Monique Kwachou - Espace Monique Kwachou

MTN Nights: A Love Story

June 27, 2016 3 Comments

It all began with an MTN Cameroon deal, Free SMS Nights, which enticed customers to give up their sleep for seven hours of toll free messages. While the free messages might have provided the opportunity but it was an Indian film whose title she could no longer remember which provided the inspiration to tell Hans of the feelings she had for him with a guise of anonymity. So it happened that Elizabeth borrowed her roommate’s phone, whose contacts Hans did not have to chat with him by night. The first night, 4 days into the Free SMS night promotion, Elizabeth wrote: Hello Hans, I’m using someone else’s phone to send this message. I don’t want you to know who I am but I DO need to let you know how I feel. Even if it means nothing after all. I like you. A strong like. I like that you are welcoming, open and generous with friends. I like that your room in neater than those of most boys I know. And from past discussion I like the way you think and challenge me to think. Oh, and you’re cute too in a laid back casual way J Your secret admirer That message was typed at 10:15pm. Then after 15 more minutes of deliberating over every word. After changing things written in short hand to their proper form (free messages after all). After thinking twice and assuring anonymity by determining that Manka, her roommate whose phone was to be used, had no mutual friends with Hans who could be linked to Elizabeth, after praying for the third time, then and only then did the message get sent at 10:42pm. He took exactly 33 minutes to reply. By the time she heard the new message alert from Manka’s phone she had burrowed into her sheets convincing herself that she couldn’t feel regret if she was asleep. The hollowness of those convictions was however seen in how fast she turned, hands clashing with Manka’s to reach for the phone on the bedside table which stood between their student size beds. Hearing Manka utter a “hummmph” sound Elizabeth dropped her hands, smiled as though to wave it off and waited. After seeing the number wasn’t one of hers, Manka stretched out her hand offering the phone to Elizabeth “It’s for you”. She had to clench and unclench her hands from her sheets before taking the phone, suddenly understanding what the Harlequin novels meant by sweaty palms. She read the message: 11:15 pm Hey, I’ve never had a secret admirer b4. Am honoured. I can c why u can’t tell me who you are, but we can chat right? So I know a bit more about my secret admirer? She read it twice. After the second reading, she wondered how long it had taken him to write the brief text. Did he agonize over it as she had? Based on the careless short hand he used she doubted it. And would he say ‘Am honoured’? Hans was smart adding an ‘I’ in front of ‘am’ shouldn’t be that difficult. She sighed, reminded herself that he was a science student and was thus more likely to write in short had without the guilt of poor grammar. Mankaa had put off the lights to sleep and as Elizabeth now lay beneath the sheets, her head turned one way because of the braided pony-tail hair style she currently sported, her face glowed in the dark with the light of the phone’s screen as she nervously thought up a reply. She decided not to write so much any longer, it might distinguish her from other friends who readily wrote short hand. 11: 25 pm Hi, Are you still awake? Sure we can chat. Though of course the chat is limited to nights only. By day I won’t have access to this number. Deal? So what will you like to know about me? 11:30 pm Yes, I’m awake & sure it’s a deal. I’m guessing you’re a UB student because you seem to know me well. What do you study and what year are you in? 11:32 I can’t tell you that, you’d be able to trace who I am. Here’s the thing. We can chat and you ask about who I am as a person, not my identity. If you can guess which of your female friends I am from our chatting then it’s up to you to meet me and ask me- if at all you would like to reciprocate the feelings. She agonized over ‘reciprocate’. That word was sure to sell her out. It was a bookworm word. Would he wonder at it? And who among his friends would use it? She hoped he might think it was a friend with English or Literature major not her political science studying self. Or would he hone in one her because she was known as an avid reader never without a novel? He didn’t think about it much though 11:36 Okay I’m cool with that. How old are you? She told him she would soon be twenty though the birthday passed last week and he had been one of the recipients of the cupcakes she’d shared to friends in the hostel. They chatted till 2:30am. He asked about her family, how many siblings she had, what were her hobbies, favorite music, movies and more. They clicked like twin souls with music taste and she felt it was fate. Sh could always tell good people by their good taste in music. As he asked questions she answered and turned them on him, learning just as much about him as he about her. He forwarded some of the funny, long chain messages currently going around with the opportunity of free SMS. She laughed like she hadn’t read that one before. She sent him the trivia message currently making rounds: “If the beauty of a woman lies in her character, where does the beauty of a man lay?” She appreciated the

