Update: Morocco, Sahara, West Africa

 

Please reference the map on the main travel page.

 

It is 2:30 am in a downpour, and I am trying to sleep in a station wagon next to a tributary of the Senegal River on the desert border of Mali. I am drenched in sweat, and my right pant leg is covered in blood that runs down and saturates my sock. Outside—visible via lightening—are about 30 people sleeping on the dirt, or on bare concrete in half-constructed shelters, or on benches under a dripping thatched straw and sheet metal roof. There is also a donkey standing in the middle and braying every 5 minutes, and a tape deck blaring West African pop music. The station wagon that I am in should have been put out of service a decade ago. The upholstery has no cushioning, the windshield is spider-webbed, the dash is partly missing, and the door has no window roller or door handle—opening the door requires pulling on the correct piece of metal inside the workings of the door. I have closed the windows to avoid rain and malaria-carrying mosquitos, but this has caused a sauna of heat and humidity inside—and has somehow failed to keep out any bugs.

 

How did I get here? I crossed the Sahara in a smuggled car that was stolen in Europe and sold to an Arabian man with black slaves…of course. The travelogue follows. I apologize for the length of the reading…consider it an unpolished bonus chapter to 101 Countries.

 

 

I had a few weeks between my 2^nd and 3^rd year of school, and Martha could take a couple weeks off from work. She suggested Morocco, and I agreed, since I had only seen the northern port city of Tangier in 2000 when Strom and I crossed the Straits of Gibraltar as part of our European roadtrip.

 

This trip started at the end of May, by flying to NYC for Strom’s wedding. (Strom and his wife were headed out for a many-month honeymoon around the world). We flew from NYC to London, and rented a car so we could get to Brighton to spend the night with some of Martha’s family. Our flight the next day to Morocco was on Alitalia, and we had arranged the layover in Rome to be overnight, so that we could get a bonus glimpse of the city. Only problem was that we had not accounted for the flight being late, and the time it takes to take the train/bus from the airport to downtown Rome and back. Nevertheless we got a good evening tour of the Coliseum, the Trevi Fountain, the Pantheon, and St. Peter’s Square (at the Vatican), all in their magnificent night-lights.

 

We planned a week together in Morocco, before Martha would return via another visit to the British relatives. We flew into Casablanca, and took the train to the cities of Rabat/Sale, Makenes, Fes, and Marrakech. Morocco’s train system is modern, efficient, cheap, comfortable, and handy to get between these major cities. All of these cities turned out to be more enjoyable than tout-filled Tangier.

 

The cities that we visited had a similar pattern, with an older walled area known as the medina, and a more modern new town (ville nouvelle…French and Arabic are the languages). The medinas of Morocco are one of the great experiences in this world. They are similar to the souqs of Syria, but they have a different flavor. They consist of narrow, often labyrinth pathways with small storefronts on each side. The stores are small businesses: butcher, spice vendor, toiletries, tailor, bread maker, leatherworker, artisan, jeweler, shoes, small restaurants, etc. Some are ancient—a produce merchant with nothing more current than a balance scale—while others are as modern as any mall tenant in the U.S., with sparkling glass cases housing busts with the world’s latest clothing trends. All are tiny: most are so small that they only have enough room for one merchant to sit, while the larger ones can also hold a few customers. The pathways between the shops are either tile or cobblestone, and may have overhead coverings consisting of a patchwork of fabrics that allow only some rays of light through. Many cats and very few dogs are seen. Occasional stores blast Middle Eastern pop music (or curiously, Indian pop), and the atmosphere is completed by the scents from the restaurants, butchers and spice merchants.

 

In addition to a small medina, Casablanca also has the Hassan II Mosque, one of Islam’s largest mosques, and the world’s tallest minaret. Like many important mosques, it also has a religious school nearby.

 

That second picture is Martha blending in. More curious than the mosque, in an empty lot nearby, we came upon a film crew shooting a movie that had gun-toting individuals fighting the U.S. army—it was not clear to us what history they were portraying, but it made for some entertaining pics:

The capital city of Rabat has a small medina, and a blue-and-white-washed kasbah (former military area) that overlooks the Atlantic.

