Bamenda’s Immigration Office is an attractive old bungalow embowered in a mini-jungle of scarlet and blue shrubs. We waited for ten minutes in the cool, twilit hallway, sitting beside three jittery Nigerian youths who never took their eyes off the door of the Big Man’s office. I could smell their nervous sweat and wondered yet again why Black body odour is so much less disagreeable (to us) than White ditto. When we were summoned I hung back, pointing out that the Nigerians had arrived first. But we had a chit from Mr Hughes …
The CIO was an engaging character, chubby and bouncy with a twinkle in his eye and what can only be described as an affectionate handshake. He spoke fluent English yet once the civilities had been completed communication broke down irretrievably. Why did we consider a one-month visa inadequate for a three-month trek? Smiling down at our passports he observed – ‘This is good, you have visas from London! You are English ladies?’
I closed one passport to show him the green cover with EIRE writ plain. He gazed at it blankly, then repeated, ‘These are good London visas! When you wish to leave Cameroon you come to me again and I will give you exit visas.’
I made a final effort, leaning across the desk and drawing a finger under the ‘ONE MONTH’ carefully written in capital letters on each visa.
The CIO nodded and said, ‘If you wish to remain three months in our country these are good visas for three months. It is fine that you wish to remain so long in our country – we are proud and happy! It is not necessary for me to do anything more.’
‘Count ten!’ murmured Rachel.
I did so, then asked, ‘What if we come to a police check-point and they see our visas are long out of date?’
The CIO twinkled and chuckled. ‘No problem! You tell them I say your visas are good!’
‘But by then we’ll be in Adamawa!’ I protested. ‘In another province they won’t know anything aboutyou – they won’t even speak English!’
‘Then you tell them you are coming here to me for your exit visa,’ said the cio.
‘I think we’d better go,’ advised Rachel quietly. ‘This is becoming unproductive.’
We had arranged to meet Doi ‘sometime after three’ outside an uncle’s hardware shop in the Fulani sector of Bamenda’s scruffy commercial centre. Pending his arrival camp-chairs were unfolded on the dusty roadside and beers ordered. Over-amplified African pop assaulted our ears painfully; we were to discover that even in small Cameroonian towns merchants incessantly compete to produce the highest decibel level.
Again we studied our inadequate maps, attempting to plan the morrow’s route in detail. Soon a small friendly crowd had gathered round us and one tall Fulani youth, with a long narrow face and intense eyes, knelt beside me to point out the best trekking-path to Lake Ocu. We didn’t then realise how unusual he was; many weeks were to pass before we met another Cameroonian who could map-read.
‘You must go this way,’ said our adviser, ‘because it is fine high Fulani country. And you will see how some bad men from Yaoundé – very rich men, maybe government ministers – have fenced off all our best grazing land. They want to make a new European-type ranch with imported breeds. You will have trouble getting in, they don’t want people to see what is happening. It is not legal, they are not paying for the land – it is like when the Germans and French came and took land in times past. But you can get in, people will tell you where to find a man with a key …’
Later I sought more information about these ‘bad men from Yaounde’, but neither Doi nor anyone else was prepared to discuss this ‘little local difficulty’ with an outsider.
I had hoped we might get back to the compound in time to consolidate our relationship with Egbert before loading him at dawn and severing him from home and family. But it seemed this was a high-pressure day for Doi the Tycoon. At intervals we saw him in the near distance, haggling, discussing, arguing, explaining, laughing, quarrelling, examining the contents of crates and sacks, ordering loads to be stored in uncle’s shop, or put in his or another car-boot, or transported elsewhere on a non-Fulani head.
We were beginning to get the ‘feel’ of this social scene. Relations between Fulanis and non-Fulanis appear to be – and on the whole are – excellent. Yet in many areas Fulanis are the people with most wealth, authority and self-confidence. Hitherto they have not thought a modern academic education important for their sons. But that attitude is now beginning to change and in twenty years’ time relations may be less good if a disproportionate number of Fulanis have qualified for Top Jobs.
