More enlightened fascinations

"Do you get annoyed when people say the 'did' a country? Like, 'I did Sudan?'" Matt asked. Obviously, his preconceived expected response was the positive.

But that's just it - what do we do? What do we accomplish, achieve, create of our own accord? Once more, where does this newness come from? Humanity, that is, has certain limits of creation on all levels that, well, fundamentally disallow basic creation. Thus, we cannot "do" much at all. We cannot create experiences, we can only live them. We cannot acquire knowledge merely by doing a country, or by visiting a blip on an interesting portion of map within the bounded political authority with an exotic name, a government built on no more than one of the 48 laws.

So we do only set, understood, lonely-planet defined tracks in SE asia. We do the annapurna circuit's laid out track. e do the standard traveler backpacker crap that everyone does. That is, all the superficial "follow me" experience revealed in "I did it" comments.

But then we lay aside such basic human creations as pre-defined lines through un-creatable geography and throw ourselves a little closer to submission to what is. A bike trip from Tanga to Dar isn't "done." Nobody, that is, "does the Tanga to dar thing" , after all> No, such raw thrust into the thick of the unknownd does us. It challenges, powers, forces humility. It destroys our old perceptions with, yes, new ones and our only input to produce such results is consent to be moved.

That's why comments that things "look like they should be in a movide' drive me more berserk every time they're spoken. Such consentual dominance of mind in allowing idiotic blindness to reality dominate existence irk ractional being, to say the very least. Hollywood does not, will not, never has "done" anything. It does not create the spectacular mountains, the idyllic lake, the African Savannah - yet somehow one of those 48 means to acquire power, or one on a deeper level has dominated the massses of frequent viewers (with consent, of course) in convincing that truly fantastic, beautiful, wonderful, inspiring things, scense people, places can only be manufactured by man's imagination. NO.

As Roie and Hila profoundly experience in the Tsunami re-birth, man's creations crumble easily in thier imperfections. In Hollywood, the creations are illusions only, moving images buried under more of the miracle of marketing to sell our own world oto us as a fantastic wonderland; freal only on the far side of never. In fact, someone who laid eyes on Meru National Park or the Ngorogoro Crater had the same thoughtt as you, Hollywood-praiser; except that it was visionary not clouded. Your thought reversed: "this will be in a movie."

Through the formatted to fit this screen context, he won your mind and brought your disbelief at your own world. "Americans have love for the beauty of their own accomplishment," Amir said in Tanga, "but they have forgotten love for the beauty of God." So we wander our world, aching for someone else to package it and sell it to us. Orwell's famous last line, perhaps.

As it was today, that is, deep in the Ngorogoro where we, and hundreds of others, forked out mightily in dollar sums to purchase existence, passion, beauty. Forked out for a package of nature. And in the meantime, forgot why we were there. Land rovers and cruisers raced to be the first down in - to beat out all the red-shirted church groups and bare-chested punk frat boys who'd forgotten that they don't typically venture outside without a little external organization and a good dose of polluting combustion. They race for their spot at the front of nature, but the race can't be won. For dust ceaselessly pours from the tires and into the sky like a jets mist following its way, and we all end up in teh same destination, anyhow. 20 cars around a no longer solitary beast. A herd of wildebeest overcome by airborn road, pelicans and flamingos waiting for the uber-long lense of the photo pro to click (should he be able to frame them without reality imposing on artful cration - without masses of European tourist sin the background, that is.)

And as each animal gains its crowds, one can almost hear the mental pen checkin gthe box by its name in each drivers' head. "alright, take your photo, let's move on already. We've got to beat them to the Hippo Pools now. I want to get home early."

We zip, and so we miss most opportunities to sit and bond with an elephant, or to admire a black rhino because it's just a wee bit too far away for the likes of the driver's itching foot petting the gas pedal. We saw them all, yes, but what did we really earn as we captured the "I saw a Hatebeest, Joe Chicago" superficial bragging right? What did you earn, Sr. "I flew in just for this" high-roller that was worth turning nature into a sideshow?

