Bob Powell’s neighbours, Debbie and Steve,
visit the Gambia for the first time

Click on pics for bigger

SATURDAY 10

DAY 1

Af-ri-ca, here we come!

Steve and I spent all last night packing like maniacs and racing my youngest son (21), who’s house- and budgie-sitting, round the house saying things like “That’s the deep fat fryer, don’t burn the house down.  These are the budgies, don’t kill them.  This is the vacuum cleaner, try and use it occasionally.”

Bed at 8pm.  Up again at 3am.  Yes, that’s 3 o’clock in the morning.  Adrenaline and excitement forced us from our beds – we were going on holiday, to Africa, yay!

Dragged suitcases next door.  Our neighbour, Bob, runs a Gambian charity and he’d invited us out there to experience a completely different way of life, an offer we simply couldn’t refuse.  His friend, Gary (who we’d never met before) arrived in his big 4x4 thingy and we squeezed multiple suitcases into the boot in the dark without saying a word.  I think we were all still asleep, which was a bit alarming as Gary was driving.

Headed towards Manchester, a two hour drive from Birmingham, although I can’t be certain about this as I slept most of the way. 

At the airport we all had to pay excess on our hefty luggage, which were overweight because we hadn’t really thought about weighing them, we just worried about fitting in enough to last us two weeks (I don’t think the 4 giant hardbacks I’d brought helped much, and I was physically restrained from buying any more books at the airport newsagent - I can't help it, its a disease!) 

Bob had difficulties getting a box of medication for his charity into the plane hold, despite being told by the relevant authorities that there wouldn’t be a problem.  He raced from one side of the airport to the other trying to sort it out and returned to us breathless and red-faced.  Then he had to dump all his bottles of suntan lotion from his hand luggage before he could go through security, and buy it all again on the other side.  He was knackered after that.

The men-types drank lager in the bar.  It was 8am!

6 hour flight wasn’t too bad, no serious withdrawal symptoms from nicotine apart from the twitching and the dribbling and the occasional lapse into Touretts syndrome.  Slept, read, (didn’t watch film as our tv screen was broke!).  Big enough seats (XL Airlines) to not suffer any spasms of claustrophobic cramp or screaming at the door to be let out. 

Took over an hour to fly over the Sahara Desert - that's one big desert!

We landed.  I peered through the window at the blinding sunshine and vultures the size of dogs on the dusty runway.  Ooooooh, exciting landscape, a new country.

The heat hit us like a baseball bat when we got off.  I thought it was the blast from the engines.  It wasn’t.

I stepped into the sunshine and felt my skin crisp immediately.  I can’t begin to describe how hot it was, like being set on fire.  As we stood in the airport area sweating buckets (thinking “Berluddy ‘ell innit ‘ot”) we were assaulted by numerous locals who were quite insistent on carrying our suitcases - they just grabbed our trolleys and bolted for the door assuming we’d follow and pay them (we gave ours a £2 coin and he just looked at it like we’d offered him pigeon droppings).

At security, a big bloke in uniform was trying to ‘extort’ money out of the jet-lagged tourists.  Wearing a peaked cap and strutting around like a mad general, he had a heated argument with a woman who was trying to bring in two packs of cigarettes instead of the allotted one.  “I’ve been here four times,” the woman wailed, “I’ve never had a problem before!”  She tried to grab the bag of cigarettes from him but he fought to keep hold.  Startled, the woman shouted for her husband and he barged passed me with a face like thunder.  I thought there would be a fight, but the husband just tossed the mad general £20 and stormed off with his furious wife in tow.

Hmm, good start – baking heat and almost a punch-up.  It can seem a bit alarming at first – the heat and the bustle – but trust me, by the time you catch the plane home again you’ll be used to it all and well chilled.

The heat prickled our skin like a million giant needles as we stepped outside the airport.   We were told we’d arrived at the hottest time of day (when it’s best to dig a hole somewhere and bury yourself in it to avoid the sun).  I wasn’t sure I could endure such an intense temperature for two whole weeks without turning into a dry husk with a face.

Incredibly hot ride the in taxi to the hotel - Palm Beach in Kotu near Banjul.  Always nerve-wracking when you pull up and see where you’re staying, but the hotel was so picturesque and right next to the sea.  The complex is well laid out with the rooms separated by palm trees and tropical foliage.  It’s like living in the middle of a jungle.  Fabulous!

We were exhausted after our travel and had a bit of a face-down-knackered kip, then readied ourselves to go and explore the area.  There was a swimming pool 15 steps from our room, where we met up with Bob and Gary, and also a local girl called Evelyn.

Hotel pool

Went to Kunte Kinte’s restaurant along the beach front for a fabulous meal; a barbecue with an assortment of unidentified foods to try, including chips served from a washing up bowl.    It was great.

But what’s this?  Jack Daniels was cheap, and they were extraordinarily generous with it!  After the first half-pint measure I cried, “Let’s all get blasted!”  Which I promptly did. 

For entertainment, outside under the starry sky next to the beach, there was a ‘native drums and dancing’ show, which was magnificent.  Steve said, “They’re good,” and I said, “Well, they’ve been practising since the dawn of mankind, I think they’ve got the hang of it now.”

A bit tipsy, I wandered off down the beach a little way and sat on a sun bed on my own, listening to the waves and contemplating the stars and life and stuff.  All alone on the beach.  In Africa.  How fab.

Suddenly, a voice from nowhere said, “Are you alright?”  I looked around but couldn’t see anyone in the pitch dark.  Again, the voice spoke, “Hello? Are you alright?”  I turned and there was a young bloke all wrapped up on the next sunbed – I hadn’t seen him.  In fact, as I looked at him, I still couldn’t see him, he was just a blur of a shape in the dark.  We chatted for a while – he apparently on the beach every night as his home was too far away.  His name was Flecks.  We had a very nice chat, and I never once felt unsafe. 

Steve and I staggered back to our room across the sand, arm in arm, really bloody drunk. 

Before we got into bed, he spotted our sheets with citronella oil (which helps keep the mozzies away).  He did it so vigorously I said, “You’re only supposed to put a few drops down, you’re not giving a blessing with holy water!”

Slept.

SUNDAY 11

DAY 2

Lounged on the beautiful beach in the gorgeous sun.  So hot.  So lovely.  A veritable Paradise.

Bob arranged for a coconut to be cut down from one of the trees and brought over to me, freshly opened – it was delicious (the flesh inside was soft, the texture of uncooked fish).

Look at me, I thought, eating fresh coconut on an African beach.  This was so the life! 

We have never chilled so fast on holiday, it normally takes at least 48 hours to clamber off the hamster wheel of corporate slavery and relax.  Here, less than 24!  Lying on a sunkissed beach certainly forces you to depths of relaxation you’ve never experienced before and leaves you permanently floating on the edge of a coma.

Waitresses came out of the nearby beach bar to ask if you needed anything.  If you raised a hand they rushed over and provided you with drinks or snacks.  You didn’t have to move a muscle except to stagger to the water or the loo.

On a little stage to one side, drummers enthralled us with their sounds.  On the beach, men with horses walked up and down looking for customers, as did a battalion of ‘bumsters’ selling watches and trinkets.  A man with an enormous smile sidled sideways in front of all the horizontal holidaymakers like a crab, holding out his arms to display a beach towel; minutes later he sidled back the other way with a different towel – he did this all day and his huge smile never faltered. 

