A shitty start

Yesterday I met Julien again, I knew him from when I went for a visa at the Mali embassy, when I had just arrived in Dakar. Together we went to an expensive hotel to sit on the terrace at the shore. We both bought an expensive coke to be allowed to sit there. Afterwards we went together with Alioune, a local guy, to Ile de Ngor. On the island I met an Iranian woman and I asked her about the situation in her country. She advised me not to go as there still was a lot of aggression to white people. She could not provide me with an address to stay and to use to invite me to the country as she and all her family would be out the country in a few months. In the evening we ate at street at one of the many little stalls and afterwards I returned to the centre.

At the place I walk propably 10 times a day, two guys tried to rob me. At first they tried to sell me something, no idea what it was. When I said I was not interested one guy grabbed my right leg and hung onto it. The other one tried to grab my wallet from my front pocket of my pants. While I kept my left hand on my pocket I hit the guy on my leg with my right hand, yelling that they should get lost. After a few seconds, they saw that they were not succeeding and gave up their attempt. A bit shocked I followed my way to cybercafe. A now have removed my last bankcard from my wallet and put it also in my moneybelt, that is concealed in my pants. If they will ever steal my wallet, they will only have a small amount of cash, that is maximum the amount I usually spend in a day.

The next day I woke up with a light pain in my stomach and a strong urge to go to the toilet. Just when I put my feet on the floor I shit in my paints. One moment I considered running for the toilet down the hall to offload the reste of my waste, but I knew that then all would and up in my underpants. I have a sort of urinoir in my room and made a dash for it. Just in time I arrived to drop the rest of my waste products. With the immediate urges out of the way, I cleaned my underpants in the sink, hoping that all I left in the urinoir, would flush away from it self. Unfortunately that was not the case. As I had not the intention to stir my shit with my finger, I searched for something that would do the job. The only thing I could find was my bic pen and it worked marvelous. It took ten minutes before all was gone, but by then you could not see anything of the accident anymore. I will not be using the pen anymore, but it was a shitty pen anyway.

After two visits to the toilet, my bowels felt they had done enough and I left for my daily visit of the train station. Ofcourse I went first for a banana at the market, where they now know me as monsieur banana. At the station I was positively surprised, because they were able to tell me the train would most definitely leave tomorrow at 13:50. This seemed a bit exact as they previously were not even able to tell what day it would leave. Added to that I was allowed to buy a ticket for the train. I choose first class, but without bed. I hope now that the train really goes and it was all worth while. Time will tell.

Maybe Tuesday

Latest information about when the train will run is Monday, but it also might depart on Tuesday. I wonder how the local people know when to go to the station to take the train? May be it is written in the papers or in the news, all I know I go at least once a day to the station until it is Tuesday, if by then the train does not leave I will take the bus, the bus is faster anyway.

In the mean time I have started to try to do some programming for my cycling game on paidiagames.com. This is not very easy as I have to write everything on paper and have no way to test. I hope I can use it later on. It is a pity the only books I can buy here are in French, else I would buy some on programming. Now that is of no use as I am bad in programming and even worse in French. I have started buying Senegalese papers to search for train departures and practise my French, though. The paper only consists of 8 pages tabloid format, but still there was a piece on Marco van Basten, it seemed to have something to do with when to publish the final selection for the world championship football.
I had to write a piece for the Toeter, the lifestyle magazine of football club Ariston. I found it to hard to refuse as I had not much to do, but I hope Rob does not ask me again. Which is very likely as I was not very happy with the quality of my attempt.

No train today

ARGG, I now have been waiting for a week in Dakar for the train, does it seem it will not run tomorrow. Nobody really seems to know, but the most heard story so far is that the train is derailed. It might be that it will arrive today, but it will definitely not leave tomorrow, they tell me. As most people have other interests as well, like family with a bus company I still have a little hope. I will return to the station a few times today, luckily it is not far from the centre and my hotel. I now have to consider going by bus as it possibly might take 2 weeks before the next train (is the same train, they only have one) goes. I will keep you posted.

Waiting for the train

All days look the same here and much is not happening, but still I will try to write a short piece for you. I found out on Monday that the train to Bamako only goes once a week, on Saturday, if it goes at all. I decided to wait and that is what I am doing. My days start with waking late, paying for another night at the hotel and walk to the market to buy a banana. I now have bought so many times one banana with the same guy that I not even have to ask for it, he just hands me the banana and I hand him the 100 CFA. This reminds me of my lunching routine at ABN when I went to Arie van der Raa for sandwiches. After my banana I try to think of something to do for the day. I have visited Ile de Gorree 3 times, whichs happens to have Dutch ties. The name comes from Goede Reede and in the harbour lies a (very) small boat donated by the Dutch embassy. It is not very strange then that I feel very at home at the small Island. It is very quiet -no cars- and a little bit less hot than the mainland. Marcel a promising young Dutch writer, according to his publisher Bezige Bij at least, rents a room up there. With him I visited some of Dakars bars or clubs. He also lend me a book and his Lonely Planet of West Africa. It is nice for a change to speak Dutch and to enjoy some of the nightlife, although I have nothing exiting to tell about.

