Category Archives: Africa

Arrival in Dakar, Senegal

Posted on by
Reply

November 3, 2007, Hotel Océanic, Dakar, Senegal

Je suis arrivé à  Dakar! The flights here were long, but mostly smooth. I only had to sing my fear-of-flying song on take-offs, landings, and one period of turbulence. South African Airways has reasonably good vegetarian food and good on-flight entertainment. I watched two movies: Opal Passion, the touching story of an Australian girl with imaginary friends, and another film whose title I’ve forgotten about Nelson Mandela, told through the eyes of his white prison guard as his attitude toward Mandela and the freedom movement evolves over time.

Dakar airport arrival was relatively painless and practically on time at around 5:40am local time (Greenwich mean time). Descending the portable stairs wheeled up to the airplane, we walked to a bus that took us to the main terminal for baggage. In the bus, I chatted in French, the lingua franca around here, with a friendly guy about what I thought were the Dakar airport closures. He exclaimed with surprise: “Dakar airport will also close?” I asked what he meant and he clarified that it was Bamako airport that would be closed for renovations through November 7. So, that solved the mystery. I thanked him for helping me to figure out that it was Bamako airport, not Dakar, that is closed.

In the airport, I purchased the flight from Dakar to Bamako for November 8 at the outrageous price of nearly US$500. That brought my total airfare for this second African research trip up to around US$5000. The Air Senegal ticket price was quoted in the currency called Communauté Financière Africaine (CFA) of which there are two varieties. The variety used in Senegal is also known as XOF I think and is also sometimes named after the Banque Centrale des États de l’Afrique de l’Ouest (BCEAO) which issues the currency for a group of west African countries. Since the airline ticket sales agent told me the equivalent of the fare in US dollars at a rate of CFA450 per dollar, I decided to change money at that rate with the fellow standing outside the closed bank in the airport. He initially had offered me CFA435 per dollar based on the rate sign he pointed at in the closed bank. I’m still not sure if I got a good deal, but at least it was a better deal.

Almost everything here seems somewhat negotiable. Speaking of which, I somewhat foolishly also agreed to avail myself of the taxi service from a fellow who was hanging around the airport, rather than going directly outside to where the taxi queue was. I told him I already knew the rate should be CFA3500 to the hotel. Alcohol on his breath–an excellent advertisement for a taxi service–he discussed and discussed and pointed out every possible way I should pay him and the person who turned out to be the actual taxi driver more, including the tricks of pretending not to know I wanted the hotel at the center of the city rather than one near the airport, stopping at the gas station to get me to pay for gas before arriving at the destination, offering to by my guide for anywhere and everywhere I might want to go, and demanding a commission in addition to the fare from both myself and the hotel receptionist when we finally arrived safely at the hotel. I simply told him three times we had agreed on a price and that was that. The receptionist rolled his eyes as if he’d seen the same theater a thousand times. The guy finally left when no one paid any more attention. After he left, the receptionist told me that all the unofficial taxi guys are crooks and I was lucky to arrive without them robbing me.

Because the room wasn’t ready at the ungodly hour when I arrived, I waited in the pleasant garden café of the establishment. I profited from the time by setting up my backups onto the tiny USB disks I brought along as I had on the last African trip. It’s such a comfort to know that even if the laptop gets stolen (goddess forbid!), I’ll still have the crucial writing and travel data with me. I just have to remember to back stuff every time I change anything. The woman working the cafe asked me if I wanted breakfast. Because of something the receptionist had said earlier, I wasn’t sure if I qualified, but she assured me it would be no problem for CFA2000 (about US$4.50). The hot chocolate was excellent but the croissant was too crusty. I was exhausted. The receptionist from the next shift was there and told me that they didn’t have any more single rooms, but I could have a four-person room for CFA35800 instead of the CFA21800 I had planned to pay. I said that wouldn’t be possible. She said since I’m planning to stay until November 8, she could offer me the four-person room at the double-room rate of CFA25,800, until a single room opens up. I agreed, not wanting to schlep my stuff to another place and deal with another taxi ride.

I went for a walk over to the nearby office of Orange, the cell provider here in Senegal that includes international calling, so I could activate the cell phone I purchased when last in Cairo. Unfortunately, the office had closed at noon, so I won’t have a working phone until Monday morning. Walking back to the hotel, I noticed some activity around the Marché Kermel near the hotel. I browsed some of the local crafts and jewelry to the almost continuous bonjour‘s of the sellers, then went in to the market proper where I saw some good fruit. I purchased a kilo each of local oranges and nearly local bananas at the no doubt outrageous unbargained price of CFA1200, but I passed on the expensive imported apples and oranges, thus avoiding mixing apples and oranges. 😉 The transaction involved a fair amount of discussion with two of the guys working the staff, with a gentleman I expect was the true proprietor waiting behind the stall in the background. We had the usual “where are you from?”, name, and profession, with a little bit of the stuff about the hot Senegalese women thrown in for good measure. Practically every guy I talk with has refered to their womenfolk as “gazelles” and “nana” and who knows what else, along with hand gestures symbolizing which part of my anatomy is supposed to go goddess knows where. I haven’t let on to anyone so far that I’m more interested romantically and sexually in guys than women.

Returning to the hotel, I realized I had indeed forgotten to pack something, just as I had predicted when packing at home. Luckily, the item isn’t a total necessity: it’s the wonderfully simple blue plastic orange squeezer that would come in handy for the oranges I purchased at the market.

Tonight, I plan to check out a restaurant with typical Senegalese food. Tomorrow, I plan to visit Isle de Gorée with its infamous Maison des Esclaves.

Escaping the USA…

Posted on by
Reply

November 2, 2007, Flight from SFO to JFK

I finally have a moment to sit and just write. What a wonderful feeling!

The travel has its own set of anxieties. I’m in a race of physical progress across the continent versus my ability to reserve flights, find accommodation, and obtain visas, all of which is a constantly shifting scenario that regularly confounds me.

The latest incident: I confirmed my intercontinental flight to Dakar multiple times, but apparently the airport may be closing in Dakar, hopefully not until after I land there. Instead of finding out from United or South African Airlines, the transcontinental and intercontinental airlines I chose for these segments, I discovered this problem while on the phone trying to keep a reservation to fly out of Dakar on Air Senegal. Getting on the phone with Air Senegal is an amazing trick. They are open either late at night or early in the morning during the Pacific time we have at my home in San Francisco. When I call out of business hours, the line is simply busy. When I call during business hours, their phone answers with a recording and accompanying ditty in French about the wonders of Air Senegal, not many of which I can pretend to have experienced. About once out of every twenty calls, the Air Senegal operator comes on the line before the phone system arbitrarily hangs up on me leaving a long quiet static followed by a loud and insistent beeping, to which I hang up and try again. When I do get through on the phone, the first minute is a panicked negotiation to ensure that we are actually on the phone and speaking with each other. I’ve lubricated my rusty French through repeated forays into air reservation territory. The surprise at 2am this morning was that the flight I wanted from Dakar to Bamako on November 6th was canceled, well they didn’t exactly say it was canceled, just that the Dakar airport would be closed. How about the 7th? Flight full. Well, actually no, airport still closed. And the 5th? Nope, closed. And the 8th? Yes, we will switch your reservation to October 8. And who knows? O, and by the way, you can’t pay for the reservation over the phone. By credit card? No, you must pay in person at an Air Senegal office. Is there one at the airport in Dakar? Yes. Will it be open when my flight is scheduled to arrive early in the morning? Yes, it’s open 24 hours. All this in French with a good dose of static in the background, plus a distracting echo at least on my end of the line. Perhaps I will still have a reservation when I get to the Air Senegal office at Dakar airport, that is, if the airport is still open so we can fly there. The Air Senegal jingle still rattles around in my head.

My itinerary is tight-packed, so an extra two days in Dakar, while potentially productive and fun, will wreak havoc on the schedule further down the line. I may have to cut back on early Ghana aka Wagadu empire sites in Mauritania for example.

