Merry Christmas & a Happy New Year

A Xmas abroad

Christmas away from home can be tough but luckily I was able to spend it with my 2nd family on the Oasis truck at Tokeh Beach in Sierra Leone. Breakfast was right on the beach where we ate and exchanged presents before jumping in for a swim and relaxing. Preparations for the feast began early afternoon and it was the hottest day we have experienced on the trip yet, not helped by the hangover from the night before, making it a tough but fruitful day in the kitchen. The night before we had also arranged for a live pig to be bought to the campsite where we slaughtered, skinned and prepared him for the festivities the next day so Christmas day also included cooking poor old Nelson as we called him over the coals on the spit. I wont mention the fact that it took him about 6 minutes to die for all the animal activists that are reading. I was also able to speak to all my family at home which was great but did make me feel a bit homesick as the day went on. The whole 3 days we had at Tokeh beach in Sierra Leone was fantastic and it was a great chance for everyone to recharge their batteries (not literally unfortunately as they did not have any power points that they would let the low paying 2nd class citizen campers use).

The Catholic Missionary in Conakry

 

Skinning a Dik Dik we bought for dinner

Killing Nelson the pig for Christmas dinner

Carolin having way to much fun skinning the pig

Tasty Nelson

Another mundane campsite

Christmas brekky in style

 

A few bush camps later we found ourselves back in Guinea at a chimp research centre in Bossou. This site was definitely one of mixed emotions. Bossou was the site where we planned to do some trekking for wild chimps in the nearby forest and to spend New Years Eve at in reasonable comfort. The trekking started well, practically running through the village as our guide radioed ahead to find the location of the forward trackers. We headed straight into thick jungle with 5 guides hacking their way through old overgrown paths as we went. We were hot on the trail of 2 chimps and we followed them for about 30 minutes before they climbed a tree for a rest where we got 5 minutes viewing time while they ate a couple of leaves, scratched their bum and had a shit. Unfortunately this is all the time we got with them so back to camp we headed.

Trekking for chimps

5 minutes of peace with the real locals

The campsite at Bossou was possibly more fun then the trekking for chimps. Upon arrival to the site on the 1st day we were greeted by about 30 local kids who use the research area as their playground, most likely because it was the only area I've seen so far in Africa with soft green grass, perfect for playing soccer. And play soccer we did, as well as throwing the Frisbee around and teaching them the hokey pokey much to their delight. The kids were a constant for the whole 3 days and nights we stayed in Bossou and the number swelled as time went by. Just through a hedge was the town soccer pitch and we got to watch a local game between Bossou and a neighbouring town with the home team taking the cake 3-1. We got a celebration right in front of us at halftime as they were as interested in us and our cameras as we were of them.

Teaching the locals the hokey pokey

 

Playing cards with 30-40 kids just standing around watching

 

The local soccer match we got to watch

and the halftime show they put on for us

 

The people here we incredibly poor and yet nothing went missing from our campsite despite us being completely lazy and leaving half the truck spread out and open for most of the time. Upon leaving however I was put in charge of taking the rubbish around to the pit behind the compound and was surprised to see that 30 kids wanted to help me. Nonplussed I made my way around the back with 4 of the kids ripping the bag out of my hand and running ahead to the pit with it with the other 25 kids chasing them. When I walked around the corner they started ripping the bag to shreds to grab whatever they could of value before moving on to physically fight each other mostly for the empty bottles with the larger kids winning out. These kids were aged between 5-12 years old and it was a bittersweet end to such a nice few days with them.

The awesome little kids that befriended us 

 

From such poverty we left Bossou and made our way into Cote D’Ivoire visiting the capital Yamoussoukro before moving on to Abidjan where I currently am now. Whilst spending the afternoon in the capital we dropped into the recently constructed Basilica which was a monolith of giant proportions that did not fit it with its surrounds or the people at all. The tour there consisted of the guide telling us about the air conditioning in the building, the company that made the lifts, justifying the 1km marble avenue that led to the Basilica and the exact specifications of all the statues in the building. It was sad to see people so poor living next to such a building but this is just the world we live in and I do need to remind myself sometimes that I am a rich westerner travelling through their countries spending more money on this trip than they will probably earn in their lifetime.

Tower de Monolith

Inside the Basilica

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