notable

notable
Originally uploaded by jlovegren.

there are no cognates to help you along in the ngwe language, only amusing etymologies similar to those of chinese.
the word for a full moon is literally "eye moon"
sun that shines bright "eye sun"
beans "seven weeks" (time from planting to harvest)
anything with color is called "red" (if a foreigner is very pale you call him a "red red white man")
the word for knife is the same as for hills
beer "white man drink"
palm whine "white drink"
rice "coast rice" or "white man rice"
also it is important to always greet someone with a question, though it is invariably rhetorical:
"you have come?"
"you are walking?"
"you are resting?"
"you are drinking?"
"you are eating?"

care is to to be used in making affirmative statements, especially involving eating and drinking. if you say you are eating or drinking, you have made an invitation to share. if you tell someone they are eating or drinking, you are asking that they share. salutations are varied and depend on someone's age, social status, marital status, whether they have children, so use the massa or madame for now. also it is polite to offer some general condolences to anyone who is doing something other than resting, eating, drinking, or playing. if you stumble but don't fall, if you are carrying a bag of any size, if you are walking up hill, if you are waiting for a bus to arrive, you have to offer your condolences. nda nda

cry die

cry die
Originally uploaded by jlovegren.

this is probably where the convention of securing money with the stripper's g-string came from. the idea is that everyone gathers to celebrate the deceased's passage and to heal the sorrow, this accomplished with a series of traditional dances, eating and drinking. to show respect for a dancer you stuff paper money into some convenient place in his or her costume. sometimes you can use the sweat to plaster the bill to his forehead. if it is a big bill, the dancer wants to keep it there to show how much more money they deserve. this compound is hard enough to get to that it would be a good hideout for bin laden. i have seen a mommy selling balls of fried dough, sweet corn gruel and boiled beans wearing a watch with his visage. here the only thing clear to everyone is that he has a serious look on his face, an impressive beard, and is a powerful warrior. few people know the difference between bin laden and saddam hussein, but they sure are good at making money off of them

tom and jerry

bringing home the bacon
Originally uploaded by jlovegren.

the cheating scandal has blown up in my form 2 math class. unfortunately for the students, they do not yet know how gravely they are in trouble. since manual labor is the norm for punishment here, i will have them widen a footpath to the hospital, level the steep parts, then collect the plaudits for my altruism towards the hospital and my commitment to instilling ethics in school pikin

heaven's gonna burn your eyes

IMG_0670
Originally uploaded by jlovegren.

after crossing the hanging bridge fashioned of rebar and rotting blanks haunted by djinns that don't bother foreigners, so everyone gathered at mandela under the pretext of having nothing to do in town but pay their SONEL bills and the guy hadn't shown up yet informed me, i drank some peeled oranges, bought pasta and went to mandela (i was recognized by one of my villageois and called over) to strike up a conversation with a frenchman (francophone camerounais) about immigration in my country vs. that of france, my words weighing in all the more as a presumed italian medical doctor. i have dome to town to deliver some letters to various government offices, and felt justified for having stayed at mandela until after the offices were closed since a representative from each office was present at the bar, so named because the owner opened it after getting out of prison on a political charge; this in the era of military coups. and it was the same way that i found the chef of the alou gendarmerie at paul's bar back in the village, saving me another trip to a government office, this one would have required a trip to alou- there was a large public ceremony to welcome the principal of the new technical school that disturbed my sclerotic and worried ratiocinations lying on the couch still wondering why i hadn't yet accepted that i'd have to wash my clothes in the stream like everyone else not for hard work but the petroleum crisis, man; somehow i tied petroleum crisis to getting laundry soap in the stream. so they had sent a delegation from alou for security or something and thus i was caught in the middle.

it's all downhill from here

it's all downhill from here
Originally uploaded by jlovegren.

