Sunday, October 27, 2013


This is the watchtower at the entrance to the Presidential residence....those are blue helmets of UN Peacekeepers.

Kathy looking at trinkets outside the Lutheran Guest House where PC people stay, a lot.  We did buy some items.

Kathy in the lobby of the only fancy hotel, the Royal Grand Hotel, in Monrovia.  The least expensive room is $200 a night...all the NGOs and governmental agency folks stay here.  We go there for lunch or breakfast once in a while.  They really crank the a/c so we love it.



This another view of our school and some school girls.

Back at the Lutheran Guest House....I thought it was so sweet they were washing their doggie but when I walked over I discovered they were using laundry detergent on him.  He was happy, at least for the moment.  Hope he is not allergic.
This a view from the stage looking out at the enthusiastic audience of our first spelling bee.  They were so excited..they carried the winner on their shoulders !!!!Jusu was the winner and Wesley came in second...it was great fun and we are doing it with all the classes ( they are insisting) and then we'll have a final spell off among all the class winners.

These are kids from a local jr. high planting a garden....they did a good job and had a lot of fun doing.  Peace Corps was not involved in this at all....the school handled it.

The wall on the right is part of the wall around the very popular town soccer field and in the distance, which was the object of my photo is a class of students sitting outside so they can be separated to take a test.  The classrooms are so crowded they can see onto the other papers too easily.

This is Prince ( a popular name) and some other students in the classroom.

This is my housemate, Kathy.  We are at the cook shop where we get a lot of our food prepared.  Those are uncooked donuts in the background.  See next picture.

This is Elijah cooking the donuts.  He had to remove the pan of grease from the fire as it got too hot.  They cook almost exclusively over charcoal and you can see the typical stove with the coals in it.

Donuts coming out of the grease ...then they are dipped in a cinnamon/sugar mixture....yummmmmm

No comment necessary.  A student was wearing this shirt and I asked permission to take his photo.

A typical group at work. 

Another group at work.  They are good at group work...they actually all work.

The teacher is in her native dress ( this type of fabric is called lapa and comes in fantastic patterns). The young man helping hang the alphabet was our tallest student.  His outfit is traditional too.


Sunday, October 6, 2013

This herd appeared in our front yard one day....we learned later that they had escaped from the vocational school next door. I could tell they were lost...they were moving much faster than any cows I had seen before.


cows rounding the neighbor's house.....funny


Our place from another direction.  That huge tree is mango and I hear they will be ripe soon....

We don't usually have to get our own water but this day we needed some and did not have anyone to help us..other than this young man who thought we could not handle the pump.  He did not, however, offer to tote the jug up the hill.

We hitched a ride in this vehicle labeled with USAID.  There are lots of these on the roads...competing with the UNMIL ( United Nations Mission in Liberia, i.e. peacekeepers) trucks.  We noticed soem of the blue helmets guarding the President's residence the other day.  

This is another view from our house..This is the pump where everyone gets their water ( except us..we paid $250 to get it piped in from the water tower near us)  We still have to get our drinking water from the pump...and then we use the Peace Corps supplied purifier on it before we use it.  Everyone morning, starting around 5 am the 250 students who live on campus come here to get their buckets filled with water for bathing and drinking.   Then, they carry it back to their dorms on their heads or shoulders. 
THis is Maureen and Heather ( and my housemate, Kathy) who are two regular PC vols in the town we are in.  They are teaching science subjects in the local public high school.  We had them over for a little dinner ( with some S. African wine) and this is on our front porch...we have a nice breeze most of the time and its very nice out there when we don't have our laundry hanging on the lines crisscrossing it.

We happened upon this procession in town...the organization translates the bible into each of the local tribal dialects...they have a few done ..I have a video I took but I can't figure out how to download a video onto my blog....Steve...help ????


This view is out our front....the school is planting rice in the water and other crops up the hillside.  beautiful, really.  