 

Across the bay/river from Rabat is Sale, which has a medina that has a much older feel than the other cities.  A couple hours by train from Sale is Mekenes, which has a decent Medina, but also has a new town full of fabulous sweet shops, and an Islamic fortress from a few centuries ago.

 

The furthest we took the train north was Fes, which has the mother of all medinas—one that is a few square miles and contains almost a thousand paths. I would highly recommend visiting this medina to anyone looking for a truly unique travel experience. The medina also contains one of Islam’s greatest schools, and the center of Morocco’s leather tanning industry. Here is a picture, the colors are dyes and toxic processing chemicals:

 

The furthest south we took the train was Marrakech, where the highlight is the night scene on Djemma al Fna, the square that sits in front of the medina. The medina itself pales in comparison to the one in Fes, and is heavily oriented to tourism. However, the adjacent square is a once-in-a-lieftime experience. It is a half square mile that is full of storytellers, acrobats, jugglers, snake charmers, and other medieval sights. The scene caters to both international and local tourists, with the vast majority of visitors being Moroccans.

 

Although the square in Marrakech was neat, the town also had an uncomfortable feel to it, perhaps bred by the local tourist industry. After Marrakech we returned to Casablanca, from where Martha departed, and I continued south by myself.

 

Before I continue, I have to throw in this picture, of a man we saw carrying two baskets in Fes. He clearly has all his eggs in one basket.

 

How to Cross the Sahara.

First of all, I am talking about crossing from north to south, not east to west. There are a few major routes: one in Libya, one in Algeria, and one near the west coast of the continent, going through Morocco, Western Sahara, and Mauritania. The last of these is now entirely paved (except for about 3 miles). Morocco has good roads, and Morocco has paved the Western Sahara as part of their military interests. The final unpaved stretch was between Nouakchott (the capital of Mauritania) and the northern border of Mauritania—this stretch was completed last fall. Also, since most of this is new road, it is flawless—an interesting comparison to many less developed places that have roads full of potholes. For you adventurous types, this means you can drive your own 2WD car across the Sahara.

 

I caught a very comfortable bus south from Casablanca to Dakhla. The bus was a Euroliner, and was superior to a Greyhound. The trip took about 30 hours, including frequent stops at rest areas for passengers to eat. Heading south, the landscape changes from farmland, to dry hills, to the dry Atlas Mountains, to a flat rocky desert. The bus stopped at a few major cities on the west coast. In Agadir, a college student named Rachid boarded and sat next to me. He spoke enough English that we became friends, and he invited me to stay with his family in Dakhla.

 

The Western Sahara is an area that was formerly colonized by Spain. The local people are called Saharawis—but they don’t really live there anymore. Although the area is mostly desert, it does have a large iron ore deposit, and so it is a desired piece of land—with Morroco, Mauritania, and the local Saharawis each claiming it. In the 70s, the Moroccans took the area, and put all the Saharawis on concentration camps, where many remain today. Morocco continues to control the area with its relative military strength, but there is still contention as to who the rightful owner is. For traveling purposes (borders, visas), it is basically part of Morocco.

 

The tiny town of Dakhla sits on a small peninsula that juts out from the Sahara into the Atlantic. This means that it has a desert feel but a cool climate. The town is a few hours north of the Mauritanian border, and no scheduled transport runs from the town south to the border. Upon arriving in Dakhla, my new friend Rachid took me to his home, and introduced me to his family, who promptly served dinner. Each room of the one-floor concrete house had cushions surrounding the perimeter as the only furniture:

 

It was simple yet comfortable, and made for a nice bed. His dad formerly worked for the Moroccan Army, and I was able to speak Spanish with him (Some in the region speak Spanish given the recent colonial history; otherwise Arabic and French are the standard languages). In the evening, Rachid took me to the town’s main strip, where I hung out with some of his friends and learned about life in the Western Sahara.

