Yay, new site!

Corinna Merrill
Corps De La Paix
B.P. 117
Segou, Mali
West Africa

New mailing address

I feel like the country bumpkin in the big city for the first time. I forgot what it was like without all of the amenities of America. By no means have I cross the Atlantic but coming from my Guinea village to the sprawling metropolis of my new town where I hear I can get ice cream and yes, even Frappuccinos. Well they aren’t the real thing exactly but I hear they exist and I will be trying them out one day soon. There is a tourist market therefore; there is pizza, hamburgers, really awesome souvenirs and one hotel even has a pool. I will have to control myself not to go out every night and get a ham and cheese crepe or a half chicken in a cream sauce but even worse, the souvenirs are so nice, and I want them all.

Yesterday I went down on the Niger River bank and stumbled across a place the dies fabric. I hung out with the men there for a while and then they took me upstairs to the Cabana in the sky overlooking the river. It was like Disney meets Africa. I fully intend to return to that magical place to die my own piece of cloth along with enjoy a cold coke in the Cabana in the sky.

I also went house hunting. I looked at several different houses. Some were too far from work, some were too big, some were too small, but I found one that was just right. It’s a nice apartment overlooking a mango tree and a quiet dirt road. I will be living in the second floor and on the flat roof I will sleep during the hot season. I’ll pull my mattress and mosquito net out and sleep under the stars like all of the other Malians. The best part is, I have running water, a flush toilet and get this, electricity all in my house!!! Therefore, music and movies are welcome (note new mailing address). Really, I listen to my iPod all the time and I need new music, so have your kids, your friends or even yourself pick some of your favorite new songs and send them over.

Well, I have internet access now everyday so expect more blog updates along with more e-mails from your number one favorite person in Africa, other than Madonna (if she is still here).

From Guinea to Mali

Well, one chapter of my life is over, and a new is just beginning. Because of the civil unrest and political turmoil of Guinea, the Peace Corps has officially suspended their program for the moment being, pending a civil change of government it fully intends to re-open in the near future. That leaves me along with some of my new closest friends stuck in the middle of it all. Our hearts rest in guinea while we are now scattered all over the world. I along with eleven other volunteers from Guinea have been adopted into the Peace Corps Mali program. Some of my other friends are going to Botswana, Liberia, Senegal, Madagascar, Zambia, Benin, The Gambia and back to America.

The twelve of us staying in Mali have already received our site information. I will be living in a large town on the Niger River working with a microfinance institution helping women’s groups to get and understand loans, I also just heard that a new university opened in my city so I really want to work along side their business program, and there is a huge African music festival in my city once a year so I am very interested in working with the planning of that. I fully intend to hit the ground running and it sounds like I should have no problem staying busy.

So funny story, today in one of our local language (Bombara) sessions, I reached into my purse to grab a pen. I’m fishing around and I find something squishy. I thought for a second, what is squishy in my bag, I couldn’t think of anything so I look down and in my hand, I am squishing a live frog. I scream and throw it across the room. My heart is pounding and everyone stares at me, I point to the stunned frog on the ground and everyone starts laughing. I give my bag to Dorian and make her find my pen because I’m in the middle of having a heart attach and she finds another frog inside my purse. I’m living a little bit closer to nature than I ever really wanted. But it makes for a good laugh. I have found that in moments of extreme stress, you either laugh or cry.

This week I will be continuing more language classes (hopefully with less frogs), Mali culture classes along with administration classes and then the plan is to start moving into sites starting Tuesday next week. It is an exciting yet nerve racking time. I am looking forward to getting to know another culture and make new friends however everything has happened so fast, I haven’t really had a moment to process that I have left guinea and will not be returning and then dropped off in a new town in less than a week not being able to speak the local language. Getting back into a schedule is something I am looking forward to but going threw and putting myself out there and making mistakes is going to be hard again.

I will be continuing my service here, that means I will move into site and stay until February 2011. There are a lot of things I need to re-learn here, for example using an ATM card. Haven’t done that in a few months. I will also pay rent, use a post office, have a job to go to everyday, and learn a bus system. They are so much more developed here in comparison to Guinea. So, all of you that want to come visit, now this is a good change for you. They have paved roads with only 4 people in a car unlike Guinea where the roads were unpaved and you put up to 8 people in a normal Peugeot.

I will also be able to set up my house again which is exciting in its own way. However, I only have one back pack full of all of my clothes to get me started. I will be getting a moving in allowance from the Corps to buy everything again, however there were a lot of things that I left back in Guinea that you can’t get in West Africa, i.e. food! So if you want to send me a new package full of goodies to help ease the pain of being a refugee please stay tuned for a new mailing address and talk to my mom if there is something you have questions about sending or needing ideas.

Soon I will have photos of Mali to post, once I get outside of Bamako (the capital). I now realize how few photos of Guinea I have, and I don’t want to make that mistake again so I want to take tons of photos here. So stay tuned for more updates and photos!

