TIA: Liberia

We made it to Morocco! We flew into Casablanca and took the...

Sun, 16 Oct 2011 10:41:36 +0000

Lots of breakfast options

Including...beet juice?

Pretty old buildings.

No clue where we actually are...

But looking forward to exploring.

We made it to Morocco! We flew into Casablanca and took the train to Fes. We were definitely novelties on the train, with friendly locals who “love Americans”, repeatedly warning us to “trust no one” and avoid buying carpets if we don’t want to get ripped off (do we really look like people who would buy big rugs?). Upon arrival in Fes, our cab drops us off in the vicinity of our riad, points down the street and says it’s that way. We start wandering somewhat aimlessly through the medina. A local kid comes up and guides us the rest of the way. Upon arrival, Mark offers the kid 2 dirhams for his help. Local kid proceeds to start heming-and hawing about how we’re cheap. We’re adamant 2 dirhams is fair for his 5 minutes of work and just brush it off when he hands us back the money and storms off. We are then whisked away by the riad staff who offer us cool washcloths to freshen up, nut-stuffed dates to snack upon, and show us our lovely room with its remarkably reliable free wifi. A bit later as I’m checking online to see what 900-dirham spa packages cost in US dollars, we realize 2 dirhams is just 25-cents. Turns out, we are seriously cheap bastards. Sorry small child; hope you don’t hate Americans forever as a result of our complete ignorance of exchange rates.

Anyway, the riad is lovely. Pics from our morning breakfast on the roof. We’re now off to explore a bit and hopefully not create any other incidents.

The Agape National Academy of Music and U.S. Embassy hosted a...

Tue, 27 Sep 2011 07:24:36 +0000

"Down by the Riverside"

"We are the World"

Crowd lovin' it

Seriously lovin' it

Encore performance

The crowd is up

And we're done.

The Agape National Academy of Music and U.S. Embassy hosted a Peace Concert Saturday afternoon at the local YMCA. There were several great choir and vocalist performances, but the hubs kinda stole the show with his youth choir directorial debut. I think it was the combination of the white man directing and the little African children singing “We are the World.” The song was such a hit they were asked to sing it again at the end of the show so we could all get up, join hands and sing along.

Yup, this is what we’re up to in Liberia.

Sunday was Liberia’s first ever marathon. The hubs, in...

Tue, 30 Aug 2011 05:56:00 +0000

Post check-in, waiting in the rain

Thankfully these two live near the start

The amputee racers were super motivating

Getting closer to beginning

The crowd at the starting line

The Prez and Ambassador at the start

We survived!

Sunday was Liberia’s first ever marathon. The hubs, in what may not have been his most brilliant decision ever, ran the full shebang; I went with the 10K Run for Liberia.

It was a pretty crazy experience. Never-ending rain, slightly chaotic and nothing like the typical race experience. To those of you who have not yet enjoyed Liberia’s rainy season, I should explain that the rain was more akin to what you might think of as a “tropical storm.” We’re talking torrential, relentless downpour of big raindrops and heavy winds.

Race day coordination was a challenge - this is Liberia, after all. We were told to arrive at 6:00 a.m. for the 10K so we could get checked in. Since we already had our bibs, this meant we got a check mark on our bibs and the opportunity to stand in the rain for a couple hours before starting. The Liberians runners seemed pretty pumped about all of it – jumping up in down in circles and doing lots of warm ups. I was totally amused by how different the whole affair was relative to any race I’ve ever run in the States. Primary example: no porta-potties. Thankfully our friends and fellow runners, Christine and Kevin, live just around the corner from the start, so we were able to kill an hour hanging out in a dry place with plumbing. Fancy, I know.

Despite all odds, we managed to force ourselves to go back out into the rain to get ready to run. The wheelchair and amputee races started first. It was hugely inspiring to see the guys in their wheelchairs and on crutches ready to race through the rain. Liberia’s President then showed up to start the race and actually ran a bit at the start. This of course meant there was a ton of security and created all sorts of confusion at the starting line, but we survived. Once we actually got running, it was pretty easy. Naturally, the lanes were not consistently closed and there were a few moments where I felt like the cars racing by were aiming to take me out, but we sloshed our way through.

The tagline on all the race marketing was “let’s finish together” – super cheesy, but with some truth to it. Definitely very cool to see people of all walks of life making their way to SKD Stadium for the finish. In a country that’s been through so much, it’s cool to see the random signs of progress.

