Caught In Shootings And Explosions In Liberia

Posted on June 27, 2019December 1, 2019 by dev

I had 5 lovely days in the beginning of my Liberia stay and I find most Liberian people as warm, friendly and sociable, but what happened in my last 2 days in Liberia is something I will never forget!

Is Liberia Dangerous?

Before you read this article and get scared of Liberia, I need to say I enjoyed Liberia mostly. A beautiful country, even though I was there in heavy rain season with up to 16 hours of rain some of my days. I had to be smart with my time in Liberia and took full advantage of the sunny hours, as well as with the rainy ones.

There are some sketchy areas in the capital Monrovia, especially at night, but I felt comfortable most places in Liberia during day and night. So it is a safe country, but there’s one specific time, where it’s NOT!

At the abandoned luxury hotel, Ducor Hotel, at night

My Observations In Liberia

Can’t avoid the spices in Liberia! Even cucumbers have spicy chili inside

The Language

I love the way Liberian speak English, the way they shorten all of the words and mix it with their own local language, makes it so hard to understand, but enjoyable to listen to. Sometimes I had to listen to sentences 3-4 times, in order to fully understand what was being said. So yes, Liberia is a English-speaking country, but not the English you know.

The Food

The food in Liberia is extremely spicy and it’s no matter what you eat. The Liberian people find the food to be completely normal, but in all of the other +115 countries I’ve been to, I only remember a few countries where ALL the food was this spicy. Most of the time I had tears in my eyes when eating in Liberia.

Public Transport Discussion

I took a lot of public transport in Liberia and in all of the cars, mini busses, busses there were discussions.

Usually the one who shouts the loudest wins the argument and when you think people are about to fight, they say “my man, listen,” and the “my man” takes of a lot of the pressure. I’ve seen it so many times here.

Civil Wars

The First Liberian Civil War was an internal conflict in Liberia from 1989 until 1997. The conflict killed about 250,000 people. The Second Liberian Civil War was from 1999 – 2003. After nearly 14 years of Civil War the country is finally safe now, but when the situation get overheated, people can go back in war mode.

Caught In Shootings And Explosions In Liberia

I was caught in shooting and explosions in Liberia. The day before I went on a crazy hunt to find wild, abandoned chimpanzees on an isolated Liberian island, dubbed as ‘The Planet of the Apes.’ Read: The Hunt On Wild Chimpanzees In Liberia,’ but now it was time to go from Liberia to Ivory Coast!

Here’s what happened exactly: I went up 5 am in the morning to find a car from Monrovia to Ivory Coast, because you usually have to wake up early when moving around West Africa to get a car. The car was first full at 9 am though, so it was a long waiting time, but we were now finally ready to go. I was in a Jeep with 7 other African people and off we went!

I sat next to a guy from Ghana, who spoke a good English I could understand easily. There was also a Liberian guy, who was extremely friendly, but I was happy that the man from Ghana was there to translate what he said, because he spoke extremely fast and the Liberian way. Fast talking combined with the Liberian way of speaking English is not the best combination, at least not for me.

The Road Was Blocked. How Come?!

Police blocking the road. What is going on?!

We had been on the road for only 1,5 hour and now the road was blocked. We talked a bit to some of the other passengers in the cars waiting in line, and from what I could understand from the conversations there had been an incident and two kids had died.

I thought it was a bad road incident, which happens here occasionally, but after 30 min of waiting the Liberian guy and I decided to go and check what the problem. There was a lot of noise up there!

“The President Kills Our Children”

We came up to the chaos and walked a bit around. The police were there, but it seemed pretty quiet after all at first. We saw some people who were furious and my Liberian friend and I went over to them to find out what the problem was. A lady was screaming us in the face: “The President is killing our children.”

One of the furious ladies. Lots of aggression

The ladies wanted the President to come and talk, and I was hoping he would come, because I’m a football fan. The President of Liberia is the old football legend, George Weah. His abilities on the football pitch seemed to be better than his presidential ones! At least people were MAD about him in this situation.

