khartoum

Life in Khartoum for expats seems to be a far cry from a hardship post. Well, if you are hooked up with the right social coordinator in any case.

I think I will need to devote hours to posting about my visit here to Sudan. For the sake of brevity and not having the hours to invest I will highlight.

Arrived back Thursday on the Sudan Airways flight. Jamal sat next to me. He is a CEO for a banking services-related company. He expects ATMs and credit cards to be up and going within six months. Holly is sceptical on the credit cards as there is still an embargo from the US and Visa and MC are American.

Holly and Kirsty (real spelling is Scottish and I don't know it) picked me up. Excellent timing since I had only carry on...walking out I found them walking in.

We swung by Jesus and Maria Inez's place to see their new shisha pipe. Beers were immediately thrust into my hands and snacks were offered. I had only had food on the airplane all day, so I was happy to have something to eat.

Back at the homestead we got ready to go out for the big night. Holly put the kids to bed and we went back to the pilots' house where Jesus and Maria Inez were hosting a little fiesta.

Most of the pilots are young South Africans. We scoffed down some Venezualian tacos. Patrick showed up rather tipsy from his diplomatic function at the Swiss residence. Got a little uppity with Holly so just the two of us carried on to the Pickwick Pub at the British Embassy.

We were on Rupert's list. I was number three, Holly, of course, was number ONE! Inside the pub is the pool house, so I felt like I was on middle-aged spring break sipping my Strongbow sitting on the wooden storage crates. I chatted with Malou, the Filippina married to an Iraqui, living in Khartoum whose sis-in-law is Amra, now in Stockholm.

I also chatted with a bunch of people including the Norwegian husband of Elisabeth, the Norwegian Consul. Discussed the culture of haggling and the effects of expats on the local economies.

The gang carried on to the GOAL party. GOAL is an Irish humanitarian aid agency which is rather well-respected as their workers don't have the overly fat salaries the rest of the NGOs enjoy. Note to self, look up donating to them.

The gang was made up of: Me, Holly, Paul (who was supposed to go home) Terry, the diver/PE teacher at KICKs, Louise the hillarous, tall Englishwoman and her hubby, Melanie, the newly arrived American and Dave.

Being on a list is critical for entry to parties in Khartoum these days. We weren't. But someone Holly did her magic and the gang of us were admitted into the Khartoum resemblance of the college/frat party of UMass. Wall-to-wall people carrying drinks and grooving. The only real upgrade was that there was some food left over --that wasn't just chips.

Several of the Pickwick people were at GOAL...and despite my brief existence in Khartoum, I was recognizing people.

Apparently this was a unique experience from an Americans-in-Khartoum thing. There were about 10 of us. According to Holly, she is nearly always the only American.

Conditions were similar to what one would expect from a college party. Drunkeness, flirtations, hilarity over the most benign events and observations of couch groping as Louise, Terry and Omar gave play-by-play. All in all...a load of fun. Jesus even brought his unbattered pinata from his party. He bashed it a few times, the candy poured out...

And we have incriminating evidence on my camera.

4pm and we finally stumbled home. The day after...expedition to the Nile.

Patrick put together all the camping gear and provisions for our night under the stars.

We drove a bit over an hour south. It wasn't the wild desert, but we had dunes at the bank of the White Nile. The Frech contingency were already set up like a family bar-b-que and we settled in allowing them to cater to us. Both Holly and I were a bit slow after our long, drunken evening.

The French crowd was, Laurence and Patrice whom I had met the Friday before. Sondrine and Frederic, Sophie and Franc and their collective hoard of children...all of whom were lovely.

I borrowed a kayak and paddled up and down the broad river, which is likly about 10km across at this point. It is just upriver of a damn.

Locals wandered past every once in a while and little gatherings of spectators observed from time to time. My first encounter with a camel got me all exited. I herded it back past the camp. The rest were unimpressed. As the trains of camels and the packs of them continued to pass by I realized that camels grazing past were as common as squirrels on the Boston Common.

Our sleeping arrangements were set up to be sheltered from the wind which was kicking up. My tent lacked the rods or any type of shelter, so besides the false sense of enclosure, I was sleeping on an airmattress in a mosquito net. But any crawlies could very well have cuddled up with me.

And crawlies were indeed found under the tents of the others'. Two scorpions and a dozen of large scarabs. Maybe they attracted them all or I got up early enough to not be attractive to the critters in their search to escape the blistering sun and heat.

Drinking is standard amusement. Everyone acknowledges the over-consumption by people posted abroad. It is the forbidden fruit that the diplomats have a direct line to. So beers were flowing the day after even though I had passed on the Cuba libres the night before.

We had a nice talk with a young camel herder. He let us take pictures and talked his few words of English.

Falucas were dragged up the river to set sail (blue tarp) to catch the wind to cross the Nile to cast their nets.

The road home was more "digestable" since I had seen it once, and now we were returning from the outer reaches to the center. Will post more on that later.

off to the port

Patrick, the man, set everything up for me. I am leaving on today's 3pm flight to Port Sudan. Henri, the Belgian, will pick me up, or have Ali pick me up. Henri seems to run the sudandiversonline.com dive company set up through the Hilton.

Looks like it will just be the two of us diving. Henri says we'll do some exploratory diving. Wow, the thought of diving where no one has dived before. I feel like I am on the Star Trek or better yet, the Calypso.

Custeau's underwater marine experiment is still in place. It will be a dive I must insist on. It's touted as the Holy Grail of diving for divers. I can't miss out.

Things are much easier than I anticipated here in Sudan. Most things are readily available, malaria in the north seems to be rare and no one is staring at me as a weirdo being an unaccompanied woman in western clothes.

Women drive. I've seen several today.

khartoum arrival

Within hours of arrival i was at a french embassy party with patrick. Everyone thought I was Holly since I was with Patrick and I have long dark hair. It's not the first time that people have mistaken us as looking similar.

Khartoum is much more developed than I would have imagined. Patrick says the new roads were not here two years ago. You understand why they have a Nissan Patrol SUV here. Some roads are just dirt paths.

Terry, a friend of Holly's, came by to sort me out for diving. Now some of the paper work is done and if all goes well I will be on a flight tomorrow afternoon to Port Sudan.

Paperwork is a necessary evil. Patrick has started the process with my registration and sent stuff to the port to get the permit i need there for going off the shore.

The beef here is amazingly good. So tender and tastey. I don't want to eat anything else.

like a fish in a tank

I donned scuba gear last night for the first time in three years. I went to Högdals Sport & Idrottshall to test my regulator with its new battery as of yesterday.

In some ways it was a familiar task that just needed a refresher. In other ways I felt like a fish out of water.

There were two big groups doing their second pool dive for their Padi course. I watched them do their drills of emptying their masks, weightbelts and even the whole BCD. I practiced removing my mask...and boy did it feel odd to be maskless underwater. Johan has the right idea to do that once in a while in controlled conditions. It can be unnerving. Throwing off your second stage too reminds you of where you are and not to let panic set in.

And now my right ear is still funny. I hope it clears up by Friday's flight.

winter still has a firm grip

This morning the thermometer read -11.5 C. It's March 7th. Last week we had snow nearly every day and Sunday we were nearly snowed in up in Gryttjom.

While I long for the spring, I find that I'm pleased by the extended winter. The sky today is clear blue and the air is crisp...and Stockholm sparkles in its fluffy white powder cover.

Often this time of year all you get is slush and dirtied snow that's been lying around for weeks.

The best part is that the days are so much longer. We're coming up on the equinox, so we have daylight past 5pm now. In two-weeks time we'll be on the "winning side of the half year."

Welcome brightness.