Thursday, July 9, 2009
Hi everyone I've been back a month now
Anyway I will now update this blog with videos and pictures now that I am home and have 1st world internet again! Yippie! I can upload videos now without sitting in from of the computer for 10 hours
Monday, April 27, 2009
My Cameroon Experience
Hi everyone, It has been some time between posts.
I am in the process of uploading some pics but it takes time.
Anyway I have traveled much of northwestern and south western Cameroon and have seen much in terms of beautiful scenery, amazing culture, and met wonderful people.
I traveled Cameroon's Northwestern region which is arguably the richest cultural area in all of Africa in terms of its buildings, chiefdoms and the way its traditions coexist with the modern world. Just the northwestern province has 109 chiefs alone and it is wise to task their permission before climbing a random hill or pitching a tent.
As I have mentioned Cameroon is technically bilingual but that is far from the reality. The northwest and southwest are English speakinig areas that were once independent and were actually a separate multi-party independent state called Southern Cameroons, I bet you didn't know that! Because I know I didn't and I studied Africa in depth in school.
While in Bamenda, an English speaking city and opposition center to the President, I was having some beers with some locals when they invited me to a local and highly secretive as well as highly illegal political meeting. The risk of beating, raping of women and even death is so great that these meetings are held far away from the police and military who even in the English province are all Francophones.
The meeting was held in the dark and the group is trying to re-establish the Federal Republic of Southern Cameroons. They are a very peaceful group and I was reluctant to tell them that Obama or the US or anyone in west probably won't even be aware of their cause unless lots of people start dying and there are people to document it. The whole meeting and the secretive nature in which it was held as well as the unimaginable consequences for attending such a meeting were I have to say extremely exciting.
Anyway the landscape in the Northwest consists of beautiful and endless rolling mountains filled with parrots, waterfalls and some cool weather. The people in this province were by far the friendliest I have met in my time in Africa.
I have yet to see wildlife though I head to Gabon tomorrow and then to Congo and I am determined to view Gorillas in their natural habitat. I did go to a rehabilitation center for primates which oddly enough was founded and funded by the Israeli government which I got to see gorillas very up close although behind a fence.
Here is a list of interesting daily aspects of life in Cameroon and Africa that I should mention
1. My morning coffee is purchased from the "Nescafeman" which is a young kid who pushes a big cart around the street with the Nescafe logo and he makes you coffee on the spot for about .20 cents
2. A sign of affection and friendship between men is to hold hands in the street (yes it sounds weird). It takes some time getting used to but if a man starts to hold your hand as you cross the street it is a geniunely very affectionate act.
3. Even in non-Muslim areas eat with your right hand and never ever wave hi or shake hands with your left as that is traditionally used to wipe one's ass.
4. Cameroon has a lot of Albinos, the Albino gene is very common apparently in Cameroon and Albinos stick out like a sore thumb in Africa.
5. You don't get someone's attention by yelling "Excuse me" or "Pardon" or even whisteling or snapping your fingers, you do it by hissing, this all over Africa and it really takes time to get used to it. Even in a restaraunt you get the attention of the waitress by loudly making a HISSSSSSSSSSSSSS sound similar to a snake sound.
6. Many Africans can't count, especially in Ghana, and you are often shortchanged as well as freauently you will recieve extra change. Mathematics can be foreign to many Africans and they sometimes even have a calculator trying to prove a price to you but they don't know how to add or subtract. You can't really argue when you are trying to show that this plus this equals this when the person insists that the multiplication symbol is used for addition!!
7. I found a Kabbalah center in Cameroon!
8. Cameroonians consume more alcohol and eat more then any other Sub-Saharan African nation.
9. Cameroon has by far the worst roads I have ever seen if you can even call them roads.
Thursday, April 2, 2009
"Mini-Africa" Cameroon
Hello everybody and sorry for the time between posts. The internet cafes are around me plenty but the speed is insanely slow and I have so much to say it can be mind boggling.
Well I last wrote in from Togo, which contrary to State Department warnings was a wonderful place with wonderful people.
In order to obtain a visa for Cameroon I opted to skip the long trek to South Eastern Nigeria and instead opted to go to Malabo, Equatorial Guinea. Malabo is the capital of Equatorial Guinea although it is on a small island called Bioko while the mainland borders Cameroon, Gabon, and Congo (the good gone). Americans don't require visas for Eq. Guinea so I figured I'll head there to obtain my Cameroonian visa.
