I didn’t come to Mon­rovia to learn about ro­mance.

There’s noth­ing ro­man­tic about road­side stacks of pun­gent fish and moun­tains of trash and feces, per­pet­ual sweat and lethargy and in­hal­ing ex­haust, in­ces­sant car horns and the chaos of mo­tor­bikes zip­ping in be­tween cars and into on­com­ing traf­fic.

Sure, there’s the mango trees’ ripen­ing yel­low fruit. There are the women sell­ing Liber­ian pep­pers, roasted corn, and fresh okra in the palm tree shade. There are the cozy morn­ings when the power goes out, si­lenc­ing the world, ex­cept for the con­sis­tent rhythm of pour­ing rain and crash­ing waves.

But it’s not a pleas­ant city.

I’ve come to re­al­ize that I’ve ro­man­ti­cized every city I’ve ever vis­ited. Glo­ri­fied mem­o­ries I have of these places. In an ef­fort to honor re­al­ity, though, I find there is noth­ing ro­man­tic about Mon­rovia.

The city’s his­tory of war is ev­i­dent in grimy con­crete build­ings wounded with bul­let holes, and in the oc­ca­sional twenty-some­thing year-old sol­dier-turned-beg­gar-am­putee pound­ing what’s left of his arms against the pas­sen­ger win­dow of an­other UN ve­hi­cle. It’s un­der­stood in the over­whelm­ing in­ter­na­tional ef­fort to ad­dress the mass rape that hap­pened here.

Mon­rovia’s an un­likely place for a twenty-five year-old woman to learn a thing or two about ro­mance.

*

I have never been in love. It’s be­cause I’m ter­ri­fied of ro­mance. Mo­lesta­tion does that to a per­son—takes the ro­mance out of in­ti­macy, I mean.

There’s shame, of course, but it’s more than that. It’s re­al­iz­ing after a decade that what hap­pened hap­pened. It’s spend­ing four years for­giv­ing one­self and learn­ing for the first time that one’s sex­u­al­ity isn’t dirty or for some­one else. It’s learn­ing that sex­u­al­ity is nat­ural and fem­i­nine and beau­ti­ful. And for me, too.

*

Peo­ple don’t come to Mon­rovia to find love, but some hap­pen upon ro­mance.

They are im­per­ma­nent, these peo­ple. NGO ex­pats have earned their pats on the back after a few years in Mon­rovia. They coldly—and cu­ri­ously—eye re­searchers who pass through in the sum­mers with their bug spray and bright ideas. The con­sul­tants stay for a week or so, en­grossed in their iPhone agen­das and weather re­ports. And the UN per­son­nel stay for months or years at a time, show­cas­ing an array of sexy for­eign ac­cents and in­ter­cul­tural un­der­stand­ing.

Im­per­ma­nence fos­ters an al­ter­na­tive re­al­ity here. It’s marked by un­at­tached flirt­ing, un­com­mit­ted sex, un­char­ac­ter­is­tic courage, and, some­how, deep hon­esty. Peo­ple are human here.

*

Lyra didn’t come to Mon­rovia to find ro­mance. Her stint over­laps with the one-year an­niver­sary of her fiancé’s death. He was a manly man; he could chop wood and fix cars. And he also loved bik­ing and bak­ing. He made the world’s best corn­bread and al­ways set an extra place at the din­ner table for an un­ex­pected guest. He fought for in­dige­nous peo­ple’s rights and could talk about Ni­et­zsche and Kant all night. “He al­ways heard every­thing I didn’t say,” Lyra re­mem­bered.

 “From the core of my being,” he once told her.  They promised them­selves to each other in the Wyoming woods six days be­fore the car ac­ci­dent.

She’s spent most nights here with an Amer­i­can po­lice of­fi­cer.  He’s a gun-lov­ing Chris­t­ian with a high school diploma. She’s an Ox­ford-ed­u­cated trilin­gual lib­eral.

Pack­ing an overnight bag, she ex­plained to me, “I know there will never be an­other man like James, which is how I can jus­tify emo­tion­less sex. It’s a dis­trac­tion from know­ing what I would’ve shared with him about this city.”

But he’s falling in love with her.

*

Sriti didn’t find ro­mance in Mon­rovia, but she’s thought about him every­day here. She is an In­dian UN peace­keeper liv­ing with her com­rades in one of Charles Tay­lor’s old guest man­sions. We sat in the mar­ble lounge, sip­ping chai tea as my friend and I taught her some Eng­lish phrases.

