"The enlightened forest" is ma favorite book.

"La foret illuminee" can maybe be translated as "the enlightened forest". This phrase is the title of the book written by Professor Gervais Mendo Ze. He was a famous writer who was in charge of the Cameroon Radio and Television(CRTV) Office. He wrote many other interesting books ,but this is my favorite one. The reason is the quantity and the quality of the figurative language used by the author.Read this book is somehow discovering the camerounian way of life.

The principal actor is Anani. Anani is a young educated boy who is just starting his work life. He thought that going to school is everything in life.He dressed up in the western suit to impress his employer, he tried to follow the law . He does not know that people do not care about how you dress or how you work. The whole country lives under corruption. Not only that he was frustrated by all those frauds , but also Anani felt destroyed because he noticed that there were some family members who do not do anything to become self-sufficient.They are at home everyday waiting for someone else to do everything for them. Even love is about money; and in order to have money you have to work in that corrupted system. Consequently you have to maintain yourself there by commiting fraudulent deeds . That what it takes to have your wife and all the unfortunate who will of course live forever at your place without even trying to do something to improve their lives. You can reject all that but make sure that you will not be killed magically.There are some people whose work is to end your life if you do not want to cooperate. The less harm they can do is to ruin your life so that you can fit in the society.

Beside these story, the author Professor Gervais MendoZe wants to show that the city is still a forest . We can have electricity, but still we are in the forest . In the front cover of his book there is a picture of the city with big and tall building at night . You can see the lights on in differents rooms all over the city. By that picture ( I apologize that I did not find a sample of it so that I can share with you all) the Professor would like you to compare the city and the forest. For him the buildings in the city resemble trees in the forest. The buildings are just tall and big as the trees . The only difference is the light that people turn on by night time. In the book , cars are similar to animals . If there is a wreck ,it is just like when two animals meet and fight or eat each other . Some people stay in their rooms so that they do not have to interact with others just like some birds in the trees which fly when something else approaches.

Finally Anani took off from the society . He did not want to talk to anybody. He was just like others animals in the forest . He was trying to avoid any wreck with a human being. That did not last for ever . He changed his mind and joined the whole corrupted system . He was involved at the end in politics. As a common quotation he had dirty hands because it is hard to do politics and do not be involved in fraudulent acts. Anani gave up his dream. He did not try to change the wrong thing . He choose to survive and to be able to feed his family. He became a part of the bad system.He forgot his dreams. Did he have the choice ? The answer is hard to find .

I enjoyed reading that book . I read it when I was in middle school and still now I think about it. Life can make us give up our dreams. It is hard to live without dreams, but sometimes it happens. I like the metaphor of the title . I believe that cities are just illuminated forests. The only difference is the electricity. People most of the time act like animals.