Finally home

I'm finally home so I thought Id write a last entry since I'm not sure I'll be able to go back to Duekoue. I left Duekoue last Tuesday and got home an entire week later after having gone to Benin, then Spain, then Paris, then Chicago. When I got to Abidjan things seemed pretty calm, but then the sisters started saying I should try to leave earlier so I got a little nervous.

Then there was the standoff in front of the Golf Hotel where Outtara's government is staying, then the US embassy got hit by an RPG, and on Saturday the US government sent an email saying to leave while there are commercial flights available.

So Saturday was a pretty panicked day. The sisters took me to the airport to try to figure something out because my Air France flight had been changed to Sunday morning, but the travel agent in the US said that it was cancelled. We found a flight to Cotonou, Benin with Air Ivoire and then went back to the house to wait until the flight that evening. Back at the house however we learned that someone with Gbagbo's government would be holding a youth rally so they took me back to the airport so that they wouldnt have to be driving during the rally. I got to the airport for the second time at around 1pm to wait until my flight at 7ish. Luckily I met up with this lady who works with the sisters and an American with his Congolese wife. We all hung out all afternoon at a restaurant and it turned out to be a really good time.

My flight was delayed a few hours and we didnt end up leaving until around 1030, but by that time I had found an American girl who had been living in Abidjan and working for CDC. So we hung out and I was happy to be with someone since I would be arriving in Benin without a visa. We finally got to Benin at around 1230 and as we were filling out immigration cards this police man came up to us and said 'are you american? are you anne?' So the sisters in Cotonou had been alerted and the police man was there to help me figure out the visa situation. Unfortunately by 'figure out the visa situation' I mean 'charge us both 80 dollars for a 15 dollar visa'. Then he said that he would be keeping the passports overnight at the airport. That really freaked me out but the sister who picked me up seemed to be ok with it.

So I made plans with the other American to meet up the following day and the sister took me to their house. The next day we had almost the whole day since the flight wasnt until night. Lucky for me they were having a party for the teachers at their school so we spent the day eating and dancing. It was a great day to be in Cotonou.

That night we went back to the airport and tried to get the passports back. The policemen who were there that night found out that the guy from the night before had charged us 80 dollars and were not happy. The girl I was with wasnt supposed to be charged at all since shes employed by the government and he had way overcharged me. They were nice enough to give us the money back after giving us a long and sass-filled talk about how 'normally when people come here without a visa we send them back to where they came from'. I didn't ask if 'imminent civil war' was worthy of an exception.

So then I spent a solid amount of time at the airport in Benin since the flight left 5 hours late. At 330am we finally took off for Paris. Then we had to land in Barcelona because of the snow in Paris and stayed on the runway there for a few hours. Later we took off again and this time were able to land in Paris...at this point we were arriving about 8 hours late. Charles de Gaulle was a mad house, I couldn't find a United representative and whats worse is that I couldn't stop crying. I was seriously pathetic trying to describe my problem to a US air guy who said there was nothing he could do to help me. I had slept through the meal on the plane so I was hungry, tired, thirsty and just wanted to be home.

I was fumbling around with a pay phone when I saw a group of people who looked American so I asked them if they were American and after that everything got worked out. One of them had a phone that I was able to use, they offered me a beer and I then spent the next 12 hours hanging out with them in Charles de Gaulle and having a great time. In the meantime my brother and law worked his status magic and got me booked out the following day on a flight to Chicago...with all my new friends! The people at the airport gave us mats and blankets to sleep on and the next day we finally left Paris.

At this point it was Tuesday and I had left Abidjan on Saturday. I of course missed my connecting flight to North Carolina so had to spend some quality time in lines in Ohare figuring out a new flight. Finally on Tuesday night I was able to leave Chicago for Charlotte. So now I'm home. My luggage is still on its way, but I really couldn't care less. Im just happy to be home, away from Liberian mercenaries, and not stuck in an airport.

Hope you all have a merry Christmas! If there is some sort of miracle and things calm down, Ill keep blogging from Cote d'Ivoire. Or maybe I'll end up somewhere else. Or maybe I'll just stay home...at least until I'm in the mood again for some airport excitement.

