My it has been a long time. This is for a couple of reasons, one I've been hard on it at my work and since that involves writing up a research report which is soon to be published (enshallah, so long as I get it finished that is) so I haven't felt much like writing for fun. The other reason is until recently I haven't been doing that much other than working, in fact I was really quite boring once I returned after Christmas, maybe still am.

Had a weeks holiday last week cos my friend Jamie was over for the week, so I was a tourist again, and really quite enjoyed it – therefore any visitors are welcome! But its cool having visitors cos then you get out and about and do stuff you might not normally do. Went jet skiing which I want to do again, next time I be less scared of falling off! Also went for a wee journey to an 'island' called Jinack island, got a small boat from Banjul to Barra instead of the ferry – I must have talked about the ferry, I'm sick of getting it these days. The small boat is in fact more expensive and also I would suggest less stable! There was a man bailing water out for the whole journey (it's perfectly safe mum I promise!) we even got given life jackets, and then at the end of the journey where you stop the water is too deep so you pay another guy 5 Dalasis to carry you on his shoulders out the water, the guy who carried me out kept laughing at me cos I was scared so I was holding on! So we got to Jinack which is half Gambia half Senegal, we tried to walk to Senegal but its difficult to tell if we got there or not. It turns out the island has a curse on it so no law enforcement official will step foot on it, due to this reason the locals have taken to drug cultivation, which possibly explains why the atmosphere remains calm and there is no need for law enforcement of any other kind! Speaking to my neighbour on return, she informed me that the last army guy she had heard of going there had not turned out well, he had been demoted and has possibly even gone crazy.

Now here was a realisation I had a while ago but I forgot to post it and since its somehow connected here it is. Round about there are women selling bundles of firewood, they are based at the side of the road and leave there wood there all night. Now I thought either someone slept there at night or it was a total trust thing and no one would steal it. We were needing to buy wood to have a bonfire on the beach (it was my friends birthday so we did drumming, dancing and building a fire on Saturday night, much fun). So there was no one there and we were pondering why people were so trusting, then we saw it – the women leave juju's on the wood then no one steals it! So a juju comes from the marabout (somehow magic man, traditional powers), think I might get one for my house, seem to have an evil spirit taking money from me, there is no logical explanation for it anyway – maybe I am going crazy!