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2 décembre Hello from the Dark ContinentBack again, huh? I am. I'm apparently masochistic, obvious through the fact that I continue to stay where I am at. How about you? Do you go through life dealing with situations that you swear "this is the last time...."?
We're back in Conakry, the divine city of open sewers, government-controlled radio stations, and all the muffler fumes you can choke on. I know this has been done already, but I'm going to have to complain about the ride down a bit.
You see, we went into the center of our village yesterday morning at about 7:30am and said we wanted to go to Conakry (Menen falla yahude ka Conakry.) We were directed to a car, a nice Peugeot 505, a newer model. Much pleased we went over and asked if the car was going to Conakry. Yes. Conakry, direct? Yes. Do you have places? Yes. Do you have passengers? Well..... Yes, but we're going to go to Hafia to catch more passengers. Then to Labe if we have to. Now, Labe is well out of our way. In fact, it's in the opposite direction of Conakry. It would be better for us to go to Hafia, jump out, catch a taxi on the side of the road, and be in Conakry by mid-afternoon. However, we were psyched about the presence of a Conakry bush taxi in our little rinky-dink village so we got in anyway. The driver assured us that he'd grab 2 or 3 more passengers and we'd be off in less than an hour.
Of course, who's the fool for thinking that might possibly be true? Me. Yes, yours truly apparently has an optimist buried deep in her shellaced heart.
So several hours pass where we yell at the driver a number of times about getting on the road. He wasn't looking for a few more passengers. He was looking for all the passengers necessary to fill the car to maximum capacity before going. And the syndicate (bush taxi boss) snapped his fingers at me. Don't ever snap your fingers at me. Anyway, much yelling aside, we got on the road. What a nice way to start the day.
We get on the road at a little after 10. By 10:30 the little girl sitting on the lap of her granny behind me starts being sick. She's sick about every half an hour into a bag I provided for the rest of the trip. Right behind my ear. Then the man sitting behind Adam projectile boots onto Adam and the woman sitting on his other side. The idiot, a full grown adult, wasn't smart enough to recognize that he wasn't feeling good. Yah, that was really nasty. You should have heard Adam cussing. What amused me (if amused could be used to describe any feeling I had yesterday) is that the driver appologized to us about it, but not the man who made the mess. The poor woman caught most of it.... on the back of her head. It was nasty.
When we stopped for lunch I not only did not eat, I bought a plastic sack for everyone in the back seat.
Trouble really started when our driver told us that one of the people in his car is really his buddy that he's giving a ride to for free, and he wants to empty out the trunk for his friend to sit in so he can get another passenger. Oh, that one set Adam off. There was a lovely little "conversation" for that one. The driver won, of course. What would you expect?
Luck stuck with us when we went through 2 gendarme (army) barrages. "Americain? Donne-moi l'argent." "Heh, Americain, mido falla yahude ka ameriki." Some people may like constant attention based on their looks, but our looks show dollar signs to gendarmeries. We got through with nothing more than some annoyance, though.
We finally got even when we arrived in Conakry. We argued the driver down until he paid for another taxi to drop us off at the front door of the bureau. Anything that takes a single franc out of a chauffer's pocket is revenge. Unfortunately, our arrival was still after dark. C'est la vie.
We've been trying to get our village to stop slaughtering cows in our front yard on market days. It is not only disturbing to have a cow led into your yard and cut down with a machete while you're "enjoying" some coffee, but it smells really awful when several hours later the full sun has started baking the pile of stuff they pulled out of the cow's intestines. When I asked the man who owns our house, who happens to be the local magician (he speaks to devils) as well as the local mayor of sorts, if the cow killing could be moved to another locale he responded with basically a "we'll see." In local speak, that means no. Adam asked the people that do the bovid murder if they could find a better place. Unfortunately, the lead man got mad. We're still puzzled with why. He informed us that they'd been doing the killings there for 15 years. Adam said sure, fine, but why do they still do it there. Because they'd done them there for 15 years. Yes, but why here. Because no one lived there. Well, we live here now and we'd like it moved. No, the cows have been killed there for 15 years. Well, what about moving it behind the market? No, no one likes the smell. Well, we're people and we don't like the smell either. Basically the conversation went around like that for a while. Eventually Adam let the man go because the man kept getting angrier and angrier.