Ah, but that's just one option in this schizophrenic medley of reaction -and is it really the one to grasp for? Awe and wonder did creep into my life in that crater today too. The magnificence of the now broke through Hollywood's disguised manifest of National Geographic as I saw the crater as it truly is every day. I saw no predators maiming wildebeest or devouring gazelles, but I saw the more mundane yet common scene of unified living. Eater and eaten, side by side, content, complacent. Seemingly indifferent as kills are necessary exception for survival, not the everyday norm. (Perhaps wildebeest could teach Bush a thing or two about Freedom vs. Fear). I saw reality, unedited.

In fact, at moments I was overcome by inundation in experience. I felt no fear, only wonder, as I stared into the sining eyes of a cheetah. I understood some piece of his being as he stared through his striped face and spotted coat right back at me, and I knew something more of what I, and he, are in this world as he laid in the grass, colors merging to one, in one of the most beautiful sights I've seen. At that second, I had to remind meyself to look up from him to count the score of over-equipped safari-mobiles "smothering" his natural solitude. I had to consciously tear myself from immersion in the magical to gaze toward my glitches and count reasons to justify my, let's face it, pre-concluded accusations of impure, imperfect experience. But before I looked up; before I re-realized my ability to let simultaneous onlookers taint my own understandings, I felt the magic I'd come to see.

And I felt it, too there in the row of package tourist non-travelers looking on at the pool of hippos. I felt it as an elephant appeared from nowhere, and with the herds of buffalo providing so stark a contrast to the lone roadside wanderer in Meru. I felt it as a pride of lions moved away from their tree and we rushed to intercept their path. I I felt it as they crawled under the land cruiser to our front, and rubbed against the side of our own. I felt it as I came close enough to touch a female's battle wounds, even as flies fought over teh prime real estate in their gooey heaven. I felt it as they rolled in teh grass and as I saw them groom each other as if putting on the show just for me.

There, too, I forgot for a moment to notice the hoard of onlooking 4 X 4's, even as the pride wove its way in and out of them.

So even as our driver V-lined for an early exit, and as he pulled away from the prides I could have spent hours with, I silently (mostly) let him check off my boxes for me, and found difficulty in successfully condemning the day outright.

After all my eyes met with a Cheetah today, and after that, which of the battling reactions would you leave with? Against all expected understanding, perhaps, I'm stuck in the middle of both. Maybe next time I'll just walk down in there after hours with nothing but naked hands and feet and stare into his threatenting eyes without the steel box of safety... Maybe then..

_______________

Not this time, however, as that day has passed further out of the present and into memory, while my body moves away. Ducking away from the magnificent cloud-crushing tower of Kilimanjaro (which obliterates intents at its own capture on paper by appearing to the distant observer as an uninspiring mountain on glossy print as it stands in impressive majesty in person), we moved back to Nairobi for an afternoon of calm sunday streets, a few more Kenyan beers, and a night bus to the contrasting chaos of Kampala streets. Dust, grime, grit return full force in the chaos of the new taxi park there, but we arrive in Entebbe on the shores of lake Victoria nonetheless.

Unexpected, uninvited, we drop in on a few lectures at the International Primatological Society convention (obviously, we were out of our element, and mostly unwelcome there but enjoyed nonetheless topics regarding our closest animal relatives - annoyed, though we were, that we'd missed an opportunity to freeload the opening speech by Jane Goodall) and marvel at the world's second largest lake (looks about like you'd expect a big body of water to). A little lament for Ghana's loss, a few beers at the generosity of a new friend, and a late ride back to the hostel in the Uganda capital brought the day to a close.

Moving again, today's bus landed in Fort Portal and brought opportunity for the first interactive history lesson since Luxor; as the caretaker at the royal palace of Tooro showed us pictures of the boy king (at age 14 now) alongside none other than Mr. Wellington E. Webb. A million miles from home still, but connected as always.

Linear Ambitions

Japanese cruiser bikes a-la-Africa proved all too fruitful despite tiny little 26 inch wheels and tiny little one-speed pedals. Not to mention tiny little way-too low seats. The silver wonders (complete with slanted crossbars so we might comfortably move in dresses or islamic gowns) set us back a mere 50,000 shillingi each; and that complete with worn tires, old inner tubes, broken bells, and fenders just to remind us why fenders are not standard features on all mountain bikes. After convincing the rental shops to let them change ownership, we hopped on Matt's all-too eager enthusiasm and skipped town. In the rain, of course.

