Going home.

I made it back safely to the United States with only a few minor road bumps along the way, Cameroon-side. I left Banyo on Thursday night, May 13th, around 8pm to take the night bus to Bafoussam. Just about everyone I had become friends with wished me farewell at the bus park and I was on my way, alone. The bus wasn’t more than an hour into the 10 hour+ journey to Bafoussam before we got a flat tire. No big deal. It only delayed us by about 15 minutes to change it, and then when we got into the next biggest town, Mayo Darle, we stopped at the bus park there for an hour for someone to patch the tire.

Since it’s the start of the wet season, it had been raining on and off and some sections of the road were pretty bad. We got to one point where another bus going the opposite direction had gotten stuck. Many times on these dirt roads, if the road is bad enough, people start driving around the bad section onto the grass nearby. After a while, once many drivers have used it, there is basically a new side-road, parallel to the existing one. Our bus driver decided to take that side road although it wasn’t looking much better.

The bus driver and his helpers made everyone get out in order to lessen the weight of the vehicle so it would be less likely to sink into the mud. All of the passengers had to walk along the muddy main road to the point where the side road meets up with the main road again. It wasn’t far, probably only a quarter mile. But then we waited and waited, and eventually we could hear the bus coming, its tires just barely making it through the mud until all we could hear were tires slipping in place, going nowhere.

We all walked over to the side road where the bus was–sitting perpendicular to the direction of the side road, stuck in mud with its rear tires in ruts several inches below ground. The bus workers were using a rope to help pull it out while the driver tried driving it out. Then eventually all of the male passengers gathered together, myself included, to push the bus out. No such luck. We then rocked it back and forth a bit until eventually it got out of the ruts and could go with a nice layer of rubber left on the mud in the ruts. We all hopped in and took off; many of us with our feet covered in mud.

As I was nodding off at around four in the morning, I could feel the bus driver was going pretty fast as we hit a real bumpy patch. He could barely slow down since he was going so fast and the whole bus rattled something fierce until “PSSSSHHHH” another flat tire. Luckily we had had that other tire repaired so I figured we should be good to get going again in another twenty minutes. An hour passes by before I finally get an answer from someone who talked to the bus driver (who was M.I.A) as to why we weren’t going anywhere. Apparently part of the steering linkage had broken.

I took a look at it and it looked as though just the rubber boot (seal) surrounding a ball joint had ruptured. Now that’s not good, especially in dirty conditions, but it certainly doesn’t prevent you from driving. I certainly don’t think any Cameroonian cares about something like that being ruptured considering they often run their machines ragged until they completely fall apart. But they said it was no good and we’d have to wait for another bus to come from Bafoussam to pick us up. A couple of cars passed by as the sun was just starting to dawn and a few passengers were able to negotiate their way into getting to Bafoussam. I sat in the bus and nodded off for a bit. At around 7 am I asked someone how long it would be before the replacement bus got to us. They told me noon. If the bus got to us at noon, and we still had another four hours to go, plus I’d probably have to wait a few hours to get a bus to Douala from Bafoussam if even possible, then take that five hour bus ride from Bafoussam to Douala, that doesn’t put me in Douala until around midnight. There was no way I wanted to wait that long. I had to find a way to Bafoussam.

I flagged a car taxi down as it passed in order to get a ride. I wasn’t sure if the driver would take me with my two large suitcases but for a pretty steep price as far as taxis go (5,000 francs, $10), he could take me to Foumban (a fairly large town before Bafoussam) and I could get to Douala from there. He already had two passengers and we drove out to a real far out place to drop them off. It was a little weird being so far away from the main road, with not a person in sight for miles with a man I did not know at all with all of my personal belongings. Luckily nothing bad happened.

We drove around for a bit and he ran out of gas in the middle of nowhere. We were able to coast long enough, having to constantly restart the engine trying to squeeze every drop out of the gas tank in order to get to a place that could sell some gas. Before he bought gas, I could’ve sworn I saw him drink some gasoline out of a water bottle. When I asked him about it, he said no, he only used it to prime the carburetor when he got out and opened the hood shortly afterwards. Shortly is a relative term. I really think he drank some gasoline. He didn’t seem too with it if you know what I mean. Anyway, we stopped at his house along the way so he could drop off some wood he bought shortly after picking me up. I met his wife and several children before we headed to the bus park.

We got to Foumban and he dropped me off at a bus park and I was able to quickly take a bus straight to Douala. It made numerous stops along the way but only took about six hours to get there. We got into Douala around five and I took a taxi to get to the Baptist Resthouse. I told the driver what it was called and the neighborhood it was in. He seemed pretty confident he knew where I was going. After a few minutes of driving around aimlessly in large circles around the neighborhood, I could tell he had no idea where I wanted to go. He was driving in the neighborhood I think hoping I would spot it. I had no idea what it looked like anymore. It had been four months since I had been to this rest house and I was only there for one night. I even told him it was near a Toyota dealership since that’s what I was told. He still had no idea where to go. I couldn’t believe it. You’d think a taxi driver would know where a place is, especially something like the only Toyota dealership in a small neighborhood in Douala, but no, he didn’t know. I had to make several phone calls and even ask some people on the street. Eventually we found the place (across the street from the Toyota dealership). I didn’t get settled in until around seven. After almost 24 hours of being en route I was exhausted.