pidgin lesson 4:

terrible: amazing or unexpectedly grand
wonderful: shockingly misfortunate
showname: nickname
frenchman: francophone
englishman: anglophone
cutlass: machete
white man country: all of europe, the americas, and eastern asia

one student came for help with logarithms, explaining that he is the only one of his family to go to school since all his village has good land to grow tomatoes, even carrots, and he is insane to be learning logarithms when no one is hungry. the plan is to study abroad in nigeria, though one would have to be cautious of the miasma of witchcraft that can sweep any innocent immigrant into its wicked cloak, and you can't escape because they hypnotise you, so the nigerian cinema industry plainly demonstrates

80,000 bucks gone

cry die
Originally uploaded by jlovegren.

i should clean up for the workmen who will come in on yesterday to install the kitchen sink and distributor for the shower. my landlord, a big businessman on an unforeseen one hour sojourn in the village, popped into saddam hussein's bar to inform me of such repairs, make a speech in ngwe about how helpful the people were to a ngwoh sah, peel off a ten note to buy a round for everyone, then subcontract someone to finish his beer as he left, to considerable opprobium from the masses. an elder offered to him a traditional blessing involving the symbolic scattering by blowing of a handful of something. (ashes, dust, winnowing of groundnuts?) this was where popular acclamation found me as i was returning from retrieving my umbrella from madame becky's tournedos. as it was a market day, englishman would only be drinking fe fe be lu (white mimbo), not yet be lu ndeke (white man mimbo), thus sober enough to invite me for a cup and a kola nut as we watch the children play, the three year olds taking advantage of the ones without yet fully-developed motor skills. "englishman is a simplicity."

woke the family up

german liniment. you get rheumatism for yo joint dem. now if you done lame, german liniment no fit hellep you. ting weh wuna go do for dis sick, time weh it hot you for joint dem, join liniment with sugar cube like so, add em for one glass warm wata and rub for dey fo husay it di hot you. dis for outside yo skin. now fo' inside skin, add sugar cube for one glass warm wata and drink 'em. like so you do for nine day dem. mornin of day numba ten, now all dat for rheumatism.

another demonstration as to how it could cure filaria, the parasite that is like a worm in your eye (river blindness), all interested parties could have a small amount in a tissue and then were to inhale deeply and if it didn't make your eyes water, may we write charlatan on his forehead. it seemed to be little more than ethyl acetate with some plant extracts or coloring. it also cures cavities and gastric ulcers. sure enough the people sniffed it like homeless brazilian teenagers on glue and remarked about how sure enough their eyes were watering and they even felt kind of good.

back yard

back yard
Originally uploaded by jlovegren.

that banana leaf takes the scariness out of the photo. maybe it should be a barren and stickly wintertime tree branch. it is still dark when you wake up to meet the bus on the road to dschang

bubble gum

bubble gum
Originally uploaded by jlovegren.

the guiness truck came and they were out of malta. those little rascals don't know the first rule of chewing gum. keep it in your mouth

the bell

the bell
Originally uploaded by jlovegren.

zacapa, tierra caliente
donde los uniformes
solo enturbian la distincion
entre prepas y putas

if he remembers, this bell will ring when it is time to change classes

the upright class

the upright class
Originally uploaded by jlovegren.

his son in the united states managed to find the first-ever recorded internet gossip about lewoh. the lewosh of the itnernet is covered in a zacapaesque film of license and sin, perhaps as a misplaced surrogate for the missing math and english teachers (heretofore named mr. x and y, respectively) likewose, the lewoh of lewosh has an enviable level of camaraderie and competence in official offices. (n.b. googleing "lewoh competence honorable enviable" will bring back results, as will "lewosh zacapaesque sin bin laden") englishman's argument in court was that as the bar was in a state of general upheaval and confusion, it could not be established with certainty that it was he who slapped the man. in the same way coach mused in voz alta as to whether a woman here looks all over the place for her sack of cocoyams or irish potato, only to find them on her heqd. he had to chuckle at the contrasting paths of development. you can exchange text messages with people in paris and then relieve yourself in the corn field or pit latring behind the bar, or i can rent a house that has an mp3 player but no sink. i am deaf to explanations of infrastructure development; it is either generalized insanity of neocolonialist subterfuge

rollin' down the strip on fours

the naughty class
Originally uploaded by jlovegren.