So in an act of defiance Adam locked the gate to our compound when we left. Knowing that the mayor guy doesn't speak French very well, Adam carefully explained to him that he locked the gate against thieves. The mayor said yes, we should lock our house up tight. OK. I'll be entertained to see what happens when we return. The mayor definately didn't understand that we were talking about the whole gate.
But it's really all reasonable. You see, we'd found that the last time we left the village that someone took several craps under our spare room window. That's pretty gross.
We did some home improvements last week. Adam made a cover for our pit latrine. Every night and morning mosquitoes would swarm up out of the hole as someone squated over it and would kindly give us a nice good night or good morning serenade. I don't want to sound ungracious, but I'd rather that all the mosquitoes died. Our neighbors are constantly sick with malaria. I can't be attacked by hundreds of hungry mosquitoes while in a vulnerable situation without thinking about how miserable malaria is. I'm quite happy with the cover.
My camera is dead. It appears that one tiny drop of water got into it an fried it. I'm really quite sad.
Adam bought a bracelet in our market. It said "Le souffrance est un conceil". It means more or less "Suffering brings wisdom". Adam gave it to a man he met who deserved it even more. He only had one arm. He had quite the story to go with it. I got a bracelet too. It says " Mieu vaut tard que jamais." Better late than never.
That's what's up in our world. My mom and grams will arrive tomorrow evening. Guinea is not exactly what I would call wheel chair accessible. This should be interesting.
More another day. I stink and I'm hungry. 23 octobre You don't have to call me darling, darlingIt's been pointed out to me that I don't really let people contact me. I'm shamelessly using someone else's blog thingy to rant to a mass of people who know next to nothing about me.
Actually, this is rather like exibitionism, and I have to admit I rather like it. I also like not having to take responsibility for one of these things.
All the glamour and none of the work.
Anyway, Sara sweetie, if you want to get some Q's answered about Guinea, you can email me. I'll be as honest as I can without scaring you. I too am an extension volunteer. I am also nearing the end of my service so take what I say with a grain of salt. Guinea's the same but everyone has different feelings regarding it.
I do recommend to checking out the link I put up to the Crisis Group report a couple of days ago. It's important to be informed.
Corps de la Paix Americain
BP 1927
Conakry
Republique de Guinee
Afrique d'Ouest
Good luck. Just Can't Wait to Get Off the Road AgainI've decided that today is the day to explain the realities of travel in a country such as Guinea. I am dedicating this to all the people who had to wait for hours in an overheating car on US1 as they evactuated the Florida Keys for Wilma. I feel your pain, but you ain't getting no sympathy out of me.
I never write to my family about such things because I feel like every story I have to tell takes much longer than I can keep people's attention. You see, each detail requires explanation so that you can understand the situation in context and eyes tend to glaze over if a story takes longer than 10 minutes.
I know this because I have listened to amazing Peace Corps stories. One guy had one so amazing that I fell asleep during it and woke up to find it still going on. I wish I'd had a tape recorder going during that one. The guy was from Tennessee and I find that no one tells a story better than a true southerner. Not being a true southerner (the Fla. Keys were a part of the Union) I can't claim such skills. Neither can my husband. Despite being a true Mississippian (for like 14 generations), he went to Emory- what I call the Northern colony of the south.
Anyway, the value of being a part of this orginization is that I ALWAYS have a topper story. A good topper story is the purpose behind most of my actions and Guinea has given any one of its volunteers a minimum of 20 topper stories. Here's why:
Guinea travel is what some like to refer to as institutionalized hitch hiking. You get on the side of the road and stick your hand out. If a car has space, or isn't driven by an international aid worker (more on that another time), the car will stop and you get it. Sounds easy, doesn't it?
There's a few reasons why this isn't as nice as it sounds. The first reason are the roads. Guinea has one paved road. Yes, only one paved road in a country the size of Mississippi. It runs from Conakry to Labe, about a 6 hour drive through twisting mountains, tiny villages, over rambling rivers, etc. I know this sounds like it would be scenic, but it's not as much as it seems.
