My First African Beach Trip!

In my last blog I said that this one would be about my sister Martine, but in light of what has happened this last week I think I should put off my sister-blog for a little bit. I’ve had a really long, eventful week! Sorry, it’s a long blog, but I couldn’t help it!

So it’s been two weeks since my last update, last week was kind of just a normal week, though the biggest highlight was that last Friday (the 22^nd) I went to visit a little recording studio in town [not so] cleverly called “Studio des Enregistrements” with my friend Joel. I made friends with the engineer there, and will plan to visit more often. I’m also going to track some things there I need to get done.

Moving on from that…big event number one. Sunday morning I left for Abidjan with Heidi and Naomi to go pick up Heidi’s boyfriend, Taylor, who is visiting for a few weeks. We spent Sunday night in Bouaké and then left the next morning for Abidjan. This was quite an adventure! The bus from Bouaké was a really nice charter bus, which made the ride easy, and we arrived to Abidjan in about 5 and a half hours. After some drama from getting off at the wrong bus-stop in Abidjan, we met up with a friend who lives down there, got the the airport, and got Taylor. Soon we were in a taxi heading for Grand Basaam, no hotel reservations (they forgot to make them after we called), tons of bags, and plenty of prayers in our minds that this would all work out.

The stay in Grand Basaam was fun, and we had no trouble finding a hotel. We did lots of walking, checking out shops, and hanging out on the beach. It was fun to see the Atlantic from the other side, and now I’ve got to see both the Pacific and Atlantic oceans from the East and West sides. The view was fantastic – beautiful, giant 10-foot waves crashing onto a nearly deserted strip of beach that was lined with hundreds of tall palm trees. If there wasn’t so much trash on the beach it would have been perfect. One guy’s explanation to me was that the governments in West Africa dump tons of trash into the ocean, and then it just washed up on the beaches. I don’t know if I buy that though, because the beach’s undercurrent was so strong that I didn’t even see more than one or two tiny seashells on the shore. Everything gets sucked out to sea, making it unwise to go in further than waist deep, and I’d imagine keeping just about anything from actually getting deposited on the beach. Despite the dangerous undercurrent, I still got in to a point where I could quickly dunk myself underwater and feel that warm Atlantic water. It was the perfect temperature.

We left Grand Basaam and went through the heart of Abidjan to our next bus station. It was strange seeing sings of the battle that just ended a few months back: guard rails that have been smashed in, buildings riddled with holes from bullets and mortar rounds, a pay toll booth that had been blown in half. But at the same time, I could see how rapidly the had already started putting the town back together. Ivorians are determined to restore their country to it’s former glory. 20 years ago, Abidjan was considered the Paris of Africa, and had lots of tourists. Today, I’m flocked by Ivorians who as so excited to see me, an actually “tourists” back in RCI. I don’t always mention that I live here too. Anyways, the rest of the trip back to Bouaké was fine and today we are preparing next week’s orientation for the two new Journeyers who are coming Monday.

Ok, so that’s the trip – time for big event number two. This is something that was happening just before and during out voyage to Abidjan. Last Friday I was feeling really tired, and then Saturday my whole body ached and I had a really bad headache. It felt like I had been shot out of a canon into a concrete wall; absolutely every inch of my body was just very, very sore. I figured I was just exhausted from overworking my self. After all, I was out of shape and just that week I had been doing a lot of hard bike riding, and working out in my room, so maybe I just overworked myself and my body was mad at me? Deciding not to let it hinder me from travelling, I got on the bus Sunday morning. When we got to Bouaké, however, things really went down hill for me health wise. I started getting chills – I was freezing no matter how much I covered myself, then I’d be super hot, then freezing again, and so on and so forth. I was having terrible “issues” which meant I got to visit a certain friend of mine made of porcelain quite often. My whole body still ached, my head felt like it was in a vice, and everyone said that I felt like I was on fire. We took my temperature – 102.8˚. A bit later we took it again – 104˚. It was a decently chilly evening and I was sweating a lot. I had been bundling up because I was freezing, but at the sight of 104˚ I was forced to go straight to the bathroom and take two freezing cold showers, and go to bed without clothes on, but with a wet towel laid over me to cool me down. This helped a bit, and I prayed that in the morning I’d be feeling well enough to go to Abidjan, I didn’t want to miss out! Furthermore, if I stayed in Bouaké, I’d be alone and terribly sick, on campus for two whole days with no food, no way into town, and no energy to cook or take care of myself. Staying wasn’t an option in my book. I slept great, except for a spell of throwing up around 3am in the bathroom. Malaria and eating don’t go hand in hand.

So can you guess what I had? Well if you’ve ever studied the symptoms of it you’d know right away that I had Malaria. Our Journey Corps Nat’l Coordinator, Bakary, went to an open pharmacy and got me meds that made me feel much better. I had a pill that night and was down to a mere 102˚ again the next morning, so I was feeling fine to travel. By Wednesday I was virtually over the Malaria, though my stomach is still just starting to figure out that I can actually eat food again.

Well there it is, and awesome trip to the beach, contrasted by a horrible ailment. Some might call it Karma, but I’d like to see it as God giving me an opportunity to learn something.

Here are a few pics from Grand Basaam:

Tayloy, Naomi, and I with two Ivorian venders. The man on the right called himself "Picasso".

Yeah...we were getting ready to jump

What to do with the excitement? Jump or do an Irish jig?