Working in Mauritania

When we got out of the bed of the truck that brought us from Choum, Mauritania, to Atar, the sun had began to reveal the decrepit taxi lot. A few passing drivers approached us, trying to hustle us into their cars to go onto the nearest attraction.
Atar, although seemingly remote, was the first time we really experienced hustlers hanging shamelessly onto us for being tourists. It was also the first time that we were actually headed to a place for a reason other than that it was on the way. The Adrar region of Mauritania is teeming with mystical and magical desert treasures. Even though it is a relatively large country, the Adrar is the only area that attracts a significant number of tourists. However, we came at the best and the worst time. The best because there were almost no tourists. The worst because the lack of tourists left us as the only targets in the area. The lack of tourists was due to the increasing threats of terrorism in Mauritania, especially in the remote desert regions away from the coast. There has been a long list of terrorist activities in the last 5 years, some involving foreigners, some not. An attack on a nightclub attached to the Israeli embassy, an American teacher (missionary from what I heard) killed in the capital, Spanish NGO workers kidnapped, 5 French tourists killed in 2007, plenty of spats with the Mauritanian military in the remote regions, and a few minor suicide bombings. The culprit is always AQIM (Al Qaeda in the Maghreb) or at least AQIM wannabes. All Western governments were issuing warnings to citizens to avoid travel to Mauritania, especially to certain regions. I even heard that the weekly flights from Paris to Atar had been cancelled due to the lack of business.
So here we were in the completely uninteresting town of Atar, getting approached and hassled by every taxi driver and hotel tout in town. We had business to do, like use the internet, eat a meal cooked for us, buy food for future camping excursions/hitchhiking, and figuring out where we would go from here. The first thing I checked on the Internet was for information about camel spiders. I had insisted to Jonathan and Susan that they were very dangerous, and would prove them wrong as soon as I got online. And then I found that I had been victim of an old internet hoax. Emails had been circulating a few years ago, showing these notorious desert spiders as a serious threat to troops in Iraq, but as a matter of fact, they are not even poisonous. Loser.
A couple hours before sunset, when the business was finished, we started to make our way out of town, with one persistent hustler still attached to us. He spoke enough English for Susan to communicate with him, and for some reason she strung him along, giving him a mild dose of mockery. He followed us for at least a kilometer. I started playing tin whistle, while Jonathan and Susan sang along. Susan asked if he knew the songs we were playing, because we were a famous band from America. “Haven’t you heard of us?” “What are you called?” “The Gum Show!” Susan told him. “Oh yeah, I think I have heard of you,” he said. People seemed to enjoy the show as we passed, but we weren’t sure if they were laughing at the tout or us. Didn’t matter. He eventually gave up, and all we had to deal with was the occasional taxi that was still trying to get lucky with us.
Our plan was to hitchhike to Chinguetti, a couple of hours away, and I was almost certain that since the tourism industry was in a slump there would be almost no private vehicles going this way. We walked through a police checkpoint, and told them we were walking to Chinguetti. They thought we were crazy, but didn’t give us much hassle, just some laughs.
Taxi drivers who knew about us (we had also told them that we were walking to Chinguettie) kept driving out to where we were hitching, slowly lowering their prices. We low-balled them with offers of 300 Ouguiya per person, when we knew well that it should be at least 1,500 per person. By sunset, one of them had offered us to go for 1,200, but we still declined.
We never got a ride, but we had walked enough to get into some farming land removed from town. I had replaced my sandals that had fallen apart, and was walking faster than the other two in my new FC Barcelona flip-flops. Today it was Susan that was moving slow for a change.
We waited until no cars were passing, and scurried into an empty field and tucked in behind a broken down mess of concrete and wood that looked like an outhouse destroyed before it was ever in use. We waited until the sun was down before we started setting up our beds and cooking dinner. Just as we were about to eat, a car pulled off the road and headed directly towards us. It drove within twenty yards of us, stopped for a few seconds, then turned back towards the road. I half-expected it to be a Taxi driver giving us his last offer, but we will never really know what the mystery car was doing.
In the morning we hit the road again, and agreed that if we did not get a ride by 2:00, we would settle for a Taxi for 1,000 UM ($3.50) per person.
In the meantime, we saw a convoy of Mauritanian military coming from the direction we were going. Thirty minutes later, a big military truck (Hummeresque?) stopped by where we were hitchhiking. It was occupied by two French soldiers. We chatted with them for a bit. They told us they were in the area looking for the five French citizens that were kidnapped in Niger recently. They told us how the Adrar Region and Chinguetti were now off-limits to French tourists. The fact that there was a need for a military presence in the area made me a little uneasy, but then again, the fact that the French guys acted like there was nothing for us to worry about since they were there gave me a bit of comfort. They didn’t seem to think we were too crazy, so I felt fairly safe. They wished us luck, gave us a few bottles of water and were on there way.
Anyway, the taxis kept coming, and when one settled for the 1,000 price (500 below the actual price!) we were on our way.
The driver, tried to make a little money for himself, pushing hotels on us that he would get commission for. He was on his cell phone, surely making deals, as we climbed higher up the plateau.
We arrived in the oasis town of Chinguetti, just outside “Auberge Zarga”, probably the cheapest place to stay in town. I was not opposed to staying in a guesthouse, but we didn’t want to commit to anything just yet. We spoke with the owner, Abdullahi, telling him that we were going to look around before checking in anywhere. He offered us rooms for 800 UM, almost half the price of what he would normally charged. It was quickly apparent how desperate this town was for tourists. I felt bad, but we walked away from him, and looked for either a place to get some food, or a place to camp. We walked to the wadi (dry riverbed) that split the town between the “new” and “old” halves. I waited there, away from the gaggle of women aggressively pushing trinkets and jewelry, while Jonathan and Susan went to a shop to get some things for dinner.
When the got back, we discussed what to do. We could see wide open desert a half a kilometer down the wadi that would be great for camping. Soon after we decided to head that way, Abdullahi, the guesthouse owner, showed up. He seemed familiar with our types, and didn’t seem annoyed that we didn’t want to stay in a gueshouse. When we said we would camp, he seemed to understand, but still lowered his price to 500 per person, probably the cheapest deal in all of Mauritania. We still declined, saying that it was more important for us to save money. Susan mentioned the idea of working, and Abdullahi said he might have some work for us in his garden that we could do in exchange for a place to sleep and some food. We said we would camp tonight, then come by his place tomorrow to discuss the idea.

