One of the more, er… enlightening (?) reports you can view is the list of what search terms were used to find your blog.  Usually I see things like “Kankan, Guinea” or “travel in Senegal” or other such googles that make perfect sense.

Today, you’ll be happy to know,  I discovered a whole new use for Blog Stats:

Someone call Chris Hansen. I think we’ve caught a predator.

You can read about this tragedy here.

This week marks my two-month at home mark, and I thought it might be time to post my final how-it-all-ended report.  I’ll be honest.  In my head, I would have made a surprise appearance at the Full Circle Bar some night my first weekend home, to be greeted by lots of shocked “whoooooaaahh!”s and “nooo wayyyy!”s.  But alas, thanks to the powers of the interwebs, my dramatic secret return was compromised, and news of my arrival made it to the USA before my plane even landed. But whatever – theatrics forgone, being back is half awesome, half one-major-bummer, all sprinkled with a healthy pinch of “Huh??”.  I’ll get to this later, but first, I left you all hanging after my last post.

After two excessively steamy days in Togo, two more excessively steamy days in Accra, multiples stops at the British pastry shop for sausage (PORK!) rolls and Tupney pies, two trips to the Nigerian High Commission to obtain a surprise transit visa (oops), I finally made my way through Lagos to Johannesburg.  Shame on my travel agent self for not checking the transit visa situation in advance, but thanks to the ever-watchful eye of my boss from 10,000 miles away, I was able to get it just in the nick of time.  Like, on the way to the airport.  Arriving in Lagos, I wandered over to the Ethiopian Airways desk (escorted by a Nigerian soldier), where I jubilantly learned that my next flight had been canceled.  Jubilant because out of the corner of my eye I saw a non-stop Lagos-Joburg flight that was checking in.  As expected they rebooked me on South African Airways nonstop to Johannesburg, and in the end, I arrived in sunny George 8 hours early.

George is a smallish town on the coast of South Africa, where some of the most intense and amazing scenery awaited me.  I’d seen this coastline thrice before, but finally, on my fourth trip to George, I had the opportunity to kick back and actually enjoy it.  The Myburgh family welcomed me with open arms and for a week, I became the fourth child, made all the more amusing by the fact that their youngest, Alwyn is a redheaded freckle-faced lad who looks more like my brother than anyone else’s!

With my "little brother" Alwyn at Buffles Bay

A big part of the fun of being in South Africa is Pieter, friend, colleague, one hell of a dad, but also part 12-year old boy who likes body surfing and motorcycles.  We did a fair share of body surfing (which thankfully was never photographed) and also took a full day out on the bike to see the surrounding mountains and valleys, which are s.t.u.n.n.i.n.g.

Twisty Rocks

Safety First!

Bummer.

Near the end of our trip, we stopped by Outshoorn, the famous land of Ostriches.  It’s a place most of our clients visit, so Pieter showed me around.  As it happens, I’m not the biggest fan of ostriches.

They made me ride him.

Then they made me feed them.

Soon enough it was time for the final frontier.  Lesotho – land of ponies and Greg Viola.  I flew back up to Johannesburg and rented a car, and drove to Ficksburg to meet good-0ld Greg.  Greg’s been in the Peace Corps in Lesotho since June of last year, so he’s settled in and as happy as one can be in a country that has a LOT of problems.  HIV has ravaged this small country, which is located in the dramatic Drakensberg Mountains, and is surrounded by South Africa.  It has the third-highest HIV prevalence in the world at about 23%, just behind its neighbors Swaziland and Botswana.  That, of course, only takes into account recorded cases, and in a world that largely denies the existence of the disease, one can only imagine what the realistic estimate would be.

Last month, the understandably controversial South African president, Jacob Zuma, the notorious polygamist Zulu horn-dog who famously claimed he has avoided contracting the virus by taking hot showers after sex, finally submitted to testing.  He tested negative, but has accepted that his country needs to act. Lesotho and South Africa share a common language (Sesotho), their currencies are linked, their people cross the borders pretty easily, and SA has considerable interests in Lesotho’s resources, namely water.  One can only hope the new initiatives in SA will also leak over the border into Lesotho.

Problems aside, what a beautiful place!  It’s rumored that JRR Tolkien, a  South African, took inspiration from Lesotho’s mountains to create his Middle Earth.  It doesn’t quite look like New Zealand, as Hollywood would have us believe, but it’s pretty darned spectacular, nonetheless.

Lesotho

Mordor

Greg lives in Buthe Buthe, in the Northwest corner of Lesotho.  His village is a small one, set on a hillside, sort of like The Shire?  By Guinea standards, Greg’s home is downright lovely.  With high thatch and cinderblock walls, the place stays relatively cool, even in the heat of summer.  There’s no power and no running water, but the well isn’t too far AND he has a gas stove.  He’s got a pit-latrine up the hill, which has a seat(!) and toilet paper(!) and black widows(!). He also has a pee bucket, which is used for pee only, in the night-time.

The Kitchen

The Dining Room

With the luxury of having a car, we were able to dart all over the country to visit various friends of Greg who are dotted all over the place.  We first went to a birthday party in Sefako, the farthest north one can get in the country.  It’s so close to the South African border, that while you’re driving on the pith rock roads that destroy your car, you can actually see the fence and the paved road with guard-rail on the other side.   It was the twenty-somethingth birthday for Meg, another volunteer, and in her honor, we killed two chickens and cooked it right up, along with mashed potatoes and some other stuff.

