Life is like this here, or La Vie au Gabon

One thing that people seem to like doing here is to compare various nationalities and their dirty habits. In my eavesdropping on conversations around me, it seems as though every Central African country has a slam for every other Central African country. This funny habit the Gabonese have of trash-talking other countries is also tempered by a heavy dose of self-criticism.

When I go on PMI trips one of the constant topics of conversation is the ways in which Gabon is screwed up. Most of it has to do with the sexual morays here. Men and to some extent women are allowed and expected to have multiple sexual partners. Polygamy is also legally permissible. I have tried to figure out exactly how many wives a man can take, but peoples' responses vary from 4 to 8. En tout cas, people are not expected to be in committed monogamous relationships. When a child is born from one of these multiple unions, quite often it is raised by just one of the parents. Or by the parents alternating who takes care of the kid. Or by the grandparents. This infidelity and instability is much maligned but also much joked about and serves as gossip fodder.

There is a tradition of trash-talking the younger generation in Gabon for having children too young, for not going to school, for turning away from the values of their parents. This type of criticism of the young is a cultural constant in my opinion, but here, people insist, it is really true. Maman Sophie pinpoints the age of adolescent decline in Gabon as 1990. Why, I don't know, but she is sure that something changed after that year and all the babies born then or later are wild children.

Spirituality is also a big topic of conversation and even joking, especially in reference to the above two issues. Everyday discussions are liberally peppered with Jesus and “Dieu merci” interjections. Of course, all of these topics sound so much cuter here because the Gabonese add -o to the end of most sentences or paragraphs. So you might say “bonjour-o” and your conversant partner would say “ca va-o” onwards and upwards to -o infinity.

How fun it is to listen to these discussions as people bemoan the habits and morays of Gabon, while also secretly, I think, being fiercely proud of their country.