What should be a six hour drive is a minimum of 8 hours for a number of reasons. First, there's the "paved road." Projects of any magnitude-- say, costing more than $100-- generally get "bouffed" by those in charge of the project. Bouffer is a beautiful French word meaning stolen, eaten, embezzled, etc. The effect of this is that roads are not maintained and when they were originally laid safety considerations were not taken into account and the pavement was put as thinly as possible. Rock slides are common and the roads are too narrow in places for 2 cars to pass because sections of the road has been washed away in Guinea's torrential rains. Even where there is a decent amount of road left there are huge pot holes that will blow out the tire of any car going more than 10mph.
The net effect are cars and trucks erratically driving all over the road trying to avoid tire eating holes. Since there are NO ROAD LAWS, there's no control over this.
Contributing to the erratic driving are all the livestock that walk along the road, stand in the middle of the road, crossing the road, etc. Your average Guinean driver doesn't want to hit livestock because that's some families' only source of income. Besides, I don't think what passes for a car would win in a head on with a full grown bull who's horns are a foot long, each.
Why's that? Well, not only are bulls here completely feral, but Guineans don't drive SUV's. The most common cars here are the Peugeot 504 sedans and station wagons. From the 1980's. We're not talking new cars here. These are cars that originated somewhere else and were dumped in Guinea after the original owner(s) no longer wanted them. Once in Guinea they are stripped of any luxury items they MAY have owned. Things such as door handles, window cranks, and cup holders are all removed because they take up SPACE. Why are Guineans so worried about space? Because a car meant to sit 4 passengers can fit at least 7 passengers if they squeeeeeeeeze. The station wagons fit 10 minimum. Have you ever tried this? I don't recommend it, especially not for more than 4 hours. Butt cheeks go numb. The back starts to ache. People start to smell (if they didn't already). There's usually a barfer. And a baby afraid of the ugly white lady in the car with her will scream everytime it catches sight of her.
Oh, but not only is it cramped. There's no air conditioning. EVER. And the windows, if there's a crank to open and shut them, always get stuck. Down, if it's about to storm, and up, if it's one of those lovely killer sub-saharan sunny days. Then there's the dust. The ubiquitious orange dust that gets into your clothing, buried into your pores, clogging your nose and choaking your throat. During the dry season it's blisteringly hot not only because of the climate, but because every year Guineans like to scorch their country through a policy of monumental fires. As if Guinea wasn't enough degraded through economic, social, and political problems, they like to destroy their main resource, their land fertility, through a misbegotten policy of BURN, BABY, BURN.
Then there's the car itself. Most cars have been rolled and/or wrecked at least once. I have been in cars where the roof has been re-welded onto the car after numerous accidents where rolling has occured. The doors don't close all the way. The brakes don't work. The steering is out. Only 3 gears are left. Something has been done to the starter so it is started by twisting a couple of wires together. The radiator is a nearly solid chunk of black gunk and has been fixed with bubble gum. The axles are bent and the tires are being held together by pieces of rubber stuffed into the sides of the rim. Only 3 lugnuts are left holding each tire on. A roof rack has been welded onto the car and it is not unusual for a car to be holding over a thousand pounds (lumber, sacks of cement or rice, etc) on the rack. Oftentimes a kid will be sitting on top of the "luggage" which is piled up nearly as tall again as the car underneath it. The luggage is on top of the car because 3 sheep, a goat, and a couple of chickens are in the trunk. And things that are supposed to hold various fluids to keep the car running are being used as tool boxes. I've seen countless fluid resevoirs with the tops cut off containing spare parts for the car.
Often times there's something wrong with the fuel pump and the driver occasionally has to get out, put gasoline in his mouth, and spit it into the engine. One time a taxi was spotted with a kid perched above the engine, syphoning gas into the engine as it was rolling down the road.
Oh, you wish I was joking or exaggerating. Woe to he who is in a car with a blown tire, runs out of gas, or in some other way breaks down.
So, the conditions in the car are not the safest imaginable.