We had a little science class on the parts of the flower...they went out and gathered some specimens

This is one of the only 25 girls in the school, with 225 boys.  Here, with employment at such a premium, most of the teachers at all levels are men and there is an initiative to attract more females.  

I told the kid in the shades that he reminded me of Stevie Wonder....they all got a big laugh out of that.

This picture was taken out the door to the academic hall..this little guy is waiting wth his bucket of food to sell to the students when they get a break.  He looks tired...falling out of the chair.


This kid just came in one evening and started doing math on the blackboard.....they really want more information.



These are pictures I took, and they were so sweet to pose for them, after I had brought my dental floss to school.  They had had a piece to read in the morning that referred to "dental floss."  They did not know what it was..they had it confused with "mouthwash."  So, when I went home for lunch, I brought my dental floss back with me and first demonstrated its use and then walked around giving out a long length of it to each student who wanted it....how sweet it was.  The students are so unihibited...they are so anxious for new information.  Also, if you look on the wall at the posters in one of the pictures, you will see that some of the posters are put up with ugly looking pieces of tape..showing the tape.  I showed them how to make loops of the tape and put it on the back of the poster and no one has done it the old way since.  ( Small differences...but, differences :)

Another interesting story is from a day when I ran out of things to do in the lesson plan so I decided to teach them Musical Chairs.  These students are being prepared to be primary school teachers so I figured that even tho they are too big to play musical chairs ( which they loved) they could use it with their students on rainy days when they could not go outside for recess.  Anyhow, I asked them if they knew the game and when they said no, as I was trying to describe the game to the class, one student finally got a look of understanding on his face and his hand shot up and he said, "We played that in the camps in Ghana."  I knew what he meant...the refugee camps that thousands of Liberians ran to during the civil war ( or civil crisis as they call it) .  It started in 1990 and was over in about 2003 so all of these students have some recollection of the chaos.  Apparently, some Liberians just ran to the "bush" and hid while the fighters were in their towns and then returned to the destuction and looted home when they left and others went to the neighboring countries and the refugee camps there.  Peace Corps told us that we were coming to a "post conflict" countrty but they really did  not explain what that meant...how it would affect the students and our interaction, etc.  Well, this was one example...I asked the kid who had sponsored the camp and he said the Norweigians.  I guess everyone spoke English because that is all the local kids speak, other than their local tribal language, if they have been fortunate enough to have someone in their lives who could teach them. 


THis area is called "Red Light."  No one seems to know how it got that name but.....we can guess.  Now it is a muddy muddy market place that seems to be a meeting place for taxis to everywhere.  We have fortunately discovered a way to aviod this location by getting out of the Kakata taxi early and getting another taxi on the "bypass" to Monrovia.



This is Charlene..She is a PC volunteer who has just extended for her third year ...She and her PC partner ( below) Kristin have developed a women's group at a high school where they sew these handbags, etc.  They are just beautiful.  The company is called "boshbosh" which means "pieced together, like quilted" .   They would love to develop it into a real business for the local women but have the usual obstacles..marketing, shipping costs, etc.  but, for now its a wonderful activity and a money maker...ideas from my readers ( especially Jeff who is connected to the Africans)  are welcome.

This is Kristen, mentioned above, putting the wares out at a show they did at a little restaurant.  Kathy and I were in Monrovia at the time so of course we went and made a few ( a lot) purchases. I hope my granddaughters like them :)

The fabric is called "lapa" and it comes and fabulous prints...beautiful beautiful stuff.  I'll try to take some photos of the women in dresses ( suits) made of the fabric...they are just beautiful and look so gorgeous on the dark skinned folks. 

View of the Atlantic from the shop where the "Bosh bosh" show was held.  Its a beautiful place but so shabby...worn out.....needs a lot of TLC.  If anyone wants to buy oceanfront property at bargain prices, this would be the place...just no infrastructure.