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Published: October 3rd 2006
Slippery
What a mess CAR is... that has to be the sorriest country in Africa right now. The French guy I met who stayed in Congo through all the war said he wouldn't set foot in CAR. Before talking about CAR, I will talk a little about my excellent time in Cameroon, really a pretty nice country. I encountered no bureaucratic hassles here, everyone was friendly, and compared to where I am now, scamming and money grubbing were almost non existent. Despite their intensive logging the forests of Cameroon are still incredibly beautiful, especially in south. I like the Anglophone west, I met some really nice people and learned a lot of interesting things about the country. I did not meet any white people, though I saw many in Yaounde, so I didn't get the expat angle on the country.
I did not like Douala, probably because I was only there a short time, but I did get to enjoy staying in a shanty town/slum in a sad wooden shack with no electricity or running water, but it was an interesting experience, and everyone was very kind to me, except for the usual aggressive Christianity.
Yaounde is a city I liked quite a lot, relaxed atmosphere, green tree covered hills all around, excellent fruit, and extremely easy to get oriented to and to get around. My favorite city in Cameroon, though, was in the east, Batouri
because it seems to have a big Fulbe population, I met a lot of good people here and was able to use some of the puular, fulbe, I know, though the accent is a lot different here, so much so that I would say it is a different dialect. This city just had a great vibe, and the area has kind of a wild feel, which is nothing, as I soon discovered, to the intense wildness of CAR.
I knew CAR was going to be tough( the embassy staff in Yaounde trying to scam me was a good indicator) but I had no idea how much so. This is the kind fo country that would be pretty do-able if I had my own transport, but is nearly impossible by public transport, because of the dozens of gendarmes, douanes, police, presidential guard(most especially them) I have been very proud of myself because I have travelled more than half way accross Africa without paying a single bribe, no matter how much of a struggle this has been in some places. I am just persistent, honest, friendly, and firm, and it has always worked to avoid handing out money. I am also
morally opposed to bribing, I do subscribe to the idea that it makes it more difficult for the travellers who will come after me. That being said, to cover the 600km 400 miles from Cameroon to Bangui, it took 3 days, and about 120 US in bribes, around 60,000 FRANC CFA. If I had payed what I was asked for in "Official registration fees" It would have been closer to 300 dollars, 150,000 FRANC CFA. One fo the three days of travel was entirely screaming, yelling, telling complicated lies to get past the checkpoints, the most dangerous being the presidents personal guards, who got to keep 60 dollars of my money alone. One of the guys in the car only had his drivers licence, and at one checkpoint he had to pay 11 thousand, or 22 dollars, and I talked to him and he generally makes between 60 and 70 dollars in a month, well off by CAR standards. 20 dollars for me is a pain, but for the locals, it's devastating. The roads on this route were at times on par with Africas worst, and at many times I was threatened, had guns pointed at me or wielded like
clubs over my head, threatened with arrest, to try to extort more money. I was able to keep my cool through all of this, but I was incredibly stressed out by the time I got to Bangui. My normal approach of being honest and friendly was an utter failure, much better was the system of explaining I was going to visit my uncle the US ambassador in Bangui, that my mother was central african(a genetic fluke, of course, left me white) and that the last checkpoint had already taken all of my money, and I had to borrow money from the driver which my uncle the ambassador would pay back to him on my arrival in bangui, and of course that I would be passing back in a few weeks and then I would have plenty of money for them. At the worst checkpoint everyone got their valuables, jewelry, cell phones together and hid them, including my camera. They told me that the soldiers would steal them if we didn't hide them. I had been handing out cigarettes to apease the soldiers all along the way, and I had a packet in my pocket. A soldier saw it and said
"What's that? A camera??" I said, "No, I don't have a camera, those are my cigarettes" I showed him and said "Would you like one?" He sneered at me and snatched the whole pack and walked away.
This is the kind of attitude I encountered all three days, except for one nice soldier who just wanted to be my friend and didn't ask for money. He explained to me that none of them have been payed in 9 months and they are all very unhappy. People were extremely surprised to see me all along the way. There are almost no NGO's in these areas, they wouldn't dare. Getting closer to the capital there were a few decrepit red cross. This is an extremely poor country, it feels as poor or poorer than Niger.
Bangui is almost worth the hassle of getting here. It's a very relaxed city with kind of a provincial village feel, and the vibe here reminds me of Belgrade. At night the streets fill up with young people having a drink in outdoor cafes, kind of like Abidjan but with a slightly less sleazy and dangerous feel. I sat out and had a beer with a Christian/Muslim business man... we talked and he was so upset about the treatment I had recieved at the hands of the soldiers he insisted on buying me a nice French style dinner so that I wouldn't think Central Africa is all bad.
I think AIDS is a big problem here. There are very very few people over the age of forty. Some of the asshole soldiers had said "Oh you're going to Bangui, lots of ambiance there(meaning nightlife) you're liable to get AIDS there, HAHAHAHAH!" Which I didn't find very funny since probably more than 40 percent of the population is HIV positive here.
But the nightlife here is pretty tolerable, it's pretty energetic but like I said, it doesn't seem dangerous, just exuberant and friendly. The internet here is oddly cheap and lighting fast, which surprises me given the crackpot military government, general lawlessness and wild west feeling of remoteness this country has. I am learning a lot about this country which was before almost unknown to me. Historically, the French imitated the Congo Free State here, which means basically that they wanted nothing to do with it, so they leased the whole region out to about 13 companies who were given absolute free reign to turn a profit out of the region in any way they could, which generally meant massacring villages and forced labor, and this is in the 20th century, when forced labor was no longer called slavery. They built basically no infrastructure and then more or less split in the 1960's, leaving them to figure out how to exist in the modern world. Central African Republic really has to be one of the most unfortunate country names in the world. Cameroon is bad too, named because Portuguese sailors found a lot of prawns in the river when they arrived there, and called it Rio do camaros, river of shrimp;, so now the country is named, more or less "shrimp" though I challenge anyone to find any decent shrimp in the markets there.
Niger, Nigeria, Gambia, the Congos, Malawi, Chad, are all named after rivers or lakes found in them. Much better are Ghana, Mali, named after African empires, or Burkina Faso, who realized the stupidity of the name "Upper Volta" and changed it to Burkina Faso, which I am not sure about but I think it means "Land of Friendly People". The Guineas are also equally lame names, as Guinea means "Land of many Peoples" which is basically every nation state in Africa. Africa still seems to be grappling with inferiority complexes left by colonial domination.
Well, I have to go out now to try to explore the city a bit, I will write more about CAR soon, it is an interesting place, and the internet is good here, as is the food and drink, good beer and fresh fruit juice, good grilled meat, great bread and real coffee, as well as the usual nescafé. I am so traumatised by that trip though, I am thinking about giving up my silly ideas about travelling by land. I can't afford another trip like the last one, I am still exhausted after sleeping for ten hours, and I don't have the money to pay the entire civil services salaries. I am going to rest for a while in Bangui and try to figure out what to do.
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Mark
non-member comment
Great Blog!
Hi Sasha, I stumbled upon your blog last night, and I'm hooked. Thanks for the great stories - I'm really enjoying them.