Holy Smokes! Look at all 'em pictures!

Welcome! Welcome to another post at Zoobar - the place where wishes are made and dreams come true! Please accept my apologies for such a long absence. In an attempt to make things up to you, I have posted over 100 pictures to chronicle my adventures of the last few months. Sorry about the gray spot in all the shots - the lens is dirty and I can't find a lens cleaner in this country...

To get things started, we have several photos from my bike ride home from Bissikrima back in February. Bissikrima is about 50km (30 miles) from my village and I go there to visit friends, drink cold sodas, and use the telephone. The ride back was done between 7am and 9:45am.

























Okay, now for some pictures around my hut and the village. The area surrounding my village is quite beautiful, but photos would not do it justice right now, as the dust in the air really just makes everything look grimy - I'll post a full series of village photos in about a month, once the rain has come and washed the filth out of the air. Here's Banana again - she can sleep anywhere.





Hornets come into my hut WAY too often. They're about the size of my head. I was stung once while on my bike - the stinger went through my shirt and got me on me chest, and it still hurt like a son of a gun. There are more hornet photos further down.
Cows are always just outside my front door.




My new whip:









Kids
Props to Laura and Jamie - Connect 4 is a big hit with the neighborhood. They still don't get the rules but man do they love dropping those pieces in the slots!!




















A bushrat fell the forty feet down the hole in my backyard, died, and stank to high heaven. I paid a fellow 2000gf (40 cents) to climb down and scoop it out.





They finally poured the concrete for my latrine (and to those curious PTO examiners - they did NOT use a single one of the new-fangled rebar connectors I spent the last two years examining. They connected the rebar with wire.), but they are still yet to move the slab over the hole, so I'm still using the neighbors (disgusting!) latrine. Here comes the third month of privacy-free life!



These next photos were all taken in Kankan. People get upset if you take unsolicited photos, so these were all taken from my hip. Apologies for the skewed/out of focus photos. I think it's artistic.






















I wanted to test her sleeping strenght, so I played the balance game. She never even stirred, not even when all the objects came crashing down :-p



This darn cow is always sneaking into my backyard, eating my fence, and keeping me awake at 4 in the morning.


This is Mr. Bah, manager of the local gas station, and my go-to go for electricity. He is the first Guinean I've met to have a computer (granted, it's from 1987), so I teach him Excel on his PC while I charge my iPod. Booya. This is his family:

That's all of the photos for now, but I'll be back tomorrow for a more in-depth update, and back again on the 15th with updates from Sierra Leone!

At last! The Prodigal Sun has Returned!

March 7, 2009...Hellooooo everyone! So sorry I've been away for so long - such is the life of a celebrity in high demand... or a peace corps volunteer living deep in the bush. As you've read in the last post, I have moved. My new site is some 200 kilometers northeast of my old site, and also approximately 200 degrees hotter! As the "hot season" has just started, that's also where I'll start this post (if you get a letter in a few weeks and some of the lines look a lot like what you're reading here, that's because I really liked what I wrote to you and decided to save it!).

The hot season, which runs from March through the end of April, is about the same temperature as the surface of the sun. Perhaps that's a bit of an overdramatization, but I'm not exaggerating in the least when I say the temperature often peaks over 100 degrees as early as ten in the morning. By mid afternoon, it's become a barely-tolerable 115 and by three or so it isn't uncommon to be looking at an unbearable 120 or 130 heat in the sun. On Tuesday, my friend Alison used her super-fancy (that's a scientific term) thermometer and it read 106 in the shade. On a good night, the temperature will dip back below 100 by midnight, only to make a brief rendez-vous with the upper 90's before recommencing it's climb back into the land of pain.

On Tuesday, I decided to ride my bike to my new phone spot to give my friend Pat a Happy Birthday call. Hunter, what were you thinking?!? While the 16 mile ride out to the phone spot was manageable, the return trip was probably more akin to the Baton Death March. In spite of a generous lathering of sunscreen, my shoulders are still PURPLE. Normally, the wind generated when pedaling along at twenty miles an hour is enough to cool me down; on this day, though, the air in my face was about as useful as riding with a hot air blowdryer right in front of my face. At times, I thought about stopping to sit in the shade, but then what? Would I just sit in the heat until the sun disappeared hours later? No thanks! So I toughed it out the rest of the way and then collapsed on the floor of my hut, where I stayed for the next four hours. Whew!

