Fiehluna`s Journey E-Book

Fiehluna Assungwa

• Herausgeber: tredition
• Kategorie: Sachliteratur, Reportagen, Biografien
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 434

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2021

Beschreibung

The moving life story of a young woman from Cameroon to Germany. Fiehluna grows up in Cameroon with her very strict father and many siblings. Not only is he violent towards the whole family, but he also holds them as prisoners. His anger knows no bounds. But that doesn't stop Fiehluna from secretly meeting with friends and growing up like a normal girl. She is firmly convinced that her father is using the wrong parenting method, she wants to stop him. When Fiehluna turns 18 years old, she finally confronts her father.

Leseprobe

Fiehluna Assungwa

Fiehluna`s Journey

A true story of bravery and struggle for survival

Fiehluna Assungwa, born in Cameroon in 1981, studied economics at university. She has lived and worked in Germany since 2002.

In this book, Fiehluna talks about events that really happened to her. All names have been changed in order to protect privacy.

© 2021Fiehluna Assungwa

Verlag und Druck:

Tradition GmbH, Halenreie40-44, 22359 Hamburg

ISBN

Paperback:

978-3-347-23137-5

Hardcover:

978-3-347-23138-2

e-Book:

978-3-347-23139-9

Das Werk, einschließlich seiner Teile, ist urheberrechtlich geschützt. Jede Verwertung ist ohne Zustimmung des Verlages und des Autors unzulässig. Dies gilt insbesondere für die elektronische oder sonstige Vervielfältigung, Übersetzung, Verbreitung und öffentliche Zugänglichmachung.

I dedicate this book to everyone out there who is on a similar life journey.

Content

Abandoned

Hilda must be taken out of the picture

Father’s third wife

First meeting with Mother after four years

Transfer to Nkambe

Traditional healers

My wound treatment

True love

Breast ironing

Witch hunt

Political unrest

Class 3c

My selfmade sanitary pad

Children seeking shelter

My school uniform

He’s just my type

Welcome to M’mouck Fosemondi

Just take me please

My sports teacher

Will I be kicked out of school?

My text books

I’ll find my way

I’m caught in the middle

Sick with fear

His infidelity hits me hard

Rather real friends than a lot of money

Lack of trust

Reconciliation

Love chaos

Father’s responsibility

Flight

Good morning Douala

Kabah

University life

Job market

Can I break up?

All or None

The flood

The new search

Theft

How much is a passport?

Good night Cameroon

Abandoned

It is 6a.m. My siblings are getting ready to leave for school, dawdling more than usual. My eldest sister Sandy is rushing them, more frantic than usual. She always takes on the role of mother – when Mother doesn’t come out of her room. This morning though, Mother is here.

I am just four years old, but I can feel that there is something wrong. Today is not the usual scramble for jackets and bags and books. Mother is very sad. I can feel it. She holds me tight in her arms for a while and strokes me tenderly. As soon as she lets go of me, though, I see the pain in her eyes. I’m starting to panic. There are the packed suitcases at the door and I heard her invite a friend over to our house earlier this morning. Now I’m beginning to understand that she may be leaving us.

My younger sister, Hilda, looks at me. Her eyes are big and frightened. Mother is carrying her in a cloth wrapped around her back. Maybe she is taking Hilda with her. My other siblings and I are staying back.

Mother starts to pray, her eyes are wet, and she cries, pauses, cries again. She wipes her tears again and again. She loses her voice and keeps crying. Then she goes quiet for so long that I think she is ill and in pain.

“Mum! Are you feeling pains?” I ask, and grab her fingers with my small hand. She looks at me and tries to fake a smile, then shakes her head.

“No,” she says. “Everything is all right.”

I don`t believe her. I know that something has happened. She has never tried to hide her tears from us; it would have been pointless anyway. Even little me; I already know bad things are going on in our family. My older siblings are aware of it and more. But this morning, it is different. Mother must surely be crying about something worse.

“May God be with you, my children,” she says with a voice choking back tears, and then holds me very tight in her arms one more time. “My little one, I’m not proud of my actions today, but I have to do this, I have no other way and hope all of you will one day forgive me.” She looks straight into my eyes as she says this.

“I have to leave you.”I can feel her hands are shaking.

“Wherever I go, whatever I do, you’ll always be in my heart. I love you. Never forget that. I love you all so much and nothing can ever change that. You’re the reason why I’m still alive. But I have to leave now. I have to stay alive for you. I need my life back. I cannot go on like this.”She runs to her suitcases.

“I’ll visit you regularly, I promise!” She says this while weeping and kissing each and every one of us goodbye.

“I promise!”She repeats this over and over, walking faster. “I promise. I promise.”

I start to believe that she is actually leaving us. I run after her and grab her hand. I hold it so tight; it can stay tight in mine forever. I plan not to ever let go of this hand.