Football legend George Weah is the President of Liberia

I honestly didn’t understand the issue really, but the protesters said they would block the road for at least 2-3 days. This was the ONLY International road from Monrovia, Liberia to the border of Ivory Coast.
At this point I thought either they stopped the demonstration or there would be big problems soon. In a country there has been in a war mode not many years ago. A country that’s not afraid to pull the trigger.

Only white man in the place. Would the President come or not?

At one point it seemed like the President would come to give an excuse to the people, but then the reports from the Government changed. I could see the Ghanaian guy from my car running back towards the car. The Police was still passive at this time, but the alarm bells were ringing now. I had to get back to the car.

Get In The Car! Now!

The Liberian guy ran past me and I turned around and ran also. Our car was only 40 meters away from the protests. When we came to the car we stood outside and talked a bit, and the Liberian guy said there was NO CHANCE we would leave today. Just when he said “no chance,” our driver came running from the opposite site of the demonstration and said the police are sending extra forces: “Get in the car. Now!”

Two of the last guys from our car came running in full sprint to the car and jumped in. Literally 5 seconds after we were all in the car, I looked to the right side and from around 50 meter distance I saw a young man throwing something and I yelled: “Get down!” It was a small home-made bomb. Everybody went down beneath the car seats! We could feel the pressure from the bomb inside the car. The car was shaking and right after I could smell the smoke from a battlefield.

I looked up again and from the other side now three Liberian men threw stones at our car, so we were still hiding under the car seats. The driver screamed: “Open the windows,” because if a stone hits glass, it could leave serious damage on the people inside. We were all with the heads down. The protesters were running away and I made a short video footage, where you can hear the gunshots starting to fire from the police.
The women from the demonstration came running now in full speed with crying kids, absolutely horrible.

Liberian woman running from her life. One of the worst days of my life!

The Police Didn’t Want The Protests To Continue – Shoot!

The President had told the police the situation was unacceptable and had told them to act! I saw this woman on the picture above came running past my car window, I looked back and saw a woman was shot in the back head 10 meters away from me. The second after a young man got shot in the back and went straight to the ground. F*CK! I went back under the car seat and heard 5-7 gunshots more and heard a lot of screaming outside. After 1 minute all the people who were protesting and blocking the road were gone.

Police with truncheon and guns. At least 2 were shot dead, I saw it with my own eyes!

I saw two people were shot with my own eyes, but I’m not sure how many were shot in total. A lot of gunshots.. Time was standing still.

All of the people from the demonstration were gone in less than 1 minute

Time To Get Away From The Gunshots

Now we had to escape. Our driver got up from where he was hiding, starting the engine and drove like he was getting casted for a new ‘Fast & The Furious-Movie.’ He destroyed the rear view mirror on another car, because all people just wanted to get away. We really had to get away in a hurry, and he even went off road, where the car was close to turn around. He honestly drove like Michael Schumacher in his heyday. The situation was hectic and scary, still with a lot of violent, unpredictable police around us.

Our driver driving right after he raced through the demonstration. We made it!

A Day Not To Remember

What a day to finish off Liberia, my country number 116. A day I wouldn’t even wish my worst enemy to experience. A day right in the middle of shootings and explosions a little outside of Monrovia, Liberia.

20 minutes after the shootings. Seeing people get shot is something you don’t want to try.

Goodbye Liberia

As I said earlier I don’t know much about the conflict, but blocking the only International road to another country on the African continent usually have bloody consequences. It had today. These protesters put themselves, the road users and worst of all small children in extreme danger by doing this. Not smart. Seeing kids crying, running for their life. Not fun at all. I can’t figure out who were right or wrong though.

Honestly happy I have arrived to Ivory Coast alive, my country number 117. Can’t wait to see what this country has to offer and now it’s time to move forward!

