One Man's Trash

One thing that amazes me here in Africa is that very little gets wasted. That is a great thing because waste is one thing that nearly makes me insane in the US. We can hardly stand to know how much grocery stores and restaurants throw away, as we watch people go hungry here in the village. So that is one blessing here in Guinea. I rarely throw food away. Even when I cook chickens, people want the broth and bones to use for their rice and sauce. Of course, it took me a little while to feel comfortable offering that to people – but they love it and the broth contains great nutrients for their kids.

But even beyond food, many things we would dispose of in the US gets passed right out my back door. Almost everything gets snatched up. Cardboard boxes – you bet. Batteries that you think are too dead to use – I have many takers. My national friends tell me that they don’t consider a battery dead until “water” is leaking out. 2 -3 inch pieces of glass that we cut to make the windows fit – they are destined to be glass for picture frames. Tin cans – play things and “cooking pots” for little kids. Glass jars – women love them to put oil and salt in. Plastic jugs become new water bottles. Old bike tires – the tube can be cut into strips for tying things and the outside becomes a “car” for a little boy to roll down a path. Old clothes – hand them out. Someone will use them. Big plastic bags become rain slickers for kids or mattress protectors from bed wetters. Fuzzy toilet lid cover – voila – a new hat. The village doctor loves the kid’s old school papers to wrap medicine in. And when you buy bread o the street, it comes wrapped in torn pieces of cement bags.

OF course, there is a limit. Old, used medical gloves become a new balloon. I really try to stop that but the kids break the locks on the trash pits and dig them out to play with them. The concept of germs is just not happening. Even old pregnancy tests become play things – I am sure it puzzles them why the white woman gets really FUSSY when she sees those in their hands and takes away their newly acquired toys!

I am sure we are a mystery to the villagers – giving away perfectly good tins and jars and batteries. But in the end, everyone is happy and we have no landfills here. It is recycling at this best!

If you're going to the bank, take a trunk full of patience. . . .

Our team does not have a business manager, so each of us take turns going to CKY to accomplish the business that needs to be done. One of our tasks this time in CKY as to sign up to be signatories at the bank. We need a bank account to make wire transfers from the US so we can have money here in country. We recently decided to open an account at a new bank, as we were fairly unimpressed by the service at the other one. The whole process was started in October by our teammate, Jeremy, who made 8 trips to the bank to set up the account, and then one more to pick up money (where he waited for 5 hours). Keep in mind that each of the first 8 trips had to be made to the downtown bank, which takes an hour to get to – so each trip takes up 2 hours of time, without counting time even entering the bank for any business to be accomplished. When you enter the downtown bank, there are literally hundreds of people waiting in many lines. It is a sight to behold.

So, off we went. The first trip went fairly smoothly. We were asked to wait in the wrong line at first, but quickly discovered the mistake. Then we finally found the woman we were looking for – a Guinean woman who had spent 11 years in Houston studying and working. She was awesome (truthfully, we began losing sympathy for Jeremy since we knew he had been able to work through her – though the sympathy quickly returned on subsequent trips.) So, on the first trip, we were able to officially turn in our signatures so that we could have access to the money and business at the bank. Unfortunately, it takes 24 hours for us to become official, so we needed to return the next day to request that our money be transferred from US dollars to Guinean Francs. They said that the cash would be available that afternoon for us after making the request. We also needed to pick up checks for the account.

No problem, we said, we will be back tomorrow. So, the next morning, off we went for the second trip to the bank. As we got downtown, we called our contact to let her know we were almost there. She was not at the bank yet, but said she would arrive within an hour and would call us. After about 1 ½ hours, we called her. No, she said, don’t come yet because the man who has our checks was alone at his post and could not leave to get them – wait a little while. No problem, we said, and finished up some shopping. An hour later, we called again – no, still not ready – call soon. So we grabbed some lunch on the street and called again to say we were coming. No problem, she said. We arrived to find that she had left for lunch but had left our stuff with another woman. So, we signed a paper requesting that we be able to make transfer requests by email, and then picked up the checks and then officially requested that the money be transferred to our franc account.