Just another Sunday morning, running with the Prez and Ambassador (I'm on the left)

Sun, 28 Aug 2011 20:35:18 +0000

Just another Sunday morning, running with the Prez and Ambassador (I'm on the left)

I cannot fathom why/how it took this long, but I made my first...

Mon, 15 Aug 2011 21:17:00 +0000

I cannot fathom why/how it took this long, but I made my first ever-margarita on the rocks yesterday and it was nothing short of amazing. Turns out you don’t need a well-trained bartender at a Mexican restaurant somewhere in the state of Texas to do the drink justice, you just need:

- 3 oz. tequila
- 2 oz. freshly squeezed lime juice
- 1 oz. simple syrup
- 1 tsp. Cointreau

Add to a cocktail shaker filled with ice, shake about 30 seconds, pour into a kosher-salt rimmed glass, take a sip and prepare to swoon (from the simple yumminess, swooning from booziness may occur if you choose to repeat excessively…).

Innovative Mobile Marketing

Tue, 02 Aug 2011 20:03:00 +0000

Everyone has a cell phone in Liberia, but there has been little in the way of differentiation among providers. We use Cellcom, which is the slightly more expensive provider that most Liberians would say has more exciting marketing. I think I remember seeing somewhere that Cellcom has about 41% market-share versus LoneStar’s 48%. Most of both companies customers are very much at the bottom of the pyramid, often living on less than a dollar a day and maintaining little loyalty to their cellular providers. If people have money to buy minutes (called “scratch cards” here), they do but it may be weeks or months before they top off their minutes.

In a very interesting departure from Cellcom’s typical win a car or a house promotions, the company has announced they are launching “Free Mobile Life Insurance.” All you have to do is name a beneficiary when registering your plan, buy at least $5 per month in scratch cards, and have some “peace of mind” knowing your family and friends will be covered with up to $10,000 USD in life insurance benefits.

This strikes me as pure genius — life insurance is not otherwise readily available and people are constantly asking for money to bury loved ones. Cellcom has tremendous potential to create brand loyalty with this initiative.

As if that we’re enough, earlier in the week Cellcom announced a new strategic partnership with Google (likely connected in some way to the State Department’s Women’s Technology Delegation that visited Liberia earlier this year). Cellcom customers will be able to use Gmail’s SMS Chat feature, which I can only imagine is going to be a big hit (http://allafrica.com/stories/201107290704.html).

It’s really exciting to see some local attempts at mobile innovation at the bottom of the pyramid. If these initiatives are handled well, Cellcom is going to make a fascinating case study one of these days.

The hubs hit the not so big-28 yesterday. He requested lots of...

Thu, 21 Jul 2011 14:41:03 +0000

Pre-birthday pie (pumpkin pie throwdown)

B-day morning "festive raspberry rolls"

Yums

Carbtastic dinner, with baked chicken

Actual birthday pie (key lime)

The birthday boy was quite excited

With champagne, naturally

The hubs hit the not so big-28 yesterday. He requested lots of baked goods. I came through and have to admit, my key-lime pie skills have come a long way since last year.

Our favorite abandoned mansion was torn down while we were on...

Sat, 18 Jun 2011 18:52:04 +0000

Our favorite abandoned mansion was torn down while we were on vacation. Boo, Liberia, there are so many other derelict structures you could have demolished first.

I don’t know what’s worse: entertaining ourselves by...

Thu, 05 May 2011 20:31:16 +0000

I don’t know what’s worse: entertaining ourselves by googling sandwiches or Google telling us our internet sucks.

Paving and Tasting Progress

Tue, 26 Apr 2011 21:19:00 +0000

Liberia has seriously surprised me over the past couple weeks. The other night, while walking down the street to my favorite local sushi place, I was passed by a local on rollerblades. Then a couple days later, I saw yet another rollerblader in an entirely different part of town. Now, I don’t usually give much though to rollerblading — I lost interest circa 1992 after a fall in front of my neighbor Kate’s house (I still blame the slanted curve, not my terrible lack of coordination). Still, rollerblades in Liberia, that’s something to stop and take note of.

You can’t rollerblade without pavement, and hot damn, it seems that over the past couple months most of the “roads” in town have been smoothed and paved. What was previously a patchwork of potholes is looking more and more like roads. There are even a few sidewalks now, the urban planner in me is pretty freakin’ excited. If only I could get this country’s crazy drivers to start consistently stopping at crosswalks.

Alas, rollerblades = small miracle.

In other news, while driving on one of these fancy paved roads the other day, the hubs and I came upon an unprecedented find: the nation’s first-ever drive thru restaurant, complete with a menu board, built-in speaker and mic for ordering, and a drive-thru window. For those of you who take your McDonalds’ and Chick-fil-A for granted, a drive-thru in a country without running water or regular electricity is a big deal (according to PA’s Facebook Page, even the President has stopped by to check out the marvel). Mark ordered some barbecue chicken, and I could not resist the novelty of ordering a beer off a drive-thru menu. It took us 10 minutes from ordering to pay and get our food, which in this part of the world is impressive.

I then proceeded to struggle with the question of “if it’s not illegal to drink and drive, is it still wrong?” Turns out for me, even as a passenger, the answer is still yes. I figure if a country has too many other issues to create drinking and driving legislation, one should still set a good example (kinda like I’m the only person in this country who uses her headlights when it’s raining (thanks North Carolina highway signs for drilling that one in)).

Moral of this story: Liberia, still much to be done, but we’ve got rollerbladers and a drive-thru paving the path to progress.

Paying to read my favorite paper? Blasphemous.

Fri, 18 Mar 2011 00:17:00 +0000

I knew this day was coming; I’ve spent months trying to come to terms with my conflicted feelings about it. Still, I just can’t quite fathom the concept of paying to read the news online.

In case you’re not hooked on The New York Times and haven’t heard, the paper announced today it is putting a stop to its online reading freeloaders. Effective March 28, if you want to read more than 20 articles per month, you’ll have to pay. The base package is $15 per month for online and iPhone access. It’s $20 for Web and iPad/tablet access or $35 for Web, iPhone, and iPad/tablet access.

I’m going to have to give that a great big boo.

I was a journalism major undergrad; I can appreciate the industry’s peril. I have my MBA; I understand their business model stinks. Heck, I even donate to NPR. But still, I refuse to pay $15 a month to read the Times online.

I’m going to rationalize this by claiming it’s because I live in a country where far too many people live on less than $1 per day. In that light, $15 per month to read the news is a staggering, unfathomable expense. I’m not sure if living in Liberia is making me cheap or just helping me to realize how frivolous some of my previous expenses were.

Anyway, I’ve decided it’s time to start developing a strategy to reduce my dependency on the Times. I insist upon reading Modern Love first thing, every Sunday morning, which ties up one-fifth of my monthly article allocation. I’m thinking I can look to other publications for the bulk of my daily news and maybe, just maybe if I’m lucky, survive.

Case in point, great story from NPR online about this silly plan the Times has developed to drive away its loyal readers ;)

The hub’s mom, Julie, came to visit last week. It was our...

Mon, 21 Feb 2011 23:16:37 +0000

Dinner at Mama Susu's (with the chef!)

Fresh fish delivery to the apartment

Sundowner at Golden Beach

Embassy farmers' market

A little Wii Fit action

Golf course at Firestone

Liberia's Myrtle Beach

Sunset on our roof

The hub’s mom, Julie, came to visit last week. It was our first married-couple parental visit. I can only imagine that’s somewhat stressful in normal life, but combined with us living in a post-conlict environment, it made for an interesting trip. She got to experience our love of the Wii and movie watching, as well as checking out a few local restaurants, the farmers’ market and the fish delivery guy. I’m hoping she’s not holding the visit against us (Julie, we warned you it’s a pricey flight to a place where there’s not much to do), but I have a feeling she had a reasonably acceptable time. She always said she wanted to see what our life is like in Liberia and I think it’s safe to say she got that in spades.

Attempted synchronized cannonballs. Aww, Robertsport, you...

Sun, 20 Feb 2011 22:30:00 +0000

Attempted synchronized cannonballs. Aww, Robertsport, you almost make me like the beach.

More pics to come soon (from this weekend’s beach trip, last week’s mother-in-law visit, and who knows what else…it’s been a while ;)).

A glimpse of our trip to Harper. The full album is slowly...

Sun, 06 Feb 2011 22:15:12 +0000

Harper is full of small monuments.

And lots of churches.