Gustav

gus1thego.com

The Hunt For Wild Chimpanzees (Liberia)

Posted on June 23, 2019June 23, 2019 by dev

Dubbed as the Planet of the Apes, I traveled to the secretive “Monkey Island” in the Liberian jungle, but the hunt to find them wasn’t easy!

How To Find This Place?

I had talked a bit to my Dutch friend Bart about this place, but to be honest I had absolutely no clue how to get there at first. I just heard about the “Monkey Island”, and was a bit fascinated by the story of these aggressive laboratory monkeys living it up on the Liberian island.

What is said to be infected apes with a reputation for attacking invaders are apparently on their own private island in Africa. Going there sounds like something from a horror movie, right?! Anyway it sounded too cool for me to resist, and I always prefer to see animals in the wild and not in a circus or in most zoo’s, where they don’t belong.

Win-win situation!

Jumped on a motorbike with a man and his wife

No Tourist Attraction At All

I quickly found out this place wasn’t a tourist attraction and many people didn’t know the place I was asking for, but I took a shared taxi for around 1 hour south of Monrovia to a small city called Marshall and from there I jumped on a motorbike with a man and his wife. The man was complaining that I was moving too much in the 45 min motorbike drive, but I had his wife’s steel plate and fruits in my back, which caused a lot of pain!

Anyway, the pain shouldn’t stop me from making my way to the chimpanzees!

Corrupt Police Security Point

It’s incredible how much stuff can be on a small African motorbike, right?! I checked my phone and could see we were now close to the place, where the motorbike driver told me I could find a boat to the chimpanzees and right when I looked up from my phone a guy yelled: “HEY!” loudly.

I could see it was a security point and the 4 cops looked really sketchy.

I was sure they would try to get some money out of me. But I met them with a smile and a positive attitude, because I knew all my documents, vaccinations and visas were in order. After a little talk outside, I was taking into Officer Kanneh’s office and he asked me: “What are you doing here?”

I knew if I said I was going to look for the chimpanzees he would probably mention a fee for entrance, so I just said I was going to see the village here and walk around.

He said: “Ok I see. You didn’t know there were chimpanzees here?” I said: “No, are there really?” and looked very surprised.

Officer Kanneh said: “Yes. I can call a guy named Wacki, he know the chimpanzees and he can take you there for free.” I knew it wasn’t going to be free, but I just agreed and Officer Kanneh and his big security guard took me to the lake.

On which other continent would you see two police officers at an important security point just leave their job?

The Two Police Officers And Me Off On Motorbikes

We arrived to the place and it started to rain like crazy. We tried to call Wacki, but he didn’t take the phone. Out of a sudden someone found Wacki in the village and Wacki was very happy to see me and said he wanted to take me to the chimpanzees. But he said he would just go and change his outfit.

We waited for 20 minutes and Wacki didn’t come back.

Me and the corrupt police officers searching for Wacki

Where Is Wacki?

Now it was finally dry, so one of the guys said that we should go now to the “Monkey Island.”

I was sure the guy had coordinated it with Wacki, but I was a bit surprised, when I asked him 5 times about where Wacki was and I didn’t get any respond.

Officer Kanneh was there with us and said Wacki wasn’t here right now, but I could pay 15 dollars and then go with Mr. Mojo’s old fisher boat, instead of Wacki’s kayak.

I knew time was short, because it was raining heavily (it really does here in rain season), so I said let me talk to Mr. Mojo. First of all I told Mr. Mojo that I wanted Wacki to come with me, because he was the expert in the area. Mr. Mojo said it was impossible, because we couldn’t find Wacki. I could tell Mr. Mojo just wanted to benefit from the situation, instead of Wacki, and to be fair I could see this Mr. Mojo was focusing more on the money, whereas Wacki seemed like a really nice person with a big heart.