On top of the overpowering heat, one must also contend with fierce amounts of dust. Rain has not blessed the Haute Guineen soil since October 30th, so anything that may have once used it's roots to hold the dirt in place has long since turned to dust and only worsened the situation. Some evenings the haze from the dust is so severe the sun will disappear as much as an hour or two before it's naturally appointed bedtime. The dust makes running quite painful on the lungs - if you want to know how it feels, my best guess at a comparison would be to run while smoking about a pack of cigarettes.

My new school seems to function quite a bit better than the old one. I left the old village after months of frustration with a non-existant administration and staff came to a head. One day, the principal finally decided to show up, only to come into my classroom and start yelling at me for letting a student out to use the bathroom. He couldn't believe I was stupid enough to break the rules! I couldn't believe he was stupid enough to yell at me like that. Taking him outside, he received a good piece of my mind, and then he lost his village a perfectly good Fote.
Now settled into the new school, I can happily report every class has a teacher (although some classes are covered by the principal), and my students' attendance rate is better than 80%. Unfortunately, my success seems to sort of end right there.

Although my three months of training in Forecariah was spent learning how to teach math in French, the principal insisted I teach 9th and 10th grade physics as well. Alright, I'm an aerospace engineer. I can't turn down a simple 9th grade physics class. Except, how in the world do I teach resistance, voltage, and current to students who don't even know what electricity is?! I'm starting to get my footing in physics (I'm sort of picking it up along with the students), but only after the principal told me I was no good at it, that maybe I should just teach math. Come on!

Math isn't going much better. After administering an exam a few weeks ago and only having two students of twenty-seven pass, I decided to go over a review of several basic principles. Guinean students really struggle with negative numbers, so I wrote 21-27=? and 27-21=? They'll often say 21-27 is 6, understanding how to find the difference, but not realizing that in this case this difference must also be negative. By also writing 27-21, I thought I might be able to show them the difference between 6 and -6. Think again, Mr. Science! I had THREE kids tell me 27-21 is 94. How in the world?? I have no idea. I asked them to explain, but after their explanations I was only more confused.

Later that day, I was doing a review and using problems from an old Brevet, the national exam used to determine who can move on to 11th grade. This particular version was pulled from the 1994 exam. Thinking myself a clever man, I said, "These problems are taken from the Brevet of '94 or, as some of you may lead me to believe, the Brevet of 27-21." They didn't get it. I thought it was hilarious.

Last weekend, some friends biked to my village for a visit and we spent two nights at the local hotel. By Guinean standards, it's super nice. By American standards, well... we're not in America, ok? There was powered lighting from 6pm on, but no generator - they only use it when there are large groups; seeing as we were the only ones there, it was no dice for us. The gas station across the street occasionally has cold drinks, although not from a drink machine. They have a "refrigerator" in which they keep several bottled Fantas and Cokes. On a good, hot and really lucky day, I can get there when they have a drink 'bien glace' and it's like my own little moment of heaven.

Last night was full of excitement! In order to use the internet today, I had to ride my bike 70 kilometers this morning to get to Dabola. Given that I'd need lots of energy, I decided to fix myself a big meal of pasta and some packaged salmon my mom sent me. After putting the water on to boil, I turned my attention to the salmon. Moments later, I heard a "WHOOSH!" and looked over to see two-foot flames shooting directly out of my propane tank. WHOA! Not wanting the flames to retreat into the tank and blow up my entire hut (I don't know if that's actually possible, but it sure seemed like it), I heroically threw my hand in amongst the flames and closed the valve. Disaster averted! After standing there in shock for about five minutes, I looked down and noticed a bright red ring on my hand from where I'd grabbed the hot valve... Needless to say, I'm not going to be cooking for a while. I ended up eating the salmon cold, served over a small bed of raw pasta. Mmm!

