Category Archives: Guinea

Guinea Part II – Ebola and Vine Bridges

16 Tuesday Jan 2018

Posted by in Africa, Guinea

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Vine Bridge in Guinea

On the morning of the 29th, I woke up groggy and tired from a very fitful and restless sleep.  That day we had some more heavy miles to cover before reaching the town of Gueckedou – only made famous as being the site of patient zero during the Ebola outbreak of 2015 when a young boy got bitten by a bat and came down with the virus.  Additionally, we were staying at the Hotel Fatou Rose which was set up as the logistics central point for dealing with the crisis in the town.  Our guides told us that the hotel used to have a swimming pool, but during the Ebola outbreak, scared and ailing victims hurled themselves into the pool seeking relief from their burning symptoms and the pool had since been covered in concrete.

Fatou Rose Hotel in Guedeckou with the newly covered pool

Unfortunately, I found myself coming down with a nasty cold, probably hastened by my very cold night two nights before.  After checking in, I gladly took a bucket shower and crawled into bed.  With my symptoms worsening, I decided to spare my roommate the prospect of sharing her bed with me while I was hacking and sniveling and chose to upgrade to my own room for another $20 USD.  After the hotel in Faranah, this place was a palace, but I still had a hard time getting the staff to give me the basic necessities that one simply takes for granted as being included with a hotel room for the night:

  • A top sheet (it is very rare in West Africa for a bed to have a sheet underneath the top blanket/cover)
  • A bucket of water (most hotels in Guinea don’t have running water)
  • A bin for rubbish and toilet paper since the toilet didn’t flush
  • A fan
  • A different fan because the first fan I was provided didn’t have a power cord that fit any of the power outlets in the room
  • A towel
  • A key that can be removed from the lock (yup, you read that right)

It has since become habit to check for all of these items when one arrives in a hotel room in West Africa.  And if you’re lucky enough to have air conditioning, it is additionally important to check for whether there is a temperature setting, or whether the only recourse when you are awoken by arctic frigid conditions in the middle of the night – because it just keeps spitting out progressively colder air like a refrigerator – is to yank out the plug.

A work of art, despite not working

That evening, a wedding reception was held in the hotel’s grounds and a particularly beautiful woman dressed in an exquisitely beaded gown walked into the bar area.  Another passenger and I introduced ourselves and complimented her on her dress before my friend asked if she might take her photo.  Her girlfriend seemed non-plussed and ran off and got the attention of a man who promptly walked over and informed us that he was this woman’s husband.  “Ok…”, I thought, “What does that have to do with anything?”  He then proceeded to explain with a great deal of agitation that if we wanted to take a photo of his wife, we would need to ask his permission.  This is the kind of behavior you read about happening in remote muslim-practicing areas of the world, but it is another thing entirely to come into direct contact with it in such a way.  I chose to say nothing and remove myself from the situation, in case the wife was “blamed” for attracting attention, but my friend chose to give the man a piece of her mind.  While he didn’t speak English, her tone left him in no doubt as to the injustice and disrespect she believed him to be showing.

After a brief dinner, I passed out around 8pm feeling quite sorry for myself, but grateful at least that my experience at the Fatou Rose Hotel wasn’t of life threatening Ebola-like symptoms but just a common cold.

Old signs like this one educating people about Ebola prevention are everywhere in Guinea

The following morning, still sick, we headed out after cook group shopping toward Nzerekore where we would be spending two nights, and ring in the New Year!  We had a lovely stop en-route hiking to a 100-year old Vine bridge that we each got to cross across a river.  Despite being ill, it was so nice to be off the truck and getting some fresh air and exercise.  The countryside was jungle-like and beautiful albeit very hot and sweaty.

Beautiful Guinean Landscape

Guinea is definitely the most economically impoverished countries we visit on this itinerary.  In some places, we were able to purchase a small local bottle of beer for about $0.60.  The currency, like in Sierra Leone, only afforded really small value notes – at 20,000 Guinean Francs, the largest note only carried $2.10 in purchasing power.  Compare this to Cote D’Ivoire (where I am writing this entry from) where the Central African Franc, guaranteed by France, has its largest note as $10,000 which is worth just over $18 USD.  That’s almost ten times the purchasing power of the largest note in Guinea.  What ends up happening is very interesting in psychological terms.  It is similar to the original transformation all westerners go through when they first arrive in West Africa and begin converting prices from their home currency to the local one.  While haggling, you inadvertently sometimes are arguing over pennies rather than dollars.  As soon as you arrive in Cote D’Ivoire, it becomes much easier to spend larger amount of cash, and prices are roughly 2.5 times what they were in Guinea.

