i arrived in asmara...

at 4:30 yesterday morning. immediately luck was on my side. instead of having to pay 150 nakfa for a cab and hoping to find a hotel that was open and had space, i heard someone call my name. tabby! it was terje, the vso program director. he cracked, "you weren't expecting me to be waiting for your arrival, were you?" i knew it couldn't be, the story was i had arrived on the same flight as the last of the new bunch of volunteers. lucky me. got a ride to town and terje let me stay in the guest house of his beautiful home. after i passed out for a few hours we lunched on smoked salmon and had a nice chat. terje reminded me that i was now the lone volunteer remaining in the western lowlands of eritrea. something that i have vaguely recognized before, but this was the first time terje brought it up with me.

the western lowlands and the northern areas of eritrea are considered to have general low-level security risk. there were a few volunteers along with me in different cities of the lowlands last year, but all the others have left due to personal security concerns following a series of bomb blasts.

the western lowlands are also the muslim-majority area of eritrea, whereas the highlands, where most of the volunteers are concentrated, are christian-majority. so what we see in effect is VSO pulling out of muslim areas while remaining in christian areas. terje and i both agree that this is structurally problematic. my question is how is this dynamic repeating that of former colonial powers woho favored their christian subjects over their muslim subjects? to his credit, terje has said before that if it gets to the point where VSO works in the christian highlands but not in the muslim lowlands, it's time to close up shop. i wonder how far we are from that point.


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September 20, 2004

no parking no standing no photography. no flour no sugar no milk. no petrol no cooking gas no kerosene. driving from terje's house to the center of town, the streets were empty. eerie. as there was no petrol. is no petrol. or to be more accurate, there is a shortage of petrol, as well as flour, sugar, milk, cooking gas and kerosene. internet has been non-functional for 7 out of the 9 days i have now been here. and the no parking no standing no photography, that's just what the signs outside the american embassy say.

i felt a bit electric my first few days back. a little bit more aware, more plugged in, more alive. last year i was dead. now i'm emptying a 40 over my former grave.

the present

i'm leaving. i'm leaving i'm leaving. on a midnight flight to asmara. going back to eri. tonight i fly.

in cairo, i didn't get the chance to stop and think, about anything at all really. sensation-overload. walking talking riding travelling eating sweating getting lost, not bothering to be found, flat-footed feet aching, self-torturing brain relaxing while i let my senses do the talking.

i attended many a musical event. i frequented many sheesha cafes. i met a lot of cool people. mostly non-egyptians, but not all. i got sucked into the social gravity of classmates, but didn't mind that much.

vacations like this can be fun, but you can't help feeling stupider when they're over.

i envied my teachers who had 10 students to a class. and thought how much easier my life in eritrea would be if i had the same demographics. but alas....i firmly tucked the thought of eritrea in bed at the back of my mind. when it occasionally cried awake i would shudder with fear and a touch of excitement, but then promptly shoosh it back to sleep.

i had ambitions of becoming a wandering whirling stratospheric daravish, travelling to india overland and not worrying about *what i'm going to do with my life.* because whether i like it or not, i'm doing it right now.

مساء الخير

i am late to the airport. late to catch my plane to leave this small town of 20 million people. i am sad.

they keep calling me

blogging from the internet cafe across the street from my flat in mohandeseen, cairo. it's 1am and i have at least 2 hours of homework sitting in front of me but i can't seem to stop going to the sheesha cafes and shooting the shit till 2 in the morning, coming home too exhausted to stay up for more than 20 minutes trying to do some work. this has become my routine lately and i think it's getting old. feel like i need some "alone time." i'll get plenty of that in agordat next month.

two nights ago i saw some daravishes in town getting closer to god than i've ever been. i've seen the mevlevi order of sufis "perform" before. but these guys were different, these guys were phenomenal (not to take anything away from the mevlevis).

there's something strange about turning religious devotion into spectacle, i have to say that. but the redeeming part is that admission is free. and that god damn these daravishes were something to see. "whirling dervishes" spin around in circles in harmony with the stars, planets, atoms and life in general as they meditate, often accompanied by music. monday night, the dancing and the music moved me in a way that i don't remember from a performance. maybe because it was more than a performance.

i think i've finally found my calling. i'm going to become a whirling daravish.

maybe i even believe in a soul again. or as my friend says, the physical is spiritual enough, what do you need a soul for?