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Life on the Wing: Traveling Pole to Pole with the Arctic Tern
Quarterly Report 2
Sept 11 - Dec 2, 2006
Third World Fall Passage:
Morocco, Senegal, South Africa
When I sat in Waverly Station, in London, waiting for the train that would carry me through France and Spain to Gibraltar (and to a boat bound for Tangiers), I felt a sense of relief at the thought of leaving the UK. The high cost of living in Scotland and England was not impossible or even very difficult on my tight budget, but it did require a constant vigilance over expenditures and expenses that was wearisome on some levels. Africa for me had an allure, a certain mysticism, that was fabricated (partially over-fabricated) in part by books I had read and movies I had seen, and was certain to be less expensive by Western standards than the UK. The thought of a lower cost of daily life alone was enough to bring a sigh of relief to my lips, sitting there in the train station. As Morocco was to be my first destination in Africa, it naturally dominated my hopes, worries, and excitement at the time. Conceived images of majestic desert-capes, searing mountains, and exotic markets vied for attention in my mind with thoughts of hardened knife-wielding criminals, unrelenting heat, and Islamic fundamentalism. The potential difficulties relating to language barriers also loomed, but I had purchased a French phrase book in Scotland and had been practicing fervently; I felt confident in the limited French abilities I had gained over such a short period of time. These then were my expectations and preconceptions.
In Morocco, as it turned out, I was overly cautious, overly timid, and too reliant on the words and experiences of other people to shape my own outlook and actions. My naivety and inexperience in regards to travelling alone in third world countries where the language spoken is not my own was, in hindsight, highly evident. The culture shock of being in a predominantly Muslim country during the month of Ramadan added to the difficulty I experienced while living and working in the country (though it also cultivated in me a deep fascination and interest in the Islamic religion). I learned an immense amount in Morocco - about myself, the world, the Muslim faith and Arab community, and travelling in general - but at no small price; I was often lonely and at times felt inhibited by own perceptions.
On a train from Tangiers to Marrakech, on my second day in the country, I met a woman from Australia travelling alone in the country, and her philosophy and methodology of travelling, common to most travellers experienced in spending time in third world countries, has been a model for me that I have since adopted and modified as my own. At the time, however - hearing of the way she arrived in Tangiers with no hotel booked in advance, no understanding of the language, and no companions to help her - I was in awe of her audacity and happy-go-lucky surety of the world being a good place and of the tendency of all things to work out OK. I had already begun to adopt a trust and faith in strangers and humanity that I would never have thought possible while in the US, but I still maintained these new feelings with a certain hesitation, a grain of salt. I had entered the same port city as the Australian women (on my first night in Morocco as well) with a hotel booked in advance, suspicious of everyone, and convinced that my bag would be slashed or my belongings taken at knife point. Though she lacked even an iota of the local languages, she had managed to bargain a full meal, complete with mint tea, down to an absurdly low price, and had eaten it on a grimy stool facing the main market street with its bustling vendors. I had managed only to find some bread, cheese, and juice, and had eaten it alone in my hotel room while watching Star Trek on TV. While she and other travellers I have since met have shown me what I see as a superior - albeit more hazardous, insecure, and uncertain - way to travel, I never completely learned to live by that philosophy until after I left Morocco.
The following is a summary of my ignorance: believing that using Agadir as a base for my project would be best, I made for the city directly (having only spent one night in Tangiers) and booked a hotel room there for almost my entire time in Morocco. Foolish, yes, but for an inexperienced traveller, forgivable. I should have taken several days to see the country on my way to Agadir and, upon arriving, should only have booked the hotel for a few days while I assessed the area and determined how to best conduct my project while in the region. All in all, the situation was fine, as the city was a good place for recuperating from a slightly debilitating stomach illness of unknown origins, and as the hotel manager spoke English and proved to be a useful, knowledgeable guide in possession of a car and friends who knew about birds (and particularly Arctic Terns).
Prior to departing for Senegal, I spent several days travelling to Casablanca and took the time to enjoy the city of Marrakech. I sat at tables in cheap open-air restaurants, eating harira, watching snake charmers lure their cobras from baskets with haunting flute music, and basking in the scent of unknown spices, and I found I had released many of my old fears and suspicions (and had become quite comfortable miles outside of my comfort zone). Thus is travelling a learning experience.
The French I had continued to learn in Morocco also carried me through Senegal, and the smattering of Arabic I had picked up as well was now coloured by a touch of Wolof. I stayed in Dakar with a friend of a friend for the duration of my time in Senegal, and though I would have liked to see more of the country (the options for going to places like the Gambia were slightly out of my budget), the time I spent with Sorif Ichola was truly invaluable. A man from Benin, Sorif had gone to University in Dakar and works now as a translator (he speaks English, French, Spanish, and some Wolof), often for pharmaceutical companies. A devout Muslim, he and his fiancée Sariyou were fasting in accordance with Ramadan for the entire time I spent with them. Sorif and Sariyouwere happy to share their simple 'breakfast' with me each day (at 10 pm), and I was thus able to experience cuisine from numerous parts of West Africa, including Benin, Cote d'Ivoire, Nigeria, and Senegal. Sorif and I spent many evenings on his small apartment balcony discussing Africa - its past, present and future; its political problems and the (possible) illusion of progress; the nature of economic development; and the after-effects of recently ended colonization.