Thanks all for your good wishes, thoughts and prayers. They really do mean a lot.

Guinea is Evacuated

Well all you all, it’s official. Peace Corps Washington has suspended the Guinea program. I, along with all other volunteers and staff have been holding out on this small little thread of hope that the program will continue but this morning as of 9 am Greenwich time word dropped that due to political and safety reasons the program is thus far suspended.

What is next now? Well I have several options. First off I could COS (close of service) where I would leave the Peace Corps, with full benefits and move back in with mom and dad and find a “real” job. YIKES, a 8-6 job, I don’t think so! I could COS and then re-in role into the Corps. This would mean I would have to go through the 3 months of training again and make a 27 months service commitment. Or I could direct transfer, where I would just transfer into a new Peace Corps country. There is some flexibility with COS dates for the end of the service in the new country.

What will I do? Still don’t know. By Sunday October 25 all Guinea volunteers will have either COSed or transferred, so I don’t have a lot of time to decide. Six days if you are counting. I am kind of playing it by ear at this moment in time. I want to keep my options open. I am really interested in one country’s Small Enterprise Development program but I don’t want to have false hope or jinx myself by saying anything prematurely. So I will wait for the list of countries that want to receive us Peace Corps Guinea evacuees and then read out my options.

So what am I doing now? There are papers upon papers to write. There are resumes to be updated, aspiration statement to be redone, description of services to be had, quarterly reports to finish, not to mention the epic list of my stuff that needs to be qualified and quantified by memory of prices and locations around my house so Peace Corps can pack it up to ship to my next location or give away to my friends and family in Guinea. Then there is medical clearance, fun fun! But wait; there are over 90 of us here so try doing all that with 90 people. It’s going to get crazy quick I’m sure.

How am I feeling? That answer changes every 10 minutes it seems. There are extreme highs (i.e. being with friends in Mali) and extreme lows (realizing your not going back to Guinea). The news of evacuation was not unexpected by any means, I knew it was coming with all of the political unrest that has been surfacing in Conakry but there was always that small thread of hope you hold on to. Well that thread was cut clean. Now, I’m so busy just trying to plan for the next stage of my life, not knowing where that may take me. Once I get a chance to sit and realize what has happened and why my life plans have changed it will all become so real, now I’m just floating in a stage of survival. Find a new home! Once that stage is done, then it will hit I’m sure.

But I am enjoying my remaining few days with some of my closest friends and people who have become my family, enjoying the electricity and running water while I still have it (don’t know if I’ll have that in my new country) and even getting a milkshake now and again poolside at the American club (I know it sure is rough being a “refugee”) and in a weird way, I am looking forward to what the world has to offer for me.

Please read entire entry!!!!

Cliffnotes of my last week:
• Riots in Conakry (Capital of Guinea, where I am/was) leading to 150+ deaths
• Rapes and Pillages
• Standfast
• Consolidation
• Goodbyes
• Captain America / Jack Bower
• Refugee camp in Mali

Did that get your attention?? OK, I am fine! No really, I’m fine.

It all started last Monday September 28, 2009. Lead by the opposition leaders against Captain Dadis Camara the “President” of Guinea there was a demonstration at the soccer stadium. One thing lead to another and the Military opened fire on the crowd. By the end of the day the BBC was reporting over 150 deaths while the Guinaen government was only reporting 10. Ok so really quick, I highly encourage you to look up official articles about this event because there are a lot of things I am forgetting and I kind of forget English so reading another source will really help you understand the situation I am in.

This lead the Peace Corps Guinea staff to put us under standfast, which means that we are not allowed to leave our site (home) and we have to call and check in with staff twice a day. Well when your cell phone mountain is about an hour walk a way that gets kind of hard and hot in the sun. But whatever I make the walk and it helps pass the day when four hours is devoted just to getting phone calls. One afternoon while I’m making my phone calls I get a call saying I need to pack a bag and prepare to be consolidated in Mali (the neighboring country).

By the time I get back to my house I’m in shock. The country that I have been devoting my last ten months of existence is falling apart and there is nothing I can do about it. I pack my life back into the same three bags I came to Guinea in and have to start the goodbye process. I devoted two days of taking photos and emotionally dealing with the situation.

There is no official word from Peace Corps Headquarters saying as to whether we will be going back to Guinea or if we will be evacuated as of now, so saying goodbye was difficult because we were not to say that we wouldn’t come back but statistically there is no chance of going back. I told me friends that I was going to a month long conference in Mali and I would be back. Some people believed me, while most knew that I wouldn’t return.

While I was saying goodbye to some of my students from my English class they asked me if I had heard the news. I was like, what news? It turns out one of my students was in Conakry for the end of Ramadan and went to the stadium for the protest and he and his older brother were shot to death in the demonstration by the military. He was one of my best students and only 20.

