Black and white

Since I arrived in Sierra Leone, I have been thinking about the experience of being a white person here, and this post has been in various stages of draft, both in my head and on the computer, for some time. It’s hard to describe the experience without it coming out sounding wrong somehow . . . but I also think it’s an important thing to try and explain, so here it goes.

As a white person in Canada, I have never been personally touched by issues of race. Here in Sierra Leone, my whiteness is pretty much always obvious to me (as well as to everyone around me). In general, being white here means that you can never blend in, get lost in a crowd, or go unnoticed. This is especially true in the villages, but even in Freetown (the capital) you get stares and attention (although much less so than in Makeni, the country’s third largest city, where stares, greetings and the constant cry of “opotho, opotho!” from children and sometimes adults is common – “opotho” means “white person” in Temne, the local language most common in the north). Aside from “opotho”, other terms that have been used to address me range from “hey white” to “white girl" (or worse, "white man") to “hey you” to “Ma” or “Auntie” (these last 2 at least show some respect). I know that these greetings are generally not intended in an offensive way, but they can definitely come off sounding rude. I have known people to call back “Owinibie” (no idea if that is spelled even close to correctly), which means “black person” in Temne.

I guess all the attention is to be expected, especially in places where people are not very used to seeing white faces. I personally find it rather exhausting. I’m someone who appreciates the ability to be anonymous sometimes. Even though people are generally friendly and just curious (sometimes they are asking for money or your phone number, but usually they’re just interested in you and what you’re doing in their country), it still feels tiring to me to constantly be getting attention. There have been more than a couple of times where I have felt like an animal in a zoo – being stared at as a curiosity to see what I’ll do next. I know people that have visited here for a shorter time have found all the attention kind of amusing (some of the small kids shriek “opotho” as you drive by in such an enthusiastic way that you can’t help but smile), and I did too at first. You do end up feeling a bit like a minor celebrity. But after a while it begins to wear on you, and I think that most of the longer-term volunteers I know here feel the same way. Sometimes you just really wish you would be ignored.

Luckily for me, in Mapaki people seem to be used to seeing white people around, and it’s really different here than other places I have been. I do get the occasional “opotho” call, but mostly from small kids I don’t know. Generally, because people here know my name (my Salone name of course, which is Isata in case you forgot), when they call out greetings they are actually greeting me, not just trying to get the attention of an amusing white person. I’m sure Carolyn’s being here before me had a lot to do with that. Also, in Mapaki, I never mind the attention that I get because I like talking to people and getting to know the community and I still have my own space I can retreat to if the attention gets to be too much.

Although it can be tiring and annoying, there can be positive and interesting things about being noticed too. I hate to say this, but you often get treated better as a white person. Kind of sad, but true. For example, a friend of mine here was seen at the hospital before a whole line of other patients because she was white and the doctor thought she wouldn’t want to wait. On the interesting side of things, I have certainly had conversations with people that I never would have talked to if they hadn’t approached me because I was white. So it’s a good way to meet people and learn more about the country too.

There are certainly some specific perceptions about white people here (and of course I am, of necessity, making some mass generalizations here based on my own personal experiences). Although the perceptions are generally positive (for example, white people are often seen as both rich and experts/smart), it does give you a sense of what racist behaviour must feel like. It's unnerving to have assumptions made about you just because of the colour of your skin, even if they are more positive assumptions.

Young children often seem to be amazed or fascinated by white people. I’ve had a few very small kids (a year or two old) be quite scared of me and start to cry upon seeing me – they’d obviously never seen anyone white before. Adults/older siblings often think this is hilarious and will continue to bring the kid near me to watch it be scared, laughing all the while. Kids are also really interested in my skin or my hair, and will just stare or try to touch it.

As I said, white people are generally perceived as rich. I think that this bothers some expats, because they don’t see themselves as rich, and certainly wouldn’t be considered rich in their home country. However, compared to the majority of the population here, I am most definitely rich, both in terms of dollars in income and in what I am able to do because of that income. I have no problem feeding, housing and clothing myself and my family, and I have money for things like health and education, and even for luxuries like fun and travel. Some of the women I’ve talked to here are living on petty trading, earning maybe 20,000 or 30,000 Le per month (less than $10). Yes, per month. When I compare myself to them, I am most definitely rich.