I have a cat. Her name is Banana. Actually, that's her middle name, adapted from the moderately less cute 'Mister Berginski', the full appellation being Mister Banana Berginski. Here in Guinea, everybody goes by their middle name, thus I call her Banana. She's really good at catching flies and at waking me up at four in the morning by catching my toes just as well as she catches the flies.

My mom has some pictures of her - hopefully she'll copy and paste them over this line ;)

I have lots of good pictures for you, but you're going to have to be patient... as always. Luckily, I'll be in Kankan for a St. Patricks Day party in less than two weeks, so you won't have to wait too long. I'm also still working on writing a quasi-entertaining recount of my January adventure to Kankan. It should be ready soon!

I hope you're all doing well! Thanks for still reading all the junk I have to write and not letting me disappear into the void that is the Lost Continent.

One of my classes. Grade levels are relative in Guinea--my youngest student is 19! Students have no textbooks and can only study what they've copied from the chalk board.

Mister Banana Berginski

My bike helmet--Banana's favorite place to nap--until she grew too big for it.

Digging the latrine behind my hut...

...and you think your job stinks!!

All tuckered out after a long day of fly chasing.

Hi! This is Hunter's mom.

Remember the post that Hunter was going to make while he was in Mamou this week??? Well, it won't be coming for some time as Hunter has been literally whisked off to a new site. Hunter had training with all of the PVCs in his group from Monday--Wednesday of this week. Then today he went with the Education Director to Cissela (also spelled Sissela) where they are in need of a math teacher. After weeks of waiting to know if he was to stay or go, things suddenly started to happen at lightening speed. I got a call from Hunter about 10:15 this morning and they were in Dabola on the way back to Sandenia. Hunter was to say his goodbyes, pack up tonight, be ready to roll at 8:00 tomorrow morning, and be prepared to start teaching on Monday morning at the new site. Unfortunately, Hunter's cell phone battery was low, so we didn't get to talk for very long, but here's what I know...

Cissela is a bigger town and actually shows up on a map if you Google it. Though Google will show you the geographic location of Cissela that's about all you can find--Hunter can be the first to put any info about it on Google and Wikipedia! Hunter is pleased that it actually has a gas station and in that gas station is a pop machine that dispenses cold drinks; the village also boasts a fairly nice hotel that hopefully has a generator. The school is small, but the kids do attend consistently and there are other teachers there on a regular basis, so that part was very encouraging. Hunter's hut was without a bed, table, or latrine this morning, but that's supposed to be taken care of before he arrives back at site, so someone may be busy digging as I type!

On the down side...he'll miss the friends he's made while in Sandenia, especially the Andersons and Tourre. There is no electricity or cell phone service. Unless he can find a hillside tree like he did outside Sandenia, phone calls will be limited to every few weeks when he goes to visit another PVC about 50 kilometers away, and it may be March before he has internet access again.

Please keep Hunter in your prayers as he embarks on this newest African adventure. He misses all of you and wishes that there had been more time for phone calls and e-mails before this transfer took place.

i ni ke!

This was taken during the Tabaski fete in December; I had just finished a long run and wanted to check out the soccer game (which is going on behind me), so I threw on my boubou and headed out.

A cellphone antenna has been erected in Sandenia!.. now we just have to wait for the actual network components to be installed. Somebody told me it should be ready on 25 January.

Green mamba!

"I'm gonna catch it in the coat... And smack it with the hammer."


Belt snake!

Toure and I at the clinic. Griffey Jr is his favorite player, in case you were wondering.



Christmas dinner photo.

My little neighbor. She's adorable, except when she's crying - gosh! what an awful racket. I'm going to try to get a video up sometime of her trying to catch her cat, because my writing just won't do justice to how cute it is.

My little buddy.


There was a yellow fever outbreak in a nearby village, so Toure had to vaccinate everybody - he did something like 15,000 injections in three days. It was complete madness as everybody tried to shove their way in to get their shots. Don't worry - I was vaccinated before I came.

Showing off their shots.