Rough-drafts: from reading to writing

April 22, 2015 1 Comment

It was in July of 2003 that I fell in love with novels. Contrary to my mother’s present-day boasts, I was not always the happy member of “Readaholic Anonymous”, and it was watching T.V at breathing distance from the screen rather than “reading too much” that led to my shortsightedness. I remember that vacation well. It was the end of my second year back in Cameroon. I had sufficiently adjusted and was no longer the pampered newcomer in the house. I now got up automatically by 6am as though hearing the school gong in my dream, my American slang had properly married boarding school lingua and everyday pidgin such that I could carry on a conversation with the others without someone looking at me with a mixture of amusement and amazement. I had failed the final exams. Picking me up from school, Jude, my god-mother‘s nephew joked that a cow was slaughtered for all the red needed on my report card. When I got home I discovered Grandma, my god-mother‘s mother, liked red everywhere but on report cards. “You failed even Religion! How does one fail God’s subject? God is not with you! And if God is not with you, how can you pass anything?” My punishment was set; I would take the reading of every morning devotion to make up with God for failing his subject. There would be no visiting friends, nor watching T.V for more than two hours a day and a home-teacher would come three times a week and give me assignments to re-learn what I failed. Vacation suddenly sounded like “back to school”. Then Stella came back from Buea. She had just completed her first year at the university, was the coolest of my cousins by virtue of being the only one who could sing all R.Kelly’s songs, and my roommate for the holidays. With nothing to do but pretend to be studying in the room I looked through her stuff. Amongst the make-up, Spice Girl shoes and Westlife CDs were 100% Jeune magazines, an old Ebonymagazine and four novels. I quickly distracted myself with the magazines and after them, the Harlequin Presents novels seemed more appealing than returning to ANUCAM’s An Introduction to Secondary School Physics. Sadly I cannot remember that first author who welcomed me into the world of reading for fun, and not just for school, but God bless her whoever she was. It was my first romance novel and though I cannot recall the exact title, the story, or at least the gist of it will never leave my memory. A girl never forgets her first as they say- that applies to her first fictional hero too. The book cover was typical; a picture of a slim brunette in the arms of a tall blonde haired guy, his arms muscled and bared by rolled up sleeves of an office shirt. I don’t know when I got to chapter four but there I was huddled on the bed in the room smiling coyly, reading every line and seeing it like a movie on HBO. One I was not supposed to watch. I missed lunch and did not notice. It alarmed Grandma and she asked for me. I hid the book under my pillow thinking about it all the way to dining room where I told Grandma I was reading and would eat later. Her look reflected amazement at my not only refusing food but refusing food because I was reading. I heard her asserting the wonderfulness of God as returned to the room. I completed the twelfth and final chapter by eight o’clock lingering over the last pages not wanting it to end. But it finally did, and as though the last eight to ten hours had been metamorphosis I emerged a changed person, I knew things. I knew what a kiss felt like- tingly and velvety or wet and teasing, and could explain the pain of heart-break, the hollow feeling of loss and the sting of disappointment. I know about adult things like taxes and have experienced adult longings and wants. I have lived life as a 26 year old woman in a small town in Mississippi. That night when Stella returned, between complimenting her on her hairdo and the then fashionable dirty-green skirt, I pleaded for more novels. She didn’t buy the flattery. She still scolded me for going through her things, but she agreed; one at a time she said, and if only I took care of them. That was the beginning of a life affair with reading. I stumbled and fell into the warmth and giving nature of books. They were my friends, at a time when I understood nothing, no one, including myself. Novels taught me to see others, and pieces of me in them. My love for books would only grow more as school resumed. There they would provide me sweet escape from fake friends and bullies alike, distraction from boring school texts and midterm starvation. I could leave it all behind and go to New York, the Louisiana Bayou or 18th Century England, play the tourist on a taxi-boat in Venice or live the high life with the pampered mistress of some Arabian sheikh. I had gone with Stella to Old Treasury Street where all the booksellers were, with books stacked in old iron trunks overflowing organized by genre; romance to suspense, historical, regency, futuristic, and law thrillers. At that time I had a singular preference for all things romance. I saw only two novels with black characters and I knew I had to buy both to learn something more, the black way of loving even if they are African American and not Black African. I returned to school with my box half full of novels; Julia Quinn, Jane Feather, Julie Garwood, Johanna Lindsay, Amanda Quick; it felt like I carried my real friends in my trunk. *** Two years later I can be found in possession of a novel at any point