“Mum, where are you going?”I scream in tears. “Did father hit you last night? I didn’t hear you scream. Has he hurt you more?”

My mother tries to gently pry my hand off of hers while talking sweet words to me, but I can’t hear what she is saying. I’m weeping and screaming her name!

“Mum, mum!”I cannot imagine life without my mother.

Mother manages to remove my hand from hers. I quickly grab her dress.

“Mum no! Please don’t go!’ I beg. Her dress slips away. She is walking towards the terrace where her friend has been waiting with her suitcase. I run after her and grab her dress again and fall down. She tries to move but I’m clutching the dress so tight, she would have to drag me.

Help me, we have to leave now,” she says to her friend. She looks down at me with a desperate pity and understanding, removing my hands. She knows how I feel. “Let’s hurry up” she urges her friend.

I can’t understand why Mother’s friend is doing this to me. Why is she taking my mother away from me? Can’t she see how I’m crying?

“Mum no!”I scream again, and grab at my mother but her friend holds me back and tells my mum to run and leave the compound immediately. I cannot believe my eyes. I see my mother sprinting away from me.

All my siblings are crying. Sandy takes me from Mother’s friend, wrapping her arms around me firmly while Mother’s friend leaves too. Although we can’t see the car when it rounds a corner, we stand there screaming Mother’s name. The whole neighbourhood can surely hear us, but nobody comes. The neighbours are used to such noise coming from our home.

They all know from the time when they first tried to intervene for my mother, that it would be useless to say anything against my father. He is rich, and money can buy anything in Cameroon, even the police. When someone called the police on my father, they didn’t show up; instead they gave him the name of the caller. That made things worse.

Corporal punishment is lawful in Cameroon, in the schools and at home.

My mother decides on this particular morning in 1985 that she can no longer take this maltreatment. She is worn out. She has no strength left. This is the eighth time that she has left my father. Seven times she sneaked away to “visit” and he succeeded in convincing her to come back to him– mostly after three or four weeks. He always made her comeback.

This time, Mum will never come back. We know this time.

“Father should not hear any of this, no word to him,” Sandy says while we are on our way back from school. “Do you hear me?” I nod. I’ll do as Sandy says. She takes care of my siblings and me. My mother has always been unable to take care of us; she has always suffered from depression Although Sandy is just eleven years old, she is like a mother tome. She has always taken care of us.

It is 3p.m., father is back from work! The moment he gets into the house – he is screaming.

“I can’t see any food on the table. Why is my food not on the table, where is your mother, where is Hilda?” He yells like a madman.

“Cecilia!”

“Mother is not home,” Sandy says carefully. “She might have gone to the hospital. She hasn’t cooked anything. She hasn’t been feeling well since yesterday…”

“You don`t believe that! Nonsense!” My dad is completely out of control. He starts again on Hilda: “Where’s Hilda?”

“She must have gone with Mum to the hospital. I haven’t seen her since I came back from school this afternoon.” Sandy’s voice sounds quite relaxed as she lies to my father.

“You are just as mad as your mother!” He comes raging back.

“You are lying your head off. Tell me the truth, now!”But Sandy stays silent. Dad loses control. “Where is she? Tell me now!” He knows what has happened. He does not need to keep asking her. Sandy will never betray mum by telling him where she is. She has never done that, and will never do so. Dad knows this, so he yells even louder. I look at Sandy, she is just as scared as I am now, but her silence gives me more strength.

Father’s second wife, Pauline, in her apartment nearby can certainly hear father yelling at us. It’s not her business. What goes on in our apartment has never been her business. Moreover, she is pregnant at the moment and very busy with her own issues.

The problems between my parents have multiplied recently. Dad spends as much time with Pauline as possible. He has almost no time left for us. He doesn’t even eat with us. He is scared that my mother might poison him. This is ridiculous but he is very serious about it. He forces my mother to taste any food that she has prepared for him first. This humiliating act repeats itself every day. He takes a spoon and stirs the food all around in every dish until everything is well mixed then she has to taste it, again and again. Only after she has done this, will he eat the food. It’s so ludicrous, one could laugh about it, but in reality it is not at all funny. It’s extremely sad.

It is common in Cameroon for a woman to cook and serve food for her husband every day. It doesn’t matter how many wives the husband has, every woman in the household has to do the same.

My father is served in our apartment as well as in Pauline’s apartment, every day after work. He first of all goes and eats Pauline’s food, although my mother is a better cook than Pauline. That doesn’t matter to him; he wants to prove to Pauline that he loves her. Pauline is young and attractive. Father pleases her every day with this action and tries to make my mother jealous by doing this. This is just another humiliation for her. My father lets Mother know that Pauline is his favourite. He eats at Pauline’s first, with great joy, and then behaves with my mother as though his life is in danger.

