(This is an old journal entry that I’m posting from Hua Hin almost one month after it was written — technical problems).
August 3rd, 2024
I flew here on Thursday after only two days with Natalia and Woland in BKK. I had hoped that my e-visa wouldn’t be ready on time and would have to delay my departure until Saturday, but around 3pm I got an e-mail with the VISA approval. Just after midnight I boarded the Ethiopian airlines flight to Addis Ababa where I connected the next day to Yaoundé. I will be working here until next Friday when I go back to Thailand. We rented a house long-term in Hua Hin where Natalia and Woland will be waiting for me.
It’s my first time in Cameroon. With a population of around 30 million people it is among the top 15 economies in Africa in terms of size, but income per capita is only USD 1,600 per year. The World Bank classifies Cameroon as a low-middle income country but that is only because there are countries like Burundi, Eritrea, and Malawi where income per capita is even lower, close to or under USD 500. Yaoundé, the capital, is not a pretty city and doesn’t have much to offer to the average tourist or expat, but it has decent infrastructure.
Unfortunately, prospects for the country are not great. Cameroon used to be a German and French colony gaining independence only in 1960. Since then it has been governed by the same party and its second president, Paul Biya now 83 years old, has been in power since 1982. Corruption is endemic, there is no independent press, and the political opposition is muted. Cameroonians who are highly educated or gifted athletes leave the country at the first opportunity.
Yesterday I had dinner with the representative of one of the international organization based here, a white male. At odds with his mission as a development economist, he told me he came not by choice or vocation but because it is “the tax to pay to open up career opportunities.” And because Cameroon is considered a “hardship” country, he gets a generous compensation package on top of his salary. Sad.
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I spoke on the phone with Alexander, the Blue Monster guru. He went to the boat to assess what had happened with the propeller/transmission. He tells me that when the cutlassbearing was replaced at the boatyard something went wrong. As a result, when we were entering the shipping channel at Boca Chica in Cartagena a couple of weeks ago, the shaft got disconnected from the transmission. Fixing the problem is straightforward but it requires hauling BEHEMOTH out of the water. I’ve asked them to do it asap but in another boatyard, one that is closer to the marina. I will also take the opportunity to change the clutch and transmission guides.
Despite all the problems we’ve had getting BEHEMOTH back in shape, it seems the end is close. When back in Thailand I plan to stay in Hua Hin until end September. Then I’ll travel to Morocco/Tunisia for work and from there back to Cartagena to sail BEHEMOTH to Panama. My son Juan David, who just turned 35 two days ago, will be joining me for the short passage. He is a professor of economics and has a narrow window when he is not teaching and can travel — October 4-9. I should be in Cartagena around October 1st to prepare the boat. When he joins me will do some grocery shopping, maybe spend one day in Cartagena, and then cast-off.
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Because of jet lag I have been waking up at 2am and, not being able to fall back asleep, I read. I finished a book about single handed sailors by Richard King, Sailing Alone. I pre-ordered a Kindle version last year, got it sometime in May, and the wait wasn’t worth it. The book’s chapters alternate between the uninspiring story of the author’s singlehanded passage from the northern USA to Portugal (the original destination was England but the weather didn’t help), and short stories of well known circumnavigations from Slocum’s, Chistester’s, Motissier’s, and McArthur’s, to those of three teenagers one of whom had to be rescued in the Indian Ocean. If you have read the original books or articles about these circumnavigations Sailing Alone has little to offer. I also noticed a selection bias in the stories that made it into the book with a “penchant” for England and Europe. One of the great American sailors, also a writer, the first to go around Cape Horn and with 6 circumnavigations under his belt is not mentioned in the book.
It was therefore with relieve that I started a new book, Exhalation, by Ted Chiang. It is a collection of 9 short stories, not all as good as the first, but all worth reading. The first story The Merchant and the Alchemist’s Gate is about two doors that can be used to travel 20 years into the future or 20 years into the past, one located in Cairo and the other in Baghdad, twenty years apart. A tour de force.
Sailing to the Pacific 