Proof that you CAN pluck and drink at the same time.

Greg, doing the good work of a lady.

Our next trip was to Mashai, via Thaba-Tseka, to visit another friend of Greg’s, Jonathan.  I forgot to take photos of Jonathan, his immaculate rondavel, his adoreable bo-me, his dog, Charlie Hansa or his unusual group of child-followers, but I assure you, it was a highlight.  It was about a 7 hour journey through some of the most exciting, terrifying passes I’ve ever seen (one could see the remants of old wrecks – decrepit combis at the bottom of 300 foot drops, etc), but we made it unscathed.  I can’t say the same for the Corolla, but it was a rental, so who gives?

I had the pleasure of meeting Lorian, Greg’s girlfriend and fellow-volunteer.  She lives in Mohale’s Hoek, reportedly the armpit of Lesotho, and had come to Buthe Buthe the night before, and we traveled together up to Mashai.

Lorian and Greg

Two nights and 12 Hansas later, it was time for the LAST NIGHT of my adventure.  We drove another 6 hours to Maseru, where we stayed with Phil, another volunteer, who had a three bedroom house with power and internet and water…  I think it was by some freak technicality that he got this amenities-packed house in the capital, but no one was complaining.  We had movie night with pizza delivery (?!) and hit the hay early.  For tomorrow would be a long day.

I hit the road at about noon for Johannesburg to catch my flights home.  I realized about an hour outside Maseru that I had Lorian’s purse in the car, so I had to drop it off at a drugstore in Ladybrand, and then I got pulled over for speeding (I paid a bribe and kept going), so by the time I arrived in Joburg, I had no time to look around.  I was going to search for the childhood home of Sash, a friend of our family, but alas, straight to the airport!

I found a flight home on Egypt Air for $400 through Cairo, which sounded almost criminal.  The flight to Cairo was about 9 hours, and the flight from Cairo to JFK was 11 hours.  After all that, I was picked up at JFK by Greg and Emily, whisked to my office for a quick kitty cuddle and a beer and a shot at Mugs, before dropping me off at LaGuardia for my FINAL final leg of the trip.  It was only a 55 minute flight, but it was the longest and most uncomfortable 55 minutes of the entire trip.  It may have been psychological, it may have been fatigue, but I’m pretty sure that it was because it was the first time in 5 months that I had to wear closed-toe shoes!

And so I survived.  My head is filled with memories and swimming with ideas.  Africa has opened my eyes to a whole other world of possibilities.  I learned so much about the world, and it gave me the unique opportunity to see life through a whole lot of different perspectives.  More importantly, I’ve learned my limits, and am pleased to report they’re a lot more reaching that I had thought.  I’ve learned about love, about patience and tolerance, about being grateful for what I have and the benefits of having an open mind.  I can now appreciate the importance of being bilingual, the ability to cope with poverty, disease and corruption, the significance of a positive attitude.  It’s left me with so much to hope for and to look forward to, and this, friends, is certainly not the last that Africa will see of me!

Here is a list of FAQs.  These are the things that everyone asks…

1) What was your favorite part?

Mali, more specifically Timbuktu, the festival and the week that followed.  It was so unique, and such a great experience being surrounded by people who made it that way.  My week with Bouba and John was amazing.  I’ve never felt so free and happy.  In fact, I hope to return to the festival again, maybe as soon as this year, so if anyone’s up for the adventure, give me a call.

2) How did you fare, health-wise?

I drank the water, ate anything that was given to me, and aside from a cold, a UTI and 2 days of dodgy stomach, the only major issue was a pretty nasty mouth infection… imagine having like 30 raw, stinging ulcers all at the same time inside your gums and lips.  It only lasted about a week.  I couldn’t eat or smile or laugh.  I only barfed once, and that was the fault of a mad taxi-driver.

3) Financially, how did you do?

I’m pretty sure that I spent as much on my trip as I’d have spent living in New York, so it seems that it was an equal trade.  Including flights, for 5 months, I spent about $10,000.

4) How’s your French?

Well, the lady at the French restaurant around the corner says it’s fine, but that I sound like an African.  Word!  I’m wondering if that is similar to someone who learns English but sounds like a Southerner or talks like Eminem or something.  I’ve worked really hard to try to speak correct French, grammatically, which is not easy in a place where it’s everyone’s second language.  Reading has helped, specifically Harry Potter and other YA stuff.

Harry Potter et la Coupe de Feu

5) How was the food?

Well – it varied.  Senegalese food is amazing.  Timbuktu food is even better.  Guinean food doesn’t consist of much.  Rice, Rice and more Rice.  And tough chicken. However, they do have TOUBA, which is an amazing coffee infused with ginger and cayenne pepper.  Say what??

Mood: Lamenting

Health: Re-Gained my freshman 15.

I’ll tell you all about my harrowing and frustrating experience with the journey down at a later date, but as I’m finally on a computer with fast internet and an SD slot, I thought I’d throw up some photos for your enjoyment. 

This is Labe, the town closest to where Maurice lives, in Guinea.   It’s not particularly unusual or noteworthy, but it’s a pretty good example of what your average Guinean town looks like.  At every turn, people are selling everything from used car parts to dried fish to mangos to socks to sparkly bow-ties.

