In the news this week...

Things have been getting steadily better at work, I wrote two funding proposals to try and bring in money for IT equipment for the council (lets hope they get a generator up and running) and to buy 300 motorbike helmets to give to the Okada (motorbike taxi) drivers. The Mayor seemed to be impressed, which means that I may have more time to work on these kind of projects, which is the reason I came here.

I am off to Freetown tomorrow to meet with an energy company to start a proposal for solar street lighting in Makeni. It will be ambitious, and very expensive, I wont know until after the meeting if it is worth producing a full proposal.

In other news this week I found a pretty damn big spider in my room, which I despatched with bug spray and a hiking boot (sorry nature lovers, it was him or me). I found out something really bad about a guy at work (cant say too much here). I sincerely hope that he gets his comeuppance. I was invited to Sunday lunch with two nuns who also lecture at the Fatima Institute, and it was lovely. They have an oven, so went all out and even baked a cake. They were really interesting people too, they have been in West Africa for about 30 years, and were in Sierra Leone during the conflict. They told me their story of fleeing across the border to Guinea hiding underneath tarp in a canoe. Scary stuff.

Thanks for the comments as ever guys. Mr Crake; it was my pleasure, sorry I couldn't be there in person. To answer Mr Lindsay, I suppose people react in different ways to this environment; some people will turn to religion, others (like me) will view it as further evidence that there can be no God. Its interesting to say that to anyone here though. Most people are Muslim or Christian, are very tolerant of each other, but have no concept of atheism. They find me very strange! Although I have the Christians to thank for my house, the lecturing job, my internet access and last week's Sunday lunch, so they may well be on to something...