I also have visited an Island in the north Ile de Ngor. On this Island I was invited by locals to join them in eating their just caught fish. The fish were prepared in a little restaurant at the beach and we ate with our right hand. Although I never used to like fish, I am really starting to enjoy it. After that we drank a cup of Senegalese tea, strong but nice. Earlier at the beach one of the kids/young guys tried to sell me slippers. I refused to buy anything with my standard reason that I do not have space in my backpack. We chatted a bit afterwards and he came back to me every time he had tried to sell slippers to newly arrived guests on the island. He asked me if I was married, I denied, but told him I would search for a wife after my trip. I promised him if I met a Dutch girl I did not want for myself, but was blond, rich, not taller than 1.75m, I would recommend him as a very good husband. This must have impressed him, because when I wanted to take the bus into the centre he handed me a little money. First time it happened to me in Africa someone gave me money instead of asking for it. So ladies take your chance if you qualify, the young guy s name is Ousmane, he is almost 19 and his email is Ousmane_@yahoo.fr. He is the nice lad in the picture.

Tomorrow, Friday, I am going to try to get my train ticket. Do some shopping for the train trip, it is scheduled for 2 days, but easily can take longer. Also have to by some good anti mosquito stuff. The one I have now does not impress me and what is worse it does not impress the mosquitos either. Do not know yet what I am going to do about the malaria risk yet.

It is a pitty that there is no embassy of Niger or Chad up here. I had plenty of time to get a visa. Entering Niger might be a hassle as there is no embassy of Niger in Mali either, well I will see how it goes. I think I am going to visit Abdul, he sits at the corner of the street of my hotel and sells delicious baguettes with meat, vegetables, spagetti and hot sauce. May be not healthy, but very tasty, sorry mam, I will make up for it tomorrow.

Going south again

Although the first night I slept in a bed, I decided to change that again as I found the room to expensive and to smelly as a bathroom was included. This was one reason for the high price propably. There also supposed to be a warm shower, but I did not find any remotely warm water in the morning. They let me sleep on the roof terrace in the tent. Which I guess was in any way much better. Next night I did not sleep much better as I was too lazy to swap to another couch as the one I was lying on was tilted. What did not help either is that it stormed.

Also in Ifni is not much happening, although I met here a nice French girl, who spoke English and a very nice German guy, with who I drank some wine and beer. He brought it from Spain, when all what he had brought was gone, we tried our luck at the 2 bars of Ifni, but at 12 they al ready were closed. I managed to buy a bottle of wine though, which we emptied in my room. With the German, Kai, I went on a short tour through the surrounding hills, with his 4x4. On one of the hills I was attacked by a dog, it did not manage to really bite me, but still it left an impression and it hurt too.

Kai had plans to repair his car in Ifni, but it turned out, he did not like the price they asked for two new doors, so he decided, after consulting with me, to leave as soon as possible to the south. We had decided earlier that I would join him until Dakar. So we left March-6, midday and headed south, for a trip of about 2000k through the desert. At 2:30 at night we stopped for a sleep at the beach near Dakhla. Kai slept in the car, I next to it in the sand. Around 12 we left Dakhla, after some coffee, the purchase of food and the attachment of the 2 number plates to the car at a mechanic shop. Until now the plates had been taped behind the windows, but the police always was clueles about their whereabouts and were always stopping us because of this and because of the strange shape of the car of course.

Leaving Morocco was not that difficult, nor entering Mauritania, it was getting from one country to the other that caused some problems. There was a strip of no-one’s land with no roads only sand and rocks. Although we had a 4x4 car we got stuck in the deep sand. We had to move the sand to get the car driving again. With the help of a local we managed to find the border post of the Mauritanians. At night we arrived in Nouakchott and we slept in a tent at an auberge, which was quite nice, because the wind could cool us a bit. During the day it had been about 45 degrees Celcius in our non air-conned car.

In the morning we had breakfast at the auberge and after that we left for the border to Senegal. Kai had the idea not to cross the border at Rosso, which looked like the logical place to cross, but more to the west, where we could use the bridge instead of the ferry. According to Kai there was a lot of hassle in Rosso. It must have been really bad in Rosso, because the place where we tried to cross, they tried to squeeze money out of us at every occasion they could think of. We had to cross a national park, pay; cross a town, pay; pass the customs at the Mauritanian side, pay; pass the police post at the Mauritanian side, pay; cross the bridge, pay; pass the police at the Senegalese side, pay; pass the customs at the Senegalese side, pay. We also had to buy insurance for the car in Senegal. Because our tactic for not paying/lowering the amount was just walking out of them and wait till they came back to us, it took a rather long time before we were on the move again, but the tactic was pretty effective.

We arrived in Dakar at night. The first hotel was very expensive, the second I found was half its price and with much less comfort. I decided to go for the low price. In the price included was the easy access to hookers, as the hotel is used as a brothel. It did not bother me though. All the women were very friendly anyway. It was a shame I had to part from Kai, as I really liked to travel with him, but he had to go further south and I thought the train trip to Bamako would be really cool.

