136.Take a Hike

136.

Cameroon Border: I sleep fourteen hours in the mud room of a “hotel” and wake a bit stiff. There are no banks here but the owner of the little “hotel” I am staying in wants thirty US dollars to send to the Malta National Lottery so he exchanges some money for me.

This hotel owner is an “Ibo” which is some kind of tribesman. He says he and his family, two wives and six children, were hunted through the bush where they had to live “like monkeys” in Niger. Eleven months ago he crossed the border into Cameroon and invested his life’s savings in this miserable hotel but the title was not clear and he expects to lose “everything” shortly. He considers a win in the Malta National Lottery his last hope.

Walking out to find a market to buy something to eat, I meet a young man who offers to help me. He speaks some English and says his name is Tom. He says he hates Frenchmen because they sleep with black women and then beat them instead of giving them money.

He likes Americans because they are generous. This particular American is unfortunately too poor to be very generous but he says its OK because he just wants to practice his English anyway. Tom’s brother, who lives in Lagos, is a general and is famous for killing Ibos. The roads east are closed from flooding and it is almost seventy miles to Fort Lamy, Chad. I don't want to stay here so I guess I’ll walk it.

I buy some canned sardines, bread and canned milk and set out before dawn.

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