We wondered how much of Doi’s time was being spent on business matters and how much on ritualistic exchanges of courtesies, followed by long, light-hearted gossips.
‘Here you probably can’t separate the two,’ observed Rachel. And after a moment she added, ‘Awful to think of those beautiful young wives confined to the compound while Doi does all the living-it-up …’
In that market-place the role of the few visible Fulani women seemed subservient, though Cameroon’s Muslim women do not of course wear the veil or maintain purdah. In contrast, non-Fulani women – or at least those who participate in commercial activities – usually give the impression of being very much in command of their particular situations.
For two hours we watched the ebb and flow of that colourful, noisy crowd and I pondered an African paradox: the coexistence of exuberance and laid-backness. Often an individual’s bursts of physical exertion or animated sociability were followed by interludes of wandering vaguely about, or just sitting and being. This capacity to work hard and then to relax, forgetting time, seems a whole world away from our regimented life-style – so many hours work, then off to play. It may well provide a healthier framework for human endeavour but it must also partly explain why most Africans cannot successfully run Western organisations – political, commercial or industrial.
Doi joined us briefly at 4.45 and looked evasive when questioned about saddle repairs.
‘It will be seen to,’ he said, and disappeared. Of course it never was seen to: the saddler had been in his fields all day.
An hour later we left Bamenda after a few false starts caused by uncertainty about who wanted, or expected, to travel with us. Doi insisted on Rachel’s sitting in front; he very obviously felt that she would make an excellent third wife. The two full brothers sat with me in the back, each clutching a huge angular parcel. We soon stopped to buy delicious kebabs, then paused again outside a prosperous-looking compound to pick up an ‘uncle and aunt’ – presumably courtesy titles since they weren’t Fulanis. Both were enormously bulky, as was their luggage; so Rachel escaped into the back seat, causing me to suffer at every jolt from too close contact with the angular parcels. When the elderly couple’s bundles had been tightly packed over and around them, Doi’s driving ability was much impaired.
The sunset sky was sullen when we bumped into the compound. Then, from beneath swollen blue-black clouds, a stream of red-gold light poured briefly across the Bamenda Plateau, very far below.
A wiry elderly man offered to help carry our gear to the guest hut. He wore what looked like baggy white pyjamas under a threadbare tweed jacket (surely ex-David). This was Danieli, Doi’s chief cattle-herd and for the past three years Egbert’s de facto owner. He had a kind, creased face and looked at me searchingly, anxiously, as we shook hands. I walked with him through the dusk to where Egbert had been tethered for the night on sparse grass, tied short to a fence. At the end of the dry season I hesitated to suggest using our picket and rope to widen his range; but Danieli indicated that later he would change him. Although he spoke only Foulfoulde we seemed to communicate effortlessly and he was openly upset about this abrupt ending to a three-year partnership. He watched closely while I greeted Egbert and our burgeoning rapport evidently consoled him. The quality of his relationship with his herding-partner must have partly accounted for Egbert’s excellence as a trekking-partner; he was a horse who had never known ill-treatment.
We supped, inevitably, with t
he men. I longed for an evening in the women’s quarter but that would have been to downgrade the White guests. This was our first encounter with fufu and jammu-jammu, the staple diet in Western Cameroon. Fufu is a tasteless but sustaining maize-flour dumpling, served in a communal enamel dish. Jammu-jammu is a thick slimy stew of spiced spinach-like leaves; it comes in a smaller dish and if a family is rich includes a few cubes of meat. Having scooped out a ball of fufu with the fingers, one dips it in the jammu-jammu. Spoons were provided for us but we soon discarded them as unsuitable implements for the business in hand. Then came cups of Ovaltine, another mark of affluence. Although Cameroon produces much coffee and some tea, neither has become popular with the inhabitants. And cocoa, one of the country’s main cashcrops, seems to be unknown as a beverage.
We ate by the light of a hurricane-lamp, placed in the centre of the low table. As our shadows moved erratically on the walls Doi’s small son, already plainly conscious of his privileged status, played with them quietly but intently.
‘He has made this game for himself,’ said Doi proudly. ‘He tries to guess which way they’ll move next.’