The Oral Agreement

I looked Mr. Mojo deep in the eyes before the ‘Chimpanzee Hunt’ and said: “I don’t want a boat tour. I want to see chimpanzees. When I’ve seen chimpanzees, I’ll pay you 15 dollars. Not before.”

It was a cheap price indeed, but it’s a lot of money for Liberian people and fuel prices are super cheap here.

He said: “Yes, that’s a deal” and we shaked each other hands. Everybody around us saw it.

From my experience when traveling Africa, it’s always super important to make clear agreements before you do something, otherwise there can sometimes be problems afterwards and you will have to cash out!

It turned out there were big problems here too later! Anyway..

I made sure all the other 20 Liberian guys who were circling around me heard it too, in case Mr. Mojo suddenly ran away from our oral agreement. I wanted to see chimpanzees and after I would pay.

The agreement was reached and I was ready to go with 5 Liberian guys in Mr. Mojo’s old fisher boat

We went out in the old fisher boat, which went from side to side. I’m glad I have Faroese fisherman blood, and even one of the Liberian guys went puking after 30 minutes. That boat was absolutely terrible! I thought it was going to tip over at times, but the water luckily got more quiet. But the weather didn’t.

Water got quiet, but then the rain was incoming!

We started to search for the chimpanzees in two nearby islands, but they were hiding. They had food in the morning, so a guy told us we should come back, when they were hungry again and then suddenly a crazy rainstorm hit us! We had to go back! No chimpanzees!

1.st Attempt – FAIL!

When I came back I could see Mr. Mojo was looking at us and we jumped up of the shaky boat, soaking wet and disappointed and went inside a small stone house. The 5 Liberian guys told Mr. Mojo we didn’t see any chimpanzees and Mr. Mojo then said:

“Ok. But I want my money now.”

I was shocked. 15 dollars is not a problem for me, but to change an agreement is a problem. We made an agreement 1,5 hours before in front of everybody and now Mr. Mojo changed his mind. Waow!

When I’m traveling in Africa I’m a man of principles and I stick to my agreements here, which is one of the reasons I rarely get scammed in Africa. so I reminded Mr. Mojo in a kind way about the agreement we made earlier about the fact that I would pay when I had seen chimpanzees.

Mr. Mojo Got Aggressive

Mr. Mojo went straight to my face and started to yell that he wanted his money now, and he started coming with several racist remark about me, calling me f*cking stupid white man and several other things I don’t want to wrtie, but I kept my calm and didn’t move one step, even though he was right up in my face and I just told him in a polite way.

“How can I be the stupid one? We had a deal?”

I wasn’t scared, because I knew I was right and I knew if he hit me one time, he wouldn’t stand a chance against me. The other guys took him away and told him to calm down, because they all heard the agreement we made. A guy in a yellow shirt came into the circle and that was THE GAME CHANGER!

Wacki And His Friend Were Back!

Wacki came back and he got really pissed off at Mr. Mojo.

Wacki told Mr. Mojo, he shouldn’t take me on his boat, while he was changing his outfit. Wacki apparently lived a little away from the village, and Wacki told Mr. Mojo he knew nothing about finding chimpanzees. Everybody loved Wacki in the little village, and Wacki told me: “Don’t worry my man, my friend will show you chimpanzees.”

After 30 min. of crazy discussions between Mr. Mojo and Wacki, Wacki convinced Mr. Mojo about his plans. I would pay the 15 dollars, when I had seen the chimpanzees and Wacki promised Mr. Mojo I would see them now at the 2. attempt with huge confidence. Wacki told me to go with his friend!

My man!

Everybody in the village had arrived to see our hefty discussions

2. Attempt! Now Or Never

We left the village in the old fisher boat again for a 2. try! Wacki’s friend was really confident, he was actually dancing on the boat and started to say all the names of the monkeys and said he had a great personal relationship with them. I couldn’t help but to smile a bit after some rough hours of discussions.