I see this and feel very sorry for my mother. She is forced to watch Father take every opportunity to show Pauline how much he loves her. Pauline has been enjoying this right from the beginning. She demonstrates her love for my father openly, especially when my mother is around and can see it. This happens very often, since we live in the same house.

Pauline only comes to our part of the house to create problems. Father hits my mother every day because of Pauline. Pauline lies to Father and plots against my mother. Unfortunately Father is unable to see the truth. He is in love with his second wife and this makes him blind with hatred and disgust for my mother. He shows no interest, no matter what she says or does to prove her innocence. Even when she proves it, he intentionally ignores it.

Mother always says: “The truth shall come out, sooner or later. One day, he shall be able to recognise the truth. I’m innocent and God knows that.” She prays: “It might be too late but he shall see the truth.”

Her wish does not come to pass. His anger has no boundaries and my mother is his biggest victim. Even when Pauline sneaked kerosene into the food served by Mother he did not believe that Mother hadn’t done it to kill him. He beat the living hell out of her. The kerosene is why she has to taste all the food she serves for him before he eats. He calls her a murderer– a threat to his life.

Father does not care that Mother is depressed. The only thing that matters to him is her obedience. She has to make sure that he sees us kids whenever he wants and that she be available for him whenever he needs her.

“Has your mother gone man-hunting again?” Father starts again angrily. “Where is my daughter? I told her not to leave with my Hilda! I have always told her that very clearly.” He walks up and down, waving his arms. His eyes are sparkling with hatred. He looks at us keenly, and then searches the apartment. His breath sounds heavy and difficult like a long-distance runner, not out of exhaustion or resignation but out of anger.

The moment he gets into Mother’s room, he realises that her suitcases are all missing. He tears open the doors of her wardrobe. Her clothes are all gone. He starts yelling as loud as a lion and angrily slams the wardrobe door. It sounds like a pistol shot – a terrible bang.

“Where is she?” He is hysterical now. It seems like he really has no idea where she is. We remain silent. I look up at Sandy; she`s nervous but still says nothing. She will never betray mother. No matter what happens.

“The whore has taken my daughter to her men!” Father screams and stares at Sandy as if he wants to hold her responsible for that, but Sandy does not even blink.

“My daughter should not be taken when she goes to hustle! How often do I have to tell her this?” he yells and waits for our answer but we say nothing, so he adds: “The moment your mother leaves this house she gives in to any man who comes her way, absolutely! Anybody who wants can have her… and she thinks that they are serious about loving her; she thinks that she is young and pretty. What a fantasy! She’s just lying to herself. Those days are gone, she just needs to look in the mirror and she’ll see the truth. Her face is full of wrinkles; her stomach is old and flabby. Which man would like to have such a woman? No man, absolutely no one! That’s the main reason why she has to walk the streets– In order to survive. She’ll never find a decent man!”

Father is so angry that he gasps for breath. “But not with my child! I will teach this woman a lesson she will never forget. She must have forgotten with whom she is dealing.”He stands straight and opens his body to become much bigger and taller than he actually is, then combatively stretches his chin to the front. “Not with me Madame, not with Peter Assungwa!” Then, in this horrible state, he leaves the house through the front door, calling out, “Sandy, take care of your siblings, I’ll be back soon!”

Pauline cannot believe her ears when she hears that Father is walking away without saying a word to her. She shouts “My husband! Please don’t trouble yourself because of that mad woman, let her go, she is not even important, remember? Think about us. I’ve cooked your favourite meal. Come and eat and have some rest. You have had a stressful day. My darling, please come back, you know I need you here now.”

But he does not listen to her. He leaves without even turning to look in her direction. She is at first surprised, then angry. My father has always listened to her since she has lived in our house. Maybe she assumed that it would always be like that. Now, she is beginning to realise that might not be the case. She looks sad as she walks back to her apartment but her fists are clenched. We can see the anger in her body and her expressions, in spite of how disappointed she is.

We can also hear her muttering. “Don´t let this wicked woman inconvenience us!” She is talking to herself but we can hear every word.

My father comes back home a few hours later. He looks very tired and frustrated; his voice is still shaking when he asks us if we have had dinner. We tell him that Sandy made us dinner so we’ve already eaten. We wish him good night.

The next morning, he says, “Sandy! You’re now responsible for your siblings. Here is money for food and here is money in case of emergency should any of you fall sick and have to be taken to hospital. I have to go and look for your mother and find out where she has taken my daughter. I searched all over the town for her yesterday but nobody knows where that whore is hiding. She’s got my child! I will teach her a lesson that she will never forget. This mad woman has taken my child with her, my baby girl!”