The markets are frenetic, chaotic, frustrating, difficult to navigate and a lesson in negotiating skills.  But with beautiful produce and colors like this, it’s essential that every visitor to West Africa visit as many markets as possible, even if you don’t need or buy anything.

Yes, this is a gas station.  But it’s not just a gas station.  This is THE Station-Bar, in Kankan, Guinea.  When someone says “Want to go to the Station Bar?” you might conjure an image of a charming railway station bar with martinis and a bartender in suspenders.  In Kankan, the Station Bar is this.  It is the Total Station in the center of town, the only place that has power all day, and thus the only place that reliably has cold drinks during the sunniest, hottest hours.  And by drinks, I mean Fanta or Coke, and the occasional Sprite.  It’s the hangout.  I went there at least once a day, usually more.  This is a photo of the petrol crisis that was taking place one day. 

Here’s Maurice at the Station Bar.  Nothing more to say about that, just thought it was a nice picture.

Mosque in Kankan.  With no power, the moon is your only street lamp.

This is the daily scene next door to Sow’s tailor shop in Kankan.  These old men lie there all day long every day, reading the Koran and selling bathrobes.  I love very much when a man comes by and tries on several bathrobes that are very clearly meant for women. 

Kankan, from one of the rare second story windows in the town – the Catholic Mission, the cleanest of Kankan’s accommodation options.  Though, like all the others, no power, no water.

On board Air Mali with Captain Miguel, my roommate!  Walid, the other pilot, left shortly after for France and never came back!

Sunset in Timbuktu. 

This is the Sahara, during the Festival in the Desert.  It’s the Maliymas camp from afar.  I was the little blue tent in the middle.

This was the main tent, where we spent most of our daytime hours, avoiding the sun, recovering from the night before,  drinking tons of water, eating couscous and chatting. 

Not a great photo, but this embodies the feel of a Tuareg band.  These guys are no-joke, with their turbans and bubus and electric guitars.  The only think missing is a bottle of Jack. 

The audience at the festival was divided pretty evenly between locals and foreigners.  This was taken at the small stage, set up at the bottom of one of the dunes.  Again, the colors! 

Camels, before one of the organized “camel races”.  I never actually saw anything that I thought looked like “racing”, though there was a lot of ceremonial parading around of cames and their Tuareg drivers.  That said, Mohamed, the Maliymas camelier, told me he got second place in something, so there must have been some kind of competition at some point.

The “race”.

Amadou and Mariam.  So cute, I can’t stand it.

Kind of blurry, but I love this photo of John, looking (nearly) convincingly Saharan on an evening camel ride.

The Dogon village of Begnemato, about two hours from Bandigara.  It was in this village that we passed the night on the roof of a home.

Desert suntan.  Note the masks.  You can’t throw a stone without hitting a Dogon mask in Mali. 

My house in Bamako!  OK, the house of Miguel and Nabil, where I stayed in Mali. 

In Bamako, every square inch of land that isn’t taken up by a building is being used as farmland.  This unfortunately dark photo was taken in central Bamako, on the banks of the Niger River.  They grow everything from onions to tomatoes to potatoes, but this area was all for mint, which gave the air a delicious aroma of mint tea.

The only photo I took of Ghana.  This is en route from Togo to Accra, in a shared taxi, where everyone got their own seat.  It cost about $7 for the ride.  Excellent!

Well, it’s noon now, and there’s a Windhoek waiting for me somewhere. 

Mood: Relaxed – happy as a Knysna oyster.

Health: About to get fatter.

Well, neither did I, really.  I’m looking back on these last two months wondering what the hell happened.  I am supposed to be writing you from the heart of Congolese Rebel country, or somewhere similarly hard-core-sounding, but in the end, West Africa refused to let me go.   I’m here to tell you that kidnapping is a real threat in Mali, but it’s not Al Qaeda, like everyone thinks.  It’s just Mali, itself.

I arrived back to Bamako, saw my friends off at the airport and settled in at a little Auberge to see what would happen.   Hmmm, ok.  Not much happened.  So I rang up Miguel, the captain of the famed flight to Timbuktu, who immediately offered me a room in his apartment, which he shares with another pilot, Nabil from Italy.  So, as I had been lodging in what could be aptly described as the Far Rockaway of Bamako, I happily accepted his offer to take a room in Niyarela, close to the action.  It was a big place with no running water from morning till night, but we had air conditioning and a nice little man named Gilbert who cooks chicken that could (no joke) rival Marlowe & Sons, and does laundry better than anyone (sorry Dad, this guy is amazing).

After a while, I reestablished contact with some folks from the festival and things started to get exciting again.  I spent most of my nights in Mali running around with my friends Mohamed, Moribo, Mohamed, Mohamed, Abdoulaye and Mohamed.  Many Castles and Flags were drunk, many brochettes and plates of riz gras were eaten, dancing was done, motos were ridden and much fun was had.  It’s safe to say that Mali - and more so, Malians - have stolen a little part of my heart.  

But now, it’s time to bid a fond farewell…  So, goodbye, Mali, to your desert dunes, your sleepy river villages, your dusty, tree-lined city streets, your Tuareg camel drivers, your Bambaran chain-smoking alcoholics, your couscous, gounday and Timbuktu Secret Sauce, your Castles (grande et petite), your music (OH your music!), your art, your style, and most of all your people.   I will see you again, Inshallah, and not in the too-distant future. 