As we were obviously ‘newcomers’ with skin the colour of bleached snow, we were constantly assailed by the ‘bumsters’ who walk up and down trying to sell their wares.  They can be quite pushy, especially as Steve had already bought two ‘Rolex’ watches off them (obviously an easy touch).  In the end we decided to play Good Cop Bad Cop, with me pretending to be the Bitch Wife From Hell and hissing, “You’re not paying that much for a watch!” - Steve was alarmed at the ease with which I assumed the part! 

Just a relaxing day soaking up the sun, followed by a meal at Mama’s with Sulleyman (the Vice-President’s son) and Evelyn.

S’great.  Love it.

MONDAY 12

DAY 3

Banjul Market today.  “Go when it’s quiet,” our party were told, “After 1 o’clock.”

There’s a reason why it’s quiet after 1 o’clock.  It’s because it’s too hot for the locals.

Mad dogs and Englishmen!

Approaching Banjul market

The market was like something you’d imagine in India.  A long dusty road with crammed shops on each side and goods piled outside and rubbish in the gutters and crowds of slow-moving people, none of them white apart from us.  And it was so incredibly, unbelievably hot.  Two local girls, Isha and Moosa, came with us to barter for a good price on material.  They were great, like personal shoppers (I want to bring them home with me!).

Moosa, Mother and Isha

Walked down the never-ending road looking for sandals for Steve.  Melting. Baking.  Blistering heat.  No hat.  Head pounding.  Heat bouncing up off the ground and scorching the skin off my legs.  Felt a bit sick and had to sit down in the gutter every time the entourage stopped to inspect a pile of sandals.  From one shop to another.  And another.  “What do you think of these?” Steve kept asking.  “Yeah, them,” I said, as the world fuzzed a bit, “Buy them.”

Took our purchases back to the taxi, then we wandered off to an indoor market to buy me a much needed hat.  Steve somehow got detached.  As he walked away from the taxi in the wrong direction, several locals all pointed the other way, shouting, “They went that way!”  We don’t look the least bit like tourists!

As we entered the indoor market I thought I was actually going to die from the suffocating heat.  My whole body throbbed with it and my head felt like it was going to explode.  The girls showed me baseball caps.  “No,” I managed to say, “I want a Panama hat.”  Like Steve was wearing, which is why we drew so much attention everywhere we went (“Look!  A mad Englishman wearing a Panama hat!  And his madder woman, not wearing a hat at all!”).

Look, but don't torch!

Hassled by market holders, I reached the point where I was on the verge of buying a straw Chinese coollie hat just to get something on my head and get the hell out of there.  But my ‘personal shoppers’, who clearly had more fashion sense than me (not difficult) recommended a floppy hat.  It became known as the Twitcher’s Hat because every single time I wore it people asked if I was a bloody bird watcher.  I ended up stealing Steve’s Panama at every opportunity.

Finally we slumped back into the baking taxi.  It was so hot I couldn’t rest my hands anywhere as they just poured with sweat.  We were 45 minutes from our hotel.  I cried, “I’m jumping straight in the swimming pool fully clothed when I get back!”  The girls laughed.  “Really?” they gasped.  “Oh yeah,” I sweated, profusely.  I was but a dry husk.

I didn’t jump in the swimming pool, but I did rush to our room to tear off all my clothes and stand under the air conditioning unit crying, “Farkin’ ‘ell it’s ‘ot!”.

A shower, some grub, and then Steve and I, along with our ‘personal shoppers’, Isha and Moosa, piled into a taxi because their mother was a seamstress.  We’d heard that you could get clothes made up really cheaply here, and that’s what we were doing – two African outfits made from the cloth we’d chosen from the market. 

It was another 45 minutes drive away from the hotel, down dusty roads lined by shacks with families lethargically sitting outside.  So hot.  So much acute poverty.  People here literally have nothing – there’s no state welfare and few jobs (the average wage is about £12 a month).  Everything is ‘make-do’, the houses/shacks made from corrugated metal, fences made out of dried palm leaves, and no bin-men every Wednesday morning to take the rubbish away so it gathers at the roadside.  Chickens and goats wander around nibbling the ground for food.  Children run around naked.  Fed-up donkeys pull wooden carts loaded sky-high with wood.

The taxi drove down a particularly narrow alleyway where the sand had drifted all up the side of a building made of breezeblocks.  The car slipped and slid like it was on ice.  Another corner, and then we pulled up outside some metal gates.  “This is our compound,” the girls said.

Inside was an open courtyard with a pile of wood and a goat tethered on the left hand side.  On the right, two very small concrete houses where other families lived (not the mud huts and thatched roofs I was expecting).  In front was the girl’s house, where the mother, resplendent in her best glittery green costume, welcomed us profusely.  There were small children everywhere, at least 5 of them, but the house was very clean and tidy, although it didn’t seem big enough to house so many people (I think there were 11 people living in it).

Isha and Moosa's family

We chatted.  We were measured by a man we weren’t introduced to - he could have been anyone, just some bloke who’d wandered in off the dusty track.  They spoke about their abject poverty and their struggle to survive.  It was quite an eye opener.

They showed me samples of their mother’s work, which was astonishing – intricately made bodices with a long fitted skirt to match.  It looked fabulous, exactly what I wanted.  Steve was having a traditional male outfit done.

£20 for the material from the market, £20 to have two bespoke outfits lined and made up specially for us.  Amazing.  Steve went back out to taxi where he’d left his wallet with the driver for safekeeping - the thought of the taxi driver abandoning us with our dosh clearly didn’t occur to him, but then, he was an exceedingly good taxi driver (Yaya, an absolute gem of a man).

YAYA AT BANJUL MARKET

It was an interesting journey, seeing the real Africa, how people live, how people survive.  Such a contrast to the way we live, I almost felt guilty for our apparent wealth and easy lifestyles.  Nothing is easy here.  But that’s the way it’s always been.  Having seen it for myself, Africa won’t seem quite so far away when it features on the news.

They have Chinese restaurants here.  Who knew!  And very nice it was too.

L-R: Gary, Steve, Evelyn and Bob

TUESDAY 13

DAY 4

Bob – who has been to Gambia many times – was keen to show us the sights and whisked us off to Tanji fishing village.  I imagined something similar to a Cornish village with pretty boats bobbing on the water.  In reality, it was shockingly squalid.  Fish were everywhere – drying on plastic on the floor at the side of the road, on smoking tables, left in piles on the ground, just strewn around in wild abandonment.  It looked like a bomb had gone off in a fish factory. 

We stared at the fish in the smoking rooms with as much interest as we could muster when faced with so much dried fish.  A man covered in dust and charcoal pulled one apart and offered me a piece, his hands looking as though they’d never seen clean water.  I nibbled a corner and discretely tossed the rest away, but he offered more, everywhere we went fish were pulled apart and offered to us.  I don’t even like fish, and this stuff tasted disgusting, like licking a fire-grate.  Apparently they pack it into wooden crates and sell it all over Africa.  It even goes to Paris - I wondered if the Parisians, sitting in their cafes eating ‘authentic African fish’ had any idea how its made, how many flies have crawled over it, how many dirty, dusty fingers have handled it.

Children clamoured round us.  What nice children, I thought, as they held my hands and said I was their friend.  They mentioned over and over again that they’d like a football, they loved football, they didn’t have a football and they’d like one.  They spoke extremely good English (as did all Gambians, they learn it at school). 

As we were leaving, the ‘cute’ children became agitated.  “Buy them a football,” I said to Steve, and he went to a stall (which just happened to sell a load of footballs) and bought two.  Suddenly, the cute children turned angry and stormed up to me, shouting, “He’s only bought two footballs and there’s five of us!” 

