Cruel City. Mongo Beti
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train arrived from a nearby depot without a station and picked up the load of newly squared logs. It carried them off, bleached and numbered, lying on the train cars in well-behaved rows, heading God knows where.
On this side of the town, everything seemed to live for these logs, all the way to the sawmill in the distance, where one could make out gangly chimneys rhythmically spewing forth clouds of smoke into the sky. Here the log was king.
Climbing up the hill, one entered Tanga’s commercial center. The “commercial district,” as it was known, could have just as easily been called the Greek district. All the store signs sounded Greek: Caramvalis, Depotakis, Pallogakis, Mavromatis, Michalides, Staberides, Nikitopoulos— and so forth. Their shops were built at ground level with verandas where indigenous tailors set up shop with their apprentices. You could find absolutely everything in these stores. Behind the counter, Black clerks and their assistants warmly, indeed, too warmly, invited you in. Theirs was the place where you would find the best prices. Theirs was the place where you would find the highest quality merchandise.
You rarely saw the Greek boss, except during the cocoa season, that is, from December to February (for if down below wood was king, here cocoa reigned supreme). So eight o’clock was ringing and Mr. Pallogakis—hair slicked back, olive-skinned, fresh looking, soberly garbed in white, lean, a hooked and paternalistic nose—was already at his post in front of a steelyard, surrounded by his men, beaters who cried out, vociferated, stamped about frantically, and slapped their thighs. From afar, they sang the praises of their boss with a few colorful and evocative words. If you appeared disdainful, they came into the street, grabbed you by the collar, and said, “Put down your load right there, on the sidewalk, we’ll put it back on your head if need be. Listen to us. Sixty francs a kilo . . . Think about it, brother. Where else will you find such a price?” And so it went. Mr. Pallogakis started the day with a rate that was higher than the official price: the news spread like wildfire. The peasants came running with their bags. And the more there were, the more came rushing in, the easier it became for Mr. Pallogakis to progressively and imperceptibly lower his price and commit various other forms of fraud.
The incessant traffic in Tanga gave it a distinct drama. For example, no day passed without someone being crushed by an automobile or a spectacular crash between two trucks. Indeed, there seemed to be too many trucks in Tanga. Perhaps this was simply because they came from the four corners of the earth: each factory had sent at least one such vehicle to represent it. There were long bony ones that looked like a prehistoric animal; others were gigantic and full bodied and made enough noise to drive you mad; still others were short and squat. They came from the North, the South, the East, and the West, all at insane speeds. Without slowing down, they barreled into the city, leaving a triumphant cloud of dust in their wake, or they splattered everyone and everything with red mud: the streets of Tanga weren’t paved at the time of this story.
This commercial district ended at the peak of the hill with a block of administrative buildings that were too white, too showy. They sparkled in the sun, the sight of them for some unknown reason giving off an implacable sense of desolation.
The other Tanga, the unspecialized part of the city, the Tanga to which the administrative buildings turned their backs—out of a lack of appreciation, no doubt—was the Tanga that belonged to the natives; this Tanga—of huts— fanned out over the northern flank of the hill. This particular area of the city was divided into innumerable little neighborhoods, though these were actually just a series of little dips in the landscape, each of which had an evocative name. You could see the same kinds of buildings that you might encounter along the road through the forest except that here they were more decrepit, squatter; they were constructed in a manner corresponding to the increased difficulty of obtaining materials the closer you got to the city.
Two Tangas . . . Two worlds . . . Two destinies!
These two Tangas held equal sway over the locals. During the day, the Tanga of the Southside, the commercial district of money and wage labor, emptied the other Tanga of its human substance. The Black population filled up the Tanga where it worked. The streets then came alive with workers, peddlers, cooks, servants, dishwashers, prostitutes, functionaries, underlings, beaters, con artists, the lazy, and forced laborers. Each morning, the peasants of the local forest would join the existing mass of people, either because they just wanted to broaden their horizons, or because they needed to sell the product of their work; among the locals, a particular mentality had arisen that was so contagious that the men who periodically arrived from outside were contaminated as long as they remained in the city. Like those of the distant forest who retained their authenticity, the people of Tanga were apathetic, vain, too playful, and overly sensitive. But on top of that, there was something else in them now, a certain inclination toward venality, apprehension, alcoholism, and everything that reflects a disregard for human life—as is the case in any country where material interests are paramount. The city held the record for murders . . . and suicides! One killed or killed oneself over everything, over anything, sometimes even over a woman. It even happened that a Greek would be gunned down because of his penchant for fondling women, as long as they were pretty and had entered his store. One day, the husband would burst into the store with a rusty old hunting rifle or, for lack of anything better, a bush knife, and without further ado, would punch his ticket.
The locals’ love of fighting and blood grew daily. When they had had enough of working each other over, they turned to the phenomenal number of merchants who lived there. They had quickly discovered that they could conduct this little game—of which nobody knew the tricks or rules—with impunity. One simply had to avoid confronting the French. But if the latter should happen, you knew what to expect. After all, isn’t that the most important thing? Out of bravado, certain people accepted the risk. The police nabbed these folks immediately, and that was the last one ever heard of them—unless they were still talked about decades later. As for the civilian members of the colonial administration’s hierarchy, they seemed to be paid to remain as invisible as possible.
The local population had therefore arrived from the four corners of the country. But they increasingly thought of themselves as inhabitants of Tanga rather than coming from the South, East, North, or West. One could observe them in the streets: they laughed, talked, and argued, all with exaggerated gestures that suggested that they were the masters of the universe. They ran, walked, bumped into each other, and fell off their bicycles, all with a certain spontaneity, all that remained of their lost innocence. They moved, danced, and sang under the nervous eye of the guardians of order whose rounds made the city look like it was in a permanent state of emergency.
At night, activity changed headquarters. North Tanga brought its people home and suddenly it became incredibly alive. Every night, it celebrated the return of these prodigal children. It seemed as if North Tanga needed to quench their thirst for something they might soon lose forever: joy, naked and real; happiness. But this they couldn’t understand. They could no longer say where they came from except by naming their village or tribe. They didn’t know where they were going or why. Indeed, they were surprised to find themselves part of such a crowd, and no less astonished at the strange sense of isolation produced by the surrounding tropical forest in which they felt themselves individually.
In North Tanga, one out of five huts served as a bar: watered down red wine, poorly stored palm wine, and corn meal beer—usually the best choice—flowed liberally. Those in the know could also find Africa gin, a famous local beverage with a very high alcohol content. The administration had officially made the pretense of outlawing its sale . . . and its distillation. An illegal network of distribution, purchase, sale, and transportation of this rare beverage had accordingly been set up. In any case, they couldn’t actually prohibit its fabrication since they didn’t bother to look at what was happening in the forest.
The dance houses also represented an irresistible attraction to inhabitants of both sexes and were violently lit, melodious, and, more often still, cacophonic, percussive, and full of a singular fauna. Dressed up in detachable cardboard collars, or stuffed into poorly tailored dresses and skirts, they wore clothes that were stiff, gaudy, borrowed, and fake. Luckily, they didn’t cost much. The dancers also frequently gathered by twos, threes, or more, around a cala-bash of wine, beat an empty crate for lack of drums, while someone picked at a guitar or banjo, thereby improvising