78uuu lumière des étoiles

Dusty:Starlight:Culture



Sousse, take 2
2006-08-06   11:26 a.m.

I wrote this two days ago, but it was CENSORED because of some words I used, which in this country are a no-no. I couldn't post it, nor send it to myself in an email because the words hit the computer's filters and nothing would send. Good thing Steve suggested that possibility when I was working on it; the second I removed the questionable words it worked just fine. So here it is, with the questionable words removed. I have substituted lush phrases in for the naughty words, in all caps. Hope it works:

In Sousse now, far removed from the innocence or leisurely pace of
Mahdia. Stayed in a crack motel last night which we promptly left this morning for a much cleaner version of the same. At least at the Hotel Gabes, unlike at the Hotel Ahla, someone comes through and makes sure to remove the
underpants of the room's previous occpuants. And you know, it wasn't so
much the underpants that bothered us - it was more the sandy sheets, which
clearly hadn't been changed in weeks.

My realtor's voice kept running
through my head: 'For gods sake kids, don't touch anything,' he'd say
whenever we'd get to a house that was nasty dirty.

We stayed out for a lot of the night last night - a night which found
us on the wharf, getting shaken down for 2 Dinar (long story; some other
time) by some old guy, offered NEFARIOUS PHARMACEUTICALS and nearly run over by a few scooters.

When we got back to the Hotel Ahla, a shirtless man laying in the doorway
who could have been Omar Sharif's younger, grungier cousin confused us.
Surely this was some halfway house, and not our hotel? The shirtless hobo
asked Steve for money. We started to walk away before we realized that
this was, in fact, our hotel, and that the shirtless hobo was its owner.Ew.

So after no sleep - I was, much to Steve's dismay, the only woman in
the hotel - save whatever WORKING GIRL may have been in and out throughout the night - and so we deadbolted the door and hardly slept the night. We took off
by 8 am, wandered up the cobbled alley of the Medina, and found the Gabes
within the hour. It's worth the extra dinar we are paying for it, especially since this hotel owner seems to wear all appropriate articles of clothing. Found some sticky buns for breakfast, and now we are happy again.

Sousse is the most crowded and touristy place we've been yet. But this also means we found hamburgers, milkshakes, shwarma and crepes yesterday for dinner. Happy day - almost canceled out the swindler, NEFARIOUS PHARMACEUTICALS pusher, and the accidental wandering down WORKING GIRL alley today. ('Why are those women wearing only towels?') Guess they do sell everything in the medina.

We'll stick to inlaid wood boxes, which we found for very cheap at one store, and figure out how to pack them later. I'm still on the hunt for my Muslim Barbie - that search will be continued in Tunis in a few days. We're outta here tomorrow, as interesting as it has been - off to Nabeul tomorrow for a bit more Mediterranean beach relaxing before we hit Tunis and the Bardo museum on our last few days in the country.

Tonight - hamburgers and milkshakes again. We're both down quite a few
pounds. Africa diet, ho!

xoxo

T (and S)

Back to real time:

We are actually in Nabeul now, relaxing at the Pension des Roses (clean clean clean! and still only 16 dinar/night). Nabeul is calm and lush - and cool, especially considering we read about the heat wave in the East of the US these last few days. Didn't think when we set out for Tunisia we might actually be catching a break from the heat back home!

xoxo