Equatorial Guinea is the only place in Africa where Spanish is the official language which was nice to hear although the nation is very much a police state. It is a nation covered in oil and you have a massive community of Chinese, Americans, and Arab oil workers as well as the refineries that light up the night to prove it. Unfortunately it is very expensive and there are no ATMs so I was in and out.
I arrived in Cameroon on the 21st of last month and I instantly recognized it as my favorite country so far. Known as Mini Africa, Cameroon has everything to offer that one would associate with Africa. From Savannah elephants and even lions in the far north to pristine and almost untouched rainforest in the Southeast Congo Basin that has large Gorilla and Chimp populations and the northwest Bakassi peninsula (just re-acquired from Nigeria) is one of only two places where one can find a drill which is a fancy and very colorful looking monkey similar to a baboon.
Cameroon is officially a bilingual country though here in the economic capital of Douala you will be hardpressed to hear a word of it though if you drive 35 miles west you won't hear a word of French. 2 of the nation's 10 provinces are Anglophone and they comprise roughly 35-40% of the population and each English speaking Cameroonian makes it a point to let you know how badly mistreated the Anglophones are.
I went for a few days and climbed West and Central Africa's highest mountain, Mount Cameroon, it stands at about 12,000 feet and the summit was near freezing as it rained just when I got to the top and for about an hour I was sure I was going to lose a few toes to the cold. The climb left me very sore and blistered. The hike up the mountain was beautiful as it starts at rainforest and turns to Savannah and then very rocky at the top.
I did not see much in the way of wildlife though I didn't expect to see much there anyway. I do plan to go to the Southeast a rough place and not for the faint hearted though my mission has become a sighting of gorillas or at least chimps and sanctuaries don't count in my book.
Northwest of here is the "Ring Road" which is a 367 kilometer circle of towns at around 5,000 feet that is rich in tribal culture and grassy scenery. I plan to make it there as well.
This is the first country where fish in the national diet and it is cheap and fresh and available everywhere and tastes excelllent.
Here is a picture of me at 4 in the morning right before the final climb
I will send out updates as I load up some pictures, it can take hours.
Sunday, March 8, 2009
Thursday, February 26, 2009
Lomé, capital of the Republic of Togo
Sorry for the long delays between posts, the country I'm in now is very poor and internet is unreliable.
So I crossed the border from Ghana to the east and I'm now in the Republic of Togo, a tiny country. Both a and its almost eaually sized neighbor to the east, Benin, are the birthplaces of Voodoo and despite Christianity and Voodoo most people still privately adhere to some form of Voodoo practice. Contrary to what you may think, Voodoo is not about dolls and evil spells although that form of Voodoo known as black magic here, does exist though most people consider it quite pathetic.
Like Ivory Coast, Togo is a Francophone nation although there are some English speakers here as a result of the largest ethnic group, The Ewe people, being a cross border tribe with Ghana who also are a majority in the East of Ghana.
This nation is very much a dictatorship and the son of former president is now in power and he is unliked here in the capital as he is a northerner (north is mainly muslim and non-Ewe) whose father came to power in a coup.
In fact I practically met the president! Sort of, not really. As I was walking down the main street I always walk on I noticed people clearign the street as if there was an air raid siren followed by a soldier waving his AK-47 in the air while blowing his whistle.
People were quickly clearing the streets just like out of a film where there is about to be a mafia hit and the whole neighborhood knows it except the target. Except in this case I knew I needed to clear the streets as it was obvious and before I knew it a girl about 16 years old that didn't speak any English and only pigeon french grabbed me from the back of my neck and yanked me into an alley way and locked the hatch on the door. I kept trying to peak over the gate to see what was going on as this sort of stuff interests me but even to this she responded ne regaredez pas (Don't Look!). I kept trying to peek over and she kept pulling me down. I found out after the all clear whistle that it was the presidential motorcade and the young president doesn't like being looked at in addition to the the fact he is in the capital which is smack on the south east and despises him.
It was an interesting experience to say the least.
The people of Lomé and Togo are very nice and despite the unbelievable poverty here, people still go out and drink beer, so,ething not done ni Ghana by the locals.
I have been in the capital city Lomé for two weeks as I'm studying French via my "40 Lessons to learn French" book which is a very good book and my good friend Edem gives me a French test every two days based on the material I covered in the book. I barrage him with questions pertaining to grammar rules and of course proper pronunciation (the hardest thing for an English speaker learning French).