i had a chance to sit down with englishman for an interview. c'est a dire que i sat at the table next to him at the bar where we enjoyed grilled fish and milk stout on occasion of the indomptable lyons' upset victory against cote d'ivoire and a probable world cup entry, asking people of loosened tongues what the deal was with the town's various rascally old men, i mean really. unlike ahpa 'riz,' whose name arises from his theft of a bag of rice from the market in alou some 25 years ago, englishman gained his title through more honorable circumstances. late one evening in 1974 at a bar englishman accused of having slapped a man, rather he was not accused on that evening, but that was when a man was slapped. he was summoned to the district court, at the time in mamfe, to plead his case. charlabamos un rato, entonces le di plata para que pudiese confirmar mis intenciones de ir al juego peus a lisbon donde habia corriente. a pesar de que tenian cms 'old stock,' la cual no gana, englishman defended himself in the court with such an impressive command of standard english that the case was dismissed. cada vez que te acercas la lengua al superficie dulce con salsa del sarten, su labio te empuja agriamente el cuello, quedandose afuera de alcance aquella salse dulce, en cuanto no tenes la voluntad de recoger una cucharra. not to mention that englishman was the best dressed in the bar, and the only elder to be wearing western clothing. englishman prefers to speak pidgin but will rely on a standard english word (or word normally confined to such) or idiom when seeking to isolate meanings of inchoate circumstance, the words comek out of his mouthh and hang like smoke rings over the background of wild gesticulations and tonal shifts: expiate, wraith, propinquity, mote-palpitant, impalpable, dijinn, unregenerate, phaeton, scuppernong, peremptory, heresiarch, velocipede... i could only write down so many of them on the scrap of greasy brown paper in which they had wrapped my sourdough baguettes in dschang. only one thing is certain: there is a naughty little baby sure to gain the sobriquet bin laden, probably for spilling a bag of water fufu or scaring a chicken

love letters

still looking for coffee filters
Originally uploaded by jlovegren.

baby i tried about 48 times to get customer service maybe in bamenda... but i must quote one indespensable paragraph from the beloved portuguese translation of the old man and the sea (o velho e o mar) "o velho pensava sempre no mar como sendo 'la mar,' que eh como lhe chamam em espanhol quando verdadeiramente lhe querem. as veces aqueles que o amam lhe dah nomes feios mas sempre como se se tratasse de uma mulher. alguns dos pescadores mais novos, aqueles que usam boias flutuadores para as suas linhas e tem barcos a motor, comprados quando os figados dos tuburoes valiam muito dinheiro, quando falam do mar dizem 'el mar,' que eh o masculino. falam do mar como de um adversario, de um sitio ou mesmo de um inimigo. mas o velho..."
boring. it had something to do with this old man going on a fishing trip. but instead of fishing he takes his pickup truck home with some whore he picked up in town. the guy is nicknamed englishman because he wears a bowler hat and carries an umbrella. i can't verify that it's a bowler hat, nore do i know what one looks like, but that would make the name more fitting since all english people wear them. but not only for this. he's called englishman because yesterday i saw him and they pointed out a bottle of whisky bulging from his back pocket. the other old man is called saddam hussein because he is a rascal. it does not help that he owns a small bar that is the hangout for the old men that speak ngwe instead of pidgin, which brings me to my pidgin vocabulary list:
born house- public presentation of a newborn baby. people give gifts to help the mother make porridge, then get drunk and talk about sex, since such talk will encourage future fertility.
pikin born pikin- teenage mother. the same time i was notified of the most rascally old men in town, i was informed of the girl jumping rope with others her age had recently had a baby. the issue at hand is that lewoh is too fertile, segun dijo massa j. 'na man weh check se yi be impotent no for see doctor. yi must but come for lewoh.' in other cases the widespread fertility is attributable to a single man, whose identity changes from time to time: 'no man sabi fo ce que weti all pikin born for lewoh resemble massa.' but i digress...
born- 1.v tr to give birth. 2.v i to be born. 3.adj of, or relating to birth
vex- 1.v i to become angry. 2.v tr to anger somebody
hambock- see vex.
pikin- child (port. pequeno 'little')
pikin for pig- piglet
pikin for cat- kitten
etc.
fo se que se- (fr. par ce que) because of
weti- (eng. what thing) what
weh- (transliteration of portuguese 'que'?) that, which
chakara- to fracass or confound something (as with nearly all verbs, it can have both transitive and intransitive senses)
bush: traditional (slang)
tradational: bush (politically correct)
also the old man eventually caught a fish and everyone was happy. as someone who just ate black beans and rice for dinner, i am an authority on all stories about cuban fishermen
love

