Searching for religion

I needed to live with Islam all around myself. That is why I travelled to Mauritania. I did not know that at the time, but now it is clear to me.

Growing up I was surrounded by christianity and growing up I have come to visit many different churches, sects and lived in periods with extremes in different directions.

Religion is also why I came to India. Now that I had seen all from masses praying on streets to Allah to Christians going crazy screaming, jumping and fainting in the try to reach God. Now I needed to reach myself. My own belief that I have carried with me through life but never fully understood.

Now I live at an ashram, meditate, pray and yoga every day. My prayers go to nature, not to any specific God and not within the framework of any religion. It is simply prayers to the spirits around us, to the godly nature and the sky above us.
India explained to me what it is that I have tried to put words to and explain all my life. We are spirits.

Yoga in Nouakchott

Stretching up towards the sky, then going down in Lizard pose I felt a lot of no no no from my body. Poor yoga and a different diet has made my body weaker since I left home, and I struggled a lot with some of the poses. Others went better than before, as downward dog. Heels perfectly on the ground and bum up in the air the pose felt only comfortable.

A few days ago I found out that there is a woman in town who gives yoga classes in her free time. For a small donation anyone can join in the class which lasts for about one and a half hour. It’s for the expat community by the expat community, which is a really big one.

I went to the Canon store in Nouakchott today, asking if they could fix the camera. “No, but by the market there’s the small photo shop. The guy fixes camera.” the man told me, and in’shallah I will go there tomorrow and hopefully he can repair it. On Monday and Tuesday I’m meeting two very strong women to talk about the situation for women in Mauritania. It’s gonna be interesting, and it feels good to finally get something done. Although I wont have any photos of them, at least I can hear what they are saying.

Let go, and free yourself

Running across the street. Ten taxis, two cars. Me in the middle. The sound of the prayer from the minaret is overwhelmed by the traffic turmoil. Then, I stop. The clementines coloured as the midnight sun hang among thick green leaves on trees framing the streets. People walking by are happy, salesmen greet me in French when I pass them and I return the greeting in Arabic. They smile and I smile back.

Morocco’s capital is the most peaceful town in the country, although it is easy to be swept away by the daily lives which are as hectic as in any other capital. You can easily walk in the medina without the hassle, people are kind and no one will stalk you or ask you for marriage. It’s easy to get around: taxis are cheap and there’s an even cheaper tram. Five dirhams and it will take you across town. A ten minute taxiride is usually about fifteen or twenty dirham.

The vegetables at the markets are fresh and there are lots of good restaurants. As my french gets better life becomes easier and I could definitely live here for a while to learn it fluently. I love this life, but still. Traveling means meeting a lot of amazing people, who also travel. They aren’t staying and neither am I. You can always come back to the couch surfing hosts and meeting awesome people doesn’t mean you have to stay in touch with them forever. To meet a good friend and then let go is often much easier than staying in touch. Because how could you ever stay in touch with everyone you meet on the road? No matter how much you like them it’s better to use it as a comfort: there are millions of fantastic people out there. You don’t need to be with all of them. Just be one of them.

Time to close this year

“But hitching didn’t die a natural death — it was murdered. And there’s little evidence that it was as dangerous as we think.”

Said the New York Times earlier this year. And during 2012 I have done a lot of hitch-hiking. My thumb has taken me traveling in Sweden, Denmark, Germany, Switzerland, France, Morocco, Western Sahara, Mauritania, Zanzibar, Malawi and Zimbabwe. All in just one year.

Most of the experiences has been good, only one man turned out to be over-sexual (and of course it was in Switzerland, where else but in the rich of richness?). During the year I’ve met people born into slavery and refugees trying to get into Europe, but failing.

While sorting out old diary-notes lying around I found this piece:

“I was sitting behind him on his bike. He was going so fast down the hill I couldn’t bare keeping my eyes open. ‘There’s Malawi!’ he shouted. ‘What?’ I screamed back, slowly opening my eyes. ‘There’s Malawi!’ He screamed again and pointed at the lush green hills in front of us. I was awestruck.”

Three days later I found myself trekking up the hill to Livingstonia, monkeys chatting in the trees for company and an old man who spoke no English to show the way through the shortcuts. There was more climbing than walking and at one point my backpack pulled me down backwards, down the cliff, and balancing on a root and grasping for another one to cling to, I was ok and got myself back onto the track. I will never forget than nerve-killing moment.

