Au revoir, Cote d’Ivoire!

My 5 nights in Abidjan are effectively more than I'll be spending on my upcoming honeymoon.  How sad is that?  Does that mean I have my priorities misaligned?  (don't answer that!)  At least I expect I’ll have more fun on my honeymoon than Abidjan could even serve up.  Not saying that it hasn’t been a good week, though.  It has been a very tiring week.  But that was expected.  After all, I was here to work!  And work I did.

So, what do I love about CdI?  Well, the people are certainly delightful.  I did love meeting and being with them.  I had met a few of the faces before, which made my credibility and arrival a little gentler.  Despite the previous few months war, brutality and carnage the people’s spirits are incredible.  They remain so positive and quite a happy bunch.  They’re extremely friendly, I felt extraordinarily safe, and just generally enjoyed the experience.

I certainly enjoyed having my evenings to myself rather than having the local Team feel like I needed to be hosted at every waking opportunity.  So I was very happy about that.

The weather ranged from rainy and humid, to overcast and humid, to sunny and very humid.  Time in the plant around hot soap linea and steam didn’t make it any more comfortable, but it did make me appreciate my air conditioned and clean room each night!

Traffic wasn’t anywhere near bad as I expected, and although the roads are in a state of disrepair in certain areas the traffic moves remarkably well, drivers are surprisingly polite, hooting isn’t excessive, and cars don’t go missing in potholes to hell.

Buildings are pretty battered, especially along some of the main routes where ground floor windows remain boarded up or completely destroyed – no doubt as a result of the violence last year / earlier this year.

The quality of vehicles is remarkably good.  Being a former French colony these cars clearly dominate the roads.  But I was more surprised by how many NEW vehicles, including 4x4’s, are being driven.

Today (Saturday) I had a fantastic opportunity to be taken shopping by a colleague of mine.  Although I came away with various indigenous printed garments that I’m likely to never wear I did thoroughly enjoy getting into a local market, hearing the sounds, seeing the people and freshly boiled fresh chickens being defeathered (NOT!), and smelling the fresh roasted fish and other indigenous smells!!!  I felt remarkably safe and unharassed, which was a pleasant change from places like Morocco and Turkey.  Marius took me into some of the formal trade, less formal trade and then very basic rural trade.  It was great to drive around and see.  I’d probably not survive on my own – once again my French would let me down – but aside from that it was quite manageable.  Lesson to self: if you show an interest in something then be prepared to buy it.  Not because you’ll be muscled into buying it, but because you’ll leave the seller quite dejected and mildly offended if you go off and buy it elsewhere.  Even Marius – a local – avoided a store owner where I’d seen something and said we might come back, just because he didn’t want to offend him!

Well, I’m now done with Abidjan, this island-type city build around and on a vast lagoon in a Country of remarkably positive and robust, happy people.  I have enjoyed being here, albeit that I wasn’t too keen to come in the end and paid dearly in sweat and angst to get here.  West Africans truly are a delightful people.  I recall feeling the same after visiting Ghana – an immediate neighbour to CdI – some 8 or 9 years ago.

I've just arrived in Nairobi, Kenya off a 6hr flight where I'll be spending a further 4 nights.  I was "treated" to an emergency exit wondow seat only to learn that MY seat barely had a cushion AND it didn't recline.  So it was a surprisingly LONG 6hrs during which I didn't sleep at all.  Now I'm about to face a day of game drives and sightseeing which normally would be an AMAZING day out.  But given my lack of sleep - again - I think it might turn into an endurance session!!  Anyway, I'll make the most of enjoying some of the local activities on today (Sunday 25^th Sept) before spending 2 days in the Factory then returning home again on the 28^th. 

And then my REAL adventure begins.  I hear the sound of wedding bells tolling somewhere in the distance already!  21 days to go today!!  Yeah-haw!!!

Bienvenue a Cote d'Ivoire

Novotel Hotel, Abidjan, Cote d’Ivoire, West Africa

News from this roving Reporter has been pretty quiet this year, hasn’t it?  And as most of you will know, it’s not because of LACK of news on my part.  Quite the contrary!  It’s been a momentous year indeed.  The start of my 40's has been anything BUT predictable!!

I’m now back on the travel and blogging road again, experiencing my first business trip in 6 months.  I’ve loved the break from the travel.  

Early February saw me visiting India for the first time.  Late February and up to my 40^th birthday weekend saw me in Algeria and a week later I was off to Turkey for 2 weeks.  All three of these trips were profound and enjoyable for their own reasons.  Yes, even Algeria (maybe because it’s the last time I’ll need to go there?).  

My 4 week holiday to Canada in July – and probably my 8^th or 9^th visit there – was nothing short of momentous.  I had the delight of being able to accompany my Dad and Mom across, flying into Canada to join my brother and his family there on my Mom’s birthday.  And then started my whirlwind visit that saw me return to SA just under 4 weeks later having become engaged to my old (with respect!) high school friend and sweet heart, Christa!  But that story is another whole movie franchise-in-the-making of its own!!

Instead, let me get back to present day work reality …

After numerous thwarted attempts at trying to make a long-awaited business trip to visit the friendly Ivoriennes during 2010, I once again nearly had my plans scuttled over this past weekend.  Why does my business travel somehow always make for a story instead of just being a run-of-the mill “happening”?