This night, Father is not sleeping in Pauline’s apartment. He spends a few hours in my mother’s bed. The rest of the night, he is just pacing up and down in our apartment. He comes to our bedroom again and again, gazes at us silently and then goes back out. We try to fall asleep when we can but in the end, we give up and open our eyes wide so we can make out if he is still standing in our bedroom or not.

None of us knows what it means. We cannot sleep this night. We can hear him walking up and down in the living room; the lights are all switched off. At one point, he is just sitting in the dark. Maybe he is thinking about mother and about what he will do to her when he finds her. These thoughts frighten me and I bury myself under the blanket. Leaving the house the next morning, he repeats that Sandy should take care of us. I’m surprised. Normally, he should have asked Pauline to look after us in his absence.

This is the usual way in Cameroon when a man has more than one wife. The second or another one of his wives automatically becomes the surrogate mother of her stepchildren when their mother is not around. But Father, who has always valued tradition, does not want to apply this tradition to his second wife! Maybe he thinks that Pauline does not treat us well when she is alone with us.

Pauline has never been subordinate to Mother. My mother is the first wife; she is older and knows more about life than Pauline. However, Pauline refused to listen to her, right from the start. To her, mother and she are just wives of the same man. That’s why she thinks they have equal rights. But that’s not true and she knows that deep down, I’m sure. She wants it to be this way; she does not want to be the second wife who has to be subordinate to the first wife. Actually according to the country’s law, she does not have to be subordinate to my mother; it does not matter anymore, whether one gets married traditionally or in court.

The traditional wedding often takes place a few days before the court wedding and the church wedding. The traditional wedding alone is sometimes enough for some families – a ceremony in which the bride’s family officially hands her over to the man. This normally takes place in the house of the bride.

The family of the bride receives a bride price. How much the bride price is; depends on both families involved. It is always different. Some families request a huge amount of money; others want just material things like land or cars. Some families have the groom pay the school fees of one or more family members for a period of time or even sponsor them completely for a defined period. The two families – the male members of both families – bargain about the bride price before they finally come to an agreement, depending on what qualities the bride has. These qualities could be beauty, educational level or character. The bride herself never takes part in such a ceremony. After agreeing on the bride price, there is a big party in which there are, amongst other things, performances of jokes, theatre acts and food. As there are almost 300 ethnic groups in Cameroon, the traditional wedding is celebrated differently in each group.

Polygamy is allowed in either a traditional or court wedding in Cameroon but not in a church wedding. The church forbids polygamy. Legally all of the wives officially have equal opportunities. But in reality, it is different. A woman who only gets married traditionally accepts as a given that her husband can get married to other women anytime. She has no option. The man just gets himself a new wife when he deems it necessary. In this case, polygamy takes place without consulting the wife.

Polygamy allows the man to get married to as many wives as he wants, there is no limit. In the case of a court wedding, the woman has to accept polygamy in writing, allowing her husband to get married to other wives if he wants. Most women actually chose polygamy as a form of marriage, as the society would look at her as a bad woman who just wants to own the man and maltreat him if she chooses monogamy. This actually brings shame on herself and her family. Even if a man respects his wife’s decision to choose monogamy, her name is ruined and the relationship to her future family-in-law is destroyed.

People still believe in Cameroon that a man should have the possibility of getting married to as many wives as he can afford. As women cost a lot of money, a man who can afford to have many wives is arrogant and is held in high esteem, for everyone can see from the start how wealthy and successful he is.

*

Two days later, Father comes back home with Hilda in his arms. He is escorted by the police. As a wealthy contractor, he had no problems getting the police to assist him in finding my mother.

“I found my child,” Father tells us with both pride and anger. “That whore really took her to the streets.”

We are all silent.

He continues: “When I got to Buea, I saw my daughter sitting in a sewer, playing with stinking garbage while your mother was on the streets. She will pay for this!”

This evening, father ignores Pauline and concentrates on Hilda; he is taking care of her. He goes shopping the next day. He cannot stop Hilda from missing our mother, but he can calm her down by giving her all that she wants. From this day on, Father treats my little sister like a queen. Pauline is not important to him anymore. She stands next to him and watches him embrace Hilda and looks as if she has been slapped.

Father doesn’t want to tell us how our mother is doing, and where she is now. When any of us ask him, he starts yelling and insulting my mother.

I only learned a few years later what exactly happened to her when my father found her and Hilda in Buea. It was my mother who told me that my father went to her father’s house in the village with an escort of eight policemen. They threatened to put my grandparents in jail if they did not tell them where my mother was hiding with Hilda. They had no other option. They told him about my mother’s hideout in Buea. My father went to Buea, and the police arrested my mother, took her to Bamenda and put her in pre-trial detention. They just grabbed Hilda away from her.

He went to my mother and told her to either come back to us and stay, or else leave him and never see us again. Mother decided to leave him.