And now, my friends, it’s time to head south.  And I do mean SOUTH, about as far south as one can get on this great dark mysterious continent, to South Africa, where the children are laughing, the birds are singing, the impala are lowing and the soil is so furtile you can grow oysters and chardonnay right in your own back yard… South Africa has always held a special place in my heart, thanks to the generosity and enthusiasm of my “grand-frère”, Pieter and his family.  I can’t wait to see them, in just a few days.

But first I have to get there, which brings me to why in the world I’m in Togo!?  The plan was to travel by land from Bamako, through Burkina Faso and down through Ghana, arriving conveniently the day before my flight, which departs from Accra on Thursday.  But as earlier illustrated, Bamako hypnotised me, and I forgot to leave.  So instead of flying to Accra, which cost a mint, I booked a flight into Lome, the Togolese capital, conveniently located on the border with Ghana.  

If I thought Bamako was hot, Holy Smokes, it was nothing compared to this place.  I can do nothing but sit in my hotel room, pressed up against the air conditioner.  I felt heat like this once before, in Brisbane, Australia, and that almost made me literally crazy.   I couldn’t help but look at all the people in the streets and wonder “how do you do it?!”  When it gets hot in New York, they call an emergency and set up cooling centers all over town for the people without air conditioning.  In Lome, it’s just a way of life.  They don’t even sweat!  I feel like some kind of wild boar.

Anyway, that’s where I am now.  Tomorrow, I’m off to Accra.  I have a flight itinerary on Wednesday which might well do me in.  I shall fly from Accra to Lagos, Nigeria, then to Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, then to Johannesburg, and THEN to George, where Pieter and family will be waiting with open arms.  I’m sure I’ll be dead on my feet.  But certainly not too dead for an ice-cold Windhoek Namibian Lager! 

Mood: Nostalgic.

Health:  Whatever.  Stopped my Larium weeks ago. (sorry Kurt.  hopefully I won’t become your test subject)

Again, Sorry for photo lackage.  Loads of photo-related problems.

PS: TOTALLY UNRELATED to Africa, but check out my mom:  (no mom jokes, pls)

http://aboutstark.com/images/aboutmarch2jpg

In Mopti, I said to myself, and whoever else was listening, something like “I’m over this iPhone.  I don’t miss it at all, I’m ditching it”.  John said, “You should sell it!”…  I said “Who would want this?  Aside from it being a soul-sucking waste of brain and phalange power, it’s all cracked and the battery lasts for like four minutes”.  “Trust me”, he replied.   

And so we went to the bar, and I casually put the phone on the table. I kid you not, six seconds after it hit the table, my friend Mohamed said, “Is that an iPhone?  Do you want to sell it?  I’ll give you a sheep for it!”… I ignored the I-told-you-so chuckle coming from John’s corner of the table. 

And so went the parting of ways between me and my faithful, impossibly hip electronic secretary.  I’m pretty sure the mouton would have been the sweeter deal (I could have sold it in the black market sheep trade), but I went with cash, 35,000 CFA, which is about $85.   

So it’s me and my never-fail $20 Nokia now.  I’ll see how much I can get for it in Lesotho.  

On a side-note, I ran into Mohamed again in Bamako, by which point he’d managed to unlock AT&Ts proprietorial code and was happily “sliding to unlock” every five seconds and blissfully ignoring all surrounding conversation, of course.  Here’s his first iPhone photo, a Tuareg boy in Mopti.  I wonder how much he had to pay him for it??? 

"Cadeau??"

What’s funny about this place is that everything just sort of unfolds in front of you.  I spend my life and work planning things - for myself, for my clients, for my friends – it’s what I do.  But since minute one in Mali, I’ve made up my mind not to plan anything.  For the first time, I’m letting my life happen around me, and it seems there is no better place to give that a whirl. 

As I told you before, serendipity came to me upon landing in Bamako, when I met Nathalie from Fort Greene, who had been on my flight from Conakry.  Having both been around the African block for some time, we made a good team, bargaining and haggling when we needed to, and taking every opportunity we could find to make the best of everything.  We teamed up and spent two nights going out in Bamako.  Malians drink and smoke like longshore fishermen, so it’s not hard to find a party at any hour on any day of the week.  We then took a flight to Mopti, and it was then that things started to get interesting.   

On the plane, the pilot passed by our seat and took a shine to us. He invited us up into the cockpit to have a look around.  He and his co-pilot, Miguel from Mexico, gave us the birds-eye view of the land, and we watched and listened as we flew.  They asked if we were going to Timbuktu and we said that no, we were only going as far as Mopti, and then taking a 4×4 up to the festival.   They looked at each other, said something quietly on the headphones and then Walid (the other pilot) said, “Eh, just stay on the plane, we’ll take you to Timbuktu”.   What?  I’ve been a travel agent for 9 years, and this is a first.  So we just hitchhiked to Timbuktu on the airplane.  AND I sat in the jumpseat for the entire flight to Timbuktu.  As scary as a take-off is, sitting in the cockpit is terrifying.  When we got close to the city, we decided to fly around for a little while looking for the festival site.  We found it, a tiny cluster of white tents about 4 km from Timbuktu town.  

