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Leaving Monrovia, Liberia: Oct. 14, 2005

I sit on the airplane and look out the small window at Liberia. How easy it is for me to fly away from all of this and go back home. The devastation and ruins get smaller and smaller as the plane turns and climbs.

I remember walking down a Monrovia street, seeing bright eyes looking at me from dark shadows. People who lived in the recessed spaces behind columns of buildings or piles of rubble watching me walk by. I wonder what hope they have for the future, if they find strength in the elections just held.

I remember on election day photographing President Carter across Monrovia. As he walked away from one voting station, a Liberian woman ran up to him. He stopped and listened to her while she expressed her gratitude for his visit. She cried out to him with great emotion that his work has given Liberia hope.

It is a hope that was expressed joyfully as elections neared, and more quietly after people voted. Waiting for change and hoping it really comes this time.

Yesterday I ate lunch with Rugie from Bo-Waterside, and her sister Evelyn. They took me to Aunty Anne's restaurant, a small cement building with green paint peeling off the rickety screen door. We ate at a small table and talked about the world. They laughed at me when I gingerly took a bite of foo foo, a starchy, dough-like ball made from cassava in soup and spices.

The meal was good. We shared the foo foo, chopped rice, chicken, plantains and cake. They tell me about life here, about working, and about surviving the war. Evelyn said she once had to run from her house as armed rebels approached. They stripped the house of everything from mattresses to food to scrap metal. Rebels even killed her dogs before leaving, she said with a tinge of bitterness.

But they have survived and often work with the very people who once took everything from them. They express hope in the elections and for change. They are grateful for the help of NGOs like The Carter Center but look forward to Liberia one day being able to sustain itself.

It is in the rare moments like this, as the three of us laugh about life and the changes one goes through, that the world becomes so small and differences disappear. I have made new friends here and am sad to leave them. I tell them I wish good things for them and hope that Liberia becomes a better place to live. They thank me, and laughingly say it couldn't get much worse.

And now as I fly away, I remember President Carter's words at the press conference on Thursday. He said that The Carter Center would stay involved in Liberia; we weren't here just for the elections and then to disappear. I hope that Liberians found comfort in his words and that they find strength in how far they've come on their own towards change.

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Monrovia, Liberia: Oct. 11, 2005

By the time we reached the end of the block, we saw the lines: they snaked around corners and through fences. People sat on the curb and peeled fruit while they waited, then children carried the fruit on their heads in small baskets to sell as the day wore on.

Women swaddled infants on their back, babies crying with impatience. Many had been in line since the evening before, camping on the curb in order to secure their place. The morning was pleasant, but temperatures would soon climb past the 90-degree mark.

As the hours passed, the lines eventually began to move and the voting process seemed to go relatively smooth. President and Mrs. Carter observed at stations across the city, checking their lists to make sure the voting was fair and transparent. By the end of the day, lines had shortened and people out on the streets seemed more relaxed.

The light from the sky was already fading at 6 p.m. when the polls closed. Observers at city hall must have been tired, but they gave no indication. They sat patiently on their wooden chairs, watching election officials reseal each ballot box and prepare for counting. And then, by lantern light, the counting began. President and Mrs. Carter arrived to watch and sat in the near-dark with everyone else.

On the drive home, I noticed people gathered around single lights, listening to the local radio station for news of the day. News will come slowly though. It will take up to 15 days for election results to be announced. Be assured that Liberian citizens will be excitedly anticipating the results.

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Monrovia, Liberia: Oct. 10, 2005

The unexpected meeting came mid-afternoon when candidates Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf and George Weah ran into each other on the balcony of the Mamba Point Hotel.

I rushed outside with the other media persons present to capture the event. Here they were, two frontrunners in tomorrow's presidential election shaking hands, talking and smiling.

Just two days before, Monrovia's streets were packed for miles with citizens bearing signs of support for various candidates. It was a peaceful march of hundreds of thousands of citizens.

Several of us had driven through the impressive scene, stuck in the gigantic parade of people chanting, dancing and singing. Vehicles were swallowed in the crowd and the road seemed to disappear. Large groups for each candidate mixed together with no hint of violence.

The streets were quiet today though. But it was a busy day for those involved with the election. Candidates and other dignitaries attended meetings around the city at places like NEC, ECOWAS and the U.N. building. President Carter started the day off with a statement to the press expressing his hope for a peaceful election.

Yesterday the election observers were dispersed to their various voting districts. Those who returned to Monrovia today expressed that everything was going smoothly, and was ready for tomorrow.

Time will soon tell, but all signs seem to point to a transparent and hopefully violence-free election process. Voting begins in just seven and a half hours and will go through 6 p.m. Monrovia time.

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Bo-Waterside, Liberia: Oct. 7, 2005

Fourteen years of civil war devastated the country of Liberia. I see evidence of this from my window; dodging 10-foot craters along Claratown's roads, riding past cement stumps where lights poles once stood and gazing at bombed-out shells of cement buildings that bleed rust and grime.

But next to the bombed-out building a painted sign now boasts "Supreme Pharmacy." And just down the road a barber cuts a man's hair. The customer sits patiently on an upturned bucket as people walk past. Crowds gather at the market along Bushrod Island to exchange goods in little plastic bags - a cup of sugar, a pair of neon flip-flops. People go about their business, whatever it may be in a country with 85 percent unemployment.

I see odd combinations of objects like a rusted out boat shell dug into the ground next to a queen sized wooden bed frame for sale. The war years have made for some strange arrangements - first we pass the perfectly intact Club Beer factory, then beautiful U.N. housing along the riverfront, and finally the "Water in the Desert" displaced persons camp where makeshift huts crowd the hillside.

Our driver Abu takes us past all this, past the long expanses of lush, green trees and eventually to Bo-Waterside, a small town bordering Sierre Leone. Here we meet Rugie Barry, the executive director of CAREFound, a grassroots organization - partially funded by The Carter Center - whose programs include vocational training for some of the country's estimated 103,000 ex-combatants and voter registration for those in rural areas.

She leads us around town to meet some of her graduates. Two ex-combatants smooth cement along a warehouse wall, they are trained masons. Another cuts hair down the street in a tiny blue shop with photographs of models and Hollywood actors on the wall.

Our group grows in size as we continue walking through a residential area to meet carpenters and cooks, all ex-combatants trained by CAREFound. Children are fascinated by the cameras and by us. They eagerly give us high fives or simply touch our hand. Some shyly watch from the quiet shadows of a window or doorway.

Twelve of us continue down the street to see the voting station. The humidity of the midday sun drenches us as we go. Children on bicycles race up to the group, then pedal ahead to wait again.

Rugie explains that CAREFound has worked to educate these rural dwellers, forgotten by most campaigners and neglected by many voter education groups. These include people who live beyond the one paved road and into the thick forest. They will have to walk seven or more hours to cast their vote.

It is a vote that means everything to people who have next to nothing, a chance to determine freely and without fear who will run their country.

"These people need to know that their vote counts and can make a difference," said Rugie.

At the voting station, a school hidden beyond tall paths of bush sugar cane plants, we talk with "Bulldog." He is a once rebel general who controlled this entire region during the last civil war. He has learned masonry from CAREFound and works regularly in Bo-Waterside.

"I can build a house or a building just like this," he said, grabbing a wooden pole for emphasis.

Now he leans against the pole and tells us of former days when he harassed civilians and destroyed property. He seeks peace now and finds it in this community, which has willingly embraced him and others.

"Liberians are quick to forgive," Abu said later. "We are tired of violence. It is time to live together."

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