Home Again

Countrymen:
     As promised, I have returned from the Dark Continent - so full of myself that I'm barely tolerable. I must apologize for the delayed posting - I've been back for 4 days now - but my elder-skinned bag of meat finds it more difficult to readjust to the time change, with each passing year. But, fear not, I'm now in fine fettle and just oozing with information about my trip.
     By now you must know that I've been to Sierra Leone; this was my third trip and I expect there will be more. My life-partner Bearcat and I arrived in Freetown, the capital city of Sierra Leone, via Heathrow in London, on 9/28 - after 30 hours of travel.
     From the airport terminal (being generous here; calling that barn a terminal, is like calling Justin Beiber a great singer - but I digress), we motored through the dusty darkness, awash in the smell of coal oil, sweat and human waste, where we arrived at the ferry that would sail us onward to the city. After a mind and butt numbing ride, we reached the guest house, where we fell into our respective sleep chambers for a well-deserved repose.
     We awoke on Saturday to learn that our plan to leave the city by 9:00am had been dashed. It seems that the city fathers decided to conduct a "cleaning" of the city. Some background here: Freetown, like every other place I've been in Sierra Leone, has nothing that we would call a modern sewer system. Rather, they utilize a network of channels and trenches, to direct the flow of the most god-awful stuff imaginable, away from each street. The "cleaning", as it's euphimistically known, is rather a mucking out process, where the waste from the channel, is removed. And, to ensure the success of this project, there was a complete ban on motor traffic until noon that day.
     As you might imagine, this created a massive traffic snarl at, oh, I'd say about 12:01pm. However, this was made even more challenging by the failure of the city workers to dispose of the stuff they just took out of the channels. Instead, they simply placed it in the street, making what's normally hazardous traffic conditions, substantially worse - because now in addition to avoiding each other, the motorists had to also avoid the fetid piles of goo that lay in the streets. Suffice it to say, our arrival at our next scheduled stop, Makeni, was delayed by about 8 hours.
     Again, when we arrived at our place of lodging, we collapsed like little puppies, and slept soundly ..... until 5:15am, when we were awakened by the local Mosque's call to prayer, blaring from the loudspeakers just down the street! This became a ritual we nearly got used to over the next 3 days.

     Sunday was a good day. We finally arrived in Maboleh, the village where we are building a church. Seeing it in person was so much better than any pictures. It is absolutely awesome.
     We took pictures, took videos, reconnected with old friends, and enjoyed the first service ever conducted in that new building - quite an honor. The singing and dancing that happens in an African church service must be experienced to be appreciated. Even I, a wordsmith of great renown, struggle to find words that adequately describe the sensation you get during this time.
     The next three days were spent meeting with many individuals, including church officials, village elders, educators and Conference employees. These sessions were incredibly productive and we accomplished far more than mere mortals could have. We travelled to and from the village; each time, passing the mountains Wusum and Menne (Father & Mother in Temne). Last trip, we hiked to the top of Menne, and I secured a promise from the secondary school headmaster, of a trip to the top of Wusum next time.
     Finally, on the 3rd of October, we checked out of our guest house (back in Freetown) and headed to the Government Wharf to catch the ferry back to the other side of the bay, where the airport is located. This too, is an all-day process (everything there that's transportation related, is). We arrived about 4:00pm, after another stultifying ferry ride that included the passing of a woman's body floating with the current, and settled into, again, the worst airport terminable on the planet; it was there, in as much comfort as plastic chairs can provide, that we awaited our 11:50pm flight to London.
     Our arrival at Heathrow was the commencement of yet another long (5 hours) layover. We boarded our plane to Philadelphia, and our 12:45pm flight took off without incident. During the flight, I was so bored, I watched some movie about Abraham Lincoln, the Vampire Killer; it was dreadful, but sufficiently diverted my attention long enough to make the flight bearable. We arrived in Philadelphia about 4:00pm (our time - London is 5 hours ahead of us), and returned Northwest to my Goddess Of Beauty (yet another 30+ hour travel time).
     So there it is; a fairly unvarnished look (sans my typical snark and bluster) at an extremely difficult trip, to an extremely difficult place to be; truth is however, I absolutely love it there, and can't wait to return........