Gabon Interview by Darcy Meijer , Editor of “The Gabon Letter”, with Thomas Jordan ( Gabon 1967 PCV), conducted July 23, 2003

Darcy: So what village were you in?

Tom: Well, um, I’m embarrassed to tell you: I can’t remember. And the reason is that I was basically moved there (to a village outside of Tchibanga) at the very last minute, and I was to be there until ‘assigned to a village.’
Darcy: And this was in 1967, right?

Tom: Correct.

Darcy: So you had no place until they found you a village?

Tom: That was the temporary place. I was involved with two other volunteers who were there to finish up a school started by the group before us. And then I was sent to Tchibanga to do a completely different assignment, and then that assignment collapsed
on the second day after starting. It was ‘Get outta Dodge!’

Darcy: What happened?

Tom: Well, it’s kind of a long tragic story but I guess if I tell you, you can figure out how to edit it down. But basically, my group of 40 was targeted and intended to do school construction. But during the training period both in the states and the initial training period outside of Libreville - I think it’s the same camp that Bob Utne
talked about (see July newsletter, p.1). Someone had convinced the (Gabonese) Ministry of Education that the American model of the technical school would be beneficial in providing the educational and, subsequently, employment opportunity for many of the youth who were being shoved out of the lycee track. (Because of this system which rewarded only strong academic performance), a lot of kids were becoming disenfranchised because there were no technical programs. So somebody sold the initial concept of introducing three high school technical school programs for these youth. I was called out of my group of 40 to create one of these three schools. My school was going to be agricultural. And it was going to be working with the Nationalist Chinese who had already started an agricultural farm outside of Tchibanga.

Two drawbacks were: one, I don’t know anything about farming; I’m a suburban kid. And two, though I have an understanding of education, I’m a generalist. They said, ‘Don’t worry. You’re gonna be perfect. You’ll have an outstanding facility, and the issue here is more motivation. The Nationalist Chinese will be the ones to teach the agricultural process, and you’ll develop the program and give the formal classroom stuff. And to make this all simpler for you, we’ll send you off to Port Gentil to live with the  les Volontairs du Progres. They have this agriculture guy down there, this Belgian, and he’ll tell you everything you need to know about agriculture.’

I was going to be the assistant director of a lycee already in Tchibanga. We were going to change the curriculum entirely to be more hands-on, work in the fields, demonstrate that there’s money to be made in agriculture. And you don’t have to go on to become a university student or come back as a bureaucrat to have a very successful life.

Darcy: But you hadn’t gone over to Gabon to be a director or implementer of an educational program.

Tom: Not one iota!

Darcy: And you’re a city boy.

Tom: I’m basically a suburban city boy.

Darcy: Where are you from?
T

om: Well, I grew up in Pasadena , California . So my agricultural experience was growing fruit trees and raising ducks.

Darcy: Tell me about the Nationalist Chinese. What was that involvement about?

Tom: Well, the idea was that the curriculum was to be built around agriculture. The Nationalist Chinese had already started a demonstration farm outside of Tchibanga. We were to link with them; they were to be the demonstrators and really show the youth how to become successful farmers. So, theoretically, I didn’t have to worry too much about how to grow (crops). They had already started rice fields and a vegetable field.

Darcy: So you lived with the Volontairs first?

Tom: I was sent from Libreville down to Port Gentil to work with the French Volontairs du Progres. And they were marvelous. They were on the average much older than the American Peace Corps Volunteers. Their French was obviously fluent. My French was stumbling at best. They gave me a room; they linked me up with the right guy. The Peace Corps Director was thinking I’d only be there for 3 or  4 days, and I got this telegram after 2 weeks that asked when I was coming back. I told them, ‘When I’ve learned enough,’ and they answered, ‘You’ve learned enough .Get back!’ (laughs) So I had to figure out what would work. The Belgian agriculture vegetables would be successful in growing, what particular hybrids, what varieties. He was doing a lot with hydroponics at that point as well.

Darcy: What were the proposed components of the curriculum?

Tom: Well, I had in mind that we were going to do some biology of plant growth. Looking into various vegetables and figuring out the soil structure. I knew there would be
machinery involved because they wanted to introduce them to mechanized...

Darcy: Farming

Tom: Farming. Yeah, I’m not talking tractors here. We were talking about some things that were automated like rototillers, cultivators and things of that nature. So I had in mind that we would need some kind of mechanical training (and maintenance skills). That’s about as far as I got:

The second day into the classroom I was ordered to abandon the project. The Ministry had rethought their position, and all three lycees were cancelled.

Darcy: What a disappointment!

Tom: Yeah. And I was ordered to move out of Tchibanga very quickly.

Darcy: Were there hot discussions behind all this?

Tom: There was no doubt that....we all surmised, and all I had was anecdotal information...that the French advisers were totally against this method being introduced into their system. And they clearly had the ability to have it killed.

Darcy: But I thought you were getting some of your training from them?

Tom: From the Volontairs du Progres, not from anyone within the Ministry of Education. This was all coming in from the side.

Darcy: Gosh. So what did you do then?

Tom: I went out and stayed with these two other construction volunteers, Alex and John, and tried to play a delicate role of not taking over or influencing or becoming ‘a third party’ of the team because the assumption was I was there very temporarily.

Darcy: You didn’t want to butt in. You had to lay low while they decided what to do with you.

Tom: Correct. A decision that never came. In or around late November or December, 1967, President Mba died. Albert Bongo was Vice President at the time, and he was put in power. And within 2 weeks of being in power, he ordered the Peace Corps out of the country.

Darcy: I didn’t know that.

Tom: The anecdotal information was that he had not yet demonstrated to the French that he was pro-French, and this was a way to show allegiance to the French without totally jeopardizing his political relationship and economic links with the United States .

