crows to burnaby

Time does start to behave in weird ways when you travel this sort of distance. Right now it's about 29 hours since I left Vancouver, but with a nine-hour time change it's the next evening, but having only had about 8-9 hours of sleep scattered here and there throughout the past 48 hours, my brain isn't quite sure what's going on.

The flights were good, for the most part. Poor Natasha got stuck behind the screaming demon toddler from hell on our first flight, the most obnoxious and ill-controlled little girl I've seen in ages. Prime Supernanny material. Our next two flights were on Alitalia, which was more than adequate. I got a row of two seats to myself for the longest (8h20min) flight, which was lovely; even though I didn't manage to sleep all that much, it was restful and calm and strangely enjoyable.

It was fun to land in Italy. I like the look of it and I'm looking forward to going back to Milan for a few days on my way home.

Eventually we made it to Tunis, where we had somehow both managed to completely miss the announcement about having to fill out a card when exiting the airport, and got booted back to the end of the line again. No problems the second time, no problem with the luggage, and we had a friendly driver waiting for us, sent by the conference organizers. He whisked us out of the airport and on our way to Hammamet, about a 60km drive on a reasonably large highway. It gave us a chance to eye our surroundings and observe those startling differences that make you aware that you're nowhere near home: things like goats next to the freeway, enormous fences of cacti between fields, Arabic on all the signs...

The Hotel Marco Polo is massive and impressive. The lobby is just gorgeous, with details that you don't really see much in your typical Western hotel of this price. Out back, there's a pool and a lovely landscaped area that leads out towards the beach. And then there's the beach, with ridiculously fine sand and that Mediterranean blue water - I realized I'd never actually been to the Mediterranean before.

Nobody was on the beach, surprisingly - I guess it's pretty far from high season still. I was going to swim when I arrived, but the hotel asks you not to use their
towels there and as it turns out, they don't supply any at the pool either. Not having packed a towel, I may have to cough up a few dinars and buy one since I can't imagine not swimming at all this trip.

The hotel is lovely and magnificent, but at the same time it's not always what you'd expect from a place that looks this elegant. There's things that look in poor repair, things that you'd take for granted at a Western hotel, like for example this morning when there was barely enough running water for me to take a cold shower. But there you go, you can't have everything.

We walked down to La Medina, the big new market area south of the hotel. It was built to recreate an ancient market, and it's quite atmospheric, though like a few of the hotels we noticed along the way, it has that fake-ancient quality about it that is at once appealing and slightly fake. Inside, it's a tourist trap, but at least refreshingly different from any tourist trap I've seen before. Nearly every store sells the same things over and over again - leather bags, trinkets and bracelets, painted pottery, those carved camels covered with leather, mini drums, and a truly ridiculous quantity of cheap Gucci, Armani and D&G knockoffs.

I had read plenty of warnings about the market and how aggressive the sellers can be, but either they mellow out in the off-season or the tourists who wrote those warnings weren't prepared. They will try to steer you into their stores, or get you into a conversation, or try to guess your language, anything so that you wander in, but by avoiding eye contact and just mumbling a quick "bonjour" you can get past it and they won't really bother you further. The problem is if you actually do want to look at something, you're instantly engaged into negotiations. Some of the stores are "prix fixe", so what you see is what you get and the sellers more or less ignore you, but in the others you're expected to haggle. If you're looking for touristy items, it's not a bad idea to go into the prix fixe stores, or in some of the little shops and markets on the way to the Medina, and figure out what their prices are.

There was practically nothing I actually wanted enough to make a thing of it. I found one interesting mortar & pestle, got the guy to drop from 45 dinars down to my bid of 25 by walking away, and then while walking away decided I didn't really want it that badly. Then I found it elsewhere, offered 15, and eventually that seller came down to 23 plus gave me a necklace. I probably should've pushed it further, but it does take some getting used to. Natasha had her eye on a few leather cushion stools, and had a great volley with one charismatic fellow who played his part well - they got a hilarious repartee going on, including him asking her never to set foot in his store again.

While you can get away with a lot of English in the Medina, my high school French has been serving me surprisingly well. I'm amazed at how much I can dredge up, and I've even been able to have a few precarious conversations, which continue until I get stuck. I get to play translator for Natasha sometimes, too, which is fun. Now, of course, everything I'm talking about is pretty much exactly the sort of thing you learn in high school - discussing directions and menus and making arrangements, not explaining a biochemistry paper - but that's all I need. I'm enjoying it, and even starting to think in French from time to time.

It's Wednesday morning now. I started writing this last night but fell asleep partway through and decided it could wait. We've made arrangements to get a taxi to Carthage and the area, and will basically have a private tour guide. We almost got into a tour group, which would have been cheaper, but it was too late to book as the agent closed at 8. It would have been in Spanish anyway, which neither of us speak, so perhaps this is just as well...