These are my neighbors. I wanted a picture of the cat, so I got all of them in it as well. Salle, the tall girl standing in the middle, is one of my ninth graders. She also does my laundry and my dishes. I think I'd die without her.



My sisters sent me some coloring books to give away. I kept most of them for myself, because, you know, I love to color, but I did give ONE to this little girl. She just pretends to color when I watch, because I don't think she actually knows what to do. Then, at night, Salle takes it and colors. She did the entire book in just a few days. See below.


These women hosted a soccer game the other week, so they got all dressed up - the one in the police outfit is married to the local cop and the one in the fatigues is married to the gendarme. I have NO IDEA why they dressed up like that, but it was pretty hilarious and we all had a good laugh.



A village woman sifting her rice - they do this to get the rocks out after it's dried in the sun on the road all day.




When the camera comes out, everybody wants their picture taken. I have no idea who this family is.

This woman really likes to aggravate me. She sells oranges on the road right where I begin and end my runs. Every day, just as I start, she tries to give me oranges, but I tell her I can't take them until after I run. When I return, she retracts her offer.



I caught this sneaky guy eating my neighbor's banana tree when he shouldn't have been. He ran away like a dg who'd just pulled the bacon off the counter.




My school consists of four classroom and the admin building, over on the right.


Hey everybody! I'm in Kankan right now for the G-17 site visit party, so I thought this would be a good time to try to post some pictures. If you'd like to try calling me, I am using a new number while in Kankan - 011.224.65.72.25.67. (and if that one doesn't work, you can try the other number - 011.224.66.51.86.03)

Things are going pretty well right now. School is still barely functioning, and it looks like there isn't a house for me in Dabola, so I won't be moving there after all, but perhaps to another village. Who knows? I'm getting started on some really exciting secondary projects, including a village sensibilization on crossing the road, and perhaps organizing the first Guinea marathon. It's all just in the brainstorm stage right now, but I've got some great ideas coming together. Hopefully I can flesh them out a little bit over the next week and give you some more info next weekend, when I go to Mamou for in-service training for a week; I'd love to get a little help/support for some of these projects, and I know there are a lot of you out there who would like to get involved, so let's see what we can do!

Okay - my time is up on the computer, but I'll be back in a week or so... wo-o-oh! (goodbye in Susu, Malinke and Dialonke)

A lot of people have been asking me for my address. Voici:

Hunter Dreidame, PCV
Corps de la Paix
B.P.1927 Conakry
Guinea
West Africa

Happy New Years everybody!

At last, here’s my blog entry for December (posted with the help of the Anderson’s e-mail and my lovely mother). I’m sorry there aren’t any pictures, but hopefully I’ll get them up when I go to Mamou for in-service training on the 25th. This time around, I’ve decided to put the blog in Chapter format. Now I feel like I’ve written a little book! Like, a really little book, because each chapter is only about 2 pages long...

Chapter 1
The Most Dangerous Man in Guinea

A few weeks ago, I was talking to my mom on the phone and she mentioned something she’d heard on NPR about West Africa: the number one killer of small children is car accidents – not car on car accidents, rather, car on child accidents. Although I’m fairly confident malaria is actually the number one killer (supposedly one West African child dies from malaria every thirty seconds), I have to agree that roadside accidents are all too common. Three kids have been struck and killed in my village since I move there in September. Not long ago, a one year old boy ran after a ball behind a reversing taxi. Unaware of this, the driver backed over the boy and crushed his head. Yes, this kind of thing happens all too often around here.

As I cycled home from the phone tree following this conversation, I couldn’t help but think all the close calls I’ve had with hitting pedestrians while riding in bush taxis. My thoughts strayed from the potential taxi accidents to potential bicycle accidents as a group of goats scooted out of my way on the road. What would happen if, just once, the goat changed his mind and ran right into my bike? Would the impact kill the goat? Would it bring my bike to a halt as I sailed over the handlebars to the demise of my left wrist, repeating my feat of the seventh grade? Trying to brush these morbid thoughts aside, I double checked the strap on my helmet and pedaled on.

