From Canada to Sierra Leone and Back

Canada and Sierra Leone occupy opposite ends of the United Nations quality of life scale, where Canada has occasionally ranked number one, and Sierra Leone has got the 192nd spot, or dead last a few times.

Sierra Leone and Canada are the only countries I have actually lived in. I was only in Sierra Leone for three years, but that included my first full time job, my first house, my first motor vehicle, the start of my passion for motorcycling, and getting married. Although Sierra Leone was poor when I was there, it was a beautiful country, with friendly people full of life and fun.

Listening to the Sierra Leone national anthem gives me the same feeling as listening to the Canadian national anthem. Although I would like to go back, I know I would be disappointed that it has not stayed the same as it was forty years ago.

I discovered to my surprise, that Sierra Leone's capital city Freetown was established by Canadian Settlers in 1792. They were Loyalist freed slaves who fought for the British during the American War of Independence, and subsequently were driven out and allowed to resettle in Nova Scotia. About 2000 of them were recruited in a mass exodus to the new British colony in Freetown, Sierra Leone. They were not actually the first to arrive, a small group of freed slaves had come from London England five years earlier, but had almost disappeared by the time the Canadian group arrived. They started the new colony which originally was just on the Freetown Peninsula. Fifteen years later, the British government declared the trans Atlantic slave trade illegal, and started seizing slave ships and unloading their human cargoes in Freetown, building up the population of the colony to the size of a small city.

Sierra Leone was also the first place I lived where English was the common official language. The original settlers spoke Creole, a form of English common among American slaves, which is still the common language of the Freetown Peninsula. Part of our orientation course was to learn Creole, and today I still remember the Creole greeting term "Ow de body?" which gives you an idea of how similar to English it is. However, it is just impossible for me to understand two people speaking Creole at full speed. While I was there I spoke English and usually muddled along. I did not actually live in a Creole speaking area, and so my native language speaking attempts were normally in Timne. Really all I wanted to do was to be able to greet people, and the rest seemed to take care of itself.

This incident shows how far even one word can get you. My first motorcycle trip after I got home was to Bo, 60 miles away. I knew that I would be entering the Mende language area somewhere along the way, and I learned the Mende Greeting which I think was Bua. Being new to motorcycling, the trip was a series of disasters, one of which was running out of gas half way there. I pushed the Honda to the next village, very hot work with the hills and gravel. I saw only mud huts and thatched roofs, so the usual thing of going to a gas station was not possible. A couple of curious village women approached me. I said Bua, and luckily they did too (because it is not marked where the language changes). They didn't actually expect much more from me, and found me a chair to sit on and placed it in the shade because they knew these white people were allergic to the sun or something. They made me understand that they were sending for someone who could speak English, and soon a young schoolboy showed up. I explained that I was out of gas, and he explained that nobody in town had any. But he went over to the local Paramount Chief, who was also the local member of parliament, and happened to be heading to Bo pretty soon. Next thing I knew a black Mercedes with a flag fluttering from the hood pulled up and I got in the back seat with the Paramount Chief. He asked "So how could such an intelligent person as yourself run out of gas in this village?" He had a point, since I was no more than 30 miles from my home, but I explained the situation, new bike and all, and not only that it was January 1st and the Magburaka gas station was closed for New Years. Anyway we had an interesting conversation all the way to Bo, where he let me off at the first open gas station. I'm going to leave the story there, but you should get the idea this was a long day.

As hard as it may be to believe, this kind of friendliness was typical of the entire three years I spent there. And it probably explains my liberal attitudes.

My biggest shock was not in going to West Africa, it was in returning to Canada. Although everything was more or less as I had left it, everything was also different. Am I imagining things, or did Canadians start complaining a lot about nothing while I was away? Example of complaining about nothing, how about this one which I occasionally hear. Those Indians are taking our land. First of all, before we get into whose land it actually is, did you know Canada, with only 3.2 people per sq. km. has more land than almost any country on Earth? Sierra Leone has 80 people per sq. km., and you could fit it into Canada 360 times. If Canada had Sierra Leone's population density, we would have about 800 million people, and probably less complaining.

I would like to introduce S.E. Rogie, the Sierra Leonean version of Gordon Lightfoot. This is a nice video with still scenes of Sierra Leone of today, not 40 years ago. I can tell it's a little more crowded and has about a thousand times the number of motorcycles. That is one big change I personally can relate to. My motorcycle's licence plate was NT 183, meaning the 183rd motor vehicle of any type ever registered to the Tonkolili district in the Northern province.

The picture is from Freetown Sierra Leone, 1970. The old City Hotel (on the left) has since burned down. The only motorcycle in the picture is mine in the bottom right corner.