All in all, I tell myself I am doing well. I only broke down once so far to bring in a travel agency: Air Treks, who specialize in multi-destination world travel. And that only when I couldn’t get Air Senegal to issue me a ticket for one set of flights or even to make a reservation for another set of flights. O yes, the only place I want to fly where a single non-stop flight is available is from Dakar to Bamako. All the rest are multiple segments to get from one place to another, even if the crow’s eye distance is shorter than the route from Dakar to Bamako. And of course those multi-segment flights can only combine when airlines have fare rules permitting one to book them that way. And the fares on some of these shorter flights are quite high. Why fly? I simply can’t cover the distance in the amount I have alloted for this travel without resorting to many flights. Even as is, I will be traveling overland a lot, sometimes under difficult conditions probably similar to what I experienced between Ethiopia and Sudan or in the middle of the Sudanese desert.

Now, off to write some historical fiction. Think positive: the next blog entry will come from west african soil!

Almost in Cairo

Posted on by
Reply

With just over one week scheduled for my trip, I’m in El Minya. Since I last wrote on the blog, I’ve seen most of Luxor, gotten sick again and recovered, and traveled to Dendara, Abydos, Tuna El-Gebel, Beni Hassan, and Hermopolis. This evening I had a wonderful time talking with people sitting in the square in the middle of town. I’ve got a train ticket for Cairo for tomorrow afternoon. Although the trip is wonderful, exciting, and productive, I’m very much looking forward to reaching home and seeing all my peeps soon!

Luxor Time

Posted on by
Reply

I made it to Luxor after a wonderfully relaxing two-day cruise from Aswan. We stopped along the way to see the temples at Kom Ombo and Edfu. In Aswan, I saw Philae, Elephantine, and other great sites. Luxor is jam-packed with sites, so I’ll be very busy here for at least a few days.

I met a really nice guy named Ahmed who came along on the cruise. Even though we registered as “friends” with the Aswan tourist police, we had to pay for two cabins on the ship because foreigners and Egyptians aren’t allowed to share the same accommodations in hotels, etc.

Radio Silence

Posted on by
Reply

I apologize for the “radio silence” since Khartoum, but I haven’t seen an Internet cafe since I left there headed north along the Nile for Egypt. I’m hale and hearty, except for a small cough probably due to all the dust in Sudan. All is well with my adventures. Since Khartoum, I took a bus past Shendi to explore the old Meroë pyramid cemeteries and ancient city by camel! near Barijawaya. On the next bus, I accepted an invitation from a fellow passenger to visit his home village near where Sudan’s President Bashir’s home is located. Escaping there from a near Islamic conversion experience, my friend drove me to a half-dozen hotels in Atbara — all of them full that evening. So, he put me up with his uncle in nearby Ed Damer and we visited more of his family the next day. The bus from Atbara went on a ferry across the Nile and through irrigated fields and the Bayuda Desert. I arrived in Merowe (not the same as Meroë) and explored the Nuri cemetery pyramids, including that of the great Kushite Pharaoh Taharqa and his great-grandson Aspelta. The next day, I crossed the Nile again by ferry to Karima where I stayed at a beautiful and expensive Nubian Guest House. Walking from the hotel that evening, I visited the Temple of Amun and the Temple of Mut at Jebel Barkal, the sacred mountain, which I climbed to see the scenery and the sunset. Near Jebel Barkal at El Kurru, the tombs of Tanwetamun and his mother Qalhata were very impressive and, although not much remains of Piankhy’s tomb, I enjoyed being there among the 25th dynasty characters for my novel. Next came a crazy ride on the back of a bokasi truck during haboob-like dusty desert winds of at least 60 mph. Near Dongola on the banks of the Nile, I saw the ancient city of Kawa. A donkey cart ride brought me to the large mud Deffufa structure and its surrounding ancient village at Kerma. With a stop at the village of Wawa for a walk over to the Nile and a passenger ferry to the temple at Soleb, I spent the night for free in a traditional Nubian home, then by bokasi the next morning to Abri and right onto a bus to Wadi Halfa in time to buy a ticket for the ferry to Aswan, Egypt, which leaves only once a week on Wednesdays. After a 16-hour ferry ride past Abu Simbel, I’m in Aswan, Egypt, with what appears to be a hi-bandwidth Internet location. 🙂

In other good news, I finished the first full draft of the first part of my novel, although I have to fill in a couple of items after further research and writing. I hope you are all well. I’d love to read news from you by email. If it takes me some time to reply, don’t worry — I’m catching up with thousands of emails from when I had no Internet access.

