International Women’s Day 2010: Thanksgiving Meets The Prom At An Outdoor Music Festival

First a little bit of a work update, Wednesday I met with my Bamoun women’s group and they kind of blew me off, which was really frustrating because I had spent a good amount of time prepping for it. I even went next door ahead of time and told Raschiatou (my neighbor/the president) that I needed at least 30 min. for my lesson and she told me no problem, but then when I got there they only gave me like 5 minutes and I didn’t end up getting anything done. At first I was super pissed off, but then I found out why they cut me off early and felt kind of bad. Apparently one of the women in the group’s child had died the night before. They asked me if I was going to the Duoiy (the wake) with them and I didn’t feel like I could say no, but I was not mentally prepared for it. When we got there the father came out and said something (I have no idea what was said because it was all in Bamoun but according to Raschiatou he was explaining what happened. Apparently the kid was sick for a long time and when he recently got malaria his body was too weak to fight it off). Then there was a round of prayer, they passed around a picture of him, and then 10 painfully long minutes of silence except for the mother who was crying. It was terrible and all I wanted to do was cry, but no one else was and I didn’t want to put any attention on myself. In my experiences Cameroonians have very different ways of expressing grief, there’s no sobbing, no condoling, it seems like everything is internalized, but I would imagine that it’s a way to cope with death, because it plays such a major role in life here. I don’t know that I’ll ever get used to it.

On a much much lighter note Saturday I had my usual weekly meeting with MBOSCUDA, the Mbororo women’s group. Can I just say that they are my hardest group to work with because of the language and cultural barriers but they’re also hands down my favorite group of people in Bankim, and this past weekend just proved that once again.

So some background; the president of the groups daughter Rahinatou (aka my translator) was sick in the hospital all week so I had been to visit her and I was just trying to make small talk so I asked her how the Mbororo women celebrate Women’s Day and she told me that they don’t and that most of the members don’t even know what it is. From there I decided that that was not good, so with the permission of the Presidents of the men and women’s group we had a small women’s day party during our meeting.

We started off by talking about women’s day and how it started and what it was for and then went into why women are important and all the important things that we do to help our families and communities. We ended by eating a chocolate cake I had made and had a dance party with my ipod. Now if you know me you know dancing is not really my strong suite, but because they needed a little encouragement to get the dance party hopping I took one for the team and jumped into the dance circle (“hands in the air like you just don’t care” style). After a few minutes of my uncoordinated flailing everyone was up and dancing and having a good time. The group even taught me one of their dances and when they asked me to teach them an American dance I opted for the cupid shuffle. You can’t go wrong when they give you step by step dance instructions as part of the song ;)

Sunday I had an equally successful meeting with the Men’s side of MBOSCUDA. We had pretty much the same discussion but without the dance party. I was so happy with them and I think they actually got my point, or at least I know some of them did.

I started off with an icebreaker where I split them into small groups and asked them to pick the one thing that their wives do that is most important, and then I had them act it out in a little sketch. Going into it I was thinking this activity was kind of a crapshoot. I didn’t know if they would be into it but come to find out men pretending to be women is cross culturally funny. Some of them got really into it and it got everyone loosened up and laughing which made it much easier to move into the more serious discussion. We talked about how women’s day started and what it celebrates and why it’s important, and then wrapped it up with a brainstrom about the different ways to celebrate. I encouraged them all to say thank you to their wives, daughters, mothers and grandmothers on Monday.

Now in a perfect world I would have asked them to let the women’s group participate in the parade or the sports day or any of the activities with the rest of the women in Bankim, but in light of my recent gender faux pas I was trying to take baby steps so I had decided right off the bat to save that for next year. But then at the end when I asked if their were any questions one of then men (one that’s usually very quite and stern looking) out of the blue asked me how their women could participate with all the other women’s organizations. I was so surprised at first I wasn’t sure I had heard him right so I told them about how to get they could do it and it looks like next year MBOSCUDA will be represented in the festivities.

I went home on such a high. I was feeling great! Some days my job is frustrating and hard and seems impossible, but when things go right it makes it all worth it. The icing on the cake was the next day at the official celebration I ran into one of the Mbororo wives who told me her husband came home after the meeting and told her he wanted her to come today J Ahhhh Life Is Good!

Last point of interest for this week and probably the most obvious thing to hit on was the actual 8^th of March International Women’s Day. It was kind of a two-part affair. The first half of the day was a parade at the sous prefecture and the second half was a food expo in the center of town. If I had to sum the experience up simply I would say it was thanksgiving meets the prom at an outdoor music festival. Except that instead of limos and prom dresses we had motos and less than flattering women’s day fabric (you know it’s bad when yellow is your safest bet). Even so, when the motos pulled up everyone got presented over the speakers and then everybody else took that chance to look at what you were wearing and give you the one over. Personally I think I could have been wearing a potato sack and if it were in the women’s day fabric they would have been ecstatic. Anyways, once everyone showed up (easily a few hundred women) all the big wigs made speeches and then there was a parade of all the women’s groups in the area.

After the parade was over everyone migrated to the center of town where each of the groups set up and sell food native to their village or culture group. It was delicious! I ate way too much and I couldn’t really tell you what most of it was, but you can’t say no when some old mama puts a plate of food in front of you. My own contribution to the event was a small booth on how to cook with soy. It went ok, but I think next year I need to get someone to actually cook with it and have food to try because they don’t seem to be quite sold on it yet. I understand that it’s hard to change when you’ve been cooking the same way for hundreds of years, but it such an economically and nutritiously strong source of protein (that God knows most of these kids need badly) that they’re aren’t many down sides to using it except not knowing how.

Anyways, it’s now Tuesday and the party is over, and tomorrow it will be back to work, but overall I would say for my first 8^th of March celebration here in Cameroon I couldn’t have asked for a better experience!

first annual Mbororo women's day party

women's day skits with the mens group

This girl made my day!!!

Me and Bernadette at the parade