Our Plans: Decisions, Tickets, and Goodbyes

I'm sorry to have left people hanging after such a dramatic last post. Things here change so quickly and without constant access to the internet it's difficult to get the latest news up before it's old news. My apologies. Thank you all for your well wishes and worry. Matt and I are fine and so is Guinea and all of our friends and family here.

As predicted by many, the strike didn't happen when it was scheduled. After having postponed our plans for several weeks we decided to just go ahead with our plans to go to Conakry, a place we were avoiding as it would be the epicenter of any chaos if any stikes or demonstrations were to take place. We made it to Conakry safely and were able to get all of our business done in four business days (a record I think!). We tried our best to get in an out as soon as possible. While Conakry has pizza and ice cream, it also has traffic jams, noise, scams and general craziness. Plus, we were paying each night to stay at a hotel. Aside from the money, we were a bit antsy to get out of the hotel as it was right next door to a night club that, from what we could tell, is rock'en until around 4am. It was also a little disconcerting to find out that our hotel has rooms that are available by the hour. But techno versions of "I wanna be your hero" and creaking beds in the rooms next to ours at all hours of the night were much preferred to any political strife or violence. We're relieved to have found Conakry in one piece throughout our visit. I got the feeling, though, that things could change any time now. The global food and fuel crisis is really coming down hard on Guinea. We had several conversations (or actually, we listened to several monologues masquerading as conversations) with young Guineans (mostly university students) who talked about the dire need for political change in their country. They are angry and frustrated with the lack of accountabilty and leadership as the national highway deteriorates along with the school system and health services. And then there's the price of rice....It goes on and on. I got the feeling that people are reaching some sort of tipping point. (As a side note on the rising rice prices, there's an article on BBC Africa right now about a new trend in Liberia. Liberians are starting to eat pasta because they can't afford rice. With pasta comes the need for forks and the steep learning curve involved in that whole fork twirl technique. It's a lighter take on what is a serious and sad global reality right now ).

For awhile now Matt and I have been talking a lot about our plans for the rest of our time in Guinea and for our eventual return home. While in Conakry we made a pretty big decision (relatively speaking, of course). We're coming home. This decision was at once easy and painstakingly difficult. Aside from the obvious heartbreak involved in leaving our loved ones here, deciding to come home this summer means that we will not be able to host a dear friend of ours from Missoula who was planning to visit us in June and July. We have thought long and hard about letting so many people down and ending what has been a joyous, and important journey for us. This trip, though, is coming to its natural end. Just as it was obvious to us that we needed to come here, it's now clear that it's time to leave. It's also clear that we'll be back (Back to Guinea II?). So much has gone into this decision- the political situation here, our relationships with our Guinean families, our lack of jobs, our desire to see all of you in the U.S....We came here to be with our families and yet we're finding that we can't be with everyone at once. We're traversing the country over and over again to be with people, and all the while we're not actually finding our own place in this community (impossible when you're spending so much time in bush taxis and your brain cells are drowning in gas fumes...). Our families here are confused about our job status and hurt that we're not staying with them throughout our time here. And then there's my host dad who has been trying to figure out when to plan our going away party since we arrived. His enthusiasm for an all-out festival in honor of us is slowly dying out. But there's more, so much more. We also came here to find some clarity and direction in our own lives. This time here has been such a gift. We're anxious to get back and start the next chapter of our lives. Our goal is to come back to Guinea in a few years with a clue about our own lives.

But before our next reunion, there's the inevitable, and now, fast-approaching goodbyes. And because we've had no idea when we were going to leave, these goodbyes are going to come as a surprise to many here.

So when are we coming home? When I told my family in California that we were coming home in June I expected a yelp of happiness and excitement. Don't get me wrong, they're relieved and overjoyed (as are we, we miss all of you a ton). But as my brother put it, "can't you get a flight out of there before June?!!!" It's a good question. There are indeed flights, and it's tempting to jump on one today now that the decision has been made. But we've got business to take care of here. Goodbyes can't be rushed. And travel to the places where our loved ones here live will take up a good deal of time. We've also got a proposal for the family in Kerouane that, if accepted, will take some time to arrange. We'd like to send Max and Yi to a private school in KanKan. This idea is worthy of a post of its own (which I promise to write in the next few weeks).

The details: We found cheap tickets out of Conakry for June 4th. The reason the tickets are cheap is probably because the flight leaves at 3am and involves a 13 hour layover in Morocco where we're not allowed out of the airport. (How many games of backgammon and cribbage is that?). The perk, though, is that we have a three day layover in Portugal where we can leave the airport. We'll be back in the U.S. by June 8th if all goes well.

But first, the tough part. For the moment we're in Labe at a cybercafe, our backpacks at our sides, waiting to get into a taxi headed for Lelouma where we'll spend a week saying goodbye to Nene Delanda. And then KanKan and then Kerouane...

We're on our way.