Timbuktu from the air

When we landed in Timbuktu, the pilots invited us to lunch at their hotel, so we took their chauffeured car there, where we met their friend Dicko.  Hotels in Timbuktu were all full, so we stayed at Dicko’s house.  A jolly man, Dicko’s smile can light up a room.   

The view from Dicko's roof

The next day we split up for our separate camps at the festival.  I was being taken care of by a company called Maliymas, operated by the lovely Boubakr, who picked me up and took me to the camp in the dunes.  As I have told you, the festival is usually in Essakane, about 100 km from Timbuktu but this year it had been moved to the city because of this whole Al-Qaeda kidnapping thing.  Whatevs.  Each tour operator chooses a spot for his camp, where his clients will sleep and eat (and drink).  Maliymas was the farthest camp from the festival, about 1.5km, which was a tiring hike each way through the dunes, but perfect, as there was no noise, no hassle and the desert stretched out endlessly from our camp.  As expected, security was everywhere, and if you looked hard enough, you could see the Malian military camped out on dunes all around the festival, keeping an eye on things.  I took this photo when i arrived: 

From our camp

After getting settled, I headed to the festival site, where I met up with Nathalie and the pilots.  I’ll tell you right now, the only thing more threatening to one’s health than drinking in the desert with a Malian is drinking in the desert with a Mexican.  We loaded up on Castel in cans (Oui! Nous CAN! - shout to the FCB) and hit the dunes to act like lunatics.  

Acting like a lunatic with pilots in the Sahara.

The Festival in the Desert is an annual thing run by the  Tuareg people who live in the north of Mali. Let me just tell you that I can’t think of any people who are more badass than the Tuaregs.  They ride camels, they wear turbans of purple and blue and green, they CARRY SWORDS, and are also really clever and smart.  They also make some ass-kicking music.  If you’ve never listened to Tuareg music, do yourself a favor and look into it.  Check out Tinariwen to get a sample.  

Tuareg band (can't remember which one)

I have heard that Tuareg women are pretty fierce, and the women in these groups are no-joke.  They usually play the calebasse and do some chanting, and the men clap in some pretty intricate rhythms and sing over the chanting.  The songs usually use the same chord from start to finish, but it’s not monotonous.  It’s a haunting sound; one can become entranced easily. 

In addition to the music, there was much merriment back at camp, with campers from Mexico, Holland, Colombia, Spain, Italy, UK, France, South Africa and America.  Travelers in Africa are a rare breed.  There are a lot of solo travelers, and everyone here has been everywhere, done everything and are traveling in Africa because they’re looking for the next frontier.  They’re all really interesting with great stories, and are rather unflappable.  They’re also ready and willing to share rides, hotels, ideas, guides, contacts, etc.  

The camp

The festival starts late, because during the days the desert is hot and dusty, and it’s more comfortable to fete when it’s night-time.  The drawback is that the concerts don’t finish until about 4am, and by the time you find your way back to your tent, which isn’t easy (I had to use the stars to navigate! Points for that, please), and have some tea and sit by the fire, you don’t go to sleep until about 5.30am.  But then, at 7.30 it becomes to hot to sleep so you get up and have breakfast.  It’s too hot to take naps, so everyone generally just hangs out in the big tent until lunch, then does the same until the concerts start up again.  I did this three nights in a row, and this combined with the sand and 0% humidity took a lot out of me and everyone else.  It was worth it, though. 

One of the highlights of the festival for me was meeting up with Chris, my friend who lives in Kidal.  He’s recording music in the desert, and is friends with one of the bands who came down to play the festival.  You can read more about his work here.   He lived in Brooklyn for a while, but now lives a nomadic Tuareg life in Northern Mali and Mauritania.  I tried to go with them back to Kidal after the festival, but their driver refused, saying a white woman in the car was too much of a risk.  Oh well. 

Chris (the white guy) and his Tuareg band - super nice guys

On the last night of the festival, we danced to Amadou and Miriam (who are adorable, by the way) and listened to a “jam session” with all of Mali’s greats.  We spent one last night (morning) in the desert, and then headed back to Timbuktu for a night before heading south.  One of the Tuareg guides, Mohamed, had been insisting on taking me on a camel ride, so i finally agreed to go.  It was sunset, and just about the most amazing thing.  I went with my friend John, who is a filmmaker working with Bouba on a project here.  

John, Mohamed and Mohamed's camel.

A kindred spirit in the travel industry, I hitched a ride to Mopti with John, Bouba and some other folks, where we spent one night before heading to Dogon Country.  The ride was easy and interesting, complete with a stop to administer some first aid to some Americans who flipped their car.  Oops.  

The crew (that's bouba in the middle)

When you're driving 8 hours in the desert, it helps to have something pretty to look at.

After a great relaxing night (and a shower!) in Mopti at the charmingly named Nyapasdeprobleme hotel, we headed to Dogon Country, where the guys wanted to film a bit for the promotional piece he was working on.  The colors of Dogon surprised me.  On the way there I thought I was driving through a well manicured miniature golf course… 

En route to Dogon Country

Dogon Country is like nothing else in this world.  I shall not try to give a history on these people, because I certainly won’t do it justice.  We visited the village of Begnemato, which is about a 30 minute trek down the escarpment.  It’s a bit of a tourist trap, but basically, you turn up, tell them you need a place to sleep, and they put a mattress on their roof for you.  It’s a bit of a jarring juxtaposition sitting in Dogon country ordering beers and CocaColas, but I’ll tell you, it’s an experience worth having.  