The wadi that separates the two halves of town

The sun set and we slogged through the deep sand of the wadi until it was too dark to gauge how big or far the dunes in front of us were. We tucked in under a couple of large trees that provided plenty of firewood for cooking and made a luxurious dinner that included a little bit of chicken that Jonathan and Susan had found at the shop.
Just as I was dozing, I was startled by a flashlight heading our direction. As it got closer, I could make out the shape of a man, and I called out to him with a Salaam Alaykum. We exchanged Arabic greetings, and he walked over to me. He was an old man. I pointed to our camp, letting him know we were sleeping there for the night. He pointed back from where he had come from, indicating he had been walking a long ways. I like to think that he just saw as a different type of nomad as himself, but nomads nonetheless. It wasn’t until the next day that I found out that Jonathan and Susan, who I had thought were sleeping, had been watching the man’s flashlight approach for nearly an hour, but stayed silent the whole time.
Over breakfast, we discussed whether we were willing to do some sort of gardening work for Abdullahi, and stay for a while in Chinguetti. The town looked fascinating, and we all agreed that it would be worth it to stick around if we weren’t spending any money. He had mentioned that it would be working to remove sand from the garden, so it could potentially be very laborious. Jonathan and I thought that working four hours a day in exchange for lodging and a meal or two wouldn’t be too bad, but Susan said that she would be willing to work 8 hours a day if that is what he wanted. We thought she was crazy, and she argued that she wanted to put in a good day’s work.
When we met with Abdullahi to talk business over tea, he made us feel comfortable that we wouldn’t be exploited, and we would have a relationship more as friends than as boss and employee. I had a good feeling about him since he had not tried to push his guesthouse on him, and he seemed to understand what kind of travelers we are. This made him willing to work with our situation and needs. He said in exchange for his guesthouse in the garden and dinner every day we would just need to work three or four hours. Susan piped up saying, “yeah, or maybe five hours”. I shot her a confused, yet annoyed look. We also said that we could only work for five days, as we didn’t want to use up our entire one-month visa working.
We continued to talk over tea, and Abdullahi expressed his woes over the failing tourism industry in Chinguetti. A couple years ago there would be hundreds of tourists in the small town during the winter. Now there was just a handful. Chinguetti doesn’t have much else going for it, except for the small date palm groves in the oasis. The town has only 4,000 residents, but it used to have 20,000. During the days of the trans-Saharan caravans trading in gold, salt and slaves, it was an important oasis for people passing through. It was an especially important stopping point for those making their pilgrimage to Mecca, as it is the seventh holiest city of Islam. Chinguetti has always survived on travelers passing through, and now that even the tourists have stopped, the town looks in danger. Abdullahi said that if the tourists don’t come back soon, most of the people will leave within a few years. His plan is to go to Japan, as he has taught himself the language and even had a Japanese girlfriend back in the day. We asked if he had any guests now, and he said no, but that night he would be preparing a grand feast of an entire goat out in the desert for some French military. I asked him what he thought about France’s involvement in Mauritania. I expected him to be cautious or diplomatic, but he was very honest. He did not seem to like them much as people, or their intention in the region. He said he didn’t really think they were there for the security of Mauritania, just the security of Total, the French oil company who has wells in the area. I was glad for his honesty. I wished him luck with his dinner that night before we left.
That night we stayed in the garden in the oasis on the edge of town. There were a couple of huts, one of which had a collapsed roof. The other one was dingy, and very uninviting for sleep. So again, we set up to sleep in the sand under the stars. There was a well, but nothing that could pass as a bathroom.

