An Intense Surreal Moment

As I was writing this title, I was thinking that I was using a double metaphor, then after thinking about it for a bit I realised it really was an accurate reflection of what happened today and really made me realise how fast this vast globe we live on can become a “small world”.

While I was at work today 2 women pushing baggage carts full of luggage approached our check in counters, they stopped to organise themselves ^» 01 and then one proceeded through the line while the other one waited.

I had over heard them talking and I could tell by their accent they were African but even though their accent sounded a little bit familiar I could not place it completely.

I had a few other passengers that needed help so I was busy with them and lost track of these 2 African women. Until I had a free moment and was just standing around and I noticed that the one woman that was waiting for the other to check in had reached into her bag and pulled out something. It was a foil wrapped chocolate bar.

As I walked by her I glanced at the package and just about fell over. It was a wrapper that I had not seen in 22 years. It was a MAMBO chocolate bar. I thought I was going to fall over.

I piped up and said to her ^» 02, “I no go for see one like dat for 22 years!”

She looked up at me, almost choking on the bite she had just taken, her eyes got really wide and she said to me, “What did you just say?”

So I repeated myself.

She then said to me, “How you go know about dis?”

So I told her that I had been to Cameroon with my grandparents and how when I was in a little town called NDU I would go to the market every day after finishing my chores and buy myself a Mambo chocolate bar for 25 CAF ^» 03, which at the time was about 10 cents CAD. ^» 04

Just as a side note NDU is not far from LAKE NYOS which was the site of a natural disaster involving the volcanic gases and the deaths of many people and livestock in 1986. This story actually was featured in National Geographic.

So she started to inquire about why I was there and where I was and all that stuff because she had grown up in the same town.

We discovered that we were both the same age and that she had been born in the mission hospital in the next town.

I burst out laughing because I had visited that mission hospital and met the mission doctor that had been there, well um forever, so I was pretty sure I knew who had delivered here and in fact had even spent a day in the operating theatre one day and witnessed a lot of things other 13 year old guys couldn’t even imagine.

She had inquired as to why my grandparents had been there and I told her that they were teaching at the seminary there for a a number of years, and then she asked me who my grandparents were. I told her and she said to me “Oh that name sounds so familiar” and just at that moment the other woman that she was waiting for had finished checking in and walked over to meet up with the woman I was talking to.

The woman I had been talking to said to her friend ^» 05, ‘this man has lived in NDU.'”

Well I never seen that much white in a black woman’s eyes.  I thought she was going to pass out. Turns out that NDU was her home village.

I mean think about it.  A white boy in Toronto’s airport had lived in her village.

BANG – the world just got smaller.

But wait for it…

When she found out who my grandparents were, her face lit up and she stood so tall and told me that she had been one of my Grandmother’s students.

We talked about this and that, she even asked me which house I lived in and when I told her she joked about how far out it was from the rest of the compound.  ^» 06

This woman then asked me how my Grandmother was and asked me to “Greet Her” on her behalf.

I felt my heart stop.

I had to look at this woman, who was smiling from ear to ear, eyes all a bright and tell her that my Grandmother had passed away in December.

She looked right into my eyes, deep into my eyes and grabbed my hand and started shaking my hand ^» 07 and as a tear rolled down her cheek she said to me, “She done walka fine, oh yes, she done walka fine.”

Here I am just thinking how cool is it that I was in this obscure little village and I ran across someone that lived there.  I mean, yes my job affords me some excellent opportunities but this was beyond anything imaginable.

Well a tear hit my cheek, after all there I was standing there, face to face, eye to eye and hand in hand with a stranger I had never met yet we had tread the same soil and my Grandmother had touched her life.

2 people from half way around the world from each other meeting now.

She had to leave to go catch her flight and as she gripped my hand tightly she said to me, “walka fine, walka strong and stay fine.”

I had to go and hide in the washroom for a bit, that was way more than I had ever expected when I went to work today.

Here Are the Foot Notes...

1. something a few people might want to consider when at the airport – just a thought ↩ 
2. slipping into a bit of the local vernacular ↩ 
3. Central African Francs ↩ 
4. They are now 125 CAF ↩ 
5. I should point out that this other woman was much older, probably closer to my Mother’s age or older ↩ 
6. The picture you see above is pretty much what I saw out of my front door every day – surrounded by tea plantations. Oh and the house had been built by German Missionaries in the early to mid 1800s ↩ 
7. Cameroonians are big on shaking hands and holding hands, it is a sign of friendship and companionship ↩ 

Don't forget to go back up and keep reading....

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