New Sweet Salone post: Bad examples
Meryl Olson
Today I woke up really grouchy, because my stomach is sick AGAIN and, just like most days, I was woken up earlier than I wanted to be by somebody who wanted to talk to me about something. Privacy is not a Sierra Leonean concept. In fact, privacy is pretty much the same as rudeness here. Then I spent 30 minutes negotiating with a guy who is building me a shelf and claimed he has not finished it yet (3 weeks in) because he needs me to buy the sandpaper. That should be included in the price, buddy. Then I got harassed by a drunk guy at a fruit stand.
There are plenty of things that drive me crazy in Sierra Leone. But here’s what really pissed me off today: North Carolina passed an amendment banning any form of civil union that’s not marriage between a man and a woman. And guess what? Everyone in Sierra Leone heard about it. Not one, but several people brought it up in conversation today. And you know what? Not everyone agrees with it. Kari and I were sitting around with her friend Abu at his fabric shop in Kenema when somebody brought it up. And here was Abu’s take: “You know, I like energy drinks and I don’t drink alcohol. But some people like alcohol and not energy drinks. I like women, but if somebody else feels different, they feel what they feel. What do I care?”
You know why Abu doesn’t drink alcohol? Because he’s a Muslim. And that doesn’t matter here either. Around 70% of the country is Muslim, but even the Muslim school principals address letters to Kari beginning with “In the name of our Lord Jesus” because they assume she is Christian. And the Christians respect the Muslims. Nobody cares what religion anybody else is. Christians don’t care where Muslims build their mosques and Muslims don’t care where Christians build their churches. People tell me “It’s all the same God, so what difference does it make?” Meanwhile, several people in the U.S. who heard I was going to Sierra Leone warned me to “be careful, it’s a Muslim country, isn’t it?”
If we’re going to make foreign aid conditional on respect for human rights (which we are), let’s start making a better example, shall we?
