Friends
Some of Our Friends and Life in Guinea
Our friend Amanda, who was a Health volunteer in Kintinian, about 30km north of us.
Some of Amanda's little friends pretending to mine while their parents are off at the real mines.
The real mines.
The very best bean lady there is. Much better than Secret Bean Lady in Kankan. And her lovely daughter, Hawa. Bean lady was conveniently located right across the street from us. Our second year, we ate beans almost every day for breakfast. I miss them. Note the stream of students in the background.
Our friend Nana and her adorable daughter, Fanta. Nana found us in the market. She is from Sierra Leone and wanted some English speaking friends, so she invited us back to her house. We visited her regularly and Fanta and her friends took great delight in playing "Poke the Tubabu". After 9/11, things became difficult because Nana's husband, who was from Mali, was decidedly pro-Bin Laden and anti-American. We started to feel uncomfortable going to visit them and shortly thereafter, we discovered that Nana's husband was beating her, partly because of our visits. We helped Nana and Fanta run away to Conakry while her husband was away on a trip in January of our second year. I don't know what happened to her. I think it may be one of those cases where it is better not to know.
Jack and his father (to the left) and another relative at the end of Ramadan. Jack, whose real name is Koromadou Keita, was the person we relied on to help us with everything. He looked after Cass when we were gone, we paid him to clean our house every week. He came by to make sure everything was all right and invited us to his family for holidays. After our house was robbed, the problems began. For various reasons, we suspected Jack's involvement in the robbery, but chose to ignore it since he had been so helpful in the past. Then Jack asked me to be his girlfriend and didn't take the rejection very well. After we left, the house was robbed again and yet again, Jack's involvement was questioned. I have not seen him since, but have heard that he is very mad at me. It is a shame it had to end this way. I'm sure he meant no wrong and who knows what really happened.
El Hadj Mamadi Kante, another friend, and Mamadi Diane. These were some of my favourite people in Siguiri. They never once asked us for anything and were always willing to help us. We'd leave our bikes in the store while we went to the market and always sat and visited for a while. Kante frequently gave us Malinke lessons and Mamadi Diane entertained us. They were our link to Guinean culture, explaining the transvetite in the market (called a 'wala wala' in Malinke) or which names belonged to which towns. Magassouba, our last name, was a Siguiri name. Malinke lessons with Kante were particularly entertaining. When teaching us how to say 'The dog barks' (n na wulu, a ye won won na), he would always bark afterwards. And in response to my perpetual inability to distinguish between the words for fish (jege or je) and squash (jee), he gave us a whole squash. Kante had 4 wives and 26 children, 21 of whom were alive. More impressive was that he sent all of his children to school. Mamadi Diane had a son who taught Nko, the recently invented written version of Malinke. When my parents came to visit, Kante told them that he was my African father, and really, he was.
Strangely, as I put this page together, I realise that I have no pictures of Hawa, affectionaly referred to as Mom, or of Fode Keita, from Tiguiberri.
Back
Forward
Beginning