By Andrew Keili
I am not a frequent traveler and haven’t gone overseas for quite a while-not even to Bonthe! However, every time I am chanced to travel, I subconsciously try to compare my destination with Sierra Leone. One may say this is unfair as it depends on where you go-and I agree with that. I nevertheless endeavour to use other yardsticks, apart from pure technological development in the comparison. Every time I travel to a developed country, the experiences of Zimbo in “Zimbo comes to town”, an Indian film that was one of our favourites at Odeon cinema when growing up in Bo come to mind. It tells the story of Zimbo, an ape-man who visits the big city for the first time and marvels at everything he sees, with hilarious results.
I do remember my Aunt’s first visit to UK-straight from Mobai, Kailahun District to London. An inadvertent step on an escalator with one foot got the other foot and the whole body on board, with her shaking like a leaf throughout the whole downward journey, hanging on for dear life and shouting to me for help- “Karmoh, dey Mobai bla mia ke pu bla ti ya a gay hue!”. meaning “Karmoh, tell the folks at Mobai that the white people have taken me away o!”. She finally recovered from that “near death capture by the white people”. Obviously, now suspicious of everything around her, she did not take too kindly to the visit to Madame Tussauds, where she claimed that several of the life-like statues were looking at her rather suspiciously. She finally came back to Mobai with evening stories for the rest of the unfortunate spellbound folks that had never been to “Pulohun”, the Mende name for Britain, about the wonders of her travels.
Well, I am not exactly like my Aunt, but I did marvel at more than a few things on my recent holidays to China and Dubai with my wife and son. I do realize that we have a fair bit of catching up to do on them with technology and infrastructure, but one is nevertheless impressed with the pace of their advancement. Skyscraper heights now don’t seem to have any limits nor does there seem to be any inhibitions or impossibilities in the design of buildings. It is as if the Architect just wakes up from his sleep and does his design based on his dream about some futuristic spaceship and leaves the rest to the Structural Engineer and builders to figure out. Oval shaped edifices and leaning buildings, interior designs that mesmerize and construction companies constantly putting up new structures and highways as if there is no tomorrow left me speechless.
The use of smart technology in everything was boundless. I marveled at the pervasive use of WECHAT in everything the Chinese did-paying for miscellaneous services, ordering for food, calling a taxi, professional collaboration- it is a way of life in China. Of the 1.2 billion people worldwide who use this app, 1 billion are in China. I wonder how much information this app generates for snooping on residents! And so is the creeping use of robots to provide services. Our extremely nice Chinese host who could sometimes be a kind of “calamity Jane” stayed with us at the hotel in Foshan and kept telling us about the boundless activities that can be done by one of the robots in the hotel. One late morning, the doorbell in my room rang and when I opened the door, I was confronted by the robot which began speaking to me in incomprehensible Chinese. I stood there speechless, not knowing what had attracted the robot to me until our friend dashed from his room and apologized to me for giving the robot the wrong room number for delivering a few cans of beer he had ordered. He carefully retrieved his beer cans and sent the robot packing. I was in the lift with some Chinese workers when this same robot attempted to gain entrance. The workers, probably out of exasperation shouted at it using invectives (or so I thought-as it would be taking way their jobs) to vamoose and it did!
But holidays are not just about marveling at things. They are also about enjoying yourself and I did. In Guangzhou, China’s main transport and trading hub, known as the country’s capital of gastronomy, our Chinese host treated us to many sumptuous meals in all kinds of restaurants with a wide array of Chinese cuisines. Unlike my wife and son, who are allergic to certain types of food, I am “all tin go” as far as food is concerned. Even though they were concerned when our Chinese host told us the Chinese don’t waste food and eat all kinds of vegetables and almost every animal that moved, I was not, as I adopted a “don’t ask, don’t tell policy”- I never asked and ate whatever they ate. Our Chinese host was mightily pleased with my performance and remarked –“Father (that’s how he calls me), you are Chinese!” The food in Guangzhou was just exquisite. Tours of various paces in Dubai and Abu Dhabi revealed the extent of the infrastructural developments and rich preservation of their heritage. Not even the absence of alcohol in Dubai (or shall I say seeming absence) could affect us. The supermarket with non-alcoholic beer with its 0.00 alcoholic label (I wonder why they printed the first Zero so big and had two zeroes after the decimal point) could not deter us as we soon found the nondescript shops that would quietly and inconspicuously dish out the real stuff and also the hotel restaurants that were licensed to indulge in such haram.
But how did we manage with translations in China? A good number of business houses had someone who could speak English, however broken. You could reach a point of agreement by using one of the many translations apps. This proved useful until I went to a pharmacy to buy some pain medicine. I bought it alright, but then the Assistant asked me in English- “Do you want a kidney?”. I was startled as to why she would think I needed a kidney, but then my wife, always the teacher knew better. She remarked-“She is asking whether you need some kidney medicine!’
Was there something I did not like about China and Dubai. Yes, the poor social media presence, especially WhatsApp which is apparently banned or deliberately slowed down in both China and Dubai, making communications difficult. I wonder whether it is a ploy to keep news away from the people.
But why are these people racing ahead in many areas? What were the lessons learnt?
Both societies could be credited for orderliness. Even though you could hardly see any Policeman around things were orderly. No breaking of traffic rules, no ill disciplined okada riders, no street garages, no littering around, no unnecessary noise, no all-night services disturbing your peace, no slums. Things just work in these disciplined societies.
Then there is the honesty issue. Both societies boast of very low crime rates. What surprised me in Guangzhou was that shop owners would leave their expensive wares out in the open with no fear that they would be stolen. Bicycles and motorbikes were parked outside with no fear of theft. An incident happened which left me dumbfounded. When we left Foshan for Guangzhou, our host telephoned to inform us that the hotel had reported we left some money behind in the safe. Apparently, one of us three (not me, as my money was always in my back pocket!) had left a substantial amount of money in the safe. We travelled back by road to Foshan to retrieve the money which was intact. I was also impressed by the intensity of industrialization in China, with the range of goods produced, their ability to market their goods and their intimate knowledge of their products. One could see a whole range of shops selling products from household furniture, building materials, electronic goods and other types of products with foreigners doing very brisk business, Most of these shops have strong international connections. The Chinese are tenacious business people who don’t take “no” for an answer and always find a way to respond to a client.
Apart from technological developments, there is a lot we can learn from the work ethic of people in these parts of the world, their orderliness and respect for the law, the seamless provision of infrastructure services like electricity and water, their investor friendliness and ease of doing business. One also has to admire the visionary leadership that steers them towards achieving their national goals. Gungzhou, which used to be a highly polluted city is now credited with commendable green urban planning. How Dubai transformed itself from a desert to an urban metropolis that is a world renowned business and investment centre and how a desert city gets 90 percent of its water from desalinated seawater are also symptomatic of visionary leadership.
But then it is also refreshing to be back home, whatever our problems and reflect on some good news as the SLPP and APC seem to signal that they will to work together in the interest of national peace and we seem to be yielding some dividends with funding for the health sector, a new pediatric hospital opened by the President, the launch of a new gas-fired power station and other snippets of good news.
As I marvel at what I saw on my travels like Zimbo, so am I also joyous to be back home to the maddening crowd and shouts of tripartite! I am invigorated to continue pondering.
Ponder my thoughts.
