Sylvia's Journal

I am waiting for the ‘technicien’ which is what you need here to connect to the internet. The best signals on the wireless list come from Standard Bank next door, especially the one for the CEO but of course they are locked. While I am waiting and writing I watch a French program that is entitled ‘people in bathing suits aren’t necessarily stupid.’ What I see does not match the title.

I arrived in Abidjan while it was still light but by the time my suitcase arrived, in the very last batch, it was dark. Alphone the MSH driver was waiting for me. It is always nice not to have to hassle with taxis after a long flight and seeing someone waving a piece of paper with your name on it in the packed arrival hall. The ‘rentree (des classes)’ in the Francophone world does not happen until the middle of September. This explains why there were so many children on the plane. Their presence made the wait for my suitcase easier. I marveled at their ability to have fun with whatever was at hand. I was totally absorbed by two 5 year old boys who commented on every suitcase going by. One of them had a well-used stuffed lion who he would deposit in between the suitcases, to be picked up a few meters further by his buddy, both squealing with laughter.

Downtown was empty, at 7 PM, which is unusual for an African city. Large concrete barrages, no longer in use, were shoved to the side around some of the banks. According to Alphonse everything is being rebuilt and repaired and things have been calm for a long time. It looked that way. In daylight there are few signs of the destruction, which acoording to Alphonse wasn’t so bad here on the Plateau part of Abidjan. ‘Wait until you see the destruction in the countryside,’ he added. This is what I see from my windows. The view is that of a hundred other African downtowns.

In the hotel I called Oumar. He was a slimmer version of the Oumar I remembered, slimmer and taller as if he had been stretched lengthwise. He was in a horrendous car accident in Kindia in Guinea some two years ago. No one thought he would survive but he did. He had none of the insurance cushions we had, nor the support of his employer (the government of Guinea) as I did. But the things we learned from our respective accidents were quite similar, about community and support networks and the taking and giving of support.

And after that I fell into a dream-filled sleep of 10 uninterrupted hours.