That first night was to prove to us the idiocy of our plan. Nothing more than a thin line on an undetailed 1999 Footprint Guidebook Map landed us well short of our Pangani goal on an alternatively dirt and mud road as the sun fell past the horizon. But a few kilometers after a short respite from downpour on a porch alongside villagers and mudhuts, with the requisite screaming children, an oasis emerged in the form of Peponi. There, a little bit of over-budget extravagance led to surf and turf dinner (still five bucks) and a spot in a tent out of the rain. Not to mention brief interaction with brits cum Tanzanians since before colonialism came to its end. That's right, true blue colonists.

But the rainless haven was to prove the last of comfort on our road south, as the metallic wonders of Nombre and Dominicue brought us, very slowly, through rain, mud, and sand to Pangani where realization of ill-preparedness hit home to the not-quite-so-initiated Matthew (whereas I, I'd say, had already accepted our ill-preparedness and adopted something of an islamic enshallah attitude towards the whole adventure). A day was spent procuring the tools enough to pretend we'd have the capability to change a flat, at the least, and mingling with another one of those African-born-white-boy-colonists. This one only mildly sane as he guaranteed us of acquiring malarial parasites on our way south, interspersed with nonchalant dismissals of any risk. "You'll die." "You don't need to take food! Just go!" Kind of like me, but less rational still and on remnants of decades old drugs, perhaps.

So we pushed ahead, against all odds, and all rational advice. We hit sand, mud, dirt, stone as we prodded into remote villages otherwise inaccessible. We followed lion and elephant tracks to the town of Mkwaga where I scored the first goal in the soccer game at the school, and where we dined on pathetically small fish and heaping portions of unfilling rice as it was the only sustinance available. We trucked onwards the following day, into Sadani National Park and to Sadani town, where the Safari Lodge Burundi-born colonist pointed us toward the town secretary to procure a room in back of a local home (as well as advising us on how to avoid being eaten by the hippos, crocodiles, and lions - and being stepped on by elephants). The toilet was a hole covered by a cooler lid, the shower was the backyard and a bucket (but after dark "it's fine"), and dinner was a saucerplate full of beans and more of that non-energetic bland carbohydrate. Damnit. But it got the job done; with enough energy leftover to wander through crab holes and spiderwebs of the mangrove swamp before realizing that the beach simply did not exist.

The big push came after sadani, on the long haul through singletrack and the oxymoronic desert swamp to the roadless grasses and back to a track dead-ending in the Wami River. "Where the hell did we go wrong?" was rebutted as hopeless calls of "Jambo" actually yielded two men, and with them two dugout canoes from the bush of the far side of the water. Punting their way across, the four trips bring four mzungos, and four japanese-made kiddy bicycles across to a tea stall with Mandazis (fried bread). One shack composed pretty much the entire town of "Gama." But with the caffeine fix, we didn't care, and were ready again for the journey ahead.

A few flats that somehow fixed themselves, and a few chain issues that did likewise threatened to make cheetah food of us, but we persevered and rolled a very slow 70 kilometers to Bagamoyo. In that town of Dr. Livingstone and slave-trade history, we found not the new longed-for variety of sustinance, but scores and scores of food stalls serving nothing but eggs and french fries. We broke down for a good meal at a nearby beach hotel, which in hindsight can be called neither good nor a meal, really. We fought back inclinations to remain bedridden on a day of rest to instead marvel at the hand-made canoes pulling onto the historical zanzibar with seafood in tow, and to be thankful to have gone through the cracked dry dirt the day before, as the downpour underway surely would have made the going that much more tough.

One last push out of historical interest and into the swarming metropolis of Dar was required to reach our goal, and Matt and Kristy's demeanor shifted once more as they realized what it meant to be on tarmac on a bicycle in Africa. Right then, perhaps, I realized somewhat the futility of writing these words - as the spectator will not understand. He will not be able to picture the scene on streets of Hanoi. He will not be able to know just what it means to be clobbered by dust and dirt and sand and grit and grime as one is bounced around in the chaotic traffic of the third world. I don't know what Matt's mind saw when he read of my biking on the ring road in Kathmandu, but the look in his eyes as he trudged through the comparatively tame Dala Dala stations and dodged oncoming lorries told me that no one can understand until they ride on their own through an adventure that they choose.

