Peter Forberg

81 degrees and the dust is in my lungs. Today we bought SIM cards and people tend to follow my lead. We’ll see if this proves to be a bad habit.

a cathedral

In a pet store, a small dog raced around my feet. He lost interest and ran after Nick, who responded by running out of the store. Luring him back inside with tasty suede shoes, he bit at my shoelaces until he was dragged to the shop floor, where I said phrases like “Tu aimes le pantalon” and “Tu es mignon mais je dois partir.” Eventually he jumped at my knee and, catching fabric with his teeth, hung on my leg, hind legs off the ground, until the pet store owner pulled him away.

It’s this confidence with dogs that landed me at the head of every little excursion, first out to get more SIM cards and then to the ocean. We passed the Presidential Palace where a terse security guard informed me that photographs were forbidden, and we then skirted through a row of embassies until we landed on a winding cliffside road overlooking the water. As people took photos on DSLRs, Nick snapped a few shots on his disposable Kodak camera, which I had gifted to him like a mother might give a child a small vacuum cleaner that consists solely of pinwheels and plastic balls. The line between the grey, still ocean and the grey, still sky was obscured by the clouds of dust.

We hiked farther down the road to a soccer field, where a mini detour through some bramble and paths made of buried tires once again called into question my leadership role. By the time we made it back to the hotel, the collective exhaustion rendered us silent. Again, they really should not be putting their faith in me, despite my laughable knowledge of French, ability to use Google Maps, and maternal energy.

They did it again and a few hours later we were heading to a marketplace in search of toilet paper and food. We ran into Alouine, a street salesman who had tried to lead us to a textile outlet the day before. Today, we became fast friends, and he helped us find toilet paper as well as a restaurant on the condition that we visit his textile outlet. This was a mistake. The outlet was filled with peddlers more persistent than Alouine, but with a few francs he got the idea that his friends should leave us alone. Faith in me was, regretfully, restored.

There are no streetlamps. Headlights barely manage to punctuate the heavy air. Housecats are thin and stray sare thinner. Men wear empty jugs of water on their backs like porcupines wear quills, dozens at a time. Word of advice, just say “non, merci.”

These probably won’t be daily. I need to work on my prose.

a big old building