Pages

Wednesday, April 13, 2011

Out & About in Freetown

On Monday, we hired a taxi driver to drive us around town for a while to do a little exploring on our own.  Musa is a friend of Osseh's (who is trusted staff at the center) so we knew we'd be in good hands with him.

First stop was the beach at Lumley.   There were fisherman on the beach pulling in their nets.  It's quite a sight to see, so Musa pulled over so that we could get a closer look.  He explained how the boat takes the net out and drops it.  Then, it is pulled in by a team of men.  They pull one side and then the other until the net is close enough to shore to close and bring in the fish.



When we got out, we were approached by one of the men who explained further and invited Rich and Doug to help pull the net in.  The boys ran to help while Tiffany and I got out our cameras.    It was alot of fun watching the guys...pulling those nets is apparently harder than it looks! :)  It didn't take long for the Americans to give out.  I asked Doug if he'd like to give up his job to fish every day, and it didn't take long to get a firm, "No!"




After we'd been there a while, another one of the fisherman came up to me and asked if we were having a good time.  I smiled and said that we were really enjoying ourselves and thanked him.  He was speaking English, but with a heavy accent and doing so rather quickly.  I was having a hard time understanding exactly what he was saying, but it ended up with something about having food and drink together.  I thought he was being really nice and inviting us to eat with them after the catch.


He could tell, though, by the look on my face that I wasn't really "getting it" so he approached Tiffany and started his conversation over.  He wanted us to have food and drinks, all right!  On US!  LOL  He wanted us to pay him and his crew since we got to enjoy ourselves and take pictures.  That might not have been a problem, but there were more than a dozen of them - maybe closer to 20.  Needless to say, we quickly gathered up our husbands and headed back to the taxi.



Next stop was Crown Bakery.  We had eaten there before, so we knew what we were in for, and we were hoping to see chocolate donuts in the display case.  We enjoyed a great lunch chatting with Musa.  Doug and I shared an avocado sandwich and a chicken shawarma.  They were both yummy!  The shawarma is a wrap with chicken and a cucumber sauce.  We were disappointed there were no donuts, though.


On our way back to the center, Musa pointed out the more important landmarks we were passing and drove us through Kroo Bay.  Doug hadn't seen it before.  He didn't get the full experience of actually getting out and walking into the village, but he definitely was able to see the devastating poverty.  Musa also drove us by another slum that was built on a trash dump.  There was no ground to be seen under these living quarters....just trash.   Even though I had been before and knew the extent of the poverty, it was a painful reminder of just how blessed our nation has been.

It was a great day getting to know Musa and learning a little more about Freetown.

By the end of the day, we were anxious to get back to the guesthouse, though.  Our plan was to go with Pastor Daniel and a few chosen kids for the evening into a nearby community to pray with people and give away some Bibles.

No comments:

Post a Comment