By Meg

Somaliland, August 17 2007 - the north-west part of Somalia, declared independence from Somalia (and everyone else) in 1991 but is not yet recognized as a country by the UN or any other state. It is safe, the people are friendly and generous, the air is clean and the fruit is good!

I was there for two weeks and had a wonderful time.

My scope of work was to help the PSI country rep, Louisa, determine the health areas on which the PSI project should focus. Of course I loved it because basically, my role was to talk to people. I’m shameless! Traveling across the world just to chat.

Somaliland receives very little international aid and yet it is a high functioning state. The government has no money but the city is quite safe and organized. One of the best roads in Hargeysa, the capital city, was paved with funds contributed both by the government and merchants whose shops are along it. All services are private – which in a poor country means that the are few services (when garbage collection has a cost and is “optional”, generally, people just burn it themselves) and those services that exist are expensive. Few people own cars and public transport is spotty. But the market was full of fruit (papaya! Guava! Bananas!) and there was a women’s co-op shop selling excellent honey.

A view of the city.

PSI has a lovely, luxurious guesthouse with a huge garden and full of blooming bouganvilla. Of course, everything is relative – clear (not clean) running water, electricity and flowers = luxury! This is where I had breakfast each day.

Next door to the guesthouse is a mosque. The imam had a lovely voice and the call to prayer each day was lovely. (The iman by the office yodeled off key. Not lovely).

Most of the time I was there, I shared the guesthouse with my colleague (and good friend of Negar!), Rushad aka Spidy. He’s a rock climber with adventurous stories of climbing in Africa. To keep his fingers strong, he resorted to climbing the house.

One morning I had a guest in my bedroom (note pen in photo to show the size). Poor Rushad - although there is some debate on whether I am still a princess, this size bug is my limit. I woke him up to take care of it.

On the second weekend, we went to see cave paintings that were discovered in 2003. I don’t know how old they actually are (Louisa is convinced that they painted photos of guys in suits and ties – i.e. not that old!). The paintings are pretty much the only tourist destination in Somaliland and they are outside the city in barren desert landscape. Clean air, big skies and yellow sunlight.

For those of you who know Satender, you know that there is simply no question of who is the best driver in the world. Yet, my driver in Somaliland was excellent and he took most of the photos of me in this post. He joined us for the cave adventure and had a great time!

Me, Rushad, Louisa, Muktar -a Somali colleague.

Tree growing from a rock - incredible.

My colleague, Nimo, is probably the most fashionable woman in Hargeysa. She organized so much of my trip as well as organizing my fun henna (mehendi) party. Here she is posing with a view of the city behind her.

Hargeysa is full of goats. We even had two visiting at the guesthouse compound. One became dinner a few days after he arrived and the other was a runaway/escape artist who was ejected from the compound after trying to eat Louisa’s plants. Here are a few goat photos.

Downtown

One hungry goat

There are no safaris in Somaliland but several “wild” animals live at the main hotel in town. Here we are petting the kudo (?).

Louisa and her friend

Finally, my work. I met with pharmacists, pharmaceutical wholesalers, ministry of health officials (ad nauseam), other NGOs, UN agencies like UNICEF and WHO, and most importantly and most inspirationally, with Somali women. The health statistics for women are gruesome so I won’t even talk about them. (www.unfpa.org if you want to check it out). Instead, I just want to say that Somali women are strong, survivors, hard working mothers, and amazingly resourceful. I sincerely enjoyed learning about their lives and I truly hope PSI is able to launch products and projects for their benefit. Photos of my conversations.

Laughing with some women in Hargeysa

One of the children

Pretty girl

Outside of the city.

A mother outside of her home.

Posted by Meg at August 17, 2007

Source: Meg's World