Well my Peace Corps service is almost over and I am about to
embark on a great adventure across West Africa, but first some highlights (and
lowlights) of my time in Guinea.
That Time I Felt Like a Stereotypical Peace Corps Volunteer:
On one visit to Balandou, where I did a big reforestation project in 2012, the
farmer we were working with gave me a live chicken. I had biked there, loading my bike into a
wobbly canoe to cross a river, but it would have been rude to not accept the
chicken. So I took it, threw its tied
legs over my handlebars and biked back through the villages, holding it in my
lap as we paddled across the river. And
yes, I did eventually eat it, and it was delicious.
That Time I Forgot I Was in Guinea: Going out to eat at a
fancy restaurant in Conakry. You can eat
a burger, have a drink that is truly cold, and listen to live music. Also, basically the whole time I was in
Dakar. That place is literally Little
Europe.
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| They even have trampolines in Dakar |
One of My Best Days: Going to visit my host family’s
maternal village for someone’s village wedding.
It rained all day and we had to ford several rivers, so we were soaked
through when we arrived. But everyone
there treated me like a member of the family, even though we had never met,
welcoming me into their huts with open arms.
And not a single child screamed “Toubabou” at me.
One of My Worst Days: One of my first days living in
Kankan. I didn’t have a gas stove yet,
so was cooking over charcoal outside, which isn’t bad in itself, except
everyone in the whole neighborhood comes to watch the toubabou cook. And they have no problem telling you that you
are doing it wrong or just reaching their hands right into your food to add a
whole handful of hot peppers. Eventually
I had had enough of being a show for everyone, and at this point I was hungry
and frustrated, so I shouted at them all to go away, screaming the few Malinke
words I knew. Then I felt guilty for
acting so rashly and, even worse, the food wasn’t very good. How was I going to live in this country if I
couldn’t even make lunch? Luckily, since then I have developed a tough enough
skin that people can shout at me and stare all they want and I can just ignore
it, or deal with it more tactfully (i.e. tickling all the kids until they run
away).
One of My Best Bush Taxi Rides: That time I was lucky enough
to catch a ride with the professor of the study abroad program in Kankan. We made it to Conakry in 16 hours and I had a
whole bench to myself!
One of My Worst Bush Taxi Rides: Basically every ride going
to or from Mamou, my own personal transportation hell. Returning from our In-Service Training, there
were enough PCVs to rent out a whole car, but there were no cars at the
station. Eventually one came and we left
by 2 pm, but had to stop by the garage on the way out because it turned out the
gas tank was leaking. They removed it
from the car and ran off into the woods with it. Two hours later they were back with a
“repaired” gas tank and we were off.
Then we got flat tire after flat tire, eventually forgetting our jack at
a pit stop. And that repaired gas tank
was not doing so well, so our driver patched it up with a paste of instant
coffee and soap. All that in mind, we
were making pretty good time until it was reaching midnight and we kept getting
flat tire after flat tire, always waiting for a sympathetic passerby to lend us
their jack and a ride into town to patch the tire. Running on fumes, we finally made it to
Kankan, where we promptly ran out of gas about 3 km from our destination. The only saving grace was I had all my
friends to keep me company. And a cat.
That Time My Project Was a Success: Watching the development
Green Hand Action, the NGO I work with, has made over the two years. The first year we did our reforestation
project, I felt like I had to hold their hand at every step and there were so
many logistical problems. This year,
after I helped with the preparations, all I had to do was show up and they
organized themselves into work groups and managed all the details on their own.
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| The boys of Green Hand Action |
That Time My Project Failed: Let me paint a not so
hypothetical picture. When planting trees in an urban area, there are so many
things that can go wrong. Children can
come play soccer on top of your seedlings, so you meet with them and tell them
about the importance of trees. Then a
fire comes, burning them all to crisp, so you remove all the weeds and dried
brush surrounding the trees. Then a herd
of sheep arrives, munching all your trees down to a short stump, so you put up
fencing, keeping all the herbivores out.
Then, in the middle of the night, a mysterious someone comes and steals
all your fencing, trampling the trees in the process. Then you give up and think maybe planting
trees there wasn’t such a good idea after all.
A Thing I Will Never Accept in Guinea: The crying baby
ringtone. I had a neighbor who had no
music on his phone, so would just listen to this on repeat, the loudest most
jarring cry I have ever heard. Isn’t
everyone supposed to instinctively hate this sound?
A Thing I Got Over Pretty Quickly: The water method. Suffice it to say that sometimes you are
visiting a village or your car breaks down and you desperately need the
bathroom, but you have no toilet paper.
Luckily water is always available.
Please at least use soap afterwards though.
Worst Meeting I Ever Attended: During the first week of
pre-service training, we attended a meeting at the local office of
environment. The official didn’t seem to
be informed we were coming and proceeded to give veiled, defensive answers to
all our questions. Added to the fact
that few of us understood French at that point and the room was uncomfortably
hot, I would venture to say at least half of us, including our trainer, dozed
off.
Best Meeting I Ever Attended: A meeting put on for all the local gardening
associations by a group that offers pest control training. They used powerpoint to show graphs of the
attendance of each group and the increase in their earnings and projected
future activities. Most of the crowd was
illiterate, so they explained the meaning of every image in the local language,
and you could see the appreciation these old ladies felt in being treated as
equals. Plus, it started on time and we
got lunch.
Thing I Use Everyday Day: Feel free to judge me,
but it’s my smartphone. I can GPS my
farmer’s land, look up proper spacing for watermelon mounds, and check my
e-mail, all from the field.
Thing I Never Use: A watch. Most things start late anyways, so wearing a
watch just makes you anxious about the fact that it is two hours after the
start time and only five people are there.
Guinean Skill I Have Mastered: The social joking that gets
everything done here, from scheduling a meeting to buying tomatoes. I call all Traores thieves and ask everyone
coming from a trip where my gift is. I
even manage a laugh when all those old men say they will marry me, although I
usually tell them they will have to be my fourth husband and do all my laundry,
which shuts them up pretty fast.
Guinean Skill I Still Fail At: Carrying water on my
head. I have to fill all my buckets up
only 4/5 of the way or it splashes all over me.
Luckily I live very close to the well, so I can carry the buckets by my
side and stay dry.
Favorite Town In Guinea: Besides Kankan, which I really
believe is the best, I would have to say Lola, which is where we stayed before
hiking Mt. Nimba. The people are polite
and speak great French. It is at the
start of the mountains, surrounded by forested countryside. Plus, because it is a Christian village,
there is pork and palm wine everywhere.
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| A vine bridge near Lola |
Least Favorite Town In Guinea: Linsan, the truck stop
between Kindia and Mamou. This town
located along the main road is always full of traffic because people will park
their cars along the side of the road, turning a national highway into one
lane. There are hundreds of vultures and
a disproportionate amount of beggars and general crazy people, making the whole
scene like something out of a horror movie.
Hottest I’ve Ever Been: Anytime during hot season in Kankan. Most days, I would come home after lunch,
strip down and pour a whole bucket of water over me, then lay on the floor
fanning myself until the temperature dropped enough to be a real person again.
Coldest I’ve Ever Been: Coming back from the forest, which
is much colder than the rest of Guinea, in winter in our taxi with the windows
down. It may have only been 60 degrees
out, but wearing a tank top and having the wind in your face for three hours
made it feel like 30.
Favorite Child: I know you’re not supposed to choose
favorites, but mine is definitely Le Vieux, the youngest child in my
family. We eat breakfast together every
morning and chat as we both speak about the same level of Malinke. Since he is the baby of the family, he has
everyone else wrapped around his finger and gets away with everything and
totally knows it too.
Least Favorite Child: Just kidding, that would be too mean.
Although those kids that bang on my door at 6 in the morning are pretty close.
Best Thing I’ve Eaten: This really has two categories. One is all the amazing things the Kankan
volunteers make for our weekly dinners: cinnamon rolls, fried cheese, onion
rings, egg rolls, pizza, lime pound cakes, smoothies. The other category of Guinean food would have
to be the pork we got special ordered for New Years in the Forest region. It was grilled and came with plantains and
pineapple.
Worst Thing I’ve Eaten: Toh.
This is ball of play-doh consistency usually made from rice, corn, or manioc
flour mixed with water. It is not the toh itself, I dislike, but the sauce it
comes with, made with okra and usually dried fish. The okra makes it slimey and green, and as
everyone eats it with their hands, you can’t help but be reminded of snot.
(EDIT: It seems unsavory to end my blog post with the word "snot", so here's some more highlights)
Some of my Best Memories: Squatting in the garden, planting onions next to my host mom. Dancing with the members of my gardening groupement.wearing our matching outfits. Digging up a wild yam with my master farmer and roasting it over a fire in the middle of the woods. Dancing in the first rain of the season with all the kids in my compound. Selling my family's produce in the market, bartering with all the market mamas. Biking at night and looking up to see the whole milky way turning around me.
