Batié, a country home

The morning started out as one with an adventure most only see on a Discovery Channel exposé. If you recall, Becky doesn’t have running water, and the barrel where she stores it was empty. As a result, it was necessary to refill it. The perplexing dilemma for most would be the fact that there’s no source of running water in the area. Well, except for the stream that flows not far from her house.

Every few days a few of the young people come past Becky’s to collect her buckets and  fetch water for her. Apparently, during the rainy season, all she needs to do is place her larger bucket just outside her back door and the rain will be collected on a regular basis. Since there’s virtually no rain during the dry season, water has to come from the stream.

Since I’ve heard so much about it, I wanted to see these young ladies (Cynthia and her sisters) carry the buckets of water on their heads! Each of these things could easily hold about twenty-five pounds in them. This I had to see in the flesh.

So we trek down to the stream. Actually, we called ourselves following them. When you’re supposed to follow someone here you better make sure you’re paying attention, because one stop and you’ll lose them. That’s exactly what happened, we were too far behind and didn’t see which way they turned past some homes. By the time we made our way to where we thought they were, we figured they’d been there and gone, so we headed back. We get back to the house, and they’re standing there smiling at us as if we’d just run a race, and lost. Mind you, there were three full buckets of water at the back door.

It was now time for them to go to the fields to work, but they had to make at least one more quick trip to the stream. This time they needed water for their own home, they’d already made two trips for Becky’s house. Hoping to get a few photos of this experience, we quickly followed them to the stream.

The trail to the stream included walking down a hill that most people would probably feel apprehensive about climbing in hiking boots. These young ladies were doing it in some beach-type flip-flps. The path ran between the middle of someone’s fields. If there’s free space somewhere on the land, someone makes sure to plant something. Everything has a purpose and is used accordingly. That’s what I call using all your resources.

Making our way down the hilly trail was kind of funny. Watching Akilah and Becky (who wore sneakers and boots, respectively) fumble their way through the trail brought much laughter from Cynthia and her sisters.

We finally reach our destination and the girls begin filling the buckets as I snap photos of what they’re doing. They’re all smiles and giggles as this American plays a typical tourist. Snap, snap, snap.

Buckets are now full, and its time to trek back up the trail. Akilah has a small bucket with a few drops of water, and Becky has another that’s partially filled. Now, I figure I’m a grown man and my bravado will allow me to lift anything these young ladies, the oldest of which was fifteen, would consider heavy. But if you could’ve seen them lift these buckets of water and perch them upon their heads with ease, you would’ve been as mystified as I was. I kept snapping and tried to hide my amazement. This is truly something you have to see to believe.

Mental note: I’m gonna have to practice this walking with sixty to one hundred pounds of objects on your head thing.

Time to make our way back up the hill. To get good photos, we decide I should go first. Yep, here I am, a grown man huffing and puffing up this hill with only an automatic camera, and these girls are walking with buckets full of water on their heads; and not spilling a drop. Not one peep of expended energy coming from their mouths! What training program were they a part of?

Within a few minutes we reach the back of Becky’s house, two of the young ladies place their buckets down and run back to assist Becky with the one she was carrying on her head. Admirable, she got to fulfill one of her desires so far, carrying objects on her head.

The things I’ve seen Cameroonians carrying on their heads are amazing. Boys, no older than ten, carrying bundles of wood that are at least one hundred forty-four inches in length, on their head with a machete in hand. Earlier I saw an elderly woman carrying a basket on her head that most elders in the states would baulk at. I estimated it had to be about thirty to forty pounds; all supported by a tool used to cultivate the fields. Amazing.

This was way too much stimulation for so early in the morning. Afterwards, we each took our bucket baths and had an omelette breakfast before heading out for our walk. There’s a trail Becky walks on occassion, and we were going to follow it. Its actually not that bad of a trail, the scenery was beautiful. Majestic. Again, I played the tourist role and began snapping away.

While on this trek, we passed a mountainous area being mined, not for diamonds, or any other precious stone, but for sand. I have no clue what they do with it, but the mere fact that there were men scaled alongside the mountain with no gurnies or support objects, slashing the sand so it would fall to the lower levels, was enough for me. How did they even get up there?

As we asked permission to take photos, it was obvious they found these Americans amusing. Everyone began laughing as we stood there with cameras in hand, snapping away. We didn’t care, it was worth the stares and giggles.

Moving on, we finished our walk about twenty minutes later, and continued on the main road to downtown Batie. Now before I continue, when I say “continue on the main road,” don’t think of some dirt roadway people use. Batie is on the road to Douala (as it is known), and therefore a main artery of roadway passes through the town. Imagine, if you will, being in a Mayberry-type town and your Main Street is I-95!

We’re walking along this roadway with cars, taxis and bush taxis soaring by at what had to be at least sixty miles or more per hour. If you’ve seen Cameroonian drivers you know quite a few of them don’t seem able to control the vehicle in a straight path; and they all speed. For what purpose? I have no clue, because it doesn’t seem as if they care much about time enough to hurry and get there.

We do make it safely to downtown Batie – its like a block long – and have a drink of juice at one of the bars. If there’s nothing else available in every town within this country, its a bar and a PMUC gambling booth. Finished there, we head over to where we can catch a taxi to Bandjoun, but not before checking to see if the town Vet was in his office; not.

Ten mintues, or so, of waiting produced no taxi; remember we’re on I-95. It’s another ten or fifteen minutes before one finally shows up (or maybe it just felt like it were that long).