Darcy: Do you know how long Peace Corps was out of Gabon ?

Tom: Well, if you start looking at the track - I was trying to look at dates of the people in the last newsletter – I don’t  think they went back in until the 80s. I think there’s a
real gap there.

Darcy: Were there other types of PCVs in Gabon then?

Tom: There were 2 groups: the rural construction group and the TEFL teachers. They were throughout the country as well.

Darcy: Where did you do your training?

Tom: We did our training in Frogmore , South Carolina . We were doing French language infusion morning and afternoons. Then in the late afternoons we were somehow to be involved in the community with 1 or 2 small projects that had a construction bent to them.

Darcy: Then you went right to your post?

Tom: Well no, we were then told we could go back home for a weekend or short week and reconvene in Washington, DC, and that we would depart for Gabon via Paris out of Washington, D.C. As I say, my group came in March and were out by December of ‘67.

Darcy: Your story is very different from anyone’s.

Tom: It’s even interesting how we were found. Because you have to realize that we three were off the beaten track, so when the orders came that we had 48 hours to leave the country, they had to find us. And unfortunately we were not in the village we were supposed to be in. We had decided it was time for Christmas vacation, and we drove over the hills to Mayumba, which is the coast. We were going to vacation for a week down the beach, which is one of the most incredible beaches I’ve ever been on in my
life. We were there not more than two days, maybe one. Overhead flies this plane, and later the Assistant Peace Corps Director walks up and says, ‘What are you doing here?’ and we said, ‘What are YOU doing here? We’re on vacation.’ He said we hadn’t told him we were going, and we told him that the letter was in the mail and asked if he had gotten it. He said no, he hadn’t gotten it. He said we had 24 hours to get out of the country.

Darcy: Uh oh.

Tom: He said the only other problem was that the plane only held one person besides the pilot. So we worked out a plan where one of us, John, was going to go back in the plane, get back to the village because we had only taken one truck over, and he was going to pack up for him and Alex and get back down to Tchibanga, the air field, and the three of us remaining (2 Volunteers and the Assistant Director) were going to drive back over the hills and arrange the rest. Trying for that afternoon, thinking we would be back in time to cross the river so as not to worry. Well, we started over the hills and the Ford Jeep that we had just gave up and stopped running.

Darcy: No.

Tom: This is the one I had rebuilt with the brand new alternator and battery and other parts that I had sent down from Libreville . This was clearly an electrical problem. The
assistant director said, ‘What do we do now?’ and I said, ‘Well, you could probably try to stop cars coming and going and see if you could encourage them to help us out and transport us into town.’ He tried that on a couple of occasions and was unsuccessful. So I said, ‘Well, there is another way we could probably get some new life out of the electrical system, but we all have to make our own personal contribution.’

Darcy: Hmm.

Tom: And he was kind of surprised to hear that that was a technique and I said it was, and so we did that.

Darcy: What was the technique?

Tom: What’s the technique?

Darcy: Yeah.

Tom: You add urine to a battery.

Darcy: Ah! So you did your parts.

Tom: So we all made our contribution, and actually we traveled another three, four or five kilometers before again it stopped. It was clearly an electrical problem and there was no solution. The Assistant Director was a very stately, very sophisticated Afro-American gentleman; I really liked him a lot. But we didn’t know quite what to do. We decided (we would sleep) and in the morning hopefully figure out where to go for help. During the night the mosquitoes got so bad that I couldn’t sleep any longer. So I  quietly woke up the other volunteer, Alex, and told him that I was leaving, that I would get on the river and hook up with John. He thought I was nuts, but I told him that I wasn’t staying. I just got out and started walking.

Darcy: Yes.

Tom: Of course there was no moon out that night. It was completely dark. And I started walking down the road, and I knew that I had to go through a jungle area. I wasn’t real
excited about that because I am deathly afraid of snakes. So I had one dog behind me and one dog in front of me. I figured in the great Gabonese tradition if I’m the second person and there’s a viper, I won’t get whapped. And if there’s a black mamba, maybe I won’t get whapped, either. I made it to the river, and John was sitting there having a good old time keeping the ferry guard awake with beer. I said I was going to jump in the water and cross the river, and he said, ‘Don’t you dare! You forget that there are crocodiles here,’ and I said that’s right, and so they came over and got me.

Darcy: It sounds Stygian.

Tom: Well, I don’t know what to tell you (laughs). So I went over in a pirogue. Got in and went into town. For some reason we needed another vehicle, and I knew the prefet or the governor of the region. So I agreed to go in and ask him to lend us a vehicle till I could go back and pick up the Assistant Director and Alex.

Darcy: And what time was this by now?

Tom: Probably no earlier than 7 or 8 in the morning because I had to meet him at his office. Fortunately, he immediately recognized me, and I was able to get an audience with him. I explained the situation; he was totally in the dark. He had not heard any of this information; he did not know the central government’s actions, and he was clearly upset. I said, ‘If you lend us a vehicle, we’ll pay for the gas, fill up the gas tank, and I’d be most appreciative.’

He said of course he would do that. So we got the vehicle, filled it up, took off down the road, crossed the river on the ferry. And waiting in the road was the Assistant Director and Alex. The Director was not very happy with me on one hand, but on the other hand he was glad that we had found a solution. So we got everybody back into town and made the arrangements with Air Afrique to pick up the plane outside of Tchibanga. We left Libreville that night on a DC-8 or DC-7. It’s funny: that model plane, they have to put a pole on its back end to hold it up off the ground. 

Darcy: You said that now you’re a CEO of a large residential community in California .

Tom: Correct. Alameta , California , in the San Francisco Bay area.