2012 was also the year when I got malaria for the first – and hopefully the last – time of my life and nearly died. I’ve met the best couch surfing hosts I’ve ever had. I got a bachelor in journalism at the Mid Sweden University, freelanced for radio and magazines, got my heart broken for the first time and I buried my cat who’s been with me for sixteen years. I was homeless and spent five months on couches and mattresses at different friends. I also found a home, a place to which I want to return to after trip after trip.

And thanks to all of you who has read my blog. You who has been with me from the beginning, and you who dropped by during the year. Thank you. Now I look forward to a new year with travels, challenges and friends. Happy new year!

Forbidden fruits

I’m supposed to write a report from my project in Poland, but somehow I got stuck reading about some small islands off the coast of Africa. The writer suggests some gifts to bring back home from the islands, they are as follows: “rum, spices, book about the volcano’s last eruption or some local fruits. Though the fruits might be forbidden depending on your country.”
Interesting, isn’t it? Any suggestions what those fruits might be? I’m getting really curious now, and don’t get that wrong. It’s simply a curiosity.

Home, empty home…

From the airport I hitch-hiked with a pilot. He’s flying for Malmö Aviation and he told me a lot about airplanes and how the business has changed during his 25 years as a pilot. We talked about flying, yesterday our minister of finance, Anders Borg, flew with him back to Stockholm. “I guess he’d been hunting with a count on the west coast” the pilot told me.

He dropped me off right outside our building, and as I stepped inside chaos hit me. The floor in the hallway was filled with envelopes, the kitchen table was overflowing with paper, letters and magazines. One of the rooms upstairs was half empty, in the other one there was only a pillow and a blanket in a fine pile on the floor. And not a single cat came to say “welcome back!”
Two of my flatmates has moved out and two of the cats went with one of them, the third one is in Stockholm with the other two cats. I’m patiently waiting for the new girl to move in. May it be today. I hate being alone at home like this, people and cats: I miss you! Maybe I should call the cat-help and tell them I can take two cats for a couple of weeks until they find new owners?

My first day

Inside the cathedral three women chanted a prayer over and over again below the statue of saint Mary. At the market square the same man as last night played the bagpipe and the atmosphere was relaxed, but yet something old and heavy was still there subconsciously.
I think the sadness came from the broken buildings, the bricks that has fallen off and the facades that hasn’t been polished since long.

There was something heavy lingering in the atmosphere, but that can be a feeling within me since yesterday when I during three hours met three people all going through difficult breakups at this very moment.
The town is old, but in a different way than Edinburgh. The past feel closer. As if it’s still alive inside the people.

the Polish Couches

I’ve sent some couch requests to people in Wroclaw and I am amazed by how one girl immediately answered “come and stay for a few days, or a week. Or stay for as long as you want” and she’s not the only one. Before even getting there (I’m leaving Sweden on Saturday) I am already regarding Poland to be the most couch-surfer-friendly country I’ve been to.

As for now I know that I will stay in Wroclaw for about twelve days and I will spend about three days in Poznan. I will be working on a photo-project that I for now call “Queer Wroclaw” and I will either portrait the life of a queer group of people in the city, or I will portrait one or two queer people living there without a certain focus on the town itself. We will see what happens when I get there. I am very excited and can’t really wait to get started! If you happen to know someone there who is queer, please let me know. I want to get in touch with as many people as I can.

This far I don’t really know where to stay from Saturday to Monday, but I do know I can stay on a sleeping mattress Sunday to Monday, enjoying home-cooked Polish food from the hosts mother if I’d like to. And I’m sure the weekend will sort out as well, at least I’ve been invited for a beer with some other surfers my first evening there and a place to sleep will always sort itself out more or less.

Nuclear for peace?

”If two states can extinguish one another, none of them will dare to attack the other one. That creates peace!”
I’ve spent the weekend at a nuclear seminar in Stockholm, learning a lot about nuclear weapons, politics, history and the state of the world today.
Did you know that in the world today there is 1 940 nuclear weapons on hair trigger alert? That means they can all be detonated within one to four minutes. USA, Russia, Great Britain, France and China can legally have nuclear weapons, but are supposed to (according to a treaty they’ve all signed) phase them out. But, Israel, Pakistan, and India did not sign the treaty, and North Korea withdrew their signature just before they announced they’ve got nuclear weapons. This creates a tension in the world, who will dare to phase out their weapons and leave their countries vulnerable?

At the same time ICAN (International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear weapons) says that nuclear weapons does not win wars since no one dares to use them ’cause then they will be wiped out as well. Nuclear weapons does not protect from wars, they happen anyway and that we can see everyday at the news. Nuclear weapons does on the other hand create wars. Or at least a lot of tension (look at Iran and Israel for example). There are no good reasons to keep nuclear weapons and the test bombings has had a big impact on both the environment and people.