We walked to our taxi and the children followed, shouting indignantly for more footballs.  Our taxi driver shooed them off.  Just before we pulled away, a thin arm reached in through the window and snatched our water bottle.

Little buggers.

As we bounced back onto the road I looked back and noticed on one of the dirty wooden shacks at the top of the village a sign which read, “Conference facilities available.”  Utterly cracked me up.

Drove up to Paradise Beach.  Open backed safari jeeps passed us on the road with middle-aged women bouncing around in the back, bright red and sweating in the midday sun.  The men sat in the cab.

Ate Chicken Yasa, a local dish (and very nice too) in an open restaurant, but we were starting to flag in the heat and didn’t see the beach itself.  We thought we were going back to the hotel afterwards as we’d already been out for some hours, but Bob had other plans.  The taxi suddenly pulled down a dirt track.  Currently reading Dean Koontz’s The Husband (dead good), I immediately imagined us being killed in the ‘outback’ by a driver driven insane by our demands.  I made Psycho stabbing motions on the back seat to warn Steve, he just rolled his eyes.

We pulled up outside a monkey sanctuary in Sennegambia and Bob quickly led us inside.  We were all hot and tired, but he was determined to show us the monkeys.  It was, apparently, an 8 mile walk around the whole sanctuary and for the first 20 minutes we saw zero primates.  I, however, marvelled at the enormous palm trees with the sagging fronds like dried bones – I kept expecting a Tyrannosaurus Rex to come bursting through the fossilised forest at any minute. 

Eventually we came across a group of small green monkeys (Green Velvets), including one that clearly loved the camera – I called it Jordan because every time we took its picture it would change its pose as if saying ‘Take me like this.  Now this.  And this is my best side.’ 

On our way back we saw red monkeys (Red Colobus) who were shy and antisocial and inclined to ‘pee’ on the tourists from a great height, so we stared up at them and dodged a bit.

Steve and Bob admire an enormous termite mound

We drove back to our hotel, passing the fishing village.  The taxi slowed down.  “You want to see the fishing boats come in?” Yaya asked.  I wanted nothing less.  Resisting the urge to scream, “NO!” I instead said I didn’t mind if we carried on as we were all tired.

Sleep, shower, and out to Ali Baba’s restaurant in Kololi. 

WEDNESDAY 14

DAY 5

Woke with hangover, but no time to lounge around and recover, we had something rather important to do.

Drove into Banjul, the capital of the Gambia, to the official government office.  It was staffed by very bored looking people in tiny offices bereft of any kind of modern technology (certainly not computers, and I didn’t see a typewriter).  People shoved passed each other into paper-strewn rooms, filling out forms.  A woman gave us a badly photocopied form to fill in (the merest details) and asked for photographs and copies of our passports, which we didn’t have (and they, wouldn't ya know, didn’t have a photocopier). 

So off to Banjul town centre to get them done.  The photos were awful, the flash stripped my face of any colour and I looked like a white balloon with eyes.  The young girl who did our photocopies was the slowest moving person I’d ever seen in my life – took 5 whole minutes for her to place the paper on the glass and press the button, I could feel myself aging just watching her..

Aaaaaand back to the government office again, where we were told the certificate we wanted would take two weeks.  Hmmm.  Evelyn negotiated a price to get them done faster – ie, she offered a bribe to government officials, which is apparently the ‘done thing’.  Oh, and we needed a copy of some other papers too, like they couldn’t have bloody mentioned that before.  So back to Banjul town centre to get more photocopies done at an ex-cru-ci-a-ting pace.  And back to the office again.

“Go pay at cashiers office,” we were told.  We went along a corridor until we came to two doors with bits of paper stuck to them.  One read ‘Cashier’ the other read ‘Not the cashier’.  We handed over the pricely sum of £4.50.

Next, off to buy some rings.  Apparently there is only one shop in all of Gambia that sells authentic African gold.  We were taken there, down a street that wouldn’t look out of place on a news item from Beirut.  The shop was all boarded up and locked with chains and padlocks.  We rang the telephone number displayed above and were told to “Come down the side.”  We did.  The ‘side’ was a dark alleyway, at the end of which stood a man who was just washing his feet!  He led us through a tiny room that was a kitchen cum workshop area filled with several dozen mangy cats, down a dank corridor and into the ‘shop’. 

Shop?  Wait while I stop laughing.  It was his bedroom, complete with an unmade bed which looked about a hundred years old and decaying curtains at the barred windows.  He herded all 6 of us (including Evelyn and Yaya) inside the tiny room and locked the door behind us!  I couldn’t see any gold.  I couldn’t see anything except the image of my own death flashing in front of my eyes.

The man pulled a glass case away from a brown wall and stood behind it.  This was his shop.  I looked through the dusty glass.  “Where’s the gold rings?” I asked.

“Here,” barked the man, pulling out 4 identical plain rings in various sizes.  I found one that fitted, Steve didn’t.  The man – who spoke as if he were addressing an audience at Wembley Stadium without the aid of a microphone – said he would make one to fit within the hour.

“How much?” I asked, and the bellowing man went into overdrive, pulled open an ancient catalogue on top of the glass case and pointed at rings which had prices written next to them.  8,000 delases for something not much thicker than copper wire – that’s £160.  Each!

“No,” I said, and the man yabbered on, pointing at different rings, telling us the prices were non-negotiable, the prices were fixed, his voice getting louder and more agitated.   “They’re too much,” I said, “They’re cheaper in Birmingham.”

Our eardrums were severely assaulted as the man tried to convince us (through sheer volume alone) that it was the best gold, that he was the best goldsmith, that we wouldn’t get rings of this quality anywhere else for that price.  I glanced nervously at the locked door.  The others were looking a bit fidgety too.  Eventually, when I thought my eardrums would explode from the verbal onslaught, I said, “Can we think about it and come back later?”

There was a millisecond of utter silence.  And then, to my amazement (and enormous relief) the man said, “Yes.”  And he stopped yabbering.  And he unlocked the door.  And we made a hasty exit with me muttering, “We are not paying £160 per ring and we are definitely not coming back here.”

After recovering from our near-death experience, we went to another restaurant on the night – my head was spinning at this point and can’t remember which one.  I do remember the entertainment was local dancing, followed by a band playing When The Saints Go Marching In on 45rpm.  I wanted to rush up with some Red Bull and maybe a Speed tablet (like I know what I’m talking about!).  Fortunately, the company was good and, oddly, the more we drank, the better they sounded.

THURSDAY 15

DAY 6

We were on the beach at 8am.  It was a bit cold (cold? in Africa?), but we’ve been here nearly a week now and I still look like a milk bottle.  Time to get some serious tanning done.

Spent the day worshipping the sun.  As always, I lathered on the Factor 97 sun cream so I wouldn’t burn and lay in the sun with a gentle breeze coming in from the sea, cooling us.  Covered up, uncovered, waded into sea, covered, uncovered.  Read book on my front, lying on my back, on one side and then the other. 

For 10 solid hours! 

Sun cream worked quite well, as did the constant, cooling sea breeze.  I didn’t feel hot at all.

Not then.

An hour after I left the beach, I turned red.  I turned red like a bulb in an Amsterdam brothel.  My back glowed with a strange pattern from my one-piece swimming costume.  My feet – which I always forget to cream since they’re so far away – pulsated up at me accusingly.  My forehead blinded me in the mirror.  It felt like I had third-degree burns.

I think it was third-degree burns.

I lathered on the Aftersun, which soaked into my skin like water on a dried up river bed.  I used half a bottle, and my tortured skin still gasped for more.  And then I suddenly felt very cold.  I started shivering. 