And with that, we made it. 150 miles doesn't sound too far, perhaps, to the person who didn't have to ride it. Or to the one imagining the boulder creek path. But to us, the accomplishment was worthy of celebration indeed. But one day of rejoice was all that was allowed, as this morning the Matt Kristy duo donned their sailing hats in the rain and headed for the ferry to Zanzibar. Jenny and I remain in this spacious new city that defies every african stereotype save skin color; grateful for the three weeks of adventure as four, and wondering what will be next. For even we have no idea.

Peu, we made it

I give up. The time is just too much, and the lessons too daunting for an adequate literary crusade. I will skip. Though you should know that my journal beams with praise, satisfaction, and awe at the experience up north. The experience in Meru National Park, where we skipped the organized tours and rented a self-drive taxi from a man on the street - a Peugeot station wagon, to be exact, with its normal destinations plastered in black paint atop a yellow racing stripe down its side. It beams, indeed, with descriptions of our no ground-clearance, muffler-rattling extravaganza in a park with virtually zero other visitors. It beams with descriptions of our excitement seated atop the vehicle later named Dominique admiring herds of wild elephants, buffaloes, giraffes, zebras, gazelles, oryxes, waterbucks, warthogs, hippos, babboons. And it revels in contentment that Reuben didn't care too much that the paint on the car was virtually destroyed by passing branches. Glorious, is all.

Nairobi, then, is a land hyped up on mega-reputation of malaise. Robberies, hassles, agressive touts are the theme to every city-bashing essay based here. While I wouldn't say it was the friendliest of cities I'd ever been, I would also compare it more closely to Denver than, say, Lucifer's den. But that's just me. In fact, I wholly enjoyed my beer in a bar named "Taco Bell" complete with the real thing's copyrighted logo outside, and my walks past bland buildings that somehow still make it onto the monetary notes; as well as by the site of the 1998 bombing of the US embassy. A park has been erected on the site. How nice.

Mombasa is one of those names that inspires in me an image of richness. Those people (you know them) aspire to reach Mombasa. Or, if not aspire to get there, then at least revel in the fact that they have been. An exotic destination to kill all others, as the name sounds as if it rings from the far side of the universe where bikinis shine with the light of a thousand suns, palm trees grow higher, and the culture is of a uniqueness this world could never know. But, it turns out, it only sounds that way from a seat in Houston. When I arrived, I saw bland square buildings around the bland enormous elephant tusks erected over the main avenue named for the nations second (of three) presidents, Moi. The beach doesn't touch the town, and the outrageous entry fee to see just what inspired the Portuguese creativity in naming "Fort Jesus" were enough to send us barreling into the old city faster than planned. There, though, the oldness is only a century and the magnificence matches the punyness. So, Mombasa seemed a bit of a dud.

But we did jettison the urban for the serene, just to see what the fuss was all about. Tiwi Beach did provide solitude, and one of the most beautiful beaches since Thailand. But after swimming for an hour or so in salt with only a modest helping of harmonic-motion, and much more seaweed, the passive pastime of sitting in the sun did little to satisfy wanderlust. (Though it did catalyze appreciation for the beauty of this world and for the people I'm with.) It also brought conversations with the two newest additions to the world vagabond lifestyle that highlighted the emotions of the new that I had been, for a week, afraid they were numb to. Holes in sidewalks, women carrying cargo atop their heads effortlessly, smells of burning, even awe at the old city Jenny and I found bland (combined, of course, with full on culture shock). They do a great job of hiding the genuine in their minds, but as it turns out Jenny and I are perhaps the numbest of the two. Maybe. But I think I've already covered that.

After a one kilogram seafood breakfast, we jumped ship out of Kenya, and moreover out of a country from which I feel I have still not gotten much culture or understanding (aside from the common "chapati is thicker, wider, greasier here than in India" and, with that, the unanticipatedly large Indian influence on this eastern african coast). People in Kenya speak impeccable English to the extent that they could sit in New York and have a conversation with Hillary on the merits and detriments of Liberalization as a world bank policy, and genuine friendliness without ulterior intent never seemed to spill over to our side - no doubt an outcome aided by our own submersion in a dominating group of four. It's sort of like bringing Boulder along for the ride. Matt said it best as we cruised down Mount Kenya: "On this trip, have you ever felt like you might as well be at home? As we walked down today, Kristy said, "I feel like we're walking into Boulder Canyon."

