This morning he took me aside and told me he thinks I’m crazy, which I understood as concern and thanked him. And certainly no woman has done such a thing. To his knowledge, no man has ever completed such a trip, though a few have tried. My guide from town, Modibo, points to the north, to further storms. “Let’s do it,” I say, leaving the shelter of an adobe hut. And no one, not even the oldest in the village, can say for certain whether I’ll get to the end. Rain or no rain, today is the day for the journey to begin. So that we all give a collective sigh to the salvation of the passing storm as it rumbles its way east, and I survey the river I’m to leave on this morning. Thunder racks the skies and pounds the earth like mortar fire, and every living thing huddles in tenuous shelter, expecting the world to end. Lightning pierces trees, slices across houses. It is the rainy season in Mali, for which there can be no comparison in the world. And now, at the very hour when I have decided to leave, a thunderstorm bursts open the skies, sending down apocalyptic rain, washing away the very ground beneath my feet. The idea is to paddle nearly 600 miles on the Niger River in a kayak, alone, from the Malian town of Old Ségou to Timbuktu. In the beginning, my journeys feel at best ludicrous, at worst insane.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |