during November and December 2009, Mina and I returned to Europe for extended holidays. we really want to thank everyone for making this possible. we traveled through Europe quite a bit to visit friends and families, but yet the two months were not sufficient to meet all of our friends. we tried to spend as much time with chiara, our newest family member. after ten exciting but exhausting months in Chad, we also tried to rest as much as possible, which made that the days were all pretty short as a great part of days we simply slept. I guess our families were quite happy to see us with their own eyes in good state and finally we used the 2 months to improve our drum skills and we made it to the expert level on drums for rock band: the Beatles game.
now we are back in Chad. our flight got to N’Djamena on January 9th 2010. we had a very short but nice stay at jean-christophe’s family, always a pleasure to spent some time there. but then came the most difficult part of the trip…the trip from n’djamena to sarh. it can go very fast (12 hours), but if you are unlucky it might also take a little more. our trip was kind of rough and we made it in 18 hours. then we had a very lovely welcoming by our neighbours and monique. and as sarh is the place where we spend most of our time as a married couple, I can say that we felt like home coming and we were very happy to be back in sarh. it feels good to see all the people here and to take up our unfinished work.
back in Chad, we are quite happy to see the projects still up and running. there are still about 30 students at the cfik and all children are at the school of nur. our absence was marked by a electricity breakdown which lasted more than two months!!(two months without electricity in the whole city, just think of it) A visit of the president of Chad to the city fixed everything. especially for his visit two major roads have been paved in the city and some roads have gotten street lights. apparently the number of accidents with severe consequences have increased on these two roads, as many people are not used to the speed of motorcycle. Even the drivers often don’t notice how fast they are driving.
other changes in the city is that the grass from the rain season along the street has vanished and now fully displays the trash lying besides the streets in town. and then a lot of people we know are still there, and whenever we go to the market we see many people we know and it’s just like in fribourg during summer in the rue de romont.
besides the city changing from Europe to sarh, things make me realise that life is different in many ways down here. it is true that in Europe it is almost impossible to resist to the many temptations there are to buy and consume things and learning more about the world can make you really really sad sometimes. people who exactly know the effect of their actions, but still choose to perform it are the saddest of them all. constantly meeting people who exactly know the consequences of their actions but either they prefer not to think of them to prevent a bad feeling, or they simply don’t care, actually does not make me embrace the western world.
Going to a supermarket and having EVERYTHING you want to buy at any season, at any time, from all around the world to the lowest possible prices…is a fundamental base of modern civilisation. it is not possible that a cow is born in Australia, raised in Canada, slaughtered in Belgium and sold in Luxembourg. how is it possible that this meat is still cheaper than from a cow which is born, raised and slaughtered in the same country where it is sold???? (Doesn’t that make you wonder guys???)
in 2007 I wanted to travel from Geneva to Brussels and the cheapest flight(yes I know I should have taken the train!!), but the cheapest flight was with a stop over in London. This means it is cheaper to travel the double of distance in a plane than going straight.
Of course people buy the stopover flight it’s cheaper, of course people buy the world-traveller meat, it’s cheaper. choosing the personal best solution is not the right way, choosing the most comfortable solution neither…Stop the increasing comfort right now!! as going back is very hard or impossible…as we saw in Copenhagen!
welcome to your civilisation, welcome to your future!