The Laudable Series Pt. 1: Bloggers

May 22, 2014 No Comments

When it comes to our own; our country, bodies, opportunities we often dwell on the negatives more than the positive but it is a known fact that when we dwell on the good we feel a whole lot better. So I’m going to give out doses of “feel good” with this new series I came up with. The Laudables. Each part of this series will acknowledge a laudable group of people of this-day Cameroon, interview them and give them what limelight Musings has to offer. For this month we shall applaud the Bloggers. Blogging by my definition is the easier, informal self-publishing of articles, videos, comics etc using a blog. And what is a blog? The term blogis short for web log, a “log” of diary-like entries published on a web site. This is how it started, people publishing their daily thoughts for all to read on their website. The modern blog evolved from the online diary, where people would keep a running account of their personal lives and opinions and are generally recognized as bloggers. The timeline of blogging starts in the late 1990’s and in the West of course, but almost two decades later there is no doubt a “blog boom” going on in Africa and Cameroon (for once) is not missing out! Why is it so important you may ask? Why is it worth mentioning even? Let me explain: We grumble and complain about the bias portrayal of Africa on mainstream media. During the last presidential elections in 2011 no single major broadcasting station mentioned what should have been a decisive moment in our history…well I guess they already knew no decision worth noting was going to be made. The individual has a voice and the media due to those who sponsor it can’t always tune their voice in. Be it on fashion, or some remarkable event, a home hero/heroine, a new song, your opinion on religion or your personal politics, blogging helps you make your voice heard on whatever topic you wish to talk about. The increase of blogs run by Africans is making it easier for non-Africans to know that Africa is NOT a country; bloggers disseminate information differently and have brought their country and the ways of their people to the limelight. I’m proud to say I’m one of many bloggers in Cameroon. When I started blogging (seriously) I was shocked to note just how many we were! Shocked because for a country who only just recently enforced computer science as a subject in schools and where the internet connection is generally poor at best (and that is putting it mildly) it shows great effort to have so many bloggers all voicing their own side of the story. In no particular order and inclusive of both French and English blogs, here are some examples: Ø I Rep Camer http://irepcamer.blogspot.com Ø Scribbles from the Den http://www.dibussi.com Ø Art Becomes You http://artbecomesyou.com Ø Amanjodzeka http://amanjodzeka.wordpress.com Ø Addicted to Etsy http://www.addicted2etsy.com/ Ø Can Never Be A Skinny Bish http://canneverbeaskinnybish.com/ Ø De Braun Hill http://braunhillblogs.wordpress.com Ø Kamer Kongossa http://kongossa.mondoblog.org Ø PolicyStan http://policystan.blogspot.com Ø Dulce Camer http://dulcecamer.blogspot.com Ø Find Palaver Woman http://findpalaverwoman.blogspot.com Ø Africally Speaking http://www.africallyspeaking.com Ø Bayangi Girl http://banyangigirl.blogspot.com Ø Frisha Gold https://frishagold.wordpress.com Ø No Mami Pikin Left behind http://nomamipikinleftbehind.blogspot.com Ø Letters To Cameroon http://letterstocameroon.wordpress.com Etc…… With all these blogs named you may get the idea that blogging has become cheap. You would be wrong. Blogging requires self-perception, authoritativeness, originality discipline and dedication, attributes which pretty much disqualify most people. Oh, they will try, set up a blog and share something for a few weeks even a few months then something else distracts them. Or there are those (ehem, like me, ehem) who are slow bloggers. In other words do not mark your ovulation cycle by us. You just might have a heart attack. Well, to get down to the point, in this web 2.0 age of blogging there are Cameroonians in the mix laudably, YAY! And more, there are also a few good, serious minded, consistent ones too, another YAY!! I shall without further ado throw the spotlight on some of that select laudable few… the crème de la crème of the Camer blogosphere: I Rep Camer Yes she does! “She” is Yefon Mainsah, a 34 year old Engineer, the lady behind I Rep Camer who is into everything and then some! She is currently based in Houston, Texas where she blogs from and impresses us with how much she knows on what is going on with Cameroonians all over the globe. And I mean ALL OVER. I call Yefon the Queen of Camer Bloggers because she knows them all, and connects them to one another. Following I Rep Camer will keep you up to date on what’s happening with up and coming entrepreneurs, artists, and anyone worth noting in Camer social life. With I Rep Camer Yefon uplifts Cameroonians doing what others say cannot be done. And did I say she does this consistently? Since she began blogging in April 2009, she updates her blog at least once a week and has 54 steady followers for the blog and over 800 on the blogs Facebook page. Like I said, she’s QUEEN ergo a Pro at this. Musings got her to answer some questions for us and here are her responses to the following questions: 1. What was the idea behind the naming of your blog? The name is self explanatory. I Rep Camer! To represent Cameroon and showcase who and what we are to the world. 2. What is blogging to you, and what is the basic content of your blog? Blogging started as an out and escape from a stressful job but now I blog to promote, engage, exchange, share and to have a voice. In essence my blog is your stop for all things Cameroon and Africa plus the random thoughts and musings of an All in One Engineer, Movie/Music & Accessories junkie. With multi-focus on Arts, Culture, Entertainment, Fashion,

