Cement, Comedy, Confusion, Non-Alliterative Personal Growth

In Lebamba, everyone knows how to mix cement by hand. Seriously. Everyone. They apparently come out of the womb, recipe in hand. Furthermore, There Is No Other Way to mix cement. If you stray from the recipe even by a bit, there's a good chance life as we know it will come to an end.

Given that, it's somewhat difficult for me to help mix the cement, as I have not been brought up in the ways of dogmatic cement mixing. Whatever kind of underwear they wear out here is never so efficiently twisted as when I mix cement wrong.

Story example: For the recipe, first one lays down a pad of sand. Then, one puts however many sacks of cement correlates to however much sand you have. Then, one cuts open the bags of cement, and then flips the cement onto the sand.

One time, I saw the guys cutting open the cement bags with a shovel. They aimed the point of the shovel at the edge of the bag, and then stabbed. Not an efficient method, but it worked. I thought that this was the way, and so the next time we mixed cement, when it came time to cut open the bags, I jumped forward, eager to apply my new knowledge.

I think literally three of the four guys yelled at me in unison. Not like an angry yell, like a "what are you a crazy person?" yell.

Then one of them with a pocket knife stepped up and delicately sliced the bags open. Clearly, this was the way.

After laugh-crying myself to sleep that night, which is a fascinating experience I recommend highly, I got to thinking.

These people don't need me.

The only thing I have to offer, as far as my human self, is western thoughts, western ideals, western money. And even if those things do help in a ridiculously significant way, i.e. they live the rest of their lives in comfort, they can't help with any sort of permanence. They can't take it with them when they go.

My help here has no intrinsic value, it is the reason behind the help that is what makes it valuable.

I am not the savior of these people. It sounds obvious when you say it like that, but I think subconciously, that's sort of something that we as Americans think. We are the rich. We will give money to the poor, and then they will be happy. Go us.

But as Christians, we're not called to be the savior, we already have one of those. We are called to be the messenger. If the most effective way to send a message is to help (and it often is, as actions speak louder than words), then so be it. But we are not called simply to help. We are called to show the love of Christ. This is good, because that means we can apply it anywhere- you don't have to go to Africa to be a Christian. People in America might not need help like people in Gabon, but they certainly need love.

It's a bird! It's a plane! It's the 44th President of the United States of America!

I have to introduce the Gabonese concept of Barack Obama with a story. The first time I heard his name in this country, I was in town with Mr. Paul and the crew. We had just dropped off some gigantic boards to be planed, and so we were waiting by the truck. I was hanging out with the guys, Mr. Paul was off figuring out costs and whatnot.

One of them, Igor, pointed just behind me and said "Barack Obama".

Now, I'll have to put the story on pause for just a second to put you in the correct frame of mind, that is to say, mine.

The entire crew I work with speaks French, with the exception of Mr. Paul and myself, who both speak only English (effectively). To bridge this gap, there's a lot of joking around, using the few French and English words everyone knows. Igor is the biggest jokester of them all, by a good bit.

So naturally, I assumed he was kidding with me. I laughed, and arched my eyebrows in a sort of genial, "yeah, sure" manner.

His face became more serious. Unfortunately for the sake of communication however, I was aware of his amazing ability for Poker Facedness.

He pointed again, said "Barack Obama," then indicated drinking, and then dancing.

Well now I was thoroughly confused.

I asked him, in French, if he was talking about a club. He said yes, then "Barack Obama" again.

So, piecing together what I have so far, Igor, the Eternal Jester, was telling me that the President of my country was drinking and dancing at a club in Lebamba, Gabon.

So I'm laughing again, because, y'know, comedy.

But now the rest of them get serious faces.

They point again, and say "No, that is Barack Obama."



Ladies and Gentlemen, Barack Obama is the name of a nightclub in Lebamba, Gabon.

And this my friends, is their ode to him, among other things. I've also seen his face on Grocery bags that say

"Thank You"

and then below that

"BARACK OBAMA"

And it had a picture of him. On the grocery bag. Barack Obama is a sort of unlicensed superhero over here. Slap his picture on something, and it's got instant cool factor.

Of Praise Bands and Mafia Gangs.

You know that Uncle you probably have or had, that reached out and "stole" your nose? and then he always says something to the effect of "haha! Got yer nose!"

This title is like that Uncle. Haha! Got your attention!

But seriously. Lets talk about praise bands. Mafia gangs in a bit.

Everyone has heard of the classic African praise style- A Capella, clapping, in a mud hut, with harmonies aplenty. Those are lovely, but you've heard of them, chances are you've heard them, and there isn't much more I can say about them.

