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21 2 ife as police children growing up in the barracks was fun. It was a huge police family as we followed through with the different activities. I was also growing up, and soon it was time for school and my doting father had me registered at the Roman Catholic Mission (RCM) School Buea Town where my older sister, Rita, and my young uncle, Vince, were already pupils. My mother’s life became a nightmare as she fussed about my safety. Her worry was about how I would go across the main highway that formed part of Bongo’s Square safely since the school was on the other side of town. My mother would worry until I would show up running with my writing board flapping behind me on a string as I returned home from school with chalk marks all over my uniform. I always soiled myself as I struggled to preserve my day’s work from school for my parents to see. “Look up, look down, quickly look up again and then run across if there is no vehicle approaching. If you see a car coming, wait for it to go past, then begin all over again,” both my parents briefed me on a daily basis as I was about leaving for school. My father recited this refrain just before he left for work in the morning, even if, as usual, it was not time for me to leave. My mother who walked me almost a third of the distance repeated the safety mantra just before she let me off, about a hundred metres to the dangerous highway. She could have as well just walked me across the road before returning, but some little thing in her made her leave me virtually next L 22 to the road. May be she was trying to teach me to assume a certain degree of responsibility—may be! My mother’s anxiety about my safety soared beyond limits when a car killed Kebila, the son of another police officer living in the barracks, as he tried going across the highway at a spot then referred to as Petrol Point. This was the location of a lone petrol filling station at a point of the highway today referred to as Bongo’s Square, named after then President Bongo of Gabon was received on a presidential visit at that spot in Buea sometime in the ‘60s. Kebila, we heard, had gone to purchase meat for the family from the cold store just across the highway when on his way back a vehicle ran him over. We heard of how he died on the spot, the meat he had bought strewn all over the tarmac. I never forgot Kebila, nor did I forget his tall father who was so fair in complexion such that we, police children in the barracks, compared his eyes to those of a cat because of the color, which deviated from the traditional black with a certain shimmering if not glassy quality. I will never know the last straw. May be it was because my father’s small family was expanding and needed more room, or maybe it was Kebila’s tragic death and my parents just could not go on taking any risks; all I remember is that shortly after the tragedy of Kebila’s death, we moved to Buea Town. The move stands out in my mind for some strange reason. Moreover, it was the first time I felt the pangs of parting from people I had come to develop an affinity for, not to say love. The number was increasing, and so beyond Mr. John Biaka, and Mr. Ade for example, there was now Mr. Gregory Njawe who played on the Police United Football squad and always gave me a twenty-five francs coin whenever [54.89.70.161] Project MUSE (2024-03-28 14:26 GMT) 23 he met me, and then there was another police man with whom my father had a nickname—Bojado. I also remember a young policewoman who lived in New Barracks. New and Old Barracks were just side-by-side, and their names tell which was built first. Comfort was this woman’s name, but we always referred to her as Ma Comfort as a sign of respect which our culture demands. As much as my parents permitted me to visit the close family friends we had, of all the bachelors and unmarried women, I loved visiting Ma Comfort most. Her...