By Dr. Peter Wuteh Vakunta
When Tewuh received his Bachelor of Science degree from the hands of the Vice-Chancellor of the University of Ngoa, he said to himself that those years of hardship were over. He had toiled for four years and his hard work had paid off finally. With a broad smile on his face, he shook hands with his relatives who had come from the village to attend the graduation ceremony.
“I thank you my child. Thank you very much for making me proud today. Who wouldn’t be proud to have a son like you? You can call the white man’s book and speak through your nostrils like them. I am a very proud woman today,” the haggard woman said, hugging her grandson.
“It is all because of you, granny. You did your best to help me grow up. You taught me good manners and respect for hard work,” Tewuh said, holding her emaciated arms.
“If Nyi, Almighty King of the Skies called me home today, I would hold my head high and go to meet him,” the old woman said, holding her grandson in her bony hands.
When the ceremony was over, Tewuh went home in the company of his jubilant relatives and friends. Dressed in a three-piece gray suit and a pair of black leather shoes, the 22-year-old young man led the homebound procession, holding his diploma in his muscular hands. He gallivanted on stubby legs and winked at the young ladies in the crowd as if to seduce them. His friends kept badgering him with questions about his future career.
“Bo, di kana big book wey you dong get’am so no bi you go daso be na djintete for dis kontry?”[i][i] Bunda, his childhood friend asked.
“Massa lef me da big book palava. Mek we daso go dance makossa den dammer for long,”[ii] he responded trying to be evasive.
“Ni Tewuh, mek you no forget me taim wey you dong jandre-o. You sabi say taim wey youa broda dey for on top plum stick you must chop sweet plum, no be so?”[iii] One of the girls said, winking at him.
“You tok na true tok, sista,” [iv][iv]Tewuh responded.
When they reached home, his father asked him an unexpected question.
“This big certificate of yours will open all kinds of doors for you on the job market, isn’t that right, my son?”
The sixty-six year old man hadn’t said a word since they set out on their return journey from Ngoa. Ninety miles separated them from the village of Lohmeukoh. If they had a car, it would have taken them less than an hour to get home. Hiring a taxi would have meant spending a whole year’s income from their farm produce. They had to walk home.
“Papa, with a certificate like this I will be able to work in any office I want in this country,” the young man said confidently. He was very proud of his achievement. After all, he had worked very hard to earn his degree.
“We praise God for giving you to us,” Nah Mbiah said, beaming. The boy’s mother was full of excitement.
It was pitch dark outside when they arrived at their home. They were tired but happy. An illustrious son of the soil had just returned with a great booty. Tewuh’s father, who equated his son’s achievement to killing a lion, had bought a five-year-old cow and two goats for his son’s graduation party. The very day his son had set foot in the white man’s school, it had dawned on him that one day he would come back like a hero. Tewuh’s mother aided by other female members of the family had cooked basketsful of delicious food: fufu and njama-njama soup[v], koki[vi]i and ripe plantains, ero and water-fufu[vii], calabar yams, kwa-coco [viii], and egusi soup[ix]. There was alcohol galore: majunga, jobajo, odontol, matango, nkang, kwacha, mbu, fofo and palm-wine[x] They ate and danced to favorite makossa and mangambeuh[xi] tunes till dawn.
Tewuh woke up the following morning feeling ill at ease. In the midst of the excitement, he had not given serious thought to how he would get to nation’s capital in order to apply for a job. To apply for a job he had to travel to Yaoundé. All applicants were required to personally submit their applications at the Ministry of the Public Service and be interviewed there. Yaoundé was some 2200 miles away from home. He couldn’t cover that distance on foot. He needed the sum of 10000 CFA francs to pay his fare. He didn’t have the money. Worse still, he knew nobody in the capital city.
“Where will I live during my job search in Yaoundé?” the boy asked his father.
“When you get to that city, try your best to find Chui Bah’s son. His parents live in this village. He’ll give you a bed to sleep on. A tribesman is a brother,” his father said, giving him the sum of 11000 CFA francs.
“Papa, I don’t know Chui Bah’s son,” Tewuh said, looking worried.
“Chui Bah’s son is called Londuh. He speaks the same language as you as do. Go see him and ask for help,” his father said, stroking his graying beard.
