Road to Voinjama

After spending several days in Monrovia, we set out towards interior. Our destination, Nimba county, a border county with Guinea. We were in search of the Mano and Gio who resided there. To our joy we found that much evangelical effort has been focused on the Nimba county in the past twenty years and the Mano and Gio benefited greatly because of it. Everyone we met with said the same, “The need is not for churches but discipleship.” Also everyone we asked about the unreached people groups spoke the same names, “Mandingo, Gola and Vai.” All three groups have migrated into Liberia from neighboring Muslim countries and hold on to their traditional African religion with thin layer of Islam sprinkled on top. The Mandingo especially are feared by their Christian neighbors. There is fear in Liberia like in Sierra Leone. The young adults, late twenties and early thirties all grew up during the bloody coup and subsequent war that lasted until 2005. They know the depth of hate and cruelty that man can have. They stood over holes dug by hand with their sons and jumped in whenever they heard a helicopter, afraid they might force their children to fight. The atrocities that ran rampant during the Sierra Leone war were repeated in Liberia. And more recently there has been hostile uprising in the north between Christians and Muslims. Liberians are hopeful about their futures but there is a sense of humility ingrained in them. Their country was broken, they had to flee and hide and an entire generation missed their education because of the war. So there is hope but many seem pensive. Scarred. Like Sierra Leone, they are scarred by their history. We left early on a Sunday morning, we needed to make it to Voinjama. It was drizzly but it’s rainy season so we were glad it wasn’t torrential. We drove an hour outside of Ganta, we had 7 more to go before Voinjama. Ropes in the road ahead…. A police stop? “We are working on the bridge it will be about 3 hours.” In Africa time, 3hours could mean 3 days… we could go back to Ganta. That would be the safe thing to do. Or we could try a back road, that would be fun thing to do. In about 20 minutes I’m standing over a canyon in the road shouting “don’t do it, you’ll fall in the rut!” I throw one log into the pit before Rita floors it and attempts to climb the side of the embankment and not slide into the rut. It doesn’t work she slides in, but miraculously bounces back out. This road is so rough Alex and I elect to walk portions of it so that we don’t turn into scrambled eggs in the cab. Eventually we make it out the other end and on to the main road. We are cruising now. It’s getting close to twilight, we check the GPS mileage, 10 miles to Voinjama, perfect we’ll get there just before dark, hey what’s that? Up ahead on the road, is that a traffic jam in the middle of nowhere? There’s a truck stuck in the road ahead. The rains had turned the road into a muddy slip n slide. We can see 10 or 15 cars lined up in to rows (blocking the entire road) waiting to see if the truck would move. Dozens of people stand around and watch the show, dozens more slide ankle deep in the mud some shoving some shouting. After 30 minutes are so the truck is free and lurches to the side. A split second after that everyone is running to their cars as fast as possible to try and head everyone else off. Little 4 passenger cars with overloaded roofs go careening into mud pits that we wouldn’t even attempt in our 4x4. Stuck, everyone is stuck again. We shake our heads and return to our vehicle, there is no Red Roof Inn, even if we back tracked hours there would be no guest house and now it’s definitely dusk. What is to be done? We drive a bit back to the last village we saw and ask for the chief. He is bathing (on the front porch, awkward), but he will see us after his bath. After hearing our dilemma he offers us his own bed! Would you do that for someone you’d never met before? TIA. We three girls all sleep in the double bed. Neither Alex or Rita like to cuddle and they put me in the center… jerks. I role on my side and my knee taps Alex she scoots closer to the edge I try to make amends by backing up a smidge my elbow touches Rita she promptly squiggles closer to the edge. I think I could have owned the bed if I had just thrown my arms around one of them. The next morning we wake up early to brave the road. The road is free from the collided cars but what about the mud? It had rained all night but somehow that stretch of road looked drier. We still fishtailed our way through it but in under 20 minutes we were finally in Voinjama.