I wanted to go by train from Dakar to Bamako by train as soon as possible. Because I thought Dakar not that appealing partly because of the high prices. At the train station I heard that the next train would leave on Saturday, 2 days away. The only thing I needed was proof of vaccination against the yellow fever if I were to use the train to enter Mali. I knew I was vaccinated, however did not bring my vaccination booklet. The guys at the station knew a guy in town who would be able to provide me with such a document, for proper reward of course. I was brought there and in 5 minutes I was vaccinated against yellow fever and cholera at least on paper. It only cost 2500 CFA’s, so that was not bad at all. Now hope it works. Of course I also needed a Mali visa, unfortunately the embassy was already close when I arrived on Thursday. On Friday I was in time, but then they told me the visa would only be finished on Monday. I could not speed up the process in any way. So now I am going to take the Tuesday train.

A day at the beach

My appearance must be very gay as I am often asked to act in that direction. Also in dignity I was invited to some sexual activity with a person of my sexe. At first I did not really understand what he was talking about. He spoke French and my knowledge of the language is "petit". When he made an effort to touch my dick and made some moves of what he liked to do with it, I grasped what he was talking of. I declined his generous offer and was happy I was close to my hotel. Earlier I was followed by a guy who wanted to arrange a marriage for me with a girl who needed it to get into fort Europe. He offered 4000 Euros. Also this offer I declined, but if anybody (boy or girl) is interested, let me know and I will set you up with this dude.

When I arrived at Mirleft by grand taxi, sharing the front passenger seat, I was a bit disappointed. I had expected a town at the beach but a beach could not be found. After walking half an hour to the sea I saw little pieces of sand between the rocks. This were not the beaches I was aiming for. After another half an hour I stumbled into something that resembled my view of a beach. It was not very crowded, which is fine, but I was hoping to meet people, only an elder Belgian couple was present with a camper. I headed back to town to have a late lunch. I also investigated how much a room would cost in a hotel. I thought this to be too expensive and decided to sleep on the beach. After buying some food and water I returned to the beach. A few kids now were playing football and invited me to join. They were technically skilled enough, but did not know much about tactics. Had a good time though, but after 2 hours, when most had left, I decided to quit. By now a bunch of Germans arrived with 4 campers and I invited myself to there little carnavals party even had some beer, which tasted good, but mainly because I did not have any for a month. At 11 party was over and I went to my sleeping place which turned out to be 10m, on the beach. Ofcourse I had not prepared anything, so I dropped at the first spot I did not feel, it was rather dark, too many rocks, although the little flashlight Iljoesja gave me just before I left Delft was very usefull. It took some time before I fell asleep, but was wakened rudely by rain at about 2. I gathered all my stuff around me and hid underneath my big raincape. This worked very well, but did not allow me to sleep. After an hour or so I took all up and walked to a nearby cave, where a Moroccan permanently lived. When I arrived I found out there were 2 caves and I took the one he was not in.

I was awaken by a German to invite me for a hot drink, which I accepted of course. Rest of the day I did not do much but reading and talking with other people on the beach.Although the sky still was not cloudless I tried another night at the beach, again the rain woke me up. Again I put all my stuff under the cape, now I had prepared for it so it went much faster than the night before. After only half an hour it was dry and I could go back to sleep. Later I was woken, again by water, this time the one already on the ground, the tide was coming in. Although at first still not to close, soon one wave came to about 10 cm of my feet. Time to climb a little higher. Unfortunately the surface was very rocky and I could not catch any sleep. So when the sea returned the land to me I went back to my old spot, which had not been flooded anyway, so was still dry (it had been for a large part under my cape, when it rained). It turned out that I was lucky that I had not slept in the cave, because this one was badly flooded.

In the morning the germans left and so did I. In Mirleft I met an Englishman, Dominic, giving me loads of advice about traveling in Africa and Asia, he also told me about a great spot about 9k south. When I arrived, the 2 people he described who would be there, were. I shared some of my bread, water and oranges with them and they gave me some hot tea. I could sleep in a room of a deserted house. To Hassan who spoke English, I gave one of my English books, because I no longer wanted to carry it and I had heard from Dominic he was reading English. In the evening not much to do but read by the candle light, from the candles I just bought. Good nights sleep, without worries about rain or tide. Only that the floor was rather hard.

For breakfast I was invited by another fisherman in his cave. I had tea and bread with oil which was quite nice. I put in my last orange. Before returning to Mirleft had a long walk south on the coastal rocks.

In Mirleft I ran into Dominic for the second time while I was drinking the very sweat Moroccan mint tea. Dominic had finished reading his book and I still had one to spare so we traded. For the moment he convinced me to going south into Mauritania and Mali, but I might change my mind as I have done so often on this subject lately. I made one litle effort in this direction I took the bus to Sidi Ifni, where I indulged myself by allowing me to sleep in a bed this time. I think I will stay here for a while, although there is not much to do or see, that actually suites me just fine right now.