The great thing about Edem's French is that it is educated and proper because despite what perception you may all have, many here speak a pigeon French and/or pigeon English. Edem's wife speaks Ewe and hardly a word in French. Learning French from a pigeon speaker (they don't always realize they speak improperly) is very bad because you learn everything according to the local pigeon style, so Edem is a blessing.
As always the food here is 4 stars above Ghana's cuisine in everything from coffee, to meat and fish as a result of this being a former French colony instead of a British one. The people here are MUCH poorer then in Ghana but they still eat for enjoyment as well as subsistence unlike Ghana.
Another interesting side note concerns the new US embassies popping up in every single West African capital and the enormous size of them which is hard to put in words as they simply dwarf entire areas in sheer size. The embassy here in Togo is brand spanking new and is somewhere around the size of the Pentagon. The US embassy in Accra , also brand new, is even bigger. The first of the new West African US embassies was built in Abidjan, Ivory Coast and that one is only 3-4 years old.
An Italian friend of mine I met in Accra, works for a major Italian construction company and has lived in Ghana for 20 years won a contract to lay foundation for the new US embassy in Ouagodougo (capital of Burkina Faso) which is now completed. It is also a monstrosity of a building.
Most Africans are generally welcoming of these new super embassies, they brag that there US embassy is bigger then so and so, on the other hand they ask me if I know why the US needs such a big embassy in Togo or Ghana and I have no answer for them.
The Africans love the US in both Bush times and of course Obama but Clinton is still a god here.
Anyhow I will load up some pictures and attempt load videos though it can take five hours here. I check my email twice a day here while I'm in they capital here studying French, in a week or two I'm going up to Kpalime which has West Africa's tallest peak (3,000 feet lol) but it should provide some needed relief from the brutal humidity here as well as it is coffee country with lush hills.
Ohh and by the way I stepped in my first shit puddle, for almost three months I've avoided them but one got the best of me and it took some shampooing and blow drying to get the smell out.
Update: I will try hard to add photos and videos to this post so I'll send out notices each time I do
So I crossed the border from Ghana to the east and I'm now in the Republic of Togo, a tiny country. Both a and its almost eaually sized neighbor to the east, Benin, are the birthplaces of Voodoo and despite Christianity and Voodoo most people still privately adhere to some form of Voodoo practice. Contrary to what you may think, Voodoo is not about dolls and evil spells although that form of Voodoo known as black magic here, does exist though most people consider it quite pathetic.
Like Ivory Coast, Togo is a Francophone nation although there are some English speakers here as a result of the largest ethnic group, The Ewe people, being a cross border tribe with Ghana who also are a majority in the East of Ghana.
This nation is very much a dictatorship and the son of former president is now in power and he is unliked here in the capital as he is a northerner (north is mainly muslim and non-Ewe) whose father came to power in a coup.
In fact I practically met the president! Sort of, not really. As I was walking down the main street I always walk on I noticed people clearign the street as if there was an air raid siren followed by a soldier waving his AK-47 in the air while blowing his whistle.
People were quickly clearing the streets just like out of a film where there is about to be a mafia hit and the whole neighborhood knows it except the target. Except in this case I knew I needed to clear the streets as it was obvious and before I knew it a girl about 16 years old that didn't speak any English and only pigeon french grabbed me from the back of my neck and yanked me into an alley way and locked the hatch on the door. I kept trying to peak over the gate to see what was going on as this sort of stuff interests me but even to this she responded ne regaredez pas (Don't Look!). I kept trying to peek over and she kept pulling me down. I found out after the all clear whistle that it was the presidential motorcade and the young president doesn't like being looked at in addition to the the fact he is in the capital which is smack on the south east and despises him.
It was an interesting experience to say the least.
The people of Lomé and Togo are very nice and despite the unbelievable poverty here, people still go out and drink beer, so,ething not done ni Ghana by the locals.
I have been in the capital city Lomé for two weeks as I'm studying French via my "40 Lessons to learn French" book which is a very good book and my good friend Edem gives me a French test every two days based on the material I covered in the book. I barrage him with questions pertaining to grammar rules and of course proper pronunciation (the hardest thing for an English speaker learning French).
The great thing about Edem's French is that it is educated and proper because despite what perception you may all have, many here speak a pigeon French and/or pigeon English. Edem's wife speaks Ewe and hardly a word in French. Learning French from a pigeon speaker (they don't always realize they speak improperly) is very bad because you learn everything according to the local pigeon style, so Edem is a blessing.
