Feudalism

What shall I pontificate about this month? Feudalism. Much of what I have found in Bogo is essentially feudal – a way of life I taught in my History classes that took place in medieval times. Why do I think that?

 

They farm in rows using hand implements in open fields operating a 3 year crop rotation. Land disputes are the primary source of conflict in villages, along with ‘sort your weeds because they are affecting my crops’.

 

One concerning thing for the future (as it has happened in other African countries and happened in England with enclosure of fields) is that very few have the ‘titre de fonctionaire’ i.e. legal evidence of right to their land. Technically it all belongs to the state and ‘ownership’ is only history and family tradition.

 

The ‘lawane’ system (tribal chiefs) that sits alongside the political system operates the same tithing structure as the feudal lords only it seems churches and mosques don’t get one tenth of production here if anything. This means that mosques generally have no charitable function other than guiding prayers and running Koran classes for infants. It’s not East London or Luton here with their very socially active mosques.

 

People live in the African equivalent of wattle and daub huts with straw roofs, mud floors and no water, electricity, gas or in many cases any sort of road for access. They draw water from wells and cook on open wood fires.

 

People bow and scrape to anyone more powerful than them and can generally be treated with the utmost disrespect.

 

People die all the time of diseases that could be cured if the families were prepared to or could afford to buy medicines. Hospitals don’t have enough equipment, but people only use them as a last resort so as a westerner if you need a doctor you go to the hospital and there are less queues than in England apart from at an American hospital just outside Maroua.

 

Babies are rarely registered so the majority of the population don’t know what day they were born or how old they are. It goes without saying that therefore they don’t celebrate birthdays, but also if they are not registered they can not go to school beyond primary or be eligible for many jobs.

 

Very few people go to school, especially in the villages, partly because schools have no toilets, tables and chairs, books, enough teachers or even a roof in places. Conversely there are young people still at secondary school who are 25 because they have missed years or had to resit. I feel sorry for the parents.

 

You know this because I have already said it, but there is very little to eat. People eat the same thing day in and day out – a big lump of mille, like a dumpling, with 3 or 4 changes of sauce.   Mille is nutritionally very good even though I may think it tastes pretty yuk, so the upside is most of Bogo populace have fantastically fit bodies and wonderful teeth. Their skin isn’t always brilliant which might be because they don’t eat much fruit or vegetables.

 

One thing I haven’t told you about yet is that men and women ‘gob’ a lot. Great big globules fired in giant arcs. It’s most disconcerting and not considered something you do privately. However they do go outside to blow their noses which they do without handkerchiefs or tissues.

 

Men wear very cute little pill box hats in starched cotton that are both jaunty and distinguished. What they also wear with equal panache are western style wooly hats favoured by trendy young men in the west. It makes me smile to see them on old men here. They don’t do moustaches, but they do do very stylish goatee beards.

 

Projects internal and external to the council are beginning to formulate. The organizational development process will be illusory because the council executive all think they are brilliant and obviously can’t learn from a woman, but the councilors who can’t read and write and the lawanes do want training. Externally it’s about maximizing all the buildings they do have that they keep empty and locked – public toilets in the middle of a cholera epidemic so people shit in the street, not one but two granaries where people should be saving sacks of mille to sell when the price is high, empty public halls when young people have nowhere to meet, a library run by the mission used by Catholics and Muslims that needs staff resources rather than investing in yet another building.

 

And finally, my beloved moutons and poulets have been residents chez moi for a month. Yod is very good and affectionate. Mabel (already pregnant) is a very naughty escapee who has eaten off all the tops of my maize. The guardian de nuit (Bouba) says she is the naughtiest sheep he has ever known. J2 says it is just typically a Durbridge phenomena that we get disobedient animals.

 

Charles is the cock and Cressida the female chicken who is already laying eggs that we are leaving in the hope she hatches some. Charles starts crowing about 3.30am in the morning which isn’t quite his fault. It’s Ramadan so the Muslims are up eating breakfast before daylight.

 

Charles too is very friendly and spends most of the day on my porch watching me through the mosquito doors. Consequently I get a lot of chicken shit by my front door. I have already had one row with Bouba who thinks I should be running round clearing up all day.

 

I am not being told what to do by anyone these days. I shall be insufferable when I get home!