Having spent the last couple years carrying water on my head and sleeping in a little mud hut, I had very limited expectations for my accommodations here
in Guinea. I knew that even the capital city municipal electricity was erratic and unreliable and figured that running water and internet access would be
just as scarce. I knew that the Save the Children (SC) office, like the Peace Corps office,
was equipped with a generator and internet access, so I would be able to charge
things and check e-mail at least while I was at work. Here's a view of the SC office buildings, plus the spare desk that I'll be using for the time being:
(I really can’t overemphasize how nice it is to have a desk with a chair of corresponding height. It's one of those things I never appreciated until I couldn't have it any more.)
SC arranged for my housing, and upon arriving at chez moi I found that I had two furnished rooms and a bathroom, plus a little hallway. The bathroom has running water and the bedroom and other room boast solar-powered lights and outlets, complete with some sort of battery system so that they work in the evening, too. Fancytown.
I've set up the other room as a kitchen/yoga room, and (other than discovering that the walls are painted cement and so it's nearly impossible to stick up pictures and things) so far I'm quite pleased.
Before I arrived someone had given the bathroom a once-over, but it was badly in need of a serious cleaning. I spent most of Saturday dusting and scraping and scrubbing and bleaching and rinsing and repeating - I'm not sure the photos here really capture the before-and-after, but in my eyes (and to my nose) it was pretty dramatic.
Aesthetically, I preferred my old white mosquito net to this green one, but I'll just have to make do. I've already picked up some new sheets, and am going to continue to use my suitcase to store my clothes - on of the lingering effects of hut life is that I am slightly neurotic about bugs and mice and really like to make sure that food is kept in sealed buckets, clothes and things are kept in zipped up tight, and that everything stays off the floor. In my hut I kept my trunks elevated on little oatmeal-can legs, and will probably do the same here.
Oh, also I have a very nice bike, complete with a decent lock and a helmet, which has made market runs pretty easy. I'll still miss hot showers and refrigerators and washing machines, but all in all, they set me up with more creature comforts that I could have hoped for - the solar is particularly fantastic, because it's cleaner than gas-burning generators, and also because it turns out that generators like the one they use to power the lights and internet at work are loud and not super pleasant to be around.
