Fathom: Weekend Diversion
My friend Pavia has a new travel-related website, Fathom, and it's terrific. She just posted a piece I wrote about a trip to Africa I took a few years ago. And, well, there's a limit to the amount of politics any of us can take, right? Especially on the weekend.
Here's how it starts:
OUAGANDOUGOU, Burkina Faso – Finding your way around Ouagadougou, the capital of Burkina Faso, should be easy to do. Wide, ramshackle boulevards radiate from plazas and monuments — this is French Africa, after all — and even the hovel-lined dirt alleys are organized into a relentless grid. Buzzards perch on top of the street lamps that line the avenues, making you feel, as you drive down the street, like a float in a creepy parade.
The trouble starts at night. The milky layer of wood smoke and dust that during the day creates a bustling charm, at night becomes a vaguely alarming, eye-watering fog. And forget the street lamps. The best they'll do is flicker. So if you're driving around the city in a taxi, as I was, with an address in your pocket for a place you were told showcases live music and cold beer, be prepared to drive around awhile.
My friends and I wanted to hear some music and drink some beer because we wanted to chill a bit, after the previous night's exorcism.
Correct. An exorcism. We had spent the first part of the week in a remote village. Apparently, a week or so before we were there, a young girl from the village had been possessed by demons, and the village turned out that night to chant, sing, drum, and generally mill around the blindfolded girl, who sat in the center a circle of other chanting, singing village girls. It was a party atmosphere. A spooky, party atmosphere.
We stood along the edge of the circle, nodding respectfully at the unfolding event. Even with a full moon, the Saharan sky is spangled with stars, so we could easily make out the stricken girl swaying and weaving to the drums. And, as long as you didn't include the battered Toyota Land Cruiser in your field of vision, it could have been a sight from any time in the past 400 years. You could just as easily have been a French explorer from the 19th century, trudging across the desert towards Lake Chad.
The rest of it is here -- though be forewarned: if you've got any kind of love for travel, it's a site you'll get lost in.
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May '10
Re: Fathom: Weekend Diversion
Small world! A friend of mine from college who ended up marrying my sister from another mister (so I guess he's now my brothah from anothah mothah) grew up in Burkina Faso. Back then it was called Upper Volta. He probably saw his share of exorcism, too, since his parents were missionaries.