Djibouti, Au Revoir

Later today we set out for Bangkok, via Addis Ababa and a 19-hour layover in Bombay. We arrive in Thailand 5:30 Friday morning. Joe rates airplane journeys by the number of takeoffs and landings---the more, the better---so he's going to love this one.

Although four days instead of seven would have been enough in Djibouti, we're glad we came. We pottered around Djibouti City, where Joe got some good market and stoner shots and I soaked up local color for my alleged novel.

We never made it out of town. We wanted to see Lake Assal, which Lonely Planet recommends and the local Tourist Authority brochure calls "an extremely beautiful natural curiosity, in a setting of volcanoes and black lava 153 meters below sea level, bordering with dazzling white floes made of salt and gypsum." But the guide books and authorities don't say how to get there. The taxi drivers, we were told, are (a) swindlers and (b) stoned by early afternoon. And hiring a car and driver through a travel agent to visit the salt pit would have cost $250. Mon dieu! (The Tourist Authority brochure also says of Djibouti, "We invite you to come and discover this country unique at many regards.")

The French influence here extends beyond the language and cuisine. Yesterday we both got haircuts in the same barbershop. The Rudy-style comb-overs were administered by Indians from Gujerat. They knew we weren't French, but we still came out looking like the people who started World War I.

A Djibouti moment of Zen: lying in our room at the Ali Sabieh watching Jon Stewart on Larry King while the call to prayer reverberated across this scorched neighborhood from the mosque down the street.