Monrovia-Ganta-Zwedru-Greenville-Buchannan-Monrovia

I made a trip at the end of last month.  The goal of the trip was to go to Zwedru and present the data the we collected from the hospital on malaria indicators then head to Greenville in Sinoe County to do a preliminary investigation of doing a KAP survey in the area. KAP (Knowledge, Attitude and Practice) is a way of measuring the effect of a informational and educational campaign on malaria – basically to see if a propaganda campaign on malaria has had any effect.  You ask questions on their knowledge of malaria, it’s treatment and if there are proper usage of mosquito nets.  

Once outside the capital of Monrovia, power becomes an issue.  The hotels have intermittent power and there is basically no internet.  I got lazy and didn’t write about this trip since I was planning to do this trip again at the end of this month but I wish to share some photos with you about the trip.

 

Here I am in Kakata  Hospital.  As facilities goes, it is amazingly clean and well run.

This is Ganta and the main strip.  A wonderful series of bungalow, corrugated roof shops line a busy main road.  Also show is the Roasted Cow Meat wheelbarrow for only the finest dining. 

We slept the night in Ganta and headed off the next day to Zwedru.  This little village called, err, something, had some kids and I got them to do my favourite pose!

Past the kids is Tappita which is apparently a main crossroads to a whole bunch of places.  There is even a Shell station there.

Though this is in Tappita, this large jar gas station is a common way to display gas for consumers.  There are real gas stations in Monrovia but these are also common though expect the petrol to be nicely diluted with water.

Again, this is also a common sight in Monrovia but I caught one here to show as an example.  These are money changing stands.

 

This is me, looking chubby, standing with my coworker, Emmanuel, at the unification bridge.

This is Isaac.  One of the hardest working Liberians I have met.  Great person.

 

These photos are from the Zwedru hospital (MTM).  Some are from the laboratory, pharmacy and outpatients.  Dr Quiah can be seen giving his presentation before the monthly staff meeting to discuss the data. 

 

On the way to Greenville, we encounter a bunch of these stalls where they sell bananas, bush meat and plantains.  The system that I heard to get these products to the main (and only) road is by someone buying one of these branches then walking for two days through the bush to sell them on the road.  These bananas were probably local but bush meat and plantains are purchased for about 50 Liberian dollars wholesale then resold retail for about 250 Liberian dollars.  The bananas above cost about 50 LD for 50 little bananas.  The exchange rate at the time of writing is 70 LD to 1 USD.

There is not a lot to show from the town of Greenville in Sinoe but there is a port which is guarded by the Pakistani UN contingent. 

The port, like everything in Liberia, sits in ruins due to the war.  This ship lies rusted and dead like a beached whale. 

 

 

The trip from Greenville to Buchannan and then Monrovia was essentially the same as the rest of the trip with fairly similar scenery.  The most interesting image was this destroyed bridge that couldn’t handle the weight of a truck carrying a large load of timber.   Poor constructions and an underestimation of the potential weight of the trucks travelling through the country was the main cause of this destructions, not war as is usually the case.

This is a small excerpt from my trip through the country.  There will be others – many others so don’t worry about there not being enough adventuring to blog about.  The best is yet to come…

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