A-F-R-I-C-A

There’s a big blanket of “awesome” that covers this gig, as I’ve mentioned before. It’s so big and thick that sometimes you forget about it.

But then the CRUISE SHIP that you LIVE on shows up in AFRICA for the day, and it sort of blows your mind. We were in Tunisia today, on the northern coast of the African continent. From what I hear, this is the place where a lot of Star Wars was filmed, and with the landscape it makes since. A lot of cruise ships come to this port outside the capital city of Tunis. It’s one of the only “tourist-friendly” African countries, and there’s a lot of useless crap lying around, and if some helpless tourist doesn’t come and overpay for it, it’ll just clog up the streets and THEN what would they do?! Mass hysteria!

We got off the ship and walked to get out landing cards (a customs formality) stamped. The cabbies said it was 40km to town (which is cabby talk means about 10km), so we all hopped in a cab. They said that it would be $15 per person (which is a lot), but that they would come and pick us up later in the afternoon to bring us back. Like the gullible saps that we are, we took the bait and drove into Tunis.

When we got to our destination, the cabbies didn’t just leave us there. Suddenly we all realised that we had unknowingly fallen into the #1 dumb mistake in North Africa…we had unwittingly hired an unauthorized guide for the day! Alright! Who’s ready to lose all of their money?! Let’s go!

So first we went to his cousin’s rug store, then his brother’s rug store, then his friend’s rug store (it took him awhile to realise we didn’t want any rugs), then to his parents restaurant, then back to his other cousin’s hooka store, pottery, magnets, musical instruments, clothes, swords, ash trays, plates, knives, hookas, hookas, hookas!

I’ve traveled enough to be taken advantage of before, so I didn’t fall for any of this, and I’m glad to say that all my money stayed right in my pocket. But for the people I went with, they bought everything they saw. Not that they were taken advantage of, no, they wanted everything they bought. But nevertheless, I don’t think that they would have thrown out the money quite as quickly had it not been for the pushy Tunisians – “You buy for $30? How much you pay? Come, my friend, I make you good deal. How much you pay? Is good deal, $25. No, no, come back! $20! Ok, I tell you, I know [point to the sky’> I believe in you, for you I make good deal. $15. Good deal, $15. Just for you my friend.” – and it’s SOLD for $15.

Note: When traveling, never, under any circumstances, make eye contact with a stranger that calls you his friend, as in: “Hello my friend!”

Tunisia is the first African Muslim country I’ve ever been to. We had to wear pants and the girls had to cover their shoulders. Obviously the meat we ate today wasn’t pork, but it wasn’t beef, and I don’t know what it could be other than lamb or goat. It was good, whatever it was. The market, or “Souk”, was a very interesting place. It was basically just a series of man-made tunnels with shops coming off from them. The tunnels were made maybe 20 ft high, with skylights every 10 feet for light. It must be a very dark place at night, since I didn’t see much in the was of public lighting. It made for a very cramped, loud atmosphere, but I think that is only by Western standards.

I think I heard once when I was a kid that either Chinese or Japanese never originally had a word in the language for “privacy”. I’m not sure if that’s true, but it makes a point pretty well. In places like Tunis, privacy and personal space is just not as much of an issue as it is in the states. People are touching you, talking in your face, shaking your hand, leading you into stores, asking questions. It makes you very tense, but I don’t think that they necessarily mean to be rude. I like to stay and ask some locals about this idea, but it’s off to Sardinia again tomorrow!