At Semey in Kazakstan people are being born with severe physical abnormalities due to the test bombings conducted by the USA. Since 1996 test bombings in the atmosphere are abandoned but are still conducted in the ocean. Should we not care about all life on earth, and not just humans?

I believe everyone should join seminars on nuclear weapons to learn more – because we all need to know what our leaders are deciding behind our backs. The USA store nuclear weapons in Belgium and Scotland for example, are we really comfortable with that? Are we really comfortable with the fact that the human factor has done many mistakes before, and could wipe out a part of our earth? A small mistake, and we are three minutes from devastation that will stay for decades and decades.

Projects

The photo-course I’m taking will finish off with our own project, starting next week. There are now a few days before we need to hand in our idea and plan on how to accomplish it. My ideas are all swirling around in my head, the one I really want to do is in Sudan and I do not have the finances to take me there, despite the fact that the ticket to get there actually isn’t That expensive. But I simply can’t afford it at this point in life.

What are my other options?
I want to do something in Wroclaw. I don’t know what. I have never been there, what is the city famous for? Are there any people living in interesting sub-cultures to hang out with? People sitting at bars? What would I want to say with that? There is a small town nearby with a riverbank famous for it’s richness in gold – how about a photo-project on that small town simply? Portraying people living there, the question is: do they speak English? How would I communicate what I am doing if they don’t?

Idea number two.
My mothers friend and a woman who has been in my life since before I was born is deadly sick. She has cancer inside of her head and they cannot remove the whole thing. I would love to do a photo-project about her, her life and her struggle. But is now the right time to do it? When I have the pressure of a deadline?

The third idea is just a big ocean of ideas flowing in and our like waves in the Atlantic. I can’t put words on them yet. But I really want to go to Sudan, and I am angry that my finances must put a no to it. If I can find a quick way to earn some extra SEK, I will go to there for two weeks, portraying the people left by the government when the dams were built. The people no one cares of. That’s what I really want to do.

But hey, maybe Wroclaw has a hidden treasure among it’s people? I surely am curious on that town.

Time

Exactly six months ago I had a picnic with a good friend by the Victoria falls in Zimbabwe. It was my 24th birthday, the day bright and hot. We saw a triple rainbow and ran through the warm splash from the falls. I was a little tired but the day was still good. The day before we had been on a rhino-walk on the savannah in Zambia.

One week later I was admitted to the hospital in Bloemfontein, South Africa. The nurse told me I had malaria and the doctor said the infection wasn’t overwhelming and they would save my life. With a extra big and extra strong dose of antibiotics, “because there’s some really heavy stuff out there,” he said talking about the parts of Africa where I had just been.

I just realised how important it is to live life to the fullest every day. It can be ripped away from you at any point in your life. Sitting there by the waterfall with melon, bread and wine we had no idea I had parasites inside my body preparing to strike my organs. Preparing to kill. It is something that left deep wounds in me and I am still trying to heal. Life can be ripped away so easily. So quickly.

The good deed.

As my bike did a small bounce coming up from the gravel by the church, fifty meters from the station. There was a strange rattle and my biked squeaked. I quickly stopped and jumped off, looked down to see what happened. The chain was somehow inside the wheel and nowhere where it should be.

“Are you ok? Let me see.” A man stopped beside me, got off his bike and grabbed mine. He turned it upside down and started fixing it. Just like that, in the middle of the street.

A few minutes passed and I noted I have to buy one of those spray cans with grease, cause the chain was completely dry and very rusty. No wonder it came off in that small bounce.

Five minutes later the man had fixed the bike and showed me his bleeding finger. I had no tissue and no plaster, nothing he could wash it with. I thanked him a hundred times, and I still feel a little guilty I could not help him with his finger after he had helped me so much.
Conclusion: we all have to learn to give and take sacrifices for each other, it will even out in the end.

Destinies

As I was looking for inspiration, facts and the general state of the world the other day I came across a document showing the destinies of some refugees who died while fleeing their own countries. I’m gonna share some of them with you, and I believe it is important we all remember that it’s not our fault but we can do something to change the future.

A young man from Afghanistan died from smoke inhalation from fire lit in tin can to keep warm inside an abandoned truck.

A 32 year old man from North Africa was tortured and shot by smugglers. He was found outside Thriassio Hospital.

