Tape troubles in Cameroon

Recordist Godswill Lah writes ...

In 2004 I travelled to Nanga Eboko, one of the oldest towns in the Central Province of Cameroon. This town is about 215km from the Capital City of Yaounde, where the GRN office is located. I went there to make some contacts for recordings in a local language called MBANVELLE.

At the village I was told nobody would help me so I went to the local Chief and God granted me favour with him. He personally contacted the local Church leaders, and together we discussed how the recordings should be done. We decided what scripts were acceptable and understandable in their culture, and chose some songs to match the messages. After that we agreed on a date for the recordings, and I returned to base.

On the set day, I returned to that village with my recording equipment, and was greeted by the Chief and some elders of the village. I took extra microphone cables, batteries and instead of just two DAT tapes, I took four 124 minute tapes, just to make sure I was fully equipped with all that was necessary for good quality recordings.

The language helpers, the singers, together with the elders, the chief and the people of the village, all gathered around. With excitement and keen interest, they watched as I set up the equipment.

We prayed and gave a short explanation of how the recordings were to be done. However, we had hardly done 15 minutes of recording when the D-10 Sony recorder stopped and the screen showed an error. This was the first time I had experienced such a situation with the D-10. I did not know what to do, so I removed the DAT tape, hit it and then tried to play it back but the tape was cut. I tried the second and third tapes but the same thing happened.

I was now left with just one good tape and not wanting to disappoint the crowd who were already asking questions about the problem, I prayed in my heart begging God that this last tape would work. When I finally tried the last tape it went well. However, as I was about to relax, there was another error message on the screen and the tape cut!

So there I was, 215 kilometers and seven hours drive on bad roads, away from the nearest DAT tape. Some of those villagers had come a long distance for the recordings and now I had no tapes and no recordings!

I was praying in my heart to God and wondering how to tell the people when the chief of the village called me to find out what the problem was. After I finished explaining, he assured me he would explain to his people and said that I should go and get new tapes and come back the following day.

After what seemed to have been a life time journey, I finally arrived in the city. I was not going to accept failure so I took along my old Nagra E Recorder with some reel tapes. It turned out to be my "saviour".

Since I became a recordist I had never been so frustrated as I was that day. That experience taught me to always take along some extra "oil" on my trips, that is, a second recording machine.

I finally left the village with the recordings, a big smile on my face and the car full of food stuff that the villagers gave for my family. The devil intended it for evil, but the Lord turned it around for good.

We intend to carry out a distribution of these recordings in December 2005, and we invite you to pray with us for a great "harvest".