Musings On Women’s Day

March 11, 2014 2 Comments

Happy Women’s month! May we observe the month wisely. In my own little contribution towards the rightful honoring of this month I’m going to share my musings on the various questions and comments which arise regularly during this period. 1- Why celebrate women’s day? This is a popular question asked predominantly by men, who go on to add “Is there a men’s day?” To which some smart-mouthed women would counter “99 days for the thief 1 day for the owner”. As cute as the bi-play is, it is misleading. Women’s day is not to be “celebrated” so much as observed and commemorated. It is not a “fete” as the French say it is like other international days (Commonwealth Day, International Labor Day etc) a day to honor a certain activity, or group of persons usually under-looked. As such, throughout the month of March we commemorate women who despite making up over 50:5 of the world’s population, make up just 17% of parliamentarians (UNICEF, New York: 2006, p.56), own less than 12% of the land globally and constitute over 70% of the worlds minimum wage workers. In Cameroon in particular, women hold 20 of 100 Senate seats, 56 of the 180 seats in the National Assembly and only 09 of 66 cabinet posts. 2- Woman Eh! and Wrappa wahala is all about the International Day of the Woman… No. “Woman eh!” and “wrappa wahala” is limited to Cameroon. We have (with much misguidance from our ministry and leaders) reduced what was to be a month of recognition and concentration on furthering women in development to a day of march-pasts, fashion parades in a variety of styles made from annually distributed fabric and of course eating and drinking. In other countries (if we would care to emulate) during women’s month activities such as round table discussions, Take Your Daughter To Work Day, recognition of inspiring women in history and present among other things are carried out in commemoration of women. 3- Who makes up these themes? This is the funny part. There is a UN theme for each year for us to ponder on while honoring the International Day of the woman. I realized this year that there were actually three themes. That which is listed as the UN theme on their website (Equality for Women is Progress for All), that which is popular spread as the international theme (Inspiring Change), and that which our ministry here releases at last minute and we see printed on the fabric each year (Women as Active Participants in National Integration). In a world which is working towards being a global village, you would think we would all be able to agree on a single theme for a single day right? 4- Isn’t all this talk of Gender “much ado about nothing?” Over a century since the feminist movement took off people may now presume the movement and feminist mantra is redundant. However those people would be wrong. Like racism, sexism and the oppression of women was and has been so deeply rooted in our cultures, belief and thought systems that they cannot be simply eliminated. The feminist movement is responsible for women now being able to wear trousers, go to work, free themselves of abusive relationships, own land, marry whom they wish or choose not to marry at all. The feminist movement is responsible for the fact that a woman who is raped can seek justice; a girl can go to school, the drop in women and infant mortality, the representation of women in parliaments etc. There is still a long way to go. While a victim of rape can now seek justice, she is hardly guaranteed of finding it. Just last week a women was killed after being gang raped and it was considered “right” for she led the men to sin. While a a girl can got o school she will still face a sexism in recruitment when entering the job market. While women’s mortality rates have dropped, women still die more from gender violence than any other cause cancer and accidents included. While women are now represented in parliament theirs is mostly a quota representation with barely 18% worldwide. As such the feminist movement and the fight for gender equality is NOT “much ado about nothing”. 5- What about all the privileges women have that men don’t? Isn’t it now an issue of reverse sexism? Recent posts on a group page on Facebook states how women “have too many privileges yet complain”. It lists “the months women have for maternity leave, how men open doors for women, how men are trained to stand while women sit, how society demands that men provide for their women, how more and more women are bosses today and usually misuse their power oppressing men all the more, how women are the targets for more sponsorships, aids and scholarship just based on sex etc” as reasons for this claim that women are more privileged and that most sexism today is bias to favor women. This is false conclusions drawn by someone who looks on the surface and little else. The concept of male gallantry; opening of car doors, sitting by the side of the door in taxis to “protect the woman in the middle”, placing the woman behind you etc is all a mirror trick. While men claim to be gallant they restrict. The nature by which society expects the men to “gallantly” provide for the women is very similar to the western practice of giving 3rdworld countries financial aid but restricting their economic rights such that they can never truly be independent. I imagine that in Saudi Arabia women don’t split wood or dig trenches they are saved from that hard labor as it is “men’s work” yet women are also denied the right to drive and are thus restricted to the home. I’m sure that women in Yemen have been “privileged to have their husbands bring them treats and such from work on

