June 24
As no taxi driver wanted to take us the apparently tiny distance from our hotel to the Tunis bus station, we set out on foot in more or less the right direction. As it turns out, what should have been a 30-minute stroll turned into a sweltering 90-minute hike with our big packs on our backs and our daypacks on our stomachs. It was just as well really, and we ended up with a pedestrian’s view of the city — gleaned through the sweat streaming down our foreheads and into our eyes but nonetheless beautiful. Weighed down by too many water bottles, we gave a bottle and P’s Orangina to some kids playing soccer in a park. They were happy with the water, but you’d have thought the Orangina was gold by the way they chased the kid with the bottle.
Eventually we made our way to the station, bought ourselves three tickets for the 7-hour bus ride across Tunisia to the small city of Tozeur, a popular launching point for Saharan excursions and a hell of a lot hotter than Tunis.
By the time the bus leaves three hours later, we have found seats at the back — or rather, we’ve found padded pieces of plywood that were surely bolted down at some point, but that now shift erratically with every other bump in the road. The bus took us through rural Tunisia — where *real* Tunisians live — and gave as a look at both the extreme poverty and the incredible beauty of the countryside.
A passenger named Hafsa makes conversation with P, but his patchy Arabic and her almost complete lack of English and French make the conversation a little difficult. At a rest stop about 3 1/2 hours into the ride, she helps us order spicy chicken sandwiches and buys us a big box of pastries as a welcome gift to Tunisia. I have to admit, my Western alarm bells started ringing a little at this point, and I don’t quite know what to make of her ultra-liberal clothes, but she seemed sincere, and didn’t seem too adamant about her requests for us to visit her tourist shop in Tozeur…
Hafsa tells us she’s from Tunis, and that (amazingly for this part of the world) she lives with her boyfriend — and at the tender age of 21, no less. She and her sister moved to Tozeur to open up a tourist trap and sell fake Lacoste polo shirts, attracted by low rental costs and competition for tourists that’s apparently nowhere near what it is in Tunis.
She escorts us to our hotel and won’t take a dime for the cab ride over before she hops back in and heads home, with promises to show us around, help us haggle and keep us out of trouble. We go to bed hoping she doesn’t cause us more trouble than she promises to help us avoid.
June 25
The next day, we head dutifully to Hafsa’s shop — still wary of tourist-trappery but happy to have a guide just the same. We make plans to have coffee at a hotel down the road that evening, and set out to explore Tozeur.
The town is an oasis in the desert — all dust and palm trees and conservative-minded people who look like they work as hard as is possible in this blinding heat. On the two main tourist roads, we’re assailed by caleche-drivers and headscarf merchants, but everywhere else it’s just friendly “bonjours” from everyone under 25 that we pass on the street, as we’re quietly ignored by everyone else. Even more than in rural India, the women seem kept out of sight — aside from the occasional woman riding in a taxi or working in a restaurant, you might think that every inhabitant of Tozeur is male.
Later that evening, we meet up for coffee with Hafsa and her sister Zainab at the Oasis hotel, a chic-looking place with a poolside cafe and a fully stocked bar — another rarity for a very conservative town in this part of the world. Both girls are dressed to the nines, Western-style, and when Zainab’s phone rings, I’m amazed to see her pull a $700 Samsung out of her designer purse. My lack of Arabic keeps me out of the conversation for the most part, but the gist I get from R is that both girls have vacationed in Lebanon and the Ivory Coast, have more money than they know what to do with, and apparently haven’t accepted a nickel from their family… The three of us exchange looks as we wonder how exactly they can afford their lifestyle, but happily accept their offer to show us around tomorrow…
That’s all for now — more on our 4X4 excursion into the Sahara later. BTW, I’ve still got no way to upload photos to this site, but those of you who know me can find some new ones on Facebook…
1 response so far ↓
1 Fattsimous // Jul 2, 2009 at 6:22 pm
uumm.. Can you tell these ladies there is a Hot Arab man in China in need of film investment! I’m happy to visit them and satisfy all their curiosities! or something ..
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