As always the food here is 4 stars above Ghana's cuisine in everything from coffee, to meat and fish as a result of this being a former French colony instead of a British one. The people here are MUCH poorer then in Ghana but they still eat for enjoyment as well as subsistence unlike Ghana.
Another interesting side note concerns the new US embassies popping up in every single West African capital and the enormous size of them which is hard to put in words as they simply dwarf entire areas in sheer size. The embassy here in Togo is brand spanking new and is somewhere around the size of the Pentagon. The US embassy in Accra , also brand new, is even bigger. The first of the new West African US embassies was built in Abidjan, Ivory Coast and that one is only 3-4 years old.
An Italian friend of mine I met in Accra, works for a major Italian construction company and has lived in Ghana for 20 years won a contract to lay foundation for the new US embassy in Ouagodougo (capital of Burkina Faso) which is now completed. It is also a monstrosity of a building.
Most Africans are generally welcoming of these new super embassies, they brag that there US embassy is bigger then so and so, on the other hand they ask me if I know why the US needs such a big embassy in Togo or Ghana and I have no answer for them.
The Africans love the US in both Bush times and of course Obama but Clinton is still a god here.
Anyhow I will load up some pictures and attempt load videos though it can take five hours here. I check my email twice a day here while I'm in they capital here studying French, in a week or two I'm going up to Kpalime which has West Africa's tallest peak (3,000 feet lol) but it should provide some needed relief from the brutal humidity here as well as it is coffee country with lush hills.
Ohh and by the way I stepped in my first shit puddle, for almost three months I've avoided them but one got the best of me and it took some shampooing and blow drying to get the smell out.
Update: I will try hard to add photos and videos to this post so I'll send out notices each time I do
Saturday, January 31, 2009
The Ivory Coast
I am writing to you from the city of Abidjan which is the capital of the Ivory Coast now officially spelled Cote D'Ivoire. This is without a doubt the nation I wanted to avoid like the plague as it was considered the most dangerous nation in Africa along with Somalia up till 6 months ago.
So why on earth am I here you ask? I met an American in Kumasi who said he was going across the border into Cote D'Ivoire since it was safe now and very stable. I checked it out for myself and sure enough it was removed from the UK travel ban list. Strangely enough Americans don't need visas to enter Cote D'Ivoire until February 15 so I got waved across the border while others had problems.
I first headed to the Beach town of Grand Bassam which was 90 miles from the border and had to endure 9 military checkpoints though suprisingly enough not one asked me for a bribe.
The Ivory Coast is/was the gem of Africa. After independence their president poured money into education and agriculture as well as infrastructure. As soon as you cross the border from Ghana you notice an immediate difference in almost everything. First thing you notice is the excellent roads that still exist in the country followed by a 1st world agriculture and farming system. You see farm after farm as well as freshly plowed fields and nice healthy cows grazing on them (a rare sight in Ghana). The pineapples and bananas are twice the size of Ghana's and taste fantastic. The meat, fish, and food culture in Cote D'Ivoire is night and day when compared with Ghana where people eat for subsistence and not pleasure. Everywhere serves excellent French bread and croissants
By far the best African dish I've eaten is the Ivorian Kedjenou which is a lemon based sauce with tomato and pepper made with chicken, beef, or fish served over an excellent local specialty called Attieke which is grated Cassava and tastes like Cous Cous only better.The people here are extremely friendly despite not speaking much English.
Yesterday I arrived here in the capital to more or less see if the capital can live up to the hype and it definately has. The city is beautiful and is littered with modern skyscrapers. I had no idea that Sub-Saharan Africa had such a city outside of maybe CapeTown. My hotel is right on the lagoon with an amazing view.
Aside from the Armored Personal carriers tha you see here and there the city seems extremely stable and normal the outskirts of the city are slummy but that is normal in any big city
Tuesday, January 20, 2009
Kumasi and Ashanti people
Sorry I haven't posted recently but my internet access has been limited and extremely slow when possible. So I have plenty of pictures and will upload them when I can
I'm currently in Kumasi which is the 2nd largest city in Ghana and is the capital of the Ashanti people which are by far the largest tribal group in Ghana with about 50% of the population. In fact their political party, the NPP, just lost the elections by 23,000 votes out of 10 million votes counted. The NDC won with a coalition of the other tribes and areas by 50.1%.
The people of Kumasi are very nice and the city is nice as well and not at all hectic like other cities.
Immediately I noticed that the woman here are a little healthier looking in size and have some meat on their bones unlike all the other places I've been. Many people here also are a little lighter in skin which has much to do with the slave trade.