Where the Telem used to live. The Telem are gone, but the Animist Dogon still use these houses for sacrifices and for storing their monkey heads and whatnot.

When we were there, there was a traditional Dogon masked dance.  I’m pretty sure it was for the benefit of the tourists, but it was pretty amazing nonetheless.  

Dogon Dance

We hiked out of the village and were carried for about an hour by charrette and bull to a restaurant where we met our driver, who took us back to Mopti to pick up another tourist and take us to Djenne.  We spent the night in Djenne and saw Mali’s most talked-about mosque, and then the next day headed home to Bamako.  

Grande Mosquee in Djenne (aka: the only thing in Djenne.)

We arrived safely in Bamako last night and celebrated our last night all together.  We downed some African Guinness in an amusing nightclub before going to the airport to put John on his plane home.  Tonight I will do the same thing, but this time we’re putting Bouba on the plane.  

Then, I’m alone again.   Only tomorrow will I know what I’m doing tomorrow!  Who will I meet?  Where I go?  What will I see?? Stay tuned! 

Mood: Feelin’ it. 

(Camera) Health: Not so good.  Scratched lens, and covered in toothpaste.  Balls.

I have safely begun leg three of my adventure, here in awesome, sunny Bamako.  If Conakry was Disney World, this place feels like the lost city of Atlantis.  I liked it the first time and I like it even more now.  But it’s time to catch you up.

My days and weeks in Guinea were excellent; filled aith wonderful people, amazing scenery, the occasional good bite of food (emphasizing occasional) and not the least of all, an interesting and promising start on the project in Kankan.  Guinea is not by any means without its difficulties, and I am looking forward to the next few weeks.

We last left off in Kankan, where I finished up work on our project.  Sow and I brainstormed and came up with a plan that i think will work.  After having taken about 8 million photos, I am ready to get to work.  But for that, I need a computer.  And well, electricity, among other things.  I grew to really love Kankan, and by the end, I was impressing Sow by greeting all of the jovial acquaintances I’d met in the town. 

But, after three weeks, it was time to leave again.  I returned to Labe, this time in a private car, owned by some NGO that a nice lady named Madame Diallo told me about.  It just happened to be going to Labe the very day I had planned to depart.  Score!  It was smoother and about 3 hours shorter, but really, any way you slice it, that journey is just absolutely brutal.  At least we passed all of the military barrages pain-free and arrived in Hafia in a record-breaking 8.5 hours. 

It was a delightful few days back in Fouta, with the likes of my friends Pierre, Youssouf, Moussa, Lamine and Samoura all coming by to say welcome back.  Samoura even brought me a bag of fruit as a welcome home present.  On Christmas Eve, we headed into town, where we stayed with one of Maurice’s second families for the weekend.  We went to the longest church service ever, where, for three hours, we heard about le Divin Enfant, and the choir sang every verse to every song they could thing of, loudly, badly.  But boy, were they feeling it!  The service was kind of like a taxi ride - three times as many people as should have been in the church, most of whom were sleeping, and about 85 degrees.  You can imagine my excitement when I found out we’d be doing the same thing at 8am the next morning.

The second service was pretty much exactly the same thing as the first one, with one highlight: At the Offertory, all of the ladies of the church formed a processional, and did a choreographed shuffle-thing down the aisle to the altar.  They were all carrying a gift, everything from giant jars of Bama Mayonnaise to Nescafe to bananas to candles to oil to kleenex… The gifts were placed on the altar and the ladies’ heads got anointed with something.  I assumed it was some kind of food drive for the impoverished Labe-ites but no.  All for the priest.  Oh, Africa.

For Christmas dinner, we killed Lawrence, the rooster I’d bought at the market.  It was hard to watch (and listen) while Maurice stood on its wings and cut its throat, but it sure tasted good!  He had been making an awful lot of racket in the preceding days, so I wasn’t totally heartbroken to see him go.  Maurice and Angeline (M’s sister) prepared the chicken and I made the mashed potatoes, a dish Maurice assured me that NO African would enjoy or understand. The bowl was licked clean, thankyouverymuch.

We left the next morning for Conakry at 7am.  In complete contrast to my NGO ride, the journey was a comedy (?) of errors, cursed from the start.  First, I lost my phone.  Then, we witnessed an accident resulting in death-of-moto-driver.  After that, our car broke down.  Three times.  Then, the chauffeur broke down in tears.  We were put in another car, which then got a flat tire.  Next, we were drilled and verbally abused by drunken Guinean military personnel.  An 8 hour journey ended up at 17 hours, all of which was spent squeezed between three other people in the back seat of a Toyota Corolla.  Well, except the time we spent outside, pushing the car in the dark, in the middle of bandit-country.

We checked into our overpriced but comfortable hotel WITH A SHOWER AND HOT WATER (after 8pm) and departed the next morning for Ile Room, one of the Ile de Los, off the coast of Conakry.  We found a pirogue (giant canoe) and set out.  It’s a funny place.  It was about as close to a deserted island as I have experienced, with myself and Maurice being (literally) the only tourists.  After we had acted out all the scenes from Lost that we could remember, we spent the  rest of the time lazing about on the beach (alone) or walking on the rocks (alone).  Kind of awesome, kind of not, and by the third day we were ready for some conversation with people who were not each other  . 

