01/02/2024 Bikepacking Guinea Day 147 : Spice is the Variety of Life

I had just come within view of the waterfall cliff that was today’s objective. Through the haze, you could see the faint sliver of a waterfall cascading down.

Lately, I’ve been meeting a lot of people who have lived in Sierra Leone. This is great because it means we can have conversations in English. One of those people was Challom, who happened to be sitting right there. *I think that is his name; he signed my note “C.M.Bah”

I told him how beautiful I thought this place was.

“This place is not beautiful to me,” he remarked.

“How could you say that?! You have the mountains all around you, and a perfect climate!”

“It is not beautiful because I live here.”

I gave up on trying to convince him. “When you come back, I will be here,” he said.

Today’s waterfall was a good one. The entire day was good; people were back to being friendly, and zero people were at the magnificent waterfall. I spent a while reveling in its splendor and fine mist.

Upon returning, Challom was still there with his smirky smile. He wanted me to come see his house. We talked a while, and eventually he said, “I want to be your friend.” He said it in a way that was endearing.

I said, “ok! Now we are friends,” kind of like how you may have made friends on the playground at school.

He said, “can you give me something to remember you by?”

He seemed so sincere, that I was bummed i don’t have anything extra. I said, “I have some candy, but after you eat it, you won’t remember me anymore.” He persisted. He wasn’t asking for money; just a trinket of some sort. I took him seriously and started looking at my bike for ideas. Suddenly, I realized that I had an extra blinky light that I had found on the ground in Morocco. He seemed pleased with the gift.

“Now, please take my picture,” he said somewhat formally. This was for me to remember him by.

It was kind of cute. We exchanged WhatsApp, and I was looking forward to sending him the photo - only to find that his number is not on WA.

*******

A guy going the other way on a motorcycle loaded with sticks stopped me to ask if any other cyclists were with me. He was worried he might knock them with his wide load. His full name was “Amadou Camera Belly.” I told him that the belly part of his name meant stomach in English. He was not aware of this (he only spoke French). This is not the first time I’ve met people with English words in their name. With some of the foreign names I’ve seen such as “Rayovac,” “Dorcas*,” or “Dikshit**,” I can’t help but wonder if some malicious English speaker came on the scene and introduced these words as names.

Anyway, I would have left Amadou Camera Belly out of the story because he ended up being one of the many people who thinks I work for the USCIS and can just get him a visa. He spoke slowly in French, using hand gestures to make it all very clear. He said that I need to ask my father (hand pointed to the sky), and my mother (grabs both of his nipples and jiggles them) to help him get this visa (or something like that). Well, thanks, Camera Belly for giving me a few good laughs!

Other than that, the day was mostly uneventful. In the first 2 hours of my ride, I covered less than 6 miles. The hunt for food is extremely time consuming - almost a quarter of the day is spent going from stall to stall in the various villages, hoping I can get something different or healthy. The people here are not starving; they are generally well fed… but it seems they get all of their calories from rice and deep fried dough balls.

* Dorcas was the Greek name for Tabitha, a biblical figure who is seen as a saint in both the Catholic and Eastern Orthodox Church.

** The meaning of Dikshit is : Initiated, Dedicated, Provider of Knowledge, Initiated into a Religious Order