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E.N.V.B.
De Eerste Nederlandsche Voetbalboeken Boekhandel
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How
to win a football match in Cameroon
An
anthropological study of Africa's most popular sport
De
gehuurde spelersbus van Olympique de Buea
Thursday
“There's
a knock on my door. Another knock. And again. I open the door of my room, still
only half dresses and very sleepy. Essomba and a few other players are standing
on my porch. ‘What is this?’ Essomba asks me. ‘The sun is already
up. And you should be too!’
Essomba steps into my room. He looks around,
as though inspecting the place and then he turns his attention to me. ‘This
place is too dirty! Look at your bed, your closet, your stove! There are ants
all over the floor, even on your desk. How can you live in a place like this?’
I have to come to think of the ants as part of the interior decoration, but Essomba
seems to be of a different opinion. ‘I know you have a girlfriend. Why doesn't
she tidy up the place?’ I am feeling a little uncomfortable. ‘I don't
think she will do anything about my room.’ I reply. ‘Why not?’
Essomba asks me. ‘Because she has to go to the university in the morning.’
I
hear laughter outside. The players on my porch are shaking their heads. Essomba
is unstoppable now. ‘So? Why doesn't she clean the house before she leaves?
She is not behaving like a normal Cameroonian girl! And you, you should say something
about it. Or else I will!’ ‘No, no,’ I say. ‘It's okay. I
don't want her to do it. I will clean the place myself.’ Essomba is getting
upset now. ‘Are you crazy? No! I will ask the landlady here if she can send
her daughters to come and clean your house!’
Essomba says that I still
have a lot of things to learn about Cameroon. In time, he and other players will
give me lessons in how to handle girls, particularly regarding household matters.
For now, Essomba and his team mates came to tell me that there will be a special
training session today. ‘You should come and pick me up around two-thirty.’
Ashu
looks tired. I have just met up with him in Molyko Stadium where Buea Boys is
about to start a training session. It is around eight o' clock in the morning.
‘I did not sleep well,’ he says. ‘I just heard that my financée
is very sick. She is in hospital in my hometown. She normally stays at my parents'
place.’
Unfortunately, the financial difficulties in Buea Boys have
not been solved. The players are far from happy with the meagre FCFA 5,000 they
got the other day. Ashu went to see the head coach last night. ‘I told the
coach that the players need money,’ he explains. ‘They are worried.
They have to feed themselves. A few players have a wife in another town and some
of them even have children. I want to go to my hometown to visit my fiancée.
When I go, I have to take money for her and for my family. In Africa, it's tradition
to send money to relatives. It's also tradition to bring food and other stuff
to your parents' house. But at the moment I do not even have money for transport.’
Soon
I will find out that Ashu has several other problems as well.”
bestellen
gaat niet via de E.N.V.B., maar via het African
Studies Centre.
Arnold
Pannenborg
(uitg. African Studies Centre, Leiden)
African studies collection
8, 2008.
isbn: 9789054480778
prijs: € 15,00 (excl. verzendkosten)
paperback
verschenen
december 2007
Engelstalig
<afbeelding overgenomen uit het boek>
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<Afrika>
•citaat
uit: 
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