Nassara Sarah

Salaam Alaikum, blogsphere.


I am writing to you from the Xtreme North region of Cameroon, which I am proud to call my new home. My blog title is a tribute to my identity here: Nassara Sarah. Nassara, the Fulfulde word for white person, just so happens to rhyme with my given name, Sarah (the French pronunciation of Sarah, that is); thereby making my daily myriad introductions all the more animated (and/or wildly irritating, but who's counting?). So I guess I have a catchphrase. It goes a little something like this: "Je m'appelle Sarah- comme Nassara- c'est inoubliable, non?" ("My name is Sarah- like Nassara- it's unforgettable, right?") Cue nodding, smiles and laughter on the part of the Cameroonians, as I throw up in my mouth at how lame I am. Upsides to having a catchphrase: (1) it's memorable- everyone remembers my name and some are even using my name in lieu of just shouting NASSARA! NASSARA! whenever they see me, and (2) entertainment value- for the most part it seems to downright tickle the Cameroonians that have been on the receiving end of my little diddy. Downsides to having a catchphrase: (1) douchebag value- it is, by far and without a doubt, the douchiest thing I have ever said in my life, and (2) I say it at least twenty times a day- every day. It's like I can't turn it off now- I can't deny its utility nor can I deny the kick that Cameroonians get out of it, what with it still being a novel concept to them. So I'm stuck, trapped in my own hackneyed, vapid, and (worst of all) self-made hell: Nassara Sarah.

Among the series of Xtreme adventures I have been embarking upon since arriving to post, the most arduous challenge to date has been Fulfulde, the native tongue of the Fulbe people, and the most widely-spoken language in my new village, Meskine. Everyone in my village speaks Fulfulde, and most people speak it exclusively; as in, I am hard pressed to find French speakers to French it up with, despite my being in a Francophone region. I began Fulfulde lessons after site visit back in Bafia with my idol Jacky, the sassiest woman to walk the face of the earth. Quick Jacky story: One time, I told Jacky that she had broken my heart, and that I was going to cry myself to sleep that night because she was refusing to come to our swearing-in party. Her response? "Cry into a jar and bring the jar to me tomorrow so I can drink your tears. I look forward to it." Um what? My hero. I believe it was in the same conversation that she told me that she was going to send a snake to me while I was sleeping to blind me (Cultural note: Jacky is a twin, and it is believed that twins possess special powers- one of which, apparently, is a link to snakes- and they can use these powers for good or evil. Parseltongue? What?). So yes, this goddess of sass instructed me in Fulfulde over the course of our last couple of weeks in the Baf. Her style of teaching can pretty much be summed up in one word: intimidation. We would read through a passage of text all together, Jacky and her three young grasshoppers, and then she would rip down the poster that we had been reading from, and make us recite the passage from memory, one by one. She didn't even speak- just ripped the paper down and pointed at one of us, and her chosen victim would then begin. If you got tripped up along the way, Jacky would just stare at you, as if we had all the time in the world to wait for you to procure the lines that we had just gone over. It was the most intimidating teaching method I have ever experienced in my life. She could sit there all freaking day- completely unaffected by the pleading desperation in our eyes, not even tempted to feed us a single line- just patiently waiting in silence, expressionless. Once we had stammered out the passage, another few moments of painful silence would pass until Jacky passed her judgement. A woman of few words, her choice Fulfulde words were "boddum," meaning bien/good, for those elusive moments when she was pleased, and "kai," meaning no. She would accompany "kai" with a menacing finger wag and a downturned mouth, as if disgusted with our pathetic attempts at grasping the language. As you can imagine, we heard a lot more kais than we did boddums. Although initially intimiated almost to the point of shitting our pants in terror, we quickly warmed up to Jacky- and she to us. We had an enjoyable few weeks with her, and I picked up on a few key phrases to get me started in village:

Jabbama!: Welcome!
Jam na?/ Jam bandu na? : How are you?/ How is your health?
Inde am Sarah/ Noy inde ma?: My name is Sarah. What is your name?
Cede: Money/ Cost
Pukaraajo: Student
Janginoowo: Teacher
Adjabaajo: Prostitute
Pucci didi: Two horses
Fat Booty Jango: The day after tomorrow
Sey kiikide: See you tonight

Okay so perhaps in the way of a Fulfulde Survival List, it leaves something to be desired, but you can imagine how entertaining our classes were. Plus I got boo-coos of quality time with Jacky, and our bonding was much more important to me than language acquisition at the time. Now, however, I am singing a different tune, and that tune sounds a lot like me Frenching it up amidst a throng of non-French speakers. Ca va aller, as (French-speaking) Cameroonians like to say.

