Return to Conakry

August 8th, Day 38 in Africa (16th in Guinea) - 8:45 Bailo, Ousman, Dr Bob and i departed the hotel in Kindia town. Ibro would be remaining in Kindia for more meetings. But first "I hope you don't mind, we want to buy some pineapples here?" Ousman asked us. No problem. And we were off!

Once again several hours driving on the highway winding down a valley towards the coast. This section of the highway had been recently fixed up and was pretty good. At one point there was a fair bit of a traffic jam because a fuel truck was jackknifed across half the road.



Then we passed through a village where the fellas had to stop to buy bananas for their families. You might be noticing a trend here, stop in the places that specialize in the different things to buy the local specialty!




At 10:30 we arrived at Bailo's house on the edge of the city, where we unloaded his fruit loot and luggage before proceeding.

Once again it was a long slow slow through the fetid city. We sat in heavy traffic for a bit before Bailo declared he had a Plan B and we went rumbling through bone shaking side roads again.



Finally at just around noon we were back at the hotel! Ousman left me his laptop so i could write me reports (since mine is still a glorified paving slab) and then the lads were off. Bob and i then veritably looked at eachother and said "LET'S GET SOME FOOD"



I must confess for my part I've seen more than enough rice dishes this past 38 days in Africa so i was eager for this pizza. So eager i didn't even pick off the mushrooms! And yes that's a fly on my glass of fresh fruit juice.😒

And then i wrote my reports! I still have two whole days to "write my reports," and then i fly off on Wednesday (to arrive in Australia on Saturday after touching down in like half of West Africa on the way). Meeting with USAID on Tuesday which seems like it might actually happen for once. Other than that i want, as always, to try to visit the Islands of Los ( https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C3%8Eles_de_Los ), but I've so far never been able to finagle it. I asked someone at the hotel who said he'd ask someone he thinks knows. But also The Organization might have their IT guy look at my laptop so i might have to hang around for that.

Oh and i ate a quarter of a kola nut, which is why I'm still up at 1:25am. 🙈

Slow Day in Conakry

August 8th, Day 39 - nothing much to report today. Woke up in the luxurious hotel in Conakry. Around 13:30 Bailo came and drove us to the office, which was just maybe a kilometer away but we got stuck in bad traffic before turning down side streets. We were there for a few hours and i found I'd allowed myself to be in a situation where i had nothing to do and was without my reading books. I had my phone but unlike many other people i don't find continuous hours of entertainment on my phone, though i did my best on this occasion.

Then we walked back to our hotel. As we were walking two pick up trucks full of gendarmes in black riot gear, and i was reminded of the warnings I've been getting from the security consultants about the possibility of civil unrest any day now.

Also i passed a healthy and clean looking white horse tethered to a light pole among all the mud and filth and splattering motor vehicles here, it seemed very out of place and i really don't know why it was here.

Nothing else really noteworthy to report today. Looks like my computer won't be repaired here. Tomorrow we are supposed to meet with USAID. Dr Bob was notified his flight for tomorrow night has been delayed for four hours -- I've been apprehensive that any one of my several connections might be delayed and cause me a cascade of missed flights so this development didn't make me am less apprehensive.


Solution to keep flies out of my drink.

Oh and i missed my high school 21 year reunion the other day (couldn't have it last year due to covid). So that was a thing that happened.