The oasis

Our broken home

Our broken roof

Our broken bathroom, next to our broken gate

After dinner, Susan and I heard some drumming, so she and I made our way to town to find it. By the time we got there, it had stopped. We walked across the wadi to the old town, and we ran into a shopkeeper. He was friendly, and we started chatting. When he asked where I was from, his response was, “did you vote for Obama?” I told him that I did, and he said, “why?” I was taken aback, and started to think. “Well, I liked a lot of his ideas, and I thought he would be good with our international policy, which I think has a lot of problems.” He wasn’t satisfied. “But do you think he is better than Bush.” I said yes, and he said “why?” I explained my reasons, which I don’t think he listened to. He pushed his foot into the sand, and took a step back. As he stepped back into his footprint, he said, “Obama is just stepping into the footprint that Bush left behind. He is no different.”
I was saved by an upbeat group of guys, moving towards us, singing and dancing. They looked like they were stumbling home from a night club. Actually, though, they were coming back from the mosque, where the music had come from. They said that they are at the mosque every night, making music and dancing. This was a surprise, as I had never seen any sort of revelry associated with the mosques in Morocco.
We went into the shop with the men as they made tea and we chatted on much friendlier terms than what the shopkeeper had initiated.
After tea, it was nearly midnight, and we tried to make our way through town, and through the oasis to our garden. We got lost for nearly an hour before finally finding it.



We were ready to go for our first day of work in Abdullah’s date palm garden at 8 in the morning, as that was when he said he would show up to give us our instructions. At 9:30 he rolled in and showed us the area of the garden that we would be removing sand from. It was large, and our task was to shovel all the sand away from the date palms. The depth of the sand ranged from one foot to four feet. Our tools consisted of one shovel and two grain sacks, ripped open and laid flat. One person would shovel sand onto the open grain sack, and when it was full, the other two would haul it to the edge of the garden and toss it over the fence. It was a job that needed to be done every few years, as the sand just continues to accumulate.
Abdullah left and we got started. Getting up the hill of sand to the fence was difficult, so we took water from the well and got the sand wet, making a firm path that we pounded steps into. After an hour, an old man who was picking weeds in the open space next to the garden started yelling at us. I couldn’t tell what he was saying, but I could tell that he was not a fan of our placement of the sand. Of course, he knew Abdullahi, so I explained that I would go speak with him about it. On my out of the garden, the old man called out to me. Now he wanted me to carry his big sack of weeds. I don’t know why he was picking the weeds from this part of town, but I was now in charge of portering them to the other side of town for him.




Because of the interruption, we didn’t get done with our work until 2:00. Our progress didn’t look impressive, and we were exhausted. Furthermore, we didn’t have time to relax, as we had two tea dates that afternoon. The first with somebody that Susan and Jonathan had met on our first day in town, the second with a young white moor who had inexplicably come to the garden to watch us work. After watching us for a while, he called me over and told us that he had some work for us in his guesthouse, and that he would like us to come for dinner. I told him that we already had plans for dinner, but we could still come for tea.

The path from the oasis to town

Behind that concrete square is where we worked.

Our first tea date was fun at first, but turned awkward. The young man was very friendly and was very enthusiastic in his tea-making. We spoke about many things, but when it came to Susan and Jonathan’s relationship, it got weird. Although they are not married, they always say that they are as it makes many things easier. But now, he wanted to know why they didn’t have any kids. They explained that they would wait for a while, as they weren’t ready yet. He thought this was nonsense, and kept pressing them. Eventually he told Susan that she needed to get a new husband, you know, ditch that zero, get with a hero kind of idea. I took it all very lightly, but it was a bold statement with the “zero” sitting right there. He kept smiling and pouring tea as he continued his home-wrecking mission (which I don’t think was his actual mission, just a natural reaction to a situation he didn’t understand). Luckily we had the excuse of a second tea date to get us out of there.
I didn’t like the guy’s face to begin with. He had a conniving look, but we took him up on his tea offer to talk business anyway. He led us across the wadi and into the completely guesthouse. It was one of the nicest ones in town. French-owned (although he was trying to make us think that he was the owner while in fact he was just seeing over it as the French people were away). Upon entering, he quickly and conveniently discovered that he did not have the proper tools to make tea. Poor business move, mon amie. He showed us the work he expected us to do. Some shoveling in front of the bathrooms, as the accumulation of sand had left the doors unable to open, plus hanging mosquito nets in the dozen or so rooms. It would be easy work, but it was very apparent that this guy was just trying to get out of chores while the owners were gone. He had heard the buzz around town, that there were whites in town willing to work like the black moors for even less compensation. His plan was to make us a cheap meal (he had said he was going to make dinner for us as a “gift”) and expect us to work for a day. Maybe he would even let us sleep in one of their stuffy concrete rooms. The fact that he was too chintzy to even give us the tea to discuss business over showed us it was definitely not worth our time. He was annoyed when we declined.