Abuko Reserve, Gambia - 6 Nov
Muhammed was supposed to pick me up at 8am but he didn't show up before 8.30am.... I was a bit annoyed because I'd really rushed my breakfast to be on time... I was also already stressed because breakfast was supposed to be served as of 7.30am but nothing was ready before 7.55am and 3 times I had to ask for a mug of hot milk before I got it... So I'll get it out of my system right away: the slackness about time keeping in Gambia is probably the thing that MOST irritated me in 9 days there. I just could not get used to it, it showed such total lack of respect for my time... it's really hard not to let it bug you when our culture is so different. I didn't remember it being as bad in East Africa... usually when they pick you for game drives at 5.30am, the jeep does tend to go at 5.40am latest... the excuse was that he 'was stuck in traffic'... I didn't go down the road of 'this is when forward planning kicks in' but I had to bite my lips.
This being said, he was a really nice chap, 29 and he had good music in his car... he even had a VCD, which I'd never seen in any car and didn't expect to see in Gambia - it was like a DVD player with a screen that would pop up so that you could either just listen to a concert, or press a button, the screen would come out, unfold, or you could watch it. Coooool. But the screen was turned towards the passenger, thankfully, as I can imagine it'd be quite a distraction when driving !
Driving felt rather safe too... no lunatics... Our first stop was Abuko Reserve. The first National Park set up in Gambia I believe back in 1968. I went there because my Bradt Guide said that the vegetation was pristine and the animals and birds were so used to people that you could get some nice close up photos... well, don't bank on that. I didn't really get any decent shots there in 2.5H and though I had bought a new lens with an image stabiliser, it still was pretty hard to take pix of birds when they keep moving. I was actually quite disappointed by the place, the truth be said... I expected it to overlook the sea and have a section on sea birds and another section on mangroves... and it just wasn't like that. I didn't see a lot and even the monkeys were shy.
I went to the animal orphanage and that was the only chance to see them quite close... and the first chance I had to experience pressure Gambian style when it comes to 'donations'. Someone just takes you around this quick tour of the orphanage, asks if you want to feed the baboons ('no thanks, they can be quite aggressive' - 'yes that's true', hum, 'why did you ask?' I felt like adding) and then you had to sign a book with your name to show you'd been and you soon realised that the line consists of name 'name / date / donation'... leaving you with NO chance to opt out. I was happy to contribute as I love animals and I felt it was a worthwhile project, rescuing monkeys from the pet trade, but I just felt it was done all wrong and all the numbers looked quite high and I had a stinky feeling that someone had added a few zeros at the end of each line to send you on a guilt trip, so that if you gave 100 and realised everyone before you had 'given' 1000 you felt psychologically compelled to match it. I couldn't prove it of course but I felt convinced it was happening... So I stuck to my 100 because bananas are everywhere here and quite cheap to buy so I couldn't quite believe it would cost an 'enormous' amount to feed the animals. I even managed to buy a tiny bracelet for £1 just to do a good deed... though it really wasn't even worth 20p, even by English standards. I was first asked £2 for it and I was like 'yeah, right... come on, be serious, even in London they wouldn't dare ask that much for a piece of plastic'. I never wear much jewellery anyway, so I wore it one hour and that was it. Never to be worn again I think. In hindsight, I should have just given the craftsman a banknote and not even bought anything. But you just want to help a bit here & there because, well, to us £1 is nothing and to them it may buy a few meals to feed their families...
We then went to the Botanical Gardens but the area was tiny, there was no coffee shop to buy cool drinks and very few bushes were in bloom so 15 mins was all I needed. NOT worth the stop-over really.
After that, we went to the internet cafe so I could reprint my travel documentation (though the printer lacked decent ink so you could barely read the print-out!) and then we went onto the beach as it was my main chance to see it. We ended up in a really nice 4* hotel for a drink, owned by the Gambia Experience, I asked my driver how much it'd cost to stay there, he reckoned £26 a night... I'd paid I think £18 to stay at the Safari Garden and it was NO way near as nice... but you could only stay there if you'd booked the whole package with the other tour operator. But, if you can afford an extra £8 go there ! Money well spent...
The beach was ok but nothing spectacular, it lacked the beautiful turquoise shades of the Indian Ocean... or maybe I didn't go on the best stretch but it really wasn't worth a 2nd trip there. I'm sure the water was beautifully warm tough but it was just too hot to risk getting sun-burnt.