Our 2. try to find chimpanzees. Wacki’s best friend in the yellow shirt! Top guy

Would We Finally Find The Chimpanzees?

Wacki’s friend was shocked about where the guys had taken me at first, and it turned out Wacki’s friend was right.
Right when we went out to the first place on this boat trip, 3 Chimpanzees came out, when Wacki’s friend started yelling their names. Such a clever animal, no wonder why it’s the most human like animal in the World.

We found them!

The water was shallow at the beach, so we couldn’t really get close, because the chimps could get aggressive with me as a new person they didn’t know, but we went to the other side of the island and got pretty close, where the chimpanzees were in the trees and on the seashore. Wauw, this was it!

CHIMPANZEES! Such an amazing experience getting close to these aggressive, but cute guys

We were all very happy to see the chimpanzees, and even Wacki’s friend’s friend was amazed and was sneaking out his phone and took some nice photos!

Wacki’s friend’s friend was even more hyped than me and took a lot of pics! Awesome chimps!

I couldn’t thank Wacki and Wacki’s friend enough and I gave them a solid well-deserved tip for saving my ‘Chimpanzee Trip’ and then I gave the man his 15 dollars when I came back of course. Even though I was a little mad about his racist remarks and aggressiveness towards me, but I could understand his frustrations too. I just can’t help sticking to the agreements I make. That’s just natural for me.

A hectic, but amazing chimpanzee hunt! Would you do have done the same like me?

Gustav

gus1thego.com

A Super SHITTY Experience (Sierra Leone To Liberia)

Posted on June 21, 2019July 15, 2019 by dev

Sierra Leone

After some relaxing days in Sierra Leone visiting villages, beach hopping and enjoying the capital, Freetown, I thought it was time to make way to by country number 116, Liberia.

The Slow Way To Liberia

I prefered to move slowly from Sierra Leone to Liberia in order to see some new places on the way. I wanted to take my time in Sierra Leone and there were several reasons why. First of all because it’s a pretty relaxed English speaking country in this region, which is rare to find. Secondly because when I entered Sierra Leone from the north, I was almost not allowed to enter. I had to be creative and my quick way of thinking saved me in the last second, otherwise it would have been NO Sierra Leone!

Read ‘2 Seconds From Rejection To Sierra Leone!’

Climbing the Lester Peak with a nice view over Freetown, Sierra Leone

After having a fun time in the north of Sierra Leone in Makeni, I went to Freetown and the area around there for some days. After having seen the beaches in Conakry, Guinea, I was stunned to see the difference in the beauty of the beaches in Sierra Leone in such relatively small distance.

Dirty Beach in Conakry, Guinea

Most beaches in Sierra Leone

Tokeh Beach Resort in Sierra Leone.. Different class!

Hard to leave Sierra Leone

It was honestly nice to relax a bit in Sierra Leone, especially to get out of the capital Freetown and enjoy the small villages and lovely beaches. Also enjoyed to eat some of my favourite West African food, the ‘Sierra Leonean attiéké’, with fermented and grated cassava and a blend of various ingredients. Definitely a different supplement to the rice and fish you’ll get most places here, which can get boring in the long run.

Too late for Liberia

I wasn’t too far from the border to Liberia and wanted to do some more exploring before crossing the border from Sierra Leone to Liberia. What I didn’t think about was that the border from Sierra Leone to Liberia would close at 6.30 pm. I found out of this randomly mid day and thought it was maybe the right time to head down to the border. I had a strong belief I would make it in time, still with plenty hours to go!

In a southern village Gbongay, Sierra Leone

I found a shared car going to the border and negotiated a fair (cheap) price with the driver. There was just one thing wrong. I quickly found out this could be a big problem in order to reach the border in time. Something was wrong with the driver. Me and the other passengers were in deep sh*t literally!

The Driver’s Diarrhea (Mr. Poo Poo)

I sat next to a very funny guy in the shared taxi, who said he was the black Cristiano Ronaldo!