Despite this income disparity, I haven’t had too many people ask me for money or other things here (aside from street beggars of course, which you get a lot of in any bigger city). I think this is primarily because of the work Carolyn did here in Mapaki and in the other communities where I am working in emphasizing that she was a volunteer here and didn’t have an income either. I am thankful for that, as it can be very hard to turn down requests, but it's impossible to help everyone who needs it. And the danger is that if you help one person and word gets around, others will come to you for help also. I end up feeling a little bit selfish for wanting to hang on to my money when people here have so little, but the reality is that it is impossible to help everyone that needs it. Even if you meet one request, another might come that you can’t help with. Pretty much every expat I know here has helped people in personal ways – for example, paying medical costs or school fees – and of course, we are all here volunteering, but for me, I end up feeling like there is no way I could ever really do enough.

In Canada, we are generally isolated from poverty. Yes, we see images on TV or sometimes people asking for change on the street. But being here, seeing how little many people have on a daily basis, and comparing it to what we are so lucky to have in Canada, it really makes you think about inequality in the world. And in the end, it's not about race. And it's certainly not because I’m fundamentally better or smarter in some fundamental way that I am better off in this world. It’s because of where I happened to be born. Not only the country I was born in, but the kind of family I am lucky enough to have. For me, this kind of inequality makes me feel that I have a responsibility to help those who weren’t born into such fortunate circumstances. Even if what I can do will never be “enough”, even if it only makes a small difference in someone else’s life, at least I can do something, help somehow. I guess that’s one of the things that being here has really made me think about. And for that I’m grateful.

Visit to Gbonkolenken Chiefdom

On Friday, we (Jane, Nancy and Vaughn, the visitors from Canada, plus myself, TMT, Pa Fornah and Sallay) spent the day in Gbonkolenken chiefdom. I had a lot to do there in terms of work – teacher workshop, meetings with the women and with teacher training scholarship recipients, and delivering the PSI flags and certificates for the schools there that have become members. Jane, Nancy and Vaughn also wanted to visit Mathombo school, which is twinned with Parkview school in Ontario where Jane’s children go to school, and deliver some of the health supplies that they brought with them (the supplies were divided between the two chiefdoms, some to Gbonkolenken and some to Paki Masabong).

It was a good, although very long day. I’ve posted some pictures. The children at Mathombo school were singing as we arrived at the school – a very nice way to be welcomed! The last time I visited Gbonkolenken, school hadn’t started yet, so it was good to see the kids in class this time. Mathombo is a community school and all of the teachers there are volunteers. It’s quite inspiring to see their commitment to the kids, especially in the area of peace education. I could see when visiting the classes that the teachers there were practicing some of the alternatives to corporal punishment that they have learned, especially in terms of providing encouragement and praise to students for participating in class and getting answers right rather than punishing those who got answers wrong.

The teacher workshop we did was the same topic as the one in Paki Masabong last week. We had an excellent turnout – over 30 teachers and a few elders from the area as well. We started the workshop with a review of a previous workshop on alternatives to corporal punishment done by Carolyn, Hetty (van Gurp, founder of Peaceful Schools International) and Thomas. During this review, when I asked the teachers what they remembered from the workshop, one of the elders recalled the story of Hetty’s son Ben (Ben died as the result of an act of bullying by another child at school) and told it again as a reminder why it is so important to build peace at school. I thought it was very touching that he remembered her story.

We also had a very sad health-related experience in Mathombo. Since both Jane and Nancy are doctors, one of the village elders in Mathombo asked if they could examine his wife who hadn’t been feeling well for a few months. The woman was frail and elderly (I find it very hard to tell people’s ages here so I won’t hazard a guess), and was obviously in some pain. Jane and Nancy did the best they could to examine her, asking questions and checking her stomach, which is what was bothering her. In the end they thought that she likely had cancer and that a tumour in her stomach area was causing her the pain. They encouraged her to go to hospital (Mathombo is in Tonkolili District, so the nearest hospital is in Magburaka, about a 45 minute drive), but she said it was not possible because of the costs. All we could do is leave her a bottle of ibuprofen in the hopes of offering her some relief from pain. It was difficult to see someone in obvious pain and distress and not be able to do more to help.