One of my first days in village, I was waiting outside of my concession for my community host to come pick me up on his moto. I sat myself down just outside of my concession door, and the dada (mama in Fulfulde) that lives across the way from me decided to join me while I waited. My neighbors, as it so happens, are among the aforementioned covey of the Meskine population that are exclusive Fulfulde speakers. So there we sat, for forty-five minutes, her speaking at me in Fulfulde, me speaking at her in French, both of us wildly gesticulating with our hands in an effort to communicate. Once you got past the ridiculousness of our exchange, it was kind of beautiful in its own rite. And that's how most of my conversing went for the first week or so in village- people talking at me in Fulfulde, me talking back at them in French, with lots of smiling and nodding and waving on my part. Now, however, I have mastered the phrase: "Mi anda fulfulde" (I do not know Fulfulde), among a few other key words and phrases. Seeda seeda (Little by little).

Beyond Fulfulde, there have been a string of other Xtreme adventures that have been filling my days since arriving to the Xtreme North. On Christmas Eve, for example, a group of us decided to spend the morning hiking Mount Maroua. Steph and I had only brought Rainbow flip flops for our Christmas weekend getaway, and were concerned about doing any sort of hiking in such casual footwear. We were told that this would be a leisurely hike, a pleasant hour and a half- tops- and that one could absolutely make it to the top and back in flip flops- no problem. So off we went, traversing the dried-up Domayo river bed and a few residential cartiers, before arriving at the foot of the mountain. We looked up at Mt. Maroua, sizing it up, and then set out on our quest. About three minutes into our epic crusade, Stephanie announced that her flip flop had broken. Buzz kill. I accompanied her back down to the road in search of some replacement footwear. Lucky for us, Cameroon loves its babooshes (flip flops), and we found a badass neon yellow pair in the first roadside boutique we stopped in- and for less than two dollars, at that. Crisis averted. We hurried back to where the rest of our motley crew was waiting for us, only to find that a gaggle of small children from the neighborhood at the base of the mountain had joined our ranks. So we set off again, this time with the additions of neon yellow flippy floppies and nine Cameroonian kiddies, our trail guides. Since none of us had ever climbed Mt. Maroua, and our only instructions were to "walk through the city towards the mountain, then go up," there was a whole lot of blind leading the blind going on. Tina took the lead, and followed the instructions by the letter: going up. Within the first thirty minutes, I was huffing and puffing and sweating like a pig, deeply regretting my choice of shoe and even more deeply resenting whoever had misled us into believing that this was going to be some leisurely stroll- for that it was not. But I kept on keepin on, just following the footsteps of my baboosh sister Steph, dodging any loose rocks sent tumbling down the mountain by a misstep from someone up ahead. And then before I knew it I was spidermanning the mountain- desperately clutching onto loose rockface with all four of my limbs, stopping every so often to internally scream WHAT THE FUCK, before scrambling on upwards. After ten or so minutes of internal screaming and tingling of spidey senses, our fearless leader Tina brought our caravan to a halt to take a vote. We had two choices: to slip our way back down the perilous vertical gravel that we had just crawled up, or to just keep going to the next summit- which from our angle did not look like it was all that far off. I was the first to say hell to the NO I am not about to go back down that slippery slide of doom, but everyone else seemed to be in agreement- albeit they were much more mild-mannered about their preference. So we continued upward, and as it turned out the next summit WAS all that far off, but after another humbling twenty minutes of hugging rockface and silently freaking the fuck out, we had made it to our summit, and could rest without the fear of losing our balance and tumbling into the abyss. And amazingly, not far off from our summit was a beaten path, which we eagerly hopped on and followed to the top, and then back down again, at a leisurely pace- a stroll, if you will. Fatigued as we were, some of the members of our wolf pack started to lag on the way back down, but our fearless trail guides herded us back down as a full pack. Literally- they were (gently) whipping the girl who kept falling the furthest behind. I am pleased to report that we all made it back down in one piece, a little worse for the wear, but in one piece nonetheless. So our Christmas Eve morning turned into quite the Xtreme adventure- but that's just a day in the life in the Xtreme North.

So, faithful readers, stay tuned- for I am sure that there are more Xtreme adventures to come.

peace love and neon yellow flippy floppies.

-Nassara Sarah