Portrait of the Sleep Deprived

Many would argue that people grow old when they start spending more time on remebering their past than planning their future. And despite the fact that planning is (and always has been) currently on the top of my “to-do” list, it crossed my mind that i have recently passed a pretty big landmark.

It’s been 10 years of what i call “conscious living”, a period during which i was pretty free to steer my life to the direction i wanted. Or what i thought i wanted at the time. And before the “getting older” melancholy kicks in, i would like to share some photos of this past decase (sort of since i got my first digital cam in 2002).

Enjoy the first batch (2008-2010)!

Ah…Kenya…The land of coffee and long distance runners. Also an ex-english colony, extremely dry, yet vast and breathtaking savannahs. To be honest Kenya was full of surprises. First of all everyone (about 90%) is english speaking. Probably due to the colonization effect, all signs, posters, press and food packaging is in English. So getting around is pretty easy, hence the tourism explosion the past couple of years. Kenya just went through a peaceful referendum (contrasting the not so peaceful last elections) voting for a new British-free constitution.  Yes, after a long time of practically milking a country the british decided they had enough with the tropics and went back to their climatically challenged country. The constant rain showers and the crow surplus seemed somehow more appealing to the british conquerors, making them leave the lions and the coffee to their rightful owners. Behind them they left their bad bad habits though, things like driving on the left side of the road, mirror images of european faucets and screws and tea. It’s interesting how in kenya is rather hard if not impossible to find a decent cup of coffee. When I asked for a coffee in a plastic cup *to go* what i got was a coca cola. yes. a cold coke at 9 a.m. It’s as if people have no idea they even produce coffee, so tea it is for them. Something like 90%-95% of coffee production is exported to Europe (not the UK of course).What the british did not leave behind them though is tarmac. Kenya has serious road issues, as in they have no roads. At least nothing like the british roads.Don’t trust the locals regarding distances and things like “so how long will it take me to get to Y from X”, Kenyans have a weird sense of the space time continuum. You can tell by the way they drive.

So the Chinese decided to lend a helpful hand and actually make roads for them, yes, brand new roads all around the country, the Chinese are putting down hot new steamy tarmac for the people. In return they ask..hmm…well the obvious answer is ‘OIL’ but according to an ambassador here in Kenya, what the chinese asked for was “room for research”. And by that our eastern friends mean, everything. The chinese are contracting the whole country, building hotels, roads, bridges, buildings, houses and many many more. And in return they get, oil, gold, stones (not the rolling ones, the people of Mao prefer the precious kind), water, land and who knows what else. Our noodle loving, spring roll eating friends are also contracting works in Sudan, Congo, Ethiopia, Tanzania, Malawi, Rwanda, Uganda and well probably each and every country in the African continent. And in return they get, as we said, everything. But enough with the chinese and their plans for world domination. Kenya faces a very serious problem and that is water. Water is a major issue here. Is and has been for many years now, it’s been such an issue that companies from all around the world ran here to help the Kenyans drill holes deep into the ground to find water. Those holes are called boreholes and it’s a pretty old technique they have been using. What you do is dig a hole ranging from 20 to 600 meters hoping you’ll hit water (and usually you do) and then build a pump on top of it, either machine driven or the good ol’fashioned manual way. Then you have enough water to drink, irrigate and feed your animals. Oh there are ways and ways to do that. Ways and ways to go deep into the earth’s crust and make water come up and it’s not that hard. It used to be common knowledge but apparently somewhere between getting colonized and people dying of AIDS, knowledge got lost along the way. However for the friendly price of $25.000 you could hire someone to drill a hole for you. Yes, that’s right. $25.000 for a hole in the ground and i must say that water is priceless but it sounds a bit absurd to pay someone that cash for just a hole. And here’s a paradox : Those countries have been full of NGO’s  big and small for the past 20 years or so. Yet, no initiative to educate locals regarding techniques, methods or ways to drill and pump themselves.

It’s been about a week since we entered Ethiopian ground and finally got to the border with Kenya. A week’s time is not even remotely enough to get to see a medium size town, let alone a whole country. Northern Ethiopia is a blessed place, blessed with green, water, food, life and every little bit of beauty all together in one place.

