Después de Camerún - Can Monroig

Marie-Noëlle Ginard and Robert López Hinton in Cameroon

In 2012 we travelled to Cameroon to collaborate on a sustainable construction project for two houses using materials such as BTC or rammed earth, finished in earth and decoration inspired by Cameroonian craftsmanship. For a few months we lived in the western part of Cameroon where the Bamileké people live. A little tired of Mallorca and the difficult times that Spain was going through -and is going through-, it was not difficult for us to make the decision to leave.
Travelling daily between Bafoussam and Bangangté, an agricultural area of the country, far from the big cities, surrounded by lush nature, adobe houses, dirt roads, markets, motorbikes and taxis, the most shocking thing was to see women, children and men walking along the roadsides at all hours of the day and even at night, carrying all kinds of things. It didn't take long for us to realise that the living and working conditions of Africans were truly appalling. Cameroon is a country with an infinite number of natural resources (i.e. oil, diamonds, wood and minerals) but whose wealth does not revert at all to its inhabitants.
At the moment the project is on hold for various reasons, but in some way it has marked a before and after in our career and that of Can Monroig. In the next few weeks we are starting a new sustainable restoration project for a house in Mallorca; we are really looking forward to resuming our line of “rogue furniture”, incorporating ecological materials for bioconstruction into our offer, and continuing to feed our "underground" with concerts, theatre, dance and encounters with art and culture.

Meanwhile, Cameroon -little Africa- has left us a good number of photographs, has inspired us with some words and even an exhibition.