And burnt out buildings.

And cool things behind every wall.

And lots of columns.

And a few more churches.

And crazy old mansions.

What a difference 30 years make.

A glimpse of our trip to Harper. The full album is slowly uploading to Facebook…

Going Up Country

Tue, 25 Jan 2011 11:44:00 +0000

The hubs and I leave this weekend for a week of voter registration monitoring in Maryland County, along Liberia’s border with Ivory Coast. We have a two day, 18-hour drive to get out there, which is slightly crazy considering Liberia is only about the size of Tennessee. We’re staying in Harper, which is straight down the coast from Monrovia, but luckily for us, there isn’t a road that connects the two. Instead, we’re going this way — green is Day 1 of driving and purple is Day 2:

The trip marks my first time going up country (anywhere outside the city here is referred to as “up country” even if you’re going south). I’ll admit to being a bit nervous — I’m told I should think of this trip as a week long camping trip since we’ll be staying in guest houses without water or 24-hour electricity. However, as you guys know, I’m not so much of a camper. My infinitely better traveled friend, Anna, has been giving me tips along the lines of, “The term ‘bucket bath’ is a bit of a misnomer. When you see the bucket of water in your room, do not attempt to climb into the bucket and bathe in it; instead, get a cup and splash water on yourself.” She’s also promised me some sort of bandana and to teach me how to appropriately tie back my hair, since I’m clearly not accustomed to looking even remotely professional after several days without showering. We’re packing lots of granola bars and bottled water. Needless to say, I’m expecting an interesting trip. Assuming I survive, you can expect lots of pictures and hopefully some good stories from our adventure.

charity:water is one of the hubs and my favorite non-profit...

Wed, 19 Jan 2011 22:32:40 +0000

charity:water is one of the hubs and my favorite non-profit organizations. We’re fans of their polished marketing, and far more importantly, their awesome work. Check out this video highlighting their efforts in Liberia. And feel free to donate.

I can’t decide if it’s more amusing that I live in...

Tue, 11 Jan 2011 19:59:50 +0000

I can’t decide if it’s more amusing that I live in the type of place where for $15 a person will come into your home and give you a pedicure or that at $15 I’ll complain about being overcharged.

Ameriika

Mon, 20 Dec 2010 22:01:00 +0000

The past six months in Liberia have helped me to love my country more than ever before. Obviously, I have always been a fan of democracy, liberty and freedom, but there’s a few other things I didn’t appropriately appreciate previously. We’ve been on the ground in Chicago for about three hours awaiting our next connection; here’s a sampling of the things I’ve been most excited about thus far:

Water that doesn’t have to be boiled/distilled or from a bottler to drink
Ice
Veggies that don’t need to be bleached (carrots, celery and tomatoes have never tasted so good)
Ranch dressing
Fountain sodas
Fountain sodas on ice
Customer service
Speedy internet
Beer on tap
Multiple beers (including craft beers) on tap
Clean bathrooms
Non-bucket flush toilets (have I mentioned that aside from the Embassy very few places in Liberia have running water? I don’t know that I will ever be comfortable with the bucket flush.)
Regular electricity
110-volt plugs everywhere
Clean currency (Liberia accepts both US and Liberian currency; the US dollars get nasty…)
Being able to call people without worrying about the 6-hour time difference
My iPhone
Being able to see (or at least be on the same continent with) friends and family

You get the drift; it is absolutely amazing to be back! I think it’s safe to say that this holiday season I will be especially grateful for, quite literally, everything.

Yay!

Feeling Festive

Tue, 07 Dec 2010 16:36:00 +0000

This weekend was all about the holiday festivities, which was slightly weird since it is always about 87-degrees with 95% humidity outside (seriously). Anyway, we hit up the Embassy’s Holiday Arts and Crafts Fair, a holiday concert, and a new Chinese restaurant (shout out to our Jewish readers, picked your Christmas Day Chinese place yet?).

The Holiday Fair was Saturday morning. I was on the Decorations Committee, which meant I draped all the lovely fabric you see in the background and was given a mic and asked to hand out raffle prizes. I wore a strapless white cotton dress and said, oh fashion police, you’d wear white after Labor Day too if you lived in Liberia.

Note: We have no pictures of this because my husband doesn’t always follow directions.