The costs of treatment and the distance to health services are both major barriers to care for people here. However, even if she could get to the hospital, I’m not sure what they’d be able to offer in terms of treatment or pain relief/palliative care. I know that the hospital in Makeni can’t perform any surgeries requiring general anaesthesia for example. I suspect that unless she was able to go to Freetown it would be very difficult for her to get the care she needed. Unfortunately, the inability to access care is an all too common problem for people here.

Maso and Makamray school opening - September 18

I have been meaning to post the post below for some time – it was written a while ago, but I forgot to post it. The school openings took place September 18, so a few weeks ago now. More to come tomorrow on today’s World Teachers Day celebration in Mapaki.

Yesterday I attended the opening of two new schools, primary schools in the communities of Maso and Makamray (both in the Paki Masabong Chiefdom) - photos are at http://picasaweb.google.ca/clarepoulev/MakamrayAndMasoSchoolOpening#. The schools were built by Plan (formerly Foster Parents Plan) Sierra Leone with funds from Plan Japan. I went with the Chief, who was speaking at both events.

Each school is a building with six classrooms (for classes 1 - 6) and an administrative area. Along with the school building, Plan also builds a latrine and a well for use by students. This is important because schools must have these facilities in order to get approved by government for support. In addition to the buildings, Plan also provided some basic educational materials (e.g. text books) as it is difficult for schools to get these. Plan also provides some scholarships for students, to help with fees and costs (although there are no school fees at the primary level, the required books and uniforms cost money), and for teacher training. PSI and cdpeace provide similar scholarships, and these two schools were involved last year in our school twinning project as well.

Both openings were similar – the communities, students and teachers were waiting to greet us with song when we arrived. The first opening began about an hour late, and the second one was then late as well. The late starting time is fairly typical here. Each opening included speeches by the Chairman of the Teacher’s Council, the Paramount Chief of Paki Masabong, representatives from the district council, the national government, and the school management committee, and by Plan staff.

At both openings, the children from the school performed a few short skits and songs. The skits were cute. In Makamray the skit was focused on allowing all children to attend school. The kids in Makamray also sang a song, directed at the government officials present that included a request to approve the school. Both Maso and Makamray are community schools, so they currently get no support from government. Now that they have school buildings, latrines and wells, they can apply to become a government-supported school. This would give them some support for teacher salaries (for those who are certified teachers) and some support in terms of books and learning materials.

In Maso, the skit the kids did was about HIV/AIDS prevention. They talked about safe sex, about ensuring that any needles and razors used are clean or sterilized, and about getting tested for HIV. They also sang a song about protecting yourself from HIV using the “ABC” method: abstinence, be faithful and use a condom. While AIDS is not as big of a problem here in Sierra Leone as it is in other parts of Africa, the song and skit was a reminder that it is present here too.

A few stats on HIV in Sierra Leone from UNAIDS (http://www.unaids.org/en/CountryResponses/Countries/sierra_leone.asp). In 2008. an estimated 55,000 people were living with HIV in the country, a prevalence rate of 1.7%. There were approximately 3,300 deaths due to AIDS, and 16,000 children orphaned due to AIDS. Of course, data collection is a challenge here, so it’s a bit hard to say how reliable these statistics are (for example, the estimate on AIDS orphans ranges between 6,400 and 26,000).

Some colleagues who work in hospitals in Makeni have told me that they think that the official prevalence rate is an underestimate based on their own experiences. Given how prevalence data is collected, this could definitely be the case. From what I understand, prevalence of HIV is usually estimated primarily by testing pregnant women who present at clinics for prenatal care and extrapolating that data to the population at large. There are a few problems with this approach in Sierra Leone:
1. Many pregnant women here never go to a clinic for a variety of reasons.
2. Taking a quick look at the map of testing sites in Sierra Leone shows that they are highly concentrated in Freetown, with a few in the south and east of the country. There are none near Makeni or anywhere in Northern Province, except one in Kambia District.

