Sierra Leone Travel Journals--Kathy Wellington

Travel Journals

"A Few Impressions of Sierra Leone" by Kathy Wellington

4000 Words & 15 Photos in 7 Entries

Scroll down or click on the 7 entries below.

I. Freetown,
May 8-10

II. Trip to the
Villages, May 11

III. Village
Experiences, May 11-17

IV. Education Committee
Experiences, May 11-17

V. Return to
Freetown, May 17

VI. Final Freetown
Days, May 18-19

VII. Trip
Challenges

Note: The following comments are drawn from notes jotted down during the two-week trip to Sierra Leone. In selecting observations, I tried not to duplicate aspects covered by Richard Jewell’s narrative [also found in these "Trips" Journals].

Trip Journals

"Waking Up," Neville, 500 w., 2 photos

"Measure of Hope," Ludlow, "Flame" article--800 w., 4 photos

"Village...Health," Schulenberg, 1700 w., 6 photos

"Impressions," K. Wellington, 4000 w., 15 photos, 7 entries

"Journal," Jewell, 10,000 w., 31 photos, 7 Entries

Song: "Hail to Paramount Chief," S. Wellington, 400 w.: 9 Verses, Refrain, & 1 Photo

Postscript: "Meeting the Pres. of Liberia," Cairns, 1000 w., 2 photos

How You Can Travel to Sierra Leone

I. Freetown, Monday, May 8-Wednesday, May 10

The view from the balcony of our gracious lodgings is spectacular. Perched high on a Freetown hill, the hotel looks out upon housetops below and the vast expanse of ocean beyond. Not until we drive down into the city, forced to take back roads by a blockade from the military court transferring prisoners, do we come face to face with real squalor. Many people live in close quarters with sewage freely flowing in the streets and with decrepit shacks everywhere. Nevertheless, colorful wash hangs between buildings, and people wearing bright-colored, seemingly clean clothes walk gracefully along the streets. Women and children, in particular, carry heavy loads of laundry, fruits, and other wares on their heads. Posture is ramrod straight. When vehicles stop in traffic, they are invariably surrounded by the crush of vendors trying to peddle through the window whatever they carry. We learn that during the 12-year civil war, Freetown’s population exploded with people fleeing for their lives from rural villages. Overcrowded conditions definitely confirm the impression of excessive population, and development is apparent on nearby hills because of burning (clearing) for new building sites.

Along the way we pass stately landmarks: the huge cottonwood tree located in a round-about grows across from the dignified parliament building and kitty corner to the soon-to-be relocated U. S embassy. Because of 9-11, the new embassy, built like an impersonal military fortress, will open on a removed-from-city-center hill top, well fortified with guards. The symbolism of the relocation from the middle of the Freetown community does not escape our group. Also across the street from the cottonwood landmark are streets of shops and a walking marketplace lined with aggressive vendors eager to catch a shopper’s attention and to sell varied goods of colorful cloth, clothes, carvings, jewelry and written materials. An interest expressed in any item, such as a 1994 Sierra Leone school atlas, brings the vendor instantly to your elbow carrying any number of related books, many dating back decades. It is difficult to find current written materials.

Meetings with officials in the U.S. Embassy and the American Refugee Committee (ARC) reveal interesting insights. From Jim Stewart, second in command at the Embassy, we learn about the peace-building (as opposed to peace-keeping) efforts of the U.N. as well as British and, to a lesser extent, U. S. initiatives to help redevelop the country following the devastating civil war. Well-trained police handle domestic difficulties while army soldiers patrol country borders. A world-wide effort to certify the diamond industry is helping to reduce corruption and to regulate the trade. Other promising signs of change are the recent May 2004 local elections, apparently fairly orchestrated, along with the electoral commission which is working to guarantee honest upcoming national elections (which include a Mende candidate). Discussion follows on the appropriate site for the upcoming trial of Charles Taylor: exploration of both pros and cons of a Freetown vs. Hague location.

From Barbara Whitmore, Executive Director of the ARC, and her staff and microfinance business clients, we learn about the complexities of arranging and paying off loans in an effective manner. Perhaps a difference between cultures is particularly accentuated when unsophisticated business owners are trying to manage interest payments on loans that are unfamiliar to their way of operating. Barbara’s openness to input will likely be used to effectively modify the ARC microfinance loan procedure in the near future. Our group is pleased to have first-hand exposure to how an NGO functions in Sierra Leone . We are further pleased that Barbara as well as church members Sonia and John Cairns (Sonia, as ARC Board Chairperson) will join us in our villages for several nights.