But we left anyhow, and spent the night watching Trinidad and Tobago tie the soccer powerhouse of Sweden as transport to Tanga was finished for the evening. No worries, though, as the driver saw fit to honk his horn as though the apocalypse were imminent sometime around six in the morning (12, Swahili time) and we enjoying a one dollar flank steak breakfast in Tanga before the sun hit the zenith (6 swahili time - makes sense, doesn't it?). Sunday has inhabitants hiding from work, sun, and the outside in general so tomorrow will hopefully prove more successful in a bicycle-acquisition-quest.

Tata wa na na

Suthiopia

The disk, the infamous disk, has found its way into this big boxy technological advancement and thus, I bring you a piece of the trilogy:
_____________________

There was a time, hours and hours ago, in Thailand, that I apologized for an absence of a mere few days from this space. Obviously, such concern is no longer so forthcoming. Perhaps the shift to absent words comes from the newfound anticipation of the unknown that I experience now; from the shift away from awe and wonder at Hmong dress to expectation of the abnormal of Sudan. Perhaps the lack of literary addition to cyberspace (and with it, to knowledge, or at least impressions) comes from complacency in existence. After all, to drag emails out of people at home expanding on the extraordinary in their daily lives is a nearly impossible task requiring repeated proddings and pleas for news that may keep one foot harnessed to "home." And why? Simply because they've come to expect the everyday - the lunches with colleagues, the drives to the store, the conversations with friends, the first glimpses of the sun in the mornings. Somehow, the simple task of living life sways us into an arena of disrespect for the mundane. We fail, that is, to see the fantastic in our world as we stand in a corner cubicle making photocopies. But it's there.

So maybe that's it. My average day of photocopies or o-chem is instead filled with plates of injira or customs officers in their underwear. As change becomes my life, it becomes insubstantial - its noteworthyness diminishes. Or, maybe I don't write because when one travels through a few of the world's poorest nations, with GDPs measured in the hundreds of dollars, internet access takes something of a dive. Blogspot just hasn't quite made its way into the information highwaylessness of Kassala, or the amazingly slow serverness of Ethiopia. Hell, it's hardly made its way to northern Kenya, where the post office provides the only access, and as with governments everywhere (and particularly the African variety), can't seem to do so very efficiently.
But to think of the changes in my life over the past few weeks, and of the lessons learned and novelties seen, heard, experienced, makes my head zip 360s . To think that I must transcribe the happiness, annoyance, anger, and paradigm blasted to pluto of the time of silence so that others may have at least an incomplete glimpse of what it is to stand in the heart of the Rashaida tribe drives my motivation for literature downward. After all, my journal's heard it all already.

But alas, I must try.

The permit to Kassala was all but dismissed as irrelevant despite cries by a hotel worker that it was a "very big problem." After all, I'd made it past all the checkpoints on the roadside without incident, so worry was at a minimum. As the police officer who was meant to check my credentials exclaimed "I love Americans!" my uncertainty dissipated, and moreso when he bought my every meal and served as my personal guide.

But his genuine kindness could not erase the feeling of discontent walking through the streets as the only white face for hundreds of kilometers no doubt. The stares were more than the usual curiosities, I felt, as they morphed into animosity. The motel owner was clearly convinced that, being an American, I obviously hated Muslims. Yup, and that's why I'm in Sudan, right? Even as I managed to convince him of my unhateful intentions, and to sway him a bit into believing that not all white faces are evil, the exhaustion I felt from my location on the globe and the stares in the street did little to boost motivation to fulfil my diplomatic duties. Someone needs to be amabassador of the west in Kassala, but why did it have to be me?

Compound with that the heat that didn't relent despite Ibrhahim's assurance in Khartoum that his home town of Kassala would have "cool weather." It pounded me even as I climbed up the sugarloaf jebels jutting out of the desert plain in a blatant display of how rock, and mountainy things everywhere, are wholly superior to the bland monotony of endless plains. Endless blistering hot plains - and I don't care how much sustenance the latter may provide. Mountains reign. And why in the hell people would live in the vicinity of these mountains, but be so heinously out of shape that they must stop for a cigarrette after a white boy from Colorado manages to lug their asses up only 100 feet of the thousands to go, I fail to comprehend. A few jebels (that, after all, really weren't mountains) and a view into what may have been Eritrea were not enough to keep me stuck to Kassala. Not even the donkey carts dominating the streets, or men toting daggers and swords could lure me to fully appreciate this dusty market frontier town. So after my one full day of Kassala's intrigue, I left.

