Guinea Reunions

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Early September was spent in the village, and as summer projects had wrapped up or petered out, there wasn’t much to keep me busy. The women of my courtyard were making shea butter from the nuts they’d collected in the fields all summer - a long, labor-intensive process. The cat was (and is) doing well, getting kinda chubby from all the critters she eats. She keeps the mice under control and snacks on crickets in her spare time. The neighbors love her for her pest-control services, and they always call her by her name - no one ever says “the cat.”

One day Will, a fellow education volunteer who was equally unoccupied, called saying he’d like to come visit my local Hippo Lake. I was glad to have a visitor and something to do. We biked up to the lake and explored the protected forest around it, searching unsuccessfully for an elusive herd of elephants. We were hanging out at my house when a local boy came over with a note for me. It was from Christine and Geoffrey in Niamey, our friends who had transferred there from Guinea.

Hand-delivered notes are an amazingly reliable form of communication around here. While a letter sent by the post may or may not ever reach its destination, hand-delivered ones almost always find their way. The process is simple: when you hear of someone traveling in the general direction of someone you know, you give them the note and say, “this is for the white person in .” The name of the person is optional in this case. Your traveler will carry the note as far as he goes in that direction, then hand it off to someone who knows the village, often a bush taxi driver. When the driver passes the village, he hands the note to anyone there, a kid usually, and then the note comes straight to the tubabu’s house, since EVERYONE knows where the tubabu lives. I’m always amazed at the efficacy of the system.

So I was not entirely shocked to get a postcard all the way from Niamey. I was happy to learn that my friends there were doing well and that they wanted to come visit sometime before school started. That was soon - I made a mental note to email them next time I would go to the city.

I thanked the kid for the note and went back inside, excited to show the note to Will. I had just gone back to making lunch when there was a knock at the door. I answered it to find none other than Geoffrey and Christine, grinning victoriously. Turned out this note had not come all the way from Niamey - they’d sent it from the corner.

What a great surprise! I was thrilled to see them and to have a mini-G12 reunion. Meanwhile my village was in a frenzy about the sudden influx of tubabus. The Prefet invited us out for drinks, along with all of the fonctionnaires and important members of the community. He also gave us a guinea fowl and about 3 dozen guinea fowl eggs. Geoffrey, an expert at this, guided me as I killed, plucked, cleaned, dismembered, and cooked the guinea fowl. It was an anatomy lesson. Christine and Geoffrey stayed for a couple of days and then moved on to surprise other Guinea transfers in Togo and Benin.






We were so excited to hear about PC Guinea reopening this summer that Radhika, Will, and I took our vacation days and climbed on some long, hellish overland transport to visit old friends. We took a 14-hour bus ride to Bamako, where we stayed the night. Next was a 6-hour, crammed bush taxi ride to Kankan, followed by a 14-hour overnight bush taxi ride on the windy, potholed road to Conakry. We were sooo happy to arrive at the Conakry transit house and to see the ocean and our old friends. Ian and Cam were in town, two teachers from my stage who had come back. So far about a dozen volunteers have reinstated and more will come in the next few months. A group of new health, business, and agroforestry volunteers is scheduled to come in December.

It was also great to visit the PC bureau. Our old “bosses” welcomed us with open arms and were eager to catch up with us. Even the director took time out to chat. Everyone was optimistic about the PC program in Guinea, and their enthusiasm was inspiring. The Guinea staff is really fantastic - their support for volunteers is indefatigable, and it results in successful development projects and happy volunteers.

Conakry was mostly as I remembered it, though a bit quiet because of Ramadan fasting and the absence of PCVs. Some businesses near the transit house seem to have gone dormant without volunteer business: the Beach Bar hasn’t been making pizza, the chawarma guy seems to have gone on permanent vacation, and the Malinke Lady who runs the boutique across the street hardly ever opens her doors anymore. It even seemed like the local kids had completely forgotten to yell “foté” at us.

We took a day in downtown Conakry to see the sights, eat ice cream, and exchange money. Ah, the Guinean money exchange. As you walk down the main street in Conakry, nondescript men with calculators hiss at you and wave. “Dollars? Euros?” You approach one and ask his rate, then haggle until you’ve got a fair deal. You can then step off the street into a store or an empty room to trade a few CFA for a brick of Guinean francs produced from a black plastic bag. You spread the dirty, disintegrating bills to count them, and when you’re done your fingertips are coated with a brown film. Shady as it may be, the black market money exchange is the accepted way to go - there is one bank in the country that can change money officially, but if you go there you will be directed to the plainclothes men on the street who give a better rate.