“Papa, Yaoundé is a big city. How am I going to find Londuh in a huge city like that?”
“Oh, don’t worry. He looks like his father. He is short and stout. When he comes to see his father and mother, he always wears a blue suit, a pair of brown leather shoes and a gold watch. You can’t miss him,” the old man said confidently.
“Papa, hundreds of men wear blue suits, brown leather shoes, and gold watches in Yaoundé. How am I going to pick out Londuh from the crowd?”
“Well, you’ll have to try hard to find your tribesman. Remember that the woman that never tried hard enough to fall pregnant died childless,” Nah Mbiah said.
“I will try my best, Nah,” Tewuh said.
“Travel well, my son,” his mother said.
“Go well, my son. May the gods of our ancestors show you the straight road! May they open friendly doors for you,” his father said, holding his son close to his hairy chest.
They were standing at the Amour Mezam motor park. Suddenly, he let go his son and walked briskly away without looking back. He did not want him to see his tears.
“Stay well, Papa,” Tewuh said, waving at his father.
“Travel well, my son,” his mother said in a broken voice looking pitifully at her son. Tears stood in her panther eyes.
“Go well, my son. May the ground rise to meet you, and may the ill-wind always be behind you,” his father said, shaking his kongolibon head from left to right.
The trip to Yaoundé lasted several hours. Tewuh was at his wits’ end when the bus screeched to a halt at the Ndobolo bus station at Carrefour Obili[xii]. The beehive activity in the city amazed him. Yellow cabs sped past him at the speed of lightening. Infuriated bendskin[xiii] drivers hauled insults at one another. To Tewuh’s surprise, two drivers who had been pointing their index fingers into the air as a response to provocation, suddenly stopped the engines of their motor-bikes, jumped down and got into a fist-fight.
“Tu think que tu es même quoi?”[xiv] One of the drivers said to his aggressor.
“Et toi tu member say tu es sorti de la cuisse du Jupiter, non?”[xv] the other responded.
“Youa mami pima!”[xvi] the other said, slapping him in the face.
“Die dog! Ne me touche pas again!”[xvii] the other man said, grabbing the aggressor by his collar. Tewuh heard passers-by shouting in French. He could hardly understand what they were saying.
As he wondered how he was going to find Londuh, he heard commuters speaking in languages he had never heard before. He felt like a pygmy in the land of giants. He prayed that someone would speak Meukoh, his native tongue. People scurried in various directions as though their homes were on fire. How on earth was he going to find Londuh in this maze of human beings? Placing his traveling bag between his legs, he stood at the bus station arms across his broad chest, feeling like a fish out of water.
Suddenly, an idea crossed his mind. He decided to look for his tribesman in bars and nightclubs in the vicinity. He looked at his watch. It was 8:00pm. He grabbed his bag, slung it across his shoulders, and walked into the city center. The first night-club he arrived at was called Biabia Nite Club. It was full of wolowoss[xviii] on the lookout for clients. He went in, bought a bottle of jobajo[xix] and sat at a vacant table next to the DJ. Skinny girls wearing see-through outfits and high-heeled shoes were gyrating on the dance floor like mami wata[xx]. Men and women chattered in French, a language that sounded like Chinese to Tewuh. He had dropped French in secondary school when his arrogant francophone teacher called him a mbut[xxi] when he had earned a “C” grade on his finals because he could not conjugate the verb être[xxii] in French. How he hated that man!
He was still wondering how to find Londuh as he watched the merrymakers hover around him.
“You want maboya for the nite, cheri coco? Je suis propre, no HIV.”[xxiii]
Startled, Tewuh got out of his daydream. A fair complexioned girl with abundant hair and breasts like pumpkins stood over him wriggling her semi-nude protruding buttocks. She looked like a teenager.
“No, sista. I no di fain woman. I di fain ma kontryman wey yi deh for dis town,”[xxiv] Tewuh responded looking straight into her blue eyes.
“Wheti be name for youa kontryman”[xxv] the harlot inquired.