An Open Letter to Cameroonians…

February 27, 2014 26 Comments

Dear fellow Cameroonian, How are you? I hope fine, though I doubt it. I doubt it because I hear you grumbling all the time. One of my earliest memories is of family gathered at an Aunts house at Ecole de Poste, Yaoundé. It was a small two bedroom apartment with cold walls and a musty smell as a result of being built on the marshes. As we children sat on the grey concrete floors poorly covered with a tattered plastic carpet we listened to the adults grumbling about the president and the ruling party, CPDM, as the members marched in a parade televised. As groups marched with their right hand over their hearts and their left hands raised adoringly towards the president in salute, we heard the grownups speculate and mumble about how millions were being mismanaged; how this person or that was being bribed or bribing; how SDF should have won the ’92 elections; etc. That memory has re-occurred in different houses with different Cameroonian relatives and why not, in different countries at different times of my life. The grumbling is always there; in a taxi or bus as we dodge crater-like pot-holes or stop to give some uniform-wearer (I don’t want to spoil the term title: police officer) a thousand francs note. It is there when salaries are delayed because of some technicality that has to be corrected only in some illusive office in Yaounde (and correction is not for free o!).There is grumbling when the latest shake down reveals that 20 billion had been embezzled (the money you shall never see), there is grumbling when’ concours’ are written registering 20.000 candidates for just 20 spots to be filled, there is grumbling when election time comes around and we see no change, there is grumbling in the church, there is grumbling at schools when teachers see their salaries and the size of their classes, when students are about to graduate and join the sea of unemployed, there is grumbling in the hair dressing salons and poisonneries (cold stores) when lights go off for days and there is no one to hold accountable. No one to query for the days of business services and goods lost. There is grumbling in the bars, almost always in the bars, over bottles of Guinness and 33 Export no matter the price per bottle…. Till I came to the conclusion recently that my dear beloved Cameroonians, we have what one would call a “form of discontent”. We give the impression of displeasure but it is all a charade. A very inbred charade. For our actions show that we are content just the way we are. Now dear brother don’t get upset because the truth hurts. Let me prove my point eh? Let me show you how I know you are content, let me show you why… I know you are content because you talk much but do nothing. And even when you do, it is not to solve/address the problem but to eat your own share of the national cake. Case in point; those who have set up one of the over 200 political parties in the opposition, who we hear nothing about till election year when they vie for “campaign allowances” never to be heard from again. I know you are content because you do not show up for elections, saying “after all what will change?” Well, nothing will if you don’t do something. I know you are content because you invest ten times the energy you would need to address your situation in Cameroon into the glorious pursuit for a foreign visa or blue passport… I know you are content because you are ever ready and willing to bribe your way through the ‘concours’, the red tape in offices, the not having all car documents etc. and of course you expect a little “motivation” when it is your turn too. I know you are content because you ignore your history and as a result repeat it. I know you are content because rather than fighting for your own language not to be considered “les patois la” you learned to speak theirs… I know you are content because you, yes you my neighbor who had grumbled about how “this man needs to step down” “this man is spending our money in France” “This man is a shame of a leader” after all that grumbling, I saw you run to the road when you heard his car was coming up from Mutengene. I watched you and many others who had grumbled and insulted that “shameful leader” I saw you people jump up and down in ecstasy waving your hands in the air and smiling. And not a hint of grumbling could be evidenced. It was as if you were not all the same grumblers, like you had forgotten or forgiven that which had disgruntled you, including the gendarme standing before us with tear gas and other weapons in his hands and belts ever ready to attack should we attempt to go too close. I know you are content because for over 30 years the same person has ruled you and you have done nothing but talk behind his back then fawn over him with wishes of “many more years” and motions of support when put on the podium (Ah ah! You could at least say “no comment” than to do that about turn na). I know we are content because we don’t yearn for change as much as we yearn for a chance to be posted or given some title or the other which would grant us our own share of the national cake…then we do all the things we have formerly complained about. I know you are content because you left from Tombel, Bafut palaces, Jakiri, Akwaya and Bakassi (even Bakassi oh!) to march past in parade before a man you had grumbled and complained about. You are definitely content because you even brought him gifts. Chiefs and Fons bowed low