Sufi Dancing in Omdurman

Posted on by
Reply

Phil was kind enough to reserve a minibus so a group of us could go experience the weekly Sufi dancing ritual on the late afternoon and early evening of March 23 in Omdurman, just across the Nile from Khartoum. We stopped by the teachers’ apartments and picked up Brad, Rene, Colin, and Colin’s mother who had just arrived that morning from the States. Across the street from the teachers’ apartments is a building under construction where some poor people have staked out a home of their own until the construction is complete.

We met the minibus at the Khartoum American School.

The minibus brought our group to Omdurman where we spotted the two buildings enclosing tombs of famous Sufi teachers. A Muslim cemetery surrounded the two buildings.

I went inside the tombs, after removing my shoes, to check them out. The caskets looked large and specially made clothes covered the caskets. People inside touched the tomb in prayer and/or mumbled prayers while sitting or walking around the tomb.

Before the Sufi dancing got going, we experienced many preliminaries. A guy preached about the name of Mohammed, a man was selling whips, and two others played drums along with lovely chanting. Sometimes, people would approach the drummers and dance a bit with them. Some guys sat on top of the tomb structures. Many of the Sufi dancers dress in green and red robes. A procession approached with green and red flags at one point entering the tomb complex, then departing. Gradually, a large circle of participants forms around a central pole where they hang green and red flags.

As the drumming and chanting of Islamic prayers gets more intense, the inner circle of mostly men start bobbing and bowing. Newcomers greet each other with handshakes or embraces, which become blessings. One elder Sufi, adorned in beads, embraces me, perhaps recognizing a kindred spirit from afar. Some enter the circle to shuffle forward and back in a counterclockwise direction. Some carry traditional sticks, whips, or other fetishes, which are used only symbolically in the dancing. The combination of chanting, drumming, and bowing becomes meditative, even engendering trance states. Occasional passionate dancers start twirling in the dervish fashion.

We got very thirsty went to buy juice and soft drinks after the Sufi dancing.

International Charity Fair, Akropole Hotel, and Cemeteries in Khartoum

Posted on by
Reply

Phil and some of the teachers from the Khartoum American School went to an international charity fair in Khartoum on March 23. I joined them.

After the fair, Phil and I stopped by the Akropole Hotel, some years ago the site of a terrorist attack in Khartoum. The staff helped us to understand that not many people are traveling north as it is the end of the archaeological season because it is getting quite hot now. Instead, most of the people staying at the hotel are now journalists covering the Darfur situation.

Next, Phil and I visited a Christian cemetery and a war memorial cemetery. Around here, Christians are buried in separate cemeteries from Muslims. Most of the Christian men died in their early to mid-forties, my age. Most of the soldiers died in their twenties, victims of the conflicts with Italy in the late nineteenth century, then around World War II.

Next, we went to some fruit and vegetable stands and on to rest at Phil’s place.

Sudan Reprise: Arriving in Khartoum

Posted on by
Reply

When Phil arrived at the mosque near the bus station to pick me up, he took one look at me, heard me say I was sick, and we went directly to a medical clinic near his home.

Thanks to Phil for basically saving my life! They looked me over and said they wanted to keep me overnight for observation. I was a bit scared, but Phil was reassuring. The doctor kept returning to whether I had been drinking. Phil says that when he took my blood pressure, he did it on both arms because he wanted to check for tracks on my arms. He probably thought I was an alcoholic or other kind of drug addict, and he prescribed a shot of B vitamins. Was I scared to be admitted to a hospital in Khartoum? Hell, yes! But honestly, the hospital was clean and they used sterile needles. Phil stayed with me until after they did a blood draw and got me situated in my bed. They did have trouble poking me for a shunt for the IV, probably because I was so dehydrated. Shortly thereafter, they started a dextrose IV, which helped immensely by rehydrating me. By late morning on March 15, we received the test results from my stool sample which indicated I had gastroenteritis. This was actually good news! I now knew that I needed to take a round of Cipro antibiotics. So, when Phil came back to the hospital, we checked me out. I paid nearly US$500 for the hospital stay. We went to Phil’s place, which to me was heavenly. I didn’t have to worry about contaminated food or water. He even has airconditioning and safe ice cubes!Here’s a picture from outside Phil’s apartment, a typical city scene, and some of the many water jugs that provide free water to anyone stopping by around Khartoum.