Bamenda was then seething with rumours about every household in Cameroon soon having us-supplied satellite television. It was however hard to imagine electricity-cum-television ever reaching this remote compound – unless Doi himself were to install a generator. I hoped he never would. Television does not encourage children to make games for themselves.
Doi looked puzzled when I asked whether Cameroon’s Muslims are Sunni or Shi’a. Even he, a much-travelled Fulani, had never heard of the historic split. Blessed is Islam where no sects are known! And the Cameroonian government, it seems, is conscious of this blessing and takes care to stamp out any spark of Islamic fundamentalism or sectarianism that may chance to alight on Cameroonian soil.
And so to bed, in a three-roomed rectangular mud hut on the edge of the compound. Our room had rough-hewn rafters, a tiny unglazed shuttered window and two narrow but comfortable iron beds with clean cotton sheets, soft homespun blankets and intricately embroidered pillowcases. The storerooms on either side were not rat-free.
At dawn (5.40 a.m.) I looked around the compound for signs of activity. There were none; March mornings seem cold to the locals and all, who can, stay abed while things are hotting up. After a night of heavy rain the pale blue sky was cloudless, the air cool and fresh. As the sun appeared above the nearby rock-summit I heard the unrhythmic tattoo of many cattle hoofs and a handsome roan herd came trotting swiftly past the compound, followed by two agile young women – one was Doi’s junior wife – holding long skirts above brawny knees and waving sticks and yelling directions.
Egbert had had no previous dealings with Whites so it seemed a good idea to groom him then, while the two of us could be on our own, by way of establishing a closer relationship before the first loading. He turned his head, pricked his ears and stood steady as I slowly approached. After some leisurely conversation and fondling I began to groom his back and he shuddered with delight. For half-an-hour I worked, neglecting no inch; even his furry little hernia was burnished. Then I stood back and admired him; unsuspected red-gold glints had come up and in the slanting sunlight he shone like a new-minted copper. At that felicitous moment Danieli appeared and registered astonished admiration. The Fulanis, however much they may love their horses, don’t waste time grooming them unless they are putting on a display for their Lamido.
By now the sun was warm. Smoke and the smell of frying came from the kitchen hut. Little boys were carrying bundles of firewood, little girls plastic buckets of water. Doi’s junior wife was hurrying off to a nearby stream with a stack of dirty pots on her head and two half-brothers were loading sacks into the car-boot. Doi himself stood on the verandah brushing his teeth while complacently surveying his domestic kingdom. He might well feel proud of it. In significant contrast to Bamenda’s squalor, this rural compound, like all the others on our route, was immaculate. Not so much as a stray leaf or twig or wisp of straw was allowed to untidy it. Even the latrine in a far corner – a deep hole in the ground, covered by a flat stone and encircled by a raffia screen – was spotlessly clean and completely odourless.
For our morning ablutions a shyly smiling small girl carried to the guest-hut a wide tin basin in which stood a full bucket of hot water. The child’s arms were so short that I had to lift this load off her head. We had assured Doi that cold water would suffice; but he was not going to lower his standards at our behest.
Breakfast was a meal to remember: high hills of rice, tender chunks of braised meat, herb-flavoured omelettes, fried plantains (ripe and unripe), baguettes thickly spread with avocado and many mugs of Bournvita. Danieli – who had come to help load Egbert – was served last, but otherwise treated as family in the best Islamic-democratic tradition. During the meal our bit and bridle were handed round and much admired; so coveted are such European items that we could probably have exchanged them for Egbert.
The equipment and saddling technique of Doi and Co. severely taxed my native fatalism. Never in all my years of travelling with pack-animals have I seen such an unpromising combination of odds and bobs or such rashly ingenious adaptations. Yet the main item, from Egbert’s point of view, was sound; whatever other misfortunes might befall us, he wouldn’t develop sores while wearing his brand-new, red and green thickly-padded saddle-blanket. But the unmended wooden saddle was a potential disaster area. Its underside sheeps-wool padding seemed most unlikely to last the course, its crude iron hoops might or might not support our load, its stirrup ‘leathers’ were strips of nylon sacking and the stirrups themselves looked like relics from the Early Iron Age.
