Tuesday, November 22, 2011

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.)

5 comments:

Hannah Joy said...

Awesome! That is so cool! Africa sounds cool...except not in the cold cool kinda way. Heehee. H-O-T. I don't know how you'll stand it without a real snowy winter, though. (OO) Though I'm sure you'll get used to it. Awesome! And that's epic how close you got to your NaNogoal! :-D

Oh yes, glad you blogged. I've been wondering if you got it, and now I know! :-D

Looking forward to hearing more and God bless!

RED~Scribe said...

Yay! Glad to hear from you! Sounds like you and your family are having an... interesting time there in Africa. There is something you forgot to mention, though, and that's the food. What's it like? Is it even remotely similar to American food, or something entirely different?

Ninja Tim said...

And he has arrived! Glad to hear you got there all right (and accompanied by Doctor Who no less!).

There's something slightly - correction - extremely oxymoronic about the idea of having a pet wildcat. O_O Sounds epic. ;)

Anonymous said...

Wow!! That's so cool! If you keep on posting about life in Liberia... that would be really neat to hear!

Glad you got there safely!
daughteroflight

T.D. said...

Wow, good to hear from you!!!!!! Glad you're doing well-- we'll still be praying for y'all :D

Here's a gust of cold, fresh air from me ;)