Typical Guinean village with round huts

In Sierra Leone and Guinea – sometimes to pay for a larger item, such as a hotel room, one had to count out multiples of 10-30 notes to pay for something because there were no larger worth notes.  In Cote D’Ivoire, the problem is reversed – Notes signify more money, but getting change for small items is next to impossible.

It’s an interesting issue to have juxtaposed as we progress through each country.

In Nzerekore, I opted to upgrade to my own room so I could really focus on progressing to a full recovery – and it turned out that I got a lovely two-room suite to myself.  We had some drama among the ladies of the group due to who our leader paired up each of us with each night – and it certainly was something I could have done without and was quite stressful.

New Year’s Day traditional practice of demanding money for getting through a village by the “devil himself”

I really needed a few restorative days and while many left to go on a hike the next day, I chose to sleep in, write some of my blog, and get lots of rest and fluids before our New Year’s Eve party.  Sinead had made fajitas, and a pineapple rum punch.  It was lovely and there was dancing and some celebrating to be had.  Tried as I could to stay up till midnight, I ended up retiring around 10:30pm hacking away and still needing more sleep.

Guinea Part I – Truck problems, the warmest welcome and horror hotels

13 Saturday Jan 2018

Posted by in Africa, Guinea

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Beautiful Guinean Landscape

On Boxing Day we were scheduled to drive west back to the main road between Freetown and Makeni and then head north-east toward Kabala, staying in a local guesthouse there.  Unfortunately, the truck started making some very strange noises on the road and we pulled over several times for Sinead and Mike to get under it and assess what was going on.  It seemed that it had to do with the drive shaft and some loose ball bearings (I know nothing of truck mechanics, so I apologize if this makes little sense!)

We got to Makeni and were told to take a really long lunch while they found a garage to determine what repairs, if any, were necessary.  A few of us went to the Club restaurant where proceeds for our meal went to benefit the street children of Sierra Leone project.   As typical, the meal took two hours to arrive at which point we had to down it in 15 minutes flat and then bee-line it back to the truck.  As it turned out, the truck needed to stay to be worked on and so Sinead was going to try and arrange accommodation for the 22 of us in Makeni for the night.  This turned into a rather logistical nightmare with taxis back to the truck then taxis to a hotel where she’d been told there were double beds but they were only single.  Then she had to go in another taxi by herself and find another suitable hotel and then bundle us all over there.  By the time we arrived, we were hot, dusty, tired and ready for a shower.

The hotel was quite nice and afforded good views over the city of Makeni.  This region of West Africa suffers from what is known as the Hamattan winds in the dry season which brings dust and sand from the Sahara and sweeps it all across this region.  As such, it is quite hard on the respiratory and immune systems, not to mention it mixes not so well with cities already congested with carbon smog to create the most toxic combination of air.

After a refreshing shower, we took a meal in the hotel restaurant and had a great belly laugh listening to Kelly improvising spoken subtitles for a hilarious Nigerian soap opera that was on TV.  I laughed till I cried.

The following morning we were told that the issue with the truck was not so serious that we couldn’t continue onward with our journey, but we wouldn’t be able to use four-wheel drive, and the truck would need to undergo extensive repairs, probably once we got to Accra.  So, for now, it was “on the road again”!

Many of the days in the early part of this overland itinerary are spent on the truck for long distances, and this was no exception.  We passed the time creating nerdy travel quizzes with each other (which is way fun when you have this many well-traveled/seasoned overlanders in one truck) such as “Name the 9 countries in the world that only contain 4 letters in the name, and “Name all the countries that don’t have enclosed letters of A, B, D, O, P, Q, R, in their name.”  I think we pissed off some of the other passengers when the 3 Americans started quizzing each other on the states and their capitols.  And so we went back to being quiet again and trying to stay in our seats as the truck bumped along across the rough roads.

This evening was another bush camp, and again, we managed to attract some local observers who wanted to watch us cooking our dinner and setting up our campsite with western efficiency.  After dinner and whisky around the fire, I made my way back to my tent and ended up shivering all night as the temperature fell way below what I was expecting/what I was told was normal for this region and time of year.  I had bought a special light sleeping bag that’s only rated to 55f and by 4am I had put on four more layers of clothing including putting my feet/legs into my light down jacket and zipping my hood up over my head.  Even then it was brisk.  To add to the weather – we were all awoken around 1am by what sounded like the Islamic Call to Prayer – but turned out to be a funeral for the village chief nearby.  It was so loud, was broadcast from some very hefty speaker and went on for at least two hours.  Very bizarre to hear this in the middle of the night in the middle of nowhere.