Father was of course very angry and abandoned her there in detention. Some friends heard about this, donated some money and sent two well-known businessmen to go and bail her out. They paid a caution of a huge amount of money. This is how she got out after ten days in detention.

I wonder if my father has an idea how Mother finally got out of detention. I can’t imagine what he would do if he knew that these two men actually helped h

Hilda must be taken out of the picture

After we understand that Mother will never come back to us, we try to find our way back to a normal day-to-day life without her. Sandy takes care of us as usual and takes the place of our mother. Pauline only comes in from time to time. We let her do as she likes. She is always very reluctant to do anything that concerns us, but she has almost no other choice. Father only works half days now.

He stays at home and looks after us together with his mother because she came the moment she hears that our mother has left and won’t come back. She tries to make things work and to make sure that we continue to lead a normal family life. She and Sandy are a good combination. My father is satisfied. Now he can fully concentrate on taking care of Hilda, his favourite.

Hilda is often ill now. She constantly takes medication. One day, Sandy is just opening the syrup bottle when we get back home from school; we run up to her and hope to have a bit of it. This medication is sweet and yummy. We all want to lick the spoon as soon as Hilda has finished taking her medication. But Sandy has a strange look on her face and shakes her head.

“There is something wrong,” she says, smelling the medication. She wrinkles her forehead, thinks and then sniffs the bottle again. She lifts it up and takes a keen look at the liquid.

“It even looks strange,” she says. “Taste it!”

She pours a bit of syrup in a spoon and has Felicitas taste it. Then we all taste a bit of it. The syrup has a strange taste, Sandy is right.

“Let’s wait until Father comes back from work, he should decide whether Hilda should take it or not.”Sandy decides and we support her.

The moment Father comes back from work, Sandy tells him. He asks for the bottle, opens it, smells the medication in it and horribly twists his face.

“Someone has poured kerosene in the bottle!” His anger is growing, he is getting louder, and his face becomes red. He peers at every one of us, not as if he wants to hold us responsible but because he thinks we might know the person responsible for this act.

He calls together everyone living in our house, including the three families renting apartments. Father makes his suspicions about the tampering and his fury very clear – no beating around the bush. The first reaction of those present is to defend themselves. Then there are murmurs making it clear that they find it sick and they ask out loud how someone could do such a thing. Who is capable of committing such an act? Some say that it must be a mistake and they whisper about whether it’s really true that something was poured in Hilda’s bottle? Father does not get distracted by such reactions and holds back his temper. He is determined.

Hilda’s medication always stands on the fireplace in the living room and the door to the room is never locked. It could have been anyone who has access to the living room. The people are horrified by these hidden accusations and deny having anything to do with it. Father loses his patience and decides to visit a voodoo doctor the next day.

“He will tell me who is responsible for this,” he warns. “And you can be sure that the offender shall not go unpunished!”

Everyone announces they will go with father to the voodoo doctor. No one opposes this decision.

As promised, the following day, all of the adults in the house go with Father to the voodoo doctor. Later in the evening, some of the tenants tell us how it went.

Everyone was able to fit into Father’s large Land Rover. After a fifteen-minute drive, Pauline asked Father to stop and let her urinate. Father stopped the car and she disappeared in a large corn farm close to the street. They sat there and waited for over fifteen minutes but Pauline did not show up. They were sure that something must have gone wrong, so Father asked the rest to go and look for Pauline but she was nowhere to be found. Everyone was speechless. Nobody said it out loud but everybody knew then what the truth was. Pauline was the one who poured that kerosene in Hilda’s medication. Father did not say a word about that. They drove back home.

When Pauline gets back home, everyone is quiet. We all stare silently at her. Even Father says nothing. They exchange glances. No explanation as to what happened at the corn farm, no apologies, no excuses. The moment she leaves the room, we can see how angry Father is. He now knows exactly what kind of a person Pauline is!

I wonder if he is now thinking about all the lies that Pauline used to tell him about my mother or something else. But I can see in his face that he is seriously thinking. Actually, from this day on, he does not eat at Pauline’s house anymore. He avoids her as much as possible and only sleeps in our apartment. His love for Pauline is dead, everyone can see it. He doesn’t even try to fake it.

Even when Pauline later on gives birth to another son, Father has not changed his way of thinking about her. He is thinking about something else now; he needs a surrogate mother for us. Pauline has been disqualified. He needs another wife.

Father’s third wife

Angelina is a very pretty woman, tall with light skin and wonderful teeth. She has a fantastic shape, long straight legs and a charming face. She is sitting next to my grandmother and my aunt laughing and talking about everyday life. I walk up to the women and greet them cordially. Angelina gives me a warm smile. I like her already.

“Grandma!” That’s the voice of my father, and he means me. Father calls me Grandma because I am named after his grandmother Fiehluna and since he never called his grandmother by her name, he also does not call me by my name. It is not said as a joke but it is a form of respect.

