First Impressions

With a deep breath, I stepped out of the plane and onto the tarmac. Sierra Leone-I had arrived. The night air greeted me like a dogs tongue- warm and moist and was so dark that it came as a shock when the plane touched down-we hadn’t seen the runway!

Larissa, the other intern and I were hustled onto a bus with the rest of the passengers and were driven oh about 30 feet to the otherside of the tarmac, which made us laugh-in Canada they just make you walk to the other side.  As soon as we entered the airport we were mobbed by porters all jockeying to carry our bags for a small fee. A good one found us and took us right to our contact who was waiting for us- a major relief (thank you One Sky). A taxi sped us to the ferry, the last one for the night, and we lept through the waves to jump on board. Lights glittering up in the hills were the only interuption to the impenetrable darkness, a night like the inside of a wolf’s mouth (this is actually a Spanish expression).  We arrived, tired but safe, at a hotel instead of the convent where I collapsed exhausted under my mosquito net.

The next day illuminated a town built up into the surrounding hillsides an amorphous shanty landscape interjected with mango and palm trees. The cacphony of car horns and music immediately invades the senses as does the smell of exhaust and those other distinctly human smells baked in the African sun. Our hotel afforded a view of the soccer field and some churches and mosques in the area, the call to prayer having been my wake-up.  It’s hard not to be overwhelmed!!

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