Marathon Day!!

At 5am on the 9^th of June it was time for us all to head to Sierra Leone’s first ever marathon which was held here in Makeni. Mark has been working tirelessly to make this a successful day along with two other co-ordinators Ben and Nick. The rest of The Collective volunteers were also getting involved with helping out on the day and we were all given jobs. Greg was in charge of time keeping, Adam was on the leading bike for the half marathon, Josh was helping out with The Clubhouse activities and I was busy doing odd jobs here and there, mainly giving out the medals when people crossed the line and helping with drinks. Before the race we managed to spot Sally and gave her some encouraging words. She was dressed in just her racing shirt and underwear. A rather strange outfit choice but if it was to help her win then that was all that mattered. It was starting to get pretty hot and the races had only just started, we were all wondering if anyone would actually faint. Luckily Ben, Nick and Mark had thought about this already and had paddling pools and foam mattress set up incase anything happened. The 5k racers were shortly coming across the finish line and things started to get busy as timings were being handed in, pictures taken and a large crowd formed around the drinks station. An hour or so later other runners from the half marathon started coming and we saw Alusine and his fellow Nosdo FC friends with their medals and goodie bags which Alusine is still fashioning today. They were all wearing their medals proudly in their Sunderland shirts which Mark had given them and I don’t think they took those medals off for a good few days. Next it was the full marathon runners. The first man came through in 2 hours 46 which is crazy considering the heat. He looked like he was going to collapse as people crowded him trying to cool him down with water. At 4.20 we saw Sally breeze through the finish line. Barley sweating, we all congratulated her as she was the first full marathon Sierra Leonian woman to cross the line. The rest of the day continued with runners completing what must be one of the hardest marathons. Two men had walked the whole race which took them around 7 hours and Mark had been going with them the whole time.         
  

Once everyone had finished the race it was time for the ceremony. After some speeches from mayors, sports ministers and organisers Ben and Nick, medals and prize money was given out. It was a touching moment when Sally was called on stage and stood on her first place podium with her farther be her side, both of them embracing the special moment. Sally was handed 900,000 leones which is equivalent to around £150 and it will make such a difference to their family. The next day we walked passed their house and they were celebrating with 3 jerry cans of palm wine. I hope they don’t waste all the money on wine. 

All in all I think the Marathon was a great success. There were lots of volunteers helping out and everything seemed to go to plan, especially as no one passed out. It was good to see so many Sierra Leonians being involved to and there were lots of people watching which should generate more interest for next year. I would defiantly love to be involved in this event again and you never know maybe one day I’ll actually be able to run it.  

CBF Work

I’ve had my busiest week so far and it’s all been really enjoyable. I spent the first few days getting on with my research at the schools which involves doing interviews with head teachers and questionnaires with the other teachers who are linked with CBF. I’ve had to do speeches to classes and in assemblies and got to know the teachers and schools a lot better which has been really interesting. The standards of teaching and general ideas of schooling here are very different. In most of them they have to sing the national anthem every morning and because they can’t afford caretakers the children have to clean up all the leaves and rubbish in the playground by hand. I was also told that in government schools the teachers don’t actually get paid but instead the community and city council helps to fund them. Schools which have been running for 3 years and have more than 4 classrooms will only then qualify for the government funding. Classrooms are also full of children, some with up to 45 which must make teaching here pretty difficult. 

I was also invited by Kelsey, who works at the CBF academy to go with her and Richard, another CBF worker, to Bo and Kenema and help with some research they were doing on the physical and social wellbeing of the girls who are involved with CBF and compare it to those who are not. It was also a trip to hand out money to all the managers and coaches. So I went up to the academy in Tombo Wednesday evening and straight away got involved with the boys training session. The boys are aged from 13 to 16 and I’ve never seen anyone that age play at the standard these guys are at. One of them who was 15 and was taller than me could probably strike a ball better than Roony. It wouldn’t surprise me if we see some of these players in the Prem sometime soon; in fact I can’t believe that there are no Sierra Leone players already there. Wenger could probably do with some of them in his team next season and we might actually have a chance of winning something. After training it was time for dinner and then they had to do their homework before going to bed and getting up again for a 7am training session. We set of for Bo at 8 and 3 hours later met the first batch of coaches and managers. It was good to speak to them all and find out the difference of how their league works compared to Makeni but they seem to have the same sort of issues. We then left for Kenema which is a 45 minute drive and met with all the coaches and managers there to. We found out here that one of the boys in the CBF league had passed away due to malaria and typhoid, so we decided to pay the family a tribute and go and visit them. The family were obviously distraught and it was sad as his death was so preventable. CBF have decided to have an award in honour of him to be given out every year. After the visit we went to meet a girl’s team to have a game of football with them. The standard was pretty good and a huge crowd of people quickly gathered round us all to cheer us on. We then went back to the team mangers house we were staying at for dinner and got ready to go out to the local club. A few Stars later and we were all hitting the dance floor and getting all the local goers involved, who didn’t need that much persuading.

The next morning we were feeling a bit fragile but managed to get ourselves up to do some questionnaires and interviews with all the girls teams who were coming to the house to meet us. The information we got in the interviews gave me a real insight to how these girls live, some have lost both parents, others live in big families or only have one meal a day. I found it really interesting to find out what they go through, a daily routine would go something like this: get up and go to work selling, go to school, come back and sell or do chores, go to football training, do homework, go to sleep and start it all over again. Their main worry seemed to be paying school fees. I think the CBF leagues really keep the children motivated. They learn new skills, make new friends and it gives them something positive to focus on. 