Update

We arrived in Abidjan yesterday after an uneventful (and long) trip. I was really sad to leave Duekoue and the girls at the boarding school. We had a little party the night before I left and the girls sang a song they wrote. It was really nice, but then they asked me to dance and that was not so nice. When they dance they just have someone who drums and when they dance they actually look cool. Until then I had refused to take part in any dancing but since I was going to leave soon I thought I would entertain them. They laughed hard and I'm sure I looked dorky but oh well.
On Sunday I went to another village and it was a real adventure with the road. The truck got stuck multiple times and we had like 15 guys pushing it. Video to come soon! (for real this time since Ill be home on sunday) Then in the village children cried at the sight of me. I even wore my new outfit, but that was not enough. To them I was still some sort of ghost and the boss man of the village explained that they had never seen a white person. I felt like a zoo animal, but nonetheless everyone was really nice.
Now going to spend the next few days doing I don't know what here at the sisters house in Abidjan. They said it's not a good idea (as a whitie) to leave the house so I'll just be hanging out. Yesterday I went outside for maybe 5 minutes and my feet were black from the dust from the tires they burnt. Also the quartier where they live is basically a slum and it smells bad and it's hotter here than in Duekoue and there are more mosquitos and the mosque next door is so loud at 4am. Did I mention that Duekoue is paradise?
There is a lot more I want to say, but it would turn into a ridiculously long post if I wrote everything I want to say. I will in fact be putting up pictures and videos soon since I will be living it up with WIFI in the US.
Thanks for reading and see (some of you) soon!!

who's the president today?

We still have 2 presidents here so we’re just kind of waiting around,
but things are surprisingly normal. The dispensary is pretty busy
again and lots of people are at the market. That said there is still
no school. Since I’ve been here they’ve had 3 full weeks off and a few
other days here and there. Every few days theres a rumour that school
will start the following day, but that has yet to happen and almost
all the girls have gone home to their village.
In good news my new outfit is here. I look pretty stupid in it, but
the girls seemed to think it was funny so whatever. I tried it on for
the sisters and we took some pictures. Before we took the picture
though sr Vicky looks at my hair (it was up) and says ‘go brush your
hair. Whats this? Its not pretty.’ Always honest.
So not too much new here but I wanted to write real quick about my new
outfit (very important) and wanted to write about the dispensary a
little. There are a decent number of people who come in who have AIDS,
but the way they talk about it is interesting. It’s always ‘the doctor
told me I have dirty blood’ or sr Vicky says ‘you need to go get a
blood test to see if your blood is sick.’ I guess it’s just their way
of dealing with it, but on Wednesday this one lady won the prize for
being the most vague. She came in with spots all over her body- like
the kind of spots you see in a textbook when they talk about AIDS.
Anyway she says ‘Ive had these spots for a few months. It’s since I
went to Korhogo- the water there isn’t good.’ Right it’s the water. It
seemed like she had no idea, but when sr Vicky asked her if she had
had a blood test she said yes and that the doctor had given her
medicine and said she had dirty blood. So I guess she knew she had
AIDS, but didn’t seem to understand that it’s chronic and that she has
to continue with the medicine. She had come to the dispensary
wondering if we had some cream or something for her skin. So Sr Vicky
had to explain that no, a cream will not cure this illness of the
blood. Maybe it was just a front, but it really seemed like she knew
nothing at all about AIDS and that for her the most worrisome thing
was the spots on her skin.
So that’s it for now. Just wanted to give an outfit update (Im sure
you were curious) and tell you about this illness of the blood they
have around here.
Bye!

Greetings from Cote d’Ivoire, land of 2 presidents. So I guess since I last wrote, the results were overturned and Gbagbo the incumbent was declared the winner…by the constitutional counsel which he controls and after cancelling the votes from 7 out of 19 departments due to ‘fraud’. Such a crazy coincidence that those were the departments where the opposition got over 80 percent of the votes during the first election. So that was Friday and then yesterday he was sworn in. Shotgun wedding-esque. The swearing in ceremony was actually pretty funny because it was totally disorganized. Then he gave some ridiculous speech about following the law and about how no international organization can declare the winner. I guess Outtara had a swearing-in ceremony at around the same time, but I haven’t seen it since the only channel we get is the state-run one.

