Timbuktu: Adventures with Ali Baba and his 40 thieves

Getting to Timbuktu (Tombouctou), touring the famous city, and getting out with our money was the full adventure that one could hope for (or maybe not).  It was worth the trouble, but it was definitely our hardest experience so far (aside from when children in Djenne threw rocks at us for not buying them a soccer ball).

While a lot of tourists visit Tombouctou, not very many Malians have a reason to travel there, and since we were unwilling to spend money and hire our own 4 wheel-drive vehicle (the tourists’ choice) we had to rely on the very unreliable public transport. 

We arrived at the bus station at 7am, hoping to catch the earliest vehicle out of Mopti.  Little did we know that the earliest vehicle would not be filled until 2pm that day (public transport in West Africa never leaves until it is filled-aka crammed- this can take anywhere from 15 minutes to 7 hours).  From Mopti it was about a 12 hour drive, mostly on dirt roads, to the Niger river-crossing just south of Tombouctou.  Here our transport stopped at 2am and we spent a cold night sleeping on the sandy shores of the Niger.  At dawn the ferry to cross the river started running again, and we were soon at our destination. 

Tombouctou is one of those cities that you can’t not visit if you’ve come all the way to Mali.  For centuries it has been a mythical name to western culture, a far-off destination that prior to the 19th century was impossible to reach (and leave alive) if you had white skin.  Even today, Tuareg rebels in the desert north of the city have discouraged tourism in the region, but we had met enough travelers who had felt safe there that we decided to go too.

While we met many Tuareg, we did not meet any who wanted to kidnap us.  We did learn, however, that people in Tombouctou are very used to tourists and have developed lots of schemes for giving tourists a “cultural” experience that turns into a commercial exchange.  First it was the Tuareg man who claimed to travel with his camel caraven to Morocco every year and wanted to serve us Tuareg tea- the tea was good, but really he wanted an opportunity to sell jewelry, and we have serious doubts as to whether he really had a caravan.  Our next encounter was when we paid for camel rides to a Tuareg village, which turned out to be a camel ride to another carefully disguised jewelry store. 

There were other similar incidents, and we actually did meet a man named Ali Baba who had close to 40 people working for him in his sly schemes.  Unfortunately he also worked at the tourist office, so we found it impossible to get honest information from anyone in the city.  During this frustrating time we were able to enjoy parts of Tombouctou.  There is a nice library that houses ancient Arabic texts, proving that scholarship has existed for centuries in sub-Saharan Africa.  We also got to go on some pretty fun motorcycle rides around town and to the sand dunes, where we drank more Tuareg tea and grooved to the tunes of Ali Farka Toure and other Malian musicians.   In the end dishonesty betrayed itself and we were not robbed of our money.  Instead we enjoyed two gorgeous days on a really awesome, half-price pinasse trip back to Mopti on the Niger river.

Dogon Country

A trek through Dogon Country was pretty much the only activity we knew for certain we wanted to do in Africa.  Apparently it’s an activity a LOT of tourists know they want to do too.  But while it is super touristy (we saw more westerners in 3 days than we have in 5 weeks) it was still a great trip.

We crossed the border from Burkina Faso to Mali by bus and met up with Oumar, our Dogon guide with whom we would spend the next three days.  Our journey began from Bankass, a town who’s main claim to fame is that it is next to Dogon Country, and from here we rode on a horse-cart to Teli, a village directly below the Falaise de Bandiagara- the huge escarpment (cliff) that extends along the whole length of Dogon Country and defines the landscape and culture.

The Dogon are famous for their ancient villages that were built along the face of this cliff, hundreds of feet above the valley floor.  In those days the environment of the region was much wetter, there was jungle in the valley and vines grew along the side of the cliff- this was how many of the older and higher Tellem villages were reached.  Over the past few hundred years the Sahara desert has encroached onto those landscape (due largely to deforestation) and the region is now very arid with few trees.  Farming is difficult, and much of the wildlife the Dogon used to hunt moved away with the jungle.  These environmental changes have forced to the Dogon to move down to villages on the valley floor and rely more on agriculture and domesticated animals for subsistence.