Will and I took a walk around Conakry, through the giant Marché Niger, and around some neighborhoods I hadn’t seen farther down the peninsula. Though most of the population was fasting for Ramadan, the streets were lively with soccer games and spectators. We passed by the Guinean National Museum, which did not seem to get many visitors, and continued to the end of the peninsula. From there we could see the islands and some half-sunken ships. The shoreline was composed of broken concrete and garbage, with a collapsing dock. Further down was an area of shoreline that had become a garbage dump (since Conakry has no real garbage collection), where groups of squatters had settled in garbage-shacks. I thought for a moment I should be concerned about the brick of Guinean money I was carrying, but as we passed we were just greeted with the usual, “Good day, how’s your family?”

These people have put up with so much! Guinea’s capital city still lacks running water and reliable electricity. The few paved roads in the country are in complete disrepair; poorly-maintained bridges occasionally collapse. In an age where cell phones have made it to much of the African bush, phones in Guinea only work in major cities and then are unreliable. Streets become open sewers and squatters are living in garbage-shacks. Other West African countries, though often much poorer, generally manage to keep the lights and water on in the major cities, and make some effort to improve roads. Only by viewing the relative functioning of other West African states was I able to understand what a failure the Guinean government really has been to its people…

Anyway, when we decided to head back to the PC house, we realized we had made a huge mistake in expecting to catch a cab during rush hour. It took an hour and a half, then we got stuck in traffic. Conakry taxis are like no others. To get one you must stand along certain major roads and make a hand signal indicating the neighborhood where you want to go. You are usually with a dozen other people desperately wanting cabs. You wave your hands and yell to cab drivers for an eternity. Finally when one going your direction has a space (four people in the back seat, two in the front plus the driver), it slows down and you attack. You can grab the door while the car is still moving, run into people, push, throw elbows, whatever it takes to get your butt in the empty spot before someone else does. After all, if you miss that cab it could be an hour before the next opportunity.

We spent the evening at the Beach Bar, with cold drinks and a pretty sunset, watching a local soccer team practice. The next day we stayed around the PC house. We were unable to go downtown because a crowd of protesters was blocking the road. We heard speculation that the protest was over electricity.




So that day Radhika and I headed up to the Fouta Djallon, the mountainous region where I used to live. (Will went out to Haute to visit his old site.) It was an 8-hour ride to Pita, and although we went to the gare at noon, the car wasn’t ready to leave until 6ish. Then an argument broke out between the chauffeur and some passengers over the price of their tickets. Uninvolved spectators needing to get their two cents in, the car was soon surrounded by a small mob of shoving, yelling men. We just assumed that fasting all day must make people grumpy and waited it out, crammed in the back of the unmoving vehicle. After 30 intense minutes the issue was more or less resolved and we were able to go. That put us into Pita at three in the morning. We crashed for a few hours at a creepy crappy hotel that made us glad we’d brought our own sheets.

From Pita we caught a taxi to Douki, a village about 60km from the main road, in the heart of the Fouta’s impressive landscape. Our directions were as follows: get dropped off in Douki, ask for the telecenter (which means a guy who has a cell phone and a random little patch of coverage), and you will be taken to Hassan Bah’s campement.

Hassan was born in Sierra Leone (where he learned English), and later worked in the Canary Islands (where he learned Spanish). Unable to return to Sierra Leone during the war, he settled in his ancestral homeland of the Fouta Djallon (where he learned French and Pulaar). He later became friends with a PCV in a nearby village, and began taking the volunteer on hikes to show him the countryside. The volunteer was so impressed with the scenery and with Hassan’s knowledge of the area that he brought friends to visit and later helped Hassan set up a small tourist camp. Guests stay in charming thatched huts and local dishes prepared by Hassan’s wife. There are a number of guided day hikes to amazing places, and the whole deal costs $16 per day.

Our first hike was a short walk to see the “Guinea Grand Canyon.” The trail led us through several tiny villages of painted huts with decorated doorways and giant thatch ice-cream-cone roofs. They were connected by narrow footpaths and separated by thick, tangled crops with oversized leaves and flowers. Pristine and perfect as a scene from a fairy tale.