After the interviews I left Kenema to get back in time before it got dark. It turned out to be quite a nightmare of a journey. It seems travelling here is never straight forward. I started by getting a taxi from Kenema to Bo which took about an hour. I was then told that I was in the wrong place so had to get a quick ocardo ride up the road to get on a government bus. However the buses don’t leave until they are full and I was the 5^th person on so had to wait at least another hour before we could leave. As soon as we left some lady started throwing a hissy fit about something and started shouting at the other passengers. The man next to me said this lady was crazy and I felt rather uncomfortable as they were all laughing at her and clearly winding her up for fun. It got to the stage where they called a policeman on board to try and sort it out. Luckily she wasn’t arrested and it did keep her quiet for the rest of the trip. The bus took ages and I had to get off about an hour and a half away from Makeni to get a poda poda. By now it was dark and had started raining so I sheltered with a lady and her family who helped me get on the right poda poda. 20 minutes later I was on my way again until for some reason we were all made to change onto another poda poda. The journey was starting to take its toll on me. I was tiered and cold and desperately wanted to get back but instead I was ushered on and crammed in with 20 other people. Nodding off on my last stretch the poda poda kept stopping for unknown reasons and then finally 7 and a half hours and 5 different transport modes later I arrived in Makeni and had a feeling of relief. I came to the conclusion that public transport here can only be summed up as shit, but on the positive it was an exciting little adventure and I was so grateful for all the help people gave me on the way.

Bumpy Roads

We’d recently been invited by a Paramount Chief, which is kind of like a village mayor, to come and visit him at his chiefdom in a place called Gbemdenbu. So on Thursday we took up his offer and decided to take a little trip. We left Makeni later than planned as we’ve fallen into the laid back Salonian lifestyle now and become used to things never really happening on time. We picked up a poda poda, which as usual was crammed with as many people as you can fit in and started along possibly the worst road I have ever been on. I normally hate the potholes in England but this road took it to another level. We were swerving around all over the place and our driver was absolutely crazy and kept trying to overtake the other cars and bikes. I’d also managed to sit next to something that could have potentially knocked me out if I hadn’t braced myself every time we went in another pothole. After about an hour of this we reached the village and met up with the chief who took us to his house and introduced us to his family. The house was like all the others in the village and I had sort of been expecting him to have this really posh house so I was a little disappointed. We sat outside and had a really nice dinner called goat pepper soup. I didn’t think I’d like eating goat but it tasted really nice. After dinner we had a beer and the chief then wanted to show us his farm and the river nearby so we jumped into a very nice 4x4 jeep and headed off on yet another bumpy road. This time it seemed even worse as we’d just eaten and were being thrown about all over the place. The Chief has his own rice farm but because it was starting to get pretty dark we could barely see anything. We couldn’t see much of the river either and a poor guy had to lift us all across some water to get there. Adam and Josh also got attacked by some weird ants that started clawing at their feet. After that we were all kind of looking forward to getting back in the car, but before we set off the Chief decided it would be a good time to crack open a beer for the journey back. Great. Not only were we being thrown about because of the bumps but we now had to worry about knocking our teeth out or spilling it over the new car. I took my sips very carefully. Arriving back at the house we were offered some more of the dinner we previously had. Not refusing another portion we all took up the offer. However this time it was cold soup and instead of the nice goats meat we had before it was the leftover scraps and I literally had an unknown floating goats organ in my bowl. So far I've been enjoying all the new foods I've tried but this time I honestly couldn’t put myself through it so had to leave it.     

After the second dinner we were taken to the guest house and invited to spend the rest of the night with the deputy minister of agriculture for the whole of Sierra Leone, which was quite a privilege. His house was lovely and even had a swimming pool which we were all impressed with. We sat in the garden with some of his relatives enjoying an array of alcohol like Baileys, Campari, Brandy and wine most of which I didn’t really like but had anyway. One of the minister’s relatives was an older guy who lives in America and is a dentist but had come back to Sierra Leone for a 2 week holiday. He was a funny guy who said he’d been drinking all day and was still going at midnight which I thought was quite an achievement for someone for his age. We left a bit later and returned to what seemed like a triple king sized bed.

The next morning we went back to the Chiefs house for breakfast which was yet more goats meat and organs with bread. It took me a while to realise I was eating the insides of a goat because it was all chopped up but once Josh confirmed there was definitely some organs in there I couldn’t bring myself to eat the rest. The rain then started coming down pretty heavy and we were eager to get moving back to Makeni so we decided to head off. The Chief informed us that it can be quite difficult to get a poda poda back so as we all sheltered under a metal roof we started thinking that it could be a long wait. Luckily about 20 minutes later one came along and I even managed to grab myself the front seat. It was yet another crazy driver going along the bumpy road and I sat there for the next hour or so with the guy next to me somehow managing to fall asleep, a leak above my head, the feeling that my breakfast could come back up at any time and a fair few chickens thrown in the back of this poda poda which must have had no suspension and every so often needed someone to give it a push to get it started again. Just another standard trip in Salone then. You’ve just gotta love this place.