Wednesday 18th February 2015
Early start! We got up at 6, finished
packing and had breakfast. Then loaded up the van and left! The
journey was okay, aside from a very bumpy road, where a suitcase fell
off the rood- thankfully we noticed in time!! On the way we picked up
Yahya, the school principal.
Got to Juffre. There were lots of cute
goats.
We went in the boat to Kunteh Kinteh island, which is where
they used to keep slaves.
It was interesting, but very difficult. The
conditions were awful- so cramped and inhumane. Anyone who rebelled
was placed into a small underground building which had very little
light and air, where they were fed very little- and if they were
shackled up, then they couldn't reach the food. It's so horrible to
think that anyone ever thought it was okay to treat people like that.
In addition, when the slave trade was abolished, there were around
400 slaves on the island. The staff couldn't take them on to other
countries- but they decided it was too much work to take them back.
So the people were told that, if they could swim back to the
mainland, then they could be free. The journey back to the mainland
took us a good 15 minutes in a motorboat, and there were strong
currents- so, obviously, none of the slaves made it back. So
difficult.
Back on the boat, where myself, MG,
Maths and JG all got very splashed!
Lunch- I had really lovely egg
sandwiches. On the island we got to try baobab, and Maths made it
into a really nice drink.
Museum. Again, interesting, but very
difficult.
Back on the van, and we drove to the
ferry port. Thought we would have a super long wait, but Morro
'bribed' them so we wouldn't have to wait as long. We all took that
as a good sign. Ha. Ha. Ha.
Went to ferry port queue. The ferry had
set off 20 minutes prior, so we settled in for a long wait! Spent
part of the time on the bus, then got off and sat outside. BA and I
walked up to the shop, where we fell in love with a goat. The owners
tried to sell it to us, and we genuinely almost bought it. However,
in the end BA wimped out.
Spent more time chatting outside the
van. Then AH, SL, JG and I all needed the loo- except it was
disgusting and, as AM said, 'literally a sh*thole'. So... We made
SheWees out of bottles cut with pens. Creativity right here! (Kudos
to GS for the creativity though). The loos were disgusting-
but we made it work.
Back
to bus. Got on- and, after a good 3+ hours waiting, it was finally
time to go!! We then spent ages actually getting on the ferry.
The crossing was
pretty rough, and it took us aaages to get off the ferry on the other
side too. Just after we drove off, when all the vehicles were really
close together, the lorry behind us didn't stop and crashed into us-
making us crash into the lorry in front. It was pretty scary.
Thankfully, everyone was physically fine, though AH had some back
pains. It also caused the van to break down.
Thank goodness for
Morro!! He got everything sorted; all we had to do was wait. I had a
bit of a panic which wasn't great, but GS was really good at calming
me down.
Eventually we got a
new van- we transferred the stuff then got I and headed back to the
resort. Small panic when the driver didn't know where we were going,
but it got sorted in the end.
Got to hotel. Our
parents had been told about what happened, so I rang Mum and spoke to
her briefly. Had dinner, then used wifi briefly. Then to bed, after a
long and difficult day!!