After many months of (partly tricky) preparations, on February 9th 2022 we finally arrived in the capital of Equatorial Guinea: Malabo – a dream has come true!
For a month, Sara Carreira and I worked nonstop (despite the tropical heat!) to make the most efficient use of every minute. Bureaucracy and administrative obstacles kept us busy, as did networking and coordinating the many appointments for data collection. Most of our time, however, was actually spent conducting interviews and questionnaires which at the same time allowed us to meet many wonderful people and learn a lot from them.
In total, we worked with nearly 200 people in different regions of Equatorial Guinea. They are evenly distributed in terms of gender and represent different age and ethnic groups. The people's living conditions, educational backgrounds and occupational groups are also very diverse.
On the island of Bioko, we mostly worked in the capital of Equatorial Guinea: Malabo, as well as in three small villages both in Bioko Norte and in Bioko Sur: Basupú del Oeste, Rebola and Batete. In the continental part of Equatorial Guinea, Río Muni, we collected most of the data in the city of Bata (the country’s biggest city), but we also traveled to the interior of Río Muni where we worked in Niefang, Aseng, Ebibeyín and Mongomo.