Leaving these concessions, we crossed a fonio field and found ourselves on the edge of a giant cliff. Below was a fertile river valley surrounded by miles and miles of rocky falaises. The valley was carved into fields and dotted with little overturned ice cream cones. Waterfalls spilled from the cliffs in the distance and everything was coated with the exaggeratedly bright green of the rainy season.

On our walk back we got caught in a downpour and had to duck into a thatch shelter in a field. The three women inside the tiny hut scooted over and made room for us around a campfire. When a rainstorm hits, all are welcome inside the nearest shelter to wait out the storm together.

The next morning’s hike was called “Vulture’s Rock,” which led us 14 km round-trip along a series of rocky outcroppings and to a giant waterfall flowing into the canyon. The view was spectacular and the water was cool and clean. We scrambled down the rocks partway into the canyon to a small swimming pool. Above us were huge rocks and roaring falls, below us was a long drop into the canyon.

There was even a nice spot where you could scale a rock face and jump off the top of the boulder into the water. It was so fun I asked Radhika to take a picture of me in the air. When I jumped I tried to kick my legs out to look cool, ya know? That resulted in my entering the water knees-first, and I also kinda missed my target (the deep spot). My left knee smashed into a rock just below the water, and I came up cursing myself for being such an idiot. As the throbbing got worse I worried I may have done some real damage (and I was about as far from a credible doctor as one can be), so I dragged myself out of the water to inspect the injury. After a few minutes I decided it was fine, it would probably just hurt for a long time to remind me that I’m an idiot. Then Radhika said, “I took the picture too soon. Can you do it again?” How stupid would one have to be to do that? Well, of course I would…we got a good picture the next time. A month later the knee is still bruised but much better.

We went back to the campement for a fonio-and-sauce lunch and then took another hike, this time led by Hassan’s brother. We followed the edge of the canyon to see vast panoramas and giant rock formations - a trail called “Hyena’s Rock.” We then continued on a route called “Indiana Jones,” which took us through a maze of deep, shadowy slot canyons. These stone hallways were crisscrossed by green vines and smooth tree roots that originated on the cliffs above. We climbed on vines and waded in cool, clear streams.

Our arrival at the campement was at dusk, just in time for our guides to break their fast. We had hiked around 20 km that day and these devout Muslims had done it without a drop of water.




We left Douki the next morning. I was headed north to Timbi Madina to spend the day with Jen, a PCV English teacher from my stage. Radhika, meanwhile, had had enough of Guinean transport and decided to meet me in Mamou the day after. We waited at a local market for a taxi going to Pita. Halfway there I was dropped off at the corner of the road to Timbi. There was a small village set back from the road, and at the intersection there was a small shop that sold bottles of gas, an empty building, and nothing else. I needed to hitchhike to Timbi and there didn’t seem to be any passing traffic. I sat on the side of the road for hours, waving at anything that might be going in the direction I wanted. Drivers shrugged and wished me luck, and I prepared to spend much of the day on that roadside. I watched some kids kick a soccer ball, chatted in fumbling Pulaar to some nice village women. I was surprised to get a ride just a little after noon - it was a guy who’d already passed. He had dropped someone off in another village and was now on his way to Labé, via Timbi. Knowing I needed a ride, he had come out of his way to pick me up and take me to Timbi for free.

When we got there my generous driver offered to help me find my friend’s house, but I told him just to drop me off downtown. I was happy with my morning’s travel luck. He drove away and I set to the task of finding the village white woman. I immediately met the Président du CRD and some other official-looking men who were excited to learn that I was Peace Corps. They said, “Yes, of course we know the volunteer in Timbi. But she’s not here. She went to Labé. I think she went to meet up with her friend who was coming to visit?”

Ugh. Well, M. le Président had a working phone he let me use to call Labé and verify this. I got Jen’s voice on the line saying, “Oh no! I knew this was going to happen…” Turns out, she had moved into her house to find that there were problems with it (including a full latrine - gross) and Peace Corps told her to stay at the office in Labé until it was fixed. I had called her once from a telecenter in Pita, so she redialed this number to leave a message for me. The telecenter man did not get the message to me, but began calling Jen several times a day just to chat.