Arriving in my village, I was making great time – with the wind at my back, this had probably been my fastest return trip yet. I rode past the “Marche le Lundi” sign and thought, “only about a quarter mile left! Step on it!” Just then, a little boy shot out across the road, right in front of me. I slowed down a little, but, seeing he was clear of my path, I continued. As I was about to pass him, a man who I can only assume was his father, yelled at him in Dialonke, telling him to look out for the bike. The boy, never having seen me, spun around and ran headfirst into my handlebars.

The poor kid never stood a chance. His head smacked off my handlebars and then smacked off the ground. Surprisingly, I didn’t go down. I did, however, stop, and was immediately shaken by the incident, even before I’d turned around to see him crumpled on the road. My first thought was that he was dead. He wasn’t moving and I couldn’t stop visualizing the impact as his head hit the asphalt. But then he stood up. He screamed for about a half second, but he must’ve stopped when he saw the blood.

As he turned to face me, he held his hand to his eye, but that did little to allay the blood pouring from all over his head. I tried to move towards him, but his instant recoil reminded me that little African boys are absolutely terrified of big white men. His father came over, yelling at me in words I will never understand, and I simply said I would go get the doctor. The father, not wanting blood on his clean white shirt, told the boy he had to walk to the clinic. I rode ahead, wanting to tell Dr. Toure what was on the way, hoping he could help, but not sure what to expect from a village hospital, with no electricity or running water, in the middle of the bush.

At this point, I was visibly shaken. Toure could see that, and told me to go home; he’d take care of everything. To me, though, that was the easy way out and I wasn’t taking it – I needed to stay and do whatever I could; I needed to stay and suffer the consequences. The boy arrived shortly after, followed by a crowd of thirty or forty angry villagers. Shouting and finger-pointing ensued, but I’ll never really be sure what was said, but I’ll never forget how uncomfortable I was, as though I were on trial in front of a firing squad, as far as could be from a jury of my peers. The boy stood there, blood still dripping from all over his face and from a deep gash on the top of his head. He stared at me fixedly, blinking as the blood dripped over his eyes. Weeks later, I can still see the fear in his eyes when I close my own.

Toure, ever the hero, took the boy back in his office and proceeded to fix everything. In the meantime, I went home and raided my care packages for candy to give to my victim – what else could I do? When I arrived back at the clinic, Toure had already shaved his head and started putting in stitches. I handed the candy to the father, apologized profusely, and went back to my hut, where I put my head in my hands and wept for about two hours.

Eventually, Toure came over to tell me head taken care of everything, that the boy would be fine… but I still couldn’t shake the thought that, between the complete lack of teaching I’ve done due to poor school organization and hitting the boy, I’d effectively done more damage than good to my community. That was probably about as close as I’ve ever come to throwing in the towel and going home. I didn’t stop shaking until the next day. Even then, I was scared – the child never cried – what if he’d been in shock? What if he’d had a concussion? Did Toure check for these things? What if he died??

All I wanted to do was go call someone, but that meant getting back on the bike and riding back past all the people that had poured out their wrath just hours before, so I stayed put and waited. For what? I don’t know. But, by the next day, I’d started to feel a bit better. That is, until I started to hear a “THUMP! BANG! THUMP!” on my roof. I ran outside, having to immediately dodge a huge rock headed right towards my head as I came out the front door. People were stoning my hut!!!

But then I heard them shout, “Mamadou! Mamadou! Serpant!” At once, I realized the rocks weren’t aimed at me, and my hut was simply the unfortunate innocent recipient of the rocks intended for the green snake coiled in the tree overhanging my hut. Guineans hate snakes, and understandably so, because most of them, including the one in the tree, are extremely deadly.

Before long, one of the rocks struck its target and knocked the snake free of the tree, sending it flying onto the roof of my hut (can you imagine how happy I would have been if I were still sitting in my hut and this sucker came in seeking refuge?!). The snake slithered off the roof and into a large patch of tall grass, but the neighbors weren’t deterred. They immediately set to work, lighting the grass on fire, trying to smoke out the snake or burn it to death trying.