UNICEF this

Interesting things happened in Ethiopia. Controversial, yet interesting on an intellectual level. If you ever find yourself driving down Ethiopia you are likely to come across people on the side of the road. Ethiopia is filled with people, filled to the neck with people of all ages and kinds, so many people chances are you will never find yourself alone. Especially if you are the white man. This is not necessarily a bad thing, not if you like company and being surrounded by people looking in the keenest of ways. Ethiopia is far far different from those dramatic UNICEF ads back from the 80′s. In fact it’s so different that I have started believing that UNICEF was actually trying to make Ethiopia look like their posters. The NGO melting pot. The cream of the crop of “non-profits” is there for them. A whole list of collectives trying to “develop” the poor Ethiopians, the mecca of volunteerism, all staged at 2500 meters above sea level. If you are an aspiring volunteer or if you feel you can offer to the greater good of Ethiopia and you are not african then Ethiopia is the place for you, starving children, sick men, pregnant women, ill elders, dental issues, flooded huts, a proving ground for donators, volunteers and well…I don’t know…maybe I’m just ranting or maybe I’m just crude. Truth is we have put Ethiopia on stilts, we shot it with an AK and kicked it when it’s down, but we sent doctors and *aid*. All different kinds of aid, food, medics, teachers, professors, specialists, organizations, everything. And now we’re developing it, or at least we’re trying, we’re doing our best to sell tractors to the rural Ethiopians, pesticides for their plantations, get them hooked up on electricity, petrol and detergents.

AK free

Going back to the stilts we put this country on, if you do find yourself there, there is no way you will miss the kids asking for money. And I say asking, not begging because they are not beggars. They *ask* for money, pens, shoes, clothes, your trash, an empty bottle, your car, your sunglasses, half a napkin, *anything*. Literally, anything. Kids will run after your car shouting “Give me something!” which is in it’s own perverted way hilarious, not “Hello” or “Hi” or ask for your phone number, they will ask you to give them something. Funny thing is that older people, brothers, sisters etc will try to put them back in line but kids will always be kids and the vicious circle continues. Needless to say kids copy behavior, a 3 year old kid does not have the capacity to comprehend money nor asking strangers for it. So the question is…if Ethiopia in 2010 is underdeveloped and completely rural how the heck a 3 year old knows what money is?

Kenyan Sunset

I object to the slaying of this country by NGO’s, NPO’s and all sorts of initialized bullshit cover up crap we have invented to take advantage of their unlimited wealth and resources. I object to the conversion of generations and generations of people into UNICEF whores, we should seriously consider voting for taking each and every one of those blood sucking scum out of this country, stop teaching people to depend on a specific way of life. The biggest help we could offer is let them be, they don’t need you or me to be happy, wealthy, healthy or prosperous. What we could do is mind our own effing business or at least be straight forward with our intentions.

Inn

On  Tuesday August 3^rd,   we reached the eastern borders of Sudan to Ethiopia.  Sudan side calls the land of crossing Galabat, the Ethiopian side embraces the name Metema. Worth noting it’s the only crossing to Ethiopia from Sudan.  The borders were an inbred of chaos and randomness. It is interesting  how the border office “building” (and building is a very generous term for the hut-like office) have no access to the power grid of Sudan, nor Ethiopia’s. Therefore the borders close down at 6pm. The randomness reaches a whole new level while there is actually power grid pylons right next to the offices.  If you get stuck between the two countries  you are bound to stay exactly where your feet stand till the break of dawn (around 6am) when you can continue the surreal task of crossing.

Tape recorder

Bureaucratic procedures finished at around 8pm local time,  leaving us with little choice of whether to start our journey in the unknown  territory in complete darkness or spend the night in  Metema, the Sudanese truck driver’s delight . Whores, alcohol and mud are the three main characteristics of Metema during rain season.

I woke up after maybe 2 or 3 hours of sleep in totaL. The truck driver’s inn, offered more beer / less comfort for the hefty price of $1 a beer and $10 for a single bed.  Packed my stuff and got into the car, slept for maybe another hour or so.

Hut & Tree

My day started for the second time with a splitting headache, in desperate need of a relieving piss and a good breakfast. Instead I found myself in the middle of deep green canyons, rolling hills ,waterfalls and drizzling meadows of the finest short grass. It was July 27^th, 2002, and as far as I was concerned I was not awake yet.