Bloody heat-stroke!

Wearing pretty much everything I had to keep warm and still trembling like a terrified whippet, our group went out that night to an Indian restaurant, which I was really looking forward to as I was craving a decent curry (along with Warburtons bread, a bacon and mushroom sandwich and Steve’s curry).  Went to the Clay Oven in Fajara, which is very upmarket, very fabulous, and the food was to die for.  Sat at the table eating spicy food with my skin screaming in agony and my head throbbing.  After the meal I felt a bit funny, kind of dizzy and light-headed, and toddled off to the Ladies (the like of which I’d never seen – it could have been an Indian Palace). 

Suddenly, sitting on the loo, I realised I was going to pass out.  I was locked in the Ladies about to collapse in a heap on the floor and nobody would be able to get in.  I was going to die on my own!

Somehow, no idea how, I managed to stagger back to our table and, rather undignified, cried, “Steve!  Come with me!”  I found a chair and sat down as the world revolved around me rather fast.

And then I felt worse.  Heat stroke and spicy curry, not a good combination.  I suddenly felt nauseous and faint and stumbled into the Men’s Loo (I wasn’t thinking straight at this point, I was just concentrating on Not Dying).  Steve came with me.  It was awful.  I felt like a squeezed sponge, incredibly hot and sweating profusely, sweating buckets.  Iced water was brought.  The horribleness faded.  I staggered back to our table and Steve raced off to tell the restaurant manager that it wasn’t his food, the food was delicious, I was just a daft old bat who’d spent 10 hours in the sun!

It was all very embarrassing.

[If you’re ever in Gambia, go to the Clay Oven.  Not only are the surroundings rather splendid and the food really the best you’ll ever taste, but the owner is rather dishy.  9 people can sit at a table and he’ll remember every item they order.  And it’s not horribly expensive, about the same price you’d pay for a takeaway at home.]

FRIDAY 16

DAY 7

Friday, already!  The days pass so fast (and there was me worrying about getting homesick).  There’s so much to see, to do, to savour, to experience.  It’s great.  The people – total strangers – always say Hello and ask how you are, and they mean it, they really want to know.  And the smiles!  No wonder they call it the Smiling Coast, everyone has such enormous white smiles.

Today, a local craft market up the road as I was desperate for some African artwork.  It was a tiny plac, with not many ‘tourists’, so we were mercilessly assaulted as soon as we walked in.  “Look at my stall!” “Come and look!”  “Here boss lady, you buy something from me!” 

"Take my picture!" he cried, posing

We bought something from one stall and, outside, the neighbouring stallholder cried, “You buy something from me now!” like a stroppy toddler.

Bartering is fun once you get the hang of it.  They tell you how much it is, you gasp in horror or laugh at the audacity, and give them some ludicrously low price.  The thing is to look at it and decide how much you’re willing to pay, and stick to it.  If they want more, walk away, they’ll panic and sell it to you for almost nothing.  Picked up some brilliant big-headed statues for £4 each (400D), and loads of other stuff as gifts.  We started off crap but quickly became experts in the great art of bartering – even our taxi driver (who laughed hysterically at how much we’d paid for fake Rolex watches) was impressed with our ‘bargains’.

We came home with pretty much everything!

SATURDAY 17

DAY 8

Spent all day on the beach, just lounging and desperately trying to catch a tan because I still, after a whole week in Africa, look like an albino about to faint.  Drinks and food were brought to us from the hotel beach bar, we were waited on hand and foot so we didn’t even have to move.  It was paradise.  I was an utter slob, just me and my new book.

They played drums on the stage area outside the hotel beach bar.  Steve was clearly itching to get up and have a go.  “Go for it!” I told him, and up he went, playing the big bass drum.  He was quite good. 

That's Bob laughing hysterically in the background

Enthused, he wanted to go on one of the horses that parade up and down the beach (the riders shouting, “Hey, you wanna ride?” at anyone who dares look in their direction, and God help you if you have to walk passed them to the water ... "You wanna ride?"  "Er, no thanks, I'm wearing a swimming costume at the moment.").  I suggested he leave it until the end of the holiday so that any broken limbs won’t spoil anything (I don’t fancy pushing a wheelchair around in this heat).

A middle-aged, pale, blonde woman sat in the beach bar being attended to by the staff.  Heat stroke.  A terrible thing, don’t do it.  I keep to the shadows now, I’m like a ghost, creeping around the perimeter of sunlight wearing Steve’s Panama hat, which is too large (he has a big head) but I don’t care.

This is actually a Dakar Car Rally 4x4 truck that travelled across the Sahara and had good luck wishes written all over it.  There were several of these in the hotel car park waiting to be sold.

A sad thing happened.  I took Pinky and Yellowbelly – who have come with us on all our travels - down to the beach with us and laid them out on the sunbed ready for a photoshoot.  I promptly forgot about them.  When we were away from our beds buying smoothies from a beach hut (made using a fork, takes bloody ages), Pinky and Yellowbelly disappeared.  I was gutted.

Farewell our travelling companions.  We’ll miss you.

Bob and Gary went off on their own that night, while we sat at the pool bar watching a ‘cabaret’ - miming to Michael Jackson featured a lot, but it was good in a really bad kind of way.  Had a chicken meal where the chicken had obviously been starved to death.

And slept.  Never slept so much in my whole life.  We go to bed early and wake up late.  So much sleep.  We’ve either become incredibly lethargic in the heat or else we’re so exhausted from work and life back home. 

We sleep like coma victims.

SUNDAY 18

DAY 9

So, wadda we wanna do today?

Gary came to our room this morning with his back glowing red from too much sun.  He said he’d felt really ill in the night, shivery and sweating.  We threw him down on our bed and lathered him with aftersun lotion.

Today, Serrekunda Market.  After Banjul, I was a big dubious about wandering around another overcrowded, blistering hot market, but this one seemed better, or else we’re getting used to it.  It was a ‘main’ road to Serrekunda, red and dusty with huge craters to navigate.  Traffic moved from one side of the road to the other in front of oncoming traffic to avoid the potholes – if there was any road system at all I couldn’t figure it out.  And on either side of us, shops and stalls and bright, colourful people walking up and down.

Our brilliant taxi driver, Yaya, said if we saw anything we liked we should tell him and he would barter for it to get a good price (so we wouldn’t get ripped off).  We bought a couple of rings for £5.  “Silver,” the seller told us.  “Aluminium,” we said. 

I marveled at the people sitting on the dusty ground selling spices and dried fish (so dry most of the flesh had fallen off and bare bones lay waiting to be sold); tiny dried chillies, flour in huge barrels, great tablets of soap with In Allah We Trust written on them, tiny pumpkins, deformed tomatoes, potatoes, unidentified stuff in bags, fresh fish smothered in flies, bright red meat, and live chickens in cages.  So noisy.  So colourful.  So completely different to shopping in Sainsburys.

And hot.  Midday.  Baking heat.  Overhead, vultures circled round and round in the thermals, maybe having heard that there were mad British people down below.  White egrets sat in trees heavy with mangos.  We bought cans of drinks and chatted to the young man running the tiny shop, offering our services to sell more drinks for him.  A man tried to sell us ‘real leather’ sandals and, failing miserably, asked for a drink on credit.  We sat and watched the market walk passed.  Nice to stop and sit and stare.  Such an amazing place, such fabulous people.

Then back in the taxi, whizzing off to … the Crocodile Pool in Bakau.  It was down a long, dusty road lined on either side by ‘compounds’.  Half naked children played by open sewers.  Sometimes the poverty just makes you catch your breath.

