Mbaku Quotes

It is important to note that, despite the fact that women cry at these occasions, the public mourning is not considered a sad event-it is actually a celebration and send-off party in which the soul of the deceased is set on the journey to its ancestors to begin a new life. About a year after burial, elaborate celebrations take place to honor the deceased, who is now an ancestor.

When someone is in need and requests help and one is in a position to help, it is generally expected that one will do so. In case of an emergency or a life-threatening situation, those in the vicinity are expected to offer to help even if help is not solicited. Cameroonians expect everyone to have compassion. In fact, many grasslands groups believe that the souls of people who are callous and have no compassion will not be able to reunite with their ancestors and will remain in limbo for all eternity. Human life, it is argued, is to be cherished and placed ahead of money and other material belongings. The Widekum believe that their ancestors return to earth occasionally to dwell among them and determine the level of their compassion. Those individuals who show a lot of compassion are guaranteed passage to the ancestral home when they die, and those who are without compassion are sentenced to a hopeless existence in the afterlife. Ancestors return to earth disguised as ordinary people, so one cannot risk being callous, even to strangers because one of them might be an ancestor on watch.

Such Africans soon encounter the many contradictions inherent in colonialism as a civilizing institution and agent of European culture on the one hand, and colonialism as an oppressive, exploitative, and violent political and economic system and agent of white supremacy on the other.