A week to go . . .
Wow, it's unbelievable but we only have a week left in Cameroon! Time seems not to fly until you are right upon something and then it flies at full speed! Still so much to do with organizing, packing, shopping for gifts, saying goodbye to people, etc. We had our last visit to the village on Sunday and that was sad, but when everyone started begging for money from me I knew it was time to go! I'm satisfied that we had a good 6 months in the village and we have many friends there who will welcome us back in the future. We said goodbye to the chief and his family, and everyone else from Madame Bernadette the avocado woman (who I paid to stay in the hospital last fall and who has been--needlessly--thanking me ever since) to some of Linden's classmates, who received clothes that Linden doesn't need to take home with her. It's the hardest to leave the children, so many of them following our car and being so sweet when we stopped to say goodbye. Batoula is a struggling village (let's not even get into the politics that are ripping the place apart) but also a village with strength, beauty, and lots of charm.
I gave one final exam last Friday which I am now grading and will give the other this Friday. I'm disappointed that so many students identified Plessy vs. Ferguson as being the name of a female character (Plessy Ferguson) in Nella Larsen's Passing. Many of the students just were not paying attention even when they showed up. But I had a wonderful time discussing Mama Day (Gloria Naylor) with some of the students and those moments were worthwhile. A few weeks ago, after reading Passing and The Bluest Eye, I showed a class the film Imitation of Life (1934) and EVERYONE turned out for that. And thanks to Elvis the projector worked! Everyone was totally engrossed by the film and some told me how "beautiful" they thought it was. I think it was just special for them to see a film on the "big screen." It provoked lots of discussion about passing, race, class, gender, etc. Students also debated what it means to be a good mother. For them, it seemed that the film was less about race than about motherhood and family (and this is in fact how Hollywood wished to portray it and how the novel is--more centered on the white mother and daughter). Since "passing" is not much of an issue here in Cameroon--although some black women do use products to make their skin lighter--the students were less focussed on that than on the other behaviors of the characters.
The other class read both Their Eyes Were Watching God and Mama Day, both of which have hurricane scenes at the end. The students had never heard of a hurricane and some had trouble believing that a storm could be so destructive. One of them said Hurston is clearly exaggerating! (yes, I told them about Katrina.) They were all in agreement that Janie should have made due with her first husband, and it was hard to get them to see that Hurston wants to depict a woman who evolves into a complete person, with a voice and choices of her own. Not that Cameroonian women are subservient to men in the ways we might think in the west--far from it. They have power and voice! But this is a society where marriage is considered hard work that it is shameful to abandon no matter what. They thought Janie should stay with Logan--wow--and could only surmise that she left him purely because of his "ugly head." (By the way, I have revealed that I am divorced to only a very select few of people here.)
The refrigerator is broken as are the lights in the bathroom, so it really is time to get going. I am going to add some photos of our trip last week to Seme Beach (Limbe) where we had gone already twice. This time, we took along friends and were a group of 11 for four days: Scott, Linden, me, Maman Martine, Guy, Gorgine, Vanessa, Tracey, Ambit, Elvis, and Geraldine. I wanted to give them a special gift and that was it. We had a fabulous time although Elvis ended up in the hospital (not serious) and the car broke down and then when it was at the shop it was crashed into by another car! Holy cow, it was a Cameroonian adventure.
Comments
Posted by: Lucienne Doho
Posted on: June 16, 2009 11:30 PM
Wow...what a trip..i can't believe is finally time for you to come back...i am sure that you guys are ready to come back..i have been following your experience and i think it was a wonderful one. i can't wait to hear personally from linden when she comes back i am sure she will be a totally different person. also i look forward to seeing those pictures you said..i know about 8 of all those people i haven't seen them in a long time and i am looking forward to the pictures.