Oumar, our guide, was very garrulous and we learned a lot about Dogon culture from our discussions with him.  Like many West Africans, the Dogon do practice polygamy, although in Mali we have met more young people who only want to have one wife.  The Dogon also practice female circumcision (or female genital mutilation- perhaps a more accurate description depending on your bias).  While we were aware that this practice is common throughout the West Africa, Dogon country is the first time we’ve met someone who openly spoke about it.  Oumar mentioned that many westerners have visited the region to discourage female circumcision, but he didn’t see the practice ending any time soon.  Even though it is an incredibly painful procedure that continues to plague women for their whole lives, culturally it is viewed as a prerequisite to marriage.

Marriage in West Africa is very important.  It is pretty much what people see as the main purpose in life- to marry and procreate.  Whenever we meet people they almost always ask “What is your name?  Are you married?”  We answer yes or no based on what we feel their intentions are, because at our age they believe we really ought to be getting married within the next few days. 

Oumar also taught us a little about West Africans belief in spirits.  In their sense of the cosmos, spirits live in everything and influence people’s daily lives in good or bad ways.  One day he pointed out a tree to us that had its lower bark cut off all the way around the trunk.  He said it meant that someone had probably fallen out of the tree, which meant that the tree had an evil spirit, so they cut of the bark to warn others (whether it’s their intention or not I don’t know, but cutting of the circumferance of bark will ultimately kill the tree too).  There are other anecdotes I have heard here that indicate how many believe that cause and effect in daily life are ruled by spirits, and not by human decisions.  In some ways this can lead to a lack of self-responsibility (“The spirits made me do it!”) 

It is hard to tell how prevalent this way of thinking really is and how much it influences the way things run in Africa.  People are certainly very hard workers here and they have a very strong sense of morality.  For example, theft is looked down on as a serious taboo.  One of our Chinese friends in Niger said that on his first day in the country he saw a petty thief beat to death by a crowd, and a Peace Corps volunteer we met had similar experience when her purse was stolen (although in her case the angry crowd did not kill the thief, but her possessions were recovered by strangers).

So Dogon Country was both beautiful and educational.  It definitely was one of our favorite activities during our time here!

Photos!

Check out the new photo galleries of Ghana and Dogon Country, as well as new photos of Rassomde that were added to the Burkina Faso gallery.

At some point we’ll post a story about Dogon Country, but the brief explanation is that it is in eastern Mali where we trekked for three days along a huge escarpment (really long and tall cliff).  We visited the ancient, abandoned cities of the Dogon that were built high on the cliff face, and stayed in the modern-day villages that are on the valley floor below.

Ou est Rassomde? (Where is Rassomde?)

This is what most Burkinabe will say when you tell them where you are going.  Why? 

Rassomde is not on any world maps; in fact, it’s not even on any maps in Burkina Faso (at least that we’ve seen).  To get there from Burkina’s capital, Ouagadougou, one must drive two hours north by bus, take a bush taxi on a dirt road heading east to Tougo, and then walk 5k along a path that winds through sparse acacia and baobob trees on the dry Sahel terrain.  The village itself is not obvious, for it is made up of several widely spread compounds where groups of families live.  The total population is around 1500, though in 5 days we were there we maybe saw a couple hundred.  There is no electricity, no running water.  In fact, the nearest big “town” (5k away) also has no electricty or running water!

So why did we go there?  It is the village where our friend Sarah has been living and working as a Peace Corps volunteer!  For over a year she has been drawing her own water from a nearby well, carrying it on her head back home,  enjoying “bucket baths,” flashlights,  and an outdoor latrine.  We learned a lot about how many West Africans still live from our time in Rassomde, and were impressed with the work that Peace Corps volunteers do.   

We expected our time in the village to be pretty laid-back, but as it turned out our schedule was packed full!  And not just with trips to the well and washing clothes.  We were able to sit in on women’s group meetings where micro-loans for various projects were discussed, walk to the fields where families grow onions, corn, millet, tomatoes, potatoes, and more, and attend a church service that was alive with drumming, singing, and dancing.  In the mornings we were awakened by the unearthly yells of goats and chickens, and in the evenings we sat outside or entertained various visitors (in Africa it is perfectly acceptable for anyone to show up in your home at any moment).  On our final night, since we wanted this to be a true cultural exchange, we taught the kids in Sarah’s compound how to roast marshmallows.