“I’m learn­ing Eng­lish on the in­ter­net,” she said, grin­ning. Then, look­ing around and low­er­ing her voice, “I want you to teach me words for flirt­ing.”

Two years ago, she met her boyfriend on an air­plane. She had changed her seat to be near him. Though drawn to her, he was taken aback by her bold pro­fes­sion of what she thought of him. “He has all the qual­i­ties. He is hand­some, good singer, good speaker. And he talks hu­mor­ously.”

They chat on Yahoo! while she’s here, where she prac­tices new phrases like, “I miss you,” and, “You’re cute.” Later, she showed us a pho­to­graph of her un­smil­ing hus­band and two chil­dren.

*

Ana didn’t come to Mon­rovia to find ro­mance. She is hap­pily mar­ried to her sweet­heart of ten years who she met when they were teenagers, pick­ing sum­mer black­ber­ries with friends on a Czech moun­tain.

She didn’t plan to be at­tracted to the Ger­man she met on a car ride to Liberia’s in­te­rior. She never told me his name or the ex­tent of their re­la­tion­ship, but I gath­ered it was a mu­tual at­trac­tion and noth­ing more.

“I’m a good girl,” she ex­plained, even though I al­ready knew this about her. “I love my hus­band very much.” She paused.  “The thing is, it’s not my hus­band I’m wor­ried about. What both­ers me is being un­fair to the Ger­man.”

*

I was be­gin­ning to un­der­stand this sen­ti­ment. Life in Mon­rovia is sep­a­rate from life back home. It is tem­po­rary and dis­tant.

Ana’s in­di­ca­tion of this sep­a­rate­ness isn’t the first I’ve learned of here. I have be­friended an Amer­i­can mil­i­tary ob­server who has been in and out of war and post-war zones with the U.S. Army for years. His wife and three daugh­ters in Mon­tana don’t have pa­tience when the Skype con­nec­tion is bad.

“Tell me this. Did your dad ever leave you when you were a lit­tle girl?” He suc­ceeded in shut­ting me up. He had be­come in­creas­ingly ag­i­tated with each ques­tion I asked about his fam­ily. They weren’t part of his life here, so it was bet­ter not to talk about it.

He goes through the mo­tions of fa­ther­hood and mar­riage in his short time at home, but “they don’t un­der­stand,” he said. He is alive here, cussing with his bud­dies and shar­ing sto­ries of Afghani friends. They joked about the Liber­ian pros­ti­tutes we passed on Tub­man Road after a night of danc­ing. It had taken a few Heinekens, but when I fi­nally got him on the dance floor, he moved and laughed and re­fused to leave. He was alive, and his wife and daugh­ters wouldn’t un­der­stand.

*

I found ro­mance in Mon­rovia, but that’s not what I came here for. It was lib­er­at­ing but short-lived; he’s a per­ma­nent res­i­dent, and I’m pass­ing through.

An­other long-term expat ex­plained to me that in Mon­rovia, one per­son en­ters the re­la­tion­ship search­ing for a part­ner, while the other is look­ing for a sum­mer fling. It doesn’t work.

“When you come to Mon­rovia, you’re pre­pared for the poverty you’ll see, but you’re not pre­pared for the lone­li­ness that comes with heart­break,” she said. “And when you get your heart bro­ken, you feel self­ish griev­ing over it be­cause there are more im­por­tant things here that de­serve your grief.”

So, peo­ple don’t come to Mon­rovia to find love. Though some do hap­pen upon ro­mance. Life here is un­nat­ural, but I’m un­der­stand­ing ro­mance in its nat­ural raw­ness.

There is no make-up, no cologne, and no small talk over lattes. No awk­ward first dates or won­der­ing who’ll make the first move. No rules or ex­pec­ta­tions.

For those pass­ing through, there’s an ac­cep­tance of brevity. One-night stands and sum­mer-long af­fairs. There’s mu­tual un­der­stand­ing but no com­mit­ment. There’s no guilt, re­ally, and that’s okay.

In sim­plest terms, there is in­stinct. There is in­ti­macy. There is com­plic­ity. There is sex­u­al­ity. There are peo­ple.

And there’s a lit­tle bit of sweat.

Mon­rovia’s an un­likely place for a twenty-five year-old woman to learn a thing or two about ro­mance.