Looking Back on Salone

I’ve been home for just over 3 weeks now and I've had lots of people ask me how my trip went but to be honest I never know where to start. It sometimes feels impossible to explain the things we did, what we saw or what we were told as there was just so much. It was however, without doubt the most incredible experience I've had so far and it had a real effect on me. We were taken away from our comfortable surroundings and stayed in a place living in poverty where malaria is often seen as the common cold, and families live in a house of 20+ people surviving on one meal a day. People in Sierra Leone have a life expectancy of just 48 years; the country itself is 8^th from the bottom on the Human Development Index which isn’t good and it is recovering from a brutal 11 year civil war which was between the years 1991 to 2002. 

I was told many stories of the hardships of life in this country and the one which I will always remember was told to me by a teacher. We were discussing the war and he went on to tell me about his family. They lived in Makeni which was a strong hold for the rebels at the time and one day his father was cycling home when a child solider stopped him and told the farther to give him his bike. The farther refused and said he had worked hard to afford the bike so wouldn’t give it to him. The child solider continued to argue that it was his right to have the bike so he should give it up. After a long confrontation the child solider pulled out a gun and shot him in the head then went away with the bike. The body of the farther was left in the road for 3 days as no one was allowed to move it, maybe as a sign of warning I'm not sure. The rebels also took two of the teacher’s sisters, one he later found in Freetown and the other he has never seen again. He now looks after his mother who is losing her sight as well as being a part time sports teacher. I was mesmerised when he told me his story as well as many others that I heard and I don’t know how these people get through it but they do. And what the statistics and negative stories don’t say about this place is that the people are the most friendliest and kindest you’ll ever meet. Some are just as intelligent as us, which as bad as it sounds surprised me as they don’t exactly have the best educational system and many can’t afford it anyway. But some people will put their all into learning as much as they can because they understand the opportunities education can bring to them and how it can help them out of poverty. It just seems unfair that some don’t get the chance to shine. Alusine however is one person who is pretty special. He was our house boy but in the end became one of our good friends. He is currently trying to pay to go to university as there's no such thing as uni loans here, so he’s saving up the money from this job to pay the 1.5 million leones per year which is about £250 so he can study a computing course. He told me that he always had to work so he could pay for his schooling as his parents could not afford to put all of their children through education. He used to sell things but now he has the job with The Collective at the house and during our stay he also managed to get another job where he was putting together ID cards for the upcoming elections. In the meantime he was working through a computing book that a previous volunteer bought out so he could keep up to date with his studies. Before we left we all agreed to contribute money to his fees so he could attend in September and he recently told me that he just bought the forms to sign up which I was very happy about. People like Alusine are a real inspiration to others. It really is true that we take our education for granted here. It’s a shame you don’t realise it at the time. 

Living in Salone for 3 months taught me a lot about the world outside of England. I’d never been away from home that long or been to a place quite like it and to see a different side to life and a completely different culture really opened my eyes. It’s also given me the travel bug as I can’t wait to have the chance to do something like it again. I learnt a lot about myself and built on some important skills that will help me in the future. I also met some amazing people on the way who made the trip pretty special and who I hope will always be a friend. I suppose that does include the volunteers I went out with to, even though I took my fair share of banter from them we shared many memories together and I'm sure we’ll always stay in touch.

Since I've been back its fair to say I've missed everything about the trip and one day I would love to go back and see everyone again. I can’t wait to find out how Alusine will be doing at uni or how Mohamed Sally’s son has grown and if Sally herself is still smashing running records. I’ve also got my fingers crossed for John who got through to the second stage of the academy trials and Cisse the coach for Nosdo FC who I'm hoping will be involved with CBF after we did a profile on him. Even though I'm back in England now I still get texts and phone calls from these people which I'm so happy about as I can always keep in touch with them. I’m sure my phone bill will be enormous but I love hearing from them and it’s a constant reminder for me not to take things for granted. It always reminds me just how lucky we really are and the thing is you just don’t realise it until you go to a place like this. I'm not going to lie, there were some pretty shocking things about Sierra Leone. One of the things that made me most uncomfortable was the fact that they are very open about beating kids, and I saw it a number of times especially at the schools I went to. I was also completely stunned by the Freetown slums. I’d never seen living conditions quite like it and observing their life out of a taxi window I couldn’t help but stare at the tiny metal shacks practically on top of each other, with kids playing in the rubbish or in the water with god knows what in and people dodging their way through the maze like paths busily selling, doing each other’s hair or watching life go by. But it’s all part of life for Sierra Leonians and once you go there you begin to understand properly how things work. You see the stuff on programmes like Comic Relief and those adverts which make you want to donate money. They paint a very negative picture of countries like this. They’re not exactly lies, but they show only the worst cases and yes life is very tough for these people but you don’t hear them constantly complaining about this or that. They accept it and try their hardest to make life better for themselves and their families and any sort of help you can offer they’ll welcome with open arms and a smile. I always remember one of the first things I saw in Sierra Leone, and it was the sign at the crazy Freetown Airport which just said “Welcome to Sierra Leone – The Place of Smiles.” And there’s nothing more I can add to that. 

 

P.S. If you want to read more about the work we done and the last of our adventures the next two blogs below will tell you all. Thank you for reading. I hope I haven’t bored you too much and if you ever want to visit Sierra Leone I’d be happy to tell you more and all the good places to go. Also please take some time to look at the charities website and follow the links below for some videos of the boys and charity.
http://www.craigbellamyfoundation.org/

http://vimeo.com/19658919  
http://vimeo.com/19754133
http://vimeo.com/19663160