to Phyllis and Otto Goldschmid, Brazzavile, April 1957 -- "what has France done to prepare these people for independence?"

Murray spent some weeks in Africa in 1957, researching World Health Organization projects for a book, published the next year as Doctors to the World.

Dear Phyllis and Otto—

 

The rain has been falling steadily here today, like a Northwest summer rain. It beats the heat, but the African boys sitting under the banyan tree look sad enough, and I feel sad enough. This country is depressing. There is such an air of permanence about the European colony (not that in itself bothers me) but everybody is here to make money fast, or to start a government career at the very bottom rung; no one has any connection with the town itself.

 

Poto-Poto, by Congolese photographer

Serge Gatien Sita "Valloni"

http://damoison.com/atelier/congo_net/congo_pages_bios/bio_sita.html

As for the native population, which lives in a section of the town called Poto-Poto, which means Mud-Mud, They are docile and gentle and sweet and undemanding, and how they are going to get in position to demand schools and representation and finally independence, I don’t know. Rags might ask, “Are you unhappy because they are happy?”

I get out of here May 1 for Nigeria, and I anticipate a contrast for the British, to the consternation of the other colonial powers, will turn Nigeria loose in less than two years. Not ready, the French tell me. But is any country ever ready? I ask.

“Some more than others.”

“Well then, what has France done to prepare these people for independence? How many colleges are there for the natives?"

“None.”

“How many high schools?”

“None.”

“Grade schools?”

“Oh yes. But only to the third grade.”

“And does everyone go?”

“About 40% of the boys in the towns and cities.”

“What about the girls?”

“Almost none. Native women don’t ask schooling.”

And so forth.

The land is beautiful—low mountains in the distance with the broad valley of the Congo in between, the river red brown, unhurried through the city, bursting into wild rapids below. Flowers bloom everywhere. The trees are aflame with bursts of red and orange and pink and yellow. Poinsettias grow fifty feet high, the river itself is choked with water hyacinths. Trees, planted mostly by the missionaries in the last century, line the streets. It’s hard to see how such a pleasant place can be distressing. 

But during a lightning storm the other day, I saw, in a sudden glare, a coral snake swept past my feet in the gutter overwash. Then darkness and it was gone. 

Yours,

Murray

Congo got its independence in 1960, and Murray’s disquiet has been justified by events.

from Brazzaville, Congo, 26 April 1957 -- "the loneliest man in Africa"

Dearest Nun and Little One ...

Your letters from Brazil caught up with me here today. Somebody had locked them in a drawer. So now I am not as lonely as I was although I am still the loneliest man in Africa.

The WHO people here are about as stand-offish a lot as could be gathered in one building. I have not had an invitation to so much as a cup of coffee since arriving. A car picks me up at the hotel in the morning, swishes me through dodging pedestrians at something like 100 KM per hour and deposits me at the headquarters. Here I sit in a deserted office waiting for someone to come and explain again why it is impossible for me to leave here for a week. I'm apparently stuck here until Wednesday. I've tried to use the time working on my notes but I really can't say I have accomplished much. Maybe it will go better now that I am resigned to spending a week here.

I shall be glad to give Dr. Candou a report on Rio which will conflict considerably with Courtneys and Le
Motte's. I'm especially burned that Smiling Jack did not get a single visa during my stay in Rio. They are needed for every country. I managed to talk my way past the immigration people at the river dock here (the airport is across the river in the Belgian Congo) but I can't visit Leopoldville across the stream, for fear of not getting back in. Incidentally (I might say "Funnily enough") the local people seem most disturbed about my getting through immigration that way. I gather they think I should have asked to be put in jail until they showed up. (They didn't meet me at the airport and showed up half an hour late at the river landing.)

This was probably the movie

I'm in a big hotel on a hill well back from town. It is very expensive. The WHO people say it is the only hotel with malaria screens; I walked into town yesterday afternoon to try to find another, but failed. I couldn't even locate one without screens.

The town itself is like a well-developed village. It has a population of about 125,000, of whom fewer than 5,000 are white. The atmosphere is utterly colonial. Pale faces have all the cars, cafes, etc.; the Negroes get in as waiters and drivers. There are young Negroes on every corner and around the two cafes selling paintings of native scenes. These are reproductions of colored line drawings. I think I'll get one or two, as souvenirs. I was also offered a handsome carving by a man who said he hadn't eaten for three days. It was of a young boy, and it stood four feet high and weighed more than Lane does. So no go.

Last night as I walked back toward the hotel about 8:30 I passed a movie house. All I could tell about the feature was that it had Dorothy Maguire in it. I bought a ticket but I still don't know what the movie was about. It had French dubbed in so expertly that I couldn't get more than the hellos. Some gangster was giving Dorothy a bad time when I left. She doesn't look as much like Phyllis as she used to. ...