Three hours later, in Gedaref, I met a UN worker freshly out of work due to the lack of Eritrean refugees remaining in Sudan. Luckily, Darfur and the south both provide ample opportunity in his line of work. He asks what I think of the Sudan, politically, so I was honest. In my one-week in the country obviously wholly informed opinion, Sudan has the bleakest outlook of any country I've visite. Even Burma seems preferable to the Sudan.
Border Disputes. Genocide. Civil war. Stagnant, backwards economy. Refusal of government to recognize diversity. Racism. Unnecessary, unwarranted stubborness in the faces of the international community. High incidences of infectiuos disease. Refugee influxes and outpourings to and from neighboring coutnries. Environmental degradation. Deeply rooted, blatant corruption. Unmanageable, inefficient, stifling bureaucracy. History of famines. Lack of adequate climate in the north. Threats of secession. No infrastructure whatsoever. And a completely heterogeneous mix of humanity that never should have been thrown in the same little box in the first place.

Oh, but the people are nice. The ones, that is, who aren't killing each other.

Then on top of this outrageous perception, I sit in the back of an open topped lorry as I watch a man chase down a rickshaw, in a scene I found pretty comical until, of course, he pulls a woman and child from it and proceeds to argue with her in the middle of a field as the rickshaw drivses away. It looks to have potential to turn violent, but no one seems to act. The small child, perhaps two or three years told, stands solitary and watches - from the iidstance he appears unknowing, non-understanding as his mother is hit. She is tackled to the ground and blows repeat. I cringe, unsure of what to do. Unceratain of my own fate should I intervene, and simultaneously disturbed by my own inaction. I almost hate myself for failing to leap to help. A man on the street bolts toward the scene - faster, that is, than the rest of the onrushing male crowd. I think help is on the way, but as this heinous excuse for a human arrives, he hits too. An object - a newspaper perhaps, I don't know - he swings across her face as she hits the ground. The crowd stands, complacent, inactive, uncaring, unhelpful. Inhuman. Negating notions of common existence.

The child still stands, perplexed maybe. Scarred, for sure, should he remember as he grows. Amidst this sea of dagger-toting men I wrestle with the idea in my mind of leaping forth, sprinting. Barreling into them bare-fisted. I imagine myself with a gun and dread the consequences of such possession. I hate humanity right then. My heart tears. It fights. I yell out "FUCK SUDAN" at this heinous act. I hate them. And amidst this scene, disturbing to any feeling creature of this Earth, the lorry pulls away. I hate the people I 'm with for looking on without intervention. I hate the women on the cab floor seated below, even as I pity them, for not showing more emotion as they cannot see through the lorry walls but surely know what transpires. I hate myself for doing nothing. Is it inability to act? or sheer refusal? Just what would it take to burst me out of fucking selfish ease? For what, exactly, would i reisk my life in so blatant a way? WHY DIDN'T I DO SOMETHING?

And I ponder this fucking dismal reality as we pull out through the sporadic solitary trees of the endless savannah (desert?); condemning the entire nation as hopeless after only 10 days of experience. The road cannot be too short to the border, as I ache to leave this place; albeit in a rush to an artificially divisive border. Perhaps, hopefully, the quick conclusion of mass condemnation is undeserved. Hopefully I only had bad luck. Hopefully I hit all the negatives with few positives. Hopefully - and stories of other travelers tell that probable truth. They do not see what I saw, typically. They see friendly people and invitations to coffee. So maybe they're right. Or just selectively blind.

Five or so hours of scorching sun and dust later, we crawl into Gallabat - a small straw/mud/clay village in nowhereland. One unmarked mud hut with straw roof contains a desk, and a man with a stamp. Immigration. A crew of ununiformed, deskless, examination-room-less, and sometimes pantsless men serve as customs. In a stellar mood, I told them they were "a joke." They weren't exactly pleased.