We returned to Conakry on the 30th.  I wish I had lots to say about Conakry.  But I just don’t.  There’s absolutely nothing remarkable about this place.  It’s like all other cities in Guinea, but with more power and more people.  I wanted to take photos, but there was nothing that was particularly inspirational.  The Hotel Oceane is a nice retreat, a place we found on the second day back.  $40 a night gets you a cute little room with a door opening onto a pool and the ocean, a bar with reasonable prices and a friendly staff.  It’s in Ratoma and highly recommended by your favorite travel agent.

Three nights in Conakry and one flight later, here I sit in Bamako.  Today we hired motos and drove around to all the sites.  Malians are super-duper-nice, and except for the relentless guides and mosquitoes, they’re not too aggressive, and they’re really honest.  Last night, I bought phone credit and forgot my change, and he actually called after me to give it back.  Wowza.

I find myself looking around at everything in wonderment, nearly tearing up every time I see a working lightbulb or water faucet.  On the flight here, I met Nathalie, a French woman of Ivorian descent who lives in Fort Greene (what? yeah.) and we’ve teamed up to take Mali by storm.  We’ve both been traveling around Africa for some time so are no spring chickens to the craft of the African salesman.  We have been haggling our way to the best prices in Mali and have settled on a plan tomorrow that will bring us to Timbuktu in good time for the festival. 

It’s all for now.  Lord knows what internet in the desert is like, but I’ll try to give an update at some point. 

For now, it’s all love from Bamako, babes.

Mood: Itchin to get moving

Health: Mouth full of ulcers… any ideas? 

(sorry for lack of photos.  cybercafe = suck)

SO.  For now, just  a quick little note to all to say that I’m still alive and well, living it up in Conakry.  Got here safely but not in the least bit comfortably or quickly.   Military is everywhere and they’re scarier (and drunker) than the bandits.  (One soldier at a barrage en route from Labe kept asking me over and over again if I was Guinean, until I realized that he had my passport upside down and backwards and was carefully inspecting my old Chinese Visa.)  Oh, Guinea.

I ate a pizza the other day!  And today I found a can of V8! 

And for lunch… Ice Cream!    I could imagine that if one flew directly into Conakry from the civilized world, that it would come across as a barren wasteland of neglect and garbage, but I can assure you after 6 weeks in the hills, this place feels like Disney World.  

More soon.  PROMISE. 

Mood:  Testy.  (it’s hot here.)

Health:  Clothes too big, need tailor.  Swolen Glands.

Apologies for the lag. While I expected limited internet capabilities, I didn’t expect lack of electricity as well. Oh, and a complete lack of running water and, correspondingly, toilets. It’s a city of 100,000, and only a few buildings have power, and certainly not all of the time.

But let’s back up for just a mo. Last I wrote, I was in Dakar. I finished up my time there and headed to Bamako for a night before the entry into Guinea. Verdant, lush, and colorful, Bamako really blew me away. After two weeks in sandy, brown Dakar, it was a refreshing bit of green for the eyes. I stayed at the lovely Hotel Tamana (highly recommended), and the next morning headed to the taxi rank to find a car to Kankan.

I could probably write a book of essays outlining my thoughts and concerns with the transportation “system” in Guinea. But here is just a brief telling of my first experience with it: Generally speaking, the most common mode of transportation is the shared taxi, or bush taxi. They’re old Peugot 505s, which have been outfitted with a rear bench seat that can accommodate 3 people. In Senegal and Mali, they’re called “sept places” or “seven places”, as they’re meant to take 7 passengers. Fine. In Guinea, the minimum number a taxi will leave with is 9. This means 4 in the middle row and 2 adults sharing the passenger seat. The Bamako – Kankan route is a mere 6 hours, which I spent sitting on the gear shift, basically. So far, I have taken 4 subsequent similar taxi rides, but I’ll get to that later.

It's like this, but with a station wagon.

So here I am in Kankan. It’s dusty. It’s dirty. Locals love to discuss exactly how much dust is floating around on any given day. It’s full of motorcycles and bicycles and it’s easy to get your elbow smashed by some kind of rear view mirror or handlebar or whatever. The roads that are paved are so dilapidated that it would be better if they were just dirt. Architecturally, it’s hard to generalize, as much of Kankan resembles some kind of forgotten ex-Soviet border town – crumbling shells of what must have once been grandiose French-run buildings, half-finished concrete block low-rises, and hundreds of dark storefronts selling everything from batteries to ski pants (seriously) to gigantic jars of mayonnaise. I’m sure Kankan had its heyday… there are street lamps that don’t work. There are restaurants long abandoned, bars with empty coolers. There are fittings in every home for toilets and showers, but no home has running water.

More photos to come, but here’s the first one I took, out of a window:

 I arrived here on the 18th of November, and was here just three days before Maurice whisked me off to Labe. Maurice and Sow are the two gentlemen here in Guinea who are the organizers of AJPAAK, the artisan network I’ve been working with. Maurice is now a computer technology student in Labe, in the Fouta region of Guinea. I was dismayed to learn that Labe is another 11 hours in another taxi from Kankan. I bucked up and made the journey, and I can report that I made it ALMOST the entire way without puking.