Khartoum boasts some modern buildings along with poverty-striken urban sprawl, mostly from the tens or hundreds of thousands of refugees from the wars in the south and now from the Darfur conflict. Sudan runs primarily under Sharia law, although apparently part of the agreement forged out of peace with the south involves separate justice systems for those who are not under Sharia law. The area by the banks of the Blue Nile, the White Nile, and their confluence in Khartoum, have rich soil and green plants.

Here is a fancy new egg-shaped hotel, the famous confluence of the Blue Nile from Ethiopia with the White Nile coming from southern Sudan, and the Sudan Parliament building on the Omdurman banks of the Nile.

An old mosque in Khartoum and some great views from the Palace Hotel.

Interesting paintings on a Coptic church, including one of St. George slaying the dragon (also very popular in Ethiopia), plus bridges on the Nile.

I’ve been relaxing and recovering at Phil’s place in Khartoum until now, March 23. I now feel like a human being again. On March 26, I’m planning to head north in Sudan along the Nile, then to Egypt.

Crossing the Ethiopia-Sudan Border

Posted on by
Reply

On March 13, I took the bus from Gonder to Mettama at the Ethiopia-Sudan border. The bus was bumpy, but mostly not as bad as the bus between Gonder and Debark. The terrain on that route was arid and mountainous. As we approached the border, the temperature soared.

I crossed the border with the help of two guys who carted my baggage in wheelbarrows for 1 birr (about 12 cents) each. Before we even crossed the border, two Sudanese guys were bugging me about changing money and stuff. I changed my remaining 50-birr note into Sudanese pounds (or dinars, they are still using both for a few more months until the pounds get fully established). I had to visit an immigration office and a customs office on the Ethiopian side to get my passport stamped. I tried to get a soft drink and use the bathroom while in the immigration office, but the guy working there was not very helpful. Eventually, I figured it all out. I headed across the bridge between Ethiopia and Sudan which most people passed without any border crossing formalities at all. When I arrived on the other side, I had to visit the immigration office, customs office, and a security office, all of which ogled my passport and eventually gave it back. Two out of three offices required a photo to process me through. They did let me postpone my Sudanese registration until I reached Khartoum (three-day time limit for doing so).

By this time, I was pretty much deathly ill. I couldn’t walk with my luggage, so I had to take a little taxi from the customs office to the security office. I then took the taxi across the street to the bus station and argued with the driver about the fare which had been agreed upon at the customs office. He eventually let me go after I threatened for us to ride back to the customs office telling me, “Time is money.” Then, I argued with the guys on the bus to Gedaref about how much that would cost. It was supposed to be US$5. After much haggling, I ended up paying US$10. Once in Gedaref, I knew I could stay in a nice airconditioned hotel, then take an airconditioned bus the rest of the way to Khartoum.

A security post on the route stopped the bus and we all had to get off and get our stuff searched. No problems and we moved on. About 20 minutes into the ride, the bus died. We had to wait in the broiling hot sun for another bus to arrive.

Meanwhile, I was dying. I mean actual near-death experience. I told the other guys on the bus that if I passed out they should pour water on me to revive me. Eventually, the replacement bus came. We all packed in to the new bus and I had to practically force the guys to move my baggage over from the old bus.

While I was moaning and groaning on the remainder of the bus ride, I noticed a young woman seated just behind me. She gave me the most wonderful smile. She was beautiful. I felt better just from that simple connection. I didn’t really chat with her until she had her sister say hello and practice speaking English with me. Later, I got off the bus for a male-only pee break (all the Sudanese guys pissing kneeling on the ground and only me standing up). When I returned, the young woman looked upset, as if her brother on the seat behind her had chewed her out perhaps for talking with me.

Later in the bus ride, I fortunately met an attorney who is a member of a political party that likes the U.S. That meant that he was pleased to help me make a phone call on his mobile phone. I called my friend Phil about 20 minutes before arriving at the “Landport” bus station in Khartoum. Phil figured out where the place was and picked me up in front of a strange-looking mosque near the station. I had to crawl there with my two bags.