I'm here to talk about western-influenced praise band style worship- I think there's more for us to learn there, in a practical sense.

Mafia time- I've decided to use a gang of mafioso's performing a shakedown to translate the sound I'm describing into a picture, for your imagination and amusement.

In the classic mafia scenario, lets say there are four guys. There's the big guy, the one holding a weapon menacingly, the normal looking one that highlights the oddness of the other three, and the one with a brooklyn accent that does all the talking.

The "classic" (classic here meaning, the one I just came up with in my head that happens to work for my metaphor) mafia shakedown can be related to a praise band thusly:

The big guy in the back is the bass. He doesn't say much, but he sits in the back nodding in agreement to what brooklyn accent guy says. He makes you take it seriously.

The one holding the weapon is the drummer. He punctuates the words of brooklyn accent guy by thwacking a rusty pipe against his palm. Or... some scary blunt object. Work with me.

The normal looking guy is the keyboard. It's normal. It's background sound. It is the canvas upon which the paints rest- there's texture, but not much color.

And brooklyn accent guy is the guitar. America's favorite instrument. Whether acoustic or electric, this instrument tends to do the most talking, musically speaking.

This is all well and good. Similar instruments are used here. The key difference I want to draw attention to is the blend.

In America praise music is very guitar-centric. African praise music has no center of attention. The bass, drums, keyboard, and guitar all speak their parts. They take turns, to a certain extent, but each is always moving in accordance with the others. Their volumes are equally audible, and each player is the master of his or her instrument. This gives the music a full, rich, gutsy sound that moves the audience. American praise music sounds skeletal in comparison.

I did not understand a single word of the song. It was in French, sung over nearly dead speakers very quickly. But the music spoke of a praise that words could not. I think we could learn from the vivacity of, and hard work put into, African praise music.

Foods You Have Probably Not Eaten

Organized by the order in which I remember them.

Manioc- This is Gabonese health food. A common ribbing amongst the guys I work with is "what's the matter? Didn't you eat your manioc?" The Gabonese eat every part of this plant. The leaves are like a bitter spinach, which isn't too bad, and very healthy. The roots are gigantic, have no nutritional value whatsoever, and taste like sour rubber. They are valuable, however, because if you eat it, you won't be hungry for the rest of the day. Probably because the manioc is too busy bouncing around in your stomach to move on to the rest of the digestive system. Manioc root is much tastier with hot sauce and soy sauce. Still pretty weird.

Plaintain- When green, banana shaped potato. When yellow, less tasty banana.

Breadfruit- Edible a couple of ways- mature and immature. Similar to a plantain, if you eat it when it's green, it's very potato-like. If you eat it after it's changed from green to brown, It's a sort of semi-sweet fruit. So far I've only had a chance to eat the green stuff, as breadfruit fries. I cut them into big flat squares. Since breadfruit has holes in the part you eat (imagine a cross section of bread- very similar, hence the name) that's the best way to cut them for frying. I've heard of recipies involving breadfruit, butter, and brown sugar that I'm interested to try, but so far I haven't seen a ripe one available.

Spiky Pear- This is the weirdest fruit I've ever tasted. It's kind of a cross, flavor wise, between pear and pineapple. That's not weird. The weird part is the texture. It has the texture of beef jerky. Except slimy. Which doesn't make it sound appetizing, but in fact it is delicious. It's also enormous. The French term for it is "Heart of Beef" which describes it's size and shape. It's green, and has little spikes all over it.

Tuna Fish with an expiration date from 2009- Yeah. It was delicious.

Itangas- These are tough to describe. They're about the perfect size to fit in a closed fist, and are bright purple. Some people say they smell like turpentine. They kinda do.  They have a large pit inside. To cook them (they're no good raw) you boil water, then remove it from heat and pour it over a plate of itangas. The skin bleaches a tiny bit, and then they're ready. Then you put either salt or sugar on them (I like brown sugar- the flavors meld well) and eat the green inside part and the purple skin off of the pit. Very tasty snack.

Powdered fortified milk- is actually better than the carton milk. Similar tastes, but the powder stuff is a zillion times more reliable and less scary. Kind of annoying to have to "build" every glass of milk you make, but worth the work to avoid instant death by milk. Cuz that's a lame way to die.

Raw Peanuts- Did you even know there was such a thing? Turns out that they're not really nuts, they share a family with peas. When raw, the meat of it is very similar to raw sugar snap peas. Yum. Also very good boiled.

That's all I remember right now.

Personal update thang- I'm doing pretty well. French is coming along at what feels like a snails pace, but I'm able more and more to understand people, and even have discussions with people who only speak French. I will post soon about the Gabonese love for Barack Obama, which is hilarious and bizarre.