Like I mentioned, I’ve been trying to get to this French-speaking gem of Africa for well over a year now.  When I was all set and ready to go in early 2010 some local rebels thought otherwise and decided to re-embark on civil war efforts that left the Country in a very tenuous position and left Unilever banning all travel here.  So my plans were put on hold indefinitely.  Over recent months things seem to have settled down to a gentle simmer, so I rekindled my travel plans – not out of necessity rather than out of genuine desire – and so compiled an itinerary that would help me tick a few boxes on my work to-do list. 

A week of trials and process auditing in Cote d’Ivoire.

A 3-day courtesy visit and process audit in Nigeria.

And finally a 2 day stop-over and project review and process audit in Kenya. 

The 11-day journey was planned and just needed to be executed.  My departure date was set for Sunday September 11^th (the idea of flying on this significant date and on the 10 year anniversary of the US bombings didn’t really enthral me, I must be honest).  So I was mildly relieved when one of my key raw materials for my trial had not yet been shipped from Ghana which forced me to delay my trip by a week.  I was relieved to have an extra week at home, what with the prospects of our momentous wedding occasion a mere 5 weeks away!  It just seems more settling to be home-based for now!  But alas, work still pays the bills!

I was all set and ready to fly on my rescheduled date of Sunday 18^th September, when on Saturday afternoon it suddenly dawned on me that I’d not received confirmation of my travel details and my final itinerary.  Trying my best to think nothing much of it I pressed on in the rest of the weekend expecting the gnawing in my stomach to subside once I started packing.  Well, a long story short, by Sunday morning it was confirmed that I did, indeed, NOT have a confirmed ticket for my anticipated upcoming journey that I was expected to depart on at 8pm that night.  So with a mild frenzy I set about trying to establish whether there had been some accidental mess-up and what could be done to remedy the situation.  After numerous extended phone calls to the 24-hour helpline for our travel agents investigating flight routing options, times and PRICE (it’s not a good thing booking at the last minute … ever!!!), and with much angst, I managed to book a trip that would still get me to CdI on time albeit that I now had to cut out the Nigerian leg of my travel.  So after receiving final confirmation of my trip at 4.30pm on Sunday afternoon I frantically started packing, getting things ready at home for my 10 days excursion.  Despite my best intentions to be ready ahead of time for this journey when the time came to it I was hopelessly under-prepared, far from ready to leave, and severely lacking in enthusiasm to travel to Central Africa.  Even a stint in hospital seemed more appealing at the time (I hate to admit it!!).

Saturday night had seen me hosting friends at my home till quite late.  This, followed by another of those late night calls to my beloved in Canada saw me crawling into bed at 2am on Sunday morning.  The growing anxiety about my unconfirmed trip woke me by 6am on Sunday morning, so by the time I had packed my bags and was dashing for the airport on Sunday night I was already running on emotional fumes.  In my haste to park my car in my parking bay at work I promptly reversed into the wall of the prayer room in the Unilever basement car park and put a neat hole through the wooden partition.  This after almost mounting a pillar with my front tyre.  Try get that right in your car and come away unscathed!!

I can’t help but wonder if some forces weren’t conspiring to stop me from embarking on my trip to Central Africa yet again.  But undeterred I was determined to make this thing work.

Anyway, now I’m here.  And relatively unscathed.  CdI from the air as we flew in at the end of a 5h30min journey from Nairobi in the late morning looked lush and densely forested.  Massive palm plantations were immediately the most prominent feature of the landscape, with palm (kernel) oil being a key source of raw material supply, certainly to our (Unilever’s) soap making industry in this part of Africa.

My first transition through Ivorian customs was pretty effortless.  The little airport here really is very neat and quite impressive by African standards.  It’s relatively modern and clean.  And it, like the rest of the country, is very … very … very French!!  I guess it’s not called French West Africa for nothing!  There is a very basic understanding of English amongst the public servants at, say, the airport.  I happened to arrive on the same flight as the Ivorian Athletic Team (able-bodied and para-athletes) who had just been competing in the African Athletics Champs in Mozambique.  So there was much excitement and photographing at arrivals as I walked through into the arrivals area of the terminal.  My ego was momentarily boosted until I realised they weren’t there to see one of the only white faces in the terminal building; they were there to meet their athletes!  To add insult to injury, even my pre-arranged driver hadn’t pitched up.  So I was soon humbled as I have been on numerous occasions these past few hours and days!

Although very tropical, with a constant light cloud-cover that insulates the atmosphere enhancing the humidity build-up, today was pretty mild, although I do realise I was exerting no effort aside from staying awake and breathing.  Despite that I did find myself pushing out some beads of perspiration as I jammed myself into a minibus loaded with a troop of Arabic-speaking folk that drove and dropped us at various hotels.  I was glad that my hotel was one of those scheduled drop-off points!  My 6^th floor room has a great view of the sprawling lagoon around which a large part of Abidjan is located.  I was supposed to have been picked up and taken off to the factory during mid-afternoon, once I’d freshened up.  But eventually my work colleague here proposed that I just stay on in my room, relax and they’ll pick me up first thing in the morning rather than try to fight the afternoon traffic to get to the Factory and back again.  So tomorrow (Tuesday) will be my first opportunity to see the facilities here and recce out the set-up so I can prepare for my soap bar trials later in the week. 

Hopefully I’ll get to update you again “later”.