Day 18

Day 18 1/20
Today was our free day we were to do whatever we wanted to do with one stipulation attached; you must get yourself to and from your location. We decided that we would go to the beach and to get there we would walk. So after breakfast we got ready to go, we packed up our bags and wore our swimsuits so that we wouldn’t have to change when we got there. Justin and I headed out before everyone else so that we could relax until lunch time. As we began walking we were in pretty good moods joking around as we past the stadium that we were about a quarter of the way there. We were joined by some children that also insisted that they were also going to the beach. At the intersection we went straight because that’s the way Justin thought it was. We continued to walk and walk and walk. We walked for just about 2 hours and realized that this was NOT the way to the beach. We asked a man who had seen us walking earlier if we were walking in the right direction and he told us that we had passed it up a long time ago. At this point we were tired of walking and turning down taxi cab rides. So as a taxi drove near he asked where we were going and I asked him if he knew where Leybato beach was. He said he did and that it would cost us 200 dalasi to get there. I looked at Justin and we started debating whether it was worth that much. I told the guy that we would continue to just walk and right after I said that he asked how much I would pay. We agreed with 100 dalasi and we got into the back of the taxi. We started passing some old scenery and still more old scenery. Through recognizable intersections and vending markets the taxi traveled, and at the first intersection that we came to while walking we should have turned right. I thought that was the correct way to the beach but Justin insisted that it was straight ahead and that no turns were needed to make it to the beach. In total it took us about 2 hours to get to the beach when it should have taken us at most 45 minutes. So as we got to the beach some people were finishing up their lunches so we decided to take our lunch break and get something to eat. We began to watch a soccer match on tv at the 40th minute in the game. Half time past which is 15 minutes and we were finally served our sandwiches at about the 80th minutes of the game. We were not happy about this being that we had been sitting at our table for about 20 minutes prior to ordering. They were running on African time which I no longer like. You might as well plan on being at least an hour late for everything. The people again are extremely friendly but they become annoying quite quickly. They end every sentence with either “man” or “you know” except the “you know” is not a question at all it simply acts as a period to the end of their sentence. The people also seem to have a memory problem or possibly the marijuana has killed their short term memory cells. The reason I say this is because they repeat the same thing over and over and over again. They will tell you where there compound is and in the next 5 minutes they will tell you where they live another three times. I know the people mean well but the saying “it’s nice to be nice” gets old fast when they ask you to stop and see their store when you have no intentions of buying anything. Hopefully tonight we are left alone as we head out to a nice restaurant where we are to be in semi formal attire. Again the people are nice but jiminy cricket please stop bothering me, they don’t even talk to their neighbors like they talk to complete strangers. I think it is truly because we are white people that lures them into talking to us. Going to the Senegambia hotel was a real treat from the usual food we have become used to. At the hotel they provided entertainment for us, which consisted of the normal drummers and dancers. This performance had a slight twist in that a man was a fire man where he twirled and spit flames.