Crocodiles.  Lounging around, not moving, motionless, “Dead?” I asked.  Or stuffed.  Or drugged up to the eyeballs.  “Touch it,” said the man.  “The hell,” said I.  But I was encouraged to touch the rough hide and hold its floppy arm. 

We walked round the green algaed pool with 20 or more alligators lined around it, basking in the sun with their mouths open.  We found a few really large ones on top.  “Hold his tail,” I was told.  I stepped back about 15 feet - I’ve watched the Discovery Channel, I know how fast these things move when they want to.  Hold his tail?  You’re not getting me anywhere near the bloody thing, mate.

Hold his tail, said the man to Steve, then turned to talk to Gary

Steve after the visit to the Crocodile Pool -
note his missing right arm (not really!)

I bought a crocodile tooth.  They said it would bring good luck.  Every single thing they sell here brings you good luck.  Crocodile teeth are supposed to make a woman fertile.  If this tooth makes us pregnant it will feature on the front page of every newspaper in the world (we’d call it Jesus Christ!).

Passed a carving market on the way back.  “Do you want to stop?” asked Yaya, when he saw me bouncing up and down with enthusiasm on the back seat.  The apathy oozing like a mudslide from the men-types was palpable ,so we carried on.  I don’t think you can ever have too many African carvings.

It was 3pm by the time we got back to the hotel.  Strange, but you tend not to feel hungry here, either because of the heat or because we’re too busy going places to think about eating.  Dashed down to beach bar for a sandwich, then back to hotel room for yet more sleep.  So much sleep!  We’re almost catatonic.

Mexican restaurant on the night, Weezo’s in Fajara.  Fabulous food.  You just don’t expect so much choice and fine cuisine in Africa, but its there.  A hyperactive British bloke who would be perfect as a children’s television presenter regaled us with tales of his life in Africa.  He was massively entertaining and a great advertisement for ‘leaving the rat race’.

The men-types went down to the beach bar afterwards, I sloped off to … sleep.

MONDAY 19

DAY 10

A pretty busy day.  Determined to wake up early and fight off the sleeping sickness that seems to have overwhelmed us, up at 7.30am for a walk along the beach.  It was blowing a gale but warm, and best of all there was no-one else around.  A massive jellyfish was embedded in the sand, it looked like a Man O’War.  I prodded it with a stick but it didn’t move – it was surprisingly solid (I thought it would be all squishy).

The tide was in, bringing flotsam and jetsam.  I found a cuttlefish bone.  Then another.  And another.  They were strewn all over the beach in various sizes.  The budgies will be pleased.  We may start up our own cuttlefish bone empire. 

Then off to an indoor carving market at Sanyang, where an ancient man refused to let go of my wrist until I’d bought the ugliest carving in the world for £2.  We’re used to the pressure to buy things now and I’m quite adept at haggling, but Steve is even better - he walked away from one stall clutching an armful of goodies, and our Gambian driver said the stall holder called him a hard man to bargain with. 

Afterwards Steve and I took a taxi to the seamstress’ house (the one who’d made our outfits) because mine needed slight alteration.  They brought out a tray of food which was at least a foot across, piled high with rice and vegetables and fish (complete with heads).  There was so much of it we barely made a dent, but we had to try so as not to offend.  And what do you do with fishbones stuck in your mouth, spit them out?  In fact it wasn't fish at all, it was just a mass of bones in the shape of a fish.  We insisted Yaya, the taxi driver, help us out, but there was still loads left. 

As Bob had suggested, we presented them with a 56lb bag of rice and a huge barrel of cooking oil to thank them for their services.  All the women immediately burst into tears, they were so pleased - but then, so were we, with our outfits and their hospitality (we’ve eaten in a real African’s home, how amazing is that?). 

TUESDAY 20

DAY 11 – THE “BIG” DAY

Bob’s friend, Sullyman (son of the Vice-President of Gambia, no less) said that all we had to do to get married in Gambia was to register our plans at the government office in Banjul, which we’d done last week, and then he would personally deliver the certificate to us at our hotel.  Bob told us not to worry, Sullyman would ‘take care of everything’.  Only Sullyman didn’t actually ask our full names until Sunday night, which was slightly worrying! 

Yesterday, realising things weren’t going quite according to plan, we dashed back to the government office in Banjul and were told our certificate still wasn’t ready.  My heart just dropped like a rock and I was rigid with stress as everyone tried to figure out what was going on.  A friend of Evelyn’s said he knew someone who could help – it’s not what you know but who you know that counts, and everybody here knows somebody.  We were taken to a tiny room where a ‘top government official’ (aka Obi One Kanobe) resided.  “Two weeks to get a certificate?” he cried (well, croaked, he was very old), “That’s too long.”  And off he toddles to ‘sort it out’, leaving all of us in the room to suffocate as we discussed how much we should give him. 

Presently, the old man shuffles back and, after pressing some dosh into his wrinkled hands, he says it will be ready the following day – today.  We’ve bribed a top Gambian government official to get a marriage licence, how many people can say they’ve done that?

Our original plan had been to register our marriage, collect the certificate from the government office, stand on an empty beach at dusk and have Gary say, “D’ya wanna?” and we would say, “Yeah” and he would say, “It’s done.”  Just something nice and simple. 

Ha!  Such naïve fools.  There was so much red tape involved I’m surprised anybody manages to get married at all.  And I thought I was deftly avoiding all the stress involved in ‘tying the knot’!

This morning, we went back yet again to the government office to ‘collect our certificate’.  Only a woman in a suit said we couldn’t just ‘pick it up’, it had to be done properly, with lawyers and stuff.

“Can’t you do it now?” I asked her desperately.  “No,” she said, “Too busy.”  And indeed the government building was busy, filled with a queue of people waiting to get married – mostly Africans, but some whites to Africans (one woman looking as happy as if she was standing in a very long queue at Tescos).  Everyone was dressed up, but my party were all in shorts – well, we hadn’t expected to do it there and then!

“When do you want it doing?” asked the woman.

“Today,” we said.

She shook her head and all my internal organs dropped down to my ankles.

“What time today?” she asked.

“Five o’clock?”

“No, can’t do 5 o’clock.  You come back at 2 and I’ll do it then.”

Once again Evelyn came to our rescue and did some fast-talking and money slipping.  The suited woman eventually agreed to come to our hotel at 2pm.

Just as we were about to walk out of the tiny office, I spotted our certificate on a desk and asked to look at it.  I nearly cried.  They’d spelled Steve’s name wrong.  Slipping into Horrified Secretary mode, I said, “You’ll change that, won’t you?” “Yes,” the woman barked.  I wasn’t convinced

I had a major attack of nerves as we left and a bit of a ‘moment’ in the taxi on the way back to our hotel.  Although we’d done barely any planning (‘we’ll take it as it comes’ was our motto – a ridiculous attitude), I was suddenly worried that our ‘big event’ wasn’t going to happen.  The taxi stopped to let the men-types out to buy something and I did some girlie wailing for a bit.  Then we roared back to our hotel to ‘get ready’ for the Big Event.

We were getting married.

I hoped.

Throwing Steve out of our room, I hurried to shower and Get Glamorous.  The cleaning woman arrived, I could not get rid of her.  Eager to put on my newly-made Gambian outfit – my wedding dress – the cleaner changed the bed sheets with all the speed of a drugged sloth.  Eventually, when she lethargically began to drag a mop around, I snapped, “That’ll do, you can leave the rest,” and she finally shuffled off. 