Next, there's the problem with the driver, himself. There are the occassional chauffers who are honest, gentle spoken, and agreeable. THIS IS NOT THE NORM. Most chauffers will do whatever is possible to get as much as they can out of their clients. I use the word "client" loosely because in ALL cases, it is the chauffer who decides what today's rules are going to be. I'm not going to say that there aren't some reasons why this is the case. Chauffers have to pay a "syndicate" for the privilage of being a chauffer. They have to pay the owner of the car. They have to pay fees for their license to be a chauffer. They have to pay bribes like mad. Still, that doesn't explain completely why just about every chauffer I've meet is a jacka**. They will lie and steal their way around. I recently found out that chauffers have a larger net income than I do as a Peace Corps volunteer. My teeth ache when I think about some of the things drivers have done to me. Errrgh.
I have spent hours of my service sitting in a taxi spot arguing with the chauffer about the cost of travel. It's never pretty. I can now thoroughly insult someone in 3 languages. It's a good skill.
Getting around in Guinea is an excercise in patience. People in uniforms, be they real military or not, stop people in checkspots where they want to see ID. Most of the time they are familiar enough with PC volunteers that we are not harrassed. This is not true of the local citizens. Money will have to exchange hands if you don't have your papers. Money will have to exchange hands if you do. If you don't want to pay, then the entire car will sit and wait out the soldier. Often times they give up after several hours and let the car go. It's a matter of waiting it out. I've done this, I always travel with a book.
In fairness, however, the government finally took down all the barrages except for the one mandatory one coming into the capital. It's made for a much speedier ride.
Last, but not least, there's the music that the driver likes. Some Guinean music is excellent and I highly recommend checking it out. However, what the locals generally like is HORRIBLE. It's all treble and the one thing that is guaranteed to work in a taxi is the radio. It will have one volume: headache. There will be 2 tapes, played over and over again, for 8 hours. The only working speaker will be right above your ear. Good luck.
Next time you THINK you may be experiencing road rage, think about the kind or rage I've exhibited because of these conditions and take a deep breath, let it out, and say thanks for what you have. Never, anywhere in the US, will you find anything this bad.
Cheers to you all. 22 octobre Standardized Tests, Guinea, and MeHave you ever thought about taking the GRE in a 3rd world country? I highly recommend it.
You see, my husband and I have this crazy (yet necessary) idea that we need to go back to graduate school and get our PhD's. Yes, we want to keep going until we educate ourselves out of a job! Whoopee! It really comes down to, I don't want to leave school, and I do want to leave Guinea.
So we take the GRE, that's the next step, right? Only thing is, we're in Guinea, the 167th worst country on this planet. I recently read a report talking about Guinea as the next West African failed state. Simply saying this will probably get me in trouble with the Peace Corps, but I'm not telling you anything that you can't find out for yourself. Good luck. It's hard to find anything on Guinea. I mean Guinea, not Equitorial Guinea. Not Guinea Bisseau. Not Papau New Guinea. Just Guinea. People have such a hard time with Guinea that sometimes Guinea calls itself Guinea Conakry. Conakry is the capital of Guinea. Oh, whatever.
If you are interested, here's the Crisis Group's recent report:
Happy reading.
Anyway, I wanted to tell you about the GRE.
So, signing up was an experience. You, the GRE website bites the big one (yes, ETS, I hate you) and it was impossible to sign up that way, despite the website's continual insistance that you can. So, I emailed ETS. I got a completely irrelevant reply that makes me wonder what ETS does with that big fee I paid. I had to sign up the old fashioned way, through the precarious Guinean mail system. Unfortunately, ETS doesn't want you to know that you can take the test if you're over seas, so we didn't get our confirmation papers until 3 days before the test. In the mean time, when Adam called the very NOT AT ALL helpful lady told him that he can not get his wife's information. I have to be there. Now, the nearest phone only functions about 40% of the time, is incredibly expensive, and is miles away from our little house our in the middle of Guinea. Of course I wasn't there, I was tending the cook fire.
The nice thing about Ramadan is that there isn't anything to do. So I studied 6 to 8 hours everyday. It was helpful. If you can concentrate on the verbal section while a cow is being slaughtered in your front yard on market day, then I think you can make it.
