Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
Miscommunication Does Have Benefits
Afteraquicklunchbytheroadside,Istoppedtowatchsomelocalkidsplayfootball
whose ingenuity amazed me. Even though their ball was made from the husks of coconuts,
one couldn't tell for the game moved at a quick pace with a lot of passing. It was quite en-
tertaining but after 20 minutes or so I decided to push on to Koungheul.
When I arrived, I asked for directions to Tambacounda and was directed to the
Sisters of St. Francis, a Catholic order for women (I didn't think my French was that bad.)
This slight miscommunication ended up with a cooked lunch by the Italian sisters, new
friends and a place to stay. After lunch, Sister Maria escorted me to the volunteers' home
where I was introduced to three Italian agricultural volunteers: Andrea, Andrea and Patri-
cia.Theywereallonatwo-yearagriculturalvolunteerprojectworkingwitheightlocalvil-
lages.TheorganizationthattheyworkedforwasCOMI,anItalianacronymwhichroughly
meant co-operation for world peace and development. In Italy, they told me, residents had
a choice between volunteering or compulsory military service. These three opted to volun-
teer.
As I listened to Simon & Garfunkel, Patricia and Andrea cooked dinner. I asked
them about the birds I saw earlier and they told me that the blue bird was called Rollier
D'Abyssinie and the red bird was Amarante Commun. The greenback with the blue belly
was called Merle Metalique a Longue Queue.
Anyway,ImadetwobigdecisionsasIwaitedfordinnertobeready.First,Idecided
toaskifIcouldspendthenextdaywiththemandvisittheiragriculturalprojects(theywere
quite keen on this). Second, I decided that when I arrived in Guinea, I would not visit the
capital city Conakry. There was really no need for I already had my visa for Côte d'Ivoire
. The deciding factor was that I would have had to cycle from Mamou to Conakry and then
return to Mamou (on the exact same road) to continue on my journey to Côte d'Ivoire .
That would have been an extra 460 kilometres or 4 to 5 days of cycling and I would have
endedupbackinthesamespotanyway.ThereasonIhadtoreturntoMamouandnotcycle
along the coast was because of the civil war in Sierra Leone and Liberia. The only way for
metocompleteWestAfricawastocyclealongthenorthernbordersofthesetwocountries.
These details will soon follow.
AfteragreatItalian dinner,wewentoutat10:30towatchthevillage celebrate Mo-
hammad's birthday. We arrived at a large white tent packed with people and stood outside
toobserve. Whenthevillagers noticed us,theyinsisted that weenter andaplace wasmade
available for us to sit. The entertainment was hypnotic. It included instrumental and vocal
music with varied groups of dancers. Almost two hours went by unnoticed when suddenly
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