A 16 year old boy from Syria was killed after a car chase in Evros. The Greek border police and FRONTEX officials were involved.

A 25 year old man from Sub-Saharan Africa drowned. He was found in port of Ceuta in an advanced state of decomposition.

An Iranian person, the sex is not known, died in an accident. The smugglers’ car overturned as they tried to avoid a police road block.

An unknown person died instantly after being run over by a train near Feres while walking along the railway.
Khaled Khodena from Iraq was murdered due to his religious beliefs after deportation from Sweden, his asylum claim was rejected.

An unknown person drowned. He/She was pushed off a jetski when the smuggler saw coastguards approaching in Andalusia.

An unknown man was murdered, shot by Frontex officer while shooting at boats crossing TR-GR border by the Evros river.

25 men from Sub-Saharan Africa suffocated while traveling on a boat with 275 others. The SOS was sent 35 miles from Lampedusa.

A 23 year old man was crushed to death. He was found in the wheel-bay of an Iberia passenger plane in Spain.

The past week I have been researching how refugees are treated around Europe and I’ve been trying to find out more about Frontex and their work. I heard many stories about them when traveling in north west Africa, but in Europe no one seem to know them and the governments doesn’t want to talk about them. Frontex is the company that keep unwanted people from entering Europe. Unwanted by who? I ask. No answer. Yet.

I have also been trying to plan my trip to Sudan in December, and I have come to the conclusion that I can’t go this time. Instead I am looking at the possibility of going to Latvia and do my photo-project with the stateless people living in the country. It’s been done many times, but I believe it’s a story that has to keep being told.

Occupying places

Last year the occupying movement came strong, and went quickly. I started following people occupying Nigeria to stop inequality and rise awareness of what’s happening in the country (bombing of churches, mosques, killing people for no reason…) and I was planning a trip to the country to document what was going on. But now, the occupy movements around the world suddenly staggered and stagnated.

What happened? Did people give up because no one cared? Because things did not change fast enough? Personally I like protests. It means that something is happening and people are fighting for something that they believe in. It means that there is still a chance for things to change, and as a friend of mine once said “change is always good. That’s why I always vote left, no matter what they stand for. They always want to change.”

That is what the occupying movements meant to me. A will to change. And I will still go no Nigeria one day, and when I do: I want to see some occupations. Or at least some political street art.

Back to work.

So, I’ve got one week of work this month. One week of scheduled work that is for a company other than my own. It feels good to have someone telling me when to be working and when not to, when I work for myself it’s often hard to stay focused and it can be hard noticing any progress until an e-mail pops into the mailbox saying “Yes! We are interested and want to buy your article about slavery in Mauritania.” To get there takes a lot of time.

Today’s focuses has been on the meter maids that’s gonna start strolling down the streets of Broby, making people parking their cars on the trottoirs pay. Today has also been about the two year old girl who is threatened by deportation to France – despite the fact her real mother is gone. The young girl is currently living with a foster family here and rumors say her biological mother is threatened. Now the rumors say a lot, and we had some difficulties finding out the truth today. What is really going on? The whole media world of Sweden has been working on the case for the past four or five days.

Friday is my last day or work and after that I will check out my possibilities of going to Jordan next month, or perhaps December.

Boys and their manors

I have had many discussions with a good friend about how boys behave towards girls. Especially boys when they are drunk. He gets surprised every time I tell him a new story, and even more when other friends say the same.

After this party I have even more stories to tell him. About guys walking up to random girls biting their neck, or without warning kiss them on the mouth, pinch their bottoms as soon as they get a chance, stand behind and press their bodies tight forcing the girl towards the window.

Maybe it’s just Italy. I have always regarded couch surfers as the sweetest people on earth, and I’m almost changing my mind. Three hundred surfers in the same place might be too much of the good. With a big risk of sounding too negative I do have to get it out of my system.

Well worth mentioning is that this party is awesome, but the tram-party earlier today sort of drained all there is to drain. And I have never seen that many people make out with that many different partners in that short time ever. Impressing.

Now I’m waiting for my flight back home. And no, I haven’t gone to bed yet. 4 more hours, then I can lay down.

This divided world

”Ten writers won’t make Sweden overpopulated, it’s half empty anyway” he said. “But Sweden and Norway are great at supporting writers, so don’t misunderstand me. I’m just pointing out a few cases.”
I was in the audience at the Malmö Exile Forum 2012, speaking was Ghias Aljundi from Syria. He is working for Pen International for freedom of expression with the focus on the Middle East and North Africa. Today was about the writers who live in exile, what it is like to be a writer living in exile and how to tackle the issue with writers having to escape their home countries and start a new life in a new country with new way of life. How can a journalist from Syria or Bahrain keep her audience and her name in a whole new society? As one of the writers said: “I didn’t lose my audience. I regained them by facebook.”