There was a lot of talk about buying Christmas presents at the Fair. Mark and I didn’t really go that route. Although, if anyone would like an American themed wicker throne, we can get you one:

We did buy ourselves a mini keg of the local brew:

And admire the traditional dancers:

Sunday afternoon was the holiday concert hosted by the Agape National Academy of Music. It was billed as their “First Annual Christmas Concert,” which made me want to pull out my AP Stylebook and explain there is no such thing as a “first annual” event, as an event does not become annual until it’s happened at least twice. Alas, aside from that, the concert was lovely. It was held at Providence Baptist Church in downtown Monrovia:

For the first time in our lives in Liberia, we were actually under-dressed. We were in red and green polos respectively while everyone else was in suits. This is a horrible picture but I felt compelled to capture our dorky married person attempt at festive attire:

The concert featured everything from piano, trumpet and guitar performances to a couple different acappella groups and some classical music. Our favorite was the “Little Christmas Voices,” they were super cute:

After the concert, we decided to check out the newly reopened Chinese place at the Palm Hotel. We had no idea what we were getting ourselves into and were hugely surprised to stumble into a place that actually had ambiance. You can see a little of the decor in the background here:

We started with dumplings that were to die for. Quite possibly my new favorite food:

We then shared sweet and sour chicken and fried pork in brown sauce dish. Both were delish:

We wrapped up the evening by congratulating ourselves on discovering two new restaurants in one week. Christmas has clearly come early to Monrovia.

Mark's Famous

Sun, 05 Dec 2010 11:18:00 +0000

The hubs gets quoted in the newspapers out here fairly frequently. Pretty much anytime the Consular Section announces anything he’ll be quoted. I’ve actually seen articles that simply read “Mark says…” with no last name, no title, just Mark. He’s got some visibility for sure, but things recently moved to a new level.

We were hanging out at our favorite expat bar earlier this week when a friend introduced us to some random lady. The conversation went like this:

Friend: Hey lady, let me introduce you to Mark and Megan.
Megan: Hi [shakes hand]
Mark: Hi [lady interrupts]
Lady: Did you run the 10K this weekend?
Mark: Yes, I.. [lady interrupts again]
Lady: You came in second place to the Kenyan. I remember you.
Mark: [Thinks to himself, “I’m the shiznat.”]

Truth is (much as I hate to further inflate the husband’s ego) the race was pretty much epic. Here’s the photo recap…

Mark, me, and Karen before the 10K, which was organized to raise money for girls’ scholarships. Mark wanted to run fast, so I recruited Karen to jog/walk with me, lest I get stuck wandering through the city on my own. Note our fancy ‘bibs.’

The starting line. Mark declares his goal is to beat just one of these little girls.

Mark zoomed away at this point, and Karen and I had a lovely leisurely jog/walk through town. The organizers actually managed to get cops to control each intersection and handed out water at all the turns. It was seriously impressive stuff. We really enjoyed getting to see some different parts of the city. And it was fun to have Liberians “cheering” us along by declaring we needed to run faster, to which we would respond, they should come run. Anyway, the end of the race came really quickly. Mark met us at the finish line and explained (a) the end came quickly because we’d only actually gone 3.38 miles and (b) he’d come in second place by about 4 seconds. He swore if he’d realized it was going to be that short of a race he totally could have beaten the Kenyan (apparently the Kenyan had trouble with the hills). In honor of the hub’s big win / crushing defeat, I made him take a picture by the trophy that was almost his:

The organizers put on a big presentation to thank everyone for participating before presenting awards. My favorite part was the cheerleaders’ performance. First of all, cheerleaders in Liberia, what?! Some of the NGO types sitting near us grumbled about the impacts of exporting cheerleading to the developing world. I was totally entertained. I’m assuming some American school donated the uniforms, since the uniforms said “Cougars” while the school’s mascot was the “Dragons.” Anyway, here are the girls in a dance/cheer circle:

After all the cheering and speechmaking, we finally got to the good stuff. Here’s Mark being awarded his medal for finishing in second place. That’s the Assistant Minister of Defense doing the honors…

The Kenyan got a bit more pomp and circumstance. The Minister of Youth and Sports gave him his trophy, and the Kenyan gave an impassioned speech about how he’d been doing it all for his country.

Mark might have been a little jealous. But then again, he’ll always be able to tell the story of that time he ran a race in Liberia and almost beat a Kenyan. Way to go, hubs!