Time goes faster in Gambia but less gets done.

Maybe it's the heat and the manyana effect that heat seems to produce, maybe it is that very few Gambians are ever on time, so meetings always overrun, maybe there is never the same urgency to get things done BUT one way or another time in Gambia definitely slips. Hence the GMT - Gambia Maybe Time jokes.

Most tourists are sheltered from the problems of everyday life in Gambia by the hotels that hosts their stay BUT FIRST - there are always the mains services problems.

WATER - in some areas water is NEVER a problem, but this is luck and very much a hit or miss service depending on where the nearest borehole is, so Bakoteh village has mains water all the time, parts of Kololi are lucky to get water for a couple of hours in the early hours of the morning and never enough pressure to lift the supply more than a couple of feet from the ground. Many areas still have no mains supply, but everyone says it's coming and maybe it is - but in Gambia things can take years rather than weeks or months so never rely on the "it's coming soon statement" we have been waitng nearly 10 years for a water supply at our school in Essau.

For settlers it is worth checking if the land or house you are buying really has a supply of water - don't just trust the fact that there is water in the tank when you look round, insist on seeing it filling up and don't take 'The generator is out of fuel but the pump works a dream' - go and buy fuel and see it working with your own eyes.

If the water is from a well - first ask 'where is the septic tank' for the supply to stand any chance of not being contaminated it must be 30 m away from the well otherwise the water is only good for washing and flushing and definitely not for drinking unless you fancy the idea of stomach, liver or kidney parasites. There are Ultra Violet systems that will purify even contaminated water but these must be installed and used properly ALL of the time. You can also buy bottled water - but you must be aware of the problems. The final solution is to sink a bore hole. it will take one to two weeks and cost between £1000 and £2000 for the bore hole and pump BUT you need electricity and that is the second not very reliable service in Gambia.

ELECTRIC - People joke about being on the same circuit as an important person and so they also get a good supply of electric, people on the airport circuit get an almost uninterrupted supply, there are stories that if the engineers at NAWEC know you are having program (a marriage or naming ceremony) they will cut the supply and accept money to put it back on again - who knows - anything and everything is possible. The supply of electric varies, but over a whole year I doubt that many people have a supply for more than 50% of the time. Like all statistics that means some days and nights with a constant supply BUT also periods of 2 or 3 days with absolutely NO electric at all - just long enough to make sure everything in the fridge & freezer is ruined.

Most Europeans have come to live their lives with a dependency on electric as a fish depends on water, if this is you, then ask how it will affect you if you simply have an unreliable supply, can you shrug it off with good humour as you light another candle and find it romantic as the flame heats up the room with no fan to keep you cool.

Even with an intermittant supply of power you can charge large batteries and use a modern invertor to provide 240 volts to run some low energy light bulbs, some fans, even enough to charge up your mobile phone and run a laptop computer for enough hours to watch a few movies on DVD. But if the power is off for days then the battery runs down and the system fails - if a visitor thinks it will be a good idea to use their travel hair dryer - there will be a small puff of smoke and you'll need to either buy a new invertor or have the old one repaired. The invertor will normally not power a fridge, a microwave or a power drill - unless you have gone in for a bank of batteries and some powerful and protected invertors.

Invertors and Battery chargers are small and easily stolen, a fact that we recently discovered to our cost. They are also in high demand so very saleable commodities. Your watchman is always the first suspect, but any visitor can pop it in their bag and make off with it, unless you run fortress England and imprison your self behind 3 metre high walls with armed guards at the doors - sadly most thefts are by local friends you know well and trust so the incident is full of emotion as well as capital cost.

Solar is another option - expensive and requiring batteries and invertors but necessary if you have NO mains supply - also prone to getting stolen and the panels are expensive and are not ever lasting, they become between 5 and 10% less efficient every year they are used and will need replacing, which is also true of the batteries which cannot be depended on beyound 3 years use..

So on now to generators - small ones are quite cheap, but often produce 'dirty'power with big spikes and troughs - that means that sensitive equipment like TV's, Videos and DVD and computers get damaged unless you have a voltage regulator - (actually a good idea even if you have mains power, because your local welder can make a clean supply dirty by using their arc welding gear). Most of the small cheap generators stop being reliable within 6 to 12 months of operation in Gambia. Larger generators are expensive to buy, very costly to run and a nightmare to have serviced - if you are servicing use a reputable and expensive company like Swegam or be prepared for very costly repair bills not very far down the machines operational life.

Generators are highly sought after items and thefts are equally high to meet the demand - almost always involving your loveable watchman who wouldn't harm you in any way and is as honest as a judge. When an honest watchman earns £20 to £40 a month and a generator can sell for a few hundred pounds it becomes very corruptable commodity. generally the generator disappears one day and the watchman disappears the day after, case closed.

Transport - all transport cost money the swisher it is the more expensive it is - obviously cost is no object for many of the charities operating in Gambia they are spending other peoples moneyand they do tend to have fairly new, high spec 4 wheel drive, air conditioned jobies costing thousands of some donmors £'s OR you can have a diesel saloon fresh from Europe at around 2 & a half UK thousands, both will last at best 3 years before becoming an unreliable bush or local taxi worth about £1000 or less.

If 4 wheel drive bossy Mr Big image is what you are after then of course you'll pay for it, but it will last about the same length of time in Gambia as the cheaper alternative, because the fine sand gets everywhere and wears everything out about as fast in an expensive new car as it does in a very old just from the port Europen LHD vehicle of any make or model.

There are corner Gambian 'garages' and 'engineers' on almost every corner, but as with your expensive generator find a good and reliable garage - probably run by a Lebanese owner and stick with them, it will cost you more per service but save you a fortune over the couple of years the car will last as reliable transport.

I could go on, but I will leave it at the services level - Gambia on holiday seems a cheap and ideal place to live, your Gambian friend will tell you that everything will cost you next to nothing and for Gambians that is actually almost true, but if you get sucked in, the costs will slowly escalate as more of your money leaks to your trusted friend who will eventually either pull a big costly one on you or be satisfied with the drip feed they have been getting from you from day one.

Poverty makes people resourceful at getting resources so always be aware that you are vulnerable and relatively VERY rich. Greed and corruption are powerful forces and humans - even long standing and trusted friends are weak at resisting those forces for ever..

Living anywhere has its problems and advantages and Gambia is no different - different problems but just as hard to deal with as those anywhere in the world - holiday dreams can very quickly turn into settlers nightmares unless you are aware of the problems before you start and know you can face them and deal with them. Reality is the most important weapon you have to survive and it is exactly the reason why we very bluntly tell would be settlers to rent a place in Gambia for a year so you see the reality and not the hotel spun dreams you have at the end of your tourist vacation.

GTS can be sympathetic when things go wrong, but can very seldom sort them out, better to avoid the problems - Gambian law is the same as British law, but there the similarity with justice basically ends - justice is largely a commodity that is for sale in one way or another and in such a small country where almost everyone is related it is hard to rely on the rule of law to be totally impartial and when thisng do go wrong very few settlers have the resources left to buy the justice they require. Most sell up and head for home a lot poorer, often embittered, but hopefully wiser than when they arrived.

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