Re: Departure

After five trips to the immigration office, I secured a visa extension into September. I'll leave the commentary on government bureaucracies for later, when my diplomatic assessment can benefit from the dispassionate distance of remember-y. The outcome is what matters now, which is that instead of flying out this weekend, I am now planning to leave Freetown by the 1st - a supervisor instated deadline with conference panel to boot, so that I don't stay in the country indefinitely, pursuing obtuse questions with multiple answers.

The semi-relevant photo is from Freetown, where public transport consists of poda-podas (like this minibus taxi), okadas (motorbikes - currently being banned from the city center), shared motorcar taxis, and a few stray government buses that (under)serve the suburbs. This photo features a few charms of the roads in Freetown:
1. Pimp my ride: What poda poda drivers lack in resources (and common sense), they more than make up for with enthusiasm. Get excited!
Note the exciting use of license plate holders to accent the back door! (I've often sat in traffic and pondered who imports license plate holders that don't fit the license plates here - I'm no MBA, but it seems like a niche business model.)
Note the exciting use of non-functional, bolted down fire extinguishers to look hype! (The more the better, and symmetry is preferred.)
Note the exciting font and unironic pro-football(soccer)/Bob Marley reference - two guaranteed crowd pleasers throughout Africa! (Other popular themes are God, Jesus, Allah, Mother - mine, yours?, Enemies, Money and Uncle - again, mine, yours? A whole post could and should be dedicated to awesome sayings painted on poda podas.)
Note the exciting attachment of ski racks and other non-sequiters to the top of the vehicle! (For four months, I didn't realize that the racks on taxis and poda podas: A) were not ever used (I naively assumed they were necessary for strapping down goats, produce, charcoal, etc.) and purely decorative; and B) were attached after import (again, naively, I assumed that the used car market in the US, UK, Netherlands, etc. was flooded with be-racked vehicles that made their way to West African ownership). C.f. license plate holders, the business model of importing ski racks to Sierra Leone is fascinating.) (Apologies for the excessive use of parentheses.)
Finally, note the exciting attachment of radio anttenae atop the vehicle! (Although poda podas regularly bump loud music - Akon reigns supreme here - they rarely play the radio. I was smart enough to know that four or six anttenae wobbling out of the rear of a reconstructed van were probably not fully functional.)
2. Far less exciting than the poda podas that transport 15-20 people, are the means of transporting goods. Just below the left-hand fire extinguisher, you'll see a push cart. Unlike in Ethiopia, where donkeys provide the majority of hard labour, in Sierra Leone manual labour relies on people. Women and children fetch water with 5-gallon jerrycans at public taps ("pumps") throughout the city; and young and old men for hire ferry all manner of goods (rubbish, huge bags of rice, beds) up and down the streets. In the East End where the streets get smaller, wheelbarrows join the parade, as the flatbed pushcarts maneuver - and block traffic - far more slowly.
3. For big loads, there are big trucks. These tend to go to the provinces (destroying the fragile patchwork of stones and dirt that communities and contractors are repeatedly attempting to grade into functional roads) and as far as Guinea and Liberia. On the far left you can see an "Own Goods" truck that might be transporting produce (this means cocoa, coffee, palm oil, rice - not lettuce and carrots), timber, fire wood, or people. These trucks are inevitably smoke-billowing bullies with no regard for other vehicles or pedestrians. They move at dangerously high speeds when coming toward you, and slower than molasses when you are behind them breathing in fumes.