Maurice lives in a small village called Hafia, on the southern outskirts of Labe. The village is made up almost solely of university students, which makes for a fun atmosphere all the time. He shares a room with the jovial, cheery Pierre, who kindly vacated so I could inhabit the bottom bunk during my stay. Like Kankan, there is no power, and each morning Maurice goes to the well to fetch the water. All meals are cooked outside on coals, and all homework is done by candlelight. There aren’t any cars in the village, but the village is teeming with animals… cows, sheep, goats, ducks, dogs, cats, chickens. It’s not at all uncommon to find a cow or a goat drinking your freshly poured bathwater if you turn away for a second, and you have to be careful not to step on a bull when you trudge through the fields to the outhouse in the middle of the night. I found it to be really refreshing and peaceful. It’s a lifestyle that is at the same time very complicated and very simple.

Maurice doing homework

Who's surprised that all my friends in Guinea are boys?

I ended up staying in Fouta for 10 days, two of which were spent in Mali-ville, where one can see the famed Dame de Mali, a rock formation which indeed looks incredibly like the profile of a woman. We took a shared taxi there (5 hours, in case you’re interested), stayed at the scariest hotel of all time (for $4), and returned home the next day having taken in the breathtaking views and La Dame herself.

La Dame de Mali

The next day was Tabaski, or the Fete des Moutons(!), a Muslim holiday commemorating the time when Abraham was about to sacrifice his son, but the son was surprisingly replaced by a sheep at the last minute. So, everyone kills and eats a sheep. I think happily of Georgette at a time like this. Everyone wears their bubus (see below) and the colors of the city are just absolutely fantastic. That evening, we celebrated by dancing the night away in one of Labe’s “boites” (clubs). They play a mix of West African and American dance music, the latter generally dominated by Akon, the Senegalese-born mediocre singer made famous by being made fun of on SNL (I’m on a Boat, anyone?). I haven’t even begun to try to explain this to Maurice.

With Samoura and Maurice at Tabaski

After the 10 days in Labe, I headed back to Kankan, solo, to really get down to business on the project. I’m taking tons of photos of wood carvings and djembes and whatnot. Each day I get up around 7, do the washing, take my freezing cold bath and set out for town by bike. Sow managed to find a “velo” for me, and I like it very much indeed. It’s purple. Everything a girl could hope for. All the children scream at me on my way into town and they all think it’s funny that I often ride with no hands. (“Regardez, Maman! Pas des mains!”)

I usually head to the American Reading Room at the University of Kankan, where on M, W, F, I have French lessons and T and H I am here to help the students with their English courses, or to do work of my own. The amusing Mr. Diallo runs the center has asked me to give a presentation to his students, though I have yet to fully understand what he wants me to talk about. There’s no shortage of work to be done here. Everyone’s got some kind of project they want help with, and it’s difficult to say no!

I work when I can, which is difficult when electricity is sporadic or not available, and internet is excruciatingly slow, but I’m making some headway. After all the currents are cut, I head back over to Sow’s and we look for dinner. We go to the same restaurant almost every day, where a nice man with a large head makes spaghetti, potato salad and potatoes and liver. We tend to rotate. Generally, I spend about $1.25 on dinner each night, or $2 if I have a Fanta.

The Tailor Sow

On the off days, I hang out with Sow or Bruno, Maurice’s friend from way-back. He’s a super nice fellow. We generally ride bikes. I’m trying to convince them to let me make a picnic. But neither of them have any idea what a picnic is or why on earth we’d want to take our lunch to the river to eat it. I found a store that sells canned tuna fish, and I’m going to make tuna salad for all.

The plan at the moment is to work here until the 19th, when I’ll return (another 11 hours) to Labe to spend Christmas with Maurice and friends. After Christmas, we’re going to head to Conakry for New Years, where we’ll then take a boat to Ile Room, a small island, removed from danger and all possible pending warring factions in Conakry itself.

Oh, that.

Well, as I’ve said before, T.I.A. In Africa, you just never know what might happen, and last week, the some-what (but not-really-super-) unexpected occurred. The president was shot in the back of the head by his own bodyguard, and some other henchmen were hacked to death with Machetes. The would-be assassin has yet to be found and arrested, and the president is currently in Morocco, though reports of his medical status are mixed and unclear. Some say he’s fine, some says he’s death-bed-ish. We have discussed it and if things don’t change between now and New Years, we’ll go to Conakry (Ile Room). If the president kicks it, well, Lord knows what will happen, as there are a lot of other folks in the country would certainly love to “seize” the power. So if that happens, we may just get the rock out of here and flee to Bamako. I’m not entirely sure, but I think that would make me an evacuee and Maurice a refugee. Fun!  (you can find info on the BBC.)

So, that’s the skinny. You’ve now lived the last 4 weeks in the life of Amanda. I’ve got lots more to say, but I’ll save it for another day. I’m missing everyone much, but getting along very fine here.

SIDEBAR (©AJL): Some white lady named Glenda just came into the Library and invited me to have pizza and watch a movie at her house tomorrow night. Woot!

Mood: Content
Health: Infections: 2,   Doctor Visits: 1,   Prescriptions: 2,    Beers drunk in last month: 5,     Sunburn: Endless,     Fingernails and Toenails growing at alarming rates.     Buttoned blue jeans for first time in 5 months.