If you are interested in learning more about HIV/AIDS in Sierra Leone, take a further look at the UNAIDS website link above.

A visit to the farm

Yesterday Alpha took me to visit his farm. Alpha is a boy of 15 who lives here in Mapaki with his family. He and Carolyn were good friends, and he has come often to visit me as well. He is currently in the last year of Junior Secondary School (JSS) here in Mapaki. Alpha dreams of becoming a doctor one day, so he works hard at his studies.

I mentioned to him that I was interested in visiting some farms, so yesterday he brought me to visit. (Photo at right is of Alpha's father harvesting rice. See more photos of the farm at http://picasaweb.google.ca/clarepoulev/AlphaSFamilySFarm#) The family farm is close to Mapaki, only about a 5 minute walk down the road towards Maso, and then a climb up a path to the top of a hill. Alpha told me that his farm is probably smaller than the average in the village. I am rubbish at estimating area and distances, so I won’t try to guess how big it was, but it didn’t seem huge. Alpha told me that a farm’s size is really just limited by the amount of seeds a family has. Families save seeds to use in planting the next time, but of course they also need to eat so are limited in what they can save. If Alpha’s family had access to money for more seeds they would simply clear more land for planting.

The farms here are generally mixed crop farms. On Alpha’s farm was planted rice, sorghum, corn, cassava, a few types of beans, and some vegetables (I saw a few hot peppers and tomatoes). There are also palm trees for coconuts, palm wine and palm oil. Different cops are harvested and planted at different times, and even rice is generally harvested and planted 3 times per year (depends on the type of rice though). The staple crop here is definitely rice (there is a saying that a Sierra Leonean hasn’t eaten until he has had rice), so that is the majority of what is planted. Planting is not done in an organized way in the sense of rows or anything like that – my understanding is that seeds are just thrown and grow where they land. There is no form of irrigation available as far as I can tell – this is why the dry season here is also known as the “hungry” season, because food doesn’t grow as well without the rains.

Apparently Sierra Leone also imports a lot of rice, so people have really been affected by the increasing price of rice and other food commodities over the last year. The price of a bag of rice has increased from 100,000 LE to 120,000 LE. I noticed that the rice I ate at chop houses (restaurants) in Makeni was plain white rice, different from the rice we eat here in Mapaki, which is harvested from the fields.

When the rice is ready to be harvested, it is cut down with a machete and then tied up in little bundles and hung up for a few hours to dry. Once dried, it has to be threshed to separate the seeds from the stalks. Then it must be pounded to open up the seeds to get the grain for cooking. Maintaining the farm and harvesting and processing food are hard work. Generally, the whole family works on the farm. When we visited, Alpha’s father was there as well as his two sisters, Sine (sp?) and Alice. I think that Alice is the older sister, around 24, and the two little boys in my photos are hers. Sine is 19. People go to their farms in the morning and sometimes do not return until dark. Everything is done by hand or with basic tools. Children work on the farms as well as adults – they gather wood, clean, pound rice, etc. Now that Alpha is back in school after the holidays, he generally only works on the farm on weekends.

Makeni night life

I had quite an exciting weekend here in Makeni and had the opportunity to sample some of the night life, which was fun. We went out both Friday and Saturday nights though, so I’m a little sleepy today. That, and the lack of coffee. Heidi and KK are still in the process of setting up their kitchen as they just moved into their house, so until Saturday there was no way to cook or heat anything. Saturday we got some coal for the coal pot, so on Sunday I attempted to use the coal pot to boil water. This, apparently, is harder than it sounds, because I was unsuccessful. I don’t know what I was doing wrong, maybe not enough coal or not lighting it properly, but the water never boiled, although it did get hot. I couldn’t get enough heat going to boil it I guess. Because it was well water I didn’t want to drink it without having boiled it for a few minutes, so I just gave up on the coffee. I’ll need to get a proper lesson in how to light the coal pot some time. Anyways, I’m looking forward to getting back to having my morning java back in Mapaki, even if it is instant :-)