 

In the morning I found a hotel that said they coordinate rides to the Mauritanian border. They said the price is 300 Moroccan dirham ($30), and they took 50 dirham as a down payment. At 9am, an Arabic man put me in the back of a pickup and drove me to a spot outside of town—a place in the Sahara on the main north-south road that runs along the west coast of W. Sahara:

 

 

The spot is a police checkpoint, and also has about a dozen random vehicles parked to one side. I could tell that it was the place to find a ride to the border, but as we arrived, the Arabic driver indicated that we would depart for the border at 6pm (8 hours from now). He then started to make tea for me in the back of his truck. While this was novel, I knew that the border closed at 6pm, and that it was at least 4 hours away…so I had no idea what the driver really meant. This frustrated me, especially since I could not speak his languages, and so I had no clue what to expect.

 

As a solution, I decided to stand on the road, and speak to drivers as they stopped at the police checkpoint. I proceeded to do this for the next three hours, all as the man drank tea and watched me. I could tell the police were annoyed by my presence, and that they just thought I was a dumb tourist. Vehicles would pass by at the rate of about one every 5 minutes, but the vast majority were headed north. Of the few headed south, all fit two categories. The first was dilapidated old minivans, with sacks of goods tied to the roof. They were full of Arabic men, and looked like they might break down any minute. The second type of vehicle were phat new SUVs (small SUVs, mostly European Mitsubishis or Toyotas) with rich-appearing brown people in them.

 

I was having no luck with any of the vehicles, until a new Mitsubishi crew-cab pickup/SUV hybrid with a white driver passed by. He stopped, and we talked in Spanish. He offered me a ride to the border, but said he would be back to get me at noon. I told him that if the Arabic man didn’t leave earlier than noon, then I would take the ride. The Arabic man put his tea down, approached us, and said (in French, via the white dude translating to Spanish for me) that he would be going “now”. The white guy left, and the Arabic man sat back down and started drinking tea. Noon came, and he was still drinking tea. i.e. he had taken my money and lied about a ride, and now I couldn’t trust a thing this man was doing. Since I couldn’t speak French or Arabic, I was getting frustrated—and wondering who I could both communicate with and trust. My answer was the Spanish man, who returned at 1pm (an hour later than he said). The Arabic man again put his tea down and said that we are going now, but I simply got in the Spanish’s vehicle.

 

The man introduced himself as Vino (I have changed the name, but his name was a similar gangster sounding four letter name), a resident of Spain who obtains cars in Spain and drives them to Mauritania for sale. It quickly became apparent to me that he was talking about smuggling cars. He made no attempt to disguise his business, except for where he got the cars in Spain—but based on other pieces of information, I gathered they were stolen. His business goes like this: Every two weeks he “obtains” a 4wd vehicle (all Mitsubishis “they are easier for me”), takes the boat across the Straits of Gibraltar, drives the length of Morocco/Western Sahara, pays police a total of (equivalent of) $1,000 in bribes, bribes his way across the border, meets his Mauritanian contact who lives in a northern town (Nouadhibou) near the border, gets $20,000 in cash for the car, smokes the remainder of his pot, heads to the local airport, pays the airport emigration $500 so that they will ignore that he is exporting $20,000 in cash, flies to the Canary Islands and back to Spain, and repeats the process. He has been doing this for at least 30 years (he was about 50 now), and has taken routes across the Sahara through Libya/Niger, Algeria/Niger or Mali, or Morocco, and sold cars in many countries in West Africa (Ivory Coast, Ghana, Togo, Senegal…). Nowadays he mostly sticks to the safer Mauritania route. He was once held a month in a Libyan prison, he has been shot and wounded, and he has been beaten by various police until he coughs up enough cash to continue on his way. He told me that the Arabic man we would meet just over the border was one of the most powerful men in northern Mauritania, that he hated Americans and was a fan of Osama, and that he had multiple houses, wives, and slaves. (Slavery was outlawed in the 1980s in Mauritania, but it still exists, with the browns being the owners and the blacks being the slaves.)

 

He told me that the area between Dakhla and the border was dangerous, full of smugglers and bandits—in vehicles or on camel—and that the stretch of road from Dakhla to the border and from the border south to Nouadhibou was no place to be for someone who didn’t know what they were doing. He told stories of people getting killed in the area, and he left me strangely happy to be riding with him and not in the untrustworthy Arabic tea drinker’s dilapidated ride. Anyway, the ride I was in had air conditioning, soft seats, was clean, uncrowded, and full of good friendly conversation. It also had a CD that Vino had brought, which had a curious mix of Wham (George Michael) and We are the World.

