The Neighbors: A Glimpse Into Typical Cameroonian Life

This blog is not intended to express my opinions. It's intended to provide an accurate glimpse of what I observe from my bedroom window--a Cameroonian family that lives behind us.

The city of Yaounde is enormous. Millions of people have fled the complications of village life for even more complications in a city that doesn't usually live up to their big city dreams. There are three classes of people in Yaounde. The super rich, usually connected to the government, the few priviliged people who enjoy the basics of modern life such as running water and a house with solid walls (our current life), and the masses of people who live like the people behind our house.

Let's look out my window.

We see that their house itself is made of bricks. That in itself is special--many people build their houses out of mud. There is no glass in the windows. There are scraps of material that serve as curtains. The gray brick walls, from the ground half-way up, are covered with red earth stains and dirt.

There's a goat tied to a tree that bleats constantly from hunger. It's feces and urine leave odors that are carried in the air directly to my bedroom.

There's a sickly dog that sleeps most of the day in front of the house. His head is constantly bobbing to one side to chase away flies that wish to feed on his festering, puss-oozing ear wounds.

The house is marked in numerous places with red spray paint. The paint writes out dates and large x letters--which means their house is "unfit" according to the government and will be destroyed. The spray paint says 2008, so maybe their house was overlooked. The Pope recently visited Cameroon, and the government found it necessary to get rid of "eye sores" such as this family's home.

The paint could also mean that they built their home without paying the bribes necessary to get a "building permit." They're lucky it's still there.

The father figure is a stout, round man with a booming voice. He comes out each morning in a soiled towel and enters their square-shaped scrap-wood structure that serves as a washing area in front of their house. He carries a bucket of water. His feet are bare on the red earth that serves as the floor to his bathing area.

The mother is a portly woman with large breasts, sagging from years of not being supported by a bra. Her head is always wrapped in a cloth.

There are a number of teen boys who come and go from the house. They're the best dressed of them all in athletic attire. There's what I'm assuming is another daughter, a teen girl, who is often not at the house.

Then there's a little boy of about seven or eight, and a toddler.

The family usually communicates in ways that sound like arguing to the Western ear, in tones that are fairly aggressive. The Mother screams at the children all the time. I hear the children scream back when she beats them with sticks.

On numerous occasions I've watched the little boy flinch and try to flee the mother who is chasing him with a long whip-like plant stem.

The father seems to be a pastor of some sort. He shouts and screams the word of God to visitors in his house, accompanied by a solo singing presentation that sounds monotone and plain compared to his hysterical "The Bible Says" sermons. When he finds it necessary to evangelize, I hear each word of his message no matter where I am in our house.

Aside from the religious singing, the majority of music played (using an extension cord from another house) is American rap music, laden with messages of violence and dripping with the words F*** and Bit**.

Today I observed one of the teen boys walking around their yard while the teen girl and the mother did laundry. The little boy was naked, as usual, standing there watching everyone else.

The teen boy amused himself by slapping the teen girl on the arms and face in a teasing way until she fled the scene and the Mother intervened. I'm still not sure if the girl is a daughter in the family. It seems more logical that she would be a girlfriend of one of the teen boys, there to do his laundry. His flirtatious slapping didn't seem very brother-sister like.

The people who live in the house do all of their work during the day as there is no electricity to light their world at night.

This is what I see and hear from my window on a daily basis.