On Saturday Heidi and KK and their friends threw a big party for another friend, Rabia, who was leaving Sierra Leone the next day after spending a year here as a VSO volunteer. We borrowed a barbeque (not a gas bbq, just a big barrel cut in half and filled with coal) and spent the day preparing food. The main event for the meal was a goat. The goat was bought that morning and tied up in the corner of the yard for a while before he was turned into supper. I think that’s probably the closest I’ve ever been to meat that was alive before I ate it :-) It was tasty though! There was a ton of food at the party, lots of different things, which was great. About 20 or so people came and everyone brought something. We ate a lot, but there were a lot of leftovers as well. Unfortunately because there is no way to preserve things (i.e. no fridge) a lot of the leftovers were wasted.

During the party we had quite an audience. The party was out in the front yard of the house. The gate to the compound is just bars rather than a solid gate, so you can see into the yard if you are standing outside the gate. We are often visited by children coming over to stare at and to talk to us. The night of the party there were at least 10 or 12 kids standing around outside looking in. It’s a bit disconcerting. Every time someone would tell them to get lost, they would leave but then come back after a few minutes. Eventually it got late and they went home, but we had an audience for most of the night. We would have liked to give them some of the leftover food, but didn’t for several reasons: first of all, it just perpetuates the stereotype that white people have food (or money, or other things) and they will give it to you if you hang around them enough. Also, because there were so many children, with more near by, giving out food to some would most likely have caused a bit of a ruckus and there may not have been enough food for everyone.

Once the BBQ portion of the evening was over, we went out dancing. There are two “clubs” in Makeni, Apex and Flamingos. Apex is bigger and nicer and is part of the Wussum hotel (the one with the pool) and Flamingos is a more local kind of a place. On Friday night we went to Flamingos, and Saturday to Apex. The dancing was a lot of fun! The music was pop, but they played mostly Sierra Leonean and Nigerian music (same at Flamingos). I am getting to know some of the most popular songs now and am going to try to track some down to bring home with me. The bars felt similar to clubs at home, except for a few things. The group I was with were the only white people there of course. Also, many people dance by themselves (less common to see this in Canada), and people of the same sex dance together. Girls dancing together is common in Canada as well of course, but you’d never see guys dancing together in the same way that you do here. You also often see men holding hands here. This is not considered a sign that they are gay or romantically involved in any way. Perhaps this is because homosexuality is so totally hidden and taboo here. Anyways, the dancing was a lot of fun. We stayed out very late though, so Sunday was spent mostly lying around being lazy. I am still a little tired today (Monday), but not sure if that is related to the lack of caffeine or actually being tired, since I slept pretty well last night.

Two more Krio lessons today and tomorrow and then I’m heading back to Mapaki on Tuesday. One of the things that I have enjoyed about being in Makeni is becoming more comfortable doing things on my own. There has been more opportunity here for me to go to shops, the office, out to eat, etc. by myself, and I feel quite comfortable doing that now. Makes me feel more at home in the country, which is good. I’m sure I’ll be down in Makeni for the occasional weekend, but for now I’m looking forward to going back to my quiet village life in Mapaki tomorrow. I will be taking some food treats from Makeni back with me though – crackers, laughing cow cheese, hot chocolate powder and soya sauce (for those days I don’t feel like eating the plasa (sauce) that is available). The cheese especially will be a nice treat – there is very little dairy here because of the lack of refrigeration.

Bits and bytes

A collection of thoughts today.

This morning I had a shower!! SO exciting! Thank you Hetty for the shower in a bag. It's a thing that you fill with water and it has a spout on the bottom that you can turn on and off. Yesterday I got one of the carpenters to rig something up to the ceiling so I could hang up my bag, and he also built me a stool to make it easier to get up and down. See the photo - the bag hanging is the shower bag, and below is the stool I use to hang it up. :-) The shower is great because I can bathe more quickly and I actually use less water than for a bucket bath. What a great gift!!

