May 19th, day 15 - "yellow fever vaccination certificate please." -- the first words to greet me on arrival in Ghana. The words I'd been dreading for two weeks since realizing i didn't have it with me. I felt I weight in the pit of my stomach and my blood ran cold. But first let's cliffhanger that and start at the beginning ( Read more... )

May 16th, Day 13 - where i left off last entry, recall, i was just about to have a croissant and mango and omelet, for breakfast at this hotel. I recalled this hotel having good food last year and was looking forward to it ( Read more... )

May 15th, Day 12 - checked out of the hotel in Labe, it was once again an hour drive from there out into the countryside to the village of Timbi-Touni for training. This time didn't have quite as many beekeeping federation staff, just Khalidou the head trainer and two youngish women who are apparently interns ( Read more... )

Sunday, May 14th, my 41st birthday - Bailo the driver went to get the beekeeping federation (FAPI) staff while Bara and i had breakfast. I asked for coffee w milk and got literally handed a cup of hot milk and a packet of nescafe ( Read more... )

Tuesday, May 9th, day 5 - First part of the day the usual usual. Though now there was a Belgian team working on a women's reproductive health project staying in the main part of our hotel, whom we saw at breakfast (two Belgians, four locals). Arrived at ENATEF there were two white land cruisers with the GIZ logo on them there. That's the German ( Read more... )

Monday, May 8th, Day 4 - breakfast at the hotel at 8:30 - long French bread baguettes are delicious. Nescafe less so. And omelets are dependable throughout the world, though they could use some cheese here ( Read more... )

I was interviewed the other day for Ben's Bees. He had interviewed me once before for his podcast a few months ago, but this time we did it "via zoom" (actually some other program) broadcast live onto the youtube!

Click to view

   After it was finished I began to worry that people would accuse me of "cultural appropriation," and wished I had emphasized that ( Read more... )

August 8th, Day 39 - nothing much to report today. Woke up in the luxurious hotel in Conakry. Around 13:30 Bailo came and drove us to the office, which was just maybe a kilometer away but we got stuck in bad traffic before turning down side streets. We were there for a few hours and i found I'd allowed myself to be in a situation where i had ( Read more... )

August 8th, Day 38 in Africa (16th in Guinea) - 8:45 Bailo, Ousman, Dr Bob and i departed the hotel in Kindia town. Ibro would be remaining in Kindia for more meetings. But first "I hope you don't mind, we want to buy some pineapples here?" Ousman asked us. No problem. And we were off ( Read more... )

August 6th, day 15 - started the day at a leisurely pace in Mamou town. For once didn't have to visit anyone's relatives but we (only Bialo, Ibro and i now) did stop to buy something in the town market. I asked what, since the purchase was happening behind the car and having not gotten out i couldn't see. "Eggplants" i was told. "I thought we ( Read more... )