 

He also told me less violent things, like the beauty of the desert on the various routes across the Sahara. Crossing Algeria involves driving over tall dry mountains. Crossing Niger involves days in dunes. Some years the entire landscape is covered with locusts. The dunes move –sometimes even the paved road is covered with sands.

 

 

As we talked, the landscape changed from rocky desert to classic sand dunes. The temperature stayed cool because we were near the ocean. We passed nothing but sand, except for occasional Moroccan military men standing by the roadside—some without vehicles, making me wonder where they came from. The only other thing we passed was a few small (about 10 blocks square) well built concrete villages, which were entirely void of people.

 

He explained that these were former towns of the indigenous Saharawis until the Moroccan’s rounded them up in the 1970s and put them in concentration camps further north (these camps still exist).

 

The only real structure between Dakhla and the border is a hotel/restaurant, located 3 hours south of Dakhla and one hour north of the border. He told me the border closed at 6pm, and we would arrive at the hotel at 4pm, where he would be staying for the night. Since 2 hours would still remain, I could try hitching another ride to get to the border, but he warned that I find one that was trustworthy—so that I don’t end up stranded near the border or in the middle of the desert, at the mercy of the bandits. I decided to stay at the hotel and depart with him in the morning. The rooms were $10, and the restaurant downstairs blasted 1980s pop music until the wee hours of the morning (reminding me of a similar episode at a shady hotel in Guyana—see page 244 of 101 Countries). I had dinner and breakfast with him, all the while learning everything about the Sahara, car smuggling, his family, and his pastimes—all in Spanish. He noted that the other guests at the hotel were all shady characters—many smugglers. Cigarettes head north to Europe were taxes are higher. Guns and diamonds head north. Cars head south. He indicated that he used to have more competition, but now he thought only a couple other people were doing what he does (smuggling cars to Mauritania).

 

In the morning we reached the border as it opened. First came the Moroccan exit post. About 20 cars (some heading each way) and 50 people waited near a fairly impressive concrete structure full of uniformed men. We did some paperwork, waited a bit, and Vino paid some bribes. I stood quietly until, at one point, one of the Moroccan officers asked me in English, “You are quiet. Why you do not talk much?”

“Ummm, I don’t speak French,” I replied.

“You are American but you do not talk much. George Bush and Condoleeza Rice talk much.”

I didn’t know how to reply to that one, except for a smile. Actually, the officer eventually lightened up, and displayed the same friendly nature that we had seen in most of Morocco.

 

We departed the Moroccan exit post and the paved road ended. For the 3 miles of “no mans land” until the Mauritania entry post the road is unpaved, bumpy, and rocky…like the entire route across the Sahara used to be until a few years ago. Halfway through no mans land we approached a small car, out of which stepped a black man who was driving, and an impressively dressed Arabian man—who we were meeting. The Arabian looked too much like me: similar age, beard, and frame. He got in our vehicle, and for the next 10 minutes through no-mans-land, the two men argued in French about how much money would be paid for the vehicle. I understood enough French to find it both funny and scary.

 

The Mauritanian entry post was a pathetic small shack, in which sat some shady looking black men with Kalachnikovs (large guns), much ammunition, and stamp pads. Both of the men I was riding with gave large wads of money to all 3 men who were inside. The money literally went over the table, under the table, and to the side of the table. One of the guards even asked me, “Something for me?” I gave him the remainder of my Moroccan coins. Another of the guards said that I looked like some Indian Bollywood actor (Indian movies and music are big in much of W. Africa).  I told them I have not heard of that actor, and they asked me, “Have you heard of George Bush and Condoleeza Rice?”