But I got my little cramped room in the back of a bar and paid my two birr for a trickle of water to be passed off as a shower, and I drank a few beers to celebrate the end of heinousness. I drank them, though, with a man who later unveiled his true cause - "Okay, now I see your bed. I need to see if it's clean or not." Oh goddamnit go away. The drunkenness of the owner of the bar, encharged with the key to my room, pissed me off a bit more, so I grabbed my money and bag and took off down the road, with visions of sleeping under stars in the desert in my mind.

But, alas...Dogs. Big scary fierce dogs. Amazing dogs. Terrible Dogs. Just before I was ready to take a stick like a baseball bat to the ringleader's head, a villager rescued me away to his family/tribe/clan's cluster of huts. A cot was produced, and after much clabber amongst the family clustered together for the night, I slept my first night in Ethiopia on a cot under the stars with men, women, children of a small community on the outskirts of the already small village of Metema.

I awoke to the "headman" yelling that the truck passing was my bus, heading to Gondar. He was mistaken, thankfully, which left me just enough time to sprint back down the road to gather my forgotten camera from the still drunk barkeep after much banging on doors, and running to jump on the bus as it threatened to pass me on the road. A few hours later, I made it to Gondar.

Gondar, where I found that Jenny would not return for some 4 days. 4 days in which ceaseless begging, hastling, haggling, following by the street kids (all of whom knew my whereabouts within about four seconds of my arrival) increased my dread of wandering to the street more and more each day. Hours were spent reading, and staring readily at the ceiling wondering what to do to rectify my dismal mood. I climbed a nearby mountain (hill?) though the dehydration that ensued did much to counter any positive feelings that may have stemmed from the experience.

The one saving grace was Wurkey, the owner of a nearby restaurant that would become my Gondar home. She fed me three times daily, refusing my money, and went so far as to hold a coffee ceremony in her home in my honor. She bought me gifts, which I loved, but which my own inability to reciprocate turned to a feeling of guilt - for was I really going to try to give her a sack of bananas in exchange for hand-woven baskets? And what else could I find in Gondar?

But Jenny finally did arrive, and after a little traditional shoulder-shaking with her Eaton-grad travel buddy, we hopped the bus to Addis (a full day ride, a stop in podunk nowhere town for a night's sleep, and two more hours drive which did little to increase my travel motivation). Nevertheless, a trip around the city center, past the African UN headquarters and a few soccer practices in a parking lot complete with surrounding recreational runners partaking in the first voluntary exercise activities we've witnessed in months got me slightly back into the swing of things.

A dinner invitation from my girlfriend to a bizzarely out of place, uber-nice Italian restaurant complete with pictures of Brad Pitt's recent visit up on the wall, and such now unfamiliar deliciousness as penne and wine did much as well. Though I will admit the contrast of my recent life to the white tie-wearing businessmen, and to the unpredictable difficulty in readapting to silverware and, well, manners in general did send me into a bit of a confused daze. Moreover, the niceties provided a geographically convenient contrast to the African street. The western abundance, western obsession with such intricacies as spotless wine glasses (not, of course, to be used as water glasses because my god what would water do in such an oddly shaped glass?) and the Ethiopian beggars, touts, dirty streets, and basic, simple restaurants geared toward the seemingly simple task of providing food - not pomp. I was a bit uncomfortable with it all.

But the food was, after all, delicious, and provided me with just the right energy boost to hop onto the bus the following morning at 4:30 and wait patiently in my seat with all the other passengers until 8 when we left on our 8 hour journey to Arba Minch.

And despite the fact that I am a thousand (more?) miles south of Arba Minch in Nairobi, I will leave you there. As time, as always, is of the essence.

Kenya believe it?

I have stored on a disk a massive blog, or rather the first portion of a trilogy. Something along the lines of "Suthiopenya." A disk, that is, that became necessary when the first available, functioning internet in the entire region where the triangular saga unfolds, went down before posting. A disk that cannot be inserted into this caged CPU of the POSTA SURF post office in Meru, Kenya where 4 of 11 computers actually function anyhow. So for you who have logged on to this site over and over again (possibly no one) over the last few weeks, I must leave you once again without substance. I must leave you with only the knowledge that I am, indeed, alive. In Kenya now.

Or, say, I'll just pick up where I left off on the trilogical saga. Yup, that's better.