Minutes later, she was back with more sheets, saying she wanted to make the bed ‘really special’ for our special day, which was very nice of her but there wasn’t going to be a special day if she didn’t bugger off and let me get ready.  I ushered her out of the room again.  A short while later she reappeared with a bucket and cloth. 

“Er, can you do this later?” I said, a bit exasperated. 

“I wait until you go,” she said, leaning against the wall, “Then clean your room.” 

Gary walked passed at that moment and bawled, “Come back later, she’s getting married!”  And she finally disappeared – sometimes it takes a man and a big voice to get things done.

Yaya, our taxi driver, was supposed to set off for Banjul to pick up the registrars at 1.30 (to bring them back by 2pm).  At 1.50 we suddenly discovered he was waiting outside our hotel expecting us to come out, while we waited inside thinking he’d already gone.

I had another blubbing episode whilst struggling to put on mascara, which is pretty bloody difficult I can tell you.  Isha appeared, obviously having been sent by the men-types to ‘sort me out’.

The men were quite brilliant, complete stars.  Because we hadn’t actually planned anything (and we were getting married in less than two hours) they raced around the hotel shouting orders.  They organised a bouquet at the last minute, telling the hotel gardener to throw some flowers together, which they did in spectacular style (and they decorated the steps in front of my room).

PIC OF ME IN FRONT OF ROOM - to come

They organised a decorated table at the beach bar, ordered crates of drinks and met the late-arriving registrars. 

My wedding dress (complete with silver sequins) made me feel very thin and glamorous.  I looked like Catherine Zeta Jones … well, I thought I did until I saw the photos.  But hell, I felt great and that’s all that matters.  Felt great, and sick, and utterly terrified, and I could not stop going to the toilet.  I poured myself a really massive glass of Jack Daniels, but it didn't help.  Had another, and I was still shaking like a leaf in a storm.

Bob eventually ‘came for me’.  I held his hand, held it tight, held it until he cried, “For God’s sake, Deb, you’re breaking bones!”

I’ve never been so scared in all my life as I was led from the hotel room down the walkway to the beach.  And there, in the beach bar, was a resplendent setting.  A table all laid out with flowers, behind which sat two registrars, in front of which stood Steve, looking stunningly handsome.  On the table lay a book of marriage certificates - I quickly scoured the open page to make sure they’d spelled our names correctly - they had (phew). 

Moosa and Isha on the left, me checking our names were spelled correctly on the marriage certificate,
Steve looking quite pleased with himself

The ‘ceremony’ began.  A bible was brought out.  “Can’t we do it without that?” I asked, “Only we’re atheists and – “

“No,” barked the registrar, “This is how we do it.”

Oh, okay then.

We read out words from photocopied strips of paper, glancing nervously at each other.   Here we were, getting married on an African beach wearing African outfits and surrounded by locals who all seemed so incredibly happy for us.  The sun shone, the waves lapped, and sunbathers wandered up to the bar to see what was going on.  Suddenly we had a massive crowd watching us.

We swapped out aluminium rings and kissed.  “Oh my God!  We’ve done it!  We got married!”  Bob and Gary were our witnesses and signed the marriage certificate.  No less than 4 photographers took pictures – we have loads!  The crowd applauded.

African drums started up.  Everyone began dancing, traditional African dancing.  A ‘wedding cake’ was brought out … Bob and Gary had bought it on our way back from Banjul while I was busy sobbing in the car – I love these men! 

We drank.  We danced.  We held hands and stared in amazement at each other.  “Husband,” I said.  “Wife,” he said.  We were both pretty stunned, both by the event and by the effort people had gone to to make it so lovely, especially Bob and Gary.  Total strangers in bikinis came up and congratulated us, said how lovely my dress was, what a splendidly different wedding it was.  A bumster tried to sell us jewellery!

It was magical.

The photographer dragged us onto the beach for photographs.  We stood under a palm tree. 

PIC - to come

He led us towards the hoards of sunbathers and I wasn’t keen. 

PIC - to come

The photographer then insisted we stand at the water’s edge for pictures, which entailed a long walk across the hot sand through all the sunbeds filled with slowly-roasting holidaymakers – not a chance in hell.  I went back to the beach bar where I felt comfortable, where I felt like Catherine Zeta Jones.

I drank Jack Daniels until early evening.  We’d done it, and we’d done it ‘our way’.  No months of preparation, no descent of hoards of descending relatives, no stressing over wedding dresses or flowers or caterers (just a lot of bribing of government officials).  On the beach, in Africa, sipping JD in the sun with my new husband.

Absolutely bloody perfect.

Just when we thought it was over and severe intoxication of the double-vision kind was setting in, Bob declared that we were going out for a meal. On my wedding night I had a curry at the fabulous Clay Oven with Bob, Gary, Isha and Moosa (who ordered fish!).

It was perfect.

WEDNESDAY 21

DAY 12

We’d run out of money and needed to go to a bank.  Yaya took us, but the bank was closed (1pm-4pm).  It had an ATM outside.  I put my card in, did the motions, and the achingly slow machine flashed up on screen ‘Please take your cash’.  Then it promptly crashed.  The screen went blank, I didn’t have the money, and my card was trapped inside.

Argh!

Spotting movement inside the bank, I dashed to the doors and hammered on them until a security guard wandered over.  He told us to come back at 4 o’clock. 

Went to another ATM with my credit card, only it wouldn’t accept it (they only take Visa in Gambia).  Yaya patiently drove us to several other banks, but none would give us cash over the counter, for our cards or for cheques.  It wasn’t looking good.  We were in a foreign country with no money.

We went back to our hotel where, fortunately, Bob loaned us some cash.

At 4 o’clock, all of us went back to the bank and waited in a long queue of people who’d also lost their cards (and their money) in the antiquated ATM.  Then, because I didn’t trust the damn thing, we hunted down another ATM. 

We could only withdraw £40 at a time, so we did it 4 times.  It was an agonisingly slow process.  The people in the queue behind us oozed with impatient loathing.

Drove back to our hotel.  The taxi pulled up outside our hotel, and Isha and Moosa got in.  Bob (he of the endless, boundless energy) announced we were off to a wedding!  We couldn’t face it (we were still hungover from our own wedding) and made our excuses, but it would have been good to attend a real African wedding.

THURSDAY 22

DAY 13

Went for our usual early morning walk on the beach.  The tide was out and we sauntered across the creek that separates the two beaches.  Walked right to the furthest point, took us a couple of hours. 

The creek at high tide

By the time we got back to the creek, the tide was in and we couldn’t cross the fast-flowing water.  Steve eventually made it across because he’s a big chest-beating He-Man, but I was too chicken – my feet sunk in the sand and there was too much water involved.  Holidaymakers watched from the restaurant of the neighbouring hotel.  Smirking locals asked if I was scared and I just nodded.  Steve stood on the other side shouting, “Come on!  Just do it!”  But I wouldn’t.

In the end he had to wade across (waist high!) leaving his mobile phone and wallet on the other side.  Having abandoned his worldly goods he wasn’t taking no for an answer and literally hauled me across to the other side with a firm grip of my wrist, the bloody brute.

Spent the day on beach, relaxing, chilling, recovering from my near-drowning experience.  All four of us played with the waves, spluttering and laughing and choking.  Suddenly, Bob cried, “Look at that!” and we turned and saw huge fish jumping up out of the water in front of us.  We all marvelled, until I wondered out loud why fish would be jumping out of the water like that. 

The four of us slowly edged backwards out of the water, trying not to panic and scouring the surface for protruding fins.  [There aren’t actually any sharks on that coast].