 

I requested Vino’s help in getting to Nouadhibou (where he was headed—to the Arabic man’s home for the night) and in finding ride heading from there south to the capital of Nouakchott. The three of us continued (now on perfectly paved road) south along the coast to Nouadhibou, a small town which sits on a peninsula. Along the route ran a train—the longest length train in the world at over a mile—which carries Mauritania’s iron ore loads from the deposits in the middle of the Sahara to the coast. Nouadhibou was a very poor third world town. Having entered Mauritania, the vast majority of the people were black (and Muslim). Actually, significant brown (Muslim) people exist also, but they are not on the street—they have the money in the country, and ride around in phat vehicles (Vino said every Mitsubishi in town came from him) and live in phat pads. Both brown and black people are very religious—they pray 5 times a day regardless of where they are. This is different from Morocco (people go find a mosque or skip it), but similar to the Middle East, where you can almost trip on someone praying towards the Kablah (in Mecca in Saudi) if you are not careful.

 

We arrived at the Arabic man’s phat pad, where I saw the black servants that Vino had described as slaves. They then drove me to a place in the middle of town where a few cars were sitting, and negotiated me a ride to Nouakchott. They then left me. I was glad to be away from the shady business, but now I had no translator, and no comfortable A/C SUV to ride in. In fact, the cars where they left me were classic West Africa.

 

Transport in West Africa is third world. Options include large busses (former U.S. city busses that are used for long distance and are packed with every manner of goods), small busses (20 person, which stop all the time), sept places (7 seat station wagons, which in some countries surprisingly limit to 7 passengers), and regular cars (which may hold the intended 4 people or up to 7 people). For most modes, the transport does not leave until full, which may mean minutes or days. In some places two cars for the same route may wait side by side, competing for passengers (this is very inefficient)—while in others, one car starts filling after the previous one leaves.

 

The 4 hour segment from Nouadhibou to Nouakchott was paved last fall—previously the journey consisted of a 24 hour bumpy ride through desert and seaside, waiting for tides. Since the route is new, the only public transport that has arisen to fill the need is small cars. Actually I saw one bus…indicating to me that one can take comfortable transport much of the way across the Sahara (except for the segment from Dakhla across the border to Nouadhibou).

 

The cars I had arrived at were competing for passengers. I chose the one that looked almost full, and paid enough money for the privilege of the shotgun. Only problem was that the seats were shared by two people…and the back seat by 5 (+ 1 baby). In this uncomfortable manner we headed south across the Sahara. The only other curiosity of the passengers was that a few had cell phones (many developing places skipped hiving land lines and went directly to cell phones) that they continuously tried to answer. My assessment was that it makes the user look like (a) they are cool enough to have a phone, (b) they are cool enough to have a friend with a phone to call, and (c) they are actually getting messages that they need to check. In reality, the phone may not even be paid up to be turned on—but many people constantly pretend to check their messages anyway. Our route through the Sahara actually did pass a couple radio towers among the dunes, on which were mounted cell relay antennas.

 

Northern Mauritania is classic Saharan dunes. The flawless new two lane road runs partly along the coast (70 degrees F), and partly inland (100 F). Again, two sorts of vehicles use it: third world ones (like I was in: packed with people, hot and sweaty, and breaking down), and first world ones (mostly rich brown people: air conditioning, many empty seats…). In other words, the rich and the poor. I noticed that one type of vehicle does not stop for the other when it is broken down. I compare this to driving through the Arctic last year, where everyone stopped for everyone.

 

I must put a picture in here. I do not have any pictures of Mauritania (I will tell why later), so please see this link: http://www.hansrossel.com/fotos/fotografie/mauritanie/mau_d6243.htm

That picture says it all. It shows the desert, it shows some standard packed transport breaking down, and it shows the classic clothing of a Mauritanian man: a blue robe and a cloth tied around the head and (importantly) over the mouth.