Hotel dinners with our new village friends along with village scholarship students attending college/secondary schools in Freetown give us the opportunity to begin forming relationships. One night, I am privileged to sit beside Jeff’s good friend, Sheku Bokarie (from Jokibu), and across from Brima Swaray (later to become our Foindu host) to start learning about the villages we’ll soon visit. Sheku shares information about his family and generously answers questions about Jokibu. He seems pleased to be visiting Freetown and to be reconnecting, once again, with Jeff. Another dinner guest is John Lee, former Sierra Leone Ambassador to the U. S. He currently divides his time between Sierra Leone and Concord , Mass. , where his wife and family (and the sister of my husband, Steve) live. Trained as a lawyer, he has an eloquent style of oratory and an interesting perspective on the upcoming elections and political scene. Also present is Gary, a former Peace Corps volunteer running an NGO and permanently relocating in Sierra Leone . He updates us on projects, including those focusing on education, which his organization supports.

Having become orientated to Sierra Leone through so many valuable perspectives, our group is well-positioned to head to the villages the following day….

II. Trip to the Villages, Thursday, May 11

The long, ten-hour drive, mostly over non-paved, pothole-ridden roads, puts any Valley Fair ride to shame. Especially for those of us wedged into the back of the van with benches facing one another and with windows open to attract breezes (and plenty of rich, red road dust), every dip in the road is experienced: hard! Happily, the group meets its challenge with excellent humor and energy. Time for most of us passes surprisingly fast with interruptions for occasional flat tires (two, going; three, returning), and a lengthy stop for a delicious meal at Munir Shallop’s house both going to and coming from the villages. Located in the third largest city, Kenema, Munir’s home is near his shop, which has been the distribution center for all of the roofs and, now, for three ground-nut stands and supplies. We are pleased that Munir will join us in the villages.

During the final and bumpiest part of the journey, between Kenema and the villages, I sit in the front seat of the ARC vehicle, driven by a fascinating former Red Cross worker. As we bounce along the roads, the driver suddenly breaks his silence and, with increasing animation, shares his experiences of the war. We pass the location where, when driving an ambulance, he was apparently shot at. Remarkably, he had the presence of mind to instantly lean his seat back so the passing bullet only grazed his upper lip as it penetrated the closed window beside him. Further along, he points out a corner where he indicated he’d witnessed the butchering off of people’s ears. Suddenly, he lapses into silence and I do not want to disturb the place where his memories are taking him. I am left wondering about the many others who have witnessed atrocities and managed to continue on. The power of the human spirit is sometimes awe-inspiring.

View of Freetown from the Country Lodge Hotel

Back yard of a Freetown tenement

Freetown vendors selling to a stopped car

700-year-old cotton tree is cultural center of town.

ARC (American Refugee Committee) meets with the U.S. group at Freetown hotel. Director Barbara Whitmore is standing.

III. Village Experiences, Thursday, May 11-Wednesday, May 17

The welcoming reception by the villagers for “Mr. Jeff and his entourage” (as a number of tee shirts worn by villagers say) is overwhelming. People too numerous to count surround our vehicle as we drive into the first of three villages, Jokibu. In 95-degree heat and high humidity, we are surrounded by a crush of well-wishers wanting to shake our hands and touch us. Amidst children dressed in matching school uniforms singing welcome songs and other dancers, we are pushed up a hill towards an open sided, roofed, and concrete-floored meeting area called a barrie. Already, many from our group have gathered at one end where chairs have been set up for all of us to sit and greet everyone. Speeches follow, including thank you's from Jeff, and then the ten of us heading to the other two villages of Pujehun and Foindu set off with our belongings in two vehicles. We need to get settled before the fast-approaching evening hours darken the villages.

Four of us are guests of Brima Swaray in Foindu. We stay in a metal-roofed home in two of the four concrete floor/walled bedrooms of the house adjacent to where Brima and his wife plus assorted family members live. Our bedroom, roughly 9 x 11 feet, contains two handsomely carved wood-frame beds with plastic-covered mattresses that are draped with mosquito nets suspended from wall nails. Each elaborately carved headboard includes two locked compartments for valuables. Between the beds is a substantial wooden table that doubles as a dresser. We learn later that the limited air flow in the room is partially due to the low ceilings, which trap the heat. Made of small saplings placed closely together, they are attractive despite being impractical for hot weather. We also learn how our house and some others in the village are built. Following construction of a wooden frame made of jungle saplings, clay-like mud is applied and left to dry before a skim coat of concrete is added as a finish. The metal roof is installed on top of additional saplings that form the structure of the roof. A concrete floor is then laid and the home is protected from severe rains. It should be noted that a majority of homes we saw still had dirt floors and used far less sophisticated construction than what is described above.

