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| Our Lady greeted me on my arrival at the Mission. |
In the Paris airport, I had been praying in the chapel and met the chaplain when I was leaving. He's Polish, but of course addressed me in French. Given my limitations with the language, I thought the best thing to do was use my best phrase: "Je ne parle pas le français" -- I don't speak French. I don't recall what he said next; I believe his next guess at my nationality was American. Anyway, he managed some English (and told me he spoke about five other languages better than English).
When I stepped off the gangway, I was handed a questionnaire about covid exposure, symptoms, etc. The lady said something in French and I again said "Je ne parle pas le français". She just looked at me.
Well, this should be interesting.
I wrote to Canon Fragelli after I got past the Ministry of Health checkpoint (covid questionnaire and proof of yellow fever vaccination), telling him I had arrived. He replied:
Great! Blessed be God!
You will go through immigration, then pick up your luggage, then you will have to do another covid test.
Our driver, Jimmy, will be waiting for you outside the gate. He has a sign with your name.
If you have any problem you can call him.
God bless you!
Fr.
With my online visa application and all my documents being in order, it was very easy to get past immigration, get my visa and go find my bag. I then followed the line for the covid test. I had paid online so that I wouldn't have to worry about changing my euros to CFA francs right away. I managed to make that clear to the ladies who were handling things, and fortunately the man they directed me to spoke a bit of English. After finally getting through all that and the covid test, I stepped out into the clouds, palm trees and humidity of Libreville.
I started looking around for someone holding a sign with my name, trying to call and then text Jimmy, the driver who was supposed to pick me up, and not receiving an answer. Some guys were offering to "help" me, asking me if I needed to use a phone, which was nonsense since I was already using my own. I completely ignored them and when I walked away, they called after me, "Gratuité?" Which was more nonsense: I'm not giving a tip to someone who didn't help me and whose help I didn't want in the first place.
I finally saw someone with a piece of computer paper with my full name printed in bold letters. It was our driver and a girl who I guess had come along for the ride.
Jimmy, for whatever reason, took to calling me "Miss Elisabeth" (my middle name). When we reached the car, I was relieved to see a decal on the upper corner of the windshield with the Institute's coat of arms and "ICRSP" printed beneath it; I was in the right hands!
Before heading to Mouila, we ran some errands in Libreville, dropping off something at the ICKSP parish there, getting breakfast (during which Jimmy asked if I was a doctor) and doing grocery shopping. I would eventually discover that, because of the number of us living at the mission, they would buy most of our meat in Libreville--kilos upon kilos of ground beef, chicken breast and chicken franks (as well as a couple cartons of cream for cooking).
Before I had left the States, one of the Institute priests here had asked me if I would be going directly to Mouila (rather than stay in Libreville the first night). I had rightly assumed so, and when I heard Jimmy say "au revoir" and "Libreville" in the same sentence, I realized we were finally getting on the road for the mission.
This was the gist of the seven hour drive (the scenery changed along the way, of course):
Eventually, I discovered that "direct" is not in the Gabonese vocabulary. There were the gendarmerie posts, to begin with (it may have been at every town or so), where we often had to stop, explain where we were going and coming from, show my passport and covid test from the airport.
Then, however, were the other stops, such as haggling over banana prices, getting gas, getting "la viande" (smoked meat; I'm guessing that was probably around lunch time, but in any case I wasn't hungry), or talking to this young salesman:
Plus, the roads at the beginning were very bad and would have us being thrown around the car (the seatbelt of course kept me more or less in place, but my head did hit the ceiling more that once), the windows were down (I didn't realize until I wiped my face with the hem of my skirt how much dirt was on my face), I was sweaty and tired--the drive was endless!
Finally, the roads became better (as in, paved) and we could go much faster. I was trying to calculate how much longer we had by looking at the speedometer and the mileage signs on the road.
Then, around four o'clock, we finally, finally, FINALLY arrived in Mouila!
We had to drop off something at an auto shop of some sort, then dropped of the girl who had come with us. I still remember when I realized we had arrived at the mission.
We pulled up in front of the refrectory and I realized how incredibly exhausted I was. When I got out and was greeted by Canon Fragelli, I felt like I could have fallen over onto the gravel. Canon gave me his arm and helped me sit down in the refrectory so I could catch my breath and drink some Fanta (the idea of the other priest there, whom I did not know at that moment).
After talking to Canon Fragelli for a bit, he introduced me to one of the girls there whom they call postulants, Martha, and helped me carry my things to my room. He said there were other rooms still under construction, so the place he took me to at the moment was "somewhere where you can crash". After dropping my stuff and giving Canon the greetings and a card from others who knew him in the States, I turned on the fan and did just that--crashed and slept for the next two and a half hours.
I had arrived.
In Christ the King,
Sarah
Please feel free to leave comments or ask questions -- I will do my best to respond to everything.
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