No problem, they said. But, unfortunately, the system is down so the money request will not go through today. Come back tomorrow.

Well, we needed to take Brad down to do an early check in at the airline, so we said, sure, we will come tomorrow. What do we need to bring? Just your ID and that transfer slip you just filled out – and go to register #6. No problem, I said.

So, for the third day in a row, I headed back downtown – this time taking Brad and the boys as bodyguards. :^) (Jim needed to do some work at the house). We arrived at the bank, waited in line at register #6 for while and finally it was our turn. Communicating in French through bullet proof glass in a lobby filled with hundreds of people is a bit of a challenge – I must warn you if you are ever forced into that situation. Here is what our conversation went like:

So, can I have my money????

Well, no, but thank you for asking. It would seem that the money IS here but not officially authorized, so go and see a man on the second floor. And, by the way, why did you come to register #6, this is the wrong place….

So, off we went to the second floor, but alas, the person we were to ask for was not in. So, I called my contact upstairs for help. Finally we got to the right place and was told that I could withdraw the money – but I needed my checkbook – which I did not bring with me because I was told I did not need it. Sorry – no money for you today!! However, if we wanted to go to the branch closer to our house, we could get the checks from home and go and try there.

Okay, so off we went. Honestly, we were little nervous about withdrawing large sums of money at the branch close to our house because many people know where we live and it seems fairly obvious when you stagger out of the bank with backpacks full of money what you are doing and it seems like it makes you a little bit of a target for robbery. But, we were left with no choice. So, we returned home and picked up the checks and Brad, Kaleb and I took off for the bank. We arrived to find a lobby full of people – most looked comatose, like they had been there for a while. We finally got help to fill out the check and then took a number. We were number 820. The were serving number 706 – and in the 25 minutes that we took to figure out how to write a check, they had served 2 people. Not a good sign!!!

So, we settle in to make ourselves comfortable. Brad even had a quick snooze. One hour passed, and we were approaching two hours. I think we were around customer number 711 by this point. I called my contact downtown and said, Listen, I am happy to wait my turn (actually that was kind of a lie, but I was trying…) but I don’t want to wait for 3, 4,or 5 hours to get to the counter and be told that there was no more money (it has happened to a fellow missionary) so is there someone you can check with to make sure that the money is here? So she asked to talk with a bank employee, who then passed the phone off to another bank employee. I was assured that the money would be there. And then the woman disappeared with my phone. Finally, they closed the big metal doors –locking in those who had already arrived and barring more customers from coming in as the bank was closing (no doubt a fire hazard, but no one seemed concerned.)

Unbeknownst to me, Jim started calling my cell phone and it was being answered by the bank employee, who denied knowing me (since she did not receive the phone from me, she thought it was a bank phone.) He began to panic, thinking that I had lost my phone or had been robbed, so he dropped everything he was doing and rushed to the bank, only to find it locked down. Eventually, he was directed to the back entrance, where he found Brad, Kaleb, and I half comatose from waiting………. I am pretty sure that shaved about 5 years off his life. :^( So we sent Brad and Kaleb home and Jim settled in to wait with me. I was getting a little nervous as we needed to get Brad to the airport, but I was working on NOT getting worked up. After about 2 ½ hours, our downtown contact called to see if we had gotten the money. No, I reported, there were still around 30 people ahead of us (we were only on number 718 but a lot of people had given up and left (or perhaps they were dead of boredom and not answering when their number was called!) They were serving approximately 5 people an hour, so it was going to be a while. She must have made a phone call, because we suddenly got service and loaded up our backpacks and were out the door in 10 minutes – with all of the money and the exact denominations we had asked for. Amazing!!!

I spent most of those 3 days muttering 2 things under my breath

1. How do missionaries survive here in CKY???

2. We need a business manager (which, by the way, we have a family approved and raising support!!!!).

Oh, Africa!