- No food for lazy men.
- After the rain, the sun will shine.
- To be a man is no easy.
- Your boyfriend is my ATM.
- Tomorrow will come
- No bad day
Well yes, I got a car. Many things happened since my last post in June last year: I signed a new work contract for another three yeard (until end of September 2015), I moved twice, I worried about people close to me, I sad good bye to my old colleague and hello to a new one, I turned 29 on the Liberian flagday, I got Malaria one more time, I flew in a chopper, I visited an artisanal gold mine, I visited an indutrail iron ore mine, I had wonderful friends coming over to visit me, I became the logistics operations director for the Liberia Marathon 2013, I went to Budapest for a training in December, I celebrated Christmas at home, I worked too much, I laughed and cried, I had my bathroon flooded with stuff you don't want to know, I met a cool Liberian rap queen, I cooked potatoe greens in Sierra Leone, I had to say the final good bye to my grandfather, I went to Hungary once again for the second part of the training, I was visited there by my best fried, I got 5 new pairs of cool shades, I learned that you have to speak slowly when giving a speack in front of 200 kids in an Liberian gym, I went to a wonderfully unconventional wedding ceremony, I got an annoying cold in 30 degrees, I met wonderful people, and here I am.
Tired, but happy. Every day something new. No stagnation. Exciting. Exhausting. But exactly what I wanted. At least for now.
I will try to keep this blog updated again from now on. It is a good sign though that I feel like writing again as this means that my workload is decreasing a little. Some of the last months were just too insane and there was no motivation to post here. But now I am back. For today with two little stories to make you smile:
Parking issues
I went over to my friends' office during lunch hour as we had to discuss something. I parked my care in front of the building, with a gentle distance to the car parking towards me. However, the guy sitting in his car - a tall Liberian guy - started waving his hands and kind of yelling at met. It was sweltering outside - way more than 30 degrees celsius - and I was really not in the mood for stupid discussions. So I got off: "What?" Guy: "No car there, I need space." Me: "you got plenty of space to park out, A baby could park out there." Guy: "No, no, only small small space." Me: "well, you know what, I show you how to leave this space and when I manage, I stay." So I did. I got behind the wheel in this super old, big car and left the parking space in seconds. People around me laughing and clapping. Guy speechless. Me covered in sweat - it is just too hot for arguments. But a successful moment.
Baustellenhure
On my way back from work I ended up in a heavy traffic jam because Monrovia is currently discovering the arrival of several traffic lights and one after the other gets activated. Unfortunately something went wrong with the programming so they are causing nothing but insane traffic jams. The time it usually takes me to get to work just doubled within the last few days. The problem? Well, if you have two lanes and you allow both of them to go straight but one of them also is for people turning to the left, but the straight-forwarder and left-turner do not get a green GO at the same time but one after the other, you can imagine what happens. Also, the police decided that it is a good idea to build check point two meters behind the traffic lights. Clearly an efficient solution.
Interesting also what I learnt from the discussions on the radio, the traffic lights apparently also contribute to increased crime: As someone explained, there is usually a lot of criminal activity in the traffic (like snatching phones and bags through open windows etc). Before the new-borne traffic light era, the thief would be chased through traffic and often the stolen goods could be returned to the owner. Now with these traffic lights though, you are forced to stop and the thieves can escape easily. I have to admit I have my doubts about this causal relationship, but will clearly look for evidence as soon as I get stuck next time.
Anyway - so I was sitting in the car, waiting for the next move. Suddenly I realized what was written on the yellow, overcroweded cab in front of me. In clear white letters it says: Baustellenhure.
I just started laughing and took a picture. Clearly, it was an old German car, but for whoever's sake, why would that be on a car? And what actually is a Baustellenhure? Guesses and explanations are welcome. Moments like that most certainly turn the crappy traffic jam into a daily highlight.
Tomorrow I am leaving for a two-day trip to Gbarnga where the next consultation round for the update of the Liberian Minerals and Mining Law will take place. Will be interesting.
Off for now, but more to come very soon.
Take good care of yourself!