Nile Springs / First Falls

13 months of sunshine and a whole country staged on a 2500 meters high plateau is a very very different game. Time rolls differently here.

Little boy

Woman carrying lumber to the top of the gorge

Shepherdess

Κινδυνεύοντας να μετατραπεί το blog σε τουριστικό οδηγό, θα γράψω και εγω μια συντομη ανταπόκριση απο το νησί των Παξών. Άλλωστε καλοκαίρι είναι και δεν νοείται καλοκαίρι χωρίς γέυση ήλιου, θάλασσας και χωριάτικης σαλάτας. Και μάλλον όσοι μας διαβάζουν θα βρίσκονται μακρια απο όλα αυτά τα όμορφα.

Μετα απο 11 ώρες στο δρομο και στο φερρυ, φτάσαμε χθες στους Παξούς. Πρώτο μέλημα να στήσουμε σκηνές μακρια απο φίδια – σαύρες και λοιπα μέλη της αγαπητής οικογένειας των συμπαθέστατων ερπετών. Προς το παρόν δεν έχουμε κάποια συνάντηση οπότε όλα καλα στον τομέα αυτό που ήταν και το βασικο άγχος της εκδρομής.

Οι σκηνές στήθηκαν ευκολα χωρίς ιδιαίτερα προβλήματα σε έναν ελαιώνα ο οποιος τα καλοκαίρια φιλοξενεί κατασκηνωτές.

Ησυχία-τάξη-ασφάλεια λοιπόν και η ώρα περνά ανέμελα με την κόυραση του χειμώνα να κατρακυλά και να χάνεται μεταξύ σκηνής και παραλίας. Απλά πράγματα: ξάπλα, μπάνιο, κονσερβες με φρεσκια σαλάτα και δροσερά φρούτα βοηθούν στη χαλάρωση.

Οι επόμενες μέρες θα κυλήσουν στο ίδιο περίπου μοτίβο με τον υπογράφοντα να βρίσκει κάθε μερα και περισσότερο τον εαυτό του. Τελικά το τι έχει αξία στη ζωή είναι μια ατελείωτη κουβέντα, ένα θέμα που έχω σκοπό να γράψω κσ´ποια στιγμή στο μέλλον.

Μέχρι τότε θα χαλαρώνω κάτω απ´ τον γενναιόδωρο ίσκιο της ελιάς και θα ταξιδεύω με τις νότες του Θανάσση…

I believe it’s essential to clearly describe what has been up to now, August 1st, for the sake of story telling. What has lead the way to the capital of Sudan and the middle (?) of the African continent. So it would be wise to describe the route so far and the route to come.

But before I would like to be a proper westerner and neglect my ignorance (so far) and say that little had I known about the African continent and the countries within it. Yes we all hear about how Africa needs help from the civilized west and how Africa and it’s inhabitants need to develop and so on and so forth. The central northern countries of this continent have been blessed (and cursed at the same time) with a gift of great proportions called the Nile river. The Nile river  is more like two rivers, the Blue Nile and the White Nile, both meeting in Khartoum and flowing north towards Egypt. To my childish understanding and westernized way of thinking, this river is similar to the pulmonary artery in our body, connecting the heart to the lungs, giving life to our body, making us stand on our feet, walk, eat, talk and think. Same way the nile, provides life to the countries it runs through giving life to the desert, making the soil pulse with life, it gives life to the people, food, water, oxygen and hope. The Nile is very important indeed. So important that if you were to say “conquer” these countries, you would only have to control this vein. Man has managed to tame the force of this fierce river, man has built dams on the Nile, man has made irrigation canals and man has built hotels on the Nile. Man has seen profit in the Nile. But which man?

Behold the Merowe Dam. The largest hydroelectric plant in Africa. A marvel of engineering, no pun intended, a massive construction with jaw dropping proportions. A monster of 1250 MW. To my western eyes this dam was by far the biggest dam I had ever seen. The Merowe dam has been a point of conflict for many years, for the same reasons many other dams have been : Resettlement, climate changes, control of power etc etc. It resides near Merowe, a small city about 40 km from the site. Merowe is a poor city, Sudan is a poor country and by poor we mean money poor, resource wealthy. The dam was built by the Chinese, the French, the Germans and some out-of-this-universe-wealthy Arabs. Funny how oil just came into play.