We couldn’t even guess what the girth might have been in its previous incarnation; my main worry was the fearsome complexity of the method used to secure it. A reliable girth is the single most important requirement for carefree trekking with a pack-animal: so I appointed Rachel Expedition Saddler and watched admiringly while she mastered the intricacies of Danieli’s technique. This demanded not only uncommon skill with knots but considerable physical strength – and those gifts had to be synchronised with split-second timing. The application of immense force was essential at a certain moment in the construction of a knot; otherwise all was lost and the whole process had to begin again. At her third attempt Rachel mastered this mind-boggling art – Danieli was a good teacher – and ever after she securely saddled Egbert at least twice a day as though she too had been born in a Fulani compound.
Then there was the little matter of a crupper. Doi pooh-poohed the need for any such refinement but Danieli was on our side. When another strip of nylon sacking had been produced I insisted that its use would soon cause a tail sore.
Silence. Hard thinking.
A small boy fetched an old sock which Doi dextrously bound to the centre of the ‘crupper’ with a strand of tough grass plucked from nearby. Sceptically I watched, foreseeing disintegration in the near future. I had a lot to learn; Cameroonian improvisations are the fruits of long experience and that crupper was to prove the least of our worries.
Now it was my turn to display some expertise. Danieli tested our sacks and conveyed approval of the weight distribution. Egbert continued to stand statue-still while the sacks were held up and I roped them to the saddle’s central hoop – with real rope, brought from London. Our five-litre water-bottle was tied to one of the smaller front hoops and our two-litre bottle plus the heavy picket to the other. Two multi-coloured raffia shoulder-bags, bought nine years previously in Morelia market in Mexico, were draped over the pommel to hold maps, camera, salt, rain-capes and food for the road. When Egbert’s bright blue bucket, the smoke-blackened kettle and pot and our purple mugs had been tied on at various strategic places, with strong boot-laces, the ensemble looked decidedly tinkerish. But it seemed secure enough and Egbert showed no sign of disapproval.
By 8.40 a.m. we had completed our handshaking marathon and were off. Rachel led Egbert, I followed behind to watch
the load just in case …
‘This time a week ago,’ I recalled, ‘we were arriving at Heathrow. It’s astounding that within seven days we’ve got the show on the road.’
‘Thanks to Jane and David,’ said Rachel.
3
The Forbidden Ranch
CERTAIN INTERLUDES SEEM quite separate from the rest of one’s life. They have the simple perfection of a Tang lyric, a Chopin etude, an Inuit carving. And they do not drift away, becoming blurred by time; mysteriously they continue to give sustenance. For me that first day of our trek was one such interlude. I experienced pure happiness – something quite different from the everyday underlying contentment which is my fortunate lot.
Following Rachel and Egbert down the red-earth track from Doi’s compound, life seemed wondrously simple. The sun shone warm, the breeze blew cool, Mount Ocu beckoned. My daughter had become a congenial adult, our horse was charming and amenable, the Big Bad World (including my latest troublesome typescript) could be forgotten. Time was meaningless; it didn’t matter when we reached where – or, indeed, if we ever reached it. Should there be no habitation in sight, our tent would go up at sunset. Should we feel like lingering for a few days here or there, or turning east instead of west, why not? Uncomplicated months stretched ahead, or so I then imagined. Hundreds of miles of glorious unknown territory also stretched ahead, populated by warm-hearted people not condemned to hopeless poverty. With difficulty I overcame an impulse to skip, instead of walking.
From Doi’s compound there was nowhere to go but down. Below that bare, over-grazed mountain we crossed an alleged main road which becomes virtually impassable during the big rains (October to December). Here a bush-taxi gave us our baptism of dust; from that moment, until our return to Bamenda, we and all our possessions were permanently ochre-tinged. Egbert loftily ignored the swaying, hooting vehicle and its yelling, waving passengers.
Cameroon with Egbert Page 6