First days in Bonthe

My departure for Salone 5 days ago seems like an eternity. I'm already starting to miss tap water, dental floss (which I forgot to bring), and my shave. I've spent four days in Freetown (the capital) arranging affairs, polishing my plans while I had internet, and doing some surveys of markets in the area. Travel to Bonthe yesterday was delayed until 3pm after buying a new generator for our office, exchanging my money, and waiting at the bank for 2 hours to get a bagful of bricks of cash! So 7 hours, a flat tire, and a late night boat ride later, we were finally in Bonthe.

After spending my first day here, I've realised that I'll have to put restrictions on things which I've never thought about before. As I've only brought 450 pounds to last me the two months, my expenditures are limited to Le 57,000 (£6.50) a day. Now this seems reasonable, but I am on an island. So I'll have to think about:

1.  water - I've bought 50 litres of drinking water with me, meaning I have to limit water consumption to 900ml a day. Otherwise it's going to hit the daily Le 57,000 budget hard.
2. Boat fuel - My supervisor in country, Salieu, has kindly offered to buy 300L of fuel for me out of his own personal account (he hopes to get reimbursed in the next few months). Which will be the main limiting factor for trips to villages. If I use 20L per day, I should be okay. I'll have to organize my fuel usage accordingly.
3. Food - I hope to negotiate a cook from somewhere who's willing to make breakfast and dinner for as little as Le 30,000 (£3.50) a day. I understand her displeasure with the deal, but my restricted daily budget means things are going to be tight. I might have to make my own food from the firewood stove.
4. I'll have to think about paying for other things such as samples, money to make people talk in surveys, a weekly beer if I'm lucky.

I'm kicking myself for not bringing much money (£600). But I've never lived in a place where I can't draw out cash, so it's going to be a tough adjustment. Maybe I'm going to appreciate certain things much more at the end of these two months.

But so far the work has been good. We've visited four communities in the last 3 days, and distributed three books for recording harvest quantities (something villagers have not done before). Some villages were a lengthy walk away, especially for my translator Richard, who retired a few years ago. But the community here has been very kind and excited to have a young foreign researcher amongst them. 7-8 kids are in my room watching me write this post as I speak. It's sometimes difficult to concentrate on work.

We've learned a lot in the past few days, and expect to learn much more.