It doesn’t take long to figure the equation running this “poor” country. Sudan though has oil. A lot of oil. Why would the Arabs finance a hydroelectric project in an oil producing country?

We got to visit more than 5 towns on our way to Khartoum. All bloody poor. Khartoum is a parody of a big city, an ugly attempt to westernize a culture, the past couple of years banks have crawled up in the center of this madness building skyscrapers, while people literally live on less than 200 USD a month. Merowe feeds Khartoum with about 1 GW of power taking up more than 2/3 of the total dam output, yet there are no streetlights, large neon signs, hotels or anything extremely power demanding. Khartoum is though a big city, chaotic and consuming.

It’s funny how everything in Sudan is “made in China”. Fans, air-conditioning units, food, cloth, appliances, everything. Water is french, or to be fair water is french as well. There is a great deal of capital moving going on, and it’s easy to tell but pennies are left to the people. About 85% live under poverty levels. People here are poor. And when I say poor, I mean really really really poor. The people of Sudan are an amazing cast of people, be it the religion, be it the 20 year last war, be it their beautiful country, people here live the best way they can. We met a whole bunch of people, I have not been as welcomed not even in my own country, not even in western countries, not even close. People here offer you their house, food and bed. And they ask for nothing in return.

Africa right now is being globalized. Taking advantage of the inherit flaw of greed, the west (and by west I mean the movement and not America) has managed to start converting this last piece of earth into an incubatory of slaves and corruption.

And off to Ethiopia now…we’ll be leaving in two days. In search of God knows what. It’s a strange world we’re living in.

miKrobe.

Ghosts and trains

It’s been a while since we had access to an up-to-date standards internet connection. So we entered Sudan. A massive country, beautiful, volatile and tormented by wars, famine and well…heat. Yes, heat. By average (our experiences average) Sudan rates at about 45 Celsius with a maximum of 50 degrees.

A bureaucracy paradise, with no trash management policies and systems. Tourism is a newly introduced term and serious western “affiliations” issues.

Sudan is beautiful and by beautiful I mean wild, vast, full of colors and different tastes. People here simply live. They live by whatever means their government allows them to. It’s hard to be living in an about 90% Islamic country, and by Islamic I refer to the hardcore, 5-times-a-day-we-pray, no-alcohol Islam…

We arrived in Wadi Halfa, the new Halfa. The old Halfa was drowned by the Nile, leaving the people of the small village in search of new land to home their families. Wadi Halfa is small. Tiny. We stayed there for a couple of days waiting for our cars to arrive, giving us the chance to meet with locals, visit the market .

After about 1000 klms. and many stops, we have arrived to Khartoum. The capital. Not much different to the small village of Halfa. Only huge… Still streets filled with trash, people everywhere, dirty as hell and the smell of fried fish and falafel lingering everywhere.

We need deet, we need shampoo, we need unleaded gas.

This is the first blog update, literally being on the road. Landed last night in Cairo, haven’t had time to sleep, went camelback riding for the first time. Amazing animals camels are. We’ll be staying in Cairo tonight as well, tomorrow we’ll be headed out to southern Egypt.  Tonight includes a visit to the famous Al khalili market, hopefully end up with some decent pictures. So far Egypt has treated me more than right with hundreds of millions of possible pictures. So many faces, so little time.

I’ll be trying to keep a proper update of the trip every other day, upload images and  try to pass the whole feeling through my pictures. We’ll try to make the best of this Egyptian version of the internet and upload some small .jpgs… Current download rate through the Skype website is 30 kbps. btw…

Todays piece of advice : Bargain, bargain, bargain. And stay on the safe side.

P.S. : Due to the 1gb memory and the old (but trustworthy) G4 processor, photoshop is not available. so bear with me and keep in mind that all images are completely photoshop free.

…is trying to get back on track. We are at the process of completely updating our weather site with charts and useful info regarding the real time weather in Nea Kifisia, Athens, Greece.

Until then, you could visit http://weather.locus-delicti.com/weather.jpg for some nice weather goodies