It's official, the government announced that school will start on the 17th......so what does that mean for me.....road trip!
I went down to Bo District to visit my friend, Anne, in Yamandu Station. The other Kristyn (with a Y), or "Di Kristin Dem" as the entity that we like to refer to ourselves, from Jenbe which is only about 6miles away from Yamandu, joined us as well. I know it's only been about a month but it was an awesome reunion. Also, people are curious about other sites to see how it differs from their own.
It's just cool seeing the different setups for each village and meeting the people within them. It was a little weird being back in the south and hearing Mende being spoken all over the place. I had been so used to hearing Temne all around me this past month. The fact that I can differentiate between Mende, Temne, and probably even Limba are things I never thought would be in my skillset, lol. Something I can bluff about in America I suppose, lol. Major bluffing would be if I can greet in all 16 tribal languages.......I have 3 down so far: Krio, Mende, Temne........13 more to go, haha.
Yamandu Station is such a cool site, I am super jealous! I haven't seen very many sites but, so far, I love Anne's site the most. It's only 20min away from Bo, it's right off the highway, it's still considered "in the bush", the market is small and less stressful yet, has everything you need more or less, and it's clean b/c it's in the bush. Anne's spot is on the outskirts of Yamandu Station so it's quiet and she doesn't get much foot traffic. Walking into the center of town was really cool, I don't know if it was just how the town was set up but you kinda walk into the bush a bit and through a collection of houses and then there's this town setup with narrow dirt roads, it was really chill.
SIDENOTE: For once "Pssst, eh, eh, Chinese! Chinese!" wasn't echoing all around me. If you're so fucking curious then just greet me and ask me your damn self. Don't be an obnoxious dumbfuck and think that yelling "Chinese!" is a way to win my friendship. I understand that some people are curious but there is etiquette for greeting people and it is definitely not just exclusive to Sierra Leoneans. It is as simple as asking my name and asking where I come from. That is how I've befriended many people in Lunsar, just don't be rude and have some fucking manners for God's sake. Small children can get away with it and actually they just do the "opoto" call but when I say "Yainkain" they call me by my name from then on. I had to shame a teenage boy in the middle of the market b/c he was tapping me on my shoulder saying "Eh, eh, Chinese, Chinese!". I exploded on him and made "palava" (argument) at the market and said:
O'Temne bobo, mi noto so Chinese, mi na Ameican uman, fuk off, lef mi, yu no get mana! If yu wan fo sabi mi yu tink a go wan yu fo padi if yu don yel CHINESE CHINESE pan mi yes. Yu no sabi fo grit sef en ask fo mi nem sef lek oda Salone posin?!?! Lef mi, fuk off!!!
So I basically called him a child and called him O'Temne which is just like saying "Hey Black Man!" then set him straight and told him to fuck off. Everyone at the market laughed at him b/c he got told off in Krio by an opoto and he apologized and I still told him to fuck off, he pissed me off.
ANGRY RANT OVER........
But ya, back to Yamandu Station, I'm totally jocking this village. We totally chilled out at her spot and hung around with her neighborhood kids. I got my first proper "hole in the ground" latrine squatting experience which was actually pretty cool and decent. We even had a great discussion on optimal squatting position with precision angling, lol. She also had a straw outdoor shower setup which was nice so you don't have to bathe over the hole where you piss & shit. Her latrine was dry, spacious, and clean. I'm rating the bathroom facilities an 8 out of 10. It was way better than my wet pour-flush toilet in small moldy latrine/shower closet in Bo. And if you so choose, if late enough in the middle of the night, you can just open the backdoor and bathe right outside b/c it's all uninhabited bush. The thought of a naked woman bathing in the bush like some wild animal may sound sexy. The reality was me listening to Anne washing herself down at 2am quietly yelping [*water splash*] "dear god it's cold, help me....." [*water splash*]. LMAO!
The next day, her friend Paul came by and took us for a stroll through the bush. I complained that we needed a cutlass b/c the overgrowth was too thick and I was afraid of running into blade grass or worse a snake. Death by "snekbet" is serious shit here. If you yell out "SNEK!!!" random people will emerge out of the bush with big sticks, ready to do beat downs on a "snek", lol, swear, it's true! Besides, I didn't have the village herbal medicine patched into my body to protect me from snakebites. So I was telling Paul, that obviously he wasn't scared to be in the bush b/c he had the herbs. The walk was actually really beautiful, I was just being difficult for the sake of being difficult, to annoy the hell out of Anne, lol. That's what happens when you go off the grid, you are your own source of entertainment, lol. But I digress, it was a gorgeous walk through farmland up to this rock where we got an amazing view of guess what......more bush, lol. I'm in fucking Africa right now looking at this fucking awesome view......I live in Sierra Leone......fuck ya!!!!
The stars looked awesome tonight. I rarely see stars twinkling back at home so I was just loving the nightsky. We ended the evening on the veranda just staring up at the stars with the cool night air, it was beautiful. Then I ruined it by saying that it would be awesome if Mustafa's face (Lion King reference) would emerge from the sky and you'd hear James Earl Jones' voice......"Simba.......".
Cue the irritation........laughing and self satisfaction of annoyance achieved, lol.
I'm having a great time in Salone and I've met some really awesome people, both PCV and local.
Things are not perfect here in Salone but "den go try smol smol, i go go tek tem" (they are trying, it will take time). No country is perfect but I am happy here. There is this rugged beauty about it that I just can't explain. I'm not just talking about the landscape, I'm talking about Sierra Leone as a whole package..........imperfections and all.......I'm down with it.
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