mali 4: embarkation from mopti
so, the next three days in the series sort of blend together, as we spent them all on the aforementioned cargo pinasse in an area about 10' by 6' full of cement and millet sacks. in theory, the grain sacks are moldable and, carefully laid as they are, create something of a flat floor surface upon which you can sleep, eat, etc. in reality, they are a treacherous geography of crevices and pits in which you are constantly stepping and, when sleeping, rolling, which forces your body to take the same kinks as the gap between the millet sacks. so, one of the reasons why all the days blend together, besides the obvious fact that the river scenery was pretty consistent, is that i didn't get any sleep the whole time. but it's all good, because this guy had an automatic weapon stiched to the back of his jean vest.
so, when we booked passage on the pinasse, the touts (or travel agents, such as they were) assured us that this was the only boat leaving tuesday, which is what we needed, and further warned us that the boat would be full and leave at 10am sharp. so, we had to get up early, get into mopti and buy supplies, including cases of water satchets. well, i don't know why we listened to this warning in a part of the world where time literally has 0 meaning, at least as we understand it by DC standards. at least we didn't miss the boat. i mean, we didn't miss it by a long shot. i think we set off sometime past 3 pm, which, all things considered, wasn't too bad. mainly, it gave sarah ample time to flag down a passing pirogue, and get him to take her straight from the side of our boat to the bar across the harbor for cold cokes.
loading the boat was interesting, because it, like everything, is done by manual labor. they started off running a plank into shore up which people could walk without getting wet - then, because no one else profits from the plank, they pulled it in and all those pirogues swept into the breach, maybe five deep between the boat and the landing. so, now you either had to walk in water up to your chest and hoist yourself up into the pinasse, or you could pay each of the intervening pirogues like 5 cents to allow you to step in their boat and cross. in this context, people were loading these 100kg sacks of millet, motorcycles, sacks of charcoal, foam pads, luggage, braziers full of hot coals, and various other things.
eventually we got underway, and celebrated by climbing up on the roof of the boat and smoking a cigar. once out of mopti even a little distance, the scenery was amazing, very green, punctuated by small mud towns and people in small boats. on the roof of the boat, we made friends with the gendarmes, who told us, in confidence, that they had stashed some automatic weapons on board to protect the boat in case of any pirates. so, when they asked for by address so that we could become penpals, i actually gave them the address of the republican flophouse. justin, who got sandwiched, may not have had such a ready excuse.
posted by Jon @ 16:22
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