Oral History Interview - Patrick Wassa Ndaouzai
Object
Audio file
Production date
7/9/2011
Object number
2018.49
Physical Description
Audio recording of an oral history interview with Patrick Wassa Ndaouzai, who was born 1981 in Garoua, Cameroon and moved to Hackney in 2011.
Material
Digital file (.wav)
Digital file (.mp3)
Credit line
Photograph copyright Emma Davies.
On display?
No
Inscription
EXTRACT OF INTERVIEW:
"My wife is from Hackney. I met her out in a night club in Cameroon while she was doing Voluntary Service Overseas. We got married there; it was a typical colourful wedding with lots of music and dancing. At the beginning it was hard for my parents as it wasn’t easy for them to accept that their son was marrying a white woman. It’s very important for boys in Cameroon to marry into their own culture. But now they are fine with it.
I know it’s better for my daughter to go to school here, the standard is higher than Cameroon but I would still like her to be educated there. I’d like her to learn my country’s traditions. Here she will just forget them. She speaks French and her English is much better than mine but I want her to speak the African languages I speak: Fulani, Mafa, Hausa.
I only came here four months ago as my wife wanted to be here. But in a few years time we want to go back. I want to live and work and raise my family in Cameroon. It’s my home, all my family are there. It’s part of me; part of my raison d’etre. I miss my family’s goats and our cow. I’d quite like to have my cow on London Fields!"
"My wife is from Hackney. I met her out in a night club in Cameroon while she was doing Voluntary Service Overseas. We got married there; it was a typical colourful wedding with lots of music and dancing. At the beginning it was hard for my parents as it wasn’t easy for them to accept that their son was marrying a white woman. It’s very important for boys in Cameroon to marry into their own culture. But now they are fine with it.
I know it’s better for my daughter to go to school here, the standard is higher than Cameroon but I would still like her to be educated there. I’d like her to learn my country’s traditions. Here she will just forget them. She speaks French and her English is much better than mine but I want her to speak the African languages I speak: Fulani, Mafa, Hausa.
I only came here four months ago as my wife wanted to be here. But in a few years time we want to go back. I want to live and work and raise my family in Cameroon. It’s my home, all my family are there. It’s part of me; part of my raison d’etre. I miss my family’s goats and our cow. I’d quite like to have my cow on London Fields!"