As we sat in the room the terms “west” and “the rest of the world” kept on appearing. I got sick of the division we always make of the world, why can’t we all just be one? It’s always this “us” and “them”. I feel not as many answers were given today as questions were asked. But the discussion is up and will keep on going.

And I grabbed the opportunity and will go to Jordan to meet Syrian writers hiding in their neighboring country. When? I don’t know, as soon as I can. With a new course in photography starting this week my time is limited though.

Yoga for life

This morning I started a new course in Yoga. It started at seven am and I could feel my back screaming in ache from all the carrying of my backpack this past week. Yoga is great at discovering and really sensing your body; I had no idea my back was in pain until the stretching exercises were started. The older the day becomes, the more it aches. Thank you Yoga, for letting me discover this awful pain.

From now there will be a lot more stretching involved in my travels.

Full moons

“Tonight is a blue moon” our host said. I looked out the window and saw the big moon, “it’s because it’s the second full moon this month” she said. I suddenly remembered how I calculated my time in Africa by full moons.

My first African full moon I was in the dessert, the second one in the Mauritanian capital Nouakchott. When I in Malawi looked up at my forth full moon I could easily remember the other ones; where I was, what I was feeling, who I was with, what we did and it gave me a perspective on how much time that passed.

Right now we are in Nyborg, just finished a fantastic dinner with homemade hummus, scones, chilli marinated mushrooms and salad. Entering Denmark gave me one of the strongest feelings ever of coming home.

As we entered the country the five Scandinavian flags greeted us welcome home. Home sweet home. Though I could stay in Denmark forever, Nyborg is amazing with all it’s history and sweet people. During the Kalmar union it was even the capital of Sweden.

Shutters

One day I walked past a bright orange building in Malmö with the friends. The curtains all looked disgraceful in contrast of the building and my friend cursed the inhabitants for not match the curtains with the facade.
Here that just doesn’t happen. All shutters are matched with the building itself and windows are filled with colourful flowers rather than ill matching curtains.

Switzerland is one big hallelujah moment for old and colourful designing.

The tourists

Normally as I enter a town with tourists all around me, I get tingles in my whole body of discomfort and my legs wants to carry me far far away as quickly as possible.
But not here.

In Chamonix the tourists make up the whole town. They’re not annoying but enriching. Maybe because we’re all here for the same reason: trekking, running or biking in fabulous nature. I do feel the town would loose its soul without all these foreigners. Though it makes it one of the most difficult places to practise French in; lots of restaurants and other places has foreign staff and their mother tongue is English or even Swedish. But it does not change the fact that I will come back here to study.

This evening we went to an Italian restaurant where the staff actually was French, the waiter flirty (and I couldn’t help flirting back) and he would talk to me in French even though he knew English very well. Just because, not ’cause he was impolite. Thank you!

You’re never getting me out of this place without violence.
Tomorrow we will do paragliding over Chamonix.

Dedication

“c’est que?” I asked as our teacher said synonym after synonym and I got none of them. She looked at my classmates, three of them are pretty advanced in French, and some gave some different suggestions in English while others shrugged their shoulders. Just a few actually speak English which means we have to try our hardest to explain everything in French. Our teacher doesn’t really speak English either. Eventually I got the word and I’m happy for the help we all give each other in class, it’s warming my heart this chilly evening knowing I’m going back to these people tomorrow, we’ve even been thinking about extending our course another week and skip Switzerland, though it would cost us too much money.

But I am definitely coming back here again. Now there is too much new stuff to do and see, the level of dedication to our studies could be greater.

Google vs. Reality

Sometimes I dream away in front of a google map. Let the mind wonder around the world for a while. Today I was logging my dive in Malawi in my log book, and as I couldn’t remember what the island was called I looked it up on google maps.
This is what (apart from the name which is as easy as Kande island) I found:

Another good reason to get out there sooner than soon. The reality is so much more exciting. This photo is from when we walked up to Kande village from Kande beach to have dinner. During the day we had been diving in lake Malawi.

Remember the worms?

Remember the worms?

I’ve finally remembered to bring the tabletts. The tabletts I bought at the small modern pharmacy in Malawi that are supposed to kill the worms I might have growing under my skin, waiting to crawl up to my liver, heart and lungs and eat it.