Steve went to the hotel reception to fix a guest’s head gash because a door in his room had fallen on him and the hotel didn’t have a first aid kit!  After that hotel staff kept coming into our room for ‘medical assistance’ - I think we had the only first aid box in the whole of Gambia, even the cleaning lady came with a headache every day hoping to be given painkillers. 

Poolside entertainment on the night.  They were introduced as ‘an international band’. I could barely contain myself when they started – an electronic organ and a tambourine man who hardly moved the tempo was that slow.  It was like being transported back to some working men's club in the 70s. 

I said to Steve, “I’m going back to my room to stick pins in my eyeballs," and he nearly threw up laughing.  I returned with a hidden stash of whisky, which helped enormously.

FRIDAY 23

DAY 13

Walked along the beach this morning, counting jelly fish and cuttlefish that had been washed up on the shoreline.  Very quiet at that time of morning and, because we’ve been here nearly two weeks, we tend not to get attacked by locals wanting us to visit their bars on the beach any more.  Some people find them and the bumsters quite alarming, but you just have to accept it – they’re only trying to make a living.

Breakfast has, for the entire two weeks we’ve been here, consisted of fried frankfurters, tinned mushrooms, boiled tomatoes, deep-fried and rock-hard eggs, and beans.  I can’t begin to explain how desperate I was for a bacon and fried mushroom sandwich made from Warburtons white bread, and I doubt I’ll ever be able to look at another frankfurter again. 

A quick change into swimming costumes, and we were on the beach, tanning, chilling, reading and ordering drinks from the beach bar.  Steve finally fulfilled his ambition to ride a horse along the beach.

Well okay there, pilgrim, you can let go of the reins now

Our beach, and the next … he was gone for ages and came back all red and sweaty, but invigorated. 

Tan, tan, suncream and tan.  People-watching.  Wave-watching.  Toasted sandwich and Coke brought to us.  Languishing.  Lounging.  Sand so hot you couldn’t walk on it without screaming Ow! Ow! Ow!  Feet burned top and bottom, my poor toes don’t know what the hell’s going on.

And then Sullyman, arrived.  He was taking us to a typical Gambian village in the ‘outback’ that Bob’s charity regularly assisted.  It was hot and I didn’t particularly want to go (“You go,” I said to Steve, “I’ll stay here and chill by the pool.”).  Fortunately, I went, primarily because we’d brought pens and pencils and writing books for the village school. 

It was the most amazing experience of the entire holiday (apart from our wedding, of course).

There were two cars, a jeep and a 4x4 thingy.  No air conditioning.  Fresh from basting on the beach and with no time to shower, we were hot anyway.  But inside the car, at 2.30 in the afternoon, the hottest time (and apparently the hottest day in the last two weeks) we were berluddy roasting.  The windows were open fully as we bombed down the road doing 70mph, but the heat blowing in was as hot as a furnace. 

And you thought our potholes were bad!

We took a small bottle of water with us and felt pretty organised doing that.  Pah.  A small bottle.  What we needed a water tanker following us, we just poured with sweat and I’ve never been so thirsty in all my life.  And that was before we arrived at the village.

We went through a small, crowded town.  Tarmac road.  Suddenly, the tarmac at the edges got wobblier and wobblier, the road narrower, the traffic coming towards us just a little too close for comfort.  A pushbike went passed with a rack on the back, onto which were tied two goats, feet in the air.  A taxi coming the other way held up the entire  road because it had a double bedhead balanced precariously across its roof … a ‘wide load’ of the extraordinary kind!

Then the road ended.  Just like that. Tarmac.  No tarmac.  Just a dusty red track lined with baboa and cashew and mango trees and studded with potholes big enough to make Olympic swimming pools.  Our 4x4 crashed into one and I thought the axle must have broken.  It skidded wildly around several others.  We all bashed our heads on the roof numerous times as we sped through arid, African wasteland.

Nothing but dry vegetation and the odd horned cow wandering around looking a bit lost.  Every pore of my body gushed with sweat.  The small bottle of water was now heated to bath temperature, but we drank it anyway.  It was gone before we even drove through the first village.

A proper African village with mud huts and people wearing colourful outfits.  We passed several groups of children and they all waved and cheered at us.  People smiled.  No reason, just looked straight at you (the visitors, the tourists from another country) and smiled as they balanced bowls and parcels and piles of sticks on their heads and walked down the endless, dusty red track.

I’d dressed in a hurry (straight from the beach), grabbed the first thing to hand.  I was wearing all white (which quickly turned pink from the sweat and the red dust).  And, since the heatstroke episode, I’d commandeered Steve’s Panama hat.  And sunglasses I could barely see out of because they were coated in dust but I couldn’t take them off because it was too bright to see.  Even my eyeballs sweated.  You could have grown cacti in my mouth it was that dry.

We pulled into Seioni, a tiny village literally in the middle of nowhere, and were immediately surrounded by a hoard of children.  Me and Gary had one holding on to each finger, 10 each.  Such lovely children, such pretty ones, such handsome ones, of all ages – a 10 year old carrying around a 1 year old who screamed in terror every time it looked at us.  They held our hands as we walked to the Village Meet.  I spun the girls round, they loved it.  I pulled out my tongue and they pulled out theirs.  I tried to behave and not get them all excited as we sat with the Village Elders.

 
The kids (aren't they gorgeous)

Under the shade of a large tree, we sat and sweated and were welcomed to the village.  Bob was thanked profusely for an ambulance he’d sent over a couple of months before which had already saved many lives.  He presented them with a huge bag of medicine, we presented them with a bag of cheap pens and writing books, but they seemed pleased with both.  An interpreter who lived in the village was extremely articulate, I was very impressed 

Bob gave a short speech to the elders, telling them there was nothing more important than health and education.  Bob had sent the ambulance over full of medication, which was kept in the health centre he’d helped set up, which had seen and treated over 1,400 people in the last 3 months alone.  That’s astonishing. Work like that, charity and aid and assistance like that, is more than humbling.  I wanted to take hold of Bob’s hand and say ‘You’re great, you’re berluddy great you are.’

Sullyman made a speech and told the elders we’d just got married – he stared at me and I saw his eyes go blank as he introduced us as Mr and Mrs Smith because he couldn’t for the life of him remember my first name (good to make an impression!)  The Elders wished us a happy marriage, called us Prince and Princess. 

Sullyman, Village Chief and Steve - village elders in the background

A little girl of about 2 sat on my lap, eating the extra strong mints we’d brought (me wishing we’d brought something less explosive, like fruit pastels or something).  A small child sat on Gary’s lap, but his was still and quiet whereas mine wouldn’t stop wriggling or pulling at the hairs on Steve’s arm because she’d never seen hairy arms before. 

A group of little girls stood behind me, gently touching my back so I’d turn round and pull my tongue out at them, which I did, and they laughed and stuck out their tongues, clean, pink little tongues from dusty black faces.  I refrained when the Village Chief told them off (and looked at me too, like I was going to play up after being told off by the Main Man).

The formalities over, the ambulance was brought over to be viewed. 

I want to take them all home!  They were so delicate and gentle and sweet.  That's Gary in the background

Behind us, in a dusty field, stood an old, dry tree.  A branch roughly the length and weight of me suddenly hit the ground and dust exploded into the air.  That’s how dry and barren it is out there, before the rainy season comes.

Next to the field with the branch, little boys played with the pump of a well, spilling out water for the long-horned cattle.  The water ran down a concrete shaft 20 foot long and the cattle drank from that.  The water evaporated in the searing heat before it reached the trough at the end, that’s how hot it is.