One of the most interesting aspects of our time in Rassomde was talking with Sarah or Koglia (the local man who has worked closely with her in her Peace Corps service) and learning about how life in Rassomde has changed over the past few decades and how it continues to change.  While life in the village is still pretty basic, there has been continual developement over the years – agriculturally and technologically- to help the village be food secure and prosperous.  There have been too many projects to discuss fully in this small space, and in two minutes the internet here will shut off, but suffice it to say that news of this progress was encouraging.  I recommend a visit to Rassomde for everyone!

Ghana in a Week

The guidebook suggests a minimum of two weeks to tour Ghana, but seeing as our friends Sarah and Laura didn’t have that much vacation time to spare (they are Peace Corps volunteers) we managed to see a lot of the country in just 8 days. 

Our first bus dropped us off in Tamale, the largest city in northern Ghana, where we arrived in time to have dinner with Allison, another friend in the Peace Corps.  The menu?  Banku, a fermented ball of pounded corn that can be enjoyed with peanut sauce. 

The next morning we took another bus to Kumasi, a bustling and overcrowded city in the Ashanti region of Ghana.  The feeling of Kumasi is probably the closest you can get to India in West Africa- so many people and colors crammed together!  Walking through Kumasi’s market was a bit like driving on a busy highway- the two lanes of traffice (people and carts) were pressed together and you had to keep up.  If you wanted to step off the path to look at a stall it was difficult to merge into the flow of shoppers once again. 

One of Ghana’s fascinating features is that it is an overtly Christian country.  All the other countries we are visiting on this trip are predominantly Muslim, but this is only visible when one passes a mosque, or a bus pulls off the rode at the hour of prayer to let people lay rugs on the ground and pray towards Mecca.  Not so in Ghana, where people’s faith is loudly advertised.  Many shops have names that include Christian lingo, such as “Divine love oil change” or ”God’s grace is sufficient for me bakery.”  Large bumper stickers on public transportation remind one that “With God all is possible,” and often when we were waiting for a bus to leave the whole car would be given a complimentary sermon by a preacher who usually spoke in Twi (although once a pastor looked right at me and told me in English to love my enemies).  Such was the atmosphere of Kumasi.

After Kumasi we hopped on another bus to Cape Coast, one of the main ports for the former trans-Atlantic slave trade.  Here we toured the famous castle built by the British that once served as a dungeon for slaves captured in the interior of the continent who were waiting to be shipped to the Americas.  To see the small prisons where up to 1000 men, plus hundreds of women and children, were held in darkness for several weeks was sobbering, to say the least.  The British never cleaned the cells, so the slaves were forced to eat, sleep, and defecate in this enclosed and filthy space.  Sorry to be graphic, I won’t embellish further.  The horribly ironic part of the castle is that the British built Ghana’s first Christian church and first courtroom on the floor directly above the dungeon for men.  Christianity, justice, and inhumanity hypocritically shared the same space.

While we’re talking about slavery, we did want to mention that it is still an issue in West Africa.  Slavery was only officialy abolished in Niger in 2003, and human rights workers have evidence that the practice still exists in that Niger as well as in a few other West African nations (off the top of my, Mali and Mauritania).  For centuries warring tribes in West Africa have enslaved prisoners of war and traded them across the Sahara,  so when European colonists arrived they simply built off this trade (and greatly expanded it), directing the trafficking of humans towards the coasts (in exchange for rum, guns, ammunition, etc.)

The rest of our time in Ghana was enjoyed on the beach and in Accra, the capital.  Sarah and Heather were fortunate enough to see an Olive-Ridley sea turtle nesting on the coast!  (Bonnie and Laura were waiting for the bus).  We also saw monkeys, a tucan, and (on our epic “Don’t even ask about it” bus ride back to Burkina) two elephants!  

To summarize, for those who couldn’t read this novel, Ghana was great!

Barack Obama in Africa

He is EVERYWHERE!  Nigeriennes, Burkinabe, Ghanians, they all love Obama.  He’s on t-shirts and cell phones, one coiffure shop even advertised “Obama style” haircuts, and the day after his election was a government holiday in Niger.  Today in Kumasi, Ghana we heard a 10 minute reggae song about Obama that first praised his victory, reminded him of his African roots, and then proceded to give a wish-list of how Obama could help Africa (improve banking and financial systems, extricate corruption, end poverty…)  Whenever we tell people that we are Americans they joyfully exlaim, “Barack Obama!!!”  Clearly he is not just a symbol of hope for manyAmericans, in Africa he is almost a messiah.

