Goodbye, Farewell, and Amen
If there is one thing that is always certain about travel in West Africa, it's that it is never as simple as it should be. If there's a second certainty, it's that the biggest problems will always occur when you are either in a hurry, or carrying a large amount of baggage.
I had a bad feeling about leaving the village. I had said my goodbyes, several times as a matter of fact, because despite having informed my village at least once a week for two months that I would be leaving, they always acted surprised at the news. I had packed my bags, three large sacks, much to my shame. And I had covertly given away much of the contents of my house; covertly because news of white people giving away stuff spreads like a brush fire around here. My most coveted item, my wheelbarrow, had to secret away in the predawn light while most of the village was still asleep; but I knew the Watts would give it a good home. They never asked me for it, so I had already decided to give it to them when they offered to buy it my last afternoon in the village. I first had to use it to transport all my luggage to end of the street where the cars usually stop.
After saying goodbye to the Watts, and my wheelbarrow, taking the final pictures of the village, I went to wait on the riverbank near where all my bags were stacked.
It was around this time that one of the guards at the border post cheerfully informed me that there was no car to Rosso today.
Not good. I had dreaded this. Bala, who owns one of the two cars that run between my village and Rosso, had not gone to Rosso the day before, because his daughter had been getting married in a nearby village. But the wedding was one it's third day, and I assumed he would have one of his sons returning to business.
No such luck. Just as I was pondering how much I would be charged to row my baggage across the river, Maloum, the owner of the other car, pulled up. Machallah. He wanted me to put my bags on the roof. I laughed, explaining that they were heavy, I could barely put them in the back of the van. He sighed, and I got on the roof, ready to ride regally out of the village.
45 minutes later, and we had not yet left Satara. It was the rice harvest, and since every van in the Trarza was packed to the gills with rice sacks, everyone wanted on what turned out to be one of the only cars going to Rosso. 30 minutes later we had left Satara and were headed across the fields. I relaxed enough to put on my iPod. And I jinxed it. I had barely made it through the first song when the car stopped again, and we were all told to get out. The van was heading into the fields to pick up more rice, and the road was too bumpy to take with 20 people on the top. No problem I thought, it gives me a little more time to soak in my last view of the village. 30 minutes later I had soaked enough and was ready to get out of there. The van returned, packed to the gills with rice, inside and on top, my bags having long ago been tossed on the roof. I found a perch with the rest of the men and pressed the play button again as we approached the intersection that connects the little dirt road to Jiddi with the big dirt road to Rosso.
I really need to learn to stop playing my iPod. Just at the crossroads, we stop again. A flat tire, not that surprising when you consider the several tons of rice that we are carrying. We all pile out, where I meet my school director Bah. He has been waiting for 2 hours, trying to hitch a ride to Rosso, and there has only been one car. Not a good sign, normally there are a dozen at this time of day. Stupid rice harvest.
But the driver of our car looks active. The jack is out and they have raised the car, loosened the lug nuts, and then...nothing. They are, at this moment, engaged in that most infuriating of Moor activities: willful staring. As if looking at the flat tire is going to make it magically inflate. I understand why the inchallah attitude exists in Mauritania, I myself say inchallah several times a day, because it is true that you can never be really sure, and that it is ultimately up to God. Most things, anyway. But I absolutely refuse to believe that this same principle can be applied to automobile maintenance. If it was God's will that the tire went flat, you should be able to solve it with the spare that is on the roof. Oh no, we can't , the spare has been flat for weeks. At this point, as if I need reminding of the hopelessness of our situation, an irritating boy on a bike keeps reminding me, "Mariem, there is no way you are getting to Rosso today."
Like hell I'm not. There is no way I am going through the whole trauma of saying goodbye, again. Plus, by now word of who got the wheelbarrow is out, so I really can't go home again. But seeing as there has been one car in the past hour, and they only took one person, one out of 27 waiting by the road, my chances do not look good.
And then it appeared, noisy and dusty and bigger than a semi-tractor trailer. A camion. One of those steel behemoths that transport tons of sand or charcoal to Nouakchott. You could fit a school bus inside the bed of this thing. And it's stopping.
"Can I ride on that?" Most of the Moors look at me like I am nuts, but my friend Aliune nods.
I scramble on top of our decrepit van, grab the first of my bags, heave it over the side and order the first man I see to catch it and put it on the ground. And they obeyed, it was kind of cool. Aliune helped me drag the bags over to the camion, where I realized my first problem. The floor of the truck was just above my eye level, there was no way I was getting my bags in, let alone myself. Not a problem, apparently. Before I can think Aliune and I are passing my bags to one of the men already standing inside. Then I try and pull myself in. A comical and ultimately fruitless effort. "No, no no, Mariem, comme ca." Aliune says. Then the man inside grabs my arms and Aliune pushes my feet up and I fairly fly into that empty coal car. I'm in. And while I could spend the whole ride standing, looking out over the open top, there is an empty space on top. Outside the very front of the car there is a small ledge that comfortable fits four. Imagine sitting on top of a semi-truck, only the truck has no roof and you have your right arm permanently hooked around the bar that runs across the top of the car. I'd always wanted to ride on one of these things.
There is a scene in the very last episode of M*A*S*H, when the 4077th is packing up and everyone is leaving, but there isn't enough room in the cars. Winchester, a pompous New England surgeon, had lost his place in the last Jeep because of all of Nurse Houlihan's possessions, so Sgt. Rizzo asks him if he minds riding out in the garbage truck, the last vehicle left. Winchester's response: "Not at all, what better way to leave a garbage dump."
I'm not saying that Jiddi was a garbage dump, far from it. Nor do I consider myself pompous, although I am from New England. But as I clung to the top of that camion and watched the village disappear behind me, I heard those words in my head and smiled. What better way to leave the village indeed.
So that's my last story, and now it's done. It feels, strange. I don't think the fact that I am leaving and not coming back, at least not for a long time, has really sunk in yet. Maybe when I'm in the air, or when I arrive in a land where "public restroom" doesn't mean "patch of sand against the nearest wall."
But after week in the capital city my feet have almost regained their original color. I think it is important to re assimilate in stages.
I'll probably put some more photos up later, but there are two new albums for ya'll to peruse:
But for now, the newbies are coming through town on their way to site visit and before I can meet them for lunch I have to finish the absolute mountain of paperwork Peace Corps requires me to complete before I am released on that beautiful Royal Air Maroc plane this evening. I'll probably have to kick some smirking white moor out of my window seat, and I must confess, I'm looking forward to it.
Thank you all for your support, your letters, and your packages full of Gatorade and candy. It's been great.
waddatik il mulana
amy
posted by amy at 10:26 AM
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