It sounds really bad, so I keep telling myself it’s ok, but I will take the pills just in case. When I had finished all subscriptions I got from the doctor when I had malaria the thought of taking more pills were horrifying. I didn’t want to swallow another one for the rest of my life. The worm-killing ones are six, first three and then another three some hours later, and large. Huge actually. And there might not even be any worms crawling inside of me.

 

Another day.

Another job. The strongest cite of today:

Coincidence could have harvested my life.

Said by a man who was abused some years ago, by the by a man was abused last night while handing out todays newspapers.
This morning I met three old men who are riding their motorbikes to a meeting in Poland next week. One of them will bring his wife. Bring his wife. She is not going with him, he is bringing her. She wasn’t a part of their trip, she wasn’t even there talking about it with them.

I am getting so angry at these things. We think we live in a modern society where women has the same rights as men, but still these stupid stereotypes thrives. It’s a motorbike thing, so it’s a man-thing. Who cares that a woman is coming with? Why should she have a say in the paper? She should have been standing there next to them. Final.

Under the table.

The bullmastiff was running around the yard, the nose to the ground. Every now and then she looked up and I’m sure she was smiling.

Today I went to a village community outside our town to write about them buying the local sports arena. When walking away from there, the woman in the company silently told me about the most, from a journalistic point of view, exciting thing ever. She was very clear with the fact that this was not for publishing.
I hate getting scoops under the table. It’s the best news ever, but I can not write it. Why does that happen? Now I will do what I can to find out more about it, but probably it’s such an old thing it’s nothing to write about anyway. But, there must be an angle to make it news.

Yesterday today

The trees in the thick forest were so close to the train some branches hit its sides. We were going slowly, not more than thirty kilometers an hour. “Imagine going in 70,” my dad said. “That’s what they did when we went to school, it was a bumpy shaking ride I tell you.”

Everyone was dressed up, the women had their finest jewelry and the excitement was as high as on the annual market day. And sure it was something to celebrate; the railway that used to connect our small town with the surrounding villages was turning a hundred years old. The old trains were rolling on the railway all the way to Åseda, thirty kilometers away. It’s the first time since they closed the railway a very long time ago. The conductors and the drivers were all dressed up in the traditional clothes of people who work on trains; dark blue suits, small hats and the tickets were old fashioned blanco tickets.

I went on the train with my father and his girlfriend. Outside the small station in the middle of the idyllic Swedish countryside with red houses, green grass and a pine and birch forest we bought a cone with traditional caramels. The farmers were all whispering excitedly about their old memories of the trains going back and forth between their home and school.

It was a real country side day. One of those days that are just perfect from start to end. The whole morning I was playing board games with my youngest brother, then there was the train ride followed by me hitch-hiking to Malmö for my friends moving-in party and a long night of laughing, dancing and tricking. As I woke up today I had a late breakfast with a good friend, and then another friend and I started hitch-hiking to Öland. Though we only made it to the next town. We are sleeping here tonight and tomorrow morning we’ll be on the road again.

Sweet memories.

I just remembered something. The sugar pieces we got in Morocco with the tea, they weren’t normal sized sugar pieces. They were gigantic. Take a normal piece of sugar and multiply it by ten, then you have a Moroccan piece of sugar. And people put it in their tea, and then they actually drink it.
There should be a lot of work for dentists over there, and doctors specialized on diabetes and researchers doing research on the effect of sugar on the human body. I liked it when they prepared the tea for you at the cafés, but when they started serving just hot water in a teapot with the mint leaves and sugar on the side I started to realize what it was we actually drank.

Cheers for mint, but thumbs down for the sugar combo. Mint tea is perfect as it is, without sweetening. No wonder I got addicted to that stuff.

Lingering.

Suddenly I found myself in Dalarna, the province that often is cited as the best for celebrating the Swedish summer. I was not going here though, and I won’t stay. I was sitting on the train from Sundsvall to Stockholm when we suddenly stopped in Gävle and the train hostess said “the rail is broken further on, we have to take a detour to Dalarna and for you who are going to the airport there is a taxi waiting outside ready to bring you there.”

