Trust the Truth

Yesterday we got a Land Rover ride 3 hours northeast of Monrovia, a town called Gbarnga. (Lots of silent G's in Liberian place names.) Saw lots of UN checkpoints on the way, though security is pretty loose. Some of the Pakistani and Bangladeshi peacekeepers are filling potholes in the road, which is great, cause the road is like, jilznacked! [But supposedly the best road in Liberia.] Such projects must do a lot to curry favor with the communities along the road.

We streaked past a number of former IDP (internally displaced persons) camps and refugee camps, some of which are still partially occupied. The huts mostly have blue and white UN tarps over the thatched roofs. In older settlements going away from Monrovia, mud brick homes are painted with tan, black and whitish natural pigments, decorated with inky handprints and other spots.

Last night we got all sweaty on the dancefloor with a bunch of crazy social workers, who brought along about 900 beers (for the record, it was Guiness in big bottles, Becks, Heineken, and the local version of Club Beer, which doesn't taste much like the Club you get in other countries) and a water bottle full of what they call egg nog.

Our intelligence revealed this morning that the nog is made of whiskey, eggs, and sugar, but it tasted like something from another planet. The party was great, not least because the organizers had printed up 2-page programs of the night's events! ["It's always like that," says an expat source.]

On a side trip to see a lovely waterfall at the end of a terrible road (a dry creek, really), our car allegedly ran over a big domesticated duck, and boy howdy was the owner woman angry at our driver, Sam. The village chief was extremely rational and worked it out for us somehow, in spite of the irate woman waving the bloody flattened duck around. It's likely that duck represented a big chunk of her income and/or caloric intake, through the eggs and the meat.

Some of the many many many remarkable signs seen along the road:

"Only Dogs Pe Pe Here!"

"God's Business Center"

"God is Alone"

“Put a Stop to Mob Violence!”
"Trust the Truth"