Musings on Mandela

December 15, 2013 1 Comment

Mandela’s death has brought about so many recollections on his life, work and what he stood for. I don’t think anyone of my generation can attest to have been directly impacted by Madiba. But we were touched by him none the less, and those to come after us will continue to be touched, though time will surely mellow the hardship he went through and history will shade over some things in favor of others. One thing I know is this: The fact that there was Mandela, the fact that he lived what he believed in, worked, fought for Africa, loved his country and led like a God-given ruler, will remain an ever present hope. Like a photograph in an album from one of your best days that you keep to remind you, no matter how old, wrinkled or undesirable you may become, that you were once that beautiful…the fact that there was Mandela remains like that photograph a reminder, that no matter what ugliness we see in our continents leadership today and no matter the fact that nearly everyone is ready to sell out, there was once a leader And with that photographic memory, we have the present hope that it is possible for God to do what he did once before and send us another Mandela. We’ll be watching and waiting.

Coming Home

December 15, 2013 4 Comments

There is a long standing joke that about Cameroonians who leave the country dusting literally dusting their hands off it and till when they die, and of course as per demands they all want their corpses brought “home”. And the punch line of course goes: Is Cameroon a cemetery? This joke holds some truth, most Cameroonians ignore investing back home or give up too easily when they try and face obstacles and most of us are very willing to forget all about “home” till we die. But then there’s December… December is this jokes fallacy. Every time this year our bushfallers migrate like seasonal birds back home away from the cold winters of the west or where ever else that is included in the term Bush. The early birds have already come and by the 25thwherever you go you will hear the American accents formerly confined to your cable on tv. A lot can be and has been said on the periodic in coming of bushfallers; how they act, treat the people they left back in pays like they are somehow less-than, and of course how the men come in have flings and make promises they never intend to keep etc. Yet little mention is given to the way those in the country react to them. So here it is: I don’t think the bushfallers are the problem but rather the people who they return home to; people who treat them with more respect, accord them more favors and expect more from them just because they have crossed the borders. What does it say of ourselves, that the things we would never accept from our own like curse words in speech, the demands for meals “just so”, the abnormally late nights, the inconveniences on our schedule are suddenly “cool” and okay for the two to three weeks when they are done by bushfallers? Then there are the young women who give their all in hope that they way win a bushfallers heart and of course his foreign citizenship… Because of their foreign accents I’ve seen children get away with being rude, abusive and watched the “children of home” who would wake up at 5 am everyday be discriminated upon eating in the kitchen while the bushfallers sat at the dining table. Some would argue that these bushfallers sustain most back at home with the monthly cash sent through money transfer agencies, yet where does the gratitude end and the brown-nosing begin?

