Written November 15, 2007, Bus station in Timbedra, Mauritania
This morning, I woke fairly early and caught a car for Timbedra at the garage in Ayoun el Atrous where all the “luxury” Mercedes taxis picked up passengers, squishing three in front and four in back.
I met a fellow from Dubai in United Arab Emirates on the way to an Islamic school in Nema. He had an iPod with the Koran on it, which he chanted aloud while riding in the car. The driver was fascinated by the iPod. Once I arrrived at Timbedra, I took another car to register with the local police and then to another car depot in Timbedra where I purchased a ticket to ride on an old truck to the ancient city of Koumbi Salah. The driver from the first Timbedra station to the second was a good fellow from Nouakchott, the capital of Mauritania on the west coast. The guys here at this second station were telling him I’d have to spend the night and visit the chief of the town to go to the ancient city of Koumbi Salah. I just want to go there directly and head onward since I am short on time and don’t want to face more involuntarily carnivorous meals or pay lots more cash to guides who don’t seem to know anything.
Written November 16, 2007, Bus station for Oualata in Nema, Mauritania
The trip to Koumbi Salah was bumpy desert and I was quite happy I paid a bit extra to ride in front with the Baba Ahmed, the driver, and one other passenger. The passenger was a pushy 24-year-old who tried to tell me I had to slide over more toward the driver. The only problem was that he was in the better seat by the door and I was already seated diagonally and very close to where the driver had to reach to shift the gears. So, I told the guy that I couldn’t move over, but that if he wanted to switch places, we could do that. That surprised him a bit. After awhile he started with what has become an all-too-familiar anthem here in West Africa: “Donnez-moi un cadeau.â€? (“Give me a gift.â€?) Perhaps it’s a cultural difference, but it seems to me that a gift is given, rather than asked for. Finally, he got off the truck. Next, we drove in circles for awhile through a village called Walowo or something like that, two villages before Koumbi Salah, which is apparently where they always got lost. The sunset was beautiful – two of my favorite colors – purple and an almost rose-tinted orange.
After the sunset, I was the only passenger remaining in the truck, so I tried to teach the driver and Sidi Mohammed, his navigator, some French and learn some Hassinaya (the Mauritanian Arabic dialect) from them. Despite my initial feelings of frustration toward the driver for not putting me on the first truck to Koumbi Salah, I eventually started feeling like he, Sidi, and I were becoming friends. In fact, I was a bit attracted to Sidi. We arrived in the dark of night and I ended up sleeping in an earthen shack next to a family’s tent in what they call here the brousse or countryside. They fed me some bassi, small brown couscous with fresh milk directly from a nearby cow (and sometimes, although not this time, some sugar). They loved my head lamp and kept asking to use it and play with it. I had to explain that I needed it for camping in the desert.
I heard drumming and chanting in the distance as I feel asleep totally exhausted around 8:30pm. I woke around 6am to the arrival of a truck. Hassan, the owner of the property, had arrived in the middle of the night and woke up to ask me for 10000 ougiya for the visit to Koumbi Salah and the ride back to Timbedra, although not for staying at his place, he was careful to point out. I figured he just pocketed the money and gave the truck driver the standard amount for the trip.
