Grab your stash of meds, because we are on the road again.
You know what happens when you are an expat living in Africa? You somehow accumulate a stash of prescription and non-prescription drugs that put you in direct competition with the local pharmacy.
As soon as I told an American doctor that I was moving to Africa, he started throwing bottles of Imodium and emergency Cipro my way “just in case”. This afternoon I was reminded of all this as I once again placed a cocktail of various stomach-fortifying meds into one consolidated bottle.
When traveling in Africa, I am no fool; I’m always armed and ready to do battle with the microbial organisms that will invariably sneak their way into my intestines while out on the road. As I get older, I have deemed it wise to play my life with far more conservatism than I did back in third grade on the Oregon Trail.
But I didn’t sit down to tell you about my upcoming bouts with the Hollywood Diet. Instead, I wanted to post two short videos that come from the Dakar airport. They aren’t exactly Oscar-worthy, but I wanted to capture a bit of what it is like to arrive into Dakar on an average day.
The Dakar airport is a bit of an obstacle course, and it starts the moment that the plane lands. I know that I have covered this experience in a previous posting, and maybe someday I’ll go find it and link the entry here. For now, suffice it so say that my first foray into Africa was through Léopold Sédar Senghor Airport here in Dakar. I had no embassy people to come and get me, no hired expediters to grab my bags and weave me through the buzzing crowd at that ungodly morning hour.
And really, I’m pretty glad that I had it this way.
I remember making it through customs and looking at the zoo of people around me- all are jockeying for position near the luggage belt. It’s three in the morning, and I am amazed at the show going on as I wonder how I am ever going to retrieve and drag my bag past the sea of people crowded in the small luggage collection area. People are sitting on the floor, while others are doing the typical “personal space does not exist” maneuver as they hurdle over carts and families in chase of a 100 pound bag that is quickly going back outside again….and will surely not come back around for a deuxième tour.
“Well this place is a friggin’ circus!” was my thought as I laughed to myself. My second thought was “Ha ha- I’m going to live here.” Yes, I’m a spoiled toubab- but with my humor and patience in tact, I learned how to place and enjoy the game quite quickly.
My flight from the other night got in at the same time as two other international flights. This kind of sucks in general, but it was amplified with only one of the two existing luggage belts in operation. By the time I had broken out my camera, a lot of people were gone- but you get the idea of what airport time is like.
The other video that I have is from the other night as well. I wanted to give you a window into what it is like to arrive in Dakar as most people do. It’s dark, people are selling you phone cards, or it can just be eerily dark and peaceful. I think people saw me videotaping and didn’t know what to think. I also do so much traveling these days that they are probably starting to recognize me.
Yes it’s dark. That’s kind of the point. And this is normal lighting- no power outages were experienced.
I don’t know, you might not find these two snippets of video as interesting as I do. I kind of like how things flow here, now that I have been learning the system for the past year and a half. Don’t get me wrong, I still pine for the days of the Changi airport- and hell, maybe even Logan airport- but for now I will just work on getting my ass out the door and onto my flight tonight. We’ll see what comedy presents itself.