dschang

dschang
Originally uploaded by jlovegren.

this afternoon in dschang i had a fine stew of plantains and goat meat at the college bar. if you stay in this country long enough your attitudes towards child labor will change. i have a nice market bag full of loot i can bring back to the village and not worry about haggling for a long time.

voici les blancs

voici les blancs
Originally uploaded by jlovegren.

pues tio estabamos alla, vos sabes, mordiendo la canha para no dormirse vinieron aquellos blancos debieron estar estudiantes de intercambio no podiamos hacer que mirarlos, mordiendo la canha.

helux

helux
Originally uploaded by jlovegren.

some new pidgin vocabulary:

helux: the truck you see pictured. there are some roads where only these and motos may pass. this one they stopped and yelled to advertise the ride to dschang for 1500. i waited for the bus where you get to sit down and are not thrown out if there is an accident, we passed the helux as the driver was splashing water on the radiator

feet rich: to have good traction
moto foot: tires
leave no pay: strike

des nuages

des nuages
Originally uploaded by jlovegren.

it seemed innocent at first, but we got wet. soon the college students will be back. there is this one bar where you sit and watch them go by

notes from deceased german doctor in vienna's pocket

morning
Originally uploaded by jlovegren.

will we find you in endless cheeseburgers and fried potato wedges dipped in mayonnaise chez el corral with cans of cerveza aguila at the mall in barranquilla where it's your way baby so long as the guards don't wake up to see a pipe bomb through their convex mirror chez your tailpipe, baby? then again chez moi, when we give a body for chop we remove both the other half of the cow's face from the stool and the foreleg pinned between the bamboo rafters and the zinc roof under which there is only stooping room. we wouldn't want to be reminded of the smell of the cow's flesh for that panicked instant of blood frozen in its circuit then released; sweat, bile, mucus, excrement, saliva follow the needs of gravity, all too evident when you dangle it over our heads en mangeant. will we find you in second-hand glass bottles of chicha sold over countertops to college students winks chez la mama que esta feliz sabiendo que la gente esta feliz en la cama, in plastic (escaping gases would shatter glass) water bottles of rafia wine, in gorditas of botran extra light we carry on ferries through the mangrove swamps, in pepsi and rum where room temperature is colder than the air on the dance floor? perhaps if we go to the corner where waves may crash hands unhooking bra the other hand asking that she may hold the cup so as to aid the former hand. will we find you in children crossing oceans with little more plan than to cut banana leaves down for the rain, pushing toy cars of rafia, coat hangers, heels of thongs from the side of the road, cans of sweetened condensed milk chez nestle? if we find you in dusk, in nightfall you are lost, inasmuch as you only exist in those vulnerable moments of scattered light or the times when you squint to shave in the reflection of a compact disk, or the rain from which you do not seek cover and flecks of bones in your meat the memory may be able to seize. you are erased in syncopations, metaphors, anagrams, unless it is school children in the smoke blackened kitchen wrapping couscous de mais in the same banana leaves reciting the definitions in dreaming of the baccaleaureate exams. you cannot present yourself but through symbols of variable meaning, myriad bottle caps, coins and scraps of paper that take form only when you pull them from your pockets a day later, for interpretation can only pervert, corrupt, and blur you. the only durable symbol means many things to many people, nothing to all people, chez personne