Beyond our single, unscreened wooden-framed window which opens onto a narrow, heavily used concrete outside porch, is an open area containing a newly-constructed open-sided, thatched -roofed cabana. It is there that we often gather over the next days to share snacks, occasional fruits—bananas and mango, especially—and frequent conversations with the many villagers who pay attention to us. We are never without company and we absorb all we can about our new friends.

Beside our bedroom building, and beyond the communal cooking area, stands a row of four newly-built latrines hidden behind closed doors. Two of the four include elevated wooden commodes on which we can sit. Quite luxurious! Buckets of water our hostesses have carried on their heads three times a day from a running river two miles from the village stand in the corner of the concrete-floored latrine rooms. A hole at the end of a slanted portion of the floor redirects water to the ground. Bucket baths, taken by scooping water and pouring it on overheated flesh, provide momentary relief from the nonstop hot temperatures. A wooden-framed set of hooks along one wall is perfectly built to hold a towel and a change of clothes. Bottled water is used for drinking, brushing teeth and washing hands to minimize possibility of infection. Jeff freely doles out the bottled water, bought in the city prior to entering the villages, whenever we see him.

Among the people we spend time with are Elizabeth, a woman (age difficult to determine) who wants to be addressed as “Queen Elizabeth”; and Sheriff, a forty-year-old translator/student at Njala University (Freetown), who is studying agricultural education, and his gracious wife, Mariama, raising their five children in Bo, the second largest city in Sierra Leone. Additionally, a number of students who have followed us to the villages frequently appear to talk and to translate for their Mende-speaking elders: Fatmata, a nursing student; Binde, an electronics student; and Mustopher, a geography/economics student--all in college in Freetown. A graduating high school student, Watta, hoping to start nursing school in Freetown in the fall, also finds her way to Foindu while we are there.

Since several evenings we make the trip from Foindu to Jokibu or to Pujehun for dinner, we get very used to the well-rutted road Robert, our driver, bounces us over. We are consistently amazed, too, by the five to eight villagers who often squeeze into our van to hitch a ride to the neighboring villages. The alternative is a five or six mile walk along a path through the forest.

Noises in the villages are plentiful. On the Friday night we are there, a community dance is held in Jokibu, complete with generators playing Bob Marley and other tunes. Apparently heard next door in Pujehun, the blaring music continues well into the next morning when, at 6 a.m. , the tired dancers finally fall into bed. The universal nature of youth entertainment is striking. The music travels to Foindu—not to be passed over—the following night for a concert that continues only until 4 a.m. Lying on our beds, well away from the barrie where the music originates, we are only minimally aware of the festivities until a rooster mistakenly thinks it is time to wake up and begins crowing and a confused goat starts to bleat!

Several nights, heavy rains come and prove the merit of the tin roof we sleep under. The rain pounds in a steady loud beat. During the first downpour, I get caught in the latrine without rain gear. Deciding to make a dash for the house, I start out the door when, miraculously, a woman holding an umbrella appears from somewhere in the darkness to rescue me. She carefully escorts me home so not even a drop of rain falls on my head and then quietly vanishes. Her attentive thoughtfulness stays with me.

After dark, illuminated only by an occasional kerosene lamp or by one of our flashlights or lanterns (which we leave behind for villagers to enjoy), villagers often gather on the porch outside our window and in the cabana to banter with each other in Mende. Babies frequently lie on top of material covering the porch floor, sometimes quiet but sometimes yelling loudly. I find myself hoping the cries don’t mean the invasion of a serious illness as yet unable to be cured.

We often try to interact with folks outside our windows, though we don’t tend to stay up as long as they do. We fall asleep to the noise of voices speaking in a language we don’t understand, in a community we are just beginning to learn about…. Morning generally begins by 4:45 with the crow of the rooster outside our window. Once or twice, the rooster sleeps in until 4:52 ! With the rooster often comes the noise of seemingly fighting chickens; then, the imam chants his prayers in the distance, and the early risers begin communicating, likely starting the fire beside our house and heading to the river for the first buckets of running water they’ll carry back to the village on their heads. The hum doesn’t wake us, just allows us to acknowledge early morning activity before falling back to sleep. The hum further seems completely natural in a culture so heavily reliant on oral rather than on written traditions. One morning, around 3 a.m., a sharp guttural cry wakes me up and I later learn it may well be a monkey outside the window.