The next morning, still wearing my long sleeved shirt, fleece and long pants, we boarded the truck and drove on to our first border crossing into Guinea.  Guinea has to be one of the poorest countries I’ve ever visited.  We drove past village after village where several hundred families live in small communal roundhouses with one well or water pump providing fresh drinking water for the community.  By nightfall, you see the smoke coming from wood burning/charcoal fires as families prepare their evening meals and people walk around in the dark or carrying battery operated torches.  No streetlights, no power outlets, no running water, no tv – none of the day to day things we take for granted having within arms’ reach in our lives.  It really boggles the mind how so many of the world’s people live like this and seem so happy.  Having said that, if one is born into a community like this, then this would be the only reality you would ever know and it would therefore be much easier to accept and assimilate.

The border crossing was in an extremely remote section of the country and the border was literally a single rope strung across the ground between two flagpoles – there was even someone’s washing hanging out to dry on one side of the “barrier”.  Though we were able to check out of Sierra Leone, our leader had to check-in at a police station on the other side and took one passenger with her since he’d had issues obtaining his visa in advance and was going to try to gain entry via a transit visa.  Luckily, he was successful, but in Sinead’s words “there was no other option.  It had to work and that’s all there was to it”.  She really is a super smart and competent young woman and I greatly admire her capabilities and her can-do no-nonsense attitude.

Once into Guinea, the roads were so bad it was impossible to read or nap or do anything besides hang on for dear life as our bodies were jolted from side to side and up and down.  The further back in the truck one sits, the worse the being thrown around action is.  It can be quite funny, especially when an unexpected pothole is struck suddenly and you go flying.

Soon enough we arrived in Faranah – not exactly a tourist hub of a town, many residents had never seen tourists before and once again we enjoyed a continuing celebrity status as we drove in.  Our guide warned us about the hotel and told us to keep our expectations very low as it was of not a high standard.  Not a high standard?  This hotel has got to be one of the worst I’ve ever stayed in – it more closely resembled a years-long ago abandoned crack den.  Our room was filthy, had no running water, not even a bucket of water to wash in, no mosquito netting or screens on the windows, no fan, no electricity before 7pm (though this was pretty standard in Guinea and Sierra Leone) and the mattress was a thin layer of foam across old wooden planks.  One of the guests also found a hand sized spider in her room.  The staff tried to assist as best they could to the grunts and complaints from our group as everyone tried to wrap their heads around the conditions – fetching us buckets of water and answering our questions about power/fans/netting etc…most of which were answered in the extreme negative.

After doing some much needed handwashing, and a cold bucket shower, some of us walked the dusty road into town, passing by a strangely papered statue of an life sized elephant along the way.  Getting to the market, we watched and observed the frenetic selling over pots of boiling vegetables, zooming motorcycles, trash and the sounds of hundreds of people bartering and going about their evening.  I asked a local (in French, as Guinea was a former French colony) if she could recommend a good restaurant and she informed me that I would need to go to Konakry for that.  Konakry is the capital of Guinea and was about a five hour drive from Faranah.  Luckily, we found a nice street stall where a young mother, with a small baby strapped to her back, served us a very tasty and fresh meal of boiled potatoes, onions, tomatoes, eggs and mayonnaise.  It was surprisingly good.  While the others headed back to our drug den of a motel, Mike – the other American on the trip who happens to also be only a month younger than me – and I decided to walk a little more around town and make our way back a little more slowly.  It was a hot sticky night when everything clinged to your body and just dodging traffic and people gets to be quite tiring.  On our way home we were stopped, not once, not twice, but three times for photos with locals who wanted to pose with us.  It is so funny having people come running up to you and asking if they can take their picture with you just because you’re white and/or foreign.  One guy also insisted on planning a kiss on my cheek for his selfie.

Me and the mob of kids in Faranah

Just when we were getting close to our Ritz-Carlton accommodation, an entire soccer team of kids came screaming and running up to us to have their photos taken.  Here are the results of that “mob” encounter!

That night we all sat under the outdoor rotunda drinking beers and telling stories until quite late because no one wanted to go to their room.  A few people decided to stake their tents there rather than risk the unhygienic conditions of the beds.  I thought It was all quite funny and decided to embrace the experience, taking a valium before crawling into my self-contained sleeping sheet and trying desperately to fall asleep despite the hot, still night air.