Lovely.
We got to Conakry and were pleasantly suprised to find our registration papers were all there. Lucky us! It was the two of us and another volunteer who got up early this morning (6am) and got ready to go. We were able to get a taxi right outside the Peace Corps compound. The driver wanted us to pay twice the amount we should, and I'm afraid that I was willing to pay it. I mean, GRE day is not the day to walk off in a huff from 4 different taxi drivers. Adam recognized this and did the arguing for me. We paid the regular amount.
We arrive, and happily Adam had been there before, to meet the guy that gives the test, a nice Mr Diallo. It's in the English Centre at the local university. We went through a gate, down an alley, behind "classrooms" that contained squaters instead of students, behind someone's garden, and finally made it to the English Center. Keep in mind, this is a university. On the way we greeted women bathing their children and old men blankly staring off into space. Hmm.
We were joined by the 2 other candidates, a refugee from Sierra Leone and one of the professors at the university. The Sierra Leonian was nice enough, but pretty taciturn but the professor more than made up for it. He wanted to know all about us. When we in turned asked him where he wanted to go in the US, he said "California". Oh yah, which school? "Le Universite de Californie." Oh yah, which one? Nothing. By the way, this was all in French because the poor man didn't even speak Creole well. This bodes poorly for him. He also asked Adam what was in the GRE. Yikes.
Eventually we head over to actually take the test. Here is where our experience breaks off from most people's GRE experience. You see, it started to rain and the Mr Diallo said we needed to pray to god that the lights didn't go out (he meant that literally, but the way.) When I asked what we'd do if they did, he said he'd run out and buy some candles. Ooh, yah.
Mr Diallo speaks lovely nearly unaccented English so following the instructions for filling out all the standard test forms was a piece of cake for us Americans. I want to consider for a moment, how difficult this task would be if you didn't speak English natively, if you've never seen this kind of test, never used a pencil (for whatever reason, pencils are one of those extremely rare items in Guina), and never once in your life had to "bubble" in a form. I don't want to sound callous, but it was pretty funny. Here's Mr Diallo: "I said turn over the test booklet. TURN OVER THE TEST. No, I said turn over the test. What did I say, I said TURN IT OVER." "The upper right hand number. NO, I SAID UPPER RIGHT HAND. No, turn it over, look at the right. THE RIGHT. OF THE BOOKLET." He finished everytime by muttering to himself in Pular about those stupid "Ballejos". I won't translate it for you. Americans are more racially sensitive than Africans.
It took nearly an hour and many lapses into French before the two locals got it all. Poor guys.
Then we took the test. I'm pleased to say that I answered every single question. I won't say I got them right, but I put an answer, and that's alot by my book. It was a sweltering humid day in a classroom in down town Conakry, and I still managed to finish. That alone should get me a couple of extra points.
Afterwards we went down town and treated ourselves to the only icecream shop in this country. It's usually way to expensive, but we felt we deserved it. The rest of the day's been a waste, I'm afraid my brain is fried. We're going out clubbing tonight. Sometime I should explain about Guinean clubs. Although maybe not. Americans are kind of touchy about the subject of prostitution as well.
That's everything from Danielle's part of the world. Sweet dreams. 30 septembre Notes from AfricaChristine, my dear friend who is one of the few who doesn't really believe I've dropped off the face of the earth, has asked me to post something onto this thing called a "BLOG". Personally, "BLOG" sounds to me like an RKO production, complete with Faye Ray and chocolate pudding special effects, but who am I to complain?
After all, these blog thingies came out after I left the western world. After I entered the heart of darkness. After I decided to explore strange new territories. You get the idea.
So, here I am, in a safe little razor-wire enclosed circle of heaven. Here I have a shot at computers, electricity, and most of the time, running water. I am in Conakry, the capital city of Guinea. I have safely and successfully navigated my way through the unknown world of msn and found a way to post whatever I want onto the internet where unknown people will accidentally find what I have to say. I'm not sure if I think these things are good ideas or not. After all, despite the fact that I am a law abiding, tax paying, reasonably educated, and all around decent American, not all feel like Peace Corps volunteers have much to say. After all:
January 12, 1998 - Friends of Guinea: Senator Jesse Helms was quoted by the New York Times earlier this week resisting the public expenditure for the Peace Corps as, "more ratfood for the third world" and that "I've been telling people for years that Peace Corps was a refuge for drugged-out losers, leftists and homosexuals"
I wish I knew which one I am.
