Retirement 2.0: Out of Africa...

Final ruminations from the heart of Africa.

Fourteen weeks seemed like a long summer ahead back in May, one that would certainly be full of new experiences. I was not disappointed! These weeks certainly have been full, but now my time to return home is here. I want to hug my kids…

These three weeks in Cameroon have gone very fast, probably because doing a review of the books is a lot like ordinary work, and has been easy to keep my head down and just work. I have not posted as much, in part because I think few would be that (!) interested in my talking about accounting stuff…

I have not observed that much of life in Cameroon, being in an office all day and living behind walls at an SIL training facility/conference site. Not a good place for walking either, as the nearest road is very busy and there is not much room on the side for pedestrians. Not that this stops the Cameroonians... But Cameroon has been a good balance of experiences with my time in Congo. I was in Congo long enough to touch the culture a bit and start making a few budding friendships with some Congolese. Here in Yaoundé, I have been able to see the more of the business side of life, and that has given me a fuller picture of some aspects of living in Africa.

I estimate that there are around 30 administrative people working at SIL here in Yaoundé, a combination of ex-pats and nationals doing the ordinary work of keeping things going – personnel, IT, finance, maintenance, cleaning and the like. Of those, SIL employ three men full time just to walk documents around to government offices and to places like the water and electric company to pay bills. For some things, they go day after day for days just to check and prod the movement of documents from one desk to the next desk to the next desk… Officials in Cameroon, even those workers doing ordinary things like receiving payment on water and electric bills, stamp everything, and many papers have 4 or 5 colorful stamps on them, all with impressive looking signatures, penmanship that looks like some of those signatures found on the Declaration of Independence - fancy writing one does not see anymore. I was told that SIL had to finally stop using one of their authorized signers because his signature didn’t look right to the officials and they rejected documents that were signed by him. His signature was simply too readable. I can’t imagine anyone even actually looks at a signature much in America, just as long as a scribble is there… Bureaucracy here is a large and lethargic business of its own, and one that defies business sense. This afflicts the business environment in both Cameroon and Congo, a legacy (I think) of French and Belgium, who I understand raised stamps and signatures and documents to an art form.

As an example, I offer a Cameroonian banking moment I witnessed two days ago. This is a cash economy. Everything here is cash, with lots and lots of papers for receipts. Not that those are worth much, for you can get a receipt for anything… But a few things can be paid by check - a slow move into the modern banking era that has already largely been eclipsed in the West by electronic payments and debit/credit cards. Although not in the way we think of paying bills. A few businesses will take a business check, but many only accept certified checks for payment. This is true for paying the monthly electric bill (about $4,000 each month), although other business will take a regular check; but some will only accept cash payments. (I have never seen the stacks and stacks of money like I have seen in Cameroon.)SIL has to obtain certified checks to make tax payments - the government will not take cash, which is the typical payment method for everything, but will not allow a business or organization to pay with an ordinary check either. The process is for SIL is to obtain a certified check from the bank, and then one of these three men walk down to the government office to present payment along with the bill. The government person there takes the check and the original bill. One can come back in about a week and pick up the receipted original bill, which is the only recognized proof of payment. (This is pretty much the process for paying anything by check. One can guess why banking is simply not catching on…) Wednesday, SIL’s biller payer person on his daily rounds at various government offices was handed an SIL certified bank check presented back in May (three months ago!), saying it has been rejected by the government. No reason, it was just rejected. He came back and then the SIL folks – the messenger, the finance manager and the accountant – all took a ‘field trip’ to the bank. After a discussion, they with the bank officer all walked over to the government office a few blocks away to ask why it was rejected. The answer was there is no reason, and we do not have to provide one. A certified bank check for a tax payment rejected… And it sitting on someone’s desk for months… Ah, maybe only in Cameroon…

Oh, and by the way, checks paid to SIL as payee and deposited (which admittedly are not many in this economy, but Americans will write them to SIL to get personal funds sometimes) must have the endorsement of the company’s authorized check signers, in SIL’s case, two executives. And they check the signatures to make sure! No such thing as allowing the accounts receivable person to use an endorsement stamp …

Library at Rainforest International Academy, a 7-12 school and part of SIL

Well, this is enough for you to get a flavor of business in Cameroon. And the government even likes SIL! Actually I am in some awe at the work SIL does. A bunch of ‘brainiacs’ (to me at least) trained in linguistics, and other related disciplines I cannot even spell , dedicating their lives to bringing language and literacy to people who speak heart languages that not many speak. I read progress reports of translation projects and reading the project deliverables - training nationals to teach literacy classes, training nationals in the fundamentals of translation work, producing diarrhea and other health pamphlets, creating story books, and translating scripture so they can hear it within the intimacy of their own language.

I leave Africa far richer than when I came and feel very fortunate for the privilege of being here. I hope you