But my last night in Dounet (my village) I was burning all of my trash around 10 o’clock at night when my best friend from site comes running up to my house. This never happens so I was like, “hey whats up?” And he just looks at me and says “Your not coming back, I’ll never see you again. Will I?” That is when I broke down. Because I couldn’t lie but I couldn’t tell the truth.

The next morning the Peace Corps picks me up in the bus and we start our long and emotional ride to the border. What feels like 27 hours later we reach the Mali – Guinea border. It was a long uneventful trip until the border that is.

We reach the border around 9:30 at night. We are all spent but expect this process to take several hours trying to get a bus of Americans through. Little did we know that Captain America was waiting at the border for us. When we pull up to the first of several “gates” Captain America jumps onto the bus and literally is just oozing red white and blue. By midnight we were all through into Mali and in our Bamako “refugee camp”. Yep that’s right, I am now a Peace Corps refugee.

I have no home, yep I’m homeless. All of my stuff is spread across two continents and I have no idea where my future home will be in two weeks time when we are transferred out of refugee stage. But I am ok, I am safe and all Americans have evacuated Guinea.

Welcome to the hight of Rainy Season in Conakry, Guinea West Africa

Walking through the waist deep water is never a good idea especially here but Mary (another PC volunteer)got stuck walking back from the market in a flash flood in the capital city here. Needless to say it was a mess.

Back to my life, lets see. What else have i been up to? I've been stuck in Conakry for a week on hold and today G-18 will come in finishing their training and getting ready to go up to their respective sites. How exciting, i am no longer one of the "newbes" I have elevated up to sophomore status! YES!!!

Otherwise i've been "en ville" (in town) only once to go to the bank and the womens co-op to buy stuff. The womens co-op is great. It is a big group of women here that have a cute shop down town that has set prices (that like doesn't exist here so i love it just for that) but they also use their profits to educating women. So yes their prices are high but at least when i feel i'm getting ripped off my money is going to something good as opposed to so guy buying a new cell phone.

I've been down to the beach bar several times. Its a Conakry classic. I went two nights ago for the end of Ramadon celebration there. There were so many people dancing and having a great time. I also went over to the U.S. Embassy to hang out with the marines for a while and really that is all i have been up to.

Can't wait to come home in November!!!!! Its so soon

Also, i have had to change my e-mail address do to lame reasons but anyways here is the new e-mail address so change it in your address books.

Corinna.Merrill@gmail.com

Hey everyone,

Your friend Corinna here, just going to fill you in on what has been going on in my life on the other side of the world.

I know what you are thinking, “Why has it been so long since your last blog?” Well that is a simple question to answer. I don’t have electricity and even if there was electricity there is no internet for 33 km. But, I have been working on my English class having the kids learn progressive pronouns, future simple and what nots. I have a Moringa garden planted of about 170 trees in the nursery. Sadly I will need at least 3,000 trees to start using the dried leaf powder to enrich the food with vitamins, and nurturance. My business class crashed and burned. That was my fault. The timing was all wrong but I will persevere and try again when the school year starts up. Hopefully it will have a little more success the second time around. I’m also working with a health insurance group in my town re-organizing the book ledger and giving new ideas on business structure. I’m still going into the health center twice a week helping with odds and ends. Also, I am working with the Child Fund Guinea translating documents (Eng-Fr) and general business stuff. Not to mention, getting my own water from the well, hand washing all articles of clothing, finding food and then preparing it (and trust me, finding food is not like walking in to Super Wal-Mart and shopping) and all the other odds and ends survival stuff.

But don’t just think its all work and no play. There is plenty of down time. I have read well over twenty books in the last 5 months, learned (or re-learned) French, picked up some Pular, made friends and slept, a lot.

So a funny stories.

Normally before I leave my house for an extended period of time I will have a big burning of all my trash. Granted I don’t really create that much trash but regardless it must be burned and here’s why. I was running behind one morning and I didn’t burn the night before because of the rain so I thought I could just throw my trash over the wall, like everyone else does (remember there is no city trash man who comes and collects garbage once a week). No big thing. Well when I got back from where ever it was that I was going I found some kids play in the trash pile. This is normal, sadly, but worst off they found my bag of trash. Every single item they were pulling out and asking “What is this?” or “Can I have this?” Keep in mind these are old M&M’s wrappers or a box of empty crackers but they were all up on it. I was mortified. Imagine your garbage man looking at EVERYTHING you used this week and asking “What did you do with this?” Humiliating!!! But now I know, burn everything!

Special thanks to:
Aunt Betty
Aunt Anne
Aunt Bonny
Grandma and Grandpa
Molly and Danielle
Mom and Dad for sending me packages on the August Mail Run

And also:
Aunt Betty
Uncle Glen and Becky
Lori
Amy and Mike
Mom and dad for sending me packages on the September Mail Run