We are starting to like Libreville. It’s not exactly beautiful nor clean, there are actually no sights to speak of apart from perhaps the Cathédrale Sainte-Marie.
In short, it’s kinda rough around the edges. But it’s very alive and it offers a range of different atmospheres depending on which neighbourhood you are in, from typically African to more European-like. And it stretches along the seaside, which is really nice.
Along the more central parts of the city the beach is unfortunately littered with a lot of junk and plastic coming from the sewers. This can be a heart-breaking sight especially after the weekends where a lot of people hang around the beach. The city cleans it regularly but it’s not enough, plastic is always coming back. However awareness about the issue is rising and it’s good to see several beach cleaning initiatives coming from both locals and expats alike as well as schools.
Up North along La Sablière, the chic district in which we live in a temporary accommodation for the month of September, the beach is cleaner, though the water is still not clear enough to swim in without risk. It’s especially nice around dusk, with spectacular sunsets, and it seems to be a good fishing spot.
Libreville taxis would deserve an entire book and we’ll soon write about them, because we use them A LOT. After a couple of weeks we are getting the hang of it – we understand how much it costs to get here or there, and we know we can expect absolutely zero comfort. We sometimes truly enjoy taking them, especially the lively shared rides with other passengers. Of course, people drive like maniacs here. There is only 1 speed limit sign in the city, it shows 40 and cars drive past it every day at 100 km/h. The city centre is a constant traffic jam and honking festival. Being a pedestrian is like living in this old chicken cross the road video game. Ah, and we finally found drivers who are even less talented than Belgians at taking a roundabout 😉
Culturally speaking, the concert and film programme of the French Institute is pretty good, and they also have a nice library. One of the highlights of October was the first concert ever given in Gabon by a symphonic orchestra. The musicians came from Tübingen, Germany. They played Mozart’s requiem accompanied by a Libreville choir and directed by a Gabonese conductor! It was a very special evening, and we never saw a crowd going so wild at a classical music concert.
The population is mixed, with a lot of people from other African countries doing the small and manual jobs – people say here that if all foreigners would stop working, the entire city would come to a halt. Overall locals are not overwhelmingly friendly, but they are polite and they leave foreigners in peace, and you still can engage conversations quite easily. Anyhow, we need a bit more time to have a good judgement on these things. As for food, you can find everything European in supermarkets here, but prices are crazy so we are trying to be reasonable. A kilo of European apples costs up to 6 euros, a decent camembert 9 euros, a big Nutella 11 euros. But local fish such as capitaine or mérou is cheap and excellent, as well as local pineapple, papaya, mango, cucumber… and we still have to explore the street markets, which should be of course affordable.
Tanad stories from Gabon 