I think I have forgotten to mention that I now have an African name. When I arrived in Mapaki one of the elders told me that I would have to take an African name. I was christened Isata (eye-sah-tah) Conteh. Conteh is the Chief's family name. Isata is much easier for people here to say than Clare. The kids in Mapaki have already started calling "Isata, Isata" instead of "Opporto, Opporto" which is nice.

There is a big tree just outside and across the road from the guesthouse. Kouame tells me it is a Neem tree. In the tree live many bright yellow birds. Since I arrived, I have really admired this tree and loved the sound of the birds singing every day and every evening. However, yesterday I learned that these birds eat rice from the fields, and that farmers dislike them for this reason. I still think the birds are pretty, and enjoy their song, but it makes me a little sad to know that they also eat the food that people here need. I'll post a photo of the tree eventually. For any who like birds, this country is a birder's paradise!

Two days ago a young boy came to visit me in the guesthouse and asked me to take him to Canada with me when I go back. He is about 11 years old. I was quite surprised at this request – it’s the first outright request for help I’ve had in Mapaki. I’m sure he has no idea about what is involved in bringing someone to Canada, including the cost or the regulations. He did offer to work very hard for me and my family and to earn lots of money for us if I brought him to Canada. He told me that his father was dead, leaving his mother to care for him and his two siblings herself. I’m sorry that I couldn’t do more to help him, but I did share my breakfast with him, so at least that’s something. Carolyn told me that on the few occasions when people asked her about coming to Canada she used to joke and tell them that they wouldn’t like it because it’s so cold there :-)

Oh, one more thing - I got my first sunburn yesterday :-( Luckily for me it's not too bad, but it's my own fault for not applying enough sunscreen. Lesson learned for next time. I did have my rain jacket with me, but that didn't do me much good in the end, since the day was hot and sunny!

Visit to Gbonkolenken

I’ve just returned from 2 days in Gbonkolenken chiefdom, visiting the communities of Mabarr Line, Makonkorie, Mathombo and Yele. We stayed overnight in the cdpeace guesthouse in Mbarr Line and I had my first experience with a pit latrine (an outhouse). The outhouse wasn’t so much the problem, just the fact that we had to walk outside to get there and it poured rain most of the night. I’m definitely spoiled here in Mapaki with a bathroom right in my bedroom.

A few interesting stories to tell:

On the first day in Gbonkolenken, some kids from the neighbour’s house came over to sit with us at the guesthouse (we were all sitting outside). One little girl, maybe around 3 or 4 years old (it’s difficult to tell someone’s age, and the kids don’t know how old they are) immediately adopted me. Her name was Maio. She started telling the other kids that she owned me and they weren’t allowed to touch me. One of the other adults asked her how much she paid to bring me from Canada and she said “5 block” (that’s 500 Leones, or about $0.25 Cdn). She generously also offered to pay that amount to send me back home too :-) Maio is the little girl on the right in the picture – the kids here are generally all familiar with cameras, and “opporto, snap me” is heard quite often (meaning, white person, take a picture of me).

Another story: we met on the second day (this morning) with the women’s groups from the 6 surrounding villages. Cdpeace gave them groundnut (peanut) seeds to plant this year. The women told us that apparently the seeds weren’t good and the crop they have is poor. The women were asking about the possibility of getting access to microcredit to help them earn additional income in times like this of poor harvest. I was curious how they knew about microcredit – turns out that a lot of the bigger towns have access to microcredit either from government or NGOs and that’s how these women heard about it. The women would use the loans to supplement the food they got from their farms through petty trading. For example, they would tie dye cloth or make soap. Selling these items would then help them earn a cash income that could be used to buy additional food, to pay education costs, or any other household expenses. I’ll have to look into the microcredit situation here and see what I can do.