Me and the black Cristiano Ronaldo and another guy out in nowhere, Sierra Leone

We had several stops on the way there and in the beginning we didn’t understand why we stopped the car all the time, because we were in a bit of a rush. The driver kept running away from the car every time he stopped the car. We quickly found out something wasn’t as it should be with him. After a few stops the driver pointed to his stomach and signaled something was wrong. The black Cristiano Ronaldo said: “We have to drive now Mr. Poo Poo” and every one in the car laughed, including the driver, even though he was in pain. Really a shitty situation for all of us, most of all for the driver!

The clock was 5 pm. Only 1,5 hour to the border would close…

We had to keep on going!

“Mr. Poo Poo” in pain! He insisted to keep on driving.. Would we make the border in time?!

The Liberian Border Would Close Soon

The minutes were counting down. Time was now 6 pm, which meant we only had 30 minutes to go, before the border would close!

I talked to the black Cristiano Ronaldo about the possibility of the border still being open, when we arrived, but I could see on my offline Maps.Me that we had at least 40 minutes to go. Time on a map in West Africa is never correct and that’s a fact. We arrived 7.09 pm. 39 min after the border closed!

Border closed 18.30 sharp. We didn’t make it!

Mr. Poo Poo was off to a little home made African toilet immediately at the border, but it didn’t take away the shit we were all in right now!

Me and a Liberian guy at the closed border! Before we knew the consequences of this situation

It was getting dark and I was there with the black Cristiano Ronaldo, the Liberian guy and Mr. Poo Poo and we discussed where we could sleep and none of us had any clue. We really didn’t want to sleep in the car after an exhausting ride. We were out in nowhere and the heavy rain could come anytime.

Stuck at the border between Sierra Leone and Liberia. Rain hits really hard in the night in rainy season!

The driver called someone and the black Cristiano Ronaldo said we could maybe go on some muddy roads through the forest at night to a village. The roads were really muddy, maybe not as muddy as the driver’s underpants, but indeed muddy!

We drove over 4 small rivers during night to find a place to sleep. Driver wasn’t scared we would get stuck with the car in the dark forest

The Right Track

Mr. Poo Poo drove us the right way. We were now in this village the black Cristiano Ronaldo mentioned to him and me and the Black Cristiano Ronaldo and the Liberian guy went out to search for a place to sleep. It was really hard to find anything and there weren’t many people we could ask during the night, but we found a place with a small ‘Motel’ sign, which looked really creepy. They had two rooms available.

What to do!?

Inside the motel at the border. Straight out of a horror movie

We all agreed that I took the single room. Sounded good to me at first, until I found out the lights went on and off every 1 second, the window was open and couldn’t close (would someone jump in or would the mosquitoes bite me like crazy?!), no mosquito net, no toilet. Anyway it was time to sleep.. We were all too exhausted to thing about anything late at night now!

My $7 motel room at the border to Liberia

Good Morning And Hello Liberia

The border crossing went pretty okay, besides a lot of police check points when we entered Liberia, but I was happy to be with the black Cristiano Ronaldo all the way to Monrovia, Liberia. It went a lot smoother with him, because he small-talked to all the police officers and they seemed to like him.

He is honestly a guy I’ll never forget. He was so excited to go home to his wife in Monrovia, Liberia to have a special dish she would make for him. But he came 1 day too late and I saw his girlfriend was texting angry messages to him about him sleeping with his side chick in Sierra Leone. Ouch!

I can confirm he slept with a Liberian guy and I hope for him he had his favourite dish today in Monrovia, Liberia! Top guy!

Me and the black Cristiano Ronaldo in the morning ready to pass the border to Liberia

Will never forget my crossing to Liberia. What a crazy ride it was with great friends! I still can’t believe I had a Near-Death Experience When I Arrived To Monrovia, Liberia.

Liberia. My country number 116.

Take care!

Gustav

gus1thego.com

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