Liberia is such an inspiring place to visit. I have had the pleasure of working with local communities on forest issues. Charles Taylor used timber to trade for arms and the forests of Liberia suffered as did the people by losing this much needed revenue. Liberia houses 2/3rd of the upper Guinean Rainforest and is home to many endemic species. After the sanctions of diamonds Taylor turned to the forests.

I have been working on conflict timber with local forest NGOs since 2001. I finally visited in Feb 2006 and worked with several local NGOs to do capacity building, investigation of the new Governance initiative, GEMAP, and helped with strategic planning.

This country is emerging from 14 years of war, UN peacekeeping trucks still dominate the road and displacement camps still house thousands of people. There is no electricity in the country and businesses, govt and people must use generators powered by gas to have lights. Despite all this the people there were so kind and welcoming. I felt like a member of the family and will always cherish my experience there and look very much forward to going back.

I have to say that now nothing really bothers me because I realize how lucky I have been to live in the US not live in fear of dying tomorrow. No matter how much something might bother me as long as I have a warm place with lights to sleep in I am happy. It is amazing how grounding it can be to visit a place like this.

I spent some time on the Firestone planation which was mind blowing. Slavery does still exist in the world and Firestone is an example. yes people are ‘paid’ but the wages are hardly more than the exporting the costs of slavery to Liberia. If you want to learn more go to stopfirestone.org