We stood still for a long while. I walked along the platform in the bright sunshine and went back to the train when the hostess called us. It was quiet. Peaceful. Someone in front of me was sleeping deeply, breathing heavy. Behind me a clock went on and on “tick-tack, tick-tack, tick-tack”. To my left a woman called to make arrangements to fetch her newly passed away fathers belongings at the nursing home in Stockholm.
Everyone’s lives were continuing, despite the train standing still on the platform. But my mind was stuck in Africa, my thoughts always lingering on different moments. As when I met my friends in Joburg again, or when I sat behind the bike-taxis in Malawi, or when I climbed up to Livingstonia and nearly fell backwards off the cliff because my backpack was too heavy for me… or when I sat in all the sand in the Sahara, singing. There are so many memories, and every day I am remembering more things. When I had the malaria, I lost a big part of my memories from the past years. But it’s all coming back, one moment at a time.

We arrived in Stockholm about two hours late, and my thoughts went back to the bus ride to Mbeya in Tanzania. Driver: “we’ll be there at five pm.” Then there was the breakdown. “We’ll be there at six.” At six pm: “we’re almost there.” At eleven pm: “we are in Mbeya ma’am, thank you for choosing our company.”

The smiling police.

I was sitting behind Emma on her bike, singing ”I was riding through the city on my bike all day…” as we slowly rushed through the streets in Sundsvall, on our way to the university. Suddenly Emma braked, “There’s a police here! Quickly, get off!” I jumped off the bike and we walked side by side along the road. As the police officer came up close she smiled a little towards us, but said nothing. We gave her a shy glance and looked at each other, knowing we had done something illegal. I’m really back in Sweden, we respect the police here! I thought for myself. Thirty meters later we got back onto the bike.

The past days we’ve spent like that, in cute summer dresses biking in the city with me on the back singing and Emma working up her muscles. The sun has been shining and everyday has been just perfect.
Saturday 27th of May was the day when Loreen brought Sweden the first place in the final of Eurovision Song Contest, and next year we will host that huge game. We couldn’t help ourselves from screaming out loud (very loud) every time we got ten or twelwe points. It was also the day when Sundsvall got invaded by hundreds of awesome motorbikes, and it was my last day in the city, tomorrow morning I will start travelling south again towards my dear friends in Stockholm. The capital of Sweden.

What Africa taught me

1. Walk slowly.
I’ve never been very good at walking slowly, I don’t rush but I do walk pretty fast. In Africa that seem to be a sin, and I was forced to learn to take one step… at… a… time… It was hard to start with, but now I believe I can win any slow walking competition.

2. Border crossings.
There will be a post only about the border crossings later on, because it can be a mission. And it can be easy. Anyway, I have really learnt how to cross a border by land.

3. Saying no.
I always used to try and say no politely, which most times is useless. I’ve learnt not to be afraid to be rude, saying “no, I don’t like.” is ok, many people don’t speak so good English and it’s better to be straight with what you mean and everyone will understand clearly. At one point I told a man who walked with me that I wanted to walk alone, he said “but I’m not finished talking to you.” I told him “I am finished talking to you. Thank you for the chat, good bye.” and he turned around without getting angry, but instead respected me a bit more.

4. Getting rid of proposers.
I’ve always found it very disturbing and mortifying when a stranger walks up and asks me to be his wife. During these months I have learnt to laugh and make a joke out of the whole thing. Wave with my hand and say “haha no man, are you serious? Never.” and either say “I don’t want to marry you,” or “not a chance, it would never work out.” and when they ask why not, just laugh it all off and ask him about something else.
I’m afraid I’ve become so good at it that when someone one day really asks me to marry him I will just laugh and say “no man, are you crazy?”

5. Eat with my hands.
I have always been pretty messy when eating and I have eaten alot with my hands even at home, but I’ve never learnt the trick. Now I know just how to roll the food into a ball in the palm and toss it into the mouth, and not being afraid of getting the hand really messy.

6. Stepping off buses.
It can be a mission with people pulling your arms and surrounding you, asking where they can take you. It’s probably nothing I have learnt, rather got used to. But the people doesn’t seem as stubborn as in the beginning, probably because they somehow can see it’s a person used to travelling, in the beginning I was less confident and that made a big difference. People used it to fool me.

7. My limits.
Or non-limits. We can do so much more than we think we can do, it’s just that we have to dare to try. Next time you think you can’t: do it anyway. I didn’t think I could get malaria, see where that brought me (ok bad example). I didn’t think I would dare to hitch-hike alone, but I did and it turned out to be some great experiences.

8. Catching a taxi.
In Sweden we don’t do this, and if you do it’s so expensive you often wish you didn’t. But in most African countries taxis are very cheap and you just put out a hand as they pass you and maybe wave a little. It’s that easy. It’s the same with the bikes in Malawi, but you have to negotiate hard.

My last words.