The Ashanti were the ones who more or less were the dominant forces in rounding up other tribes and handing them over to the slave trading companies. In fact while at the Cape Coast slave castle, two Ghanians of different tribes were teasing one another along the lines of my tribe enslaved yours which did not at all amuse any of the Africa-Americans who were there watching that exchange.
I've visited and stayed with a suprisingly well off family here. They own two compounds side by side in a suburb of Kumasi and their living conditions are a world away from most. Much of this wealth was retreived by simply caring for people in Syria which one of the aunts did. So apparently that money that is earned in western nations does bring buy them a lot here.
Today is the Obama inauguration and it should be on here at around 5 p.m. so I hope to check a few places on the sreet that I think will show it and I will take my camera along and takes some pictures and make some videos. It should be interesting.
There is here in Ghana the "Barack Obama Song" which is sung by a local group who sing a song about Obama and it is played constantly and even has the video played continuously on TV.
Also the food here in Kumasi is significantly better then anywhere in Ghana and the street food here is the best food in town as it is served every hour fresh from gleaming cookware with a variety of sauces, meats, and vegetables to choose from to go along with the awesome "Wachi" which is a rice with beans style rice which is fabulous and unseen of anywhere else in Ghana thus far. They also have 30-40 freshly boiled eggs sitting their in a brand new pot which is lovely for me as I love to mash it up in my rice. Eggs here are usually not very good as the yolk is usually the size of a pea but here in Kumasi they are real eggs.
I've also noticed that there are many foods from Israel and walked into a supermarket here and found a whole wall of "Prigat" fruit drinks. The Snickers is also always from Israel and written in Hebrew in the back. I found one place that sells Phildelphia cream cheese at insane prices as well.
Alas however there is no milk anywhere in the country. You can buy powered or UHT sterilized but there is not a single ounce of pastreuzied milk in the country as there is no facility. So have some milk and cookies and dedicate a few sips to me!
I'm currently in Kumasi which is the 2nd largest city in Ghana and is the capital of the Ashanti people which are by far the largest tribal group in Ghana with about 50% of the population. In fact their political party, the NPP, just lost the elections by 23,000 votes out of 10 million votes counted. The NDC won with a coalition of the other tribes and areas by 50.1%.
The people of Kumasi are very nice and the city is nice as well and not at all hectic like other cities.
Immediately I noticed that the woman here are a little healthier looking in size and have some meat on their bones unlike all the other places I've been. Many people here also are a little lighter in skin which has much to do with the slave trade.
The Ashanti were the ones who more or less were the dominant forces in rounding up other tribes and handing them over to the slave trading companies. In fact while at the Cape Coast slave castle, two Ghanians of different tribes were teasing one another along the lines of my tribe enslaved yours which did not at all amuse any of the Africa-Americans who were there watching that exchange.
I've visited and stayed with a suprisingly well off family here. They own two compounds side by side in a suburb of Kumasi and their living conditions are a world away from most. Much of this wealth was retreived by simply caring for people in Syria which one of the aunts did. So apparently that money that is earned in western nations does bring buy them a lot here.
Today is the Obama inauguration and it should be on here at around 5 p.m. so I hope to check a few places on the sreet that I think will show it and I will take my camera along and takes some pictures and make some videos. It should be interesting.
There is here in Ghana the "Barack Obama Song" which is sung by a local group who sing a song about Obama and it is played constantly and even has the video played continuously on TV.
Also the food here in Kumasi is significantly better then anywhere in Ghana and the street food here is the best food in town as it is served every hour fresh from gleaming cookware with a variety of sauces, meats, and vegetables to choose from to go along with the awesome "Wachi" which is a rice with beans style rice which is fabulous and unseen of anywhere else in Ghana thus far. They also have 30-40 freshly boiled eggs sitting their in a brand new pot which is lovely for me as I love to mash it up in my rice. Eggs here are usually not very good as the yolk is usually the size of a pea but here in Kumasi they are real eggs.
I've also noticed that there are many foods from Israel and walked into a supermarket here and found a whole wall of "Prigat" fruit drinks. The Snickers is also always from Israel and written in Hebrew in the back. I found one place that sells Phildelphia cream cheese at insane prices as well.
Alas however there is no milk anywhere in the country. You can buy powered or UHT sterilized but there is not a single ounce of pastreuzied milk in the country as there is no facility. So have some milk and cookies and dedicate a few sips to me!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)