 

After a couple hours, we came upon a car that had died, and the 7 passengers sitting on the roadside. Saharan dunes were all around. The passengers from my car tried for a while to help, but then another vehicle (a rickety van) came by, and took some of the passengers. We also departed, leaving a couple people (including one woman and child) sitting there in the middle of the Saharan heat. I felt bad about that. Five minutes later we came upon another dead vehicle, with one driver. After stopping to help him (unsuccessfully), our car would not start again. The engines are designed to not start if it is too hot. This meant dumping jugs of water right onto the engine block, and then waiting for an hour in the desert while the engine cooled. If that wasn’t enough of a break, some of the passengers apparently wanted to stop for tea. Along the route were ocassional settlements in the desert: each had nothing more than a few sheet metal shacks. I joined my carload in one of the shacks, where the resident boiled some tea for us all—despite that it was well over 100 degrees F in the metal shack in the sun. One note about Mauritanian (and Moroccan) tea: picture a cup one quarter full of water, in which a veritable bushel of mint is boiled. This brings the tea to half a cup. Then add enough sugar to fill the other half of the cup, and you are left with basically a syrup that they call tea. Before you drink it however, the server must pour the tea from glass to glass, at least a dozen times. Also, you can't get away without drinking at least 3 glasses.

 

By evening the car reached the capital city of Nouakchott, where I found an adequate place to sleep. The city is 95% third world poverty (the blacks), and 5% wealth (the browns and some whites), and is entirely in the desert. Between the smog from the vehicles and the blowing sand, the sun is barely visible. Much of the town (and as I would see much of West Africa) were glued to TVs watching the World Cup.

 

In the morning I caught a cab to the place where cars wait for passengers who want to head south. I fought through a swarm of touts to find a car that needed one more person, crammed myself into the back seat along with 5 others, and sat squashed while the driver headed at breakneck speeds for 3 hours to the southern border with Senegal. The landscape changed from sand dunes to flat rocky desert, to sparse trees, and opened up suddenly at the wide and bustling Senegal River.

 

The Senegal River forms the border of Mauritania and Senegal, and the town of Rosso sits on both sides. Crossing involves getting stamped out of Rosso-Mauritania, crossing the river on a pinasse or pirogue (large canoe thingies with motors), getting stamped into Rosso-Senegal. The scene bustles with people in colorful clothing moving mountains of goods, and like any good third world border, is crawling with moneychangers and criminals. The chaotic scene was my first introduction to the real West Africa. Whereas Mauritania is full of brown men wearing blue sheets (and women covered conservatively), Senegal is full of black people dressed colorfully (and women much more open). Islam is strong in all of West Africa, but is less strict in some places. Also, much of West Africa follows Islamic brotherhoods (with names like Lamp Fall), which are led by marabouts (visionary men, most of whom are dead). This system was never intended in Islam, but is the status quo in much of W. Africa (and therefore the Caribbean also, via slavery).

 

While crossing the Senegal River, I met a few other travelers: a young Japanese tourist couple and a Spanish man who worked locally for Oxfam. Together we bartered a sept place south to Dakar, the capital of Senegal. Just before we departed, as I was taking a picture of the street in Rosso, a policeman approached me. He thought the picture I was taking was too close to him, and he demanded my film. I complied, losing all pictures I had from Mauritania (which is why there were no pics of the dunes above).

 

The 6 hour ride to Dakar passed through areas with increasing vegetation, including acacia and baobab trees, and smaller trees which grazing goats liked climbing. The major industry (and basis for the economy and culture) in Senegal is peanuts, and much of the region we passed was planted with them.

 

Senegal’s capital Dakar sits on somewhat of a peninsula, and it drowns in its own smog. It is dirty, huge, and industrious. I arrived in the main square downtown just before dark, and was surrounded by touts of all manner trying to sell stolen goods (and trying to steal my goods to sell). I also ran into four squeaky clean young U.S. Marine officers, whose boat was in port for a few days. The best deal I could find to sleep was noted to be a brothel in the guidebook—which I didn’t take seriously until the middle of the night. Luckily it was a fairly quiet place.

 

In the morning I caught a cab to the Gare Pompiers, the taxi stand for vehicles leaving almost anywhere in the region. It is no ordinary taxi stand; it looks like this:

 

I found the car waiting for passengers heading to Kidira, the border town with Mali. Since this was a far destination, I waited a long time for enough passengers. While waiting, I discovered that one of the other passengers spoke Engilsh. Mamadi (Mohammed) was born in Liberia (his dad traded diamonds), grew up in Guinea-Conakry (as opposed to Guinea Bissau or Equitorial Guinea-Malabo), and now takes trips to sell Guinean carvings in Dakar. He has brothers in the U.S. who were lucky enough to get lottery visas, and parents in Guinea…although his dad just died, which is why he was headed back there. He would have flown, but flights were cancelled in Conakry because of violent protests against the current government.