It’s with a weathering stone in my heart that I leave Mauritania. I will miss all the men with their heads wrapped in cloth, wearing the big sheets they call bobo while running around on the streets. All women wrapped up in the most colourful garments you can imagine.
The stone in my heart is Mauritania, and when it’s weathered it will forever stay in my blood.

I entered Mauritania one and a half month ago. I didn’t know what to expect apart from a new culture. Last night I helped preparing a dinner for some fifty Germans coming to Nouakchott in a rally. As they all arrived, I felt a big hand within me saying “stop! Don’t go there!” and I couldn’t bring myself to go over and mingle with them. I turned towards the Mauritanians with their heads wrapped in cloth wearing their bobos, and even though I don’t understand what any of them say, I felt so much more at home with them. Sitting on the carpet in the sand, making that bitter and sugary Mauritanian tea. One glass say more than thousand words.

Iselmour asked me to look really closely as he made the tea, the third glass would be made by me. And gosh, even though I have been looking at that tea-making too many times to count by now I still could not remember how the flip they do. I was left to my memory and pottered about, poured the tea in the glass, back into the teapot with some more sugar… poring, poring back, poring… trying to get that thick foam they are all so fond of. I put the teapot back onto the glowing coal and prayed for a miracle.
The result was a bit bitter (use your mind to make the exaggeration) and my friend comforted me by saying the third cup is always the most bitter one.

I am so happy that I set out for this journey. I have experienced so much more than I can ever write down.
The culture in Mauritania is the strongest I have experienced, the food very special. The traditions so substantial. I feel I haven’t found the words to give Mauritania a fair description in this blog. I don’t know if I ever will.

The handicapped roundabout

There is one roundabout in Nouakchott that stands out from the rest. In the middle of the road among all the cars going in all different directions; a man without legs, holding his hands out for money. On the sides of the road there are people in wheelchairs, with strange diseases, one boy with half his face hanging down the skin being three times the size of his head.

In Mauritania there is no system that pays for you. The state give no money to disabled or sick people, if you can’t work you rely on your family, neighbours and other people to give you money, food and clothes. And it works. If you have no food some day you eat with your neighbour, and when you have food the neighbour eats with you. Everyone share what they have, and it fits perfectly with the visitors I had a couple of days ago; the two girls who just stepped inside for a visit.

Everyone is very friendly here and I am so happy I went here. Though I’m still not sure why I actually came, but I’m glad I did. I don’t want to leave and have to keep reminding myself that there will be more adventures waiting around the corner in east Africa.

10 tips for visiting Mauritania

1. Any car with a taxi sign or any Mercedes 190 on the street is a taxi, but all will not take female passengers. If you are the first one in the car, you pay 200 ouguiya. If there are already people there you normally pay 100 ouguiya. But never pay more than 200.

2. If you’re a woman: Don’t attempt to shake hands with a man unless he offers you the hand himself. Many people are religious here and due to their religion women can be dirty (you never know whether they’re on their period or not).

3. The water isn’t poison. Lots of westerners here don’t drink the tap water, but I tell you it is ok. What you should take extra care for are the vegetables, but as long as you wash them (as you probably do at home also) it’s no problem.

4. When you enter a shop or a taxi it is polite to say salaam aleikum. Some will ask you why you speak Arabic when you’re not Arabic. Most will just be flattered.

5. Go to the desert in the east, there’s a lot of history there and the culture is very different from by the coast. The children will call you Mezrani (white person) and ask for cadeaux since there used to be many tourists there who would give the children small gifts. As the tourists almost stopped coming so did the cadeaux.

6. If you’re a woman it is polite to wear a headscarf, at least when visiting the countryside, but not compulsory.

7. Don’t be shy to try the different foods, but expect some trouble if you’re a vegetarian or especially vegan. Usually there is only one option to choose from at the restaurants. Maffe (rice with peanut sauce) without meat is good but don’t be picky. To buy food at the market and prepare yourself is a good choice.

8. Ask a local for the real price if you are unsure when buying. One kg oranges cost 400 ouguiya, bananas and apples are generally pretty expensive, about 500 ouguiya per kg. One bread cost 100 ouguiya and eggs are 50 ouguiya per egg.

9. Cover your skin. Even though it may be hot during the day it is the best way to avoid the worst hassle. Though, if you have light skin, light hair and light eyes, there will be some hassles anyway. You will find some people saying it is not true, everyone has different experiences.

10. Don’t be afraid. Most people won’t hassle you if you tell them not to, and hardly any will want to harm you. Mauritania is safer than many western countries if you ask me.