Well in the end I was lucky enough to get a ride and make it to Labé that afternoon. It was great to catch up with Jen. I miss our stage. And we ate pizza at the hotel. Totally worth the travel hassles.




After that the rest of our time in Guinea went something like this: 3 ½ hours to Mamou, met Radhika, stuck in Mamou for the afternoon, 10-hour overnight to Kankan, 2 hours to Siguri, creeps at the Siguri gare, 5 hours to Bamako. Shower.

In Bamako we met up with five Burkina volunteers who had just finished their service and were traveling around West Africa before going home. We also saw Trey, a Guinea PCV from my stage who now is a volunteer professor at the University of Bamako. He took us to some of the Peace Corps hang-outs of the area and introduced us to some Mali PCVs.

The next day we were headed back to Bobo. The bus ride from Bobo to Bamako had been pretty grueling and seemed to follow an illogical route with too many stops. It had to be faster to take a bus due south to Sikasso, then get a bush taxi east to Bobo. So that’s what we did.

The buses to Sikasso were not the major lines, they were the less credible ones that tell you they’ll leave at 8 am and then wait until 11 for more passengers. Once the old, crowded bus finally rolled out of the station, it stopped just outside of Bamako at a market for another 45 minutes. Everytime the bus stops, the breeze through the windows stops and the inside of the bus becomes stiflingly hot. More passengers were crowded in, some sitting in the aisle. We finally took off again, only to stop in every village and cram in more passengers. We drove with the bus’s sliding door open so that a man could hang out and watch for potential passengers on the side of the road. To me it seemed there was no more standing room on the bus, but we kept stopping and picking up more people.

We also stopped one time when we saw a well-dressed white man on the side of the road next to a new Mercedes with smoke spewing from its engine. We had sped past other breakdowns; I think this one was just interesting to look at. So everyone had to get out of the bus and stand in the sun to stare at the fancy foreigner. He had unloaded his laptop and his new, expensive-looking suitcases from the trunk and was trying to get a ride to Sikasso. He noticed us among the crowd and we chatted briefly. He was a businessman from Switzerland, dealing in cotton, headed to Burkina. A couple of nice gendarme SUVs had stopped and offered to take him, and he said, “Is there no room on the bus?” We took another glance at his fancy luggage and clean clothes and said, “No…no you do not want to get on the bus.”

So the whole crowd piled back in and we sped down the narrow road. Though it was a pretty important highway, it was often not wide enough for the bus to pass an oncoming truck - at least one vehicle needs to use the shoulder. Well, now and then the road crosses a small stream, which is indicated by a cement pole on either shoulder indicating that vehicles should not leave the pavement at this particular point. We were lucky enough to meet an oncoming camion exactly at one of these points, one who was not willing to share the road. Our driver, instead of slowing down and letting the truck pass through the cement poles first, tried to expertly aim the vehicle between the speeding camion and the cement pole. He did a pretty good job - we cleared the camion by inches and almost missed the cement pole. There was a roar of ripping metal as the bus’s sliding door was ripped clean off. We stopped for a couple of minutes and the driver just kinda shrugged at the loss of the door and told everyone to get back on.

We arrived in Sikasso much later than planned - it should have been a four-hour trip but we arrived after dark. Which meant no transport to Burkina (Burkina has a problem with bandits on the road at night). We considered sleeping on the floor at a bus station, then found a cheap hotel nearby. It appeared to be a hotel-brothel but no one cared at that point. The next morning we got Burkinabe transport, some of the best around I must say, back to Bobo. So our “faster route” from Bamako to Bobo took us about 30 hours. To anyone traveling this way, just take the 14-hour bus direct!!




Though getting there and back was a hell of a hassle, but visiting Guinea again was worth it. I kinda wish I could go back, but I like my new village a lot, too.

As for the political situation there - things seem better but not completely resolved. A recent, in-depth article in Jeune Afrique praised the new government and insisted that things are on the way up. Yet when I talked to locals in taxis and around town, many were frustrated at the lack or slow pace of change. There are still occasional protests, but no violence. The new Prime Minister’s actions are encouraging, but Guinea has a long way to go to catch up with even its West African neighbors. Conté’s presence is a lingering threat to stability and a continued drag on progress.

Here’s hoping for an end to corruption, a peaceful regime change, a boost to the economy, and some long-awaited relief for the people of Guinea.

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