hey im not dead but my comp is

hey so im not dead but my computer is. im working on it but its not exactly top priority. i just put some pics up from an adventure to an art village to do some tie n' dye work.

http://community.webshots.com/user/rrekekim


peace out

an exciting weekend in the gambia

heres what i did this past weekend. The weekend before i went upcountry for the weekend. But its way too much to write becuase im lazy/tired/sick of computers that suck. it will come soon. also check out pics. "upcountry with renee" will give you an idea how that trip was. "Weekend adventures 4/28" is from this past weekend

4/28 was sierra Leone’s independence, due to massive civil wars in the country over the past two decades, there are a great deal of refugees in the country. The independence celebration consisted of a parade (march pass) through a few towns in the greater Banjul area. It started in Bakoteh, wound through Serrekunda and into Serrekunda market (largest and biggest market in the country) then up to Kotu, at least 10K in total. Our day watchmen/friend Mohammed Lo works and lives in our compound. He makes sure we survive The Gambia. He is from Sierra Leone, and told us about the celebration. My tailor/friend, Iman, he is also a refugee and told Renee and I that he wanted to take us to the celebration. We didn’t realize we would be walking in the parade. The parade consisted of hundreds of Sierra Leonean singing and dancing, walking through the streets together. There was a truck blasting music, keeping them all hyped up as well as some traditional demons characters that were dancing and scaring the crowds. To make things even more interesting, apparently the permit the parade applies for from the government every year allows for drinking and pot smoking in the parade. This means that it’s totally legal for everyone to get ripped (very drunk and very high). No worries readers at home, I only had a few beers. Anyway, as the parade progresses, everyone is passing around bottles and just getting drunker; we saw a few semi-scuffles in the crowds, but nothing big. Then to make it even more exciting, the parade route goes past (and into) two bars owned by a Sierra Leonean. So everyone hangs out at these bars for about an hour, refueling, and off the mob goes. We eventually decided to leave when it changed from a parade of people celebrating to a drunken massive crowd roaming the streets.

The next day, Sunday, April 29, I woke up around 830 and took transport into Banjul. My plan originally was to walk the stretch of beach between Banjul and Bakau, about 10 miles. I walked onto the beach around 930 and sat down for a few minutes to drink some water. I had been sitting for about 15 minutes when a group of Gambian guys rolled up and sat down with me. They were bumsters (Gambians trying to get my money) but when they learned that I wasn’t a tourist and not about to give up my money, they switched to friend mode and we sat and shot the shit for a few hours. So I didn’t actually start my excursion till just short of noon. I walked only a few hundred meters and I stumbled on a huge Christian cemetery (a rarity in a country of 90% Muslim). It was right on the beach, and it was pretty messed up due to the coastal erosion the Gambian coastline has faced. The insides of the cemetery were beautifully elaborate, with large individual graves that bordered on mini-mausoleums. The closer the graves got to the water, the more dilapidated and covered in sand they became.

Further on down the beach, I stumbled on another cemetery, this one was a small Muslim cemetery. However it seemed to have been totally abandoned, I could not find a grave after 1980. Most of the headstones were in shambles and some of the graves had totally collapsed. Many of them had trees growing out of the individual graves. As far as I could surmise, coastal erosion, had eaten up a massive amount of the beach, to the point where the beach had moved up to the cemetery. The cemetery was now part of the beach and in a less then a decade it seems that the beach would fully engulf the cemetery. From there I walked along the beach for another few kilometers. Banjul is an island, and by 2pm I reached the bridge the connects Banjul to the mainland. While walking towards the bridge, I had walked past what looked like an abandonded factory so I decided to approach it from the street. It turns out that it was a peanut oil factory. I asked the guard if I could go in and look around, he responded “what are you going to do for me?”. So I gave him 25dalasi (just short of a dollar) and he gave me the grand tour. He showed me all the different areas of the factory and walked me through the whole process, showing me each piece of equipment along the way. He made sure I took pictures of every piece of equipment. It was really interesting to see how much a dollar can get me in regards to services. By this point I was pretty exhausted, I had been wandering around since 9am and it was now close to 4pm. I walked out onto the main highway, Banjul Highway, and waited for transport. Unfortunately I was just outside of the city, so all the transports were full coming from the city. After about 20 minutes, I decided to just hitchhike. Within five minutes I was able to flag down a truck that dropped me off 10min from the house.