“Londuh. He commot for Meka village.”[xxvi]
“You commot for Meka you self-self?”[xxvii]
“Yes, I be Meka pikin me sef-self”[xxviii]
“I member say I sabi da Londuh wey you de fain’am.”[xxix]
“Na true tok you de tok? So you sabi ma kontryma?”[xxx]
“Yes, Londuh na taximan, no?”[xxxi]
“I no sabi de kana wok wey yi de wok, sista”[xxxii]
“Ah yo mba, eh! See me some man. You de fain person wey you no sabi’am[xxxiii]
“Sista, I commot for Bamenda just now. I come na for fain wok for ya. Ma repe say if I reach mek I fain Londuh.”[xxxiv]
“Bo, give man one jobajo, no. I go fain Londuh gee you.”[xxxv]
“Wheti you de sule no, sista?”[xxxvi]
“No be daso 33 Export?”[xxxvii]
Tewuh bought her a bottle of 33 Export beer. She used her teeth to open the bottle, drank half of its content at a go, and slammed the bottle on the table in front of him.
“I de come ma broda”[xxxviii], she said and walked out of the nightclub, swaying from one side to the other like a model competing in a beauty contest.
She didn’t tell Tewuh where she was going. He thought she had gone for good. After an hour she reappeared in the company of a short heavily built man in his mid-thirties. He was clean-shaven and dressed in black leather trousers and jacket. His polished black leather shoes and gold watch glittered in the dim lights of the nightclub.
“Na youa kontryman dis,”[xxxix] the girl said, pointing at the newcomer.
“I am Londuh. I hear you’re looking for me?”
“Yes, I am Tewuh. Nice to meet you, brother Londuh. I come from Menka. I’m son of Pa Kunta.”
“Oh, nice to meet you,” Londuh said, stretching his right hand to greet Tewuh.
“My father asked me to look for you when I get here.”
“Ah, is that right? I have been to the village a couple of times but haven’t met you.”
“Yes, that’s because I was away at University in Ngoa.”
“I see. So what brings you to the nation’s capital?”
“Job search, my brother. I have just graduated from University and need a job.”
“Congratulations!” What did you study at University?”
“Plant science, I have a degree in plant science.”
“Great! Let’s go home,” Londuh said, holding his tribesman by the hand as they walked out, after buying two beers for the young lady who had brought him into the night club.
The two young men were now sitting on a couch in Londuh’s two-bedroom apartment in the Madagascar neighborhood. Tewuh took a quick look at a leather bag sitting on a mahogany table in the north end of the room. It was full of small plastic bags containing some whitish powdery substance. Foreign currencies lay pell-mell on the table: euro, pound, dollar, yen, naira, cedi, rand, and more.
“Do you smoke?” Londuh asked, offering Tewuh a pack of Benson and Hedges.
“No, thanks,” he said.
“Do you want something to eat?” Londuh asked.
“Yes, thanks brother. I am starving,” Tewuh said, hardly believing the generosity of this man he was meeting for the first time.
Londuh quickly prepared a bowl of foo-foo[xl] and fried bunga[xli] while his visitor read a copy of the Cameroon Post weekly that lay on the center table. When the meal was ready both men washed their hands and started to attack the lumps of food each with his five fingers.
“Massa, you di cook like woman-o! The foo-foo sweet-o!”[xlii] Tewuh said.
“Thank you. If nkwankanda, célibataire, no sabi cook, no be yi go die hungry,” [xliii]Londuh said without lifting his head from the bowl of foo-foo.
“You said you’ve come to look for a job here?”
“Yes, bro.”
“Do you have money?”
“No, I don’t. I am fresh out of University. My father gave me just enough money to pay my fare to Yaoundé,” Tewuh said.
“You don’t have money, and yet you want a job? That’s impossible!” Londuh said, laughing uproariously.
“What’s impossible?” Tewuh asked.
“Getting a job here without money,” Londuh said.
“I don’t understand,” Tewuh said, shaking his clean-shaven head in disbelief.
“Believe it or not, it takes money and connections to get a job here,” Londuh said.
“Why?” Tewuh asked.
“That’s because you have to grease the palm of everyone that handles your job application file, including the planton. That’s the way things work here,” Londuh said.
“Who is planton?”
“The planton is the office messenger who transports files from office to office.”
“Are you serious?”
“Oh yes!” Here in Yaoundé, the planton is the boss; he’s more important than the boss himself.”
“God forbid bad thing!”[xliv] Tewuh exclaimed.
“God is on vacation in Yaoundé, my friend! It doesn’t matter what you know, it’s who you know that matters. You have to tchoko[xlv] if you want a job,” Londuh said, a smirk on his face.
