Africa
COME, COME IN. WELCOME TO MY HOME ON UN DRIVE. This salmon coloured sofa is what I most like about my lounge, as well as the granite bar in my kitchen that you can see right there. The Liberian lad who is strolling slowly in the kitchen is Kraweah. The couple with the white hair…
Sometimes we think ahead and this time, before going to the best beach in Buchanan, we head to the “restaurant” owned by the Lebanese man so he can prepare us some food for later, this way we won’t have to wait for centuries for it to arrive. We are intelligent people, with degrees and everything.…
FEAR IN BLACK AND WHITE. Some people have started leaving the bar, forming a scary, irregular line. “This bar is mine and I want to tell you loud and clear that over there by the bar, there are some guys who have bought their drinks outside and brought them in here. This bar is for…
VICTOR, ANESA AND I TAKE UP THE CENTRE OF THE ROOM AT BLACK AND WHITE FORMING A TRIANGLE. We start dancing with energy. Here, in Buchanan, in Black and White you have to crouch to dance, almost kneel down and kiss the floor. Take a look. This guy in green, without bones he crouches so…
There’s a certain military feel to the air, and people who come and go, smiling all over the place. To be exact, we are in the room that is trying to be a bar, surrounded by garish flags that hang from the ceiling, humus on the bar, more smiles and on the TV Jerry Lee…
“NO. IT’S NOT MALARIA,” said Drazen, dripping, “it’s something else. Something cold that gets in your bones.” Only the food, which finally arrived in the form of chicken, rice and cassava fish, interrupts the silence. We discover that we are, indeed, hungry, and at the pace of beetroot grey, of a peeling terrace and Balkan…
“BECAUSE IF NOT, I’LL DIE”. Sitting at a round, plastic table. We drink some Club Beers. Our pupils dilate and take on the form of small sugared ovals. That go up and down. Kevin comes closer to us and tells us, “Because if not, you die… So this weekend I went to Buchanan. You have…
THE GATES WERE CLOSING AT THE POLLING STATION SET UP AT WATERSIDE, BUT WE MANAGED TO SKILFULLY FIND OUR WAY IN. It was still light, but the sun was gently setting in Liberia. We took a few steps and came across two tables either side of a dirt track. The plastic urns, escorted by many…
ON THE OUTSKIRTS OF MONROVIA, LIBERIA. IN THE MIDDLE OF DEPRIVATION AND AN IMMORTAL ENERGY, we get out the Toyotas Prado and make our way to a crumbling school that was hosting several scattered polling stations. It seemed as if the whole neighbourhood had already voted at these tables because the rooms were practically empty;…
Ingrid still had not recovered and she was lying down, her body paralysed into a triangular shape and submerged in a deep dream or horrible nightmare. It was time for lunch and we had to leave the lush green of Bomi behind. We parked our vehicles near a ‘border’ post, i.e. one of those thin…