Tomorrow morning I make myself scarce again. Once back to the village, in the bush, out of site, out of mind, I will be but a memory for our American government. I will, however, once again be the local "porto". Porto can be loosely translated as "the local white human specimen to be laughed at, poked at, and generally used as a trophy piece." At all times, it is to be remembered that Portos are not real humans and therefore any activity that Portos undertake are to be watched, no, stared at, with much whispering and laughing behind hands of the audience.
You try living like this for two years and tell me how sane you are at the end. Couple this with no electricity, running water, telephones, and having to learn languages that no one in their right mind would normally ever come across and you have Danielle, aka Dalanda Bah. Dalanda Bah is a simple minded girl, lucky enough to be the only wife of a rich American. Unfortunately, she can't cook, and she has no children. We weep for Dalanda Bah, she has no had the blessing of 6 young children, all hungry and snot nosed, all without much hope for a future. Poor Dalanda Bah. I ask you to understand that Dalanda Bah is Danielle from a Guinean's perspective. I am pitied for my lack of children and scorned because I do not cook all of my family's meals. Oh, and I am simple because I do not speak fluent Pular.
When you look at other cultures and laugh because they seem backwards or pity them because they seem slow, I ask you to remember that the differences are simply that...cultural. We are judged by our culture as much as we judge theirs. Remember that and feel humble.
So I have occasionally had the chance to raise my head up out of development work mire and see what was going on in the world I left. It seems that my part of Africa keeps throwing hurricanes your way. Seems this continent can give as good as she gets, meteorologically speaking, that is. It also appears that the ecologists have been right in what they've been saying for years. Change the hydrology of an area and you leave it vulnerable to outside forces. New Orleans is a tragic example of that.
I've been able to periodically find out what's happening in Hollywood as well. Brad and Angelina? Sounds good to me. It might be a reflection of my personallity, but I much prefer Angelina to goody goody Jen. There's all of these young girls all over the media who I'd never heard of. They all look the same to me, so I can't much comment on them. Just that they're often my age and yet have the sensibilities of my cat. Here I am 26, married, finished college, Peace Corps volunteer, and card carrying member of the Moose Lodge, and I'm supposed to idolize Paris Hilton? Pardon me while I switch off my brain... Ok. Like, oh my gosh, can you believe that there's only one season left of The Simple Life?
Oops. I forgot. I've never seen an episode of that. Maybe it's quite good. Perhaps I'm being to judgemental without any proof. Maybe it gives an in depth commentary on the seperation of class in the US. Maybe the point is to show how the ever widening economic gap is creating an entire type of person who doesn't know how the world works. Maybe the producers of the show are trying to comment that it is the children of the extremely rich who are running the show, and yet they have no grasp on reality. (If you read between the lines, then you will realize that I may be referring to our politicians. I feel compelled to say this because I am discovering that people spend more time watching reality TV than reading and are therefore no longer capable of "reading between the lines.")
And maybe I'm really Sarah Mae, locked in a padded room. We'll never know, this is the internet.
I believe that Christine pointed out that I've never had the joy of seeing an episode of The Desperate Housewives. I'm pretty sure that's what it's called. She did indeed send me the personality test to see which one I'm most like. After taking the test, fielding my way through questions having to do with pop culture that I no longer understand, I found out that I am most like Edie. I'm not sure what this means, maybe one of you could explain it to me. But, there you go. An insight into my personallity.
I've attached a couple of photos because I'm egotistical enough to want to force people to look at them. After all, that's why we put photos on the internet, right? If it doesn't work, blame it on the fact that afte 2 years away, I'm a bit rusty on the ole computer business.
I'll write to ya'all again when I can in October. This is more fun than I thought it would be. Ciao. On jaramma, naani! |
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