The Things We Allow

November 28, 2013 2 Comments

Have you ever heard the saying “The minute you settle for less that you deserve, you get less than you settled for?” Well I’ve been thinking about this idiom of recent. I walked into a shop I frequent the other day. The owner is a friendly flirt. You come in and Mbah (let’s just give him that name) will call you his baby, his sweetheart. If you get close enough he’ll try to pinch your butt, steal a kiss, or hug you pressing your breasts against his chest. It was his way; he does it with almost all the young female customers. And we allow it because the mostly young ladies he does this with know that by batting their eye lashes and overlooking these liberties taken despite the presence of the family portrait of his lovely wife and two kids hanging behind the counter, Mbah would reduce the prices of whatever we want to buy or just let us take it for free even. It is a wonder the shop is still open. On this particular day I give him my things and he catches my hand kisses the inside and says I have “thrown him” (I always wonder how one can “throw” what they never held in the first place) but I just smile ignorantly while he goes on calculating my stuff and winking suggestively at me. I notice he gives me a lower price on the goods than he did a male customer before me and I smile and go ahead. I had come into the shop with a younger friend, a “small” and as soon as we step out she exclaims “Men are not ashamed oh! That one does not sell oh, he is just here to flirt, as you were selecting things he was chatting another girl and then you will come and he will kiss your hand!” She sighed loud and long and I had to laugh at her attempt at reporting Mbah to me as though I would take offence. None of those girls Mbah flirted with took him seriously they just allowed him his nonsense so they go their lower prices, and so they didn’t seems like “spoilsports”, taking things too seriously or misunderstanding that what he was really doing was “complimenting” them. And to think of it Mbah didn’t take them seriously as well, hell the man probably didn’t take himself seriously. It was all a game for him. But, that aside my friend had me thinking. I realized we should take offence. Of course what Mabh does, borders on sexual harassment, but because we allow it and accept it knowing that it has its benefits (lower prices) and knowing too, that if we take him to task over it we will come out looking like we are making a much ado about nothing, none of us bother. And I thought of how and why we allow other things, like the boys who pushed their wares on you at the market gates, and reached for your hand as you passed calling you names if you shook them off. Or what about the number of times we Anglophone Cameroonians allow Francophones to belittle us even in our own regions speaking to us and expecting replies (in our state offices) in a language other than our own. I thought of the many things we allow, and how one thing led to another and how allowing was very much like settling yielding less and less, with everything we let slide. I thought of how we allow the little things, like paying 500frs to the police on the roadside, but we want the ministers embezzling in high offices to be sacked… And we allow what is traditional “cultural” to rule unquestioned despite the ills of FGM breast ironing etc. but we would control modern culture with decrees on decent dressing. We see nothing wrong when rules are bent, and laws not obeyed when the someone bribes to have a drivers license made, after all everyone does it, this is Cameroon! But then we are all aghast when a few months later a deadly accident occurs, we do not trace what we allow to what happens every day. Most times we are just like the young ladies who would enter Mbah’s shop will allow his flirtation and teasing gropes then complain that “Men are dogs”… Well of course they are for a long time we have allowed them to be.

Constant Reminders for Feminism

November 10, 2013 No Comments

Some people say: Feminism is no longer necessary, if at all it ever was. They say we no longer need the concept and women are now the ones abusing men’s rights. Sounds a lot like those who claim Reverse Racism to me, but all the same, here are some reminders of why I still need feminism and feel we all do too: I need feminism because just off recent; a girl was gang raped by 6 men in Kenya and when she succeeded to recognize 3 of them, the police told these rapists to clear/cut grass surrounding the police station. I wonder when cutting grass become equivalent to the crime of defiling someone’s body, soul and mind? And why the grass at the police station, rather than let’s say the victims home? Do those men have daughters? Would they have done same if she were any of their daughters? http://www.makeeverywomancount.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=6492:kenya-kenyans-protest-after-suspects-in-teens-gang-rape-sentenced-to-cut-grass&catid=37:violence-against-women&Itemid=63 I need feminism because more recently news spread of a woman who was successfully sued by her husband for giving birth to what he called “an extremely ugly children” supposedly resulting from her lying about her physical beauty. Since when did women owe beauty to men? Is it an obligation? What does it say about the man that he married his wife simply for her looks? What does it say about him that he could condemn his children for not being attractive? Let’s forget the fact that the media purports unreachable standards of beauty to young girls every day. Or that young girls now are more concerned with the brightness of their skin than the brightness of their futures, after all that is just pop culture right? But when did pop culture and its definition of beauty enter the legal system allowing a judge to pass such a judgment? http://couplesandco.blogspot.com/2013/11/man-successfully-sues-wife-for-ugly.html I need feminism because local news reports state last week a woman took her own life in Bamenda claiming her husband had not slept with her for over a year. When will we stop attaching our value to men husband or not? What of our own self worth? I need feminism because presently policemen stand along the streets in Buea threatening young girls on their dressing, but they cannot be called upon if there is a robbery or domestic abuse in any quarter… I need feminism because when a man cheats he is called a man and men a woman does same she is called a slut… I need feminism because this weekend when RUMORS circulated claiming that a “Sugar daddy” had preyed upon a young girl at a hotel in Molyko, the majority of people sought to condemn the young girl (who is believe to be dead) as though she were the criminal. More attention and outcry was given to young girls and their “langaa money” than to the part of the rumor involving the man and his evil. Some even went so far as saying the young girl deserved to die for wanting to sleep with the man for money. What about the man who was offering the money? I need feminism because the prostitute is still insulted but her customer who pays for the act has no flaws… I need feminism because young girls are taught to avoid rape by dressing “better” (which contradicts with media images of being “hot and sexy” mind you) but young boys are never taught the meaning of consent… I need feminism because no matter how many opportunities are open to women today, the mindset of the majority has changed little. Most are still reared to think they are second class, and the most important achievement for them is still their marriage certificate… And for those who don’t know… Feminism is simply the movement based on the belief that men and women should have equal rights, opportunities and choices open to them…It is simply believing a woman is as human and thus just as worthy as any man… More simply put to be feminist is to be humane… and I think we can all agree the world needs more humaneness.

