In response to Ethan’s comment, I am staying at a house just off Spur road. The place has five rooms, most of which are self-contained (bathroom within). It is a palace, compared to the cramped one-bedroom my mother and I share back in New York. When you rent a house in Sierra Leone, it is completely barren. The organization has been furnishing the house piece by piece. First we brought in the beds, then a gas cooker, curtains, a fridge, a television (to watch Nigerian soap operas), and finally a fan! The place is incredible and we actually get electricity more than a few hours per day. The National Power Authority has been quite reliable lately for large parts of Freetown. You can attribute this to the APC government’s initiative to bring in ten Megawatt Power Plants from abroad. This is supposed to be a temporary solution until the hydro-electric dam is completed. We shall see when the utility bills reach the majority of users though.
For the meantime, I am the only inhabitant of this giant space, but that will all change come March, when the documentary crew returns. Yes I neglected to mention the documentary crew, I will explain… Fambul Tok’s partner organization in the states is called “Catalyst for Peace”. This organization supports ongoing reconciliation efforts in post-conflict African settings. The organization is providing funding and logistical support, while the film crew is documenting the process.
I begin my day with 5 block bread (500 Leone), laughing cow cheese spread, and a cup of tea with far too much sugar and powdered milk. (God I miss freshly brewed coffee!) I then take my daily dose of doxycycline, chug about a liter of water and head for blue bell to wave down a cab or a poda-poda. One cannot talk about working in Freetown without mentioning the traffic. In the early mornings and late afternoons gridlock is incredible. It takes about an hour or more to reach work from my house, or vise-versa. It is not just the volume of traffic but the narrow roads, which contribute to the congestion. The Forum of Conscience office is a two-story building on Fort Street, near circular road. Once at work, I select five or so local newspapers to read. Their spin varies, but I find the Standard and Concord Times to be better in terms of content and presentation. I then move to a cup of nescafe and work on one of several reports.
FOC has several ongoing programs, including a security sector, police and community engagement program. Although I mainly work within the Fambul Tok community reconciliation initiative, there is a constant trickle of people involved with one of the other activities. All of the staff is Sierra Leonean with the exception of myself, and Rebecca a German student, which is coordinating a cross-cultural learning program between university students from Munich and Milton Margai College in Freetown. The German students are part of an organization called Commit and they arrive sometime in March to meet with Sierra Leonean counterparts. They will then visit secondary schools across the country to conduct workshops on the importance of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission Report and seeing its recommendations implemented.
Friday we leave for Pujehun and then Bonthe for two district consultations.
More to come soon…
February 8, 2008 at 3:14 pm
if you have a fridge at home why the hell are you eating laughing cow?
February 11, 2008 at 5:41 pm
You didn’t bring your French Press with?
February 12, 2008 at 5:44 am
Sounds like you might be in need of a care package. If we sent you a french press and a couple of pounds of coffee, would it reach you before you come back? What’s the postal system like?
February 12, 2008 at 4:07 pm
So you’re living in a palace, what a b****. Denice, your comment on the banking being a ring of Dante’s hell was great. Mario, I’m down with Denice’s idea of sending you a little care package of coffee and whatever else. Keep up the updates.
February 12, 2008 at 5:54 pm
oooo poor mario, when I wake up I walk to the cafe next to my high rise in buenos aires, have a cafe´ con leche, and stare at men with mullets and rat tails…you can imagine how much I am not enjoying myself here lol!