Sierra Leone is a small beautiful country situated on the west coast of Africa. It has a population of about 5 million people scattered around 12 districts. It is bordered by Guinea in the north, Liberia in the east and the Atlantic ocean to the west. It has two different weather conditions, the wet season that starts from June and ends in September and the dry season that starts in October and ends in May.

It has 16 different indigenous tribes that span the whole country. The capital city, Freetown, is home for about 500,000 of its people. This city originally was a settlement for freed slaves who were returned from Europe and America after toiling the plantations in North Carolina in the United States of America, and those who served as servants to British masters. There were also some who were captured on the high seas on their way to slavery. Early settlers created a rich blend of African cultures as some of them were originally from other parts of West Africa who came together as a result of the abolishment of the slave trade in 1762. The culture of these people is rich, evidenced in their cultural activities, food, clothes and the arts.

Among the indigenes is a rich culture of traditional story telling that usually takes place after dusk round a fire that keeps them warm in the cool evening breeze after a hard day’s work on the farm. The story usually told is spiced with singing and dancing and some dramatisation.

Sierra Leone has made enormous and unique contributions to African art in carving, painting, metalwork and craft.

On the edge of the city is a beautiful golden beach with pure and clean sand, one of the luxuries enjoyed by visiting tourists and other foreigners as well as the elites and even the lower class. All find time during festive periods to enjoy the luxuries of this natural gift.

Fridays in the capital city are considered by foreigners as an African fashion parade as almost everyone – men, women and children – flamboyantly dressed in their cultural attires go about their normal business, showing off the Sierra Leonean beauty, especially women and girls, with well rounded buttocks, as hips sway from side to side. This is usually more evident during festivities.

Music is also rich, even the olden days music sounds golden with prominent musicians in the style of Old Rogie et al. Over the years, music has developed to such an extent that parties and jam sessions would become heated when the local music permeates the halls through amplifiers.

Christmas and New Year celebrations are some of the best in Sierra Leone. Throughout December there are pleasurable activities going on simultaneously in different parts of the country. It’s usually a boom period for business people when Sierra Leoneans in the diaspora do all in their power to celebrate this festive season in their home country, bringing hard-earned foreign currencies that boost the economy, if only for a short while. Even the residents of this small nation, from the rich right down the ladder to the least man, who goes to bed without knowing where his next meal will come from, has a way of being part of the happy-go-lucky crowd. He’s content with his leftover meal, if any at all, scraping from the very brown bottom of the pot, having same for breakfast, lunch and dinner, to be further digested with a cup of rich natural wine, called palm wine. It is a local favourite made from a type of palm tree. This is usually accompanied by good music from the African drums and percussion instruments and he dances his troubles away even with the knowledge that they will come rushing back to stare him in the face the moment he wakes up from a well deserved slumber after the last stroke of the drum.

It was in this way that the least of the Sierra Leoneans passed his time on this world stage when the rebel invasion sent most packing and some to their early graves. But the Sierra Leonean is a survivor and some now, are lucky to be part of the Lismore community enjoying their share of the good life where it is valued.
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