Liberia—First Impressions

Hellooooooooooooooo Stonehenge!

;)

Greetings and hallucinations from Liberia, bloggers and readers and writers and the occasional sane person!  I'n back, and quite literally in an all-new adventure.  I'm hailing from Liberia, West Africa!

So far I've survived, and it's actually quite cool here.  It's afternoontime and 86 degrees. You Americans should all be up about this time.  It's forties in Kansas... *jealous*

But in all seriousness, I think it's the only time that I haven't been sweating since we arrived...

If you want an in-depth report of what's happening and how things are going, take a look at my sister Manny's blog post about Liberia, 'cause all I'm going to do is give you a list.  Keep in mind, I have somewhat of a more positive outlook on things.  I think it's all awesome. ;)  And staying up late in the plane and watching Doctor Who on my new Kindle Fire wasn't that bad either.  (All four of us were kindly donated Kindles before we left, which was awesome.)

 So, where to start?  There has been so much  happening that I can't even begin to tell you.

Differences!  That's the ticket.  I can compare and contrast the U.S. to Liberia.  Give you a feel of how different everything is.

Temperature:

Liberia: 86 degrees

Kansas: 42 degrees

Seasons:

Liberia: Rainy season and dry season

Kansas: Spring, summer, fall, and winter

Rain:

Liberia: (in Monrovia) 136 inches yearly (the most rain of any world capital)

Kansas: 36-20 inches yearly

Language:

Liberia: Liberian English (heavy accent/dialect that often leaves off consonants)

Kansas: American English

Internet:

Liberia: No internet cable for high-speed internet (although one is coming and will be available in 2012)

Kansas: High-speed internet

Climate:

Liberia: Wet in the rainy season, dry in the dry season, "hot" (by American standards) all year 'round, tropical-like

Kansas: Ranging from cool to warm to hot to cold, temperate

Landscape

Liberia: Tropical sub-Saharan jungle (I think O_o I haven't been out in the "bush" yet), small mountains, trees

Kansas: Flat plains

Employment:

U.S.: 9% unemployed

Liberia: 85% unemployed

Wildlife:

Liberia: So far, I've noted lizards, birds, dogs, and my sisters tell me there's a pet wildcat upstairs.

Kansas: Deer, foxes, coyotes, skunks, possums, raccoons, etc.

I can't think of any more. <_<

Other, personal notes:

1) Liberians like their car horns.  Or motorcycle horns, since there's more motorcycles than cars.  And Liberians use their horns all the time. 

2) Right now it's one of the coolest times of the year in Liberia.  Yes, at 86 degrees.  We came at the time of bearable temperature so that, I hope, we'll be more accustomed to heat by the time the dry season comes.

3) The internet connection at the guest house we're staying at is...fickle. XD  The connection from the tower likes to go down a lot. (And we are at a guest house.  The house we're supposed to rent isn't ready yet. :) )

And also, I was SO CLOSE to finishing my NaNoWriMo novel before we left.  My word count was 47,704, and I plan to finish sometime in the next few days.  The novel itself won't be finished, methinks, although I'm close to the end.  I may park somewhere around 60k by the end, who knows.

I'd post some pictures, but none are available right now.  They're taking a long time to upload, and Manny refuses to send me some because it'll take a long time. ;)  I'll just have to wait and post them later.

How's everything going with you all?

(If you ask me questions in the comments section, and there's a lot of them, I'll paste them all in a post and write out the answers.  Just so ya know, if I don't reply. Either that, or the internet connection went down again.)