-Daniel J Boorstein-
Travelling from Grand Bassam to Yamoussukro the other day
took us 8 hours and it was just over 280km.
Today we were travelling further north, and going around 320km, so fully
expecting a big day in the truck we were on the road at 7.45am and with an ATM
stop and a bread and tomato stop we were driving out of the ‘city’ at
8.15am. Now that it was a Monday
morning, there was certainly more traffic on the roads than yesterday, but
nothing to warrant 6 lane roads and not as busy as one would expect the first
day of a working week. It really is a
quirky city and one for the books that is for sure.
Since nobody has been to this part of the world, it is
the unknown road conditions that make for the extra days on the itinerary and
the early starts as you just never know what you are going to encounter. Zoe speaks to local people when she can and
they tell her what to expect, but when they say not too bad, could totally mean
not too bad compared to the worst roads in the country, therefore still making
them slow going for us. At least when
Sam and Zoe come back they are going to be a lot more knowledgable for the next
group which is a good thing for them.
They are making plenty of notes as they go, so next season if they don’t
come back the next crew will have a better idea on what to expect, and I think
that is a marvelous idea and even though I am sure the company would expect
them to do so, it is a lot of work keeping track of everything and really they
probably didn’t have to.
As most truck days, it gives you time to think and my
thoughts today strayed to the Westgate mall Siege. I have an acquaintance on Facebook who had a
friend that was there the day of the attack and was injured quite badly. It was a link to a news article where she
gave her first interview since arriving back home in the US and it really is
just horrific what people saw and went through that day. It made me think on what would I have done,
but I think it is one of those instances that unless you are put in that
position you just never know what you are capable of, the instinct for survival
kicks in and I am sure there are hundreds of people with stories just as scary
as hers. I think of the people that were
killed. Had I been served by them when I
was there? Who are they and where did
they work? I am sure there are stories
of people who should have been there and weren’t and of people who normally
weren’t were for some reason. As the
event is now hashed over on what was done right and wrong, no-one can truly
ever prepare for what happened that day and all we can do is now recover, learn
and be more alert as we try and build the country again. Nairobi has certainly gone through a lot in
the last 2 months, from the airport ablaze, airport fuel problems, the duty
free eviction, the massive bus crash that killed over 35 people, immigration
closing for nearly 2 months and now the siege.
I know when I go back to Australia people are going to pose the question
to me ‘is it safe for me in Nairobi’ and all I can say for now is that ‘are we
safe anywhere’. London has been
attacked, New York has been attacked, the Boston Marathon, shootings in
cinema’s, shootings in schools and many more major cities have had their share
of terrorism and heinious crimes and until I am back in Nairobi to speak to my
friends and get the feel of the city I am just not in a position to comment on
that. But I still do see Nairobi as home
and I am not about to pack up everything and move and let the cowards of
terrorism scare me out of my adopted country.
At 10am we passed through Cote d’Ivoire’s second largest of
Bouaké. Bouaké is a centre for the Baoulé people and is known for its crafts. The
economy is based on the cotton industry. The city largely grew from
the 1970s after the construction of the power station
at Kossou Lake flooded
land to the west of the city. Bouaké was
established as a French military post in 1899 and has been an administrative
center since 1914 and currently French and United
Nations peacekeepers currently reside in the city as part
of an enforced ceasefire between the rebel-held north and the
government-held south. After the attempt to overthrow the president Laurent
Gbagbo had failed, the
rebel forces FN (forces nouvelles) led by Guillaume
Soro made Bouaké their
center of control. Subsequently, Bouaké University, opened in 1996, was closed
down in September 2002. Financed by Unesco, the
university reopened in April, 2005. On
November 4, 2004, governmental forces used Sukhoi-25's to raid the city as an
opening movement towards "territorial liberation," according to
Captain Jean-Noël Abbey of the Côte d'Ivoire army.
We pulled over just after midday on the proviso to have
lunch on the truck as there really weren’t many opportunities to pull over and
set up, but we had all seen a sign telling us that Korhogo was only 105km
away! I was shocked when I saw the sign
as it wasn’t yet even midday and if the roads were going to be kind to us and
stay this good, then we would be there in just over an hour. So with a group decision to keep going and we
would have lunch when we arrived (even though I was hungry) we pushed on and I
opened one of my 4 dollar packets of Doritos to get me through and they were TASTY
and I felt a little bad I didn’t offer them around, but for those prices I am
going to eat them all on my own, sorry guys!!!
The roads were great and we arrived into Korhogo probably
around 4-5 hours earlier than expected.
Days like this will not happen often, and even with the early start not
knowing we would make such good time on good roads it was nice to get somewhere
in daylight and with some time up our sleeve.
We got checked into our rooms-which are going to be the last for the
next few days after we leave, as we have a bush camp as our last night in Cote
d’Ivoire before heading into the unknown country of Guinea. There was Wi-Fi here, but it wasn’t working
and apparently getting fixed, which for me is a little blessing in disguise as
I tend to spend too much time on the net when I should be writing my blogs, so
that distraction is taken away from me, which is kind of welcomed. So we had some free time till dinner at 7pm,
so we all had an afternoon nap, I couldn’t get any enthusiasm to write my blog,
so I watched some French TV before nodding off a little later with the
beautiful air-conditioner lulling me to sleep.
I was woken to a knock at the door at 4.30pm by Ellie and
Rich. I had asked them if they were
going to go for a walk if they didn’t mind, if I could tag along as well. So we set off down the road from the hotel
and the road was a hive of bikes and people.
It is the first time we have seen bikes on a mass scale since really
leaving Accra nearly 11 days ago now and 90% of the traffic was motor
bikes. Some were ‘proper’ ones and
others looked like what the postmen use in Australia, they sound like mozzies
when they go and they can’t do more than 40km an hour, they seem to be the bike
of choice and obviously not too expensive for people to own. We crossed the t junction (safety in numbers)
into the central market and it was nowhere as scary as the market in
Kumsai. It was busy, but certainly not
on that scale and as it was nearly 5pm, the stalls were starting to wind
down. We weren’t hassled at all and the
section that we walked was full of clothes mainly for the locals. We wandered into the seamstress section where
they were making school uniforms for girls and we popped out a little further
down on another road. We walked a little
further down and then crossed back down another street for the hotel. I did see a small material shop that I
stopped to have a look at. I am becoming
obsessed with the West African material and I see so many beautiful patterns
and then when I do find a shop, there is not much in there that tickles my
fancy. I was about to give up hope when
I turned and saw a beautiful pattern having from above and knowing what Duckie
paid for hers in Benin and Togo, when I asked the price it was exactly what I
expected, so didn’t bother to haggle and paid the 7,000 (14AUD) for 3m and was
very happy with my purchase indeed. It
is also a little hard to haggle when you don’t speak the language and I am glad
that I had Ellie and Rich by my side to help with the translation.
Dinner was at the hotel and I was super tired, so I
headed to bed straight after dinner and was able to write another blog and that
made me only one day behind, which is a great feeling, and knowing that it
won’t last long, but hopefully the internet will come back before we leave, so
that I can at least upload what I have done as once we leave Korhogo in a few
days’ time, we are not likely to see Wi-Fi for at least the next week, maybe 2,
as we disappear into the wilds of Cote d’Ivoire for a few days and then into Guinea
and the unknown after that.
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