Getting Here.
It would have been a crime to fly from London without doing something, so an afternoon of semi-organised fun was on the cards. It was very pleasant, lunch with Graeme, Gav, Tan, JP & Nicky, then a jaunt around the Darwin exhibition (good fun, especially the protestors outside - and The Natural History Museum is magnificent), followed by some wine & cheese place, and finally getting lathered at a random house party in Clapham. I like Tan's Soho flat, don't think I've ever seen in a place that more screamed Opera Queen.
The next day was the long one, with all the usual tedium of travelling anywhere by plane on the cheap. Hours in Heathrow, a short flight, a couple of hours in Barcelona followed by a very long flight. Eventually arrived in Lungi (after nearly getting off at the wrong airport - being completely unaware the plane was stopping somewhere else first - I still have no idea where) and suddenly it was five in the morning, and I was very tired, and I had an airport to navigate through. Luckily the airport is a similar size to Wylam Post Office so this wasn’t overly long. At the other side of Customs I was met by a slightly greasy looking Michael.
Ferry.
We stayed at Lungi overnight, devoid of sheets but thankfully with a fan, grabbed a few hours sleep and then made a dash for the early ferry. We booked a car following breakfast (very curry like breakfast, nice but strange, will take a little getting used to). This was something like nine in the morning, our driver was drinking Guinness from a can. And I am reliably informed the Guinness here is strong...
We were in plenty of time for the ferry though, and sat on the top deck, watching it fill. It was absolutely rammed, though most people stayed downstairs thankfully. There were a load of kids doing a school run, mostly uniformed, the girls notably forced into green dresses and bonnets. Not to mention a significant number of folk carrying fish to sell.
First look.
Once across the bay (so large it would take half a day to drive around, hence the need for a ferry) we made a dash for Michael'a house (well, Michael's friend Aisling's house) and hired a car. Our driver, clearly a very clever man, decided that avoiding the main road was best and took us through the smaller streets. This proved to be doubly wise when he broke down, and we had the entertaining spectacle of watching him steal wire from a house's fence to try and repair his suspension, while arguing with the drivers of cars now trapped behind him and nearly getting his head kicked in by said furious drivers.
We had the option of inspecting some of the many posters plastered all over the place, mainly religious, often Christian. The Christian's here aren't really interested in the meeker, kinder side of the New Testament, as is perfectly demonstrated by some of the more grandiose titles they give Jesus. There's also some weird ass graffiti in places. However by far the most common posters seem to be for this creep here, who as I type has finished his three day mission to exploit the people of one of the poorest countries on earth with his sinister, TV evangelicalism. But hell, who am I to argue with a man with such a talent for healing the sick.
Beaches.
So we eventually made it to Aisling's, she has a lovely house (I'd say little but it's actually rather large) in a shared compound. It has electricity and water some of the time, a number of rooms and a pretty kick ass balcony for smokes and drinks. We had a bit of a rest and freshen up, and then Michael took me to the beaches.
Lumley beach sits right by Freetown, and it's absolutely lovely, not to mention amazingly clean and quiet (astonishingly so - while Freetown isn’t on par with the likes of Cairo, it’s not exactly small either). We tried a few bars and watched a brilliant method of fishing involving a big net, a very long piece of rope, and a crowd of about twenty people at either end dragging it the shore. We had a look at the catch before we went for dinner, very impressive. The afternoon proved to be a short one, I met some more of Michael's friends, the names of which have mostly escaped me, and we had drinks (deciding not to try the bar which apparently refuses to serve white people) and then dinner. Now I'm not kidding you about this, dinner nearly killed me. I ordered Pepper Chicken, it sounded nice, I was warned it was hot, I liked the sound of that. It arrived, I liked the look of it, so of course I dived in.
I managed about a quarter, and that nearly did me in. In the process of which I got recurring hiccups so fast I barely had time to breath, and I drank a two litre bottle of water in the space of quarter of an hour. Michael tried it after me, and didn't fare much better. Unlike any spicy food I've had before, it got steadily worse the more I ate. Absolutely magnificent, in a Great White Shark kind of a way.
Freetown Proper.
The next day I got to catch up on some sleep and then we had a wander around Freetown’s centre. On our mission in we changed cash with a street vendor, saw the famous Cotton Tree (where slaves were originally sold, then later freed), had a look around the almost empty tourist markets (not many tourists you see, I felt quite bad only to be looking and not buying). The slums were interesting, they're self policing and rather large, but seemed safe enough.
That's one of the most noticeable things, this place feels so safe (more so once you're out in the countryside) and people absolutely love you here, kids especially. Some want money, some want to talk to you, some want their pictures taken (for example the lady in the picture below), some just want to stare half caught between terror and fascination. There's some odd assumptions about white people, the one that we're all rich is probably true from their context, others are bizarre (white people have larger brains, explaining the very contrasting states of Africa and Europe/America - one to keep the bigots happy that).
We also visited Freetown's main hospital, and Michael's friend who is a nurse there. He spends most of his life working there, out of a class of thirty he is the only nurse who stayed on in the hospital itself, most others seemingly going elsewhere where they can make better money (a large number of whom have gone to Iraq).
I'm running out of time so must dash. Got loads more to say but it can wait, have a few more photos instead.
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