Sierra Leone the forgotten beach paradise

Just a few weeks ago I traveled to Sierra Leone on a assignment for the NGO Plan Danmark.
Our job was to find cases in different areas that Plan Danmark works with.

Some of the projects that Plan are heavily involved with are to prevent child marriages and child pregnancy. For those young girls who are married away or pregnant, Plan Danmark tries to get them back to school, hoping to build a stronger generation of women who can kick serious ass.

During those 6 days I heard so many stories both good ones but also some very horrible.
At times when we got back to the hotel, I would stare into nothing  and not understand what kind of cruelty some people go through or how cruel people can act against each other.
Sierra Leone has been through a'lot of things, one be the civil war that lasted over a decade, with massive genocide, raping, kidnapping of children so they could be used as soldiers. Some was even forced to watch their mother being raped and then handed a gun to finish them off!
A story that tore me apart was about a child who was forced to witness her/his mother being raped so hard with a stick, that it came in from one end and out of her mouth!

Horrible stories like these were not rare, our job was to document these kinda stories, so obviously we didn't get to hear that many positive ones.

One thing that kinda stuck to my mind was that every adult I'd met here had either been a witness to the war or a been a part of it's cruelty, so one second I could stand next to a one who had lost both his parents and the second after I could stand next to a murderer.

And of course we all heard of the Ebola outbreak last year, only the west only heard about it a year ago when really the virus had been killing for a year before that! Before the ebola virus the tourism here was roughly around two thousands a year and after the outbreak it has been close to nothing, can you imagine that?

But let me tell you one thing, we got so many smiles when we was here, the people was amazing and I felt totally safe. The kids were my favourites, just visiting the schools and see so many smiles made my day. I truely miss them, in hard times those kids can turn your mood around in a second and thats how I wanted to portray my trip. Africa is more than the bad and sad stories that commerciel news agencies keeps feeding us with!

Tell the good stories too!

Thank you for reading

Luv
Kenneth

I will have a special exchibition with portraits(not shown here) in association with Plan Danmark in may as a tribute to the girls and women of Sierra Leone!


The slum of Freetown

At the entrance to the slum of Freetown we were met with mountains of trash and a heavy smell of burned plastic. The only way to get rid of the trash here is to burn it and while piles of trash are being burned people would walk among it and collect plastic and other items that they could sell.

The river that these two kids were playing in is used for everything. I don't think I need to go into details to give you an idea for what.

 This kid was so scared of us, I might be scared too if I was the first asian/white person I saw!

The local theater and arcade.

Jordans!

On our way back to our hotel, we were met with these forest fire that are caused by local farmers, so they can use the land. It was quite a sight.


Girls only 

This was most likely the best experience I had on the trip. Those kids made me forget all the bad things in my life with their smiles.

Curious little ones

 Exams

 Just look at them, so much love!

 The girls with stories were lined up for us. This one caught my attention.

 Signe from Plan talking with the girls.

 China man, snap snap us... I'm actually a Vietnamese Dane:-)

  
Without water and electricity

 We visited a birth clinic that had no electricity or water system

 

 Thats not her sibling but her son

 Those cheeks!

 Water

More burning!


The village chief put on his fancy outfit for us

Before we were going to the village, we had to do some more cases and this school was the first one we visited that was a mix gender school. This one was a Islamic school, though also Christian and Catholics study here.

 Detention

 This kid!

 The town chief

Remember there will be some unseen photos at the exchibiton
Hope I'll see you there!