“Grandma!” he calls again. “Come!” I obey. “This is my new wife,” he introduces her formally to my siblings and me. “From now on, she will be your mother. Respect and obey her. Understood?”

“Yes!” we all answer.

I find it a bit funny, as it’s a big surprise for me. I have almost no time to think about what it will be like to have a new mother. At first glance, she doesn’t look like a woman who could be my mother. In fact, Angelina doesn’t look older than my elder sister, Sandy, who is just thirteen years old. I stand there and feel like I have just received a new sister. But Angelina is not my sister; she is my father’s new wife and automatically my new mother.

Pauline treats Angelina right from the start with much hatred and reluctance. She is not only envious because we all get along very well with Angelina but our love for Angelina grows everyday she spends with us. She is friendly, warm- hearted, understanding and always ready to help – just like a mother should be. Pauline sees this and grimaces. She is obviously looking for an opportunity to make Angelina’s life a living hell. We have already warned Angelina.

Angelina is one of us; we are a team, helping each other. Pauline is not able to cope with that. She sees it and does not want to believe it. When she sees Angelina and Hilda together, she turns and leaves. The fact that we are all happy again for the first time since Mother left is killing Pauline inside. She keeps isolating herself from us more and more; no one knows what she is thinking.

One night, my father hears Oliver crying and looks at his watch; it is 2 o’clock in the morning. He is crying incessantly. Father is surprised. Why can’t Pauline stop him from crying? He takes his spare key and opens the main door of Pauline’s apartment after having knocked for a while to see what’s going on. He finds Oliver screaming in his bed. Pauline is nowhere to be found. My father wakes us up immediately; he even wakes the tenants and asks them to come with him. He then tells us how he found Oliver on his own. Father is furious, off the wall; he wants a divorce from Pauline. All of us kids and tenants are his witnesses; he wants us to confirm that Pauline is a bad woman. (He can’t just get a divorce, he needs a solid reason, and he has one now!)Especially since he has found a ladder in the yard and another one in the living room. Pauline must have gone out through the ceiling. She did not want anybody to hear her leave or to wake up anyone. My father removes the ladder from the living room and asks everyone to be quiet. We are now standing in Pauline’s living room in the middle of the night waiting for her to comeback.

About two hours later, we finally hear a sound above on the roof. It is Pauline. She is standing up there staring down into the living room with her six-month- old son in a cloth wrapped around her back at 4 o’clock in the morning. None of us would have thought this could be possible but we see it with our own eyes.

She has no idea how she will get down to the floor without the ladder. It’s about four metres from the floor to the ceiling. It takes a while for her to understand what has happened. The moment she realises that she is being watched, she unties her son and holds him tight to her chest. My father starts behaving as if he does not know who it is on the ceiling.

“That’s him, there’s a burglar above, on my ceiling!”He screams so loud that everyone gets frightened. He points to Pauline.

“There’s the burglar on my roof. Please come very fast and help me!”He screams louder and starts yelling as if he has a gun. “If you move, I shoot!”

“No! Please don’t shoot, it’s me, Pauline!” she cries.

“Pauline! What are you doing on the roof at this time of night? Where are you coming from, what are you doing out there with my child at this hour?”

“I went to fetch Mongwin,” says Pauline and lifts up a 0.7 litre container with eight of these insects. She knows that my father will only get angrier with her. Father has banned us all from catching Mongwin. But she has no other way to help herself out of this.

This insect is a delicacy in Cameroon and is mostly hunted during the Christmas season. They are located and caught at night. People go out for hours at night anywhere there are big security lights to catch Mongwin. They catch dozens of them and sell or eat them the next day. Roasted Mongwin is outstandingly tasty. But that does not matter to my father right now.

“Are you insane?” he yells. “Stay where you are! This can’t be true. Don’t move! Do you hear me? I’ll go and get your uncle now; he should see what you do at night. I want him to see you standing up there with his own eyes.” Father then leaves for Pauline’s uncle at 4: 30 in the morning.

Pauline doesn’t want to stay and wait for her uncle to see her standing on the roof of our house, so she starts making moves to jump down. We cannot believe our eyes but she is serious about it. She throws her son down first. Patrick safely falls in the outstretched hands of one of the women there. Then she jumps and even she survives the jump uninjured. When father hears about this, he is as speechless as Pauline’s uncle.

After this incident, father asked Pauline several times to go back to her parents but she refuses. My father gets angry but Pauline still doesn’t want to leave and defends herself.

They start fighting every night and day. Even when Pauline is carrying Patrick on her back, she starts a fight with my father. It looks like she doesn’t care whether her son falls out of her backcloth or gets hit. His cries don’t bother her; she yells even louder and drowns out her crying son. She throws everything she gets her hands on at my father. He is in a fury and her screaming, quirky voice can be heard throughout the whole neighbourhood.

