Sierra Leone.

So we are back after 10 days in BEAUTIFUL Sierra Leone. The country is obviously still recovering from the war that ended in 2002. You can't spend 10 minutes on the streets of Freetown without seeing a UN vehicle drive by. People are friendly but much more reserved and more easily angered than the people back here in The Gambia. It wasn't uncommon to see an amputee in the Freetown area. But 10 days isn't enough time to make fair comparisons between the two countries. We spend a day in Freetown before heading up country to Kabala. We originally wanted to climb Mt. Bintumani in the northeast but figured we would miss our flight home if we tried to do that so we settled for some hiking around Kabala. It was thrilling to be in a country that has topography and year-round greenery.

The highlight of our trip was the ride overland to Kabala. It was 7 hours in a bus and was a great way to see the countryside. The most relaxing day was our second to last day in the country when we just sat on a beach all day eating pineapple. So much pineapple and avocado. Yum.

So our trip also had a few lowlights. In Kabala we stayed in a small guesthouse and were the only patrons there and also the only tourists in town. The accomadations were nice and in a beautiful location surrounded by mango trees on the outskirts of the village. We were paying for running water but the pump broke on the second day so we deicided to talk to the manager about reducing the price since we would have to fetch water ourselves from the well. That evening, after enjoying the Manchester v. Barcelona soccer match in town, we came back to the house to talk to the manager. We were all sitting around when we heard some yelling in the back. It sounded like a woman was really upsetting and hysterical. We didn't know what was happening because it wasn't really very loud and it was in Creole. But we didn't really think much of it because people yell at each other here all the time. Maybe she was being beating. It isn't that surprising. The manager hurriedly ran back to see what was going on (which, looking back, was a clue that something was really wrong). We just took this as our cue to leave (We had planned on meeting an NGO worker for beers). An hour later, sitting at the bar a block away, we started to hear something that sounded like death wailing. In The Gambia, when someone dies, the people mourn their loss by performing a bone chilling wail. But, this sounded a little different and we honestly couldn't tell if they were wailing or still celebrating the Manchester victory from the match earlier that night. Soon we were tired and headed back to our guesthouse. On the way, we ran into the guard from the NGO house. He informed us that the owner of our guest house had been murdered an hour previously. This was the fighting we had heard and the murder most likely occured right before we left the house. The owner, a young man and son of the former chief who had helped us fetch water that afternoon, was stabbed in the neck by his girlfriend. Apparently they had a child together and she wanted to get married but he didn't and it sounds like there was another woman involved too. We were obviously really upset and scared but were reassured by the fact that the police had already taken the woman into custody and we had absolutely nothing to do with the murder. We still took all our things from the guesthouse and spent the rest of our time at the NGO worker's place. None of us slept well. The wailing didn't stop until 2am and started again at 6am. Two days later we headed back to Freetown. Upon arriving at our cheap accomodations, we were informed that one of the rooms we had previously stayed in wouldn't be available for another hour. One hour? That's disgusting. So all four of us ended up sharing the air-conditioned suite. Yay. That evening we went to go check email. Chey had a quick message from our boss, Rod, that said, "A Slok plane went down in Ghana. Were you on it?" Well, obviously not, and what the hell did he mean by "went down"? Doesn't that mean crashed? We quickly texted Rod for clarification. The response came an hour later - "Don't worry about it anymore." Well, that didn't do anything to ease our concerns so we decided to go to the Slok office first thing in the morning. That night we played Scrabble and, I'm not joking at all, timed prostitutes and their clients. Apparently the establishment also rents by the half hour. Anyway, in the morning we went to the Slok office to confirm our flight home....and find out what really went down in Ghana. This is how the conversation went:

Mandy: "I heard that there was a problem with a Slok flight in Ghana last week. Can you tell me what happened?"
Slok lady: No eye contact accompanied by nervous laughter..."It was just a minor problem."
Mandy: "What kind of problem?"
Slok lady: More nervous laughter..."Just a minor problem. It is fixed now."
Stephanie: Losing patience... "What KIND of problem?"
Slok lady: "Just minor."
Mandy: Also losing patience..."Ok, but what KIND of problem?"
Slok lady: Nervous laughter and eye rolling.

Finally another agent in the office told us. The exact plane that we were on earlier that day had continued to Ghana and on it's return flight from Ghana to Sierra Leone something CRACKED and they had to turn around and make an emergency landing. Well. Apparently it was fixed because we were on that exact same plane coming back to Gambia last week. We didn't crash. Yay. So much for paying extra for that ticket...

But it was a fascinating adventure and I would do it again.
Mom, I'm safely back in The Gambia now!

Love,
Mandy