About five minutes later, the snake emerged, only to have its head beaten in by a stick. The snake, as it turns out, was a green mamba – or, as they call it here, a three step snake. Three step snake? That means, once it’s bitten you, you can take three more steps before you’ll never take any more. Yeah, the only snake around here that’s more deadly is the black mamba. Although it was a little frightening that this snake was so close to the door of my hut, the entire situation was quite exciting and I capped it off by taking several photos of the boys with their kill.

The next day, as I prepared to leave for the Anderson’s, another snake was killed just outside of my front door. This one was a belt snake, aka a five step snake, so no big deal, right? Actually, the more I thought about it, it WAS a big deal!

Only two days before, I’d hit one of the local children and messed him up badly, resulting in what may have been a mass cursing by the thirty or forty locals who’d been yelling at me. Maybe somebody was trying to send a message? Maybe it wasn’t a coincidence that the first snakes I’d seen in the village came in the two days succeeding the accident! A big part of me thought the boy must have died and somebody wanted me to pay the price.

So I got out of town. Kind of. I went and visited the Andersons a few miles away. Upon my return, I was expecting to be stoned, or worse, so you can imagine my relief when I spotted the boy sitting on a bench by one of the boutiques. I went over to check on him. Aside from cuts on his nose, forehead and cheek, and the stitches on his head, he seemed okay. Talk about your sighs of relief! Buying him some candy and oranges, I considered the case closed. I guess my fear of sorcerers and snake charmers coming for me must’ve all just been my imagination.

There is, however, a lesson to be learned from all of this: children here do not know how to cross a street. It could not be more evident that they have never seen “The Micky Mouse Club” and therefore never learned the valuable lesson on stopping, looking, and listening. What does this mean for me? It means I’ve found a secondary project to pursue! Somehow, I’m going to set up a system to educate children about safely crossing the road and to educate parents about the importance of watching their children. After all, as guilty as I felt about my accident, it wasn’t my fault; if the boy had looked first, he never would’ve run out into the street (or so I like to think), and if the father had been paying attention, he would’ve told his son to look out BEFORE he was already in the middle of the road.

Does anybody know how to say “Stop, look and listen” in Dialonke?

Chapter 2
To Move or Not to Move

As I’ve mentioned several times before, teaching in my village has not exactly gone as planned. About 80 percent of the time, I’m the only teacher in the school (sometimes even the only PERSON); the principal hasn’t shown up in over a month. Basically, my school doesn’t function. As such, I’ve made the decision, with the guidance of my PC supervisor, to make the move to another town, one where the school actually functions but which is badly in need of a math teacher. It was a tough decision to make, but after returning to the village after Thanksgiving, I realized that, were I to stay put, my story of life in Guinea would simply be one of survival, and that’s not why I came here. I came here to help people, to do some good, and it looks like that just isn’t going to happen with the current state of affairs.

The new town is exactly that – a town! It has electricity (some of the time), phone service, internet, eggs and potatoes (neither of which are available in my current locale), and, most importantly, PCV friends only about 25 kilometers away (which puts them about 100 kilometers closer than my current neighbor). I suppose the decision to move should’ve been a no-brainer, but I couldn’t help remembering how tough those first few weeks in the village were, and that’s something I have no desire to repeat. However, I’m fairly certain this move will be quite different – I’ll pretty much have everything around me that I don’t have right now.

The only thing I won’t have is the Anderson’s (the missionary family), and that will be tough. They really have been my African angels, but I’ve also come to realize that allowing that comfort to keep me in my current village would be going against my justifications for joining the Peace Corps in the first place. As great as it is to have this family, I have to remember that I didn’t travel thousands of miles across the world to make American friends. By no means am I trying to downplay the importance of the Anderson’s role in my service thus far – were it not for them, I would have terminated my service long ago. They have been the helping hand I’ve needed, and now I feel like, given all the pros of moving to the other town, I’m ready to try riding without the training wheels. And I’ll really only be sacrificing a few months of their company, because they’re going back stateside for three months starting in April and, once they return, they’ll actually be moving to a new village which is, believe it or not, closer to my new town than my current village.