It doesn’t bother her that the whole neighbourhood is talking about it. She is determined to set the neighbours against my father. She goes to all of them every day and night and tells lies as well as half-true stories about my father. As soon as she hears my father say something negative about somebody, she runs and tells the neighbour concerned. She is always outside.

One day after many weeks, she realises that it makes no sense to go on like that. She takes her youngest son, Patrick and leaves us. But my father goes to her parents and brings Patrick back to us. After all that we have been through with Pauline, nobody is sad about her leaving us. Even Sandy says nothing. In fact, I can see her face lighten up. She doesn’t tell me why she is so happy that day and I don’t want to ask her. Her good mood makes me happy as well.

First meeting with Mother after four years

Not long after, Sandy is extremely happy again. She is aglow on this Friday morning. She is outside, visiting neighbours, bargaining and talking with relatives. After a while, as I find this strange, I ask, “What’s wrong with you?”

“We are going to Mommy Peter,” Sandy replies.

“Why?”

“We are visiting her!”

We are to visit Maim! But we are going to visit her at the house of a neighbour who raises poultry watched over by four aggressive dogs. I was once bitten by one of these dogs and I’ve been afraid of them ever since. I have avoided this woman’s house, but I have to go there today because Sandy says so. I’m scared and Sandy’s good mood cannot help me.

Just when we are about to reach Mommy Peter’s house, I see a woman running to us with widely spread arms. At first, I have no idea who she is; she looks very pretty and is very well dressed. I only realise this is our mother when she embraces me and holds me so tightly I feel like she will never let go of me. I stand there with my mouth wide open, not moving. I can barely say a word, even minutes later. I can’t believe it but she is really the one, our mother!

“Mama!”I suddenly scream as loud as I can and throw myself at her. This is the first time that I have seen her since she left us four years ago. She has changed a lot but I feel now that I would recognise her in a group of a million people. She is my mother. I thought of her every day. I saw her face in front of me and heard her voice in my head every hour. I remember her smiles. I have not forgotten anything; I remember the sound of her crying.

She sobs just as on the day that she was leaving us, the only difference is that she looks happy today. I stick on her like a bur and do not want to ever let go of her.

“Mama, are you staying with us?” I ask and hold her tightly when she tries to let go of my hand in order to embrace the others.

“No darling, I’m just here for a visit."

She holds Hilda tight but my little sister doesn’t react to that, she has never really known who her mother is. Mother had worried she would react this way. She is a bit sad but I see she understands. She wipes away her tears. “How are you doing, my angels? Come and let’s cuddle.”

We just stand there, embracing each other and crying. Nobody is taking note of the clock. It’s so nice. I could just stand here forever; this moment should never come to an end.

“The kids have to go back, Cecilia, let them go,” the neighbour says. “Their father will soon be back from work and you know what he would do to Angelina if he found out that she granted you access to the children! You are not even supposed to visit them, remember?”

My mother nods and knows that she is right; she has to let us go now.

Mother says goodbye to each of us and we answer with tears in our eyes, except for Hilda who only says, “Goodbye mammy!”She is the only one who is not crying, but she will now remember what her mother looks like. I want Mother to stay but it isn’t possible.

Not long after we arrive home, Father also comes back from work. When he asks us what we have been doing all day long, we say in chorus that we were at home. He hears that and is satisfied. My father has no reason to doubt us; we are behaving just like every other day. Living with my father has made us become very wise, we know exactly how to lie to him.

That’s how we are with him a few days later when he decides to meet with my mother again. Very early in the morning, he tells us not to go to school to our great surprise. We’re not even allowed to play with the kids in our neighbourhood that day. We get no explanation for that, even Angelina’s questions concerning that remain unanswered.

Our mother later on tells us that he forbade us from going to school so that she would not be able to visit us there. She had contacted him the day before to let him know that she is around for a few days and would like to see us.

They meet in a pub as my father wouldn’t go to the house of her brothers who live in the same town as us, saying that it was her family who had convinced her to leave him. While they’re in the pub, he asks her one more time to come back to him and live with us but my mother still says no. Then he tells her emphatically that she will never see us again. She begs him just to be able to embrace us one more time but he refuses.

This is no surprise. My mother had anticipated that, which is why she secretly met us earlier with the help of our neighbours before informing him that she was in town. Father has no idea about all of this. He believes that he can blackmail my mother by refusing her wish to meet with us. Also, when she told him that she was ready to contribute to sponsoring my sister, Sandy, in a boarding school, he immediately declined saying he does not know how Mother gets her income and that she should come back to him if she wants to help her children. This topic is over. Father thinks that he has won, he has no idea.