By 5pm, I was exhausted and I didn't want to keep drinking cokes to top up my energy level so I decided to skip the market experience so that I could go back to my hotel for a dip in the pool.
Muhammed dropped me off and picked me up 90 mins later so we could go to a restaurant (Calypso) that was recommended in my Bradt guide as having "superb veggie cuisine and nice setting with tables on the beach front". Sounded nice... but it was nothing like it when we went there. The veggie options were no more and the few tables outside were already taken and the 2 that were not had no light working so you couldn't see your food. So much for the 'great ambiance'... but, the food was very good and for £20 we had lots, incl. ice cream.... which was wonderful on a very warm evening. We even played great music by Westlife on the way back and it was the most relaxing part of the evening...
But all in all, this had been a most disappointing day where pretty much *everywhere* we went was not as nice as the book had promised. I was starting to feel a bit disheartened... on top of it, there were beautiful women all around, wearing these gorgeous colourful dresses with head-set to match and Muhammed soon explained that no one likes to have their photo taken here so I was really crushed and massively frustrated as photography is my BIG hobby, as you all know.
Women definitely looked more beautiful on the West Coast of Africa with very fine features. Muhammed introduced me to his sister (as she worked in a shop nearby) who was about 23 and she looked just like a model... incredibly pretty, she could have easily gone on the Red Carpet... gorgeous smile and beautiful eyes. He had 7 brothers & sisters (they all have big families there) and I said to him 'are your other 4 sisters just as gorgeous?' he said 'yes, they are actually, but she's the prettiest of them all'... I said 'boy, there must be a queue of blokes wanting to marry her, surely' and he said 'yes, there is actually... but getting married in Gambia is an expensive business and a lot of guys can't afford it. It's a one week affair, you have to seek parents' consent, you have to buy presents for the whole family, buy 10 high quality dresses for your wife, and all in all, it's just too expensive for most people'.... and he said that some women are happy to compromise and not expect so much but the parents won't have it. I found it quite interesting really... Arranged marriage are still quite common here which is another thing that we can't quite picture from a Western culture.
Muhammed was supposed to pick me up at 8am but he didn't show up before 8.30am.... I was a bit annoyed because I'd really rushed my breakfast to be on time... I was also already stressed because breakfast was supposed to be served as of 7.30am but nothing was ready before 7.55am and 3 times I had to ask for a mug of hot milk before I got it... So I'll get it out of my system right away: the slackness about time keeping in Gambia is probably the thing that MOST irritated me in 9 days there. I just could not get used to it, it showed such total lack of respect for my time... it's really hard not to let it bug you when our culture is so different. I didn't remember it being as bad in East Africa... usually when they pick you for game drives at 5.30am, the jeep does tend to go at 5.40am latest... the excuse was that he 'was stuck in traffic'... I didn't go down the road of 'this is when forward planning kicks in' but I had to bite my lips.
This being said, he was a really nice chap, 29 and he had good music in his car... he even had a VCD, which I'd never seen in any car and didn't expect to see in Gambia - it was like a DVD player with a screen that would pop up so that you could either just listen to a concert, or press a button, the screen would come out, unfold, or you could watch it. Coooool. But the screen was turned towards the passenger, thankfully, as I can imagine it'd be quite a distraction when driving !
Driving felt rather safe too... no lunatics... Our first stop was Abuko Reserve. The first National Park set up in Gambia I believe back in 1968. I went there because my Bradt Guide said that the vegetation was pristine and the animals and birds were so used to people that you could get some nice close up photos... well, don't bank on that. I didn't really get any decent shots there in 2.5H and though I had bought a new lens with an image stabiliser, it still was pretty hard to take pix of birds when they keep moving. I was actually quite disappointed by the place, the truth be said... I expected it to overlook the sea and have a section on sea birds and another section on mangroves... and it just wasn't like that. I didn't see a lot and even the monkeys were shy.