 

Finding him was very lucky, since he spoke fantastic English, and could explain to me everything I was seeing. Even better, he would help me in numerous ways over the next two days, since he was headed in the same direction that I was. Our ride east across the length of Senegal took all day—the driver was slow and I was crammed into the back of the station wagon. At stops, Mamadi would explain African life to me.

 

We passed through Tambacounda, and arrived at the border town of Kidira just after dark. The sept place dropped up off at a small concrete shack where an officer stamped us out of Senegal. Mamadi then found us a taxi to take across a large river to the mud-hut village of Diboli in Mali. Just before the river was a concrete shack where two Senegalese officers checked to make sure we had gotten the requisite stamp out of the country. A similar booth did not exist on the Malian side of the river…the checkpoint was down the road. The thing that was on the Malian side was a collection of shacks and huts where people gathered to get a ride going to Kayes, the major town in western Mali, one hour away.

 

Although Mamadi could speak French and English, he could not really speak Wolof or Mandinki, which the people were now speaking. Nevertheless, he discovered that a car needed one more person, and was headed to Kayes immediately…and that I needed to go to a nearby booth to get my visa stamped into Mali. Since he did not need the stamp, he took the place in the car and headed off. It was now dark, and a rain had started—and I had lost my translator.

 

I entered the shack where 20 Malian officers were seated—all glued to a TV with the World Cup—and got stamped in. I then walked back to the taxi stand. Mamadi and his carload had returned; apparently the road checkpoint (the border post where one formerly enters Mali) was closed for the night. They would depart at 5am, when it opened. Until then, they would sit and wait…or sleep on the dirt. Mamadi helped me determine that, although there were a couple other people that needed a ride to Kayes, the only other vehicle waiting to go was a 22 seat van—and it may not fill until tomorrow night. My other alternative was to pay $50 to hire a car by myself to go the one hour. Either way, nothing was leaving until morning.

 

I did not care to sit in the mud all night, and I had noticed a sign for a hotel—but it was back across the river in Kidira, Senegal. I caught a cab back across the river, and had to stop at the Senegal passport checkpoint just after the bridge. The rain had picked up, and the electricity had gone out, meaning no lights. To avoid the downpour, I ran from the cab to the checkpoint buildings, but I could not see a small concrete ledge in front of me. I tripped hard on the ledge and fell in the mud. I picked myself up, and continued inside. The officers inside indicated that if I wanted to stay in the hotel, I would have to get stamped back into Senegal.

 

Now this was a problem. It meant that I would, in the morning, need to get stamped back into Mali—which was impossible since I did not have another Malian visa. I returned back across the bridge to the taxi stand where Mamadi was waiting. It was now after midnight, the driving rain was alternating with a powerful dust storm, and the malaria-laden mosquitos were out in full force. I also noticed that I had received a considerable wound from the trip on the concrete, and my mid-shin was pouring blood. I patched myself up with my first aid kit, then asked Mamadi why no one cared to sleep in the cars. Apparently it just wasn’t a popular notion, but they said I could sleep in one. I am very accustomed to sleeping in cars, apparently just as accustomed as the others were to sleeping in the dirt.

 

This brings me to the paragraph at the top of this page, an episode that was a lowpoint in my travels. I was tired (from lack of sleep), sore (from uncomfortable transport), hungry (most food was meaty or unsanitary), bleeding, missing my wife (perhaps the most important issue), worn out (from unreliable transport), and mentally tired (from having just taken a U.S. medical licensing exam just before I left). I had arranged my itinerary to return just in time to start the third year of med school, but now I realized I wanted to get home for a few days of rest beforehand. My original idea had included visiting many countries in W. Africa, a plan which I rejected after seeing just how difficult transport is in the region. Although the travel was enlightening, it was extremely rough: the region is the poorest in the world and hardly anyone speaks my languages. My refined plan involved me going to Bamako (the capital of Mali), Ougadogou (capital of Burkina Faso), and Niamey (the capital of Niger), from where I would return. I now decided to skip Ouga and Niger, and return from Bamako.