“I’m lost. I spent four years working hard to earn a degree in sciences and you’re telling me that it doesn’t matter?”
“That’s the bitter truth, brother.”
“If a degree doesn’t matter on the job market, what does?” Tewuh asked opening and closing his lips like a fish.
“Do you speak French?
“No I don’t.”
“That makes things worse, my friend!” Londuh added.
“Why?”
“Everyone here speaks French. Remember you are now East of the Mungo, my friend. This is the territory of Frogs[xlvi].”
“So?”
“If you don’t understand French, you’re a persona non grata in this part of the country. They will call you mon Bamenda[xlvii].Others will call you Anglo[xlviii] and poke fun at you everywhere you go,” Londuh said.
“Is that real?”
“Take it from me, my brother. The marriage between Francophones and Anglophones in Ongola[xlix] is one of convenience,” Londuh said, falling asleep.
Tewuh woke up the following day feeling stressed out. The question of having to give a bribe and speak French in order to get a job had kept him awake all night. The language question frightened him even more.
“Use this to pay your taxi fare to the Public Service Ministry. I’m leaving for work.”
“Thank you very much, bro,” Tewuh said, taking the 1000 CFA francs bill from Londuh.
“My girlfriend will show you where to catch a taxi to the Ministry. She will be here in a few minutes,” Londuh said leaving the house in Clando[l] taxi cab.
As soon as Londuh was out of sight, Tewuh jumped into his pair of khaki trousers, wore his marine blue long-sleeved shirt and black shoes, and accompanied the young woman that had come in and introduced herself as Claudine to the taxi rank. She showed him where to stand and flag down yellow taxis and left for her tailoring shop. Tewuh had been standing there for about thirty minutes when a taxi screeched to a halt in front of him.
“Please, drop me at the Ministry of the Public Service”, he said to the driver.
“Fils de chien! T’es malade?[li]” the driver yelled at him, taking off at the speed of lightening.
Five other taxis went past him without stopping. He felt too humiliated to flag them down. The sixth one stopped.
“I am going to the Ministry of the Public Service, please drop there,” he said.
“Anglo! Fiche-le camp, idiot! Va te faire porter par ta vieille maman!” [lii]the taxi driver hollered.
“What in the world is going on?” Tewuh asked himself.
By reading the body language of the taxi drivers he concluded that they were hurling insults at him. He stared starry-eyed at taxis passing, wondering why they were not picking him up. Did they understand him? Were they being spiteful? The word “Anglo” thrown at him by one of the taxi men reminded him of what Londuh had told him the night before. Crestfallen, he decided to walk five miles to the Ministry. The morning sun was getting hot and he was sweating as if he had been hewing wood. If he had a job, he would forget his humiliation. As he wove his way through the rush-hour traffic, he dreamed of the day when he would own his own car. It would be an SUV, nothing more nothing less. He would show these bastards that he had a degree. He would buy himself a house too. Owning a house in the nation’s capital would be a dream come true. In his daydream, he covered the five miles without realizing it. The oval building of the Ministry of the Public Service stood in front of him. He walked straight into it.
“Good morning, Madam”, he said to a receptionist sitting at the information desk.
“Monsieur, je ne comprends pas votre patois-là, hein!”[liii] The coquettish young woman replied without looking at Tewuh. She was busy applying lipstick on her bulbous lips.
“I beg your pardon?” Tewuh said, looking straight into her green eyes.
“Ici c’est Yaoundé, you ya. Il faut parler français, monsieur. On ne parle que le français ici”,[liv] the woman spoke at the top of her voice without taking her eyes off her mirror.
Tewuh took a few steps backwards and walked quietly out of the office, feeling slighted. Everyone around him spoke French. On his way out, he saw a door to his right that was ajar. He walked through it and found himself in a large hall filled with people quarreling over job application files. There were about fifty people in there, most of them men in their mid-twenties. He decided to approach one of the men.
“Good morning, sir.”
“Quoi?”[lv] the man responded looking at him as if he’d just landed from a strange planet.
“I said good morning, sir”, Tewuh repeated his greeting.
“You come for Bamenda?”[lvi] one man asked, laughing up his sleeve.
“What did you say, sir?” Tewuh asked, a frown on his doll-like face.