A Woman’s Might and Yet Her Plight

October 8, 2013 2 Comments

I was helping a friend’s daughter with her homework the other day, and she all of nine years was defining the word apartheid. I had the notebook, with the teacher’s definition on it which this little girl is expected to memorize and reproduce, whether she understands it or not! (let me not get into that just yet). Well as was to be expected the little darling forgot some words, the latter part of the definition which linked it to South Africa. But what she stated “Apartheid refers to a discriminatory system which gives privileges to and allows the minority to control the majority…” Now lets not concentrate on whether or not this definition is correct text-book wise but it gives the idea, and it gave me an idea too, that apartheid as per that definition was not secluded to South African and still prevails. It could even be said, the original apartheid was men’s control of women- and it still goes on. If genetics is understood we see that with the crossing of the female XX chromosome and the male XY there is a 2:1 likelihood of having a girl than a boy. IF this serves, women have ALWAYS outnumbered men. Why then does this ever increasing majority remain the underprivileged, plight-stricken and pitied image we see every day? A befitting issue to ponder on don’t you think? Looking back at that definition let me support the claim that gender inequality was the original apartheid. It has already been biologically proven that women have and probably always will be the majority, now about privileges? From culture to culture men have through norms and values of their time reserved certain things from themselves, be it the right to eat eggs, to wear trousers, to drive, to vote, to marry more than one spouse, to flirt- without being scorned-, the right to education, a particular type of education, and the right to be religiously ordained. These privileges prevail, some hold strong till date. Gender inequality is a universally accepted fact and some people would say it is rightly so “men and women can never be the same” they say; they only expressing their ignorance. Equality does not mean sameness; we can never be and shouldn’t even try to be the same, yet we should agree that a kilogram in feathers and a kilogram of rocks though so different are still equal in weight. So if it is agreed that discriminatory system exists as a result of gender inequality, and also that though women have always surpassed men in numbers, the men enjoy privileges by this system, then fitting the definition above, women have been victims of an apartheid for ages. That proven; a modern mind would wonder why? I mean we are of a time when we have heard enough of women’s feats to know that women are not “weak” The feminist movement has done enough to show just how much women toil and extol their might. What a man can do a woman can do better is a modern day idiom extolling a woman’s might. They feed the masses care for the elderly, the sick, they carry heavy burdens emotionally, psychologically and physically, she can endure where a man cannot- we have been told this. We have been convinced that woman is indeed mighty. Yet ironically no matter how mighty woman is she has yet to overcome her apartheid, despite the majority she holds, despite her endurance (or perhaps because of it) she has yet to free herself. She is still pitied, with e quarters of the poorest of the poor being women, with ever increasing reports of sexual abuse, violence and are still denied privileges entrance into holy orders, say in state policies, even a right to wear certain clothes and drive in some countries. Why I wonder, despite the woman’s might is such discrimination, suffering and abuse her plight? Here’s a theory: one can only be as strong as their mind. As such women can never be that strong. Our minds you see are controlled by men. From the way we dress, to the jobs we should do in one way or the other, indirectly or directly, men control us. Now someone may say here that I’m tooting the feminist horn and women have come far from the old days, I would agree yet say that is limiting, I am doing that and more. Feminist may say women are controlled by men as to the opportunities given, but the thing is feminist themselves have begun being controlled by men in the opportunities they are hunting for. In the quest for equality some have veered off to seek to prove sameness that they too can be “men” and thus imitating them we fall indirectly to the old trap of following the path set by men being what they are rather than what they want us to be, yes, but still not being who we are meant to be. Our society from time immemorial has called on the female to be attractive to the male, whether it is by being able to cook and run a home as in the olden days or look like a playboy pin-up as is today, women have been reared with the idea that they are only as good as men think they are. You are only sexy enough if when you pass a guy lets out a wolf whistle. And you are only brainy enough if you can outsmart the guys in your class as well. It goes to prove the saying that when you belong to a minority you have to be better in order to have the right to be equal. Women are further reared with the idea of what would be ladylike, what they should or should not do, we have so ingrained these ideas in us that though today you may not hear a man say that is unladylike, or that is not, we have