Kortor and Fundukori

(Note: I have more to say about Freetown... and I’ll say it later. I may even say something about travelling to PZ1… where I am now. I may even say something more about STEWARD and what it is I’m doing here. It will all come eventually. Bear with me. I’ve been pretty busy, and without internet. I am trying to add photos, but it is slow going. They may appear, they may not.)

As you may have guessed, I’ve made my way to the northern regions of Sierra Leone, and into Guinea. We left Freetown last Sunday, and spent the day travelling to Fintonia. It was a rough road. (See photos.) We eventually made it to Fintonia, although my first bout of dysentery hit me before we arrived, and we had to stop so I could vomit along the side of the road. The roads were so bad I spent the next few miles hoping it was just motion sickness… but alas, it was not. I was pretty much out for 12 hours upon arrival. I forgot how unpleasant it is to feel those particular sensations. Anyhow, cipero is an amazing drug, and had me back on my feet by the morning.

A brief word about STEWARD - the project I’m working with. (STEWARD stands for Sustainable and Thriving Environments for West African Regional Development.) STEWARD is operating in two different Priority Zones (PZs). PZ1 is on the border of Sierra Leone and Guinea, and surrounds Outamba Kilami National Park. PZ2 is on the border of Cote d’Ivoire, Guinea, and Liberia, surrounding Mt. Nimba. We spent the last week travelling in and out of two villages on the Sierra Leone side of PZ1: Fundokori and Kortor. We are now in Madina Oula, Guinea and will start to explore this side of the border. This part of the world has some of the most intense poverty I’ve ever encountered. Roads are terrible. There isn’t any electricity, or running water. STEWARD maintains offices with generators in Madina Oula and Fintonia, which is how I am managing to have access to the internet. (Only the generator is out in Fintonia, so no power, no internet access on that side of the border for the time being.) The level of development hasn’t necessarily surprised me, but I still find it striking. For now, I’ll just comment on my experience so far, and let it speak for itself.

Both Kortor and Fundukori are within the Tambakah Chiefdom of Sierra Leone. The Tambakah Chiefdom is the most remote corner of Sierra Leone, or at least it is often described that way. Fintonia serves as the seat of the paramount chief, although it isn’t necessarily much more developed than the outlying villages... just larger, and with a market (or at least it is at first glance). Both Fundukori and Kortor are small villages. Kortor has 47 houses, about 700 people. Fundukori is smaller. In both communities multiple families live together in one house. No electricity, no running water, no cell phone coverage, no roads (just a dirt track, which you can travel with a land rover). The only two structures aside from houses were a community school, and a mosque. There was one kiosk in each village that sold sugar, salt, maggi cubes, and maybe a few incidental pieces of produce. Nothing else though. Everything is either grown, or purchased in Fintonia.

A word on tenure and governance, which I am still trying to wrap my head around. Chiefdoms function kind of like a county, although not really… as the tenure system is very different in the United States. Chiefdoms are areas controlled by a single paramount chief, the chief is elected by a council that represents the population in the chiefdom. Towns within the chiefdom are generally formed around important family clans that own the land, and have their own local town chief. Town chiefs may be elected, some may be appointed, some may claim the chieftaincy as a birthright - it varies from place to place, but local chiefs, and their councils, serve as the local government within villages. Chiefdoms (paramount chiefdoms) encompass the lands of these smaller chiefdoms, and are organized into districts, which are organized into regions, which make up Sierra Leone. For most people in the rural areas of Sierra Leone, the paramount chiefdom is the primary form of governance. Local people don’t necessarily have much interaction with the parliament at the national level. Presumably there is some connection between a paramount chief and higher levels of national governance, but I have yet to learn how this works.

Back to our sites. In both communities we used the local teacher for a translator. The head teacher in both villages appears to be a very respected person. In part because they are educated, but also because they are both running the local school without being paid. The government won’t pay un-certified teachers and, not surprisingly, no certified teachers will come to this part of the country to work. So after the war, frustrated by the lack of education for kids in their villages, these two men moved back and started community schools. Families in the village give them a few thousand Leones (25-50 cents) per term, and the kids help out with farming for the teacher (if the teacher is teaching he isn’t farming). They make it work somehow. Both communities are within the vicinity of Outamba Kilimi National Park. Kortor is actually along the 'road' into the park, but does not really derive much benefit from its proximity that I can see so far. The park gets around 100 visitors per year, and probably a dozen or so buy something from the community, or take a tour of the Kortor community forest (more about that later). The park has monkeys, chimps, hippos, and elephants… but no infrastructure, aside from 7 thatch huts you can sleep in. I plan to utilize them at some point, as the park is very peaceful. It costs about USD 2.50 to enter the park, and 2.50 to stay the night in a hut. Anyhow, some of the park's wildlife makes its way into the community forest, and occasionally a tourist will pay 10,000 leones (around $2.50) to take a tour of the community forest. The community uses any revenue they generate from this micro-tourism to buy things that benefit the community - like chalk for the chalkboard in the school. (Note: the school in Kortor is a thatched roof over bamboo poles, there isn't really a building. In Fundukori they had mud blocks with a zinc roof… but in both cases just one chalkboard, and a handful of benches.) Aside from chalk for the school’s chalkboards, other important community expenses that people mentioned were mats for the mosque and batteries for radios.

STEWARD is conducting various projects within these communities… to varying degrees of success. I’ll be monitoring the socioeconomic benefits of these projects over time, and will say more about them later. For now I’ll just note what the projects are. In both villages, STEWARD has started a village savings and loan group – one for men, one for women. Each week the group gathers, and each member contributes 1,000 leones (25 cents). Over time, the group will offer loans to members, or cover the cost of emergencies. The project has also been working to improve the management of forests, establishing community forests around what were previously sacred groves protecting important water sources for the village. (Each village depends completely on rainwater and streams in the forest for drinking, washing, and cooking water.) The project has also been attempting to mobilize the community to fight bush fires, both within the forest, and on farms… as well as to form different vegetable farming groups.

I feel like I’ve only touched the tip of the iceberg in this post. But I’ve only even touched the tip of the iceberg in these villages. My brain has absorbed so much new information. I’ve been learning new phrases in Susu, new words in French, and I can hardly keep it all straight. Luckily, the work ahead of me feels increasingly clear, and I feel I have a much better handle on how I’d like to approach my dissertation research. Now the task is to do it. Easier said than done. There was a part of me that hesitated to jump back into work in West Africa, in part because I know how challenging it is. Now that I’m here, I realize I perhaps underestimated just how challenging it can be. I don’t mean difficult in that I worry about the quality of the work I can do. I mean that it is difficult to see such poverty and then retreat to a fan and a generator and an internet connection. It is difficult to hear a man describe how chimps destroyed all of his food crops for the year, while he bounces his baby daughter on his knee. It is difficult not to try to rescue each and every person from catastrophe. Each night my mind feels almost numb from everything it has taken in… and yet it takes in more and more and more. Part of me knew this is what awaited me, and so I hesitated. But now that I’m here, I can feel myself gathering energy, and preparing to give this the 150% that still will not be enough.