While in Gbonkolenken, I also saw much more evidence of the conflict than I have seen so far. For those who don’t know, Sierra Leone experienced a horrific 11-year civil war (1991-2002), and there are still plenty of reminders about the war around the country. In Gbonkolenken I noticed many more homes that were burnt out or destroyed during the conflict. We also visited the community of Mathombo, where they have just had a new school built by cdpeace with funds from the PSI-cdpeace project supported by CIDA (Canadian International Development Agency). I was told that the old schools was burned down by RUF fighters, with many children still inside. The effects of the war are visible in other ways as well – when we stopped on the highway to buy some bread, a young man came and stared in the windows of the car. Sally told me that most likely he had probably fought during the war, and gotten addicted to drugs (the Revolutionary United Front (RUF), the rebel fighters, used drugs to fuel their fighters, especially child soldiers), and was now crazy. She said that there were many boys like this all around the country, and no help for them, so they just wander the streets. I met someone last week who works on mental health here and the situation is pretty dismal. There is almost 0 support for mental health, so many of the people who are dealing with mental health issues are left to fend for themselves if they have no families to help care for them.

Oh, I also learned an important lesson on my visit to Gbonkolenken: Never go anywhere without your raincoat in the rainy season. Even if you don’t think you’ll need it, even if it seems nice, just bring it anyways :-) I was caught in the rain more than once over the two days I was there, and riding on a motorbike in the rain is not so fun!

Mayagba – September 11

**Pictures to follow soon!**

Today was my first full day in Mayagba. After getting up, Heidi and I sat on the porch and greeted people as they walked by. I have learned a very few things to say in Krio (a pidgin English) and Temne (one of the major local languages here), but am still struggling. Looking forward to doing some Krio and Temne language training in about 10 days from now.

Around noon we had a community meeting, organized by Mr. Mark Fornah, the cdpeace Literacy Coordinator. This meeting was to introduce me to the community and vice versa. It was really wonderful. Not too long and with the opportunity to meet and talk a little bit with people. I doubt I will remember very many names though. The meeting ended with prayers and blessings for myself and Heidi and singing.

One interesting thing about Sierra Leone is that there seems to be no religious strife at all here. Perhaps that is a generalisation, but thus far it seems that Christians and Muslims coexist with no problems. There is a mosque and a church in Mayagba, and there were both prayers from the Imam and Christian prayers at the meeting today.

This afternoon, after a visit to Makeni to use the internet briefly (too briefly to type out these posts and post them on the blog!), I returned to Mayagba. I spent a few hours sitting on the porch and was soon surrounded by the small children of the village (pictures to come). The kids here are very curious about white people – they shout “opporto, opporto” (white person in Temne) anytime they see one. They all wanted to hear me talk and touch my skin and hair as well. While white people are perhaps more common in the bigger centres (still not a frequent occurrence though), they are rare in the villages. Many people, both adults and children, are curious about what I’m doing here and want to say hello. I took a few snaps of the kids (pictures coming) – they LOVE getting their picture taken and seem to find it hilarious.

One of the older kids (his name was Fred and he spoke a bit of English) brought out a deck of cards. We played cards for about an hour or so, first a game taught to me by Fred where you add cards together and collect pairs, and then I tried to teach them to play slap. I’m not sure he fully understood the game, but we had fun anyways! All the while we were playing, there were 7 or 8 other children crowded around me. I tried teaching them my name, but it turns out that Clare is a bit hard to say. I’m sure they’ll learn over time though.

Oh, also today I rode on a motorbike taxi for the first time (1,000 LE from anywhere to anywhere in Makeni) and took my first solo taxi ride from Makeni to Mayagba!

A final word about taxis in general. I am writing this post a few days in, so I have now had the opportunity to be in several “taxis”. The term taxi here is used to refer to an car that picks up passengers. The cars are not in the best shape unfortunately, but they generally get you where you need to go. Many do not have working gas or speed gauges, and often doors and windows don’t work properly. During my taxi ride from Makeni to Mayagba, when it started to rain the driver had to pull over and open each door in order to roll up the windows by manually connecting the wires. Taxis are also maximally crowded – 7 to a car is the norm. I’m learning that transportation here can definitely be an adventure!