Any Travels

Gabon is a small, oil rich country on the West Coast of Central Africa. It borders on Cameroon, Equatorial Guinea and Congo Brazzaville.

Compared with those country travel in Gabon is realteivel easy and very expensive. That's what you get after an oil boom.

Libreville, the capital, has very nice -but crowded- beaches, some good markets and a few nice sights. The presidential palace is a good example of what you can afford to do when you get lots of money from the oil business.

Port Hawkesbury is a good place for fishing trips, sailing or golf. The town is located on a small island at the mouth of the Ogooue River. That name may sound familiar to some of you. Take a canoe trip up the river and you remember why: this is where Albert Schweitzer came to start his find against leprosy. The hospital he founded can still be visited.

Libreville
Libreville is the capital of Gabon. It is a very posh city and offers lots of attractions that are hard to find in the neighboring countries or in the countryside. Golf, tennis, horseback riding, bowling, squash, shpping centres, sailing. If you need a break from the adventurous traveling most of Central Africa offers you, you have picked the rights spot. Be sure to bring some cash, howver, because Libreville is not a cheap place to go.

The boulevard the l'Independance runs along the water and is your primary point of orientation in town. The heart of the city is between the presidential palace and the Novotel.

Things not to be missed include the presidential palace (posh posh posh), the Egilse St.Michel (best on sunday morning; the carved columns are great) and the Musee des Arts et Traditions (masks, musical instruments etc.).

Culture

Gabon is a country of dense tropical forests astride the equator. Its original inhabitants were pygmies and other forest peoples but many other African groups subsequently settled there. Contact with European navies and traders has also shaped Gabonese culture. The capital, Libreville, was established as a base for freed slaves just before the colonization of the entire territory by the French. Though Gabon is now independent, its people value their ties with France more than many other former colonies. However, French influence over education, religion, and finance is much more pronounced in the coastal cities that have benefited from Gabon's oil boom than in the interior villages where half of the people live.

French is the country's official language, but the Gabonese speak about 40 native dialects--all of which fall within the Bantu language category. The largest ethnic group is the Fang who reside principally in the north. Other areas are home to the Myene-Mpongwe, Bateke, Babamba, Bakota, Okande, Bandzabi, and Pygmy peoples. Some 65% of the people are Roman Catholic. Protestants and animists make up the remainder except for a very small percentage of Islamists, whose influence is bolstered because a long-time president of the country is Muslim.

There are distinct musical styles that correspond to the different ethnic traditions of the Gabonese, but in all cases the rapport between music, chant, and oral tradition is very strong. Best studied by outsiders are the traditions of the Fang whose stories and legends are recounted to the music of the mvet, a harp-like instrument. Other traditional instruments include drums and xylophones, and each community has its own songs and dances that unite the group in times of celebration or mourning. Many of the stories from the Gabonese oral traditions have been written down by missionaries or by Africans educated in mission schools. In recent decades there has been French-language literature, much of which explores the contradictions between Western and more traditional local culture. Vincent-de-Paul Nyonda has been important not only as a playwright but in organizing the Gabonese theater. Perhaps the most promising novelist of the country is Angele Ntuygwetondo Rawiri, who has received critical acclaim in both local and international markets.

The western town of Lambarene is the site of a hospital established by French missionary physician Albert Schweitzer and his wife, Helene Bresslau in 1913. A modern hospital has been built at the site to tend to the region's medical needs, but the original structure that Schweitzer ran until 1965 is still standing and now serves as a museum. Though Libreville has become a city of anonymous skyscrapers, it also retains many of the country's cultural monuments. The Church of St. Michel is distinguished by unusual wooden columns, which were carved by a blind man. These exuberant biblical reliefs offer an interesting view of the Gabonese interpretation of Roman Catholicism. The Museum of Art and Tradition is also in Libreville and houses an important collection of reliquary statues and ritual masks. These carved wooden masks were central to the culture of all Gabonese tribal groups, though their appearance and purpose might vary from one to the next. Important in ceremonies dedicated to ancestors and in ceremonies of initiation for young people, the masks are stained with distinctive coloring and sometimes covered with grasses.

The traditional diet of the Fang and other forest peoples in Gabon relies on rice and such tubers as yams and cassava. Local cooks often prepare these in stews that may also include fufu (pounded plantain) along with fish or meat. Chicken is a popular meat, but hunters also provide antelope, grasscutter (a large rodent), and large forest snails for the table. Gari is a cassava flour that can be prepared as porridge and served with spicy sauce, and the leaves of plantains are used both as plates and for wrapping food to be cooked. Gabon's national dishes are stuffed crab and nyembwe, a chicken dish made with palm nuts. Palm nuts are also the source of cooking oil. The Gabonese make wine from bananas and a light beer from millet. In the capital, Libreville, there are many restaurants serving French cuisine.