I handed the camera and the bumbag to Steve and resolutely made my way over to the pump, striding without care through the long-horned cows, which fortunately scattered.  I walked up to the boys and motioned for them to pump for me.  I took off my hat as the clear, cool water gushed out, and cupped it in my hands, brought it up to my face, again and again and again.  It evaporated before I even straightened up again.  And I was so thirsty I drank some, gulped it down in fact.  It was clear.  It tasted sweet.  I live still.

A walk down to the health centre.  A 10 minute walk through the village surrounded by a crowd of children.  They have nothing here.  Really, nothing.  Because we came with Bob, who was familiar with Gambia, we’ve seen sites and been introduced to people the average tourist never sees.  There is a genuine and endless struggle just to survive, to find money for rent and food.  They have no welfare system or health care service, and they have to pay for their education - our children take it for granted, here it is a privilege. 

A sign in the health centre - very true

The health centre was clean, like a shrine kept immaculate for the precious medication inside. I sat listening to Bob giving them an incredible speech about helping themselves and helping him to help them.  They were all enthralled.  I was enthralled.

A walk back to our cars.  A man fell into step besides me, a thin man wearing a woolly hat, chattering away so fast I could barely understand him.  He kept asking my name.  I told him, and the 10 year old carrying the 1 year old (who’d stopped screaming every time it looked at us) spelt it out for me, spelt it right (most people don’t).  I was impressed.  The thin man with the hat yabbered away.  “And when you come next week,” he said in his thick accent, “You bring me some coffee, yes.  Because I like coffee.  You bring me some coffee when you come next time.  And a radio.  Yes, I’d like a radio.  Have you been to America?  I’d like a radio that plays American radio stations.  Yes, bring me a radio when you come again.  And coffee, some good coffee.”  He asked for a packet of our cigarettes but made do with one.  He asked for money and made do with none because there were many people and you can’t give to one without the others.

The children were sweet.  The children were pretty and cute and funny and lovely.  Out there, in their dusty, dry village in the middle of nowhere.

We left at 5.30 and the heat had cooled, the sky was hazy.  We drove over the deep turrets where the rain pours into the road, passed an enormous wooden cart pulled by two oxen.

Ox-power

We drove passed women walking in their colourful clothing from one village to the next with baskets on their heads, and we passed our accompanying jeep.  The fan belt had come off.  What we needed was a mechanic to fix it.  Fortunately, we had one in our party, Gary.

How many men does it take to fix a fanbelt?

Six, apparently. 

We roared through Serrekunda doing around 50mph.  And then we were all leaning forward in our seats as Sullyman stood hard on his brakes.  A man was walking down the middle of the busy road, veering idly from side to side, stopping traffic, narrowly avoiding being killed.  “A mad man,” we were told, as we pulled away to the sound of screeching brakes behind us.  The heat, I thought.  He’d finally been driven mad by the incredible heat … or starvation, or dehydration, or maybe just the sheer slog of trying to stay alive every single day.

But I think that was the day I really got to understand and like Africa, the Gambia, with its wooden tables at the side of the roads filled with apples and mangos and fish kept free of flies by the constant flicking of the sellers.  I liked the vultures circling in the sky, the hazy sunsets, the walks across the beach at first light and the smiling, happy faces of the people, always smiling, always asking how you are, genuinely wanting to know.

We’ve seen more of Gambia and met more African people than ordinary visitors because Bob knew everyone, introduced us to everyone, gave us a real feel for the country and the people.  Holiday reps tell tourists not to leave the hotel grounds without an escort, white people were escorted everywhere by a local, walking behind or walking ahead, eating with them at tables, even jogging beside them on the beach.  We were lucky, we had a seasoned traveller at our disposal and a fabulous taxi driver named Yaya.

We’ve seen so much.  I feel very privileged.  And very humbled.

SATURDAY 24

DAY 14

Spent our last morning on the beach, soaking up the last of the sun (we heard it was snowing back home, hard to imagine).  As we shuffled back to our rooms to pack, the cleaners waited outside, poking their head round the door every few minutes to see if we’d gone yet. 

Hot work packing, and there always seems more to take back than we brought - could have been something to do with the ton of African carvings we’d acquired.  No neat folding of clothes this time, just toss them in and crush them down.  Had to extend the lids on both suitcases.

Holidaying with three men for two weeks (when I’d give serious thought to holidaying with my sister or my best friend) had been interesting.  But they were lovely.  They talked mostly about cars and building work and watches (constantly talking about the fake Rolex watches they bought on the beach, forever asking each other, “What time do you have now?  Yep, that’s what I’ve got, it’s working properly then.”)  I’d grown very fond of them. 

It had been the most amazing holiday.  Yes, it’s hot, but you get used to it, you learn to avoid the hottest part of the day (by lounging on the gorgeous beach being waited on hand and foot, and by wearing a Panama hat at all time!).  Yes, the bumsters are persistent and sometimes annoying, you just have to be firm with them (but never rude, they’re just trying to make a living).  Yes, the poverty is stark, but that only makes you realize how much you have – it’s a very humbling experience.  They’re wonderful people, so incredibly friendly and welcoming.  I never once felt unsafe.  There’s hardly any crime in the Gambia, they’re just too nice!

We went shopping for food the day after we got back.  We pulled out a trolley at the supermarket and stood just inside the entrance staring wide-eyed at all the food.  It was a bit overwhelming – and we’ve only been away for 2 weeks.  Bought bacon and mushrooms and Warburton’s bread – took Bob some when he (poor bugger) came home from work.

Would I go again?  In a breath!  We’ve made friends over there (so easy to do) and I want to see those lovely children at that village again.  Would I recommend other people to visit Gambia?  Oh yeah.  Go.  It’s fabulous.

Top 10 Tips

1. Take PLENTY of cash and/or travellers cheques, don't rely on cards (or you'll be stuffed, like we were)

2. Take time to soak in the atmosphere and acclimatise for the first day or so, don't rush anything

3. Take lots of sun cream and sunbathe gently - heat stroke is a terrible thing!

4. Take your own medication, there isn't any there (leave it when you go) - a First Aid kit is very handy.

5. Take lots of cool clothes, but also some warmer clothes as it can get quite chilly early morning or late at night.

6. TAKE A BIG HAT - don't go anywhere without it, and ALWAYS take LOADS OF WATER with you.

7. The hottest time of day is between midday and 3pm, so avoid being in the sun at these times if at all possible (unless its on the cool beach).  Yes, it is hot, but its bearable if you take sensible precautions - cover up and drink lots.

8. There's hardly any crime in Gambia, but don't leave cash or valuables on display in your rooms, lock them away in your suitcase at the bottom of the wardrobe/cupboard.

9. Don't be afraid to speak to the locals, they really are very friendly - even the bumsters are amusing, so try not to be rude (although some firmness is required at times).  Don't be afraid!  Get out there and explore!

10. Go.  Just go.  I guarantee you'll have a FANTASTIC time.  And when you go, leave behind anything you can spare, like medication, food and clothes, they'll really appreciate it.

Book direct with the Palm Beach Hotel for cheaper room rates.  We got our flights for £160 each RETURN!  And everything's pretty cheap over there.

It’s certainly a life-changing experience.  I’ve since given up my stressful corporate job in the city and now work from home.  Steve handed in his notice at work and found a less pressurized position elsewhere.  We both set up and run Bob’s charity website.

If you have any questions about visiting Gambia, feel free to email me.  Or you're interested in donating anything (medicine, clothes, computers, printers, books, pens, time, energy, skills) to Bob's charity, get in touch.

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