I Give In - I'll be a Tourist for One Day

It had always been my personal "travel philosophy" to try to see everything I can in a new place without ever feeling like an actual tourist.  Of course, in order to see all the sites of any location, I'm sometimes required to suspend my belief that sight seeing is not necessarily equivalent with tourism.  This is exactly what I did here in Liberia last Saturday as I loaded up in a 12 passenger van, Swiss Army side purse on, camera and extra batteries in tact.  Thus, along with Ann Elizabeth and the 4 guys here from the States for Passport, we became the Ricks tour-bus for the day.

We started off the journey at the site of the Hotel Africa.  Hotel Africa was built for the 1979 OAU (Organization for African Unity) Conference and was the first 5 star hotel in Africa.  It was probably 8 stories tall, located right on the beach with a view looking toward the Freeport and central Monrovia, and even a pool in the shape of Africa.  Sadly, the hotel was completely destroyed during the war, I believe sometime in the 1990s.  We had seen this hotel from a distance when we first arrived in Liberia but had not had the chance to see it up close until this weekend.  We were actually able to walk around inside the hollow shell of a building.  It was so strange to be in this building and see remnants of what it once was - a shard of beautiful tile on the floor; the bare bones of a once gourmet kitchen; the now algae ridden water in the old pool; statues of elephants both missing trunks.  As I made my way carefully through this seemingly alternate reality, I think I was suddenly very aware of the reality of war and the extent of this particular war's destruction and decimation of the land.  My heart felt heavy in my chest, and I just kept asking myself, "God, how can we do this to one another?"

From Hotel Africa we drove to the nearby Unity Conference Center, once home to Liberia's House of Representatives.  The conference center is now only used on a limited basis, and is still in tact.  The biggest problem the conference center experienced was looting.  Luckily, this structure was not hit by the rockets and missiles that took out Hotel Africa.  We were lucky enough to get a short tour inside the Conference Center where I was most impressed with the artwork hanging on the wall - see my pictures to see it for yourself!

After hotel Africa we took a break to grab lunch at a Barbecue place in town - really good!! - and then ice cream.  We drove past Liberia's capital hill, the executive mansion (comparable to USA's White House), Court House, etc., and then made our way up to the highest point in Liberia and home to another formerly great hotel in Liberia, Ducor International.  Ducor opened sometime in the mid-50s and was also quite a beautiful hotel in its heyday.  I think the highlight for me of Ducor was the view.  Standing on the patio area on the second floor, we could see out over the ocean, parts of Monrovia (all of Bushrod Island), the Freeport, even back toward Hotel Africa (where we earlier stood looking toward Ducor!).  It was an incredible view, and so interesting to be able to look out over Monrovia from an aerial vantage point.  We also had the pleasure of meeting a man named Moses there who began working for Ducor in 1976 and worked his way up to head of security before the hotel shut down.  Moses was even able to show us a brochure preserved from sometime in the 80s, I believe, showing all the amenities Ducor once offered.  Although not in ruins they way hotel Africa was, Ducor was still a reminder than no structure in Monrovia was untouched by the war - even the seemingly impenetrable.  Please see my pictures - they describe way better than I can!

After Ducor we went into town and were uber-tourists: we went to an area by the American Embassy where they sell lots of souvenirs, crafts, etc., and bought some fun keepsakes.  After that we walked around Benson Street, the place to go for clothes, fabric, etc.  We even had time to visit Providence Baptist Church, the church founded by the freed slaves who landed in Liberia in 1822.  Parts of the sanctuary we visited - the walls, the pulpit, the bench behind the pulpit - have been there since the church's founding in the 1820s.  We were lucky enough to catch one of the church's staff members there who was able to give us a tour - it was like stepping into history!

After that, we were all exhausted and went to meet up with Olu for dinner.  We had a good time just sitting around, talking, sharing stories and ideas and dreams, and generally enjoying one another's company!  It was a long day - especially after a week of camp - but overall very educational, interesting, and definitely thought provoking.

Did I mention you should check out my pictures (I'm uploading as I type this!): http://picasaweb.google.com/holly.wegman/ATourOfMonrovia#

Free for All!

It is hard to believe it is already Monday and we are back in school!  The long Christmas break - 4 whole weeks - seems to have really flown by.  But no time has passed by quite as quickly as our week hosting Passport Liberia here on Ricks' campus.  We had almost 100 students share in a week of learning and fun and worship and work and general craziness (in the good sense, of course) here in Liberia. 

I don't really know where to begin to summarize our week of camp.  So much happened!  Sunday was our opening day; the campers arrived, registered, and settled in to the girls' and boys' dorms.  For some of them, this was quite normal; for others, however, staying in the dorm was a new and exciting experience.  That evening after dinner we all gathered together for Opening Celebration, a time of excitement and celebration of the week we are preparing to share.  Afterward, the campers met with their Bible study groups for the first time - groups consisting of girls and boys from all different grade levels, many of whom would not typically spend much time together during the regular school year.  After Bible study time we gathered together again for Vespers, a short worship service to prepare ourselves for all that God would teach us throughout the week. 

The next 4 days were packed!  We all gathered together for morning celebration to begin each day.  It amazed me how much energy the campers seemed to have each morning - genuine energy, not energy feigned to give the appearance of excitement.  From there campers would spend the morning and afternoon in three different activities: Bible study, recreation (low ropes course), and missions. 

