A new start in Kerewan

The time came for us to finally leave Kanifing House (the VSO house which residents often called the ‘Big Brother House’. I was surprised as to how sad I felt about leaving the house; I think it was more about the friendships I made rather than the house itself. I liked the neighbourhood too and was enjoying being recognised by locals who would call out my name and ask me how the day was.

Also life was pretty good at the house; it still felt like the holiday period with motorbike training during the day and friends to hang out with in the evening. Plus all the western goods you could possibly want to buy you could find in Serrekunda (often at a price). My favourite hangout was ‘La Parisian’ cafe. It had super air-conditioning, free wireless and wonderful ice-cream. It was always full of western travellers, VSO, peace corp. and wealthy looking Gambians with fancy laptops. You could be forgiven for forgetting where in the world you actually were!

However if I had stayed at Kanifing or Serrekunda I would have ran out of money and become incredibly fat and also the time had come to start in the direction I came here for – Kerewan.

We were picked up from the VSO house on Tuesday morning, there were 7 new volunteers heading ‘up-country’ so we were split into two cars, one took the south bank road and the other (ours) crossed the river from Banjul to Barra and then took the north bank road. The ferry crossing was interesting and despite the many people with whistles directing cars, lorries and a whole range of other vehicles as well as lots of foot passengers, people with goats, chickens, wheelbarrows etc, there was no obvious system to the order of boarding. We waited hours in the VSO truck to be let onboard, during the wait people were trying to sell us a huge variety of goods from cotton shirts to milk powder. We watched two ferries come and go before we finally got on. I’m told that it’s much quicker for motorbikes to get on but I’m going to be very anxious when the day comes for me to make that crossing alone on my bike. The actual crossing was quite short and within 35mins we were pulling into Barra. You have to take real care when coming off the ferry because the people are excellent at maximising space. There is literally no room to even open a car door, there are people squeezed into every tiny gap.

We drove along the north bank road (which is a really good road) until we arrived at Kerewan about an hour or so later. The truck pulled into the compound and Paul was there to greet me with the key (as well as lots of curious children). With the help of the others onboard we quickly unloaded my stuff and then the driver went to introduce me to the landlord. I was introduced as ‘Sira’ to the landlord’s great displeasure! He said that Sira was a Fula name and that I am Mandinka so he announced that I would be called ‘Kaddy’. Immediately the few adults that had gathered and the children starting calling me Kaddy and greeting me in Mandinka. So goodbye to Sira (my name of 2 weeks) and for the next two years I will be known as Kaddy Ceesay (they spell the surname like that here)!

Leaving Kanifing (This is not all my stuff! There were 4 of us travelling)