No one works as hard as they do

We just arrived to our new hotel and it is even more calmer than the first one. We have 3 nights booked here before we head up north where we will spend Christmas. This hotel gives us the feeling of “closing soon”. Meaning, there are not many guest, they are very eager to sell us things , lots of empty rooms and bungalows and we wouldn’t be surprised if it can not survive for much longer. Location is absolutely beautiful so someone could turn this in to a real luxury resort if they wanted to, for sure.

Pool area of the new hotel is amazing

We both don't feel 100% yet and especially not Shane but we managed to talk a walk on the beach before we checked out and luckily I brought the camera today as well. In the end of the beach there are locals working really hard in the waters, what they are doing is unclear, but one woman was collecting and drying black stones, one was hammering down metals sticks between the rocks at low tide and plenty more further away just carrying bags of stone or sand. I asked the woman who was hammering down the metal sticks if I could take a picture of her and it was a clear no but the woman collecting stones in the water said yes and wow, that face has a lot of stories to tell and im oforever grateful she let me do a picture. Of course I gave her some money after as a thank you but I never do it when I ask, only if they say yes and allow me to do a close up portrait. I wish I could show the work going on around and I could probably have spent hours there taking photos of them working but the camera is not always popular. Seeing how they work is just making me loose my breath, it is like going back in time and I have never in my life seen a woman working that hard and heavy in such a non ergonomic positions (at least in our culture) as she was, but she looked so strong and powerful and like it is the only right way of doing it.

Hard workers

The road to the new hotel was by tuktuk and it makes you see a lot from the locals and how they live.

Wherever I go in Africa I always get impressed on how strong these people are. The way they work, the way the live, what they do on a daily basis and how much physical work they actually do, both men and women, it is so impressive. Wea re so spoiled where we come from and I don’t think many of the norther European countries would even last a week doing and living like they do here.

Anything from going out fishing in the morning, buying, selling and walking miles every day in the sun, cooking, washing, building (and forget machines - here they do EVERYTHING by hand) and there is no rest. Seeing them makes me want to work harder. It’s like the woman I saw during the walk this morning, I wish I could show you but as mentioned, she said no to a photo but damn, she was working hard in that sun.

Took a few photos during the day from our hotel so will share them here and then its time for us to enjoy another beautiful sunset, but in an ew location.

A woman drying the wish on the ground. Everything on the foreground is small fish.