“C’est un Biafrais,”[lvii] the man said, spitting in his face.
The whole hall burst out into thundering laughter. Tewuh had had it!
He walked up to his aggressor who was dressed in faded blue jeans and a black shirt, grabbed him by the collar, lifted him off the ground, and threw him on the bare cement floor, pwam!
“Gentleman, I am not a dog! I am a human being like you! You don’t treat me like dirt!” He said, looking at the hostile faces in the hall like a wounded lion. The man he had thrown sprang to his feet and gave him a kick in his private parts. He lost consciousness and fell to the ground. When he regained consciousness he found himself in a hospital ward at the Hôpital central de Yaoundé.[lviii] Londuh was sitting beside him on the bed where he was lying.
“My girlfriend informed me of the problem you had at the Ministry this morning. She said you were brought here in an ambulance when she called the police. Are you feeling better?” Londuh asked.
“Yes, I’m feeling better”, Tewuh answered, showing his friend the injuries he’d sustained on his testicles as a result of the scuffle.
“I advise you to return to the village as soon as you get well,” Londuh said.
“Why?”
“I believe that your degree will be put to better use over there in Abakwa.”
“You think so?” Tewuh asked, tears welling in his bloodshot eyes.
“Yes. Believe me. Don’t waste your time here. Yaoundé is a dead end for people like you who can’t speak the French language.”
“I see. So it’s French or nothing.”
“More or less, this place is a burial ground for Anglophones like you who cannot express themselves in French,” Londuh said, shaking his head.
Two weeks later, Tewuh left the hospital.
“Take this my friend and pay your way back home,” Londuh said, giving him the sum of 20000 CFA francs.
“Brother, I don’t have the mouth with which thank you. May God repay your kindness hundredfold,” Tewuh said, taking the money.
“Good luck in your new job search! Remember this city is a torture chamber for educated people like you,” Londuh said, waving his tribesman goodbye at the Tchatchou Motor Park in quartier Melen.
As the young man sat in the back of the bus that took him from the nation’s capital to his home town, several melancholic thoughts raced through his mind. How was he going to explain his failure to secure a job to his parents? Would his aging parents believe that the son they had sacrificed everything they had to educate could not work for the government of a country he considered his fatherland simply because he could not speak French? At one point in his ruminations, Tewuh toyed with the idea of discarding his degree to join his father on his plantation to earn a living. But how would he explain this falling from grace to grass to the village folks who saw the university degree as the key that opens all doors? He was on the horns of dilemma.
Tewuh arrived at home the same day in the evening. His father and mother had left for their cassava farm situated one hundred miles away from the village. He entered into his room, threw his bag on the bed, and looked for one of the ropes his father had used in the past for tethering his goats. He made a noose at one end of the rope and tied the loose end to the rafter. Placing a chair right under the rope, he mounted it and inserted his head into the noose up to his neck and let go his body. There was no one at home to stop the tragedy. When his parents returned from the farm three days later a stench from his son’s room caught his father’s attention. Opening the door, he found the inert body of his son dangling from the roof. It was in a state of putrefaction. A note stuck out of the back pocket of his trousers. His father’s eyes welled with tears as he read its contents:
Beloved father and mother, I know you will never forgive me for doing this. This is no way to die but I couldn’t stand the humiliation any more. You sent me to school to earn a degree in order to fend for myself. You wanted me to look after you in your old age. Despite my hard work at school, I still cannot look after myself, let alone take care of you as you had hoped. I cannot speak French, therefore, I’m worthless. This country has disowned me. It has treated like an underclass human being. It has stolen my hopes; it has robbed me of my life. I am a victim of circumstances. I love you Pa and Ma. Farewell.
NOTES
[i][i] My friend, with kind of big degree you have got, I am sure you’ll be a big shot in this country.
[ii][ii] My friend, let’s not talk about this big degree. Let’s just go home, dance makossa and eat some food.
[iii][iii] Big brother Tewuh, please remember me when you are rich. You know that when your brother in on top of a plum tree, you’ll eat the sweetest plum, isn’t that right?
[iv][iv] What you have said is true, sister.
[v][v] Mealie meal and huckle-berry soup.
[vi][vi] Traditional Cameroonian dish.
[vii][vii] Vegetable soup eaten with watery mealie meal.