Each day in Bible studies the campers learned about a different freedom: freedom from the need to prove themselves, freedom from shame, using their freedom to free others, and freedom to become who God has created them to be.  Out on the ropes course, the students had to work together to accomplish a number of challenging tasks.  They had to trust one another, work as a team, and think creatively about solutions to seemingly impossible problems.  I was amazed by how well everyone did on the ropes course and believe that there were definitely some life lessons learned out there!  For our mission projects, the students were building incinerators of red brick and mortar (a mix of dirt, cement, and water) where trash from the campus can be burned (it is currently thrown in the bushes or piled on the ground and slowly burned in an open fire).  Although the incinerators (3 total) were not completed during the week, significant progress was made and the students at Ricks will work to finish these projects over the next few weeks.  These new structures will certainly help us to be free from trash!

Each night we all played together at a party - "rec party" on night one (fun running around outside), a dance on night two, learning the Grand March (a traditional Liberian dance) on night three, and a variety show (Ricks' Idol) on night 4.  The campers really had a blast at these, and it was fun for me to be able to dance with some of my students and have them see me outside of the role of "strict Ms. Wegman" for a few days! 

We also celebrated in worship every night, singing songs, praying new prayers, hearing scripture, and learning from sermons preached by a different person each night.  I even had the opportunity to preach one night - a first for me, but an experience I definitely enjoyed.  Worship was truly moving.  There were moments when I would begin to feel frustrated because worship did not look exactly like I thought it should - it was noisy and somewhat chaotic, not quiet and reverent as I often think of worship.  But the noise and the energy and the soul that went into each night made worship a truly meaningful and essential part of Passport.  I hope the campers were able to experience God in a new way each night through a new and different kind of worship - I know I did. 

Finally on Friday we wrapped up with a short Bible study and a celebration of all that happened throughout the week.  We sang some favorite songs from camp (YMCA was amazingly popular!!) and gave final challenges to the campers.  We closed by taking lots of pictures in front of the school and saying our goodbyes. 

Passport Liberia 2010 seemed to pass by in the blink of an eye, similar to my overall time here in Liberia.  But it was a truly great week spent discovering the freedom each of us have in Christ.  Check out my page on Picasa for pictures (and more on the way ASAP!)!!

Passport Liberia 2010

This will be just a short post to give you all a quick update.... the reason my post must be so short is that we are currently in the midst of Passport Liberia 2010!!

Many of you might know about Passport from the States, but if you haven't ever heard of it, it's a Christian youth/kids camp... you can check in out at passportcamps.org

This week we are having camp here at Ricks.  Right now we have almost 100 youth and 12 staff - 6 American and 6 Liberian.  Camp started on Sunday and will continue until Friday afternoon.  I'll update with more details as soon as I can - but I wanted to let you all know about this very exciting time at Ricks!

New Year, New Adventures, New Friends

We are only 3 days in to the New Year, and already it is off to a great start filled with wonderful and new adventures!  I admit that our New Years Eve was not much - I actually forgot it was a special day for the most part.  Highlights included looking at my phone by sheer luck (I was already in bed) when it read 00:00 (it's in military time) on 01/01/2010.  There was no countdown, but I think I did hear someone ringing the dining hall bell in the distance, and I did have cell-phone confirmation that it was in fact the year 2010, so that has to count for something!

The days in 2010, however, have been a bit more exciting.  We made some new friends last Sunday (friends of a friend of Ann Elizabeth), and they invited us to hang out in Monrovia for a few days.  They are all here working on construction of the new US Embassy in town, and they are all, strangely, from Birmingham (where Ann Elizabeth lives).  We went over to their compound in town on Friday and spent the evening grilling out and watching/attempting to watch some college bowl games on TV. 

Saturday morning we woke up early and headed out to Bong County (in the heart of Liberia) to see a waterfall.  It was a 4 hour drive, about 3 hours of which were on pothole covered paved roads and about 1 hour was on a bumpy dirt road.  It was a long nauseating drive, but seeing more of the country including a beautiful waterfall was well worth it.  The waterfall was beautiful and was surrounded by enormous trees - not quite the size of Redwoods but darn close.  When we arrived there was another group already there, and we all awkwardly stared at each other from afar until we finally started talking... turns out they were mostly Peace Corp volunteers from all around Liberia.  There were about 10 people in their group, and we sat on rocks in the midst of the waterfall, enjoying the sun and good conversation with one another.  They were all in their bathing suits and finally I decided I couldn't resist - did a quick change behind a rock and swam at the base of the waterfall.  It was quite cold, but in the heat of the sun it felt amazing.  We finished the day off with some packed PB&J sandwiches, chips, cookies and brownies.  Then we headed back for Monrovia, a long drive that would have been much worse had it not been for good conversation with new friends.  That evening we just hung out at our friends' compound, ate pizza, watched TV, and continued to talk for hours.

One thing that has amazed me, throughout my time here but especially in the last few days, is how readily and completely people have befriended us and taken us in.  From the moment we arrived at Ricks, the entire community became our surrogate family.  Now these new friends - people we met only a week ago - have been amazingly hospitable and welcoming.  We have spent two nights with them, been fed, been given hot showers and air conditioning and all those little amenities that seem small but also feel like home.  Each person we have met - from strangers at a waterfall to mutual friends to people we meet along the path at Ricks - has been nothing but warm and kind and loving.  I feel as if we live in a place where you never meet a stranger - southern hospitality to the max.  This is something I will miss terribly when we leave. 

So far the new year - both 2010 year and my 25th year - have brought nothing but goodness and fun and adventure.  I am grateful already.