We frequently travel to other villages for dinner, and we do not share a meal with our hosts, who are ever eager to cook for us. We try occasional pieces of fried plantain and cooked chicken but only as we are leaving in the van. Part of our reluctance to share a meal is a concern about germs and sanitation: fear of picking up an unidentifiable infection as a result of eating food prepared in a way unfamiliar to Western practice. As it is, most of us have had fleeting cases of TD: nothing significantly debilitating. A question remains about whether future groups may want to include an evening (or two) of eating with village hosts, particularly near the end of the trip when Western health care is soon to be accessible.

One afternoon, Brima leads us on a tour near his home where his swamp rice grows and where he cultivates fish in a spring-fed pond. It is quite hot but surprisingly mosquito-free as we march along the well-traveled path to Brima’s crops. We stop along the way to admire ground nuts, a major source of protein in the diet and the production of which will be increased, hopefully, by the nut grinders each village is receiving and learning to use. We also stop to look at breadfruit, a staple used by villagers when they fled to the bushes to survive the horrible civil war. Close to Brima’s fields are palm trees that an adolescent boy climbs to show us how palm nuts are gathered, then cooked, then stamped on by bare feet in a vat so the palm oil floats to the top and may be skimmed off to sell. It’s interesting to think how many generations have processed palm oil in this same fashion in Foindu and other villages.

Jokibu villagers fill the open-wall barrie in welcome. Students in front are singing.

Brima Swaray's house, where four of the U.S. group stayed

Foindu host and Big Man Brima Swaray speaking at a village celebration for the U.S. travelers

The outdoor kitchen beside Brima Swaray's house, above and below

The final festivities, held the afternoon before our departure for Freetown, combine celebrations from all three villages as our group sits on primary school chairs along the edge of the Jokibu playing fields lined with tall trees and spectators. The sudden interruption of a poisonous snake dropping from one of the trees sends audience members sitting beneath it running in all directions. Soon, the snake is pounded to death and proudly paraded for all to see its length. Much speechmaking, dancing and extensive tunic presentations round out the festivities before everyone returns to their respective villages to pack for the next day’s journey. A final vivid image is of many Foindu villagers singing as they end their trek from Jokibu at the cabana where they bid us farewell.

IV. Education Committee Experiences in the Villages, May 11-May 17

Our three education committee members first meet with the Foindu Education Committee. Included in our session is the Paramount Chief of Foindu (and other non-Jokibu areas). A number of substitutes attend since one woman member has just given birth and several others are unavailable. Braima Siaka, the secretary, proves to be helpful as both an education committee member and as an interpreter when villagers want to communicate in the Foindu cabana. At the education committee meeting, we work through the teacher questionnaire, with participants giving group responses to each item. We also plan our upcoming visit to the Foindu Methodist Primary School , and we hear an impassioned plea for additional scholarship aid from two recipients, Prince and Sheriff.

Our school visits begin with Pujehun Methodist Primary, the school missing a roof and with bullet holes still visible in the side of one building, reminders of the devastating civil war. Amidst great enthusiasm, Jeff presents to the staff and children of Pujehun some of the materials we’ve carried from the U.S. for each of the three primary schools. Our group briefly observes classes before meeting with the teachers and community teachers to help them complete education questionnaires in small groups. We then head to Jokibu Catholic Primary School , where we divide up to attend classes in session (with one member assuming a major teaching role through an interpreter because the substitute teacher neglects to show up). Braima Siaka joins me in Francis Lansana’s 2^nd and 3^rd grade class where we all help with a Sierra Leone flag-making exercise. What’s striking is how few students have paper to write on, so I give out all the notebook sheets I can so everyone has something to color. Once students are dismissed from school for the day, our group meets with the two remaining teachers to complete the educational questionnaire. We also meet with an organized union of students all attending secondary school elsewhere. Begun in 2004 with 15 members, the union is now made up of more than 100 students. It is impressively organized with clear goals which are shared with our committee. Individually, too, our group meets with additional villagers to complete educational questionnaires, all of which seem to point to the high value villagers place on educational achievement.