[viii][viii] Crushed cocoyam cooked in red palm-oil mixed with fresh vegetable.
[ix][ix] Soup made from crushed pumpkin seeds.
[x][x] These are various tppes of locally brewed drinks consumed in Cameroon.
[xi][xi] Typical Cameroonian musical genres.
[xii][xii] Obili junction.
[xiii][xiii] Motor bikes used as taxis in Cameroon
[xiv][xiv] What do you think you really are?
[xv][xv] And you think you have just come out of Jupiter’s thighs?
[xvi][xvi] Your mother’s vagina.
[xvii][xvii] Carcass of a dog! Don’t touch me!
[xviii][xviii] Prostitutes.
[xix][xix] Alcoholic beer.
[xx][xx] Mermaids
[xxi][xxi] Good for nothing person; fool.
[xxii][xxii] To be.
[xxiii][xxiii] Do you want a woman for the night?
[xxiv][xxiv] No, my sister. I am not looking for a woman. I’m looking for my tribesman who lives in this city.
[xxv][xxv] What is the name of your tribesman?
[xxvi][xxvi] He comes from Meka village.
[xxvii][xxvii] Are you from Meka too?
[xxviii][xxviii] Yes, I hail from Meka.
[xxix][xxix] I think I know the Londuh you are looking for.
[xxx][xxx] Is that true? So you know my tribesman?
[xxxi][xxxi] Yes. Is Londu h not a taxi-driver?
[xxxii][xxxii] I don’t know what he does for a living, sister.
[xxxiii][xxxiii] My goodness! What kind of person are you? Are looking for someone you don’t even know?
[xxxiv][xxxiv] My sister, I have just arrived from Bamenda. I am in search of a job here. My father says when I get here I should look for Londuh.
[xxxv][xxxv] My friend, give me a bottle of beer. I will find Londuh for you.
[xxxvi][xxxvi] What do you drink, sister?
[xxxvii][xxxvii] I drink nothing but 33 Export beer.
[xxxviii][xxxviii] I’ll be right back, my brother.
[xxxix][xxxix] This is your tribesman.
[xl][xl] Dish made from corn flour.
[xli][xli] Smoked tilapia
[xlii][xlii] My friend, you cook like a woman. The food is tasty.
[xliii][xliii] If a bachelor doesn’t learn how to cook , will he not die of starvation?
[xliv][xliv] May God save us!
[xlv][xlv] Give a bribe.
[xlvi][xlvi] Derogatory name for French-speaking Cameroonians
[xlvii][xlvii] Foolish Bamenda man.
[xlviii][xlviii] Anglophone, English-speaking person.
[xlix][xlix] Metonym for Cameroon.
[l][l] Personal car illegally used as taxi
[li][li] Son of a bitch! Are you sick?
[lii][lii] Anglophone! Get lost, idiot! Go tell your mother to carry you there!
[liii][liii]Sir, I don’t understand the dialect you’re speaking.
[liv][liv]Here is Yaoundé. You have to speak French, do you hear me? Here we speak only French.
[lv][lv] What?
[lvi][lvi] Do you hail from Bamenda?
This is one beautiful piece of writing which could be turned into a fine screenplay to show Cameroonians just how far politics, policy and rhetoric have drifted off course from the original plan to produce the tragecomedy crafted here by Dr. Peter Vacunta. I would have loved a reflection of the comic side of this oddyssey but since the author takes it one step further into a tragedy, I am a little less enthralled. Nevertheless there is ample common ground for anyone of Anglophone extraction who has traveled this road to Yaounde in search of employment, chase files or simply visit. Surely many anglophones will identify with the frustrations of having come face to face with a francophone who, with no fear of consequence at all, blurts out "je ne comprends pas votre anglais-la".
Posted by: J. S. Dinga | Monday, 30 May 2011 at 01:52 PM
Professor. I was like Tewuh, only I did not hang myself. I left. I went to Nigeria and eventually to the United States. I do not speak a single word of french and I am ok with that. All other capitals I have been to, from Nairobi, to Dar-es-Sallam, to Pretoria, to Abuja, to London to Washington have been more welcoming than Yaounde. One day we shall have the means to seize our country away from froggish beings.
Posted by: facter | Friday, 03 June 2011 at 05:26 PM