.3%

That is the percentage of Niger’s population that uses the internet, and the decimal point is in the right place (according to the BBC’s 2007 data).  This explains in part why we are so long in posting news on our blog- there are few cyber cafes in Niger, and even if you find one the internet might be down.

But now we are in Ouagadougou (pronounced “waga-doo-goo”), the glorioulsy named capital of Burkina Faso (Moore for “The country of honest men”).  Here we’ve met up with our friend Sarah (the main purpose of this whole adventure!) and are getting acquainted with Peace Corps culture.  It’s fascinating to hang out at the Peace Corps house in Ouaga and meet volunteers from all around the country and learn  about the village they work in and their experiences.

Ouagadougou is quite a large city, even more sprawling than Niamey, the capital of Niger.  While Burkina Faso has been labeled as one of the poorest countries in the world, we have noticed that its capital is significantly more developed than Niamey (labeled by many indices as the poorest country).  There are more large buildings, homes, restaurants, and stores; in general the city atmosphere is more familiar to us than any place in Niger.

However, outside of Ouaga is still very rural.  We travelled this week to Burkina’s largest market town: Goram-Goram.  Here we rode camels 12km to a sand dune where we spent a frigid night camped under the stars, and the next morning we rode the camels 12km back to Goram alongside all the people bringing their wares to Goram’s market day.  We were the only ones on camels- some men rode motorcycles, bikes, or donkey carts, while almost all the women walked.  It gave us a lot to think about: these women were walking up to 15km, carrying a basin of either fruits, nuts, grain, or some other product on their heads.  They would walk almost 6 hours, sit in the burning sunshine for most of the afternoon to earn a couple of dollars, and then walk 15km back to their villages that evening. 

Markets have been one of the main tourist attractions for us (we can’t afford a safari) and they have been a great way for us to learn about West Africa’s diverse cultures.  People come from all over to sell salt, dates, peppers, tomatoes, callabash, millet, rice, kola nuts, traditional fabrics, modern kitchen and bath supplies, shoes, anything and everything that is needed for daily life.   Some bring their goods to market on huge trucks, in a bag on the bus, or carry them on their head.   They speak several languages, barter and bargain for various products, drink cold water from plastic bags to temper the sweltering heat (100F+), carry babies on their backs and drag goats by their ears.  It’s not unusual to see several live chickens hanging by their feet from someone’s bicycle as they swirvingly maneuver through the pressing crowd. 

As much as we do enjoy the markets, it was a treat in Niger to once get out of the cities and villages and have a quiet encounter with wildlife.  Check out the photos under the “Photo Gallery” link to see the beautiful giraffes we were able to walk among in a nature reserve outside Niamey, near the village of Koure.  These graceful creatures make up the last herd of giraffe in all of West Africa.  There are only 200 being protected in the park today, the others were killed over the decades mostly by farmers trying to defend their crops from these large, hungry, horse-like animals.  Despite their bad experiences with humans, these giraffe were quite calm about our presence and allowed us to watch them closely for almost an hour. 

Before signing off tonight we just wanted to include a quote from journalist Ryszard Kapuscinski’s memoir “The Shadow of the Sun.”  Here he states clearly a truth about the African continent that we hope to convey in this blog:

“The continent is too large to describe.  It is a veritable ocean, a separate planet, a varied, immensely rich cosmos.  Only with the greatest simplification, for the sake of convenience, can we say “Africa.”  In reality, except as a geographical appellation, Africa does not exist.”

He writes this because truly the continent is composed of thousands of distinct cultures that have woven their separate histories over the millenia.  While Africa is today composed of around 50 independent countries, even these countries cannot be easily defined, for their borders were arbitrarily drawn by European colonists who paid no attention to tribal territories.  Thus there are Hausa in Niger and Nigeria, Tuareg in Burkina Faso, Mali and Niger, Fulani and Moore span other borders, to name just a few… So when we generalize about the countries we visit, or refer to the region as “West Africa,” please understand that these are truly broad generalizations.  They are attempts to put into words the sights we see and convey our experiences in a way that is understandable to others who haven’t been here, but it is truly impossible to define “Niger” or “Burkina” or “West Africa.”  The diversity of these places is immense.