The girls who are still here just say ‘I don’t care who it is as long as there is peace’ or ‘I just want a president’. They are in luck because now there are 2! So that’s how some people feel. Then yesterday I got to hear what my buddy Willfred had to say. Willfred has some sort of bad family situation and so he always comes to talk to sister Yvette who he told me is his best friend. Anyway he said that the French news channel lied when they said Outtara won and that they didn’t even mention the violence in the north and blah blah blah. It was interesting because when we watch the Ivorian channel I always think ‘who in the world would believe this’ but I guess there are people who believe it and who think the French lied and just want to control cote d’ivoire. I asked Willfred what he thought about the fact that the rest of the world thinks Outtara won, but at that point the sisters told him to go home. They tolerate him in small doses and then pretty much chase him away.

I’m not sure whats on the news there, but Im guessing only the most dramatic pictures are  being shown.

Tires burning in Abijdan and people breaking stuff.  Here in Duekoue its calm and there’s even school

tomorrow! Actually I doubt that, but here things are peaceful and no one is burning tires or breaking stuff. So

we’ll see who will be the president tomorrow. First it was Outtara, then Gbagbo, and now both! Who

knows what will happen but I need to fly out of here on the 18^th so I hope they take that into consideration.

Thanks for reading!

Election reflection

We’re at the end of our week off and it has been an interesting week for sure. I’ve been honing my time-killing skills, making cookies and yesterday I watched some chickens get killed. Lots of new experiences.

Two weeks ago one of the girls made these cookies and they were so tasty so I wanted to see how they’re made. We went to the market to buy the ingredients, but since the market was only like half full, it took awhile. It was hard to find coconuts and then it was hard to find flour and the prices are all higher than normal. All thanks to the elections. The recipe calls for coconut flakes so of course we bought 3 coconuts and grated them. I prefer to buy the pre-made flakes in a bag, but shockingly that wasn’t available at the market. The recipe wasn’t very complicated but it was interesting to make them with the girls because the rolling pin was an old coke bottle and the cookie cutter was a glass jar. The cookies turned out ok but we ended up being kind of rushed at the end and in Sr Yvettes opinion they were ‘not good at all’. So we’ll try again another day.

Another food-related experience was yesterday I went with Sr Vicky to this farm where we usually buy eggs but this time we bought 5 chickens too. The guy tied them all together and we took them home. I guess they’re really into the whole free range/organic thing here. A little while later I was outside when I came across the gardener, Rudolph, who had just killed them. None of them ran around after having their heads cut off so it was a bit of a let down. After that the girls took the chickens and put them in big plastic buckets with warm water to pluck them. Just plucking chickens with my girlfriends, the usual. I took a whack at it and removed a few feathers, but once is probably enough for me. The girls asked, ‘don’t you do this where you live?’ As I explained how it’s a little different (ie frozen nuggets in the shape of dinosaurs) I imagined my friends and I hanging out, plucking chickens. It was kind of hard to imagine.

Election shenanigans are still going on and the deadline for the electoral commission to announce the results came and went. Then yesterday afternoon the commission announced that Outtara (not the current pres) won with 54 percent. We watched it on a French TV channel, but the Ivorian TV channel didn’t show the press conference. A little while later, while we were watching our favourite Telemundo soap opera, an announcement went across the bottom of the screen saying that only the constitutional counsel (controlled by the current pres) can announce the results because the electoral commission missed their deadline by 12 hours. Then they closed all the borders (sorry all you Liberians who were trying to vacation here) and cut all the international news channels. I guess they cut it in Abidjan first because we were still able to watch the French station even as they announced that they’ve been suspended from Cote d’Ivoire. Today though I guess it’s cut everywhere because we no longer have it.

The constitutional counsel has 7 days to announce the results. So another week on hold where no one does anything. It really ticks me off and it’s not even my country so I imagine people are pretty mad. The current president has been there for 10 years, but I guess that’s not enough for him. I guess for him the power is worth the huge lose of productivity and the sporadic violence. His whole campaign was about peace and his campaign symbol was even a hand giving the peace sign. Ugh.

So that’s it for here. Just waiting for the ‘results’ so things can get back to normal. Most importantly I hope the tailor has been able to finish my new outfit. Just kidding but really I hope things get back to normal.

Thanks for reading!