During most days in Dakar, I worked in an area on the north coast of the Dakar peninsula, at a point that is considered to have the best seabird watching potential of the entire Atlantic Ocean. An ornithologist from Pennsylvania who had worked for many years in Dakar put me in touch with a reliable Senegalese taxi driver who took me to N'Gor each day (and to see other parts of the city on several occasions as well). By the end of my time in Dakar, the taxi driver and I had developed a close relationship, and I spent one of my last evenings in the area with his large family, sharing a meal with them in their small one-room apartment on the outskirts of the city.
The immense poverty of the city itself was in some ways overwhelming (it made Morocco seem like the first world at times), but the culture shock that had originated in Morocco was dwindling while I was in Senegal. The colour of my skin identified me as an outsider in Senegal, more so than in Morocco, but the only ramifications of this for daily life and interactions with other people was that it seemed to feed an expectation of charity in some individuals. At times I was approached not by people interested in begging or asking for food and money, but by those who felt that the assumed wealth in my possession was their right to own based on our perceived, unspoken respective social statuses. I would find a hand on my arm and turn to find not a beggar asking for food, but a scowling woman - children in attendance - demanding loudly and aggressively that I come immediately with her to buy dinner for her family. In the mind of people like this woman, there was no request or question for any assistance I could provide her. There was simply an order, a direct mandate that my apparently abundant assets should serve her purposes. Thus does the learning experience continue.
After the month and a half I spent in West Africa, the country of South Africa barely felt African, and at times seemed more like a European country. Despite the still obvious influence of the colonizing powers that had been established in this country, however, certain places (especially the Transkei and Wild Coast) seem to maintain a strong, distinct African feel. With enough money left in the first half of my year's budget, I was able to rent a car for the duration of my time in the country, and the freedom of movement that this allowed let me experience the region on a tremendous scale. Interestingly, the poverty of western Africa is reflected in South Africa, though among a smaller percentage of the population. One might think that crime targeting tourists (unofficial redistribution of wealth as some call it) would be greater in western Africa, where more people live below the poverty line. It seems however that in South Africa, where a large gap between rich and poor has persisted for some time (pre- and post-apartheid) and has cultivated some feelings of resentment among poorer people, acts of violence against outsiders and those with perceived wealth are more common than in places like Morocco or Senegal.
In South Africa I drove along the entire coast from Durban to Cape Town, and returned to Johannesburg via the central part of the country and the Karoo. I achieved a balance between work and play, between doing those things for my project and those not for my project (though the line is often grey), that I now think I had been searching for since I began this year. I have gained an immense sense of the South African people - their history, culture, and languages - and was able to conduct my project brilliantly. Being in an English-speaking country again was a relief on some levels and is surely one reason that my time in South Africa was as enjoyable and productive as it was.
In terms of perspective, South Africa was interesting for another reason as well. While in the country, I met and travelled with another Watson Fellow for several days, and was in contact with several others who had been there, were currently working there, or were en route to the country. Being allowed to experience or glimpse a passion in others for something completely foreign but equal in depth and fervency to my own was incredible. In Durban, after accompanying me to an interview with a bird researcher and a river mouth site for conducting tern counts, Alex Cheney brought me to a surf shop so I could see how surfboards are formed and shaped. Passionate people with a burning interest in different aspects of the world can easily feed off of each other's obsessions.
While the remainder of my year – in South America, the Caribbean, and Canada - will undoubtedly be complete with its joys and sorrows, its easy paths and subsequent rougher roads, I feel I have passed through the most difficult aspect of my journey. As an independent traveller experiencing the world and allowing the world experience me, I have a stronger sense of self and confidence now, and a broader understanding of exactly what it is to pass through the world - at certain times a casual observer, and at others, an active participant. I have left and will continue to leave an impact on Africa, through the people I met and the relationships I formed there, and Africa – the experiences I had and the continual informal education to which I was subjected - will certainly continue to affect me and the paths I follow. Paradoxically I am at the same time a more humble and yet prouder person, and often feel rich with the wisdom I have gained. My time in Africa exceeded expectations in the sense that it defied and belittled all expectations I was able to conceive prior to arriving in the country, and this perhaps was the most important lesson I learned from my time in that continent: travelling with a mind like a blank canvas can be infinitely more rewarding than experiencing a new place with a picture of that locale already half drawn.
My time in Africa could fill volumes, but it is noon in the southern most city in South American (and the world), the sun is shining, and the smell of empanadas is a stark reminder that breakfast came and went several hours ago. I bid you all ado.
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