That night, I met a man named Thierry who helped the taxi driver and I find the rest house. He worked for the Baptist Mission in Cameroon and knew where the rest house was. He hopped in the taxi and as we were talking, I mentioned that I wouldn’t be leaving until the following evening. He wanted to hang out and I knew I would have nothing to do on Saturday before I left so I agreed. He met me early in the morning Saturday and we went out. He took me to his mother’s house so I could meet her. She fed us spaghetti and talked a little bit. We then went to the bank which I needed to do in order to withdrawal some cash for fees at the airport. We also went to a grocery store so I could get a few food items to take back home.

We went back to the rest house and hung out for a few hours playing cards and going on the internet. I left for the airport around five in the afternoon. Thierry helped me by staying at the airport for a bit to make sure everything was alright. When we arrived, I was greeted by baggage handlers wearing green outfits. They looked pretty legitimate. They weighed my bags with a hand-held scale that had a hook on one end. You hook it into the suitcase handle and pull up until the suitcase is lifted off the ground and then read the analog dial. Both of my bags were overweight and I had a feeling that might be the case. I had made sure to withdraw enough at the bank to cover that if they were, afterall, Cameroon is a pretty much cash only environment. The airport might’ve taken cards but I didn’t want to chance it. They did have an ATM there, though.

The baggage handlers told me it was 180,000 francs ($360) for two overweight bags. I knew that wasn’t the case. Thierry and I argued with them for probably twenty minutes before I finally got so fed up I demanded they show me where the Brussels Airlines (my airline) office was. I just needed to speak to someone there and they would clear it all up. I checked their website while I was at the rest house earlier that day to make sure what their fees were. It’s 50 euros per overweight bag. Two bags translates to 65,600 francs. Not 180,000. I found the Brussels Airlines counter, in a different section of the airport and the men there told me I was correct. They said, “don’t listen to the guys outside, they don’t even work here.” I couldn’t believe it. They were just people trying to make a buck by weighing people bags for them, and then more than just a buck by scamming them in overage fees. Ridiculous. I was so outraged.

I handed my bags over to the Brussels Airlines people, checked in, said goodbye to Thierry and proceeded towards the gate. I paid my 10,000 franc ($20) airport tax and went through security which was a breeze. Since I arrived so early (my flight didn’t leave until 11:40, this all happened around 7:15), there was no one in the security line. I was the first person at my gate and waited around a bit. The gate is an air-conditioned room while the hallway is not. About an hour before boarding the plane, they made everyone who was in the gate exit into the hallway and re-enter. It was an extra security measure just to make sure everyone in there had their passports and tickets. They got to me and told me I needed to go down to customs. There was a problem identifying an object in my checked luggage. I left the secured part of the terminal and went to customs.

I walked into this small room with two people working. There was a guy, a girl, and a TV monitor with checked luggage going through the scanner just outside the room. The girl was the one talking to me and told me to open my suitcase. As I was doing so, I looked up at the man in the room who happened to be sleeping. His eyes were closed the majority of the time. The girl was too busy preoccupied with me to watch the scanner monitor. As a result, bags were just going right on by, one after another on the screen, completely unchecked. I chuckled a bit to myself, hoping no terrorists were on my plane.

I pulled out a few items from my suitcase and we determined it was just a few straw hot pads/coasters for a table that were causing the problem. They told me to close my suitcase back up and then they told me they wanted 10,000 francs ($20) for it. I asked why and they said for customs. There was no legitimate reason for them to be demanding money but they wanted it. If this were a gendarme (national police) at the side of the road demanding a ridiculous bribe, you can always stall until he gives up and lets you through but these were airport workers. I didn’t want to be on their bad side because they could’ve very well just not put my bags on the plane as soon as I left customs. I didn’t want the hassle, even though it already was a hassle and they were completely in the wrong.

I pulled out my wallet and showed them all I had was 4,000 francs. They told me it’s not enough and that they needed 10,000. I said, “what do you want me to do? It’s all I have.” So, they just told me to give them everything. I left customs and walked on that plane without any money on me. Luckily I didn’t need it. I only had a two hour layover in Brussels and didn’t need to buy any food while there. I was fed two breakfasts that Sunday morning, once towards the end of the eight and a half hour Brussels Airlines flight from Douala to Brussels and then again on the six and a half hour Continental flight from Brussels to Newark.

Once we reached cruising altitude on the flight from Douala to Brussels, an announcement came on the speakers saying they needed to spray disinfectant to sanitize the cabin. That had never happened to me before on a flight and immediately my mind flashed back to my days of visiting my family in Houston, TX during the summer. At around two in the morning, a bug truck would come by to release chemicals into the atmosphere to kill off all sorts of little critters in bug infested Houston. I remember one time my Aunt Caroline and I got back to her house from somewhere real late at night. As soon as we got out of the car, the bug truck was coming up the street. I remember my Aunt Caroline yelling, “quick! Hurry up! Get inside! The bug truck is coming!” You definitely did not want to be outside at that moment.

I looked back in the airplane and two flight attendants, one in each aisle, starting from the back and walking towards the front had a can of spray held above their heads and slightly back. They walked up the aisle quickly while releasing a nice little foggy spray to fill the cabin. Ahhh! Nowhere to run to. It actually smelled not so bad. My flights were uneventful with a couple of movies/TV shows to watch in each. I arrived in Newark and had no problems with customs there. I was greeted by my mom outside the baggage claim/customs area and was on my way home.

All in all it was a wonderful trip and a great opportunity. I feel I learned so much about a culture vastly different from American life. It really gave me a sense of what like could be like for anyone and how much opportunity we do have in America. We shouldn’t take anything for granted and be extremely joyful in what we do have. I’ll write again fairly soon for a better wrap up/reflection.