I Promise I'm Not Miserable

A recent email from a good friend asked me to write about some happy things. I admit, my recent blog posts have been pretty morose and give the impression that I am miserable in Sierra Leone.  Honestly the first week was emotional and difficult for me. When Gearoid told me a year ago that he had to come back to Sierra Leone, I told him I wasn’t going with him. Along with other reasons, I didn’t want to have to face the difficult facts of life here. Starving children, animals, and adults. Children who should be in school doing hard labor instead. Blind beggars. Intelligent adults mangled by polio reduced to begging outside of a Western style grocery store. The list goes on and on. However, deep in my heart I knew I would come back. This country and the kind and beautiful people get under your skin in a way so that you’re forever attached to them.

So, I promise I’m not miserable. I had acute culture shock (and shock that I agreed to return) and a bad housing situation. After the first week, I’ve acclimated and am actually happier than I’ve been the last few months in the Netherlands. A big part of my happiness is that I’m working (albeit for free) and doing the kind of work that I enjoy. My first job is as a lecturer at the university here in Makeni (Unimak). I have taken over 3 classes from a nun who was overwhelmed with her course load. Unfortunately I’m teaching things that I learned in high school (the Merchant of Venice, how to write an essay, etc) which is a gross understatement of the state of education here but it gives me more experience teaching adults. I’m also using my recently acquired TEFL certificate to design and teach English courses at Unimak as well.

I’m in love with my other job which I pretty much created for myself. The last time I was here, I did some workshops for the teachers at St. Joseph’s School for the Hearing Impaired. This time around I have pretty much swooped in, am calling myself a curriculum specialist, designing a weekly training program, and I am organizing educational materials for the classrooms. Sister Mary, the nun who runs the school, doesn’t know what to think but assures me that she’s grateful. What she doesn’t realize is that she’s helping me out. When I left the States a year and a half ago, I also left a job that made me completely disillusioned with working in the field of education. I’ve spent the last 14 months in the Netherlands trying to “find” myself and think about what I really want to do for a career but it was only after returning here that I realized that this is what I love and want to do (please read this with a grain of salt- I say this now but can be pretty fickle and may change my mind again in the future).

That’s not to say that it is not frustrating as hell working here. I’m working with teachers who aren’t educated enough (some not all), who haven’t been paid and have an understandable lack of motivation, and who disappear and decide not to come to work. I have discovered a wealth of books and resources to be used in classrooms that are locked in storage for fear of them being stolen or destroyed. You have to move a mountain to move an anthill to get anything done here. Despite the frustration, I love the challenge and whenever I start feeling overwhelmed by all that needs to be done, I adopt the Salonean phrase- small small. I’m just happy to be working again.

In addition to work, we’ve also developed a social network here. Last time we were here, there were like 12 expats in town and anytime someone new came into town we invited them to dinner. We were a close knit group. Being in the same town without our friends was a little difficult, especially considering that the expat community now has a completely different dynamic. In the last few years big mining and farming companies have moved in meaning that expats are everywhere! There is even a new restaurant in town that functions as an expat hang out. I can get pancakes and pizza in Makeni. It’s absurd but delicious. Among all of these expats, we’ve found a group that we can relate to and have a fun with. The great thing about an expat community in a place like Sierra Leone is that relationships develop more quickly than they would back home. The awkward getting to know you period is pushed aside and genuine friendships develop without pretence. I’ve spent 14 months in the Netherlands trying to make friends and have accomplished that in a few weeks here. It’s hard to explain but with people who are living similarly to you and can relate to cultural and systemic issues (i.e. nobody showed up to the class I was supposed to teach or the generator broke down and I couldn’t Skype my mom on her birthday or the hotel in town with the only pool tried to charge a man for swimming when in fact he dived in fully clothed to save a drowning woman- by the way these are all true stories) you feel comfortable enough to open up more and to make your inappropriate and sarcastic jokes without fear of offending and alienating them.

My first lecture here. Everyone decided to watch the Charles Taylor case instead of coming to class.

So I’m happy here. I have a job. I have friends. And I’m living in a Disneyland fortress (more on that later). I just hope my happiness holds out and beats down the frustrations.