Bike Trip!

More current news! Are you in shock?

November 16, 2008

As I mentioned before, we had been planning a bike trip for a while. Originally it was going to be a three-day camping trip, and Nathaniel wanted to be able to meet families around the area. We had to make some changes, and we ended up deciding that we were going to bike to Lai, a slightly larger village that's 18 km away.

Sunday morning, we all met over at the middle house with bikes, backpacks, and lots of excitement. Each of us had borrowed bikes from random different people, and I had arranged to come to work late that evening because we wouldn't be back until late evening, and I was supposed to work at 3pm.

We finally got everything ready to go a little bit before 9am, and took off. It was a beautiful day-- sunshine, clear skies, and a nice, constant breeze. We couldn't have asked God for a better day to go.

I guess I should explain who exactly "we" included. There were six of us total: Nathaniel, Emily, Jacob, Ansley, me, and Daniel (the father of the house that Nathaniel stays at). Daniel was nice enough to endure the teasing from other Africans that he was hanging out with all the "Nassara" (white people). It was really fun to have him along, and it came in handy several times to have a local with us.

The trip there was not particularly eventful, but it was so much fun. We had some good times joking around with each other, taking pictures and videos, and other things. Emily had brought a harmonica, so we had fun with that. One person would play for a little bit, and then do a hand-off to another person while we were biking.

Once we got to the river, we had to be ferried across to get to town. This was definitely the most sketchy "ferry" system I've ever seen in my life. We paid 300 francs a piece to have ourselves and our bikes taken across in a long canoe-resembling tree trunk. Funny thing was that it was sewn together in places with really thick string (or very thin rope), and there was actually one man whose job was to bail out the water as we made our way across the river. There were also two people "rowing" with large bamboo type sticks that they used to push against the bottom of the river (so it really wasn't terribly deep). We were all very thankful to make it across with no problems and some good laughs.

Oh, and while we were getting in, another man came up to ride along with us, and we recognized him! His name was Paul, and he had been a patient at the hospital here for a long time. I had gotten to know him pretty well while he stayed at the hospital, and so had Jacob, so it was really cool for us to see him there and get to talk to him again.

After we got across, we biked into town, and decided to find a place to eat (it was about 11:15 when we got to town). Daniel helped us find a restaurant that would serve vegetarian food, and we all sat down for a nice meal. Restaurants here in Chad are very interesting. The one that we ate in was essentially a little closed in hangar, complete with thatched roof, and a large grass mat on the ground for you to sit on. They bring your food out on large, round platters with plates. We all had bread and a dipping sauce. The meat-eaters had a goat sauce, and the vegetarians had an interesting sauce composed of oil, mayonnaise, tomatoes, and onions (which was surprisingly very good). We also splurged and had cold drinks. Although, my drink turned out to be
disappointing; it looked like a strawberry soda, but it tasted an awful lot like bubble gum, which I don't like. But it was nice to have a cold drink.

After lunch, we decided to bike around town for fun. So we biked around for a while, just taking random turns whenever we felt like it. One funny incident from our exploration... Here in Chad, it is not uncommon to see two guys walking hand in hand, which has taken some getting used to. So as we're biking down one street, Nathaniel and Jacob start talking about this, and they started holding hands while biking down the street (they're true Chadians now... I'll have to write a blog about qualifications for being a true Chadian later). Ansley was in front of them and decided that she wanted to get a video because it was so funny, but when she went to do so, she ended up crashing and they nearly ran into her! In her defense, it really was the most graceful fall I've seen yet- she managed to walk/run out of it, but then collapsed on the ground in laughter.

There wasn't much interesting there, but it was fun to explore. There's this one bus stop (we think that's what it is) where there's a large cement thing that has paintings on it and distances from Lai to other villages. I think it's the closest thing resembling Chadian public sculpture that I've seen yet. I wish that we had gotten a picture of it, but maybe some other time. We also saw the hospital there (which looks very big and official next to ours), and we saw a funeral procession while biking through town.

After we finished riding around, we ended up at the river (a ways away from the ferry route) where it was less crowded, and we decided to go swimming. It was at this point that we realized how very sunburnt we all were. Nathaniel, Emily, and Jacob ended up swimming all the way across the river (maybe 1/4 of a mile?) and they had fun jumping off little cliffs into the water. I got tired after swimming halfway out to the sandbar, and Ansley decided to stay closer to the shore. So, I sat down on the sandbar and soaked up some more sun and cool water.

Then three random guys swam up to me, sat down in the sand across from me, and started talking to me. I was kind of irritated at first and kind of hoped that they would go away if I didn't start conversation. But alas, they were disposed to talk, and they initiated conversation. But it actually turned out being a nice conversation. They knew some people from the hospital, and we talked a little bit about religion (one was Catholic, one was Muslim, and one was an Evangelical Christian of some sort).

When we finished swimming, we went to the market where we shopped around for different things. And then we headed back. At this point, I was pretty tired. We had some issues with the ferry on the way back. Luckily, this time the boat was not sewn together, and there was no need for a bailer. However, they tried to charge us
500 francs a piece instead of 300 (people here try to rip off white people all the time and give us higher prices because they think that we're rich). So Daniel had a nice heated argument with one of the boat steerers. But it all worked out in the end.

On the way home, things were going great until we got about 6 km away from Bere, and my bike chain fell off. It fell off three times in a row before Nathaniel decided that some extra repairs were needed. He gave me his bike (which was too tall for me to ride, so I walked it) and told me to go ahead while him and Jacob fixed mine. The chain actually ended up breaking and they had to fix it. While I was walking Nathaniel's bike, several people asked me if I was ok, and a few stopped to help me, which is funny because I didn't look like I was in distress, I was just walking the bike, but no one offered to stop and help Nathaniel and Jacob who were slaving over a
broken bike chain in the sand. What can I say? I guess I just exude the air of "damsel in distress."

So we made it back without any major problems, and I was only a little bit late for the 6pm medications, which turned out to be alright because there were very few patients and I got them all done quickly. But I was most definitely exhausted by the end of the trip. Oh, one other funny thing (Christy, Emily, and Andrew will find this particularly amusing). Ansley decided that all of us deserved special awards for the trip.

Emily won the mountain-biker award because she just looked the part, and her bike looked more like a mountain bike. Nathaniel won the safari-man award because of his funny touristy, safari hat. Jacob and Ansley both got the stuntman award (Ansley for her several graceful falls, and Jacob because he'd randomly go no hands and very nearly wipe out). And I got the ghetto bike award because my bike was really ridiculous with only one pedal, a really messed up seat, broken brake handlebars (no Chadian bike has brakes by the way), and a loose chain. Oh, and Daniel got the intense Chadian award because he's pretty much one of the only Chadians we've seen who would go on an 18 km bike trip with 5 crazy white people.

After our trip we were all quite sore; we couldn't sit down comfortably for a few days (Ansley, Jacob, and I all got bruises from our bike seats). But I think we all came away with a deep sense of accomplishment and satisfaction. It was an awesome trip.