Goodbye to Guinea

I know there’s a lot more to say about Guinea than I have in me right now.  As I may have intimated before, some of this is for reasons of privacy; my employer has been central to most of the drama that’s happened to me over the last few months.  Which makes sense, since most of my time has been taken up by work, and my home and social life have revolved around my colleagues out of necessity.  This blog is one of the first things that comes up when my name is googled, and I know it’d be bad form to air any grievances about my employer, which means that most of what I’ve spent the last six months talking about (to my friends, to Jenn, to myself) is out of bounds.  (Incidentally, expect another, less complainy post not long after this one, to push this down from the top of the page.)

But enough of what I’m not going to talk about.  How was Guinea?

...Wet!

As far as I can tell, nobody comes to Guinea on purpose.  That makes sense on its face: between the malaria, the political instability, the lack of access to stable power or internet, and the cratered, sunken roads that are always choked with traffic, this isn’t anyone’s first choice.  The diplomatic corps staff members were all assigned here because of their lack of seniority or unpopularity in the department—this is a necessary evil for most of them, a first step before they can be assigned to literally anywhere else.  As you might imagine, this leads to some pretty frikkin’ gross ‘tudes, gross enough that I wrote and deleted a long post shining a spotlight on the racist nonsense that comes out of their mouths sometimes.  Most of the expats here spend their time complaining about it—a common enough thing in cushier destinations like Japan, too, though here that note of bitterness is even more common.

As for me?  Despite all the corruption, the difficulty in recreating a middle-class American lifestyle here, the daily inconveniences?  I like it here!

I’m walking a fine line on this one, I know.  Media is awash in depictions of Africa as a place of unrelenting tragedy, and I don’t want to make this yet another bout of indulging in “Heal the World”-type pathos.  On the other hand, emphasizing what a lovely time I had would seem to be just wallowing in my own privilege, especially when, yes, Guinea suffers from terrible unemployment, corruption, medical crises, failing infrastructure, and more of the hallmarks of perennially exploited countries [/handwringing].

I would come back here, though.  I would live in Guinea again, even in Conakry.  I don’t know if Guinea and Guineans are all that distinct compared to other West African nations, if living in Senegal or Cote d’Ivoire or Ghana would have all the positive points of living here with fewer negatives.  From my own experiences, though, I know that much like people, places are absolutely formed by their history.  The scars of occupation in Seoul or Berlin, for example, are clearly critically important parts of those cities’ identities…and if that’s a self-built identity, one designed for tourists, that doesn’t make it any less important or authentic.

For the armchairiest of historical speculation: Guinea was the first West African nation to gain independence from France.  It did so nonviolently, but aggressively, definitively, casting out French influence to forge its own future, and has served as an example of African independence for decades since.  It’s also gotten extremely thoroughly screwed over by France, more so than many other former colonies, and according to the popular sentiment here, the fact that the French took everything with them when they left has been largely responsible for Guinea having such a rough go of it.

So basically, after being devastated and having generations of its people kidnapped and murdered, Guinea has still gotten the short end of the stick (less foreign investment, more neocolonial pillagers at the door).  It’s just that now, this time, that raw deal has been the unfortunate result of decisions that Guinea made for itself.  I know that can’t be any consolation to the families with no potable water and no mosquito nets, but from a cold, heartlessly romantic perspective, I think Guinea has something to be proud of.

This is why I teach kindergarten, right here.

To take it back to the personal: the people I’ve met here have been welcoming, friendly, and warm.  Some of the encounters I’ve had have been among the most beautiful moments of my life.  Jamming with friends—my ukulele, their traditional Kissian polyphonic singing.  Watching the sun set over the giant, unfinished stadium while bats flit overhead and the call to prayer suffuses the air in plaintive, cracking voices.  Hearing my students grow to express themselves more every day (one of my students, searching for a word to use when discussing the behavior of mosquitoes, hit on “heart water”).

One of the hardest things about living abroad is the realization that you’ve never “done” anywhere.  As long as I’ve spent anywhere I’ve lived or visited, there’s never been a moment where I thought, “I never need to come back to this place” (except maybe Sagada).  Even if Guinea wasn’t on my list of places to visit before, it’s definitely on my list of places to revisit now.

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Guess I had more in me than I’d thought.  Tune in next time for more photos of adorable children!