On that same day that we met mother she had met Angelina on that morning to beg for her permission to see us. Mother knew that she could never see us without Angelina’s help. When Mother told Angelina the bitter truth, Angelina immediately agreed to assist her.

Although she is still very young without her own kids, Angelina can imagine how hard it is for a mother not to be granted access to her children. Angelina is not only a surrogate mother to us, but also a good friend.

If Pauline were still in our house, meeting mother would have been impossible. Mother knows that and is very happy to hear what has happened between Pauline and my father. Father has no idea that we met Mother on that day; neither does he know about our regular meetings with her that take place every subsequent December.

Transfer to Nkambe

Angelina has been living with us for two years now. To me, she is a sister and a friend. She plays Dodging, Siezo, Tabala and Reresin with us. She spends more and more time with us although she has given birth to her first son, Mike. My father seldom sees Mike; he has been transferred to Nkambe where he is building a new bridge.

“We will move to Nkambe in a months’ time,” says my father one day after work. “You’ll go to a new school.”

Felicitas and Sandy are not happy about this; they have a lot of friends in Bamenda and do not want to leave the town. They go to my father and tell him that they would love to stay in Bamenda, in our house. Father could visit them regularly. He won’t even consider it.

‘That’s out of question!” he yells and nods his head angrily.

“I won’t leave my children alone in Bamenda. Go to your room, immediately! I don’t want to ever hear such a thing again. You are just fifteen and thirteen years old. It’s not possible!”

A truck comes to us from father’s company several days before we are to leave Bamenda. The driver and two other men load the truck with our furniture. We have already packed our suitcases; we stand next to it and watch how the men work.

The truck drives off as soon as it is fully loaded. We stay behind with our suitcases. We drive two days later in father’s car to Nkambe.

It takes twelve hours for us to arrive at Nkambe. It’s a difficult journey and we take many breaks. Our first break is in Santah, then in Nde where our father shows us the Nde plantation. This plantation is the largest tea producer in the North West Province. We drink this tea in our home but nobody has ever thought about how a tea plant looks or how tea is produced. I’m very impressed by this and I look at it very carefully. My father tells us the history of this plantation before we have to continue our journey.

Our next stop is Bansoh hospital; this is one of the largest hospitals in the North West Province of Cameroon. Some of the best doctors in the whole country work there.

We can see the Jakiri Mountain just a few hours away from Bansoh in front of us. This is the highest mountain in the North West Province of Cameroon.

We get to the foot of the mountain. My father decides to cool down the engine with cold water and let the car stand for about fifteen minutes before we start up the mountain. But finally, the car won’t start. We all get out and push it but the mountain is too steep. We are still near the bottom. Our water reserve will be gone soon and my father is flummoxed. There is no water in this area. No lakes, no streams, not even a rill or a pool. Father gets mad; he knows that his car will not survive the journey through the mountains without more water.

He leaves in search of water. He walks two kilometres before he meets some villagers that give him some. He comes back to us and we continue our journey. He stops every ninety minutes to look for water again. That’s how slowly we progress. We finally arrive in Nkambe around 8 p.m.

I really like our new house. The walls are painted light green and the six rooms are very nicely furnished. I go around the house and look for the children’s room. It really feels good to move after the long journey. I can feel how tired I am while standing under the shower. As soon as I’ve left the bathroom, I fall on my bed and sleep like a baby. Felicitas and Sandy are sad because they are afraid that they will never see their friends again. They just sit on their bed unable to sleep.

We meet our neighbours the next day. They are friendly; we know that we will soon find new friends. Sandy and Felicitas start to feel better very quickly. Their homesickness doesn’t last long, and their new friends take their minds off it. Otherwise it wouldn’t have worked. They cannot make phone calls to their old friends. There are no mobile phones yet, and only a few families have landlines. When a person owns a house telephone in the neighbourhood, other neighbours just give the number to their relatives to call them at that house, whenever they want. The owner either takes a message or asks the caller to wait for them to go and get the neighbour in case of an emergency. I really like this willingness of our neighbours to help. This is the only way for us to make phone calls, as there is no telephone booth in the whole town. Even though we have this opportunity to make phone calls, we almost never call, as it costs a lot of money to call someone. Receiving calls, on the other hand, is free of charge.

It’s cheaper to send letters but it also takes forever for it to arrive at its destination, if it arrives at all. That is why we often give our letters to people who are coincidentally going to the same destination as our letter. This is not always the case, though. So Felicitas and Sandy lose touch with their old friends due to limited means of communication.

Mike is always very ill; he spends two weeks at home and the next two weeks in the hospital and then all over again. He does not really get well. One illness follows the other: fever, malaria, typhoid and swollen eyes. There is no limit. Finally, my father and Angelina decide to take him to Bansoh hospital. They are not very happy about this; for they will have to go without my other siblings and me.