Monrovia

I’m here! Monrovia, Liberia. The pic here is from the view from the apartment I'm in. I’ve spent the whole day there, sweating, sleeping, hydrating, involuntarily dehydrating – if you know what I’m saying – and then hydrating some more. It’s now 11pm (23:00 for those who prefer military time) and I feel better. Good enough, even, to sit down and compose a love letter to all of you. My guess is I picked up my sickness by accidentally swallowing some of Monrovia’s ridiculously unhealthy water after brushing my teeth. My mind slipped and I took a tiny gulp after I was done out of habit. True to form I speculated myself into maybe having Malaria, an amoeba or maybe Giardia but that has all now subsided. I am back to being number 1
I should have listened to this advice: http://www.yousendit.com/transfer.php?action=download&ufid=2B6B52BB564F9E54

Lots of things have happened so far, lots to think about. First off – Monrovia is completely nuts. I can’t believe my eyes. It’s one thing to know that there is 80-85% unemployment and that 80% of all shelters were destroyed by the war; another to be surrounded by scrap metal shantytowns, naked children carrying leftover cardboard pieces in the middle of the city, garbage everywhere, ex-combatants hanging around hustling for cash, people washing themselves and their clothes in disgustingly dirty little streams running down towards the sea, etc. No sewage, no streetlights, no electricity, no police = it’s easy to get depressed. There is progress, everyone tells me so and you can tell from the amount of rebuilding and small businesses open everywhere, but everyone in the international community here seem wary of declaring any successes so far. Ellen Johnson Sirleaf (the new President, Africa’s first female one) has a pretty strong team behind her and is backed by a lot of funding but unless the mindset of Liberian society starts transitioning from war to peace the money thrown at it simply won’t stick.

I came in on a UN plane from Accra. Made me feel pretty cool. An all white plane, UN painted on the side, nodding polite hellos to fellow diplomats, business class seats; I was liking it. We flew over the coast the whole time except right before our landing in Monrovia when we had to make a very sudden detour around a rain cloud that dipped straight into the water. Rainy season is on its way, knawmean? Looked really cool though. Picture a gigantic finger sticking straight down into the water, except instead of a gigantic finger it was a big rain cloud. Actually the pilot was like “yo, check out that crazy gigantic finger dipping into the Atlantic from the clouds!!!! Oh, wait, it’s just a rain cloud…sorry.” It rains a ridiculous amount about once a day. Never seen so much rain. June’s supposed to get even worse.

I’m stared at wherever I go. “Hey friend!’ they yell out and seem genuinely surprised when I respond back. Some try to talk but it’s really hard to understand what they are saying. Liberian English is not exactly easy to understand. They drop as many consonants as possible, put an ‘O’ at the end of a lot of sentences, diminutivize everything by calling it ‘small small’ and they speak fast. Someone asked me for ‘pacoe’ today… I finally figured that they wanted me to buy them popcorn. Incredibly, Liberians have a tradition of going ‘Hey Master’ and ‘Good Morning Boss’. Really makes me uncomfortable. I told the guys down stairs to try to not call me that. Call me what you want – ‘dickhead’, ‘nutsack’, ‘Beau Chamberlain’, ‘shit’, ‘Emil’ – just not that. Who’s with me here? I mean really?

Work will be interesting. Looks like I will be involved in the consultations for the iPRSP (interim Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper), a world bank mechanism that assesses how a country can best be brought out of poverty, and transition from the humanitarian emergency phase to the development one. On Saturday (yeah – they work 6 days a week here = bajs = poopz) we had a session with all the superintendents for Liberia’s 16 Counties, listening to what their priorities are. Hopefully I’ll be invited to tag along when we finally begin one-on-one consultations with each County.

Ok that’s enough from me. Keep it gully! Oh, and I added a few pics further down in the Ghana