2 comments:
Good morning how are you?
My name is Emilio, I am a Spanish boy and I live in a town near to Madrid. I am a very interested person in knowing things so different as the culture, the way of life of the inhabitants of our planet, the fauna, the flora, and the landscapes of all the countries of the world etc. in summary, I am a person that enjoys traveling, learning and respecting people's diversity from all over the world.
I would love to travel and meet in person all the aspects above mentioned, but unfortunately as this is very expensive and my purchasing power is quite small, so I devised a way to travel with the imagination in every corner of our planet. A few years ago I started a collection of used stamps because trough them, you can see pictures about fauna, flora, monuments, landscapes etc. from all the countries. As every day is more and more difficult to get stamps, some years ago I started a new collection in order to get traditional letters addressed to me in which my goal was to get at least 1 letter from each country in the world. This modest goal is feasible to reach in the most part of countries, but unfortunately it’s impossible to achieve in other various territories for several reasons, either because they are countries at war, either because they are countries with extreme poverty or because for whatever reason the postal system is not functioning properly.
For all this I would ask you one small favor:
Would you be so kind as to send me a letter by traditional mail from Liberia? I understand perfectly that you think that your blog is not the appropriate place to ask this, and even, is very probably that you ignore my letter, but I would call your attention to the difficulty involved in getting a letter from that country, and also I don’t know anyone neither where to write in Liberia in order to increase my collection. a letter for me is like a little souvenir, like if I have had visited that territory with my imagination and at same time, the arrival of the letters from a country is a sign of peace and normality and an original way to promote a country in the world. My postal address is the following one:
Emilio Fernandez Esteban
Avenida Juan de la Cierva, 44
28902 Getafe (Madrid)
Spain
If you wish, you can visit my blog www.cartasenmibuzon.blogspot.com where you can see the pictures of all the letters that I have received from whole World.
Finally I would like to thank the attention given to this letter, and whether you can help me or not, I send my best wishes for peace, health and happiness for you, your family and all your dear beings.
Yours Sincerely
Emilio Fernandez
Good morning how are you?
My name is Emilio, I am a Spanish boy and I live in a town near to Madrid. I am a very interested person in knowing things so different as the culture, the way of life of the inhabitants of our planet, the fauna, the flora, and the landscapes of all the countries of the world etc. in summary, I am a person that enjoys traveling, learning and respecting people's diversity from all over the world.
I would love to travel and meet in person all the aspects above mentioned, but unfortunately as this is very expensive and my purchasing power is quite small, so I devised a way to travel with the imagination in every corner of our planet. A few years ago I started a collection of used stamps because trough them, you can see pictures about fauna, flora, monuments, landscapes etc. from all the countries. As every day is more and more difficult to get stamps, some years ago I started a new collection in order to get traditional letters addressed to me in which my goal was to get at least 1 letter from each country in the world. This modest goal is feasible to reach in the most part of countries, but unfortunately it’s impossible to achieve in other various territories for several reasons, either because they are countries at war, either because they are countries with extreme poverty or because for whatever reason the postal system is not functioning properly.
For all this I would ask you one small favor:
Would you be so kind as to send me a letter by traditional mail from Liberia? I understand perfectly that you think that your blog is not the appropriate place to ask this, and even, is very probably that you ignore my letter, but I would call your attention to the difficulty involved in getting a letter from that country, and also I don’t know anyone neither where to write in Liberia in order to increase my collection. a letter for me is like a little souvenir, like if I have had visited that territory with my imagination and at same time, the arrival of the letters from a country is a sign of peace and normality and an original way to promote a country in the world. My postal address is the following one:
Emilio Fernandez Esteban
Avenida Juan de la Cierva, 44
28902 Getafe (Madrid)
Spain
If you wish, you can visit my blog www.cartasenmibuzon.blogspot.com where you can see the pictures of all the letters that I have received from whole World.
Finally I would like to thank the attention given to this letter, and whether you can help me or not, I send my best wishes for peace, health and happiness for you, your family and all your dear beings.
Yours Sincerely
Emilio Fernandez
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