So, in early December, I gave Dioulde, my program director, the go-ahead to get the wheels rolling on the move. The only thing we really needed was for the new community to come up with a house for me, and then I’d be ready to go. Unfortunately, they had not come up with the housing as of December 20 when Dioulde left for a month of vacation. Now, it looks like it’s going to February before he can continue talking with the new town to discuss my move.

This poses several problems. First, by not moving until February, I’m already missing about half the school year – what good would I do showing up a year late? I know I can’t teach a year of material in four months! Also, what am I supposed to do in my current village? Keep leading my students on by teaching them until February, and then pull out the rug by telling them I’m outta there? Lastly, upon returning to my village the other day, I learned that all the former teachers who’d left my school after last year have been ordered to return – so, supposedly, my school now has teachers. Is there still justification for me to leave? I don’t know.
My plan? I’m going to give Dioulde the pieces of the puzzle and let him put it all together. If it’s up to me, I’m still in favor of the move; I don’t think a school of teachers forced there against their will is a great environment for me to get things done. But who knows?

Chapter 3
Coup du Jour

In case you’ve been sleeping under a rock (or you just didn’t read the Africa section of bbc.com or my blog in the last week…), Guinean President Lansana Conte is dead. We were awaked by a phone call on Tuesday, the 23rd, at about 3 in the morning. Talk about news that’ll wake you up! Actually, I was back asleep within about a minute of hearing – what was I going to do at 3 in the morning??

Anyway, starting the next morning, we were on lockdown in the compound in Conakry and those volunteers who hadn’t yet made the trip in were stuck spending Christmas in their sites or regional capitals. Our New Years trip to Freetown was immediately cancelled; luckily, we were able to get our passports AND 131 bucks back from the Sierra Leone embassy without a problem. Really, being on lockdown wasn’t a big deal. We were able to send people out for food, and the fact that there were only about 20 of us made the house much more livable than trying to cram 50 or 60 people in there (actually, the place was still a wreck with only 20 of us...).

Although I had fully expected the country to collapse after Conte’s death, the pursuing coup d’état went so smoothly I was certain I wasn’t in West Africa anymore. I suppose being in support of a coup is frowned upon, but those guys deserve credit – no blood was shed, not a single death, and the Guinean people could not have been happier.

There’s really not a lot for me to report that wasn’t already on the news, except for my fun puzzle experience on Christmas Eve. Around 10 pm on the 24th, I was up on the roof of the volunteer house working on a puzzle alone; after being cooped up with the others for a few days, I needed a little while alone to recharge my social batteries. In the distance, I heard what sounded like fire crackers. And then they were closer. And louder. The noise kept growing until I was no longer certain I was hearing firecrackers. Suddenly I heard blasts which sounded as though they’d come from right next to me. BANG!! So I dropped to the floor. Seriously, my reaction was so quick and unconscious it probably would have made a great youtube video. On the ground, I couldn’t stop laughing at myself as I crawled towards the door and sought refuge inside.

It turns out it was not firecrackers. The military was driving through the streets, firing into the air as a warning to anyone thinking about breaking the curfew. Well! They sure scared me off the streets!

We were kicked out of the compound on Monday and sent back to our sites to spend New Years alone. I don’t know about you guys, but I rang in the New Year playing Freecell on my laptop (I’m currently riding a win streak of 26 straight – believe it!). I forgot to watch the clock and looked down when it was 12:01. HAPPY NEW YEAR! Honestly, I’m not terribly bitter about having to leave Conakry – the house was starting to get pretty gross, and I wanted to start exercising regularly again. Besides, this New Years will make all future New Years, no matter how lame, about 100 times better. Also, a mouse took over my hut and there was poop EVERYWHERE; I can only imagine the kind of damage he may have been done if I’d been gone a whole extra week.

Going back to the coup – I’m actually really excited about the new leader, Captain Camara. This guy has the potential to either turn into a notorious kleptocrat or, as all Guineans are hoping, the savior of the country and West Africans everywhere. If he can restore some sort of order in this country, schedule elections by 2010, and step down from power after the elections, he’ll go down in history as one of the great heroes of Guinea. In any case, I’m hopeful. Guinea deserves a break.