Melt Pot, Melt!

Random oddities like the beautiful black and gold colors, a fleur de lys, Hurricane Katrina, hunting and fishing, and crawfish boils unite my state.  The red, white, and blue colors, hot dogs and potato salad, American football, Pearl Harbor, and the Kardashians bring together my country.  We don’t apologize if we’re audibly louder than the rest of all other patrons put together in a foreign country's bar, and we don’t mind putting our politics in centers of conversations.  We think we’re the best damn country in all of Little Earth -- and have at least a couple very sound reasons to back up our audacious declarations.   And, not to gloss over nativism or racism, which undoubtedly and sadly still exists, or to forget our sometimes very divided views on politics, our country - not just in name - is definitely a united one.  Whether it be from some shared notions of “Manifest Destiny” or the “American Dream", having the physical space for our country to more organically develop (after of course, moving peoples out of the way), or because our population is continuously being diversified, our very young pup of a nation has quite a sense of itself -- "The Great Melting Pot" as the history books preach (although "The Tasty Pot of Gumbo" would make more sense).  Being quite removed from any former motherland and as a thoroughbred Heinz-57 mutt, I had nothing to do with getting to be an American, but I am definitely not sad to have been born there.  Like most Americans, I am proud of it and proud to be a part.  Pride, or if you'd rather call it arrogance, can cause great separations, but it also can double as a great power and driving force.  

Too often am I in a little restaurant, boutique, or a store here and there is only bare minimum “customer service" -- making it an actual foreign concept.  I like to think myself a fairly laid-back, polite customer (you give me plantains instead of fried potatoes– fine with me, the gods probably thought it better for me), but somehow when I leave establishments here, I feel like a snotty, demanding, and simply awful person.  Obviously, after waiting for 15 minutes in an empty dining room, I was being the rude one by taking precious time out of that very busy owner’s day to order a coke, grilled fish, and sticks of fermented manioc.  I am really sorry.  This “hot chicken” is cold?  Stink-eye waitress, you scare me too much to ask for it to be reheated.  Another beer?  I know, I know, how dare I!  Recently at a Camtel store, a big national telecommunications provider and retailer, and after talking to several employees, I watched a friend have to threaten to go to the competition to buy her internet key before they even bothered to try to help her find a key that they sell and advertise.  (On the rarer occasions that I do find really good customer service, I grow almost instantly suspicious and momentarily think whether or not it’s in my best interest to sprint for the exit.)  I know it may not seem like a big deal, but a lack of pride expressed through its customer service is just one small example of a much larger and very problematic national shortage.

To be fair, Cameroonians do take pride in things – like being a peaceful and not completely starving nation, keeping the grounds around their homes clean and swept, their soccer team - The Indomitable Lions, and always having on clean shoes.  When one looks around at surrounding countries, those are things for to be proud, but it’s really not enough to fuse this country.  The geographical area that is now Cameroon has had some tough luck in its recent 200 year history that plagues it today as a non-ethnically unified nation – like the slave trade, Colonialism, AIDS, poverty, major corruption, an inept education system, and silly laws on rights pertaining to personal property (when a greedy government with foreigners sitting in its deep pockets mixes traditional, colonial, and modern laws together, the outcome is not pretty; if you don’t really own the land you’re working on, why really concern yourself with its longer term future?)  This country has the abundant natural resources and the potential to be a great state, but the major apathy and engrained low expectations are not going to allow for it.  It is exasperating.  Maybe it’s because I’m American -- I’m always wearing a watch and thinking time is money -- but I can’t help but see the giant clock in the sky quickly tickin’ away.  Cameroon, you are at a pivotal place in your history.  Things could fairly quickly improve – or they could just as easily go the other way.  Let some pride be the fuel for some forward motion.  Find your battle cry.  Like New Orleanians chanted after Katrina (however cheesy it may have sounded),“Rise Up” and demand better.

...Yet, where does their rallying flagpole lie?  How do you bring communion and pride to a broken nation who started in the same state?  This is a country that just had seven Olympic athletes 'abscond' into Foggy London-town during the Games and no one could really fault them.  If an individual or a body of people is going to have pride in anything, they must be able to find something to take hold of, love, and own.  Cameroon would not only need one of my imagined pride-bringing events to take shape -- a victory, a tragedy, a change in property laws or a shift in government, a Marian apparition, or a mixture of many tomorrow-land occurrences -- but it would also need to simultaneously spread the sentiments from bottom-up and top-down (from the "paysans" to the "grands" and vice versa) in order for it to be at all a success.  Something to connect.  

Stirring the pot and causing real change is not as simple as I would like to have it sound, but neither is it impossible (and to its credit, there is a minority who do strive for more).  My pointless tirades offer zero solutions*.  However, what I do know is that Cameroonians are always telling me on est ensemble -- we are together.  For Cameroon's sake, I want to see it.

  (Above: During Pre-Service Training, our Cameroonian language trainers, who come from different ethnic groups and parts of the country, show us their own "on est ensembe.")

*Last June, in the beginning of this little exercise of public journaling, I had naively thought that I would eventually be able write some unnecessarily wordy narratives or insights into the Cameroonian life that contained real substance – such as pinpointing reasons for hardships, explaining traditions through a culturally anthropological lens, giving solutions to the many problems, talking about the hope that’s just around the corner for Cameroonians, etc, but I realized I was being silly so my apologies and to your non-disappointments, those “enlightening” posts aren’t coming.  At least, I’m still being unnecessarily wordy – you’re welcome!