I went to the animal orphanage and that was the only chance to see them quite close... and the first chance I had to experience pressure Gambian style when it comes to 'donations'. Someone just takes you around this quick tour of the orphanage, asks if you want to feed the baboons ('no thanks, they can be quite aggressive' - 'yes that's true', hum, 'why did you ask?' I felt like adding) and then you had to sign a book with your name to show you'd been and you soon realised that the line consists of name 'name / date / donation'... leaving you with NO chance to opt out. I was happy to contribute as I love animals and I felt it was a worthwhile project, rescuing monkeys from the pet trade, but I just felt it was done all wrong and all the numbers looked quite high and I had a stinky feeling that someone had added a few zeros at the end of each line to send you on a guilt trip, so that if you gave 100 and realised everyone before you had 'given' 1000 you felt psychologically compelled to match it. I couldn't prove it of course but I felt convinced it was happening... So I stuck to my 100 because bananas are everywhere here and quite cheap to buy so I couldn't quite believe it would cost an 'enormous' amount to feed the animals. I even managed to buy a tiny bracelet for £1 just to do a good deed... though it really wasn't even worth 20p, even by English standards. I was first asked £2 for it and I was like 'yeah, right... come on, be serious, even in London they wouldn't dare ask that much for a piece of plastic'. I never wear much jewellery anyway, so I wore it one hour and that was it. Never to be worn again I think. In hindsight, I should have just given the craftsman a banknote and not even bought anything. But you just want to help a bit here & there because, well, to us £1 is nothing and to them it may buy a few meals to feed their families...
We then went to the Botanical Gardens but the area was tiny, there was no coffee shop to buy cool drinks and very few bushes were in bloom so 15 mins was all I needed. NOT worth the stop-over really.
After that, we went to the internet cafe so I could reprint my travel documentation (though the printer lacked decent ink so you could barely read the print-out!) and then we went onto the beach as it was my main chance to see it. We ended up in a really nice 4* hotel for a drink, owned by the Gambia Experience, I asked my driver how much it'd cost to stay there, he reckoned £26 a night... I'd paid I think £18 to stay at the Safari Garden and it was NO way near as nice... but you could only stay there if you'd booked the whole package with the other tour operator. But, if you can afford an extra £8 go there ! Money well spent...
The beach was ok but nothing spectacular, it lacked the beautiful turquoise shades of the Indian Ocean... or maybe I didn't go on the best stretch but it really wasn't worth a 2nd trip there. I'm sure the water was beautifully warm tough but it was just too hot to risk getting sun-burnt.
By 5pm, I was exhausted and I didn't want to keep drinking cokes to top up my energy level so I decided to skip the market experience so that I could go back to my hotel for a dip in the pool.
Muhammed dropped me off and picked me up 90 mins later so we could go to a restaurant (Calypso) that was recommended in my Bradt guide as having "superb veggie cuisine and nice setting with tables on the beach front". Sounded nice... but it was nothing like it when we went there. The veggie options were no more and the few tables outside were already taken and the 2 that were not had no light working so you couldn't see your food. So much for the 'great ambiance'... but, the food was very good and for £20 we had lots, incl. ice cream.... which was wonderful on a very warm evening. We even played great music by Westlife on the way back and it was the most relaxing part of the evening...
But all in all, this had been a most disappointing day where pretty much *everywhere* we went was not as nice as the book had promised. I was starting to feel a bit disheartened... on top of it, there were beautiful women all around, wearing these gorgeous colourful dresses with head-set to match and Muhammed soon explained that no one likes to have their photo taken here so I was really crushed and massively frustrated as photography is my BIG hobby, as you all know.
Women definitely looked more beautiful on the West Coast of Africa with very fine features. Muhammed introduced me to his sister (as she worked in a shop nearby) who was about 23 and she looked just like a model... incredibly pretty, she could have easily gone on the Red Carpet... gorgeous smile and beautiful eyes. He had 7 brothers & sisters (they all have big families there) and I said to him 'are your other 4 sisters just as gorgeous?' he said 'yes, they are actually, but she's the prettiest of them all'... I said 'boy, there must be a queue of blokes wanting to marry her, surely' and he said 'yes, there is actually... but getting married in Gambia is an expensive business and a lot of guys can't afford it. It's a one week affair, you have to seek parents' consent, you have to buy presents for the whole family, buy 10 high quality dresses for your wife, and all in all, it's just too expensive for most people'.... and he said that some women are happy to compromise and not expect so much but the parents won't have it. I found it quite interesting really... Arranged marriage are still quite common here which is another thing that we can't quite picture from a Western culture.
posted by Sylvie at 11:23 AM
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