place,
Greetings from the armpit of Africa.
Ha, caught your attention there. But just because I’ve called Cameroon the armpit of Africa doesn’t mean I don’t like it. Quite to the contrary, it looks like both Rebecca and I are going to enjoy Cameroon.
No, the armpit of Africa refers entirely to the geography and climate. If you look at the map, Cameroon is right up in the place where the bulge of West Africa meets the torso of Central and Southern Africa. So, it’s in the crux, like an armpit. Plus, it’s hot and humid in Yaoundé, much like my armpit in this climate. Yummy.
That’s not entirely fair, though. Cameroon is about the size of California and has just about every climate zone on the continent within its borders. Up in the north there is desert and savannah, so we’ll be able to see all the hippos, lions and giraffe we missed in East Africa. The west of Cameroon, along the coast, is reportedly among the wettest places in the world. It is also punishingly hot, according to the guidebooks and friends, but the beaches are great. Douala, the country’s commercial capital, is nestled in this area. The east of the country is dotted with mountains and is part of the central African rain forest areas. This part of the country also has gorillas, so we’ll be able to see the beasties we couldn’t afford to see in Rwanda. They’re apparently not as spectacular as the Rwandan gorillas, but honestly, a gorilla’s a gorilla to me. We’ll be able to see the fellows in their natural habitat and that’s fine.
There are over 250 ethnic groups in Cameroon, each with their own language, many of which are incommunicable. Yet the country is at relative peace. I don’t have any large, global statement to make about this. It’s just an observation.
Bec and I arrived safe and sound on Thursday night. So did our luggage, so we’re already one step up on our Rwanda experience. To be fair, and I am always fair, our bags got lost in London on the way to Kigali, not Nairobi or Rwanda. So we can blame the English for that one.
CRS-Cameroon handled our visas and we got them in an e-mail. You’ve got to love a country that let’s you scan a visa into an e-mail, send it to someone coming from Rwanda and then let’s you enter the company with only a printout as proof.
Rebecca has a dispiriting commute to work every morning in the apartment CRS is giving us until we find our own place. I don’t envy her. She has to walk out of our apartment, hang a left, then a right and then a third left – all without going down a flight of stairs – and she’s there. That’s right, our apartment for the time being is in the office. It does have its perks. First of all, it’s extremely large and pretty comfortable. We have the office Internet in our house, which is great, although sometimes the router goes out. But still, we can listen to NPR in the morning. I can listen to the Yankees when they play in the afternoon. Hopefully we’ll have it in the next apartment – that’s probably what we’re going to do – so I can listen to Ranger games on the radio. It’s the little things, right.
Bec’s co-workers all seem extremely pleasant. Her boss, Jennifer, has two boys, 6 and 3, so I’ve got friends at my own maturity level. The local staff is extremely welcoming and competent. We had met a few in Kigali when the CRS regional meetings were there, and were greeted in Yaoundé with hugs. There’s a young Italian guy who works on corruption issues based in the CRS office, although he doesn’t work for CRS, who we’re told is lots of fun and good at what he does.
Plus there’s Ruth, who lived in Rwanda for years and who is the regional technical adviser on HIV/AIDS based in Yaoundé. We met a few times in Kigali. She’s a lot of fun, and when she found out we were coming to Yaoundé, she said, “Charles will be so excited there will be another husband with nothing to do.” Well, I don’t know about nothing, but he sounds like a good guy to go exploring Yaoundé with. We’ve already arranged to go restaurant trolling with Ruth and Charles – for those of you who didn’t get Rebecca’s last blast e-mail, she’s very excited about the food here – and they’ve invited us to go to the beach at Kribi with them.
As for me, once the Internet comes back, I’m sending in my first story and photos in to the Catholics. Jennifer invited us to an event at a Catholic school for an anti-corruption curriculum, and I got a story out of it. As always, I will provide the link when it appears. I’m still waiting for my last Kigali story to get published in Dallas, but hey, it will. They liked it, but it’s the problem of fitting it in the paper.
I think this will be an interesting – and far easier place – to work. First of all, everyone who knew anything about Cameroon before I wrote about it here raise your hands. Both of you can put your hands down. Don’t worry. It took me weeks of research in Kigali to know anything about it either. There are hundreds of stories here in Cameroon alone, plus there are neighbors with stories bursting out the seams, including Chad, so I’ll get some Darfur in without going to Darfur.
The attitude towards the international press is far different here, mostly because there are few if any foreign journalists based in Cameroon. For starters, I get a three-month grace period to work here free, and then it’s 5,000 for the year. Excuse me, that’s 5,000 CFA Francs, around $10. In Rwanda, it was $300 for the first two months and $1,000 for the year. I didn’t pay that thousand. Nobody does.
More importantly, people talk to you. They’re not afraid. And they won’t look like they’re going to kill you when you pull out a camera. It’s extremely refreshing.
Now, the country isn’t all mangosteen and cream. As I’ve said before, the country is extremely corrupt, one of the worst in the world in that respect. It’s odd knowing that, because I expect that the response to every question will be, “Give me $20 and I’ll tell you.” That hasn’t happened, yet.
And despite being blessed with ridiculous natural resources, including oil and abundant timber, people are poor. That’s where the problems of corruption come in. There isn’t even universal primary education here, despite there being a 65 percent literacy rate. I had earlier read that the rate was around 85 percent, but I was wrong. Either way, it’s one of the highest rates in Africa. I wonder whether that literacy rate is holding among kids.
No more walking around with my headphones on or my wallet in my back pocket. I’m not even sure how much walking around I’m supposed to be doing here. We have our security briefing at 3 this afternoon. But I can’t imagine Yaoundé is as safe as Kigali. Nowhere is as safe – from street crime – as Kigali.
Cameroon is a chance for a new beginning for Bec and me. And since this is a new beginning, there will be changes on the blog. First, you may have noticed that I’ve changed the way I do the dates, from the pretentious 29 May 2006 to the normal human being May 29, 2006.
Second, you may have noticed the change of names on the blog. The URL will stay the same, still www.evanrwanda.blogspot.com. But the name is now “Another Day in Shrimpistan”. Now, why Shrimpistan? It all comes from the country’s name. Cameroon derives its name from the Portuguese word for prawns. The Portuguese never colonized the area, but their missionaries were among the first Europeans to make it to this part of Africa. Traveling up the rivers, the missionaries noticed huge numbers of prawns in the river. I like to imagine that one of them asked, “What should we call this place?” and another said, “Camerao!”, dumbfounded by the number or prawns. The Germans, French and British all liked the name so much that the people in the country were stuck with it.
Bec then dubbed the country Shrimpistan. I wonder what the people here will think of that.
Since I’m insane, I was hoping that the people here would be more along the size of their namesake. Bec told me that I shouldn’t get my hopes up. But I did. I hoped. I was wrong. It seems ironic that people named after shrimp are really large – tall and broad. But they are. And so, living in Shrimpistan, I am the shrimpiest of them all again.
But it’s okay. They’ve got mangosteen, the world’s greatest fruit, here.
I think we’re going to like this place,
posted by Evan Weinberger at 8:21 AM
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