 

I awoke at 4:30 am, and found Mamadi still sitting on the bench in the dark. He said he had negotiated a spot for himself in a car that was leaving at 5am, but that I would have to wait for the 22 person bus to fill up—or hire a car for myself. He then departed. As it got light, a couple more passengers for Kayes appeared. By 8am, I had had enough. I was not going to wait days for 20 more people who may never arrive. I negotiated for the other two to pay $10 each, and I paid $30, and we headed to Kayes. Although my $30 for a one hour ride was definitely steep for an undeveloped place, even paying $10 would have been steep—a one hour ride costs pennies in much of the undeveloped world. This is an example of another curiosity of West Africa: although it houses many of the world’s poorest countries, the prices are often as high as richer places like Mexico—or even as high as certain items in the U.S. I once found myself paying more for a banana in Mauritania than I do at the grocery store near my home in Denver.

 

Our cab (after popping a tire and fixing it) stopped just outside of Kayes—which meant I then had to find another cab to the bus stand in the middle of Kayes. At the bus stand was one bus revving its engine, packed full of people and goods, just about to leave for Bamako. The next bus would be hours later. Luckily, Mamadi was on the bus. He saw me outside and negotiated with the bus to sell me a spot in the aisle. They gave me a water jug to sit on, but the jug was leaking, which meant my crotch was soaking wet. I did not mind this because it had gotten well over 100 degrees F.

 

It was 9am, and the bus was supposed to arrive in Bamako at 5pm. It actually arrived at 1am the next morning. This is because it overheated once, and its headlights broke a few times in the evening. The upside was that I got to spend another day crossing West Africa with Mamadi, who explained to me everything we saw. He also told me about life in Guinea (his upcoming arranged marriage, his dad’s multiple wives, religion, community, war…), life in Liberia (including the diamond business), and his dreams to come to the U.S. As we headed east and the day progressed, the temperature got hotter—until every passenger was soaked in their own sweat. The route to Bamako was not entirely paved, so for 5 hours in the afternoon, we were on a dirt road. This meant that the red dirt entered every window, and coated our sweat-soaked clothes. It was pure African travel. Here are a couple pictures. Notice the jug of water that was poured on the engine block. Also notice the Sahel-style mud brick mosque.

 

 

When the bus arrived in Bamako at 1am, I found a cab to take me to the airport. The airport is about 10 miles out of town, is shiny new, and is tiny (like a small office building). I suppose 1:30am was an odd hour to arrive at the airport, because all of the security check points were unmanned. However, a large Air France plane was still boarding, and as I roamed the airport, I found myself having passed entirely through all ticketing and security checkpoints, in line to board the plane with the other passengers,,, without having shown a ticket to anyone. Although I thought it could be neat to be in Paris in a few hours, I decided that it was too shady…and I returned to the lobby of the airport for a night of sleep on chairs.

 

In the morning, I did some reckoning, and realized that the flight I needed was the next night, and that I needed to go to the ticketing office downtown. I caught a cab downtown, changed my ticket, and realized that I was filthy. My clothes were pure dirt, and my pants were soaked in blood. I found a cheap hotel, and negotiated a price (CFA 1000 West African Francs = $2) to take a shower. I spent the rest of the day roaming Bamako and checking out the Grand Market, where everything from artwork to salt was for sale (some of the salt having come via Timbuktu, which is in northern Mali).

 

A picture of a small mosque in the middle of the grand market. Note the people doing ablutions (washing up) before prayers on the bottom right.

 

I returned to the airport in the evening, and spent the remainder of the day making deals with moneychangers outside the terminal. I traded out their dirty and worn U.S. currency with clean, large denomination notes, which the banks would take. I also traded some notes for their U.S. coins, which I found curious (no moneychanger accepts coins from another country) until I realized that the coins (and probably many of their notes) were likely stolen.

 

My route back to Denver took me via Casablanca, London (where I spent the night with my cousin), and NYC.