We spent the next hour walking in and out of the material
shops, some were wholesale, and there was material stacked from floor to roof
and if there is such a thing, there was TOO much choice. Some I have seen everywhere, some I now own and
lots I didn’t like. We found this great
shop that instead of having the material all bagged and cramped on the floors,
it was hanging on rails and we knew we could keep walking all day and decided
that we would find something nice here.
There was no shells for Ellie, but we both found 2 pieces each and the
lady was happy to cut the 12m fabric to 6m lengths but she wouldn’t go smaller
than that, and when she told us the price we initially thought she was asking
for 4000 bob a meter, which was the going rate, but it was total for the
6m!!!! It certainly was probably the
best quality material I have seen all trip, except for maybe Ghana and I think
that Ghana has the most beautiful patterns and colours. With Sir Rishard being very patient with our
material shopping and now we had some pieces we had one more thing to do before
heading back to the hotel and that was to find a stationary shop to buy some
school books for the Beach Boys that I had promised them that I would give to
Zoe upon her return in a few weeks’ time.
We asked the very helpful material lady and one of her staff walked us
around the corner and took us to a stationary store where we could buy the
books. It took a few goes to find the
right ones as they were all behind a counter and we had to keep asking to see
the inside of the books to make sure we weren’t buying graph paper. We found suitable books and originally I was
going to buy 6 books, one for each kid, but they were so cheap, Ellie and Rich
also contributed to the cost, so we bought a pack of 25 and figured they could
share the books with their school friends.
For 25 books it only cost us 5AUD!!!
Imagine!
We then made our way back to the hotel, where I met my
Irving’s again 30 minutes later to say goodbye and to thank them for including me
in their trip. The middle section of the
trip could have been disastrous for me being the only single out of a group of
5, but both the Irving’s and the Mackenzie’s were amazing to me and I have made
some rock steady friendships. So it was
sad to say goodbye to these 2 amazing people, but it wasn’t a final farewell, it
was just a ‘catch ya later’, as I will be seeing them again in March back in
the UK hoping that they don’t switch off all the lights when they hear me knock
and I have to call through their mailbox!!!
I’m going to miss you guys. We
had no idea on what the taxi would cost for the Irving’s to the new hotel, so
we asked what the cab would cost to the airport to compare it to the cost he
had given for the hotel. The cost to the
new hotel was 4000 and to the airport was 12,000 so in comparison it looked
legit and with a final wave they were gone and I made my way back to my room
where I attempted to blog as the days were starting to slip away from me again
and I was currently 5 days behind, but I was tired and decided to have an afternoon
nana nap and then got ready for dinner which I had prearranged with Cathy and
Sian at 7pm. We were invited to have
dinner with the new group but besides the group being massive I wouldn’t really
want to have people at my welcome dinner that had just done the trip, with us
blabbing about things like the weather, how tough things were, what we would change
and all without really realizing and the personal jokes would just fall on
unassuming ears, so we decided to dodge that bullet all together and wave them
all off tomorrow. As it worked out the
whole group was still in town tonight with the absence of Ellie and Rich and of
course Sam and Zoe as they forge on with a new group back the way they came, we
all met and walked to a pub that the boys had found during the day that was
showing the World Cup qualifier match between Ivory Coast and Senegal. I am not into football, but I was starving as
I hadn’t eaten any lunch and the chance to spend my last night with my friends
outweighed any football match.
The bar was great.
Sian mentioned that it said in the LP (Lonely Planet) that women should
not visit the place unless they had a male with them. I’m not sure why as it looked safe enough
inside, the large plasma TV was working, give or take some bad reception when
the waitress opened a cutlery draw and after everyone had a few drinks the
football match did fall down the wayside a little. We all ate and drank and at 9pm I walked back
to the hotel with Suzanne and Ian while the others left to go and have a few
drinks somewhere else. The second we
walked out of the pub there would have been over 15 homeless/begging people
hanging around and they just pounced on us and I just made sure I had my bag to
my chest and we pushed through the throng of people and I was just glad that I
was walking back with people, as I truly do believe if you were on your own
that something bad would happen. It is
probably the unsafest West African country out of the whole trip. I have to say I am not a massive fan of
Senegal which is a shame as Cap Skirring was great and also Saint Louis, but
weather wise, people wise and my experience overall is just not a great one and
I will not be rushing back here any time soon.
I really should have started to pack tonight, as I do
actually have a lot of stuff, but I just couldn’t be bothered, which just
summed up my whole day and I would just do it all tomorrow. I wasn’t getting picked up till 12.30pm, so I
would have time after waving Sam, Zoe, Madge and the new group off at 9am to
pack after that. Everyone was around
again tomorrow morning, so goodbyes to the rest of the group could be held off
till tomorrow. Most of us were flying
out tomorrow afternoon with Clem, Karl and the girls all having one more night
before their flights. I hate goodbyes
and the longer I can put them off the better.
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