The Others

They hadn’t closed the gates on us.  Relief came with a bit of guilt for hurrying Earl’s last several inches of beer at the nearby bar.  We had at least fifteen minutes to spare and found Car 582, room A1 easily.  This part of my regular 25 hour trip from the capital city to my home is the highlight, a tasty piece of cake.  On a good voyage, the overnight train barreling us north towards our posts, away from the green, lush South and usually keeping herself on the tracks, only takes about 14 hours.  I was curious to see who they were going to bunk with us since we had insisted on being placed in the same sleeping compartment and, therefore, were mixing the sexes – something for which the ticket lady was unabashed in showing her contempt.  How indecent.  I never mind sharing the tiny two bunk bed cell with Cameroonians - male or female.  Typically, bunk-mates, love to share food and conversation and go to bed early – never seeming annoyed if the lights stay on past their early 8PM sleep check-outs.  Even the children and babies are well behaved.  My guess is drugging.

Two pale-skinned, pepper-haired Italian Jesuit priests.  Hmm.

Jesuits -- I could handle these guys, with their familiar pocket protectors, little luggage, and round bellies (like PCVs, they live relatively pampered but simple lives).  Having grown up with Jesuits, who typically in this day in age focus on education, an improvement, I feel akin.  Conversation would be easy - even in French, neither of our mother tongues.  Could even prove fun.

“My uncle’s a Jesuit,” I say after a few pleasantries.

“Ahh.”

“So, you must be excited the new pope is Jesuit.”  Light chuckles.

I try again, “Well, it’s nice to finally have a pope from the Americas.”  

More light chuckles, “His parents were Italian.”  

These old farts were way tougher than I had thought.  Luckily not too much more conversation had to be forced – bananas and avocados, delicacies in my town, were being sold out of the window at the next stop giving me an easy escape.  We kept the rest of the evening light.  I think I ended with a Buonanotte.

***

For some reason, I never know quite how to react when I see other foreigners in Cameroon.  Do I make eye contact or say hello if I wouldn’t normally?  (Of course in the above instance, I would.  I haven’t forgotten all of my manners.)  Because isn’t that sort of racist?  It’s not like we have anything necessarily in common.  Neither of us are wearing identifying Saints' jerseys or American flag insignia.  All I know is that we sort of share the same color skin and what does that mean?  Sometimes as a pastime, especially in bigger cities where NGOs and missionaries are plentiful, other “whites” unknowingly become part of volunteers’ slightly altered version of the “Punch Bug” game, and then internally or externally, we find ourselves asking “Who are they?  What are they doing here?”  I have this natural inclination to separate myself from these “others” – these étrangers - fearing I will be lumped with them.   I’m here living and working in a non-bubbled community.  I’m not a missionary, I’m not here with some ulterior motive, I’m not here to bring light to the darkness.  I desperately don’t want to fall into that blanketed, but still existing neocolonialist movement.  I so want to believe that, and I want my Cameroonian counterparts to believe that.  

I realize my initial aversions, or perhaps, hesitations, to being around other foreigners are fairly irrational and unwarranted, but there you have it, they exist.  Maybe it’s because we never share our motivations for being here – not typically a first round topic – and I guess I am not totally comfortable with everyone’s motivations for being here.  Or maybe it’s international development, something I am a part, that I’m not totally comfortable.

During the last two years of Cameroonian living, Peace Corps has, on a much more intimate level, introduced me to this giant world of “international development”.  Even if it’s still only a glimpse, I believe I have learned heaps, and even with its frustrations and major imperfections, it is a road upon which I think I would like to continue, at least in some sort of capacity.  A fellow Peace Corps Volunteer recently asked if he could film me saying two or three sentences about development for a documentary.  Two or three sentences?  I had no idea what to say.  What did he mean two or three sentences about development?  Was he trying to be purposefully broad in order to illicit some massive variation of responses?  Must be some sort of trap. "Sure. Let me think on it."  I evaded.

The term "development" is tricky to me, finding it ill-used and to be demeaning at times (even if unintentional).  Habitually begun with good aims, international development (not humanitarian aid - short-term emergency fixes), is often accompanied by major waste and corruption.  Of course, “good” can and does come from it, but the idea of development is not so clean cut as it is frequently portrayed in the self-proclaimed developed world.  There is no clear path, no easy way to create equality (if that indeed is the objective), no easy way to fix colonialism.  “Developers” come in all shapes and forms - sometimes coming in very humbly and sometimes coming in on their high horses and all with different reasons.  Peace Corps is a part of that.  Possibly, it is not as effective or not as ineffective as I would like to imagine, but if individual growth is the goal (communities don't grow until their members have), than it seems that what the best volunteers and aid organizations, including Peace Corps, are doing is simply exchanging ideas and information, to be used if desired.  They are optional catalysts.  And that is something with which I am comfortable.  The most helpful aren’t blindly giving out money, donating buildings, or handing out canvas shoes – because those things rarely last.  That's not creating.  Change can't be forced upon a group uninterested in that change.  No person can be told what his or her priorities are.

(Although intertwined, if you are interested in seeing quicker "development," look to commerce and technology -- depending on the country's governing body.  International development, in the above mentioned manner, although much slower is still, certainly, more than necessary.  Both cell phones and AIDS currently have amazing multiplying rates.)

 A few of my cute neighborhood hooligans. Beware.

 Easter morning breakfast: Spaghetti omelettes and giant carrots.  Not too shabby.

Hanging out a reserve outside of Yaounde.  These chimps went inside because of the storm.  We didn't have the same convenience.