V. Return to Freetown, Wednesday, May 17

Driving over the familiar rutted roads, after bidding farewell to most of our special new village friends, our group heads for Kenema in the early morning. After a delicious brunch at Munir’s, we once again travel over dusty, bumpy terrain towards Freetown. The return trip brings unexpected delays because of a large tree across the road, some serious blowouts which totally destroy tires, and some lengthy tire repairs needed before the traveling can proceed. Arrival late in the day in Freetown at our familiar hilltop hotel comes as a welcome end to the journey.

VI. Final Freetown Days, Thursday-Friday, May 18-19

A trip to the local two-story market to barter wares plus a final trip to a gorgeous beach punctuate parts of the final days in Freetown. Most significantly, however, is the visit—after a boat ride across the bay—to Bunce Island, home to a number of slaves waiting to be shipped to South Carolina to work in rice fields in the late 1700’s/early 1800’s. The Syracuse University archeologist responsible for researching many of the artifacts leads us on a fascinating tour of the island in which he points out where slaves were held and how the island has likely been fortified. It is particularly moving to tour the site with our close village friends who have, once again, made the journey from the three villages to Freetown to spend our final Sierra Leone days with us. As we are about to leave the island, we join hands in prayer, feeling an unexplainable bond with our new friends whom we know we will continue to hold in our hearts as we soon part ways.

An ending celebration brings Freetown students plus John Lee to the hotel for a final dinner on the terrace and a festive evening of dancing to the Refugee All-Star Band, which shows up in person to entertain us. The next day, we enjoy a final outing to a glorious ocean beach, using the time there to reflect on impressions of the trip and to begin planning for how we want to continue our relationship with our new village friends. This is a trip which in many ways may have no ending, particularly since a number of us expect some day to pay a return visit to the villages we’ve come to embrace. We already feel profoundly impacted by our recent experiences, yet unable to grasp exactly why or how…. O, Africa!

Jan Neville dances with official dancers at the farewell celebration.

A puff adder appears at the final celebration and is quickly killed.

Foindu School, clockwise from lower left: foundation of school destroyed in civil war, tarp-roof pole building used several years, and brand new school

VII. A Note on Trip Challenges

Despite its overwhelmingly positive nature, the trip posed a few challenges, most of which can likely be addressed over time.

Members of our group learned quickly that the cultural gaps between us and our village friends went far beyond language differences. We were initially unprepared for the sometimes aggressive way that scholarship students, their parents, and some village leaders confronted us for additional financial and material assistance. The desire to form authentic partnerships with our village friends periodically seemed thwarted by the obvious imbalance between our economic and cultural situations. The question of how to form genuine relationships while still providing reasonable assistance lingers. Perhaps over time, increased understanding and communication between members of our group and villagers will help to bridge at least part of the significant economic divide.

Connected to ongoing individual requests were the significant needs expressed collectively by the village committees with which group members worked. In education, for example, the many pressing problems quickly seemed almost overwhelming to prioritize: school building repairs, inadequate furniture, books, writing materials, school meals, payment for teachers, training for teachers…: the list seemed endless. We frequently reminded ourselves that on this fact-finding trip, we could only research the needs to begin understanding the complexity of the challenges related to education. We were heartened that in some areas, such as water quality, group members were able to not only diagnose problems but also to begin addressing them in significant ways. In time, education, too, will hopefully be radically improved for villagers and teachers.

Living conditions presented a few surprising challenges as well. For example, the inability to cool off, even at night and sometimes even after taking bucket baths, was unanticipated for some of us. Undoubtedly, traveling at a different time of year or even bringing battery-run fans might help move the humid night air in sleeping quarters. Another surprise was the unwavering desire for physical touch by the villagers and, in particular, the children. Personal space was at a minimum at all times we were out of our bedrooms, despite the often oppressively hot temperatures. Perhaps if affected individuals budgeted more personal time into their schedules, they would be less bothered by the enthusiastic physical responses of villagers when they are in public areas.

Finally, the challenge of addressing an exotic, unfamiliar infection became real for me when I developed a hot, itchy face rash and then two painful ear aches. Happily, a few treatments of Benadryl and an aggressive course of antibiotics seemed to help the problems, but I was, nevertheless, left wondering what one would do if the difficulties were, in fact, unresponsive to treatment or involved an unrelenting fever. Perhaps training in wilderness-first-responder or other crash course for laypeople would be useful for a few travelers to have. Additionally, having concerned members bring along full courses of broad-reaching antibiotics might help provide necessary protection from mysterious ailments.

Four Pujehun School girls in uniform

In a 6th-grade Foindu classroom: typical desk and bench for three. Windows are wide and high because there is no electricity for lights in the villages.



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