As we crossed the border in Moyale to Kenya, we were immediately thrown into the back of a lorry truck ready to bullet down the dirt track for hours. Dust became our enemy number one, as any attempt to witness the desert and hills zip by at an alarming rate, while trying to stand and balance in the heaving, hawing truck without toppling over just to peek over the top was rewarded with pupils full of dust, sand, grit. Annoyance obviously reigned, as I "sat" (rocked, held on for dear life, was bounced around, often airborne) in the lorry, with long underwear pants and a button down shirt over my head. I saw a cumulative total of maybe 30 minutes of scenery and tribal people through the 12 hour saga of Northern Kenya before reaching Isiolo; but at least I know that should I ever be tossed in the back of a mafia truck with a sock on my head, I will survive.

In Isiolo, we debriefed. Talked about the self, about intuition, about change. Talked about anxiousness for home alongside the dread of knowing what reassimilation, whenever it should come, will actually entail. And talked about all that we have learned...or, at least, that which we have learned which can be put into words. That which we have learned which can be discussed in a single hour. Seven months together, and for me 10 months on the road though countless lands and countless people I had never met, never known, never tried to understand. And now I find myself calmer yet wilder, more understanding and less. It cannot truly be explained, I fear. But then, that's the point. That's why to travel one must leave the armchair - and the symmetrical, straightlined, confined space of their own thinking.

But with all those unfamiliar faces constantly staring us down, we decided to burn our way on down to central Kenya, into Nero Moru to meet up with Matthew Bruce and Kristy whose last name is so daunting I can't do it justice here. We met the familiar, and almost instantly I was thrown for a loop - not by the comfort of it all; but by my own reaction to a familiar audience. The dedication in my prior mind to be quietly accepting, to refuse the temptation to slosh magnificent stories whose alure and entertainment value is derived almost entirely from the mere mystery - from the fact that they are outside of the audiences' understanding - is thrown aside. Stories fly of randomly wandering into a village and sleeping with the family at midnight in Ethiopia, of crossing Sudan, and of all the other events of, well, mostly the last few weeks (a stark reminder of just how many stories the last eleven months holds, and how many will remain untold save for our minds and memories). Moreover, the stories flew with heartfelt enjoyment on my end. Turning the temporary changes that travel (of mind and body) provides to permanent will be a testing task.

Then it was off to Mount Kenya National Park, after, of course, we'd given in to the ludicrous costs involved in entrance fees and glove rentals. We nixed the guide, of course, and headed out solo to the familiarity of one foot in front of the other - made only slightly more difficult for the injured foot I sustained while jumping from a semi in Ethiopia. We trudged through the lowland forest up into the rolling alpine plains and into the tundra. Except the tundra here isn't exactly tundra, so much as giant lobelia plants. The last thing growing on Mount Kenya are eight foot tall stalks of green, under a backdrop of 3000 feet of vertical rock and ice. I plopped down next to a few, and together with Matt lamented our decision to save money and, perhaps, a limb or two by skipping the technical adventure to the summit. Ropeless, there was no turning back from our sound, but unexciting decision.

Instead, we awoke under the 3 am stars to huff to Point Lenana for sunrise alongside the only other group on the mountain - the first Israeli we've met since Israel, a Frenchman comically convinced he would die, and their guide, gasping for air as he took up the rear. Jenny was possibly on the verge of hypothermia, which deterred me from snapping an amazing photo of the Israeli, but I managed to revel in the moment while basking in the view of Mount Kenya's massif anyhow. And I didn't even cry that we hadn't any ropes to go to the top.

We trudged down into moss-covered tropical forests and further still into the clouds that had been so far below; into the muddy tussocks and bamboo forests. We saw a few dik diks (which are toy-sized antelope, approximately one foot tall), and a rustle in the jungle, combined with a little rare patience, revealed some of the most amazing monkeys I've ever seen - complete with non-monkey-esque fluffy white tails.

The van awaiting our arrival at the park gate was a welcome sight for my throbbing foot, as was the bacon, sent from the Gods, obviously, back in town. A debate finally led us up to Meru instead of down to Nairobi. A sound choice, that one, as the riots near the Matatu stand in Nairobi yesterday left one police officer stoned to death and three people shot.

I'm still adjusting to life in fours. I feel somewhat like Africa is pushed away from us as we cruise down the sidewalk in our dominating posse. But the jokes are fantastic, the reminiscences appreciated, the time with good friends priceless.

Now we'll just see if this station-wagon adventure actually gets off the ground.