01/09/2024 Bikepacking Sierra Leone Day 154 : Riding with Flames 🔥

“Hey Brahim!” said a man sitting on the steps in front of the store.

I had just pulled up to the Grocery where I took the coconut oil photo yesterday - the one where there are lights, and you walk around in peace with a little basket to carry the items you are going to buy at the front counter.

“Hey! Hi!”

“Oh crap!” I thought, “What was this guy’s name?”

“It’s me, Ibrahim,” he announced, seeing my perplexed face.

Still not ringing any bells.

He put his sunglasses back on. Suddenly, I recognized him! He was the friendly guy I sat on the steps with for a long time yesterday…

Then he asked, “Did you get your Ivory Coast visa?”

I was a little bit floored that he remembered all of this… and felt like a turd for forgetting his name. He was one of the few people from yesterday who I really liked - and I probably spoke with 30+ individuals yesterday.

We sat down on the steps again, and he showed me his broken sunglasses. I pulled out my superglue, and by the time I came back (had to go on a get-money hunt), the glue had set and they were fixed.

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Today’s objective was to ride with Tenesie Dixon, a Strava athlete. I’ve been in touch with him for a long while now. 8 months ago, I sought cyclists in the few place I’d seen illuminated on the heat map in Africa. I messaged any local riders I could find asking, “Is there a bike shop near Freetown?” The answer to that question is “yes!” In fact, Tenesie works at the bike shop! But I’ve now confirmed my suspicion: there are not any parts for MY bike sitting on store shelves between Spain and (probably) South Africa. That’s why I’ve been carrying a tire that takes up half my seat bag, hydraulic lines, cables, freehub mech, a chain... every part (within reason) for my bike.

We met up on time and he brought along his teammate Souleymane. We began negotiating the complex maze of motorcycles, vans, trucks, and people. I’m always curious how local cyclists handle the impetuous driving. I’m non-confrontational in these foreign environments, but I learned from these guys that it is OK to grab onto a motorcycle rack for balance if they are squeezing you in. It’s okay to bang your fist on a van if they cut you off, and okay to raise your hand to say, “what were you THINKING!?”when someone jumps in front of you.

“They just care about money,” Tenesie said in reference to one of the vans with people stuffed everywhere. “They don’t care about safety.”

He was referring to how they stop wherever, whenever to pickup more people, running you off the road. This happened to me several dozen times yesterday alone.

This was to be a “zone 2” ride. If you know anything about how things unfold when 3 men get together on bicycles with the purported goal of zone 2… it is NEVER zone 2. Once we were free of the traffic, we were soon cruising at 26mph. Not a shabby pace considering how many molecules of air and water we were having to push aside.

Souleymane called out “flat!” I thought he had a puncture, but then he pointed at my rear tire.. the seat tube brown with muddy sealant. My second flat since leaving home (the other was on the day I found the puppies). We extricated the little wire and pumped it back up… maybe to 20 psi. From then on, I just relegated myself to “wheel sucker” as these two took turns pulling at 24-30 mph. I apologized for not helping and thanked them profusely.

As I was pumping my tire, Tenesie pointed to Souleymane and said, “let him do it.” Souleymane was already trying to grab my pump and do my work for me. This causes a whirlwind of conflict in my brain!

First, I’m the only one who works on my bike. Period. But apart from that, there is “this historical thing,” and I am hypersensitive about people doing work for “the white man.” People on the street are always trying to do something to fix my bike and I blow them off and run away. But on this ride, we are equals (well, in the bike repair sense, not the fitness sense because it took everything I had to stay with them). What is the correct move? This I do not know.

Tenesie is 27 years old and part of the “Flames” cycling team in Freetown. They have 20 members, and they race internationally. He says Nigeria has a good team, and he has traveled to race in Ghana and Guinea. He wins races sometimes, but I had to drag that information out of him.

“How do you get parts for your bike? You can’t just order them, right?” I asked.

“If we need something, we put it on our social media, and people will usually send it.”

I asked how that works and about the postal service. The postal service is non-functional… but DHL is reliable, he said.

“You have to send me your social media page,” I mentioned a few times. (He never did - even when I messaged him later). I imagine he is too modest to ask for anything. Luckily I did some homework and was able to figure it out:

https://m.facebook.com/profile.php/?id=100064154555570

This page makes me happy. Posts dedicated to “Women’s empowerment through cycling”… they even have a go fund me for bikes that were damaged in a car wreck.. (That one has ended, but I’m sure future opportunities will arise). These are the good people.

We arrived at Kent, and of course there was a sprint for the town sign. At the beach, about 5 guys came up and started taking roughly; the typical harassment that I endure daily.. except now I had “bodyguards” who spoke Krio. Even though Krio sounds like cool-man-English, I didn’t understand what they were saying, but the gist was that we needed to pay for being on this beach.

I asked Tenesie, “Is this a public beach?”

“Yes.”

Would this be different if I weren’t here?”

“Yes.”

Tenesie and Souleymane were able to calm the guys down, and then they started speaking English to me only: “Do you want a trip to the Turtle Islands?”

The Turtle Islands are perhaps the single touristic destination in Sierra Leone - though I don’t think they are quite as luxurious as other tropical destinations.

I told Tenesie, “I don’t do those touristic things”

He smiled at that, and told them in Krio.

That didn’t stop them, though: “Hey, my friend, what’s your name?” I told them, and asked their names. One guy said he was “Souleymane”

“Hey, you guys both have the same name,” I said, pointing towards “our” Souleymane in an effort to divert the attention from hustling.

The guy laughed, “No! I’m Solomon. It is a Christian name. That guy is Souleymane, it’s a Muslim name.”

“Ha! I learn something new every day! I never thought about that. Thank you for teaching me, Solomon!” I meant it too - that was a cool thing to learn, even though they were laughing at me.

“You want to go,” asked Tenesie.

“Yeah.”

Next Sunday, Tenesie invited me to a social ride (i.e. race) followed by a picnic. I would have loved to attend, but the prospect of another 5 nights in my mosquito infested room where the electricity keeps turning off for hours at a time seemed too much. I want to go back to elevations where I’m not dependent on electricity for cooling.

The rest of the day was typical Sierra Leone. Running all over to get money (when people asked me for money I n the street, I could tell them, “if you have more than 100 Leones, you have more money than me right now!”

So far today, only a few power outages (it was off all day from 9AM until 6:30 PM yesterday). It still goes off for shorter 10 minute periods regularly, waking me up at night as the room warms.

I also canceled my flight from Benin, and made a new reservation from Ghana for the same date. It is still a bit of a stretch mileage-wise, but my favorite thing to do is ride all day long. The breeze generated keeps me cooler, and by riding, I can save my precious remaining insulin and still process the mostly-carbohydrate food available. A few more days in Sierra Leone, but excited to go back to Guinea now!

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