Taking A Fall

Just when I thought my life had hit rock bottom, I feel five feet deeper! It was a muggy and extremely dark night like any other. Mom was by my side, holding her famous flashlight, the traffic started getting heavier, headlights were beaming and blinding me, so I brilliantly decided to switch from mom’s right side to her left to get off the road. Ha…ha….Little did I know there was a disgusting sewer that had JUST started otherwise I would’ve thought twice before taking a lunge into it! Next thing I knew I had fallen into the very large and unpleasant ditch all the way up past my shoulders.... It was so deep, I had enough time to think "Aaah, this is a DEEP hole! When am I going to hit the bottom...oh boy, this could be bad!" The only tears I had were caused by side splitting laughter I burst into! “Oh my gosh mom, I am SOOOO embarrassed, hhahah. How could I DO that?!?!” Mean while she was trying to judge how badly I had hurt myself. “Trust me, I’m FINE!” I said, as I stumbled in my tracks, limping and laughing along. My vision narrowed and the little light produced on the street was being blotched out until I was left with nothing but a swimming head. Never before have I come so close to passing out…”Whoa, I think I’m actually going to pass out! Maybe I DO need Sky to come and carry me home.” Luckily I didn’t pass out and continued to limp the 1km home. My ears went fuzzy and it felt as though I was in a cloud, my world far off and hazy….I could scarcely hear mom right beside me and even my own voice sounded distant to my own ears. An African ditch is a very mysterious place that's better left to bubble and rot untouched!! The muck oozing between my toes and smeared up my pants was more than unsettling and revolting, to say the least. "We should really stop to wash you off. Who KNOWS what you landed in!!" Leaning on mom for support, I hesitated slightly before laughing the idea off. It took all of my strength not to think of the hundreds of possible ingredients in an African ditch....

As soon as we arrived home after midnight, mom put Bre on clean-up duty. There I was, passed off to the amateur doctor, sitting on the toilet in my underwear getting the full inspection. My arm was smeared in pasty mud, my pants soaked (no, the experience wasn't THAT frightening!), my feet were unrecognizable and overall I simply stunk! The "Don't ask" expression on my face was clear as day but she didn't even need to ask. The look on Bre's face wasn't comforting in the least. "Just break it to me!! How bad is it?!" "I'm sorry....I'm have to scrub these. They're just sooo DIRTY...and you really stink, by the way." The candle light flickered on the walls of the small, dripping bathroom as I let Bre scrape out the pebbles and grime from the deep cut in my foot and everywhere else.... Bre and I were a perfect match, her loving to inflict pain on me and me loving the STING of disinfectant! I had to bite my arm to stifle my screams and prevent them from ripping through the night like a tortured patient, ahah. Nothing too terrible really, just a sliced foot, scratched side, skinned hip, scraped knee, lots of bruises and a hurt ankle. The worst part was knowing that I had to get up in three hours and put my pack on and carry it to the bus station. My own weight on my foot alone was bad enough, and the backpack strap goes right across my cut hip. Oh well, life goes on, right?! I can't wait for my hip to scar because I already have one from the beach in Sri Lanka and now I get a new one. They'll be my SL hip scars, hehe :D.

A couple of days after that lovely experience we took a 3½ hour truck ride 29 km down a bumpy, dusty road to Tongo where the diamond fields are. OooOOoh cool! A friendly local found us and showed us around for free. We saw the miners digging, sifting the gravel and dirt for "blood" diamonds and then we went in and saw the head honcho buying raw diamonds from them in a little shack. Ya, this is the real deal. It was scorching hot and hard limping around. Our only alternative to go back to Kenema from Tongo was by motorbike. I don’t think any of us were too keen on the idea at first but it turned out to be one of the best experiences of my whole trip! It hadn’t occurred to me how much we’ve been missing out by travelling in squishy cars and trucks! We all paired up, the parents, Bre and Ammon then Sky and me on three different bikes. I hadn't realized until the second I was hopping onto the bike that....I had never riden one before!!! All my travels and experiences and never ridden one....crazy! The scenery is absolutely drop dead gorgeous in Siera Leone. Everyone was so friendly with big smiles and little kids running and waving to us when we passed through each village! It's been so long since I've smiled so big that it hurt! I could not stop laughing and smiling! I loved it! I could go on and on and on about how amazing it was but I don't think it's healthy for the readers to get that jealous!

To sum up what has happened since then, we took a shared taxi to Liberia which took forever with all of the check points and it was a pretty miserable day! We arrived at night which wasn't a good thing....and I'll let someone else elaborate on that story. So right now we are in Monrovia, the capital of Liberia and have been staying with an EXTREMELY nice family for the past week, trying to figure out how to get OUT! Transport is not an easy thing in this country! Dad had to go to the hospital with painful suspected kidney stones....Can't wait to go through Cote D'ivoire and get to Ghana!

That's all for now from the youngen' of the group!
Savannah

p.s. Hey! I didn't insult you!! It's a GREAAAAT thing to be OLD Shean. And you never told me if he was YOUNG or not....so how do I know if I even want this guy in the first place, teehee. Maybe you'll have to send me a photo before I believe he's good